As some of you may know, the lovely Jen Arnall-Culliford has been a pal for a few years now, and we’ve met her husband, the just-as-lovely (and somewhat long-suffering, if you believe his alter-ego, @VeufTricot on Twitter) Jim Arnall-Culliford a few times too. So when we heard about Jim running the London Marathon for Refuge, we offered to put them up for the weekend and help in any way we could. Both Wendy and I are only just over the river from the start (well, in global terms) and both TBk households are seasoned Marathon spectators (this year was Wendy’s 15th consecutive marathon, I have chickened out on the years when the weather was bad…).
So, Jen and Jim arrived Friday evening. Saturday morning we set off to Excel for Jim to go through the final registration bits and pick up his number and microchip. Here is Jim in the queue for his number:
and here he is with his number:
no longer Jim, but Runner 45699! Have to say, the organisation at Excel was fantastic. Super speedy, teeny tiny queues. We did a bit of wandering around the associated exhibition, and then thought we’d pop over to Greenwich so that Jim could see where he’d be starting from. We thought we’d go the scenic route, so we popped onto this:
and ‘flew’ over the Thames. Here’s Neil (Mr. TBk) and Jen in the capsule:
and here’s the view just before we set off whilst waiting for our capsule:
looking back to the Olympic Stadium and The Orbit:
and back to the ‘flight’ once we’d landed:
We wandered along the Thames Path towards Greenwich, crossing from East to West along the way:
And when we got to the top of Greenwich Park, just outside the Observatory, we saw this little sweetie:
It was the coat that made me excited to start with (so cute!) but then we noticed the claws… Never seen a dog with painted claws before. Considered painting Iman’s, briefly, but decided that having functioning fingers was more important in the general scheme of things.
Anyway, wandered over to the Start, showed Jim where he’d be then set off home. Saw this sign at the bottom of the hill, which amused me.
Got home, Neil made fresh pasta for dinner to go with the ragu I’d made the day before (requested specially by Jim) – Jim ate rather a lot of it:
(ok, perhaps not quite all of that dish full), and then it was time for bed. I’ll tell you all about the actual Marathon day tomorrow, this post has been long enough I think. Just in case you’re wondering, that hoodie Jim is wearing is going to be a pattern available from Jen fairly soon… I think she should call it ‘In da E9 Hood’…
So, we have a winner in our little Tour de France and Chapeau! giveaway. It’s…..
Fine Lightness!
The pattern has already been emailed over to her and yarn from Artesano will be arriving with her, soon, too. And wasn’t it good to see Mr. Wiggins win the Sports Personality of the Year award on Sunday night, too? (Although, I whisper, I voted for Ellie as I think she has slightly more of your actual personality. And she smiles more.)
We’ve said before how lovely the people at Artesano are. We sent them Chapeau!, Pendleton and Ribblehead Scarf patterns to see how they liked them and if they wanted to give them away to their followers, and not only did they like them and want to give them away, they also said that they’d give some more yarn away! So if you pop over to their Ravelry group and leave a comment about which pattern you like in this thread then you may well win one of the patterns, and if you’re the lucky over-all draw winner you’ll win the yarn too.
We’ve also got a brand new group on Ravelry and are also going to be giving away a few more patterns, so if you head over there, join our group and comment in the appropriate thread by 11.59 GMT on Christmas day you’ll also get the chance to be picked out for patterns. We’ll do the picking on Boxing Day and pop the patterns into the Rav libraries of the winners. You do have to join the group to be included in the draw, but that isn’t too much of a hardship, is it?
Tomorrow, we’ll have a Tale of Two Trees, but just to get you in the mood, here is a pic of Iman and her reaction to a bit of our tree that was in her way. She loves the tree, but she likes it just so. These bits were surplus to requirements, she said:
As we may have mentioned before, as well as the TBk stuff we work with lots of lovely fashion people and I can say without doubt that one of the loveliest people I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with is Guy Hills from Dashing Tweeds. As well as being generally lovely, Guy is, I think, the most stylish chap I’ve ever worked with too.
Adding to the style of our great nation is a big thing, and Guy has done it again with the Hanky Hat for summer (we will have a summer soon, I hope, and at least the Hanky Hat would keep you dryish during a shower).
(lovely photo from Dashing Tweeds)
As every True Brit will know, if you’re caught short without a decent hat then the only thing to do is tie knots in your hanky and don that.
As every fashion icon is even better with a song, Guy has obliged, producing this little gem with another Guy (who has written a few other songs in his time). As we only put the very best musical content on the blog, Iman settled down for a viewing because – well, you know she’s a most discerning rabbit:
Passed by Her Imperialness, here is the Hanky Hat Song for your delight. Now pootle off to Dashing Tweeds and buy your own here
Well, after announcing Wendy’s arrival I offered ‘a small present’ for an entertaining comment about what the ‘c’ word could be, and PipneyJane is going to get that present for confessing that she takes her knitting to see Chelsea play and guessing that the ‘c’ word in question might well be ‘crochet’. I am impressed beyond belief that she does take her knitting to Stamford Bridge and also wondering if she still will after the Daily Mail’s little hissy fit over somebody spotted knitting on Centre Court at Wimbledon this week. I’m not putting a link in there as frankly I wouldn’t direct anybody whatsoever to the Mail’s website, I’m sure if you put ‘knitting Wimbledon Centre Court’ into your search engine of choice then the whole overblown, ridiculous tale will be made instantly visable to you.
As I do not personally know PipneyJane I will refrain from saying rude things about her choice of football team (unlike Jen and her family’s strange, incomprehensible allegiance to Spurs). I can’t be rude about Arsenal, either, as even though I know Nicky I have an odd, sneaking regard for Arsenal.
So, PipneyJane, I’ve emailed you and if you send me your address and preference for plain, lined or squared paper and whether you like chocolate or not I shall send something chocolately and papery to you, to sustain you through the Olympics (the chocolate) and also so that you can write down Chelsea’s scores next season. Or something knitting related. Or a recipe. Or whatever you like to write down.
To otherwise entertain and follow on from Wendy’s head-to-toe Knitted Baby pic of yesterday, I give you Iman last night after a bit of a snack whilst sitting in her haybox. Sometimes she’s not the sophisticated rabbit she would have you believe.
Remember the Craft Cotton and the before and after swatch? Well, this is it a step further on. I saw this little beauty on somebody-or-others Pinterest board and thought ‘how nice for WSN’. Obviously, being the fiddler I am it was not enough to follow the notes on the Ravelry page (it’s not really a pattern, more notes and for a baby size as opposed to a toddler size), plus one of my pet hates about many top-down cardis / jumpers is that they have no neck shaping. I know they drape a bit but I really don’t like a lot of the very square / rectangular necks you end up with like here. So, here we go with the same cardi but with short-row shaping to make the neck a ‘proper’ shape. Also I didn’t like the use of ‘kfb’ increases on the raglans, so here we have garter st raglan ‘seams’ and M1 incs either side of them.
So far, it seems to be working, although it’s been a bit of a faff – mainly because I abandoned the ‘w&t’ short-row technique I know in favour of this one that Rox demonstrates on Ravelry. It think it’s German short rows. For me this gives a much better look to the turning points, indeed an almost invisible one which I never quite managed with w&t. I am very impressed with this.
Non-knitting news – I have discovered what has been digging violently in the pot of mint growing on the roof garden. I feared a squirrel, which would have meant that virtually everything I try and grow up there would become squirrel fodder, but no! The hole-producing creature is none other than Iman’s greatest adversary:
Mr. Blackbird. Presumably taking mint-perfumed dust baths because Iman won’t let him have proper baths downstairs. Hmmm.
She fell in the pond on Sunday, having slipped on the icy edge of said pond on take off and again on landing. Only Pride (and she is a very Proud Rabbit) was hurt, although I have been left in no doubt that I was Wrong and have Offended in hoiking her out of the pond in what (obviously) she decided was an Undignified Manner. Her fur is so thick and in such good condition that she was barely wet (she is nearly waterproof, it seems) and she most definitely was not wet anywhere near her skin. ‘Vaguely Damp’ is the best description. No photo as I was too busy offending her by pulling her out to rush off and get the camera (she is perfectly capable of getting out of the pond herself, I was trying to be helpful and get her out quicker).
This:
…I feel, is Iman’s revenge for me manhandling her in an Undignified Manner. It was the charger for my beloved Zen MP3 player. I discovered it this morning, dismembered in her litter tray. I think it fell off the worktop and she stole it, took it to her litter tray and did the dirty biting deed of chopping it into pieces. And before anybody says that rabbits don’t do that sort of thing, she does. She stole ornaments off the Christmas tree and ran off with them. She steals lots of things and runs off with them. She is not as Refined as she likes to make out… She also objects to birds in the garden. Here she is guarding the bird bath so that the blackbird can’t have his daily bath.
It got too quiet without a Small Furry around after the lovely Ev died. Iman* needed a home, so she came to us. She likes the windfall apples in the garden.
*She wasn’t called Iman before, but following our method of naming Buns after models (Heather was named for Heather Mills, being stroppy and having a leg missing) Iman is named for Iman, being black, skinny and astoundingly beautiful. She is too nicely tempered to be a Naomi.
