happy happy joy joy

Florencio Avalos is rescued

The world has looked on with happiness and joy as the 33 Chilean miners are released from the collapsed San Jose mine in the Atacama desert.

The men have been trapped at approx 2,000 feet below ground for 69 days.

It has been a complex rescue operation and it is taking about 15 minutes to lift each man slowly and individually up the narrow tube back to safety (the capsule moves slowly so that the men do not suffer from "the bends" the compression sickness that deep sea divers risk).

Now for an unusual link (I bet no one else in the blogosphere links their knitting to the Chilean miners): my favourite knitting mag reached its 3rd birthday this month.
My Gran taught me to knit as a child, but I never really pursued it, I found it frustrating and often tedious. Although I admired my Gran's handknits, and in later years my MIL's knitting skills,and appreciated everything they made for me, I wasn't drawn to it. When I became ill with ME 6 years ago papercrafting became a source of comfort to me.

Then three years ago the papercraft mag that I subbed to sent me a preview of their new knitting mag Let's Knit and I was immediately attracted to it. It was bright, cheerful and modern, it had a range of beginner's and intermediate patterns, it explained knitting jargon, the patterns were in the main written out in full (psso? what's that?). It has taught me so much, has always encouraged me and never, ever, patronised me. Sometimes the mag is dismissed by others as too young in its style. Hmmmm. I'm 49 and LK cheers me up enormously. Age is a state of mind I think!

In the last three years I have knitted/crocheted 7 garments, 4 pairs of mittens, 7 hats, 5 scarves, 1 baby blanket, 10 (yes,TEN) pairs of socks, 7 amigurumi toys, 2 cuddly toys, 21 washcloths, 3 household items and 33 Christmas decorations. I have learnt to cast on in 5 different ways, and then cast off in 3 different ways, how to cable, how to knit lace, how to use dpns, how to use circular needles, how to increase/decrease, how to add beads, how to correct my mistakes. I think that's pretty good, as until then all that I had knitted were garter stitch rectangles for Jen's teddies to use as blankets.

Let's Knit introduced me to Ravelry, podcasts and blogging and kept me going when I was at my lowest, when the ME kept me trapped in bed or on the sofa. It has helped me so much, so I would like to say a big, big thank you. Happy birthday and many happy returns of the day!

and the latest project off my needles are the Nimble mitts for Jennifer. I makes me happy that I can make things for my kids to keep them warm .

There's some men's fingerless mitts, Felix, in the latest LK which I'll make for Jack so that he doesn't freeze as a poor student and can still play his guitar (I think I'll use the shadows zauberball for those, it will be better match than for the Rick socks). And the cover sweater Seraphina looks perfect for my Mam's 77th birthday next Feb.

That will make me happy being able to make her a sweater, and as it's similar to those that my Gran used to knit for her, she will be happy too.