Not much to report at Chateau Cat, as I’ve spent most of my usual knitting time whipping through the Twilight Saga at break-neck speed! I did manage to get a little bit of knitting time in on Saturday in the sunny garden, while my husband played his guitar and the hens pootled around nearby – bliss!

Maybelline is no longer living with us. While I was out the evening following the previous blog post, she apparently scarpered out of the front door when my husband opened it, and pootled off back down the street where we found her. We’ve seen her since, sunning herself in somebody’s front garden, and we’ve seen the neighbour feeding her too — so it seems she’s itinerant rather than properly stray, probably being fed and sheltered by a few neighbours in the street as well as ourselves, and she seems happy with the situation for now.

Me? Well, I’m happy while she’s happy; she knows where to find us, and we can keep an eye on her make sure she’s being fed. If and when the weather turns, we can always whip her in a cat box and get her properly re-homed. We are satisfied to “watch this space” for the moment.

mushroom pouch by Jonette2

It’s lovely, really lovely, to get to see the projects that people make from my patterns, like this lovely russet mushroom pouch (made in Australia, no less!), or this mini-mushroom for handkerchiefs made by Helen.

I’ve been getting in the Twilight saga recently (better late than never!). I’ve seen movies 1&2, missed 3, and read books 1, 2 and I’m halfway through 3. I’m enjoying the books immensly, the movies slightly less-so, although it is pleasant seeing the books in less-detailed movie form.

My neice, Ellen, is well into the whole Twilight scene (though, aged 12, she has far more of an excuse than I do!) so I’m knitting us both a pair of grey mittens like the ones Bella wears in the first Twilight movie, in the scene where Edward saves her from being crushed by a truck. Here’s a bad photo of the first mitt; I will add some better pics when I’m finished them!

I have made an important discovery: I hate intarsia knitting.

I am persevering with the Fox Sweater, but it is such a hassle that I needed an easy project to knit alongside it for those days where I just can’t be arsed!

So, finding I had exactly the right number of balls of Rowan Felted Tweed in plum leftover from the mystery project for Yarn Forward Issue 33, I cast on ‘Lochalsh’.

I have adapted the pattern to be knit in the round rather than back-and-forth, to make the fair isle easier. The pattern repeats don’t fit in with the sweater shaping, leaving you with half a heart at each end for example. I thought this looked rather odd, so I have added a false seam to each side through the use of a single column of purl stitches.

When we moved into our house, we went to great effort to uproot an ugly privet bush and plant an apple tree in its place.

This year, we had about 40 smallish apples. They weren’t quite ready yet, but they were getting well and truly noshed by caterpillars and I knew that if they didn’t get picked now, there would be nothing left for us in a few weeks! (That’s the downside to having cats I suppose – they scare off the friendly caterpillar-eating starlings!)

On a whim I picked them and made 5 jars of spiced apple chutney, 4 jars of apple and lemon jelly and 4 jars of spiced apple jelly. They will go in the cupboard for a few months before being eaten, and a few may find themselves gifted at christmas.

Tom’s 30th has come and gone along with lots of house-guests, nights out, and not much sleep!

As you can see, though, Gruber was definately a hit. I had to laugh when I saw Tom come downstairs coincidentally wearing in his favourite jumper, and I handed him his gift!

Today is Tom’s 30th birthday; he is getting drum lessons for his “main” present, but I couldn’t see his birthday come and go without getting something to wrap up and give the man-who-wants-nothing.

Meet Gruber the Goat.

Tom wants to one day have a garden (or a bit of land) big enough to keep two goats, one called Hans and the other called Gruber (after the bad guy from Die Hard, apparently).

It will be a while til we can afford to live the dream, so in the meantime I have knit Tom a little Gruber mascot! I came across some blue and purple yarn that matches Tom’s favourite “time traveller” jumper, and so I knit Gruber a matching sweater!

Happy birthday Tom!

Meet Maybelline.

Maybelline was hanging around the street yesterday and, encouraged by a bit of impromtu petting from Tom’s young sisters, followed them home. They didn’t let her indoors, but after hearing her crying on the doorstep I let her in. She ate a whole sachet of wet food before crying for more, and then spent all night curled up alseep at the foot of our bed!

Maybelline is very small, but definately adult. She has matted chest fur and plenty of fleas, a bald patch on her leg (probably from scratching or licking away fleas or matted fur), lots of scabs on her body, and her ears look quite scabby and flea-bitten; she hates having them touched, so they obviously hurt. She has ventured back into the garden a few times (she is very curious about the chickens, but as they are actually bigger than her, we’re not very concerned!). She never goes far, though, and always pootles right back in. We are going to let her stay for a few days, and I will take her to the vet Friday and see if she’s microchipped.

A woman down the street has a cat that looks very similar, that she calls “Eyeliner Cat”. Eyeliner cat is one of several generations, she says, and a new one moves in with her every few years. Her theory is that there is a ferral Mother Cat somewhere that keeps having kittens and sending them to her door! So, we’ve decided to call her Maybelline for now (after the makeup brand, of course!)

In knitting related news, I have just finished a sweater that will be featured in Yarn Forward Issue 33, which will be out around Christmas time. I’ve worked on it non-stop for the past fortnight, and my arms actually physically ache! But it was great to see it finally finished, as it’s a design I first started work on in a different yarn several years ago, and then ressurected in a better-suited yarn (Rowan Felted Tweed).

I have a small birthday gift to knit this weekend (I will post details once the birthday boy has received said gift), and then I plan to knit the Fox Sweater by Kid Acne that was featured in Yarn Forward Issue 10. It’s designed to be knit in a mix of Rowan Cotton and Pure Wool, which I just can’t get my head around (surely the fibres would block and wear differently and look awful??), so I bought some more Rowan Felted Tweed – yes, I’ve just spent a fortnight up to my elbows in it, but that’s how much I love this yarn!

More news on Maybelline to follow, no doubt, so stay tuned!

Finally! Inside Crochet Issue 9 has been published, and it includes the pattern for my crocheted Mushroom Project Pouch!

You can find the magazine in good newsagents, WH Smiths and HobbyCraft, or you can download it from YUDU.

Sally left a lovely comment the other day, and asked about my continental knitting. Do you want to know the secret of my success? Crochet. Yes, crochet. (I wish I could say “patience” but alas, patience is not a virtue I’m blessed with!)

I briefly tried contiental knitting about a year ago, but couldn’t master the purl stitch either. Each stitch was a painfully slow process – even the knit stitch – and as the increase in knitting speed I’d hoped for just didn’t materialise I quickly went back to “English” knitting and put all thought of continental out of my mind.

Fast forward a year, and I picked up my crochet hook for the first time since I learned to knit. As I was working in the garden, the hens pootling around me, the similarities between crochet and continental knitting drifted into mind: I was tensioning the yarn using my left hand instead of my right; I was learning to manipulate a stationary peice of yarn with a moving needle rather than a stationary needle and moving yarn – hooking rather than throwing; and I was learning to keep my tension even over a range of different stitches. Added to which, the crochet stitches were nice and easy so I wasn’t being frustrated by the dreaded continental purl. For me, it was a great introduction to how I needed to learn to hold my yarn and use a needle.

I picked up my knitting needles a week later, and knit a swatch continental style. It certainly wasn’t perfect, but it was certainly much easier than before. I found that continental knitting has a real rhythm to it: as you knit, purl, knit, purl, the way you move your needle is like a conductor swishing his baton back and forth. “English” knitting doesn’t have this; it seems terribly stiff and un-organic after knitting continental style.

On the subject of tension – I feel I owe my successful tension to a bit of a happy coincidence, if I’m honest. Through knitting Anais as a first project, which has a roughly equal number of knit and purl stitches throughout, I learned and used both knit and purl stitches at the same time and so I didn’t become proficient in one over the other.

There are loads of different continental purl techniques, and there a gazillion tutorials out there. This tutorial depicts the method closest to the one that I have been using, though I hold my yarn much lower (I’d get cramp if I held it like her!).

Following quite a busy week working in Bournemouth, I spent last week at home with the Ladies – Bertha, Bridget, Pidgeon and Princess Layer – and my furboys – Howard and Fuzz.

The weather hasn’t been great here, so we spent lots of time indoors, knitting…

A little bit of dust-bathing, when the weather allowed…

…and a whole lot of napping when it didn’t!