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And so to bed..

Holly goes to bed happy in a kid mohair cardigan courtesy of T.K Maxx . Meanwhile Mum takes to bed her joyous bags of half-price "Tapestry" from her L.Y.S . I have no idea why they cut the price on a new yarn but I got a pack of Vintage and a blue mix . Heaven forbid I should follow a pattern these days so they will end up as part of shawls but I am happy. Holly wasn't interested in either in particular so they are all mine. They had "Roma" too but when I saw it was something like 88% viscose I wanted to laugh as these are promoted as the classsy end of Jaegar .Viscose goes hard and that is a fact .The only yarn that has a high percentage that stays soft is Colinette's Zanzibar or Shimmer 5. 

What not to call your child.

In my husband's Govt. job he gets to meet some of life's less fortunate and often lacking educational opportunities. He comes home with sad stories mostly but yesterday he asked me this "If your surname was Pipe what is the worst name you could give your child?"I couldn't think of an actual name .It turned out to be Duane which has to be one of the daftest moves you can make .Kids get bullied and laughed at for the smallest reasons ,what were they thinking?

Henriette gets a new outfit.

She wants a Russian hat now.

Mark Steele on "Marie Antoinette"....

If any of you have yesterday's "Independant" do NOT miss Mark's article on the film about Mrs Let Them Eat Cake ..or rather the dreadful film about her. Many a historical film seems utterly ridiculous to me.They are often bonkathons and the T.V series about Charles IInd was hideous.
I have to say that the series we just watched "Divided by the Sword" was un-pretentious not trying to overdo it's remit.The scenery was rather good , in fact better than that in "Cromwell " in which it is obvious Whitehall is cardboard .I just don't know a funnier comedian and historian .He isn't being critical for the sake of it I know he is really insulted by this rubbish and it's patronising of an audience.Maybe us "girlies" really just want lots of attractive men and pretty dresses ...excuse me but I want the facts as Cromwell would say "Warts and all".

A few of the silks..

spread out they give a better idea of the subtle colours. 

Answer for Amber..

Sorry Amber didn't notice your question "What shawl?" I am just knitting a rectangular version of Kaffe's "Persian Poppies" .A bit like the one Holly is sitting on in some of my photos which is "Jewelled stripes it's going to have a huge amount of colours. I'll never stop with his patterns I am sure.I want to do a "Stars" next but I hate three strands a row .

June Munro's shop url....

http://stores.ebay.co.uk/only-Roses-Vintage-Textiles

Two exquisite little parcels..

From June Munro of E:Bay ( used to be Colourspun yarns) . I will find her new name and post it .The screen doesn't do them justice as a lot are silk and really shine .June's colours just blow me away and I always have trouble thinking what to do with them .This time they are perfect for the shawl I am working on . 

Mum says "Well spread it out" ...

all I can think off is the precariously balanced baskets .Would she have saved me or the stash ? I am modelling this for her I'd rather not go out in shawls yet . As she has white hair I can always say "Come along now Granny the home is expecting you back" . 

Sea-cape no 2 .

Not too bad Mum. 

Mum's who need help work in this mess and knit rather a lot of these

Shawls? But you can still love them because you can make an even bigger mess with paints. 

Adorable Mums buy you a Betty Jackson coat and let you have it two months before ...

your birthday.

Very evil mums ..

knit this six years ago and still think you'd wear it .. 

Slightly evil mums ..

make you model their Donegal Tweed shawl and pretend you'd go out in it. 

Very Good Mums ..a fairy story..

Buy lacework from T.K.Maxx because they are no good at it. 

Terrible cover ,happy memories..

Great republican that I am I adored this book at 13.I read it over and over. I had a bet with Holly that I could remember the first page and it arrived this morning ( E:Bay) and I could .It is about Charles IInd's youngest sister , who he adored.The first part is her life with her exiled mother and the poverty and political struggles . Then The Restoration .Sadly she died at 26 some think poisoned by her husband The Duke of Orleans.It has good reviews by the T.L.S and H.E Bates amongst others ,I could not remember if the writing was good ,the research certainly was excellent. A little like I think The Queen should apologise to Ireland for the Potato Famine etc I think we the British people should remember Minette's mother with a memorial and apology for the treatment she received here. A park would be lovely .She was a human being and an extremely brave one . Bygones can be helped to be so by these gestures. I wonder how many other women ill-treated in history could be honoured . All poor women were ill-treated by not having equal rights etc .I think given a different education Henrietta herself would have been a champion of women's rights .She was lucky to be treated far better than most Queen consorts as she was loved and adored . 

A little treat..

Sent for the new Colinette book .It has four patterns for the new D.K .Blogger is slow to post or I'd put up another. 

Polish Bloggers in England...

If you look at the wooden furniture Holly is playing with please lock up your husbands , partners in a shed and send in wood and tools. When they have made sufficient to sell on your own E:Bay site let them out.I love this stuff , not nasty old plastics , beautiful wood .I no longer see my Polish friend and have not a lot of idea if such lovelies are still made but I also adored these little shoes with brass buckles she had . When I talk about the poor quality of shops in our town that includes toy shops and we do have a large Polish community.Holly is no longer this age but we have kept the furniture. 

Friday is going to town day..

I try to avoid it in the week and especially Saturday.We did go to T.K Maxx last Sunday and found Holly's birthday coat. There is very little of interest in town now except bookshops. I remember with great affection a now boring st. that is very historical that I haunted at Holly's age because it had a large independant bookshop and two art-shops. We have to go to Hobbycraft for art-supplies now which I find boring and revolting.We had a new chocolate shop open last week .You could not have asked for a more boring ,tasteless design.It looks like a warehouse to me.I would hope for something out of "Chocolat" I suppose but this is a stainless steel horror. No individual chocolates picked up with tongs.To make it worse several spotty , gormless looking staff in no uniform .Why not a nice gingham cotton with a lace apron and best of all a hat . They are only out-done by the repulsive staff at the Mac cosmetics counter who wear hardly anything play rap and giggle like morons. What I wouldn't give to see Elizabeth the Elizabeth Arden girl on the counter at Boots when I was a teen .She wore a French pleat a uniform and perfect make-up. I wore Biba and looked like a Vampire more than a vamp but she looked so wonderful. The Yardley lady also had class .I tried to ask some poor dip-stick about Guerlain last week .The poor lass knew nothing .I love some of the names I think they now have one called "Insolence" doesn't that say it all. So much for "Jicky" , "L'heure Blue" or "Mitsouko" .I wonder when "Tart" ,"Trollope" or Whore" will become perfume names ..won't be long.

School work abandoned

Holly had enough of books today and decided to knit Minette a cardigan and leg-warmers. 

Plaid is nearly finished..

only the collar to go then I have an alpaca/silk shawl half made.After that I'm free for a bit and might try socks as there is a pattern in "Vintage Knits" or "Yorkshire Fables" that takes normal needles .

Treated myself..

To this book yesterday .You might be thinking "the mad fool can hardly knit lace" .I know but the one on the front looks easy and the long version Holly has decided she wants as a Wedding coat as she wants a winter wedding.
We also spotted a boxed set of an old B.B.C series called "By the Sword Divided" about The English civil war .It must have been made in the 1970's so looked like "Upstairs ,Downstairs" meets "Blackadder" . It wasn't too bad so we watched five solid hours .At least they tried hard to deal with families who were divided by being on opposite sides to each other ..not something so likely in The American civil war I suppose ? We could only recognised one actor who also has played Sherlock Holmes .The actor playing Rupert kept letting his German accent slip ,the King had lost his Scots one .The best performance had to be the really mean Roundhead who was all New Model Army and no messing. A real meanie ...the poor Queen got the usual "Papist Whore" treatment throughout without anyone toning it down .I really hope that the entire country except The King didn't insist on calling her that . The atmosphere of the times seems to indicate that even royalists felt free to throw the expletives no matter the Queen was a Catholic . I want to get in the ring on her side and ask "how happy would you be called that you bullies". It seems worse after reading my book the poor woman ( married at 15) was terrified that a mob would break into her chapel and murder her at prayer.A feeling she felt more strongly because her father had been stabbed for being too nice to Hugenots ...sigh .Not a "win,win" situation exactly and no wonder a lot of royals come across as bonkers.Even now we have the law whereby a Monarch can't marry a Catholic ...how mad is that?
I shall finish the series today as I knit the dread "Plaid" then hunt down some "Luxury Tweed" I have to knit this "Bed-Jacket" ..cardigan to us.

I'm still knitting..

but it's a "Plaid" jacket for Holly that I find very dull. I cast on a "Silk Mountain" capelet today just to break the monotony . I am able to dive into my stash to add other deep violets such as some wildly vivid "Hanna Silk" . I just gaze at piles of wild colours and want to do things to them . I read a wonderful quiz on Jane Thornley's site ...link on Gill's ( Woolly Workshop) site.I could ogle Jane's site for hours. I have a skein of "Fandango" that is so fabulous ..like a rose bush but I think it is raspberry colourway.Anyhow It's inspiring something because it is so gorgeous and soft.

Being a woman in the 17th century..

Cherry has made me think of the things I find most horrifying after reading about Charles Ist's Queen. The most horrifying was her first birth which was so bad it was a case of save her or the baby and the shock of the Doctor and courtiers that the King begged them to save her. That he expressed no desire to have a son first was pretty amazing too. But no member of Parliament was a woman so when they decided she should be deprived of the right to see The Prince of Wales men had decided that . When she was declared a traitor , men had decided that too. Her love of the King could not be understood by such people or her love of her children.She was not just a breeding machine. She seems lucky to have had a husband who allowed her to act because woman who did were labelled as whores. In fact when she needed help the Catholic Church dominated by men abandoned her , her sons don't seem the greatest help either.That is the life of the most " important"woman in England so we are now looking for a book about the life of the average woman...dying in childbirth seems quite a good option except for the child's sake.

Cherry has tagged me so...

Five things feminism has done for me...
1) Voting
2) Property rights
3) Like Cherry the right to work if I wanted to and I don't.
4) Again like Cherry ...trousers ,what a liberating joy .I manage to find high waist still because low-rise look ugly and so uncomfortable.
5)Being able to stand for election even though again I have no real desire to .


Thanks Cherry that was thought provoking and to be honest I hated leaving out my very equal partnership ..Jeff irons and does housework far better than me but I think the rights I listed are important even if I choose not to use any.

Rosemary keeps the devil out...

So Holly tells me so my Christmas wreath might be an unusual combination of rosemary, garlic and silver bullets. I half stripped the rosemary bush today to hang a bunch in my workroom as I love the smell. Sadly my lavender is pathetic as I love that most of all. I'd really love some misletoe and was told if I cut a slash in my apple tree and shoved in a berry it might take ? Now I only need to grow a Boswellia ( if that the spelling of the tree with Frankincense) and I'll be a very happy bunny. If global warming carries on I might just get my dream but I'll pass away just as it gets a foot high.

You never expect the Spanish Inquisition..

So M.I.L leaves the country in March and I relax and feel a prison sentance is over.Just as I am happily looking forward to Christmas she phones to tell us she is coming over in November. Please pray that all planes from Bridgetown suddenly develop technical faults that last until at least January .Nothing that is not noticed before some poor soul gets on of course. Any wealthy Americans can fly to Venezuela and then land in Bridgetown but maybe have to get a boat back ..so no-one is too put out right? Those Americans can have a nice chat with Chavez maybe ,explain about my problems and if he is supplying fuel to Barbados just mention it for me huh?

Help support the Amish victims...

A lovely blogger has come up with the idea of knitting remembrance shawls for the families of the Amish victims of that terrible shooting. There are quite strict dress codes as I am sure you all know but the details are on her blog.The alternative is to give money to help with posting them .I think I will do that as I know I would find it un-bearable to knit at the moment.These people live in peace with no weapons.They hurt no-one yet this monstrous crime was visited upon them.In their generosity the group will include the shooter's wife as I am sure the community would want. So if you want to help in any way http://asheepinwoolsclothing.typepad.com/

I did wake up ..

and start the book later in the evening.My knitting kept calling but the book won out.It is the most balanced so far on the subject .Still not quite the in depth book on the Queen I want. Amazon have one listed that is still being written but can be pre-ordered that sounds perfect. I won't order from them as this one was something like £3.00s cheaper in "Waterstones" . Talking to Holly I admitted that I wished I'd bought the biography of Henrietta Maria I had seen in Oxfam some time ago.I found it difficult , at the time , to admit to a near life-long fascination with a royal as I am a republican and it appears Quakers were part of what seems a near conspiracy called Fifth Monarchists . They believed Jesus was the only King and I agree butthe vengeful ,over sober puritanism is repellant. History is a strange thing that repeats itself yet we don't seem to learn much from it . I'd like to think the personal suffering of the King and Queen had bought about a more democratic England and one that learned utter fanaticism like The rule of The Commonwealth was not something we would ever want. Even royals are people so it was nice to see the late Tsar's mother get her wish to return to St. Petersburg . I really think Monarchy is well out of date but our history should be cherished. There are many aspects of the first Caroline court I admire , not least the couple's faithfull marriage. How they managed to give birth to a serial adulterer like Charles 2nd is a mystery.

Slows down knitting..

Treated myself to this today as there are no books on Henrietta Maria in print at the moment. Holly bought herself a cracking book on the history of handbags which I might borrow and post a few pics later. I have been hoping our John Lewis will get in Bebbie Bliss's Cashmere but not yet ..I want to feel something that expensive before I buy. I'd love to say I did lots of interesting other stuff today but I fell asleep on the sofa after starting my book. 

I ask you is this evil?

Having read a blogger suggesting that "Plume" is evil ( don't get me wrong I disagree but am very fond of her).I ask you all to tell me is this "Boa" evil ,ugly and horrible ? I always feel so bad about knitting eyelash yarns that I knit them alongside another yarn.They feel cold and I have seen too many grinning ,preening little child models adopting stupid poses in patterns. But of late I am quite taken with Silky-chic and Firecracker drives me into ecstasies of ooohhhhing. I can't imagine ever suggesting wool ,alpaca, silk, etc are evil .Maybe it's the environmental thing and although I agree it's impossible not to go for shiny .At least I don't drive an S.U.V or I'd be in therapy. I got a huge parcel of half-price Plaid today ......can I find my Plaid pattern book ? I found every other pattern book .I must finish the Frizzante capelet which I have the most vivid purple Hana silk to make the neck band .I think George Bush is evil ,Osama Bin Laden is evil but Plume is just a bit wicked maybe ? 

Brother Sun and Sister Moon....

Happy St. Francis's Day to all ,especially Robert F. Kennedy jr whose hero he is.Who also does his best to care about the air we breathe ,the water we drink and the lives of the animals on the earth.