Older not wiser.

Tulips, knitting and cake. Good times.

Thanks for all the birthday love on Facebook and Twitter!  Yes indeed, I had a birthday yesterday and there were presents, cake, artisan cocktails, fun – and the yummiest steak frites ever! A great day.

I like to bake little birthday cakes for my peeps (including moi), just enough to celebrate but not enough to have masses of cake leftover.  I know that cake looks massive but it’s really only 6″ across.  It’s chocoloate cake, filled with raspberry/kirsch and iced with chocolate ganache.  All chocolate is Green and Black bittersweet organic so this cake is not too sweet yet super yum!  And yes, it will be my breakfast today since I’m working out with my trainer later.

The Tulip Watch 2013 continues with the three Claudias you see in the bottom picture.  One is a bit past it today but the other two are looking good.  The front tulips are doing F-all flowerwise at present so we won’t mention them.

Craftwise I’m more than halfway done with the back of my self styled alpaca boucle Poodle Sweater.  It’s easy to knit this up when watching movies so I hope to make a bit of progress every day.  The only downside I can see is that an alpaca sweater with the current temperatures will cause me to spontaneously combust.  Still, we’ll probably get a cooling trend sometime.

I also finished sewing up a knit dress that I should love but don’t.  I’ll force myself to take pics and share, just not today.  It’s too annoying really.  I’m just going to have to ignore it for a bit.

Thanks again for the lovely wishes! xoxo

Oodles of poodles

Can you see how soft and fluffy this is?

For some reason everything I’m interested in making these days is falling into the “comfy/cozy” category.  I wonder if that means anything?  Probably not, I’m not that self aware or introspective.  Really.

What you see in all it’s creamy poodle glory is the beginnings of the back of the Poodle Sweater.  I’m imagining it as oversized and comfy with drop sleeves and a loose turtleneck or small cowl.  The yarn is Drops Alpaca Boucle and feels like heaven!  Boucle can be a bitch with which to knit because of those loops, but I’m using a nice slippery, pretty sharp metal needle.  Not so bad and it’s at aran gauge so it’ll go fairly quickly, and I’m knitting it flat since it’s going to be a bit bulky.  Easier to handle in pieces.

The pattern in one I’m making up as I go, using a few calculations of course.  I’m not a moron.  Well I can be if one remembers me losing the last ball of yarn on my previous sweater make, frogging and then finding it…moron that.  This time the yarn is all corralled up in a big bag that is in a special place, no wayward balls please (that’ll make a good google hit).

Now I’m off to work and cold places.  I’m cold already thinking about my non-tropical layovers…