FOs all over the place

Part of my preparation for the knitted wedding was of course to pick something to knit on the train ride to London. I had this handspun mohair/silk (if I remember correctly) which I bought at a craft market on Hornby Island a couple of summers ago. I was going to put it in The Sweater That Makes Me Sneeze, but then decided I'd like to use it on its own. I think it was not that expertly spun, as it kept twisting around itself, and I also think it was dyed first and then spun, leaving little candy-cane twists where the red meets the green. And that's all I can tell you about spinning! I started it days before I even got on the train (just to try it out, you know) and since there wasn't all that much yarn in the skein, finished it in time for Katherine to wear it to the wedding. It's my approximation of this scarf. Through the wonders of blocking, it now wraps cosily around my neck, but it's about the shortest scarf around!

The rest of the day I knit on this multidirectional scarf, in weirdo variegated 100% nylon. I like the faded-jeans look of it, but wonder what one will actually do with a nylon scarf! Just decorative, I suppose. We shall see. I think I'll just keep this around for future train knitting... It's quite fun so far to see the short rows actually work out. I have three balls of this yarn, so the scarf promises to be long enough!




And this cushion cover is from the yarn that I bought at Loop in London. Take three skeins of Colinette Point Five, make an envelope, shove a pillow form in. Three buttons and you're done. I really like the colours. Poopedy green is an old fave of mine, but I wouldn't have thought to add the peachy pinks in with it.

It is apparently Knitting Week here in the UK. The department store is having knitting classes and a knitathon tomorrow to knit squares for a charity blanket. And I've heard of a gang that gets together Thursday afternoons, so maybe I'll give that a try today.

I brought home Mary Poppins on DVD from the library the other day, and the kids have been downright reluctant to watch it for some reason, so I thought I'd watch it myself since I'd paid for it and all. This time I noticed that the family lives on a street with a hexagonal Victorian pillar box, and the bank the dad works in is surprisingly similar to Gringotts! I wonder if they were filmed in the same place, or if there is a plethora of big banks like that!
Our family lore says that when Mary Poppins first came out, my big sister took me to see it. She was maybe 18 and I was maybe 5. And at the end of the movie I just cried and cried and cried and cried and cried and cried and cried, because Mary Poppins goes away, you see. Well, since I was all alone here yesterday, no one need ever know what happened, but I tell ya, that's about the most dreadful ending in all cinema... just ... dreadful...

I did manage to pick out the great dance scenes and once the kids saw the chimneysweeps, they gladly watched other snippets. That Dick Van Dyke could sure dance, eh? Sigh.