Arrrgggghhh my fingers....

My hands ache, knitting has broken me.  I've been spending my time off work trying to finish off the baby blanket for my sister.  This is my first knitting project, it's been great teaching me all the stitches and practising, I'm quite fast now.  The blanket is 30 squares of about 40 stitches and 50 rows, I started off doing about 2 squares a week gradually building up to 3 but even so I've been knitting small squares for 3 months now.  I've now just got 2 squares left which are stocking stitch with bobbles.  After then I have to block (wetting each square and pining them out to the correct size) then sewing them together before knitting the border and sewing that on.  Here's the bag with all my squares.

 Phew!

I can't wait to get it finished and I've been so good not buying loads of wool and I haven't started any other projects to distract me.  I can see the end of the tunnel and can't wait to start my first pair of socks with my Regia self-striping wool.  Here's my stash, complete with nosey cat.

In other news, I've been doing lots of batch cooking for the freezer, we probably have close to 20 meals in the freezer now.  I sorted out the lounge shelves so they're nice and neat without the heaps of crap we usually dump there.

Yes, this is actually better than it was before.

Week Off

Today is the first day of my week off (including Easter, that's a total of 11 days off work).  I'm not going away but I'm not going to do nothing either.  I have a long list of stuff I want to get done, stuff which has been hanging around for ages and needs to be sorted.  I thought it would be interesting to see how much I get done.  Here's my plan:

• Friday 26th - Exercise DVD, food shopping, 3 hours clearing loft, 3 hours knitting
• Saturday 27th - Exercise DVD, make soup to freeze, 3 hours clearing loft, 3 hours knitting
• Sunday 28th - Yoga class, make chilli to freeze, 3 hours clearing loft, 3 hours knitting
• Monday 29th - Go for a run, shopping with Mary, spinning class, 3 hours knitting
• Tuesday 30th - Exercise DVD, bike service, 3 hours cleaning, cinema trip with girls
• Wednesday 31st - Go for a run, 3 hours cleaning, 3 hours knitting, make shepherd's pie to freeze
• Thursday 1st - Upgrade phone, exercise DVD, massage, Circle AGM, 3 hours cleaning, 3 hours knitting
• Friday 2nd - Go for a run, make goulash to freeze, 3 hours cleaning, 3 hours knitting
• Saturday 3rd - Exercise DVD, 3 hours cleaning, 3 hours knitting, make casserole to freeze
• Sunday 4th - Yoga class, 3 hours cleaning, 3 hours knitting
• Monday 5th - Go for a run, 3 hours cleaning, 3 hours knitting

As you can see that's a lot to pack in.  The loft does need clearing out, it's full of my stuff from when I moved in.  I'm going to go through all the boxes, throw stuff out, keep stuff and sort stuff for a car boot later in the year.  I'm also going to spring clean the house, I'm a bit lax on the cleaning usually but a full blitz is needed to make the weekly cleans easier and more effective.  I'm also going to fill the freezer with healthy food, I'm usually too knackered during the week to cook anything from scratch so having a freezer full of meals is great.

I'll post again at the end of the week to see what I actually managed to do.

Right it's time for my exercise DVD so I'd better get dressed!

Relaxation and even more knitting

I've just come back from a gorgeous weekend at Ragdale Hall, a spa near Melton Mowbray.  It's become a tradition in my family, we've been going there once a year for about 7 years and every year I love it even more.  The atmosphere completely relaxes you as soon as you walk in the door, everyone serenely wanders around in white bath robes and slippers, people doze in comfy chairs, even the resident cat is chilled out.  The treatments are the best I've ever had, I've never had a bad experience there, all the girls are cheerful and polite, each treatment is perfectly done and I float out of each one even more relaxed than before.  In case you hadn't noticed, I can't recommend this place enough.

Back to the real world and back to knitting, which has become my life recently.  I've done 22 squares of my 30 square blanket, so close I can almost smell the finished article.  I've learned to cable, which was easier than I thought and I love the effect of it, it makes the squares nice and chunky.  My plan is to finish the last 8 squares in the next 2 weeks, then start blocking them (wetting, pinning and letting them dry so they become all the same size) and then sewing them together which will be very exciting as that's when they properly become a blanket.  Then it's just the border to finish and sew on.  I'm hoping to finish everything in 7 weeks which takes me up to mid-May.  Just in time for my niece who should arrive on 17th May (give or take a bit).

I've been a bit lax with my cycling recently, I've had a week off but am raring to get back to it.  I'm starting my running training in a few weeks, ready for Race for Life in July.  Pete, as ever, is doing so much more exercise than me.  His JOGLE training is going well, he had a week off work and cycled over 100km each day which is unbelievable and fantastic.  Tomorrow is the Reading Half Marathon which I'll be watching from Madjeski Stadium (might take my knitting).  Good luck to everyone who's running it including Pete, Gail, Fiona, Harry and Gill.

Knitting in earnest

Knitting has begun in earnest, I'm 10 squares into a 30 square blanket.  Here are some pictures of my work so far...

I've become slightly obsessed with knitting (as is my way) and I've already got a list of stuff I want to try including circular knitting to make socks...







I also like the look of these wrist warmers...











and bag...






Watch out friends and family, guess what you're getting for Christmas!

In other news, I've signed up to do Race for Life in July.  I'm going to train for it properly unlike last time when I went for approx two runs and then died during the race getting the quite pathetic time of 39mins59secs (and that was with a sprint finish).  I've worked out a 16 week plan which should mean I can run all of it in about 30 minutes.  I'll let you know how that goes when I start it in March (when it's light enough in the evenings for me to run after work).