Friday Eye Candy

I have found a couple of new blogs lately and here are three more. They are not necessarily knit-related. In fact, most of them are about fabrics and sewing, but I enjoy the pics and posts:

whipup (sroll down and you'll find the most amazing rain coat)
hopskipjump
weewonderfuls

In der letzten Zeit bin ich auf ein paar neue (für mich neue) blogs gestoßen. Hier sind wieder 3 links. Diese blogs sind selten Strickblogs. Im Gegenteil häufig geht es ums Nähen, aber ich mag die Fotos und die Einträge:

whipup (sroll down and you'll find the most amazing rain coat)
hopskipjump
weewonderfuls

January

Last day of the month - time for an evaluation. What have I accomplished this month?

Here is the list of WiPs I started the month with:

1. Juno Regina
2. Mystery Stole
3. Lacy Waves Top
4. Bloomsbury scarf
5. Kells
6. Crochet cardigan
7. Starmore afghan
8. Diamond upon Diamond
9. Mondnacht stole

And here is what I finished this month:

1. Lyra cardigan (new project this month)
2. Mystery Stole
3. Lacy Waves Top
4. Bloomsbury scarf
5. Green sweater for my son (new project this month)
6. Twisted Stitch Gauntlets for myself (new project this month).

Altogether approx. 1350 g of yarn - 1150 g from my stash!

I made progress on these projects:

1. Juno Regina
6. Crochet cardigan

I did not work on these items, although I had planned to:

Starmore Afghan

New projects this month:

1. Cashmere sweater for my son
2. Alpaca sweater for my son

Thus, I'll start February with 8 WiPs. I plan to work on/finish the following:

Kells, Diamond upon Diamond , Crochet cardigan/Cashmere and Alpaca sweater, Starmore Afghan, Juno Regina.

What else happened knitwise? I broke 3 bamboo knitting needles and one plastic crochet hook!!! Two of them this week.


Der Januar geht zu Ende und ich nutze den Tag, um eine erste Bilanz zu ziehen.

Das neue Jahr begann mit diesen WiPs:

1. Juno Regina
2. Mystery Stole
3. Lacy Waves Top
4. Bloomsbury scarf
5. Kells
6. Häkeljacke
7. Starmore afghan
8. Diamond upon Diamond
9. Mondnacht

Fertiggestellt habe ich:

1. Lyra cardigan (neu)
2. Mystery Stole
3. Lacy Waves Top
4. Bloomsbury scarf
5. Green sweater for my son (neu)
6. Twitsted Stitch Gauntlets (neu)

Insgesamt habe ich ca. 1350 g Wolle verarbeitet, davon 1150 g aus meinem Vorrat!

Fortschritte haben diese Wips gemacht:
1. Juno Regina
6. Häkeljacke

Obwohl ich es mir vorgenommen hatte, habe ich dann doch nicht an meinem Starmore Afghan gearbeitet.

Neu hinzukamen:

1. Cashmere Pulli für meinen Sohn
2. Alpacapulli für meinen Sohn

(Ja, er braucht dringend neue Pullis)

Ich beginne den Februar also mit 8 WiPs (immerhin eines weniger als den Januar) und plane an folgenden zu arbeiten/sie fertig zu stellen:

Kells, Diamond upon Diamond , Häkeljacke/Cashmere and Alpaca Pulli, Starmore Afghan, Juno Regina.

Was ist sonst noch passiert? Ich habe 3 Bambusnadeln zerbrochen und einen Plastikhäkelhaken, 2 davon allein diese Woche...

Anne Enright, The Gathering

I have just recently finished this novel, which won the Man Booker prize 2007.

The narrator Victoria is one of 12 children and 7 miscarriages in an Irish family. Her brother Liam to whom she has been very close has just committed suicide at the age of 40. The tale alternates between various settings in time. It starts off in the 1920s and an imagined love-triangle. As it turns out later, the people involved are Victoria’s grandparents and their later landlord and friend Nugent. The second story line basically tries to retell what happend when Victoria was eight and her brother Liam was nine and their developments into adulthood. The third story line outlines Victoria’s life since Liam’s death, but even here events are not told chronologically, only what happened after the wake is in chronological order.

The narration navigates towards the revelation that Liam has been sexually abused as a child and Victoria witnessed it (or maybe was a victim herself? She cannot say for sure, 31 years later, nor were it happened and how often). This doesn't come as a surprise in the narration. In fact, the cover text gives it away before you even start reading.

The narrator is no great help, in fact, she repeatedly tells the reader that she has been drinking at least a bottle of wine every night since the wake, that she has not slept at night ever since the wake, that she is not sure what really happened and what she is just imagining, because she learnt to imagine a different/better world for herself at the sink in her grandmother’s house. So, the narrator doubts her own reliability.

I think, the novel transports these doubts , Victoria’s frustrations in her marriage and the consequences of the abuse for her very well and documents her process of becoming aware of what determines her own reactions (and obsession with and aversion of penises). After her brother’s death she gradually turns from her romantic imaginations (first half of the novel) towards what really happened and determined her life. As she says in the end, throughout those weeks she has been falling into her life.

The novel may seem confusing and there have been stories about child abuse, about women having too many kids and not being able to cope and about how families mame you. What the novel achieves is to transport Victoria's confusion. The consequences of her being a witness to the abuse of her brother for her own sexual life, her relationships with men.

I haven't ultimately made up my mind about this novel. It leaves the reader dissatisfied. The narrator is very occupied with herself, she "lacks" distance and true reflection. The reader is witness to her confusion and "sorting out" of her memories. The reader experiences the same daze as the narrator. The novel ends when she decides to tell her family about the abuse - to not spare them any longer, only maybe "Mummy". The reader is not told whether Victoria will really tell her brothers and sisters and whether that will result in any positive development for her. The novel leaves it very much open whether there is a real solution to Victoria's problems.
It is an interesting novel, but not a "must-read".

You'll find many reviews on the web. I found this discussion very interesting.

Der Duft von Lavendel

The show of FOs from 2007 draws towards its end…

Here are two Christmas presents, I haven’t shown you yet. The first is a long-sleeved Very Berry sweater I made for a friend’s daughter.It wasn’t difficult to rewrite the pattern for a long-sleeved version. I really enjoy knitting this pattern which I discovered again thanks to Ingrid!

And yes, I made a couple more of these lovely, fidgety lavender hearts. I find the result just adorable:

Langsam nähert sich die FO 2007 Show ihrem Ende...

Hier sind noch 2 Weihnachtsgeschenke, die ich bislang noch nicht gezeigt habe. Zum einen ein Pulli nach dem Very Berry T-shirt, nur mit langen Ärmeln. Ich stricke dieses Muster wirklich gern, dass ich ursprünglich nur ausprobierte, weil Ingrid ihrer Tochter eines gestrickt hatte und dieses meiner Tochter so gut gefiel.

Und ja, ich habe noch ein paar von diesen wunderschönen, fieseligen Lavendelherzen gemacht. Ich liebe den Effekt von handgefärbter Wolle und Patchworkstricken: