princessdeia

Instead of setting mini lists and deadlines this year, I thought I would focus on a larger list of things I want to this year. Jason and I have created a list of things we want to do in London (but for some reason we have never found the time).

1. Tea at the Ritz.
2. See Mousetrap.
3. See Avenue Q.
4. Lose another stone in weight.
5. Use my pedometer for 30 days.
6. Do the couch to 5k.
7. Do a charity run.
8. Start a new blog.
9. Design a layout for the new blog.
10. Create a new gallery for deeandjason.co.uk
11. Finish all the Sock(topus) Club 2009 socks by the deadline (28th Feb.).
12. Finish all the Knit Love sock within the year.
13. Compete and finish in the Ravelympic.
14. Knit another lace shawl.
15. Take mum to Paris.
16. Read all the Sookie Stackhouse books.
17. Read all the Vampire Diaries books
18. Read all the Adrian Mole books
19. Re-read the Harry Potter books (before the films are released).
20. Re-read the Twilight books (before Eclipse is released).

I was hoping to have 40 items on this list (to insure I did the 101 things in 1001 days), so it is still a work in progress.

Tags: 101things

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I have been having a few problems with my web server over the holiday period and as a result have been unable to blog about some of the amazing things that have been happening in chez princessdeia.

• Secret Santa present from Shobianx.
• Secret Santa socks from Thumblina.
• Mini Socks Swap from Seamstress.
• My Endpaper Mitts.
• New Socktopus Parcel.
• Progress on my Socktopods socks.
• Updates on my 101 list (Although I will be dealing with this soon).

Tags: admin, Swaps

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For me one of the best things about doing Secret Pal type swaps, is hunting out new or different gift ideas… recently I have been doing all this searching on etsy. The thing is I found all these wonderful tools I had to buy extra to treat myself. That is the best part of buying knitting gifts isn’t it?

Remember the wonderful sock knitting bag I got as part of the Sock Club parcel? It was made my Zigzag Stitches, I have been over using the bag and thought I could so with a larger version – but I also discovered they made matching mini DPN holders, so I contacted the seller and she made me a matching sheep set, she only had the blue fabric left – but who I am to complain it is almost Tiffany’s blue

The mini DPN holder is perfect, I have been working on the endpaper mitts this week, and I have had all the needles right there on hand for when I need them.

But why stop there… I found the amazing practical Stitch Saver from 5elementknitr and some pattern tamers (to keep track of your line in a pattern), made by Slipped stitch studios. She has some amazing tamers – I had to buy some Twilight themed version for one of my swapees.

Tags: etsy, gifts, Swaps

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I have been thinking a lot about my future lately, long term where I see myself, what I would like to do. I believe all creative people think about ways they can make money from their hobbies. However, I don’t really see how this could work for me. I could charge for my knitting, but is there enough call for bespoke knitting for me to live off? As much as I enjoy cooking, I don’t think I could charge people for my food. I have made (and charged) people for greeting cards/invites but there isn’t enough money in this for my to live off.

I am lucky, that I do get to be somewhat creative in “day job” but for the past year I have only really been doing this part-time and I would like to increase this next year, but I need to increase my portfolio.

Designing the Knit Nation website for Alice, made me realise there are a lot of creative people out there who all need websites/blogs creating or updating. So I have a proposal… A bartering service.

Here is the deal…
I am willing to offer my services in creating or re-designing someone’s website or blog. Whether it is a creating a new header, adding up a shop, or totalling creating a site.

In return, I am willing to trade services, it could be products that you sell, a lesson in a new technique (I would love to learn how to speak Spanish), or something you know longer need (I would love a sewing machine).

Interested? comment below.

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I am a little late posting this but I have been busy working on a few secret things. (More about one of those later). Last month was my birthday, who knew 35 would be such a memorable one.

As my birthday is on Halloween, the festivities always start the night before as we decorate the house, this year we were up until 1am blowing up balloons. Surprisingly I was up early the next morning. When Jason and I headed to Westfield for him to buy me a present (which is becoming a bit of a tradition), what I didn’t know was my mum and sister had also given him some money to buy me a present. So when I was picking which bag I wanted he encouraged me to buy the matching wallet, and then produced a card explaining everything. I nearly cried in the shop.

Too calm myself down we headed to the champagne bar.

Then we took a pause from the celebrating to watch the football in the pub, at one stage we looked into getting tickets to the game (as Liverpool were playing just down the road), but they were too expensive (over £150 each) so we settled for watching the game in the pub. I am glad we didn’t go as Liverpool had an awful game and lost.

Then we popped home for some more champagne and cake with my mum and sister. No baking this time (the cake was from Marks & Spencer), but this cake reminded my of the birthday cakes I had as a child.

There are numerous restaurants in London I dream of going to but without a doubt I have always wanted to go to Nobu, and my birthday seemed to be the ideal opportunity.

I tried to take photos of every course unfortunately I forgot about this starter so you will have to imagine what the oysters looked like, but you can view the rest of our meal here.

Now remember that secret project I was talking about – well you might have seen the advert in knitting magazines or seen the news on Ravelry but Alice and Cookie A are organising a major knitting event here in London next summer, and I was lucky enough to be asked to design their blog.

Tags: Birthday, Food, Knit Nation 2010

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After all the grief with the drunken wave on the first sock, it took only a few days to knit it’s partner. Finally, I was able to join the masses and have a pair of wollmeise socks.

I have also been knitting away on a pair of socks that are a secret present – as part of the SoSeSaSwa. I realised I haven’t done any swaps this year so to make up for it I have signed up for three Christmas swaps, a sock kit, knitting a sock and a mini tree decoration.

Tags: Finished Project, Scadenza, Socks, socktopusclub2009, Wollmeise

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Sock knitters all know October means Socktoberfest! This year is no different, my aim this year is to try and finish all the socks I have on the needles and take part in the TTL Mystery Sock. Not too big a task, I was working on August’s Sock Club, and just had to make a partner for my p/hop sock. However, I forgot that the next instalment of the Sock Club was due (I will post about that soon – it is truly an amazing package), so of course I had to cast that on!

Then I hit a snag with the Scadenza, one of the joys of this pattern is the continuity of the pattern, the waves are carried from the toe to cuff, then new waves are started on the base of the foot carried over the heel and onto the leg. When I joined the back and front instead of pretty waves, I ended up with some lovely waves and one rough. Jason actually named it the drunk wave!

So I frogged the pattern, started again, then I notice I have dropped a stitch whilst frogging, so had to rip it back again. Third attempt, the drunk line once again appeared!

So this time I sat down with a pen and paper and drew the pattern as I saw it should be, realising I had no idea what I was doing, I scanned the chart and got to work in Photoshop linking the charts from the front and back. After about a week of this I discovered the pattern was meant to look like this, with the drunk wave.

Of course I was not content with this idea, when back to photoshop and eventually re-drew the chart on graph paper to insure I had all sober waves. So my sixth attempt at the pattern with the help of photoshop, pen and paper and had one completely lovely sock.

Tags: Scadenza, Socks, socktoberfest, socktopusclub2009, WIP, Wollmeise

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Every September Macmillan organise the World’s Largest Coffee Morning encouraging people to donate £1 whilst having their elevenses. This year they teamed up with The Knitter to do something a little different. They wanted people to knit a comfort square which could then be turned into a blanket.

So last week Hattie and Alice organised a coffee evening at Socktopus, only we drunk coke, ate Vietnamese food and jelly belly beans, and I made these lovely little squares.

The pattern for the first two are on the Macmillan site, the third I made up.

It is not too late to get involved the deadline for square is the 9th October, or you can donate some money via the button on the sidebar. If you do donate include your Ravelry name, as they are having a raffle. As for the prize Alice has kindly donated a skein of Woolmiese (the scrummy one from this months sock club)  for one lucky donor.

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I saw this on the Pop Candy blog, we all dream of one day writing a novel but have you ever wander what it would be called or even what the cover would look like. I hadn’t until I saw this and now I have a pen name and my novel title – I just been the plot to go with it!

Meme details here and the gallery of other novels is here (some of them are amazing).

Tags: meme

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5. Create a Home Organisation System.
Over the last few weeks, I have completely organised our household, I have a nice folder with all my cleaning plans, useful information (size of the windows, tables, beds) for when I am shopping, and of course all those technical manuals! The de-cluttering is still going along slowly, it is amazing how much stuff one can accumulate.

The same website also runs a 16 week plan to get your house and family ready for the holiday season and it starts next month – which is pretty scary! But I am planning on adapting the plan to get us ready.

7. Boost My Income by £1000.
After carrying on with the advice from the moneysavingexpert website, I also started claiming back money I was owed – fuel surcharges from our recent trips to America and some bank charges, which sent the total over the £1000 mark. I think I am going to try and earn an extra £500 by the end of the year.

10. Book (or go) on a holiday in the sun!
Finally, we have got around to sorting out our summer holiday! It has been over two years since I have been near a beach and 15 months since our last week away, so next month we are off to Miami.

16. Drink a two litres of water a day for a month.
I have up coffee 8 weeks ago (yes I am counting the days), and cut down on all sugary drinks, since then all I have left to drink is herbal teas and water, as a result I have found it incredible easy to alter my routine to include 8 or more glasses of water a day.

20. Complete 5 random acts of kindness (Knitting related via the Ravelry board).
I have always loved the idea of RAK, this board on ravelry is similifies the process of brighting someone’s day. The added bonus is you don’t need to spend loads of money. The lovely ladies on the boards are looking for all sorts of things, and I managed to de-clutter a lot of my knitting supplies,  clearing out old knitting magazine, the freebies from the magazine that have never opened, some old acrylic yarn I was given and never used.

It is a board everyone should check out for the price of a postage stamp you can make somes day.

Tags: 101things

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