and adorable plump wrens


This time I actually made some progress while away on holiday, knitting a few inches on my Julissa sleeve sitting under the stars. I haven't checked yet whether I dropped any stitches.

I'm retrieving the zombie librarian for this post because after attending the VALA conference and this year's Library Camp (#libcamp14), I felt a little zombified.

VALA provided the spacious conference experience of attending large lectures and wandering around looking at product displays - while Library Camp (an un-conference) felt very intimate. 

Clearly a lot of pre-work and thought had gone into enabling Library Camp to unfold so organically on the day itself. My interest was mainly focused on meeting/re-connecting with others (rather than the content of the day), and the un-conference atmosphere exceeded my expectations in this respect. I encountered some new crafty librarians, while we appreciated everyone's home-baked treats during the breaks. Thank you to the un-organisers for an opportunity to reconnect with friends, and a great day!

2013 was our second year attending the Australian Sheep and Wool Show. We haven't discovered any other large wool shows in our area so this is an exciting time of year.

It was three degrees walking around the Ballarat showgrounds so we rugged up with our woolly scarves and hats and gloves. It was mostly inside but the sheds were rather chilly.

Lots of pretty colours everywhere!

I got some more lovely stash:
Garrett hand painted laceweight yarn from Wool n Wire


and Skein DK in Quill from ZigoZago ^_^

We are back from our travels and have got through the madness of the last weeks of work and Christmas. We had a fantastic time, and between visiting many castles and galleries I managed to seek out quite a bit of yarny goodness.
They had great samples knitted up from many of the yarns...
When leaving the shop a man stopped me in the street and said something I couldn't understand. It turned out I had bought so much wool the zip on my bag wasn't staying closed any more and things were spilling out :p
I also took a long Metro ride to the famous Loop in London. I picked up three pretty skeins but spent most of the time looking over all the colours :)

After 6 weeks in plaster (netball injury) I have two hands again! I managed a fair bit of spinning and plain knitting while broken (Asunder with some handspun) but had to hold my right hand completely still and just use the left :(
Looking forward to getting back into my favourite project (Honeybee Cardigan), but have very little mobility in my right wrist so purling is still fairly tricky and painful.

Going back to study has somewhat dampened my blogging schedule, but have been meaning to report back on our adventures at the Bendigo sheep and wool show.
The website gave us no indication how exciting the show would be. I had thought perhaps we might get to browse a few stalls of woolly goodness. Turned out there were five large sheds of beautiful yarn and fleece!
It was wonderful to discover some Australian based indie shops, and finally be able to experience the excitement I am always hearing about on podcasts!
Our favourite shops were Moseley Park, Raxor, Spun out, Ixchel Angora Bunny, and Wool n wire

I am terrible at actually buying things, and can talk myself out of anything, but I came away with a nice little collection.We also visited the Bendigo Woollen Mills while there, and I picked up some staple colours.

These little lollies may look innocent, but they have made my last week of holidays very painful
Ever since our 2005 trip, I remembered Tasmania as a land of tasty green sour lollies. This time, lured into a wonderful house of sweets, my eyes fell upon these super sour green apple delights.

I put the first in my mouth and it literally burned. After eating it for less than 10 seconds I had to stop, and five days later I could barely eat anything - my dinners uneaten, my nougat pudding abandoned :(

I suspect something was wrong with the sweets (perhaps out of date and very potent for it). I guess I have learnt my lesson and will steer clear of anything labelled 'super super sour' in future :/

We did manage, however to buy something a bit more yummy in Tas - some Ella Rae Lace Merino from Tasmanian Woollen Co in Salamanca Place - yum!

This was long in the making (2 months) but totally worth it ^_^

Very inspiring pattern with great results. I would like to try this again one day with thinner yarn, as the Socks that Rock lightweight was perhaps a little heavy for this shawl and makes it quite bulky if wearing as a scarf (as I generally do).

I first became obsessed by Blue Moon's Raven Clan colourways when I saw Chrissy's amazing versions (Ravelry) of the Multnomah Shawl and knew I had to get some for myself.

I noted on my Ravlery that this was a ‘keeping me sane’ shawl. Now, a few months later, I can't quite remember what it was keeping me sane from, but I imagine part of it was having to move house yet again.

On nupps
Found the new technique of nupps pretty fun. Because of the thicker yarn, I used 5 stitch nups instead of 7 or 9. They're not super noticeable, but because I was running out of yarn I am glad I chose to do smaller ones.

Went to Melbourne Craft and Quilt Fair with SlightlySquiffled this weekend. There was quite a bit of squooshy yarn - lots of Noro - but the most exciting thing was the stainless-steel yarn from Dairing
Announcement of giveaway coming soon...

Very long week - our mini visit to Lake Mountain seems like ages ago and it was only 5 days - I am still sore after finding skiing harder than unicycling and falling over lotsI have managed to leave not one but two jumpers at netball courts - hope I can get them back :(

Coming up: what happened with the shawl for which I was running out of yarn

So both skills I've been practicing this month involve pushing a pedal...

Luckily I didn't get them mixed up and 'spin' the car though, so it's all good :)
And now I'm allowed to broom broom around town all by myself (and I can treadle pretty fast so watch out ;))

Little Car - Amigurumi Pattern by DeliciousCrochet on etsy

but my pics do prove I finally made it to see the bridge and the Opera House ^_^ Didn't expect to get to do so, but the night before the conference started we went on an adventure.

Felt so lucky to be able to be spending a week in Sydney (in air conditioning luckily) learning library things and meeting library peeps