Ho Ho Ho

Who are you calling a ho? {Groan – I thought I’d save you a job.}

As we all know it’s nearly Christmas.  What?  Next week is November and at that point Christmas is next month.

Now I’m not a big fan of hand embroidery but one of the quilting blogs I read ‘SewHappy.Me‘  (as you know I don’t really quilt but it’s one of those crafts that I like to look at and think about doing) started a Christmas Banner sewalong.  So far I’ve managed to remember – in some cases just – to download the instructions weekly eg, block 1…

and today I finally got round to embroidering one…

On another creative note here’s how you give your husband a fright – you go upstairs (yesterday afternoon) at 3.oopm (see I’m remembering to use ‘old money’ on the times) to make sure he’s still awake after his alarm went off half an hour before and chat to him, then you go back downstairs and do some knitting. As you sit there knitting your head starts drooping and you decide to take a little snooze, so you snuggle down on the settee under a blanket and promptly fall asleep. When your husband finally makes it downstairs he opens the lounge door and you raise your dozing head off the cushion to find him looking at you with a horrified look on his face as he says ‘Are you not well?’ to which you answer ‘I was just taking a nap’.  He was reassured when I was able to get tea!

Other creative spaces can be found here.

Bananas in pyjamas, no wait – a bear in pyjamas!

I got my finger out and finished my first bear tonight – watched closely by Bud, who when introduced to Mr Bear attempted to greet him with a nibble on the nose.

Here he is sans pyjamas…

With jim jams and slippers…

And remember this…

the mis-matched front and backs of the dressing gown?  Well it turns out that I wasn’t the problem – well in this particularly instance.  After finishing the jim jams I didn’t have enough variegated yarn for the dressing gown, so I re-knit it in another colour and as I was working up the first front I realised that there was no way that it was going to match the rows for the back – so I had to adjust the decreases to get them to end up the same length.  And here’s Mr Bear in his full outfit…

The pattern is from Teddy Bears: More than 25 irresistible designs for knitted bears by Debbie Bliss.

I think the second bear may turn out to be an Aviator Bear.  B meanwhile has stated that although I always deal with Christmas presents, and he has always had minimal involvement, that as presents go these bears potentially suck as gifts for the recipients concerned!  Well at least I know Bud likes the look of this one.

Holiday Crochet

My second item of holiday craftiness is a crochet blanket.  Much as I’d like to show a vision of craftiness in a forest setting surrounded by whatever woodland creatures were brave enough to venture close enough with Bud around (so that would be slugs) it’s now too big to tote anywhere other than settee to car and back.  Here’s a little taster of it…

And here’s my holiday reading…

It features Stephen Fry, half of the reason I can’t envisage, even in a dark room, Hugh Laurie being considered a sex symbol/hunk.  ‘What makes me think anyone would consider Hugh sexy?’ I hear you ask – well it’s that time of year over at Kim’s blog – Knitters’ Hunk.  So if you fancy a bit of fun nominating three hunks or just voting on other people’s ideas of heartthrob pop on over there.  I’m still one short in my nominees and bearing in mind Hugh’s popularity I’m seriously toying with the idea of British beefcake Ricky Gervais!  {cough, splutter}  Moving swiftly on.

In Last Chance To See Mark Carwardine undertakes an updated trip to see really endangered species with Stephen Fry, a mutual friend of his and the participant of the original trip, the late Douglas Adams.  Zoologist Mark narrates with a sense of humour I find really enjoyable.  The book is also of a size that comes in really handy when the view into the holiday accommodation from a window adjoining the outside path is this…

and your small furry family isn’t afraid of bursting open doors to check you’re doing okay!

Other creative spaces are here!