Left and Right

Hello all!  Such a lovely sunny day outside, I hope it's as pleasant where you are :)

I thought today I'd ask if there's anybody reading who crochets left handed?  I'm visiting home soon and my mum has asked if when I do I could teach her to crochet...

Now, we've tried this before and kind of failed because she's left handed and I use my right.  I attempted to switch hands to demonstrate, but I'm far from ambidextrous and just couldn't work it out.  When my mum tried to follow me, it felt just as odd for her to use her right hand as it did for me to use my left.  We sort of bumbled through how to chain and then gave up...

I've since watched a few videos on youtube (which we don't have access to at home) and I think I understand the idea behind it.  I used the videos to make the following step by step guides to give to mum.  I thought I'd share here in case they're of use to anyone else too :)  (The first is a guide to chaining, and the second is for an American single crochet.  Click on either picture to make larger).

I'm still working on the hdc, the dc and the trc but I'll share those too once they're done :)

I'm hoping these will help my mum to learn.  But if you have any tips to share - whether you're left or right handed - about how best to set about teaching someone something new, I'm all ears!

Until next time

Kim x

Kreativ Bloggers

As you may have seen from my previous post, I've been neglecting my blog slightly in favour of being all adventurous around North West Wales.  So it came as something of a surprise to discover that while I've been off galavanting, I was left two lovely comments by Lucy In The Sky and Cherry Heart informing me that they'd included eggbirddesigns in their Kreativ Blogger Award lists!

I had to do a bit of research, because I still feel pretty new to this blogging thing, and I wasn't entirely sure what a blogger award even was (and I'll be honest, this was the kind of kick up the bum I needed to go and find out! :P)

What I discovered was that at their heart, blog awards are a very kindly gesture; a firm handshake and a "jolly well done, old chap!".  I've decided that blog awards are the cyber equivalent of winning first place in the vegetable show at the village fête.  (For those of you wondering, it is one of my life's ambitions for a kindly old vicar to announce "excellent parsnips, dear!"  I'm about 83 in my head).

From what I've gathered from my sleuthing, I must now furnish you with 10 facts you weren't previously aware of.  Brace yourselves:

1. At the age of 15, I got trapped inside a Dalek.  My cries of "help me!" came out in the Dalek voice, which made my brother laugh more than he's ever laughed before or since.
2. I went to the same school and university as Danny Boyle (the director of Slumdog Millionaire and 28 days later).
3. I must, under ALL circumstances put my right shoe on before my left.
4. I have a degree in Linguistics, but sometimes wish I'd done Physics instead.
5. I was going to tell you here about all the bands I would see if I could time travel.  The list included most of the 60s, 70s and 80s.
6. My Portuguese is terrible.  I once asked for "a bedroom sausage" instead of "four sausage rolls".
7. At just under 5 foot, I'm the shortest person in my family.
8. My favourite artist is Alphonse Mucha.
9. Soup and toast or rice pudding are my favourite comfort foods.
10. Danse Serpentine is one of my favourite pieces of film.  It was hand coloured frame by frame and made in c.1896.

 

Phew!  That was harder than I thought it would be!  Hopefully I've given you a bit of insight into my mad little world! :P

Here is my list of nominations for the blogger award: 

• Crafty Valley
• creJJtion
• Embroidery With an Edge
• Lucy in the Sky
• Bunny Mummy
• Bustle and Sew
• The Quiet Home
• Useless Beauty
• Tickety Boo

Many apologies if I've left you off the list!  There are so many brilliant blogs out there, it was almost impossible to choose.

Until next time!
Kim x

Gardd Bodnant and Aberffraw

Hello out there, lovely folk of blogland!  How're you all keeping?

There's so much to tell you I hardly know where to start!  I've been so busy recently with one thing or another that blogging sort of slipped my mind, and now there's a big stack of stories, and an even bigger stack of photos!

Then this morning, there was a lovely message in my inbox from Lucy in the Sky which said "oi, where've you been?!".  To be fair, Lucy did put it much MUCH more sweetly than that, but I suspect that's what she meant :P

And the answer, really, is where haven't I been?!

A friend of mine came down from Leeds and together we visited Bodnant Garden (Gardd Bodnant in Welsh), which is a beautiful National Trust property full to bursting with amazing plants and views and wildlife.  I'll not bore you with all the photos I took (well into triple figures!), but here are a few of my favourites...

I was really glad we got to see the Laburnum Arch in bloom (it was just starting to turn) - the last time I visited Bodnant, it was all just twigs!

A couple of days later, I found myself at Aberffraw beach on the Isle of Anglesey.

I think I've always been a "beach baby".  There's something about water that I'm really drawn to, and I'm so happy that I live just a bus ride away from some really wonderful beaches...

The only problem is that I'm STILL finding sand in bags and shoes and clothes!

So there you go.  What with gardens and beaches and BBQs and other days out, there's been next to no time for crafting recently.  In fact, I've only managed to add a measly 7 rows to my scarf since I last showed it to you!!

But not to worry, I've been having a rather lovely time anyway ;)

Kim x

An update from eggbird

Since I've been a tad quiet recently blogwise, I figured I'd pop by and give you a little eggbird update :)

This afternoon, I've been working away on a new crochet pattern inspired by the design in the bottom right hand corner on this page.  For some reason, I started with a bit of a collage using scraps of fabric (MUCH recommended for the fun-factor by the way!) and sort of went from there.

The pattern isn't quite right yet, but it should be ready soon - looking forward to sharing it with you all :)

Since last posting, I've finished and blocked the Tilting Tardises...

...sadly, very very sadly, it's come out a bit too short.  Well, saying that, perhaps really it's just an average size, but I don't like to have scarves too tightly wrapped.  Still, it's a lovely pattern, and I have a few ideas about what I'll use this FO for instead - more on that soon :)

Once the Tardises were finished, I set sail on the Frost Flowers scarf.  Boy-oh-boy it's been slow going!!  This is what I have to show for approx 2 weeks...  on the plus side, at this rate it's gonna be ready for winter and that's the main thing! 

 

Image from wikipedia

Recently I've really been getting back into reading again, and making great use of the library in town.  At the moment I'm partway through Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger as well as a book about Houdini.  Both are brill.

If you have any book recommendations, I'd love to hear them.  I've been stocking up on things to read over the summer and it'd be great to hear some suggestions :)

Much love,

Kim x

If Superheroes Knit...

Picture courtesy of My Modern Met

It's not often that I share stuff like this on the blog, (my poor facebook friends on the otherhand...), but this is simply just too brilliant to resist.  Plus, I heard it from Derren Brown, and he's pretty brilliant too (not just for bamboozling with his tricksy beard, but also for doing unbelievably good portraits like this one).  Anyhoo, this is a picture of Superman, made upside down from spools of thread.  Click on the link in the caption for more brilliance (including a version of the Last Supper and some Van Gogh!).

And speaking of Van Gogh (tenuous link alert!!), fellow Doctor Who fans may remember the episode in which the Doctor and his companion Amy visited the great painter... In this episode, Amy wore a very pretty red lace scarf:

Image via Google

Well, after the episode was first broadcast, there was a fair bit of excitement about the scarf on Rav, and many nerds fans such as myself went on to knit something similar as a tribute.  Unfortunately, I move house a lot, and somewhere along the line, my scarf was lost (in a wrong-bag-to-the-charity-shop type scenario I suspect).

But look!

I have some wool!  And I'm going to make myself another Amy scarf, this time using the slightly more complicated frost flowers pattern.  I absolutely cannot wait to begin.

First though, I have to complete my Tardis cowl...

...it's almost there.  Only one more pattern repeat to go, a light blocking and some buttons to sew on.  Fingers crossed, I'll have that done by tomorrow.

Lots and lots of geeky knitting going on at the moment at chez eggbird then, and it makes me very happy indeed :D

Have a lovely week,
Kim x

Time to Knit

First off, thank you so so much for all of your lovely comments on the Psycho Delia ta-dah.  I don't always get chance to reply to everyone (in fact, I have a very bad track record on that front!), but I do read and appreciate every single one of them.  Thank you!!

After Delia was finished, I had a couple of "days off" craft-wise.  I was astonished at how antsy and irritable I got.  After the second day I was more forgetful than usual, feeling a bit confused and restless...  I knew that crochet and crafting in general had become something of a therapy (I honestly think it should be suggested as a relaxation technique to anyone with anxiety disorder or similar), but I hadn't realised quite how much.  Maybe it was all just coincidence, but it certainly feels very nice to have some needles back in my hands!!

Yesterday I cast on the Tilting Tardis Cowl.  It's satisfying both my urge to knit and my obsession love of Doctor Who :P

You can probably see where I went a tad wrong on the first repeat...  I've not knit since finishing the Potty Potter hat and it kind of shows, but oh well - I'll just overlap the cowl the other way when I wear it and you won't be able to see ;)

*

Going through my memory card the other day I realised that I seem to have a backlog of photos building up.  It's pretty dull here in Bangor today, so I thought I'd remind myself of how lovely it's been by sharing some recent pics with you :)

Lovely stuff!

Kim x

Psycho Delia: ta-dah!

It's here!  It's happened!!  Delia is COMPLETE  :D

Remember when it was all just circles?

...and the cirlces grew and grew...

...and the piles of circles got bigger and bigger...

...and then the circles turned into squares.  It started to get exciting...

...and the excitement grew at each step...

...and along with the excitement, the worry that it might not work...

...that maybe it was just too psycho...

...it required a lot of patience and persistence.

It felt giddy to be joining the last sqaure...

...and sad to find that the border colours just didn't quite reach.

But it got there eventually.  It was worth it...

...and the thousands of ends just celebrated the achievement.

Now take a deep breath.  Stand back and see: ta-dah!

Wow!  I'm a little bit stunned.  All along I worried that it was just going to be a massive mess, and all of that hard work would have been wasted.  And then it got to the end, and I realised that I loved it.  Strange, eh?

*

It's only fair to credit all the hard work that other people put in designing the patterns and techniques I used on this:

The main pattern is Lucy's Summer Garden Granny Square

And the general gist of the composition is inspired by Lucy's Sweet Flower Granny

The border follows this brilliant crinkle-free pattern

My Ravelry project page is here

I used mostly Sylecraft Special DK (you can read more about that in my post here, although I didn't end up using all the colours listed).  I also used some other balls of DK acrylic mixed in.

The finished blanket measures approx 153x108cm, with 13 large sqaures, 98 small squares and a grand total of 1002 ends.  It took approximately 1 month to finish.

It's also an absolute pain in the bum to get a decent photo of the whole thing!