cold comfort

Cold

I spent Friday afternoon selling craft items for my pal's daughter (who is also going to Kenya with my son)- I hadn't planned on doing this, as I was supposed to be selling stuff for him today, but she was unable to attend the Fri craft fair, and J2 volunteered our services.

All well and good until we realised that our stall was outside, not inside! We wore our thermals, wrapped up really well,  drank lots of hot coffee to keep warm and were very grateful that it was a dry (if chilly) afternoon.

After 4 hours we had sold £13 of cards and notebooks! Not a great success!

Comfort

So today, despite having a hot bath and 12 hours sleep, I was aching and tired and couldn't make the other fair, so J1 and J2 went without me (and thankfully they were inside!!).

Overall the fair was pretty busy and raised quite a bit for Mission International- although my handstamped, handpainted cards didn't exactly fly off the stall.

The felted toys which Amanda (Feltfinland) had sent to us to raise funds could have been sold several times over though. There was a lot of oohing and ahhing over her designs and craftsmanship (which is perfectly understandable as her work is fab!).

I might have done better if I'd made more knitted flower brooches like these two which I'd made for J2 and me. J2 said that the jewelry, felted bags and handknits, home baking, sweets & jams went quite well today. (and apparently last year was great for handmade cards!!)

I hadn't realised that there were such distinct trends /variations in craft sales - but then I'm a novice at this. Who knows what will be a big seller next year?

staggering!

the football was amazing on Sunday, I hardly had time to pick up my crochet hook when Spurs were on MotD2- they beat Wigan 9-1! A team is doing well when they win 3-0 or 4-0, but to score 9 goals in a match is astounding, and very rare at the top level.

The main man was Jermain Defoe who scored 5, joining a very exclusive club consisting of Alan Shearer and Andy Cole who also scored 5 in a match in their careers. The boy was on fire!

Wigan are feeling dreadful, so bad in fact that the players themselves are offering a refund to any Wigan fan who went to London for the match. This might be a worrying precedent for any sportsman- having to refund ticket money to any disappointed fan- I can't see it catching on.

They'll be wanting to thrash their opposition next week- sadly that's my team. I can only hope that Wigan still feel embarassed and fail to perform well.

J1's pals are having strong reactions to his bald head- literally staggering back in shock when he whips off his beanie to reveal his baldie bonce. He's having to warn people to sit down and brace themselves!

The local press were on the phone to interview him today- I hope the fame doesn't go to his head!

massive excitement!

cor blimey what a day!

Sunderland beat Arsenal 1-0 at the Stadium of Light  (in the pouring rain).
It wasn't a great match, Arsenal were lacklustre, but in previous seasons we would have caved under pressure and been over-awed by their brilliance, but today we kept going and the amazing Darren Bent scored a flukey goal. He is tremendous and the crowd love him.

J2's guppies have produced baby fish. They are tiny, about 5mm long, almost totally clear, they look like an eye with a fin!

Guppies are live bearers and the young fish have to hide before the other fish scoff them. Years ago, when J1 was a toddler we used to have 3 tanks of fish, one of which was for platies, also live bearers and it used to be fascinating to watch the young fish grow. It's lovely to be able to do that again.

..and the postie made my day by bringing iss 5 of Inside Crochet today. I love the patterns in this mag and my queue is getting ever longer... both J2 and I want a pair of the beaded cuffs and the dragon gauntlets!

I have managed to get a bit more done on Crazy Waves over the last few days, but I'll have to put the hook to one side and crack on making Christmas cards for next weekend's fundraiser.

my son and hair

so, it's done, my crazy son has had his hair shaved off, and thankfully it's not a bitterly cold day today, the sun is out.

Here he is at L.A.L before the dreadful deed.

this is the amount of hair removed- that foot in the top right corner is an adult sized foot!

and here he is- my totally bald, totally bonkers son.

There's lots of things I would do for charity- shaving my head is not one of them!!

There's still time to make a donation on the  To Baldly Go blog and win a prize!

and please leave a message of encouragement for him!

hair today, gone tomorrow

So, the boy takes the plunge and becomes Baldyboi tomorrow, which is not great timing as Scotland is very cold and wet at the moment (oi! who said when isn't it cold and wet??oh, that was me, sorry), and of course he's looking for sponsors.

Anyone (except our family) who donates on the To Baldly Go website will be included in either the yarn draw or the chocolate draw.

All you have to do is click the DONATE button on the top right hand side, and fill in the form , putting in the special message box YARN or CHOCOLATE. The draw will be made on the 4th Dec and winners notified.

The Yarn prizes are

1. Noro silk garden sock yarn, chosen cos it looks a bit like the saltire flag (although I would surprised if it knitted up like that!) and two saltire stitch markers.

2. Araucania Ranco multy in a blueish grey shade (scottish skies? hmmm? well they call it color 328, bah, where's the romance)

3. Regia Jacquard (colour 5269) which should knit up into a nice jacquard pattern, so it looks good , without much  effort.

( anyone with allergies should note that this is a nonsmoking household, but there is a daft dog lurking about)

Photos of the chocolate to be posted tomorrow!

well at least he won't freeze

the (non) stripey snow cap is finished, so at least Baldyboi won't freeze when he gets his head shaved on Friday.

I finished knitting it last night and sewed it up today.

I might have finished it sooner but I couldn't concentrate on it while watching "The Waters of Mars" the latest Doctor Who ep. I was almost hiding behind the sofa , never mind trying to knit! Talk about scary!! Almost as scary as "Blink". Really looking forward to the two-parter at Christmas!

To Baldly Go is live!

I've set up a seperate blog for J1's fundraising efforts To Baldly Go, feat Baldyboi.

He got a good response at Church this morning, with friends and neighbours being very supportive even if they do think he's slightly bonkers!

Online sponsors (excl our family) may be entered into a sponsor incentive draw - some prizes will be fibrey goodness, and some will be chocolate/candy (for those poor benighted souls who neither knit,spin, crochet or weave!).

More updates soon!

felt so good!!

I got a lovely parcel from Finland today- with these totally cute toys and Christmas deccies inside.

Aren't they totally fabulous?

They have been made by Amanda at Feltfinland and she makes the cutest, funniest toys. If you think they look good online, they feel totally wonderful IRL.

Amanda has sent these across the North Sea to help with my son's fundraising efforts. I feel delighted and humbled at the same time.

And because she's totally wonderful, she sent me some Finnish yarn to play with. It's gorgeous!

a slight change of plan

Burundi shown in red

J1's proposed trip to Burundi in 2010 as part of a Mission International team has had to be re-organised.

There is going to be a Presidential election next year in Burundi, and as African elections can be a little fraught, the charity and the organisers in Burundi have decided to postpone that trip till things are more settled.

Kenya shown in red

So the team is now planning to go to Kenya, about 500 miles from their original destination, to help orphans and refugees in the very rural areas.

J1's first big fundraiser is next week when he is going to have his head completely shaved, he hasn't had his hair cut for more than two years so his wild curly hair is more than 34 cm long.

November in Scotland is such a great time (not) to go bald so I'm having to knit him a beanie to protect his baldy bonce from freezing. He chose a very simple pattern from Sublime -Stripey Snow Cap(Let's Knit iss 23) but instead of stripes he chose plain black.

For the first time I'm having to put a white cloth over my knees to be able to my knitting clearly! (Aaargh! My eyes! ) I'm using Debbie Bliss Rialto which is wonderfully soft and should keep away the frostbite. It's very straightforward, unlike his BSJ hat!

I'm still listening to Half of a Yellow Sun, which is probably not such a good idea, now that the Team's plans have been changed. I'm about ¾ through, just at the stage of extreme violence between the different tribes, people fleeing the towns and villages and ending up half starved in refugee camps. It is horrifying to know how complicit the British govt was in allowing the Biafrans to starve. Why? Oil reserves of course, why else?

stars and stripes

One of my newest downloads is The Jodcast from Jodrell bank.

Even though it's 30+ years since I did any physics, it's fascinating listening to astronomy news and getting information about what to look for in the sky at night. (As I usually give the dog her last walk of the day between 9pm and 10pm that's a good time to look at the heavens.)

It's not necessary to have a telescope (or even good binoculars) to look at the night sky and marvel at the changes, just a clear night , a woolly hat on your head and in my case a patient dog!

I did manage to finish the woolly hat for the Christmas Child shoebox yesterday. The pattern is Mia by Luise Roberts and is in iss 23 of Let's Knit. It was fairly straightforward to make (I just made it harder for myself by not checking the size as I went! Doh!). It's in Rooster almerino (custard) with two stripes of Lana Grossa baby alpaca (green), and is wonderfully soft and hopefully very warm for whoever's head gets to wear it.

Now I need to cast on for a beanie for J1 before he gets his head shaved for charity- I don't want my boy to freeze even if cold nights are good for stargazing.

At the going down of the sun,

and in the morning,

We will remember them

Laurence Binyon

It was Rev. Torrance's first Remembrance service at our church, and he brought a leather flying helmet and knitted balaclava, from the Great War, to show the children.

I hadn't realised that one of the main dangers facing the early pilots was the cold. The early planes didn't have glass canopies and their heads could become so cold that they could lapse into unconsciousness while flying. What an appalling thought.

One of the ladies in the Monday night knitting group has a son serving in the Helmand province at the moment. She was happier when she didn't know where he was stationed, now she worries every day.

We still haven't found a way to live peacefully in this world, our soldiers, sailors and airmen face death every day. That is an appalling thought too.

boxes and bonfires

a lovely busy day today-

J2 and I put together 6 shoeboxes for Operation Christmas child. We had enough for 2 boxes ourselves and donations from some of the people at church for another four.

I now have a stack of 23 shoeboxes in the spare bedroom, (collected from friends & neighbours) which will be taken to the collection point this week. J2 was very good at filling every cubic centimetre in the boxes and great at deciding the right toys for each age group.

I just have to finish knitting a hat to go in one of the boxes. I thought I'd finished it last night, but it was enormous- it was too big even for J1 and his enormous bonce and wild hair.

So the hat was ripped back and will be finished tomorrow. OOPS!

Tonight we joined about 3,000 other people in a farmer's field on the other side of the village to watch the firework display.

Our Guy Fawkes night is always on the Saturday nearest Nov 5th as it's organised by the teachers & parents of our local primary school. It's a brilliant fun-draiser. The fireworks are done by a professional company called Pyromancer, there's a disco in the field beforehand, and some crazy guy doing firejuggling too.

It's tremendous fun especially with a cup of mulled wine in one hand and a camera in the other.!

So, great fun all day, and just about made up for being beaten by Spurs today (2-0) I couldn't believe that Darren Bent missed a penalty against his old club. gah!

Notes and queries

the scrum (for readers in North America!)

so why exactly would a teenage boy need undershorts to protect his nether regions in a rugby scrum?

In rugby, if the game needs to be restarted some of the players from the two teams form a turtle shape by locking arms and heads, sometimes gripping the front of the shorts of the guy in front (or sometimes, I'm told accidentally, their nether regions!)

The ball in then thrown into the middle through the tunnel formed by the players legs and the players try to hook it out backwards with their feet to one of their team.

It is the funniest thing to watch, and there is nothing like it in any other sport, but as J1 has told me rugby is a game for thugs played by gentleman whereas football(soccer) is a game for gentlemen played by thugs.

I used to play hockey, so what do I know?

parenting in the 21st century

ante-natal classes don't prepare you for the challenges that parents face in the 21st century.

J1 needs to have inoculations for almost every conceivable disease before he heads to Burundi next year, so we've visited our practice nurse to start the process: we begin with hepatitis B next week. He also has to have jags for malaria, yellow fever, typhoid, rabies & cholera. All of a sudden this trip seems very, very serious.

This summer when he was staying at Innerwick outdoor centre I had to sign the usual parental consent form and give permission for him to receive iodine capsules if the nearby nuclear power station (Torness) had any fallout.

Finally, after rugby practice, he asked me to get him some undershorts so that when he is in a scrum none of the other players accidentally grab his nether regions.

cor blimey! heavens to Betsey! and Oh Emm Gee!

Still, the breathing techniques practised before the birth always come in handy... breathe slowly in for two, and out for two....

seeing red

Premier League football went mad yesterday!

I think it was because I was off fund-raising with my kids and wasn't supervising it from my sofa that so many players got in an absolute tizz and were redcarded.

Eight players were sent off in one afternoon in nine matches (beating the previous record of 6 in one afternoon on 7th May 2005).
Even our own normally levelheaded Kenwyne Jones got his marching orders! The other reprobates were Bilyaletdinov (Everton), Carragher (L'pool), Cuellar (Villa), Degen (L'pool), Geovanni (Hull), Keovac (WHam) & Samuel (Bolton).

Liverpool lost 2 players and were soundly beaten 3-1 by Fulham; Portsmouth got their first win against Wigan 4-0 and were very convincing, Arsenal clobbered Spurs 3-0 and thankfully the Black Cats got a 2-2 draw against West Ham. We're still 8th on the table (phew)

A recent book discussion on Ravelry made me realise that my tastes in literature have been limited to white European authors and have not included many by People of Colour (POC). I could only think of 7 books which I've read in this category : Midnight's Children, Shame, The Satanic Verses (Salman Rushdie), Wild Swans (Jung Chang), The Color Purple (Alice Walker), Kite Runner, A Thousand Splendid Suns (Khaled Hosseini).

So on my next visit to the library I moved away from the audio classics and found Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie . The story is set in Nigeria in the 1960's, during the civil war between the Hausa and Igbo and the

creation of the new state of Biafra (and is brilliantly narrated by Adjoa Andoh).

The violence of the Hausa towards the Igbo is shocking and the rage between the different peoples descends like a red mist. But I have to ask myself if I would be any different if my own children were threatened. Would I strive for truth and reconciliation like Mandela or would I be a berserker? Sadly, probably the latter.

Funnily enough, one of the customers who gave a donation yesterday had lived in Nigeria for many years. I told her about this book and she is going to track it down to read it too. What a small world we live in ! (thankfully a small blue planet, not a red one!)