Thursday 21 January 2010

Project 365 8-14

Yay, project365 is still going! Not a day missed so far :)

008/365
Jan 08

I was trying to get a picture of something else in the room, and put the camera down after I'd finished. As I took a step back, I realised that this actually made a better picture than the one I'd just taken. So I grabbed my smaller camera and took this picture instead. :)

009/365 More Snow!
Jan 09

This was the last big snowfall round here. We got an inch overnight.

010/365 Zen
Jan 10

This is a little decorative thing the bf set up. I changed the colours in Photoshop to sepia-ise it.

011/365 Sky
Jan 11

This was the first day that the clouds went away, and the snow started melting. The snow was really pretty, and I have to say snow is my favourite weather, but it's not very practical for living daily life in. Especially since with the slightest bit of snow, everything in Britain seems to grind to a halt. So this little bit of blue sky was very welcome.

012/365 New Glasses!
Jan 12

New glasses! I mentioned them in my last post. I got them on a Tuesday, so it seemed appropriate for self portrait Tuesday to take a picture of myself in them! I'm not so sure I like this picture, but this project is at least forcing myself to look at myself and be honest about what I look like. Which can only be a good thing, right?

013/365 Devil Dog
Jan 13

There has to be a picture of Tupac! :D Here he is, messing up the new throw that we got for the sofa. Anything new, he has to cover in his hair. You know, just in case we start thinking it's ours or something ;)

014/365 Simple
Jan 14

This was a fortuitous arranging of things on the table. I just looked at the table, and the things were like this, so I grabbed my camera :)

I think I'm getting a bit better at grabbing photo opportunities by doing this project. I hadn't realised that quite a few of them this week had been just taking pictures of things that were already there, instead of having to arrange a shot. I've noticed some themes coming out of this project already, it'll be interesting to see how it goes on.

IntSweMoDo Sweater #1 Completed!!

I completed my first sweater of the year the other day!

019/365 The Librarian Look

Another Pic Of The Sweater

The pattern is the February Fitted Pullover by Amy Herzog, available on ravelry here.
It's based on the February Lady Sweater, which if you're on Ravelry, you'll have seen went totally viral as soon as it came up. I made one of those myself in purple, and I totally love it, so when I saw the pullover version come up, I had to put it in my queue.

I bought the yarn last year off of ebay. As soon as I saw the colour I knew it would look great in this pattern (it's Woolcraft Aran yarn, BTW.) It comes in 400g balls (875yards/800m), and I used nearly a whole ball making this sweater. I had a tiny little ball left at the end. I had bought two balls of it, just in case, so now I need to find something else to make using the other ball! :D

I saved the actual knitting of this sweater till after the new year, becauase I wanted it to be part of my IntSweMoDo2010 project. It's my first sweater out of (hopefully!) at least 12 this year. It knit up very fast, and the pattern was very easy to follow. I had to do a bit of thinking around the shoulder and neck area to keep the lace pattern going, but it wasn't too hard to figure out, actually.

The top photo is actually one of my project365 photos as well as one of my photos for self portrait Tuesday, and 52 weeks of self portraits! I'm such a multi-tasker ;)

I really like this sweater. I think it looks very cute, and with the shirt underneath, it's really warm. Just right for this weather, lol!

Oh, and the top picture also shows my new glasses! I decided to get my eyes tested since my right eye was really getting quite blurry. Turns out I have an astigmatism in that eye, so it's a funny shape, and that's why my vision in that eye is blurry. The left eye is nearly perfect, it's practically plain glass in that side! But it's great being able to see without squinting and straining my left eye. I was getting headaches from the strain of it trying to compensate, and it's fantastic not to have had any headaches for the past week or so! I can play my DS again, yay!!!

Saturday 9 January 2010

Project 365 1-7

Well, I started doing project 365 on New Years Day, which is where you take a picture every day for an entire year. I tried it before and only lasted for just over a month, I think, so hopefully this time I'll manage more. I've got a flickr set with all my photos here, and I'll post them here with a short description. To be honest, I think it'll be a bit easier this time around, because I went to a digital photography class last year, and I understand a bit more about cameras now. I can experiment with different settings on those days when inspiration is a bit harder to come by, and generally try different things out. So here's my first week of photos.

001/365 Shiny
Jan 01

This is some tinsel really close up. I wanted something festive but not christmas-y, and the light was shining really nicely off of this tinsel. I have two standing lamps in my living room, and always wrap tinsel around the stands at Christmas time so the light shines directly down onto it, and it looks all pretty and stuff :)

002/365 Tupac In The Falling Snow
Jan 02

This is my dog Tupac in the back garden while snow is falling. I think he's a bit confused here. He really likes to jump around in the snow, but hates it when rain or snow is falling onto him. I'll try not to make this a 365 of Tupac pictures, but he does look cute :)

003/365 Cat Washing In The Snow
Jan 03

A cat washing in the middle of the road. In the snow. This cat wasn't budging at all. This was his bit of snow and he was staying there till he'd finished doing what he was doing!!

004/365 Running In The Snow
Jan 04

This is Tupac in his more normal "snow mode". Running up and down the garden being completely mad!

005/365 Self Portrait
Jan 05

Self portrait :) I'm trying to incorporate other projects into my 365. This is part of self-portrait Tuesday (there used to be a blog for that, but I think it's just a flickr group now, the blog is gone), and "52 weeks of self portraits"

006/365 Playing With Light
Jan 06

This is my favourite so far. I was experimenting with longer shutter speeds in the dark. This is a fibre-optic lighty uppy thing from the pound shop that changes colour.

007/365 Compare and Contrast
Jan 07

And number 7! I've noticed recently a whole lot of stupid notices and stuff on packaging. Like how to open a box, for example. Not kidding! The photo's on my flickr stream here. These are two Ariel bottles with apparantly different measurements of liquid inside. The older one on the left has 666ml of liquid, the newer one on the right has 667. Where did the extra ml come from? Is it even in the bottle, or are Ariel just pandering to somebody who complained? Anyway, I thought it was mildly amusing. I've decided to make a whole other flickr set for every stupid packaging label I see from now on. Sadly, I think it's going to fill up kinda fast...

So the first week of my 365 project went OK. I'm still motivated, and still have plenty of ideas. I think incorporating other projects like the self portrait thing will make it easier by adding a bit of structure.

Oh, and I've noticed quite a lot of people are doing project365 this year in the blogs I read. If you're doing one, let me know so I can come look at your photos!!

Monday 4 January 2010

The Obligatory New Year's Resolutions Post

Well, it's that time of year again, when we all start to think about what we want to acheive in the coming year, and when new goals and resolutions are born :) Some die pretty quickly (last year's quest to lose weight? Yeah, not so much!) but I still feel obliged to make these goals. I figure in the pursuit of them, something will happen that will be good. I'll at least be a little closer to what I wanted to achieve.

Last year I resolved to learn to knit colourwork, and I did. I can now do stranded knitting and double knitting. I didn't do as much of it as I thought I would at the beginning of the year, and that first fair isle sweater is still some way off, but I'm happy with what I did manage to achieve.

This year, I've joined the IntSweMoDo2010 group on Ravelry, which has the goal of making 12 sweaters in 2010 (InstSweMoDo stands for International Sweater a Month Dodecathon). So that's the first goal, to knit or crochet 12 sweaters. I think that should be do-able, so long as I don't have a big knitting flump in the summer like last year.

Secondly, I want to knit my way through all the socks in the book Favorite Socks (rav link) This one is just me, no group behind it, I just love all those patterns so much! This one is probably do-able, but I'm not sure about it all being done in a year. But hey, even if I only make a few, I'll still have some pretty cool socks!

That's it for the knitting goals. There's the usual lose weight, get fit, dance more type of resolutions. The bf's giving up smoking, so that should be fun over the next few days!!

Oh, and I also want to do project 365 this year, and take a photo every day for a year. I've managed the three days so far, go me!! (I'll do a seperate post for that) I've joined the project 365 flickr group, and the project 365 ers group on ravelry, so hopefully that should keep me motivated.

So I'm definitely going to be busy over the next year! It'll be interesting to see how far I get with each of these goals!

Saturday 2 January 2010

Happy New Year!!!!!

I hope you all had a wonderful time over the holidays!

My Christmas was very nice. On Christmas Day we had the bf's family over. That was good, it meant everyone was there all at the one time, the living room was stuffed full of people! The bf had a cold so I had to make the dinner "so he wouldn't spread his germs" :D I got him to stand behind me and tell me what to do though - he's totally the chef round here, not me! But I made roast beef and potatoes with onions and mustard, and it all went well, and tasted pretty good, if I do say so myself!

I got lots of lovely things for Christmas. I got two games for my DS - Professor Layton and pandora's Box, and Chrono Trigger. I really enjoyed the last Professor Layton game that I got last year, and I really like old style RPGs like Chrono Trigger. I also ordered Harvest Moon - Island of Happiness with some money I got for Christmas :)

I got two bellydance belts:




and I also got lots of warm things to snuggle up in, which turned out to be just the thing I needed in this weather! I got pyjamas, slippers that look like bunnies, and a slanket!! I am now officially a slanket owner! ;)

Those turned out to be doubly useful since I caught the bf's cold just after Christmas. I spend most of the time between Christmas and New Year sniffling and feeling sorry for myself. Honestly, it was such a bad cold! I went totally man-flu on my bf and moaned at him the entire time. Poor him! I spend the actual New Year's night in my bed, because my nose would not stop running, and I just felt awful. So I texted everyone early, switched my phone off and went to sleep. I woke up for a while when some fireworks went off, but there weren't as many this year as last year. The snow must have been too much!

Speaking of which, we got another two inches here overnight!! This is what it was like at my parents on Boxing Day:

My Parents' Garden, Boxing Day

and this is it here now:

My garden, Jan 2nd

I'm feeling a lot better now, whatever bug it was seems to have pretty much sorted itself out, and I actually feel human again, if a little sniffy and coughy. But I can't tell you how great it feels to be able to breathe out of my nose again!! Such a little thing, but it makes so much of a difference!



I hope 2010 is a great year for everyone out there! Happy New Year!!