With all my determination to start to blog everyday (apart from Saturday), it’s a shame that I hadn’t thought of Blogtoberfest. The idea of Blogtoberfest is that you post to your blog everyday during October. I’ve actually done very well with my blogging and have only missed the two Saturdays that I hadn’t planned to do anyway, so I’ve signed on for the rest of October.
Blogtoberfest has been around for quite a while, although I can’t find who started it or when it actually was that the idea was born - it’s not even on Wikipedia, so I’m out of ideas. A few blogs are running link-ups for Blogtoberfest, including tinniegirl and Tresa Black. The month is a celebration of blogging and posting everyday, whether a long post or a short one.
Today was supposed to be about another of my new books, but it’s been hi-jacked today! I really want to write the next book post with the book in front of me, and I was lazy last night and didn’t prepare it in advance, and I don’t have the book with me at work, so you might get it tomorrow, or it might wait till next week!
talk more about knooking tomorrow). I’ve nearly finished my first 
unless food is involved. They are lovely though and it’s a lot of fun to watch them together. Misfit is the oldest. We think she is about seven years old, and two of her toes (one on each foot) seem to have stopped gripping properly, but there’s nothing a vet can do for her because she’s so little. She does fine though flitting and jumping around the cage so we think she’s just feeling the effects of old budgie age. They can live to ten years old, but five is more normal, especially for pet shop birds, which she was. She is a sky blue, pied, grey wing and was so completely different from any of the others in the avairy (Pets at Home when they used to sell birds, had the budgies in an amazing 4’ x7’ x12’ avairy!) so that is how she got her name. She’s the bravest of our budgies and is happy to sit on hands and be lifted around, or sit on shoulders. Gizmo is a fat, greedy, blue girl. She’s the most timid of our birds and gets bullied by both the other two, poor girl. she’s about 6 years old. Widget is our grey boy. He came from a breeder and is ringed, so we know he’s six years old. Because he was bred as a show bird, he is bigger than the other two and he’s ridiculously laid back about being handled. He’s somewhere between Misfit and Gizmo as far as friendlyness goes - he will eat from your hand, but it takes him a little while to build up the courage. He’s the noisiest of the three and has a wide vocal range that he goes though, loudy!
them, Kami, who is about two weeks younger than Lofty had just been weaned. She had her first flight the day before we first saw them (a couple of weeks before we’d got them home) and she’d crash landed onto some fly paper, poor girl, so we named her Kamikaze. She was a bit shy of flying for a while after that, so she let us carry her everywhere and was pretty much tame right from the start. Lofty on them other hand, being slightly older had learnt to fly and that was all she wanted to do, so that’s how she got her name. Kami and Lofty have completely different personalities which is really cool. Kami is relaxed and not much bothers her. She’s pretty happy go lucky, will sit on your shoulder for hours and is very good at coming when you call her name. Lofty on the other hand is much less laid back. She’s also a sweetie and loves to sit with you, but she also has tantrums and hisses and 
stamps her feet which can be pretty funny. She particularly dislikes “mwah” noises and sneezing! They both love having their headscratched, and Lofty is definitely the most demanding and squeezes her head under your chin as part of her demands.
patterns in the course of a year. It’s about setting a goal and working towards it. Really though, there are no rules. Lists can (and have) changed and for myself at least, the adventure is more about seeing what I create by the end of a year of yarn crafting, and as a result my list is slightly all over the place! I have goals and targets (and I’ve already completed some) but some change frequently. This week I decided instead of making scarves as Christmas presents (when I suddenly realised I have no idea if anyone has wool allergies or sensitivities and if my sisters-in-law are anything like my husband, they will, and the fact that the first scarf took me a month) I’ve taken the scarves off my list and they’re getting clutch/make up bags instead. My list though is about to go through another huge change because I’ve learnt to knit (or knook) with my crochet hook and I’m loving it. So of course, I need to make room for some small knitting projects too.
So what have I been doing this week? I’ve been working on adapting the Skaði Fingerless Gloves to fit my hands in fingering weight yarn with a 3mm hook. It’s pretty slow going I have to say, and I haven’t made much progress since Wednesday, but I’m determined to complete them. I love the way the bamboo yarn feels so soft and smooth, I think it’s rapidly becoming my favourite fibre! It’s a bit of a shame that the colour runs are so short, but as the rows build up I’m enjoying seeing the random patterns they form.
WIP Wednesdays are one of the highlights of my week. I love to see what everyone else is working on and be inspired by so many wonderful knitters, crocheters and bloggers! Hopeful my jury duty will be over today and then life can go back to normal, although since we’ve been starting at 9.30 instead of 8.30 I’m going to miss my lie in in the mornings! This week I have finally finished the lacey crochet scarf, which is something of a relief since it felt like it was taking forever, so you can see that on Friday if you haven’t already. I started the broomstick lace scarf, but I’m not sure if I really want to keep going with it, as pulling all the loops up seems to take forever and it’s quite fiddly to work. I might change out for another scarf on my favourites list.
From pressing flowers and plastic canvas embroidery as a child and cross stitch when I was teenager to chain mail and wire jewellery and crochet now, I've always loved crafting, and this is my crafting blog.
