April 13th, 2020

 Hi and so sorry about the previous post.  Blogger has not been allowing me to add photos and after a bit of research today, I could see an option to go back to the old style and so I did.  I googled what was happening and seems quite a few people have had the same problem so it is not just me.

We are still in lockdown like most countries and I am working from home 4 days out of 5 which I am pleased about but is rather odd.  It is convenient at the moment too because my dog Tammie has been really unwell.

I took her to emergency vet on Sunday and he said that Tammie may lose her eye because she has an ulcer on her cornea and the cataract is quite bad too.  So we were sent away with eye drops for her and had to go back on Thursday with the decision whether we want to go ahead with Tammie either having the eye removed or a cornea operation.  On Thursday morning I took her back to the vet and then I went to work which is next door.  I was expecting a call to say she has not passed the test for  the anaesthetic but he said that the ulcer in the cornea is not as deep as he thought.  So we have got to go back to the vet on Tuesday evening to see what the next stage is.

I must say that it has taken Tammie 2 days to get back to some energy levels and then the past day she has been a bit more like herself.  We are hand feeding her and having to make sure she doesn't walk into anything.  She doesn't like going out much now because of the sun so we are waiting till quite late to take her for a short walk.

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I got a lovely surprise on Thursday when I got back from work and the vets, at first Frank gave me a parcel that had loads of lovely Merino fibre and then he gave me another parcel which was a big big excitement like I was a kid.

An Ashford E-spinner 3 and I have used it twice so far.  It was like winning the lottery and it is not even my birthday yet.  

We waited till Good Friday to set it up and luckily, it was already set up so I was straight onto trying it out.

Just as I expected, you have to learn all over again to spin and I was spinning thick and thin at first.  Today I intend to have another go at it and will hopefully, spin a bit finer.

I got so use to spinning on my drop spindle and spinning a thinner yarn and it is true, you have to learn a whole new way of spinning on an E-spinner or even a normal spinning wheel.

I will show you what I spun first on the e-spinner.

This was what I spin, it is 50g of Welsh black natural fleece and 50g of Masham White.  As you can see it is thick and thin but I was getting the hang of it eventually.

It is so quick now to spin fibre, I think I will get through what I have pretty quickly and I am now thinking what I can make with it all.

I do like the idea of knitting a pure wool blanket with various colours and knitted in strips.  I think a long term project would be better because I have enough hats and socks to last a long time.

We will see.....watch this space.

This is also some handspun that I did on the drop spindle before I was gifted the E-spinner.  It is 50g of Suffolk grey and Dorset Horn which is a rare breed.  This is definitely going to be part of a blanket or a pair of fingerless gloves.

I will keep on with my drop spindle, I love doing it and could take it to work with me because it is so portable to use.

That is, if we ever get back to normal in this crazy world right now.

And finally, I finished a pair of socks

These are Lemino Socks on Ravelry and I knitted them with Novita Nalle sock yarn.  The pattern was quite easy to remember after about 3 repeats and was glad to get them off the needles to be honest.  They are going to be for a relative at Christmas and I am to knit a pair of socks once a month.

I hope everyone is doing ok, I haven't spoke much about Covid-19 because it is upsetting to even think about what my family and friends are going through.  I work at a hospital and am in the Administration side so I am not front line but I dread to think what my colleagues are going through.

Stay safe everyone.

April 4th, 2020

I am now out of isolating and it has been a long 2 weeks for me.  Even now, we still cannot go out unless absolutely necessary so we stick to our local shops for groceries and walk the dog at the same time.  At most we are only out for about 20 minutes.  The roads are still quiet of traffic and people and when you see on the BBC News video's of Oxford Street, London is deserted, it seems so strange.  Only food shops are open in most areas of the UK and you have to queue up for hours at a Supermarket so we would rather queue a short time at our local shops rather than go to a big supermarket.

It is a glorious sunny day today, I am going to struggle getting up at 6 am from Monday for work having spent the last 2 weeks rising out of bed at about 8.30am.  I am kind of hoping I can work from home after Monday so I don't have to use public transport.  

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I have finished my hand spun that I showed off last time and am so happy with the outcome.  My partner said it is really warm and is looking forward to wearing it in the winter.  

Blogger has changed their format on writing new posts and I have tried several times to add my photos but with no luck, it is really annoying when you get use to a system and then it is changed without notification.