Socks, socks, socks

Summer of socks is now underway so its socks, socks and more socks around here. I had said in my last post that I was going to try and finish my current sock KIPs prior to the start time. Well it almost went to plan. I finished the multicoloured monkey socks.



And then I went on to knit the second sock of a pair in Lorna's laces shepherd sock in rainbow.



Which left me with one sock on the needles - a purple/grey/blue pair. They are still on the needles and sleeping peacefully there to be finished at a later date.

Then I got ready for Summer of socks. I wound some yarn.



Printed lots of different patterns.



And got underway with a favourite pattern and favourite yarn - No purl monkey socks in Lorna's laces shepherd sock in Uptown.



The first sock is finished as you can see and the second one is now at the heel.

I've also cast on a second pair. Plain stockinette socks in Garnstudio fabel.



Which I've now turned the heel of the first one.

I had hoped to have a little more progress but I've been a bit stressed and down this week. I had a discussion with my manager about what I'm going to do re my job and back problem. Currently I work on an acute surgical ward and for all my nursing jobs so far I've had similarly heavy nursing jobs. My back is, to be frank, not really up to that long term so I'm now waiting for an assessment by the Occupational health department and what that will bring. Hopefully I should be fit enough for work in a few weeks but I'm not sure what my work schedule will be as I think I might be eithermoved to another area if a job is available or more likely, a back to work programme in my current workplace with shorter shifts. Either way, its all a little uncertain and I'm not good at coping with uncertainity. I'm also coping with the frustration of feeling up to working out more/doing different exercise but my body rebelling and not letting me do it. Very frustrating. I can feel myself getting down about it too and know I need to fight that as things are better than they were. I can do more that I could when this all flared up again in April, the numbness in my foot is gone and the pain is a lot less. If keep reminding myself of this and keep myself busy, I know I can get through this frustrating time. It helps just typing this all out.

Anyway if you managed to read though that, thanks.

Thanks to everyone who commented on my last post. Someone asked what fabric I stitched Happy Haunting on. Well I used the fabric that came with the kit when I got it at the retreat. Having seen Joy's WIP recently, its obvious that the fabric in the kit in the shops just now is different. The fabric I have is much more yellow/green.

Yay stitching

I've just about recovered from last weekend's stitching GTG and now its the weekend again. The GTG was lots of fun and I really don't think I've laughed so much since the same time last year. During the weekend, I dyed a couple of pieces of linen which I'll share pictures of once I've managed to get around finishing rinsing them and ironing them. Ironing is really not my favourite thing to do but I'l force myself lol. I also made a small trip to Wye needlecraft but I didn't go mad - I only bought a small piece of linen plus two mirabilia charts which were a particularly good price. We also had a stash giveaway in which I managed to give away a good amount of used charts and I gained a couple of pieces of fabric and two chart. All in all, it was a good weekend.

Anyway being around lots of stitchers certainly helped my stitching mojo, especially with all the finished pieces and WIPs that I saw. It helped so much that I actually finished a fairly long term WIP Happy Haunting by Shepherd bush.




I actually finished it on the train whilst the train got very close to Glasgow. Its one of the only good things about public transport - the ability to stitch on trains.
This was the retreat project from the 2006 Shepherds Bush retreat. I had planned to go again this year but being off work and still having back pain, I had to email to cancel. I'm a little disappointed but I had to be sensible.

Inpsired by one finish, I decided to pick up one of the numerous small projects that was waiting to be started and so I started, finished and finish, finished the Purrfect Bookmark from Cat's Whiskers. Its stitched on 40ct.



I'm off now to try and finish my multicoloured monkey socks. Next weekend sees the start of the Summer of socks KAL. I've joined in to try and use up some of my frankly too large sock yarn stash but I need to try and finish some of the socks currently on my needles as only socks started and finished during the time of the KAL count towards it. Currenty I have 3 pairs of socks at various stages of completion on the needles and it would be nice to start the KAL with none on the needles. That hasn't happened in a while.

New month, new look, new projects

June already, it seems this year is going very quickly. Anyway for the new month, I decided on a new look for my blog. I found a few different layouts I liked so there might be a few different layouts during the rest of the year.

There has been a lot of Little house needlework designs being stitched around stitching blogland lately so inspired by that, I've finished up one that I started earlier in the year.



Pumpkins stitched on 32ct lambswool linen. I plan to finish it into a pinkeep.

I've also stitched and finished a little kit given to me by Simone as part of the Here's to ewe SBEBB exchange. Its a dutch kit which came with all the bits to finish it as well but all the instructions were in Dutch too so I guessed when doing the finishing. I used the kit picture as a guideline.



I also managed to finish the first sock of another pair of monkey socks. They are knitted in Shelridge farm soft touch ultra like one of my previous pairs. It is so very soft but without being too fluffy and the stitches are very well defined in it.




This weekend, I'm off on my travels. Myself and 15 other stitchers are headed for a weekend away in some farm cottages. There will be lots of stitching, knitting, eating and drinking plus some shopping hopefully and a dyeing class by Kate of Sparklies fabric. We had a similar retreat last year which was lots of fun so I'm really looking forward to it. Hopefully when I return on Monday, I will have lots of lovely stitchy progress to share.