is being posted today due to my spending the whole day cleaning out the garage, doing dishes and then going to the gym in the evening because I didn't have time during the rest of the day and being totally exhausted by the end of it all.

In fact I'm still a bit sleepy to tell the truth (I should be hanging out the laundry right now).

The garage cleaning is important as I'm hoping to get everything arranged so that I can actually use the floor loom I bought second hand two years ago. Can you believe I still haven't had a chance to use it? We moved interstate soon after I bought it and it's been stored ever since.

So far I've managed to destash 2/3 of my yarn to people who are actually going to use it and I've put my spinning and felt making stash into the empty plastic tubs that no longer had any yarn in them. The next step is to clear out any craft crap and kitchen stuff that is no longer wanted and get Miss Brittany's boxes into her bedroom so she can sort out what she doesn't want any more. Then I'll arrange my cupboards and get everything put away. Hopefully after that there will be room to bring out the loom so I can retie the treadles, get a new reed in and start using up what's left of the stash while learning to weave all sorts of cool techniques :). I love weaving but I was only just beginning to learn before the move so I'm still very much a beginner two years later.

But you're probably here to read more about all the cool stuff I made while I've been not-blogging...

This first scarf is quite special deranged.

A closeup:

I call this the "Party Scarf", after the yarn that I used to knit it.

A few years ago there was a sudden new craze of spinning yarns with "stuff" in them. To be honest, a lot of the yarns I was seeing back then weren't really going to stand up to actually being used. I decided to prove (to myself) that it was possible to create a yarn with lots of deranged stuff in it that could also stand up to the wear and tear of being handled. "Party Yarn" was the result, and it led to my writing this tutorial. If you don't spin you can make a thread with all the bits and pieces in it and just knit it along with your main commercial yarn if you want to. It's totally impractical and a lot of fun :) (BTW, just ignore that bit in the tutorial that says "picture goes here". I need to find an ftp program that will work on my crappy old computer so I can update the website).

I also made a skinny scarf out of a couple of balls of Cleckheaton Snowflake. I wanted to destash the yarn but Brittany liked it. It's 2 inches wide, garter stitch all the way until the yarn ran out.

I finished my teneriffe lace doily that I first mentioned here.

It's the first piece of complicated teneriffe lace that I've made and I really think it turned out well. I need more practice making up crocheted edgings though. I'd have liked to have made this one a bit more complex in the crochet part.

I crocheted myself another doily too. I do love making doilies :)
This is from a vintage book from the 1940's called the Complete Book of Crochet by Elizabeth L Mathieson. The pattern has the very unromantic name of "Doily No. 7690". I need to block it properly but here it is in it's not-blocked-very-well state.

I used a single ball of DMC Cebelia Cotton size 30 and a 1.25mm crochet hook to get gauge. Considering I'm not that great at crochet I'm extremely pleased with it.

Even though the doilies are very pretty, I think my favourite project was this next one. I made two but I'm waiting on a photo of the other one because I gave it to my brother and forgot to take a pic.

What could be better than an army of cuddly evil Daleks? :)

The pattern is Extermiknit from Entropyhouse and I knit them using Aussie 8 ply weight wools (dk weight) and 3.2mm needles. I love this pattern. It's really well written and they look just like the real thing. Only cuddly :)

Well that's it for my current crop of finished projects. I'm off to hang up the laundry and get another load going in case it decides to rain again!