I have a bike / I am a wuss

Recently, I bought a bike.



I got it second-hand from The Bike Station, an organization that refurbishes old bikes and sells them at discounted prices. They only sell adult bikes on Saturdays, so after I heard about them I wandered down one weekend, only to find that they had already sold out for the day. They warned me to come early, so a few weeks later I showed up an hour before they opened and shivered with other prospective cheap bike owners until they finally opened the doors. I ended up being 12th in line, and by 10:30 there was a long line of people behind me.

Once inside, I stared at the array of about 40 bikes of all shapes and sizes, ranging in price from £45 to £120, unsure where to begin. After trying a few, I decided on the purple one, not just because it's purple, although that is why it caught my eye. ;)



Edinburgh has lots of bike paths. More commonly called cycle paths here, but whenever I say that people seem to think I'm saying "psychopaths" because of my accent. True story.

Anyway, I went out exploring on a bike path by the river the other day.



I find it fascinating that unlike those of many major European cities, Edinburgh's city centre isn't located on its river. Cycling by the Water of Leith, I sort of felt like I was in the forest at times.



Bike paths are awesome because I'm sort of wimpy when it comes to cycling in traffic. This is nothing new, and I stuck to bike paths / quiet streets in Ottawa whenever I could; however I'm even wimpier when faced with traffic driving on the left. As a pedestrian, I've gotten used to dealing with wrong-side traffic by now, but since I don't drive a car I haven't had to contend with being on the actual road until now.

It's nervewracking. Something I hadn't even considered before getting on the bike was that when cycling on the left, one must shoulder-check over the right shoulder, rather than the left. After years of checking automatically over my left shoulder, teaching my neck to do it the other way is harder than I thought it would be.

Moreover, there are roundabouts. Oh, roundabouts. Apparently they are safer and more efficient than other kinds of intersections, but because I'm not familiar with them yet, they scare me. I haven't cycled around one yet because I'm freaking terrified. This is something I have to get over, but man. So much fear. My boyfriend drew me a helpful diagram about which lane to be in for which exit, and it's great, but I still haven't gone out and tried it. One day. For now, I'm sticking to the paths.

Halloween/Samhuinn in Edinburgh

Let's start this NaBloPoMo with some pyrotechnics! That's what I like to hear.



Last night, the Beltane Fire Society put on a show through the streets of Edinburgh to represent the arrival of winter. As we waited for the parade to come through, I was suprised and bemused to see it preceded by a zombie walk - I'm a little annoyed I didn't have the presence of mind to take some video as a gory zombie walked towards me mumbling "Staaaarbuuuucks" and grabbing at my chai latte. Priceless.


St. Giles' Cathedral looking spooky

The Samhuinn parade itself was impressive. It started on Castle Hill and wound down to the big show at West Parliament Square in the shadow of St. Giles. Body paint, costumes, puppetry, dancing, drumming, and, of course, fire pervaded the scene. Although I'm not very familiar with the mythology of Samhuinn, and I couldn't always follow the story or identify the characters, it was really fun to watch.


Fiery crowns



Apologies for the quality of the photos - they are all screen captures from the mediocre video I took. Here are some of my favourite moments, and you can see all of them here.


A red character accosts my boyfriend with a mysterious note.


The denizens of summer march to the oompa loompa theme

What did you do for Halloween?

It's nearly November

There's a beautiful bush in the shared garden of our building that I keep trying to photograph.



Today it was really windy and most of my attempts came out blurry, but I caught the colour. Just thought I'd share.

I'm going to be participating in this month's blog posting event of doom, occasionally known as NaBloPoMo, traditionally done in November, apparently all year round as well; I don't know if I'll actually register on their site, but will see. When I did it last year, I learned just how bad I am at planning, so this year I'm going to make an effort to come up with stuff to post about a few days in advance so I don't get stuck. That may fail. Anyway, should be fun. Anyone else doing NaBloPoMo this November?

details

In a fit of housekeeping, I've finally changed the blog url to match its title, neglecting to find some way of redirecting from the old url. Whoops. Ah well, I'll try to be findable.

New url is http://goodenoughknits.blogspot.com.

I've also changed my ravelry username, so don't be alarmed if you have a mysterious new friend called notpanicking. It's only me! The Crudmonkey handle had been following me around since grade 7, and it was time for something a little more representative of me. (dontpanic was taken).

Meanwhile, I went on a long walk about town the other day, and took lots of pictures. I was focused on details - there are lots of interesting curlicues, ironwork, windows and doors. Here's what came of the outing.



It's been awhile since I went out solely for the purpose of photography, and I should do it more often. I feel like I'll never run out of details to capture in this city, even if I traverse the same old streets.

gift knitting and job hunting

I don't have much to show for my efforts these days. I have gift-knitting projects on the go that I'm keeping quiet for now, and although I'm applying to everything even vaguely related to my field, I don't have a job to show for it yet. The job hunt is getting me down! Other than being jobless, my life is pretty damn sweet right now, so I'm trying to be enthusiastic about the awesome bits.

Today I started taking advantage of my free time to start something I've been meaning to do for ages.



(That's Marnie MacLean's tutorial about using Excel to chart colourwork open in one window)

I'm envisioning some fingerless mitts. Will anything come of this? Who knows, but for now it's a good personal challenge.

Does sock yarn count?

I'm usually pretty good about buying yarn with specific projects in mind so that it doesn't languish unused and unloved for ages. I take this approach to limit my yarn buying because I don't have the time, money, or space for a big stash. Sock yarn poses a problem, though. It has been said that sock yarn stash doesn't really count as stash. I mean, each 100g skein is enough for a whole project, be it a pair of socks or a lacy shawlette - and I have enough of both in my queue to use up twice or three times my current sock yarn stash. It's different from sweater stash, which by necessity comprises at least a few skeins of yarn per sweater in potentia and takes up a whole lot more space. (That's my story and I'm sticking to it.) Not that having a stash is a bad thing, it's just that I don't want to have an extensive one right now.

On that note, look what I got! This past weekend I trekked out to the Morningside Makers' Market and spent a while squishing yarn at the Yarn Yard table. I was mesmorized by the pretty colours and took ages to decide on one to purchase, but finally decided on this one.



This is Cairn, 80% merino, 20% nylon. There are green streaks through the dark blue that aren't showing up well in the photo. Despite blue being one of my favourite colours, I haven't knit anything blue in a while, so I thought it was time for more bluish yarn.

I have no idea what I'll make with it, but I'm not letting that bother me. It's sock yarn, after all. I can always make socks.

Swap day 7: the last day :(

Today I'll show off the last of the lovely gifts from Stephcuddles. As so many other participants have already said, this was such fun and I didn't want it to end!

On to the goodies.



Little owl coin purse, with a lucky penny inside. At least, I'm calling it lucky since I didn't expect to find it there. My love for owls is on trend, but no less diminished by that fact. I'm not often on trend with things. But then, Everyone is fond of owls. Hehehehe.

Next, more stitch markers! These ones are shaped like tiny slices of pie and cake. Yum.



I should have expected this, since Stephcuddles has an etsy shop devoted to handmade stitch markers. They are so cute. Plus, these ones open for easy removal, which is always handy.


Mmmm cake.

So many new goodies to play with. Ahhh. Thanks again to Stephcuddles for the wonderful, thoughtful, and fun goodies, and also thanks to Eskimimi for organizing the whole thing.

Edited to Add: Apparently, I was confused and the pies/cakes are wine charms, not stitch markers! Whoops. Now I look a bit silly. Heh. Is it bad that I had never heard of wine charms before? Clearly don't get out much. At least now I know they can have many possible uses. Thanks for clearing that up!

Blog Hub Swap Day 6

Apologies for the terrible photos - it's raining and gray and dreary out, and the light isn't cooperating. All the cunning poses I tried ended up looking rather uninspiring, but believe me: this soap is inspiring! Now that my sense of smell is returning, I can confirm that it smells nice, too.

Handmade soap and bath bombs from It's Soap.





It's all so pretty and fragrant, and handmade/not mass-produced, which makes it extra cool in my opinion. I'm excited to try it out. Again, thanks Stephcuddles!

Day 5, belatedly

I missed posting about day 5 of the Blog Hub Swap yesterday because I spent the whole day trying to drown a sudden cold in herbal tea and soup. Things are well in hand today, but I'm going to keep up the tea guzzling just in case. Also, the weather was terrible yesterday and there was no light for photographing things. But today, there's even a little sun!

So. Day 5 in the package from Stephcuddles contained fun gadgets.


(Yes, the backdrop is my ironing board.)

A knitting spool and a row counter. I had a knitting spool when I was little and had so much fun making a family of snakes. I have visions of super-fast i-cord happening with this one, though. What fun!



A closer look at the row counter reveals that it has a handy stitch-marker attachment. I've had row counters before, and they always seem to run away, (okay, so I lose them), so maybe the little ring will make it stay put for longer. Brilliant!

Blog Hub Swap Day 4: Embellishments!

The fourth package from Stephcuddles brings goodies related to embellishments.


A button tin! I definitely need one of these, as I fear I will quickly amass a large button collection.


And inside, the beginnings of a button collection! Little clay elephants that have stolen my heart - I do love elephants - and some sweet little shell hearts. Other than these, I currently own two buttons, which will soon take their place in the tin with the rest. I also love the green spotted ribbon. What shall I use it for? Hmmm. I know I'll save the cute strawberry label after I find the use for the ribbon, though.

Close up of the adorable elephant buttons:

Blog Hub Swap Day 3

First order of business:

Soxonfox, aka Pip of the Sock Yarn Shop has received the package I sent her in the Blog Hub Swap and is blogging about it here complete with really great photos. I'll admit I was a bit intimidated when buying yarn for a sock yarn connossieur who sells it for a living! The legendary K1 Yarns came to the rescue, since they stock some really beautiful yarns.

Second: I survived 8 hours on the coach to Birmingham, 8 hours following my boyfriend around a bit cluelessly at UK Games Day (we both have life-consuming hobbies and obsessions - one day I'll take him along to a knitting festival), and 8 hours on the coach back to Edinburgh. Whoosh.

Third: Swap day 3!

I think Stephcuddles is determined to destroy me with sweets. Heh. (This is clearly not a bad sort of destruction). Day 3's bundle contained one large chocolate bar...



And several teeny tiny ones in the form of cute stitch markers. Aw.



Now little chocolate bars will garnish my knitting. A good combination, I think. Thanks, Stephcuddles!

Blog Hub Swap: Day 2

As it turns out, package #2 is the squishy one, so I didn't have to wait long before encountering exciting new yarn.

Contents:



1 ball of Zauberball in the Cranberries colourway. So pretty! And soft. I've wanted to try Zauberball for a while, so this is excellent mind-reading on the part of Stephcuddles. (Or rav-stalking, whatever).

I also received Eskimimi's lovely Simple City scarf from Stephcuddles directly in my ravelry inbox yesterday, which calls for one ball of Zauberball... Brilliant. I see where this is going! I actually have a load of Noro Kureyon Sock that might work for this scarf as well, but it's not nearly as soft and neck-friendly as the zauberball. Decisions, decisions. Maybe I'll make it with both!

But there was more:



Haribo! Yum. I'm going on a long long long coach ride tonight, so I'll bring this along for when I need a bit of sweetness.

On that note, Day 3 will have to wait until Monday, because I'm spending all night on a coach to Birmingham... And then much of the following day on the coach back, it seems. Quite possibly the longest coach ride of my life so far - we'll see how it goes.

Blog Hub Swap: Day 1

Today has been awesome, especially in terms of mail. This morning, our router came finally, so I am on the internet in our flat for the first time since moving to Edinburgh. Excellent. Then, this afternoon my swap package from Stephcuddles arrived! Extra exciting.



I eagerly opened the box to reveal several numbered colourful parcels, and a note from Stephcuddles saying that I could eschew the order and open the squishy one first if I wanted... Heh. Tempting, but I decided to follow the order Stephcuddles has set up.

Package number 1 contained these goodies.



Candy and a fun little notebook! Candy is always welcome. Mmmm. I find blank books very useful, and small ones like this are perfect for carrying around with me everywhere. Unfortunately I have a habit of forgetting to look at the lists I've written... but it's a start, right?

I'm excited to see what number 2 contains tomorrow!

Thanks Stephcuddles! And thanks again to Eskimimi for organizing the swap.

Swap!

I'm participating in a swap in the Blog Hub group on Ravelry, and have finally gathered together all the various things for my swap partner. I hope the recipient enjoys this as much as I have!

Here's the pile before being stashed away in their box.


Peruse a pile of polkadotted packages!

Off it goes, at the mercy of Royal Mail. Cross your fingers for me...

I had lots of fun with this, my first ever swap. Shopping is not my favourite activity, but shopping for knitting things, bits, and things that are not strictly required is quite fun. It also gave me a chance to poke around and discover shops I might not have found right away. A good introduction to more places to spend money in Edinburgh. Maybe that's not a good thing, after all.

Yarn!

Enfuriatingly, I still have no internet access at home. I am considering taking matters into my own hands somehow. I'm also still unemployed, but that's to be expected at this point.

But! A friend came up to visit me last week, and she gave me yarn from the Isle of Skye. It was really good to see her, and it was fun to have someone to hang around with now that my boyfriend has started working fulltime. (I will get a job soon, I promise)

Anyway, about the yarn:


It's greenish-black, tweedy, and wooly. The yarn label says Skye Knyts, but the internet doesn't yield a whole lot of information about this company. Does anyone know anything about them?



Still, very pretty! I don't know what I'll use it for, since it is fingering/sport weight and quite rough - maybe something with a lining. Any suggestions?

WIP tease

Still no internet access at home, but I have been testing out the flat as photography space. Here are some teaser images of my current WIP. Socks: two at a time, toe up, and knit in Tanis Fibre Arts Blue Label.


Looks grayer than real life. Imagine Vibrance!

This is the sole: these will be a gift, so I don't want to ruin the surprise.



This is my first use of Tanis Fibre Arts yarn, and I'm really enjoying it so far. The colourway is Mallard, which of course gets distorted since I photographed it on the kitchen table. It's blue, teal, green, and even pale yellow-green in spots. Mmmm hand-dyed semisolid goodness! Am kicking myself for not buying more than one skein when I was in Montreal, but there are more lovely yarns on this side of the pond to discover.

Hello from Edinburgh

The move went well, and we are settling in. Still no internet connection: 5-7 working days, my foot. Free wifi in the pub next door, though. Awesome.

Seeing the flat again for the first time in a month, I immediately noticed all sorts of things that I hadn't noticed at our viewing. For example, lack of right angles. Ah, character.



We picked a great/terrible time to move to Edinburgh, depending on your point of view: it is festival season, and the Edinburgh Fringe has taken over the whole city. We knew that going in, but it's still a pretty weird atmosphere to form first impressions in. I've been here as a tourist before, and I sort of still feel like a tourist. Maybe when the Fringe-goers go home and there are fewer tourists around we'll get used to living normal life in Edinburgh.


The Scottish parliament is a frankly confusing building up close. I think it comes together rather well from slightly further away. Art? Or monstrosity? You decide.

Not a whole lot of knitting going on between unpacking, assembling flatpacked furniture, and going to Fringe shows, but we did get out and climb up Arthur's Seat the other day. I've been up several times before when visiting Edinburgh, but every time the views of the city startle me. The spires in the centre of town help form an impressive skyline.



I love that there's a huge hill right in the middle of the city.



So far so good.

One last foray on Dartmoor

As I mentioned in my last post, I recently spent a day out hiking on Dartmoor. Hiking, or walking as they tend to say here, is pretty much the only athletic activity I feel any good at. During the time I spent in Devon a few years ago, I took advantage of the proximity to beautiful hills, tors, and moors: I joined a walking society and went hiking most weekends. My boyfriend and I met on one of those walks, and the rest is... geography? Har har. In any case, we both like to walk, and this is a great place to do it. We set out for a final walking daytrip before moving to Scotland.

We started out in Okehampton, followed a proper trail for a way, and then struck out onto the moors to clamber up and down some tors.


For a while, all the views were like this. Nice. Luckily the weather is very changeable. Over the course of a short walk between tors, we might lose sight of our goal completely, even if it was less than 100 metres away. And then it would reappear. And maybe disappear again in the fog.


Blunt enough.

We wandered into the danger zone which covers a large portion of Dartmoor, but there were no military exercises going on. Remnants of past military activity cropped up every so often in the form of shell casings and rusted bits of metal, but nothing big and scary.



It's hard to capture the extremeness of the landscape in a little rectangle. The scrabble, gorse, and tumbled rocks give the whole place a bleak look in the fog and rain, but shine out starkly in the sun. Groomed fields contrast the wildness on all sides of them. On occasions when the fog did lift, the views from the top of the hills and tors were startling and beautiful.


And yet, it all looks so piddly when I try to take photos of it.


And of course there were lots of sheep about. These rams looked like they were having some sort of meeting. A Conference of Rams. New collective noun?



This is my last post before moving to Edinburgh - lots to be done around here, and I'm not sure when I'll next have a reliable internet connection. Exciting times, though! See you soon, blogosphere.

FO: Herbivore

Two FO posts in a row? It may never happen again. Or maybe it will.



Pattern: Herbivore, by Stephen West

Yarn: Sweet Paprika Messa di Voce

Notes:
This scarf/shawlette took far less yarn than expected. The pattern calls for 430 yds / 393 m, so I figured two skeins of Messa di Voce would do it. In fact, the scarf was full pattern size after one skein, but I dipped into the second skein because I was nervous it would be too small. I only knit about an extra inch before the bind-off - about 13 inches deep instead of 12. It's a good size and blocked a little bigger anyway.

The colour is a bit brighter and slightly yellower than the photo shows. It's exciting to use indie hand-dyed yarn! (And Canadian indie yarn, no less.) The yarn bled quite a bit when blocking, so I will probably avoid this yarn for colourwork. I really enjoyed knitting it, though, and it's super soft.



I wore Herbivore while hiking on Dartmoor yesterday. More on this in another post: it really is an astounding place. I hoped to use the landscape in some suitably dramatic FO photos, but none of them really show off the knit or the landscape. Ah well. It kept me warm!


Herbivore's test-run on Dartmoor: photofail, warmth success!



This deserves blocking wires. It would look so much nicer with crisp straight edges than my straight pins can provide. Wibble wobble. Also, after one wearing, the edges are already rolling, so I think I should have blocked more vigorously. One day I'll get proper blocking wires!

FO: Noro socks of pinkness

The noro knee-sock saga has come to a close, and it's so exciting.

Pattern: Delicious Knee Socks by Laura Chau

Yarn: Noro Kureyon Sock

Notes:
As previously noted, I ran out of yarn 1.5 socks in. The pattern's handy yardage chart is great, but you have to actually use it for it to help you. *headdesk*. I decided to order more yarn after all, and I'm glad I did.

I did not attempt to match the two socks, instead deciding to see where the Noro took me. The tops ended up nearly matching anyway, through no extra calculation of my own.



My gauge was much tighter than the pattern required: 32 sts / 3.5 inches rather than 32 sts / 4 inches. Even so, I still ended up going down a sock size, knitting for foot circumference 8 instead of 9 inches. I think if I use this pattern again, I will go up to a 2.25 mm needle, instead of 2.0 mm. The fabric is really dense and warm.

These socks are super fun, but now that I've completed them I can't imagine ever wearing them in public. And yet, they are too fabulous to be hidden under trouser-legs.

Olive bread success

I have a long-awaited FO to show-off in the next few days, once I can get some decent photos when it stops raining, but in the meantime, I made bread. It was delicious. I have been baking more bread lately than in my whole life, since bread is something the whole family will eat - my boyfriend's family includes a vegan who eats almost no fat, so cookies are out. In any case, half my attempts at cookies here have been horrible failures. (I blame the oven's mad vendetta against me and the surprisingly lack of baking trays.) My bread attempts have been moderately more successful, but this one is the best-received offering yet.



My lacklustre photos on dirty counter top do not do it justice. The thing was devoured in minutes! Or maybe hours, if I'm honest. Luckily, I made the two loaves at once, so there's a whole other loaf hidden away. It will disappear by tonight, though.

I used the recipe for Sun Dried Tomato and Olive Bread on the BBC, but left out the sun dried tomatoes. I didn't use as many olives as required, either, but I should have used the full amount. I also used loaf pans instead of making round loaves since there were no flat baking sheets to be found. I also used active dry yeast instead of fresh yeast, using this conversion chart. This was my first time baking with a recipe that called for weights as opposed to volumes. I used a kitchen scale and everything! I still have all my North American volume-measured recipes and have meauring devices suitable for those, but I'm excited to venture into these British recipes as well.



Not going to lie: this is my second attempt at this particular bread. The first attempt looked promising until I cut into the middle and realized the centre of the bread was still doughy, even though the outside was very brown. It never cooked, despite hours and hours more in the oven on low heat. Fail. Reasons for failure are probably two-fold. 1. boyfriend's oven is a temperamental beast that hates me; 2. I tried to make it as one loaf rather than the two called for in the recipe. Bad idea.

Anyway, the second attempt was a resounding success. Fluffy, moist, olive-y, crusty, mmmm.

Fall Twist: best issue ever?

I think this is my favourite issue of Twist Collective so far. The photography and styling in Twist is always beautiful, so I love looking through it even if the individual patterns don't appeal to me. In this issue, the photos are gorgeous but I also want to make practically everything, so it's all a bit overwhelming!

I can't pick one favourite, but as it turns out, many that jump out at me are from Mary-Heather's colourful story.

Orange Pop is awesome. I've never considered using the "wrong-side" of fair-isle as a pattern in itself before, but leave it to Norah Gaughan to come at knitting from all sides. So cool. I would leave off the turtle-neck on this, probably, and I suspect I would use less popping colours, but still. Cityscape is adorable. I would add waist-shaping if I made it for myself, though. And socks! Manolo is so elegant. I've never been attracted to designer shoes, but I would totally make these socks, even to hide them in my unfashionable footwear.

I also like the soft, muted colour palette of "Une histoire comme les autres" - extra bonus points for Montreal and French!

Acorns is pretty and looks infinitely wearable, as does Metro.

Finally, I've always wanted to make a coat, even though I'm not sure how practical it would be. Maybe Red Oak is the one.

I'm so glad fall knitting is around the corner.