Days of Enjoyment to which everyone CHEERS

I had a lovely drive out to Weston today and played with unicorns. The shop is gorgeous, and hopefully not too far out for people to find their way there. Things didn't get totally finished as there's still some work missing, but Simon's fluorescent sweet wrappers already filled some of the space out quite nicely.

I also managed to eat some fairly gross Fish n Chips and an ice cream, and to pay a visit to Carter's Steam Fair. I've been wanting to go ever since they were at Weston last year, but I eventually gave up on convincing other people to come along and went alone. It was absolutely brilliant. There's an actual steam powered sea-saw thing which looks terrifying, plenty of beautiful sparkly rides, and a fantastic penny arcade. You get fake old pennies which let you see old 3D rude peep shows, play various games involving little silver balls, and get your fortune told!



According to these little cards, the gentleman on the left is my future husband (I like his dress sense), and the card on the right is an all-purpose fortune.

Creative n shit.

So, lots of stuff.

I'll be taking the horses down to Weston tomorrow. Here they are - I eventually managed to track down a decent frame that was big enough. Incidentally, does anyone know the trick for taking a picture of something behind glass without taking a picture of yourself at the same time? You can just about make my PJs out in this one.



Aaaaaand, I finally wrote up the pattern for the red zig-zag lace jumper. It's turning out to be a bit of a hit on teh Rav. 100 downloads already! But it's about to be pushed off the new patterns front page so the rush may be over.



And I've just come back from S'n'B, where some very nice new people turned up, AND I've kind of finished the Quasi Cardi, but I think it needs more ribbing.


PRODUCTIVE.

Best. Surprise. Present. Ever.

I had almost forgotten that I took part in a competition on A Homely Heroine's blog, so the little parcel I got in the post was an even more exciting surprise.
Beautifully wrapped in tissue paper:

containing four lovely things:

(little rose-smelling heart, grapefruit showergel, Malabrigo laceweight, rose tea!) You'll have to imagine the pretty smell.

Horses.

So, there's this unusual horses thing. It started off as a couple of odd dreams about horses that I had (no, not like *that*), which then turned into the idea of making a Complendium of Unusual Horses. This happily coincided with the Mythical Beast Sweet Shoppe at the Weston Arts Festival. Originally, the plan was to make a whole alphabet's worth and turn them into either a collection of postcards or even an little book, but time ran out, so I've collected my best horses into a Guardian-style wall chart.

I'll post the whole thing here at some point, but for now, a little taster - a swiss cheese style horse. Incidentally, Katie Prices horse (illustrating a Guardian interview where she shared the priceless nugget of information that her favourite word is c**t) modelled for this one.



I'm a bit apprehensive about this whole thing, having never really had art for sale (except for the drawings that have been hanging in Kino for about 2 months now), but if nothing else, I will have enough horse posters to wallpaper much of my living room.

Unfortunately, Alex's two awesome horses didn't really fit in this time, but maybe there will be a whole book some time in the future.

non-ironic cosy

During my recent lull in knitting inspiration, a Facebook friend expressed an interest in a cosy for her teapot, so I made one. I'm quite impressed how well it fits, considering I have never actually seen the pot in the flesh.

...are the new Russian Dolls

A little while ago, Owls were the twee motif of choice. They appeared on every little purse and polka dotted greeting card. I played a little game with my friend, googling the phrase "are the new owls" and came up with deer, unicorns, and russian dolls. The latter trend seems to have lasted quite a while. Now I've had a bit of a *thing* for anything Russian since I was a teenager, so I got highly excited when I spotted a Matryoshka stall at this years harbour fest. I bought this beauty:


and also a pin and a keyring. Hooray!
(PS: "are the new Russian Dolls" gives precisely zero results. Boo. Maybe they are here to stay?)