The Woolly Adventures of a Knitting Kitty

Thursday, 15 October 2020

Matchy Matchy

I had to pop in to share my new project bag with you. I bought it from Mrs Moog after seeing some of her posts on Instagram. She not only sews some absolutely beautiful bags, but she is also a very talented artist. The Sweet Williams flower print fabric was created from one of her paintings (after quite a few technical steps) and I’m in awe! Lesley produced these gorgeous limited edition bags as her contribution to the FlowerPowerFund which raises money for Marie Curie.

I have the perfect project ready to start as well! I had bought a set of mini skeins back in the summer, dyed by Rusty Ferret Yarn. These minis were also dyed to raise money for the FlowerPowerFund and the colours were inspired by Sweet Williams too. Don't they go together so well? Matchy matchy wins the day! If you would like to buy one of these bags, there will be another pre-order tomorrow (Friday 16th October) at 7pm (GMT +1) if you go to Mrs Moog's Etsy shop. Not only will you have a very pretty project bag but you will also have done something amazing for Marie Curie UK, who do a wonderful job supporting people with a terminal illness. xxx

Friday, 9 October 2020

Fibre 4 Fibres Giveaway preview 28

Another week, another prize! It seems to get around to Friday pretty fast these days. It's another scheduled post because when this goes live, I'll be back at the hospital having more chemo. Fingers crossed that I don't have all the drama like last time! I cannot believe the total raised so far. Last week's raffle brought the total to £6416. It makes me feel incredibly humble that people donate to support my fundraising. Myositis UK is a very small charity and relies 100% on fundraisers like me to get income to fund research. So every pound donated is so important. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

This week's prize has an autumnal feel to it. The prize includes a beautiful toadstool bag with a sweet little toadstool glass bead which has been expertly stitched and donated by Ann, who is Busy Pottering on Instagram. Ann also donated the toadstool stitchmarkers. Along with that there are two skeins of Blue Faced Leicester and Gotland yarn which have been donated by The Knitting Swede. Tanja has stopped dyeing yarn now to concentrate on designing, so this is one of the last chances you will have to get hold of some of her gorgeous skeins. There is a skein of Briar Rose 'Fourth of July' 100% merino yarn in bright autumnal shades, and two balls of Rowan Purelife Chunky yarn. The Crafty Bird has donated a very fluffy pompom that can be attached to a knitted or crocheted hat, and lastly my friend Alison (who also has myositis) has donated a beautiful needle felted hare which can either be used as a card or framed. Alison has a shop selling her work which you can find here. Thank you so much to everyone who has generously donated a prize.

I'm sure that you know the score by now, but I'll tell you how to enter anyway! You have a chance to win all these gorgeous prizes for a minimum donation of £2 - less than the price of a cup of coffee! Are you tempted to try your luck? Here's everything you need to know. This giveaway will run this coming Sunday 11th October, closing at 23:55. To enter, go to my JustGiving page here and buy your virtual raffle tickets by donating £2 or more. £2 gets you 2 tickets, £3 gets you 3 tickets, £5 gets you 5 tickets and so on. The more you donate, the greater your chance of winning. You will need to leave your Instagram or Ravelry name, or tick the box to share your details with me when you make your donation, so that I can contact you if you are the winner. This is really important as I have no way of knowing who you are otherwise. Each week, I still get donations where no name or email is left, so if that person's number comes up in the random number generator, I have no idea who it is! All your donations go the Myositis UK to help fund research into this incurable muscle disease, so thank you from the bottom of my heart for all your support. Every single donation is important. My fundraising efforts even got a mention in their latest news update, and that's thanks to you! Let's see how much we can raise this weekend! xxx

Thursday, 8 October 2020

Introducing Softie

Stylecraft has released a new chunky yarn and as soon as I saw it posted on social media this week, I knew that I needed some! It's called Softie and it's 80% premium acrylic and 20% wool. It currently comes in 6 shades and I asked for some of each colour, because - well, what can I say? I'm a greedy guts when it comes to yarn and it was too hard to choose! It comes in 100g balls and there's 170m of yarn in a ball. It retails at £3.95 a ball. Take a look!

I knew exactly what I wanted to knit - a cosy striped jumper with a high neck to snuggle inside. I've made a start and have just separated the sleeves from the body. I plan to match up the colours of the stripes on both the body and sleeves. It's absolutely lovely to knit with and it would make great accessories too for keeping out the cold this winter. Which colour do you like the best? xxx

Friday, 2 October 2020

Fibre 4 Fibres Giveaway preview 27

My goodness, I can't believe another week has gone by and it's Friday already (AND October too! How did that happen?) I have been struggling with 'brain fog' this week and haven't really been able to concentrate on anything. I have read about something called 'chemo brain' and so I'm putting my lack of focus down to that. I'm finally feeling more with it thank goodness and am looking forward to a productive weekend of crafting. My chemo infusion last week was full of drama. When I told the doctor that I'd had a temperature the previous weekend (following the infusion of bone protection), they looked again at my blood test results and saw that one of my inflammatory markers was sky high. Apparently it can be high if you have COVID so I was whisked into isolation while they repeated my blood tests. Thankfully the marker had gone down, so I was able to have the infusion. Because I was waiting around for the results of the blood tests, I managed to get quite a bit of my chemo sock knitted. I've only got to knit down the foot and decrease for the toe and then I'm done!

This week's raffle prize is another riot of colour! And it should take my total to over £6000 which is amazing! Let me tell you about the prize! The prize includes a complete set of Scheepjes mini balls of Stone Washed and River Washed yarns - that's 56 balls of gorgeousness! I have been very reluctant to say goodbye to this box of yarny sweeties, I can tell you! There is a beautiful floral and nature project bag and lavender bag which have been sewn and donated by SarahJoMakes, 6 balls of Stylecraft Batik and Batik Elements yarn which have been donated by HandKnittedThings and ElphynRose, a fun sticker and postcard donated by LanaBouShop and some pretty stitchmarkers made and donated by Scarlet Stitchcraft. Thank you so much to everyone who donated a prize.

I'm sure that you know the score by now, but I'll tell you how to enter anyway! You have a chance to win all these gorgeous prizes for a minimum donation of £2 - less than the price of a cup of coffee! Are you tempted to try your luck? Here's everything you need to know. This giveaway will run this coming Sunday 4th October, closing at 23:55. To enter, go to my JustGiving page here and buy your virtual raffle tickets by donating £2 or more. £2 gets you 2 tickets, £3 gets you 3 tickets, £5 gets you 5 tickets and so on. The more you donate, the greater your chance of winning. You will need to leave your Instagram or Ravelry name, or tick the box to share your details with me when you make your donation, so that I can contact you if you are the winner. This is really important as I have no way of knowing who you are otherwise. Each week, I still get donations where no name or email is left, so if that person's number comes up in the random number generator*, I have no idea who it is! All your donations go the Myositis UK to help fund research into this incurable muscle disease, so thank you from the bottom of my heart for all your support. Every single donation is important. My fundraising efforts even got a mention in their latest news update, and that's thanks to you! Let's see how much we can raise this weekend! xxx

Friday, 25 September 2020

Fibre 4 Fibres Giveaway preview 26

By the time you read this, I will hopefully be hooked up to my next chemo infusion. I'm a little anxious about it all because I am hoping that the blood tests I had yesterday are going to be better than the last ones. I had an infusion of a bone protection drug last week, and oh my goodness, it didn't half make me feel poorly over the weekend. I was told that I might have 'mild flu-like symptoms' and they weren't wrong! I had a temperature of almost 40 degrees on Saturday and Sunday and felt like I'd been hit by a bus. Thankfully, on Monday, everything was back to normal again! I managed to get quite a bit of sock knitting done too, my chemo socks are progressing well and I've started the second one.

I can't tell you how thrilled I am with how my fundraising is going. I so appreciate every single donation that is made, and can't quite believe that in the next couple of weeks, all being well, the total should pass £6000. I have lots of prizes to give away, so even if I reach my £10,000 target, I will carry on with the raffles.

This week's raffle prize is all about colour. The prize includes a copy of Gradient Knits which has been donated by Search Press. To go with the book, I have tried to pick some gradient yarns, so that if you're the winner, you can have a go at some gradient knitting (or crochet!) There's a sock set of two 50g Opulence gradient yarn cakes from Knit Circus in the colourway Tropical Sunset, a set of five 20g miniskeins from Burrow and Soar, two balls of Mini Mochi 4 ply yarn, a Wee Sheeps yarn fade kit and a fun zipped project bag, both of which have been donated by Ruth and a pair of cute sheep progress keepers which have been donated by Hannah Daisy Crochet. Huge thanks to all the very kind prize donors.

I'm sure that you know the score by now, but I'll tell you how to enter anyway! You have a chance to win all these gorgeous prizes for a minimum donation of £2 - less than the price of a cup of coffee! Are you tempted to try your luck? Here's everything you need to know. This giveaway will run this coming Sunday 27th September, closing at 23:55. To enter, go to my JustGiving page here and buy your virtual raffle tickets by donating £2 or more. £2 gets you 2 tickets, £3 gets you 3 tickets, £5 gets you 5 tickets and so on. The more you donate, the greater your chance of winning. You will need to leave your Instagram or Ravelry name, or tick the box to share your details with me when you make your donation, so that I can contact you if you are the winner. This is really important as I have no way of knowing who you are otherwise. Each week, I still get donations where no name or email is left, so if that person's number comes up in the random number generator*, I have no idea who it is! All your donations go the Myositis UK to help fund research into this incurable muscle disease, so thank you from the bottom of my heart for all your support. Every single donation is important. My fundraising efforts even got a mention in their latest news update, and that's thanks to you! Let's see how much we can raise this weekend! How close to the next milestone of £6000 can we get?! xxx

* I thought I should explain how I give people numbers. Each week, I set up a new spreadsheet. Each £1 donation gets one line of the spreadsheet, so I fill in each row with a person's name. If you donated £5, you would have five rows. The spreadsheet is filled in in the order that the donations are made. As the admin of my Just Giving page, I can see all the donations with any message, email address and contact name etc that has been left (this is not all shown on the Just Giving page for anyone to view.) Then, once the raffle is over, I generate a random number using a generator on my phone, between 1 and whatever number is the last row of my spreadsheet that week. Once the number has been picked, I look at the spreadsheet to see whose name is in that particular row number.

Thursday, 24 September 2020

Six months on ...

When I wrote this blog post and this one back in March, I didn't expect, six months later, to still be having to stay at home, shielding. I know that officially, the government's shielding programme has been paused since August, because I'm still immunosuppressed and having chemo, my consultants have told me to carry on doing so. Apart from trips out to go to hospital appointments and blood tests, and more recently, to make use of the mobile post office van that comes to the village one morning a week, I haven't been out of the house at all. Six months, half a year - it sounds like such a long time. But I haven't sat at home feeling sorry for myself. I am quite happy with my own company, and I do have Flo of course to talk to! I have tried to fill my time with a variety of things. Knitting, crochet, reading, listening to audiobooks, sewing - just a few of the things I've done. More recently, I have been making a conscious effort to watch less television. It had got to the stage where the TV was on a lot of the time, more as background noise than actually paying attention to what was on. And believe me, if you've not experienced it, daytime TV is pretty grim! So I thought I'd celebrate the past 6 months with a few photos of happy things from each month. xxx

March 2020

Happy rainbow feet!