My first amigurumi

May I present Ole, the pig? He is my first amigurumi. I was always sceptical of doing one of those patterns but I took a class at the Ravelry meeting in backnang with the great Diana and she showed us some very useful tricks. As I was lying in bed all week, I thought of trying this. And voila!

I am definitely feeling better and will start to do my fisrt test knitting while watching football (Germany vs. Russia) tonight.

Over half a year???

Believe it or not, I'm still alive. If anyone is still looking at this blog that is. To say my life turned upside down is quite an understatement. I don't know where to start. First of all, in July the bf and I movved in together. We have a huge appartment (5 rooms, 105 sq metres) in a very posh neighborhood - for less rent than our two smaller appartments together. It was a stroke of luck, because the money we pay is in no proportion to normal price here. And so far I haven't found anything bad about the flat. Apart from the fact that you can't shout from one room to the other because they are so huge! We had to move at the end of last school year which was absolutely horrible. Out of sheer exhaustion I got sick and it wasn't a nice feeling to leave the work of moving to the bf and friends.
Around mid-August we were relly settled and there were no more boxes. And then we went to the south of France on vacation. It was very relaxing, alas the weather wasn't that nice. It was very windy on the beach and a couple of days were cast over. However, we went to Andorra and Barcelona and we had a great time.
The new school year started well ,I have nice students - but yesterday I was supposed to go on a five day school field trip and I got the flu really bad. I have everything you can imagine I - don't want to go into details here. Suffice it to say that the doctor said I wasn't allowed to work for the whole week. I feel really bad because now another teacher has to go on the trip on very short notice.
I did a lot of knitting over the past months - not as much as I would like but I was productive. Everything can be seen on ravelry. On Saturday I finished the Manchester Jacket from Interweave and I like it a lot. At the Moment I am working on the Trellis and Vine Sweater from this fall's Interweave. Finally apattern that captivates my whole attention. Until I got to the lower body - stockinette stockinette stockinette....
In September I went to the German Ravelry meeting in Backnang. It was really a blast. Sadly I could only go for one of the two days but it was great nevertheless. I met a lot of people and bought a lot of yarn :-)
At the beginning of November we will go to NYC for a week. Yeah! I'm so looking forward to this. I have nevver been there so far. I went to the west coast a couple of times but never New York. Any advice on yarn shops (apart from Purl?)

Packages!

I'm sorry I have been absent for so long but I was pretty ill in January. First a bad case of cysitis, then one tooth broke out while I was eating and now I had also a wisdom tooth removed. No good month! Work was also pretty hard ,too, yet I had some knitting done, however I lacked the time to put everything in Ravelry - but I'm working on it. On the good side: packages!
First of all the next to last installment of "Seven Deadly Sins" (theme: envy):



And I got a package from my SP 13 pal. The yarn is pure alpaca and so soft. I already started the Montego Bay Scarf with it :-) The magazine is beautiful as well - sadly I can't speak Finnish. Does anyone know if there is a Finnish- English translation of knitting terms on the net?

Dear secret pal - thank you sooo much for all the beautiful things!

Happy New 2009

Happy New Year! I know that I am a bit late on that but it's still the beginning of January, right? I had the most blissful (and needed) winter holidays - tomorrow I have to go back to work. Sadly I had the flu over Christmas but I stayed mostly in bed so I was over it pretty soon. After that we went to North Italy to a sweet hotel. The food was fantastic - I guess I have gained some pounds. For the bf I went skiing, something which I haven't done for 15 years and which I didn't really like as a child. But I have to admit thast it was kinda nice this time. Maybe because of the skiing instructor (the bf :-) ) ? Anyway, I think  I will keep on doing it - it's a good contrast to dancing anyway.

I did also a lot of knitting but I didn't have time to take photos yet. After months, I finally finished the second sweater for the bf (no sign of the curse yet), I mad a travel neck pillow and a felted bag. I also started a cardigan (I'm on the first sleeve) and today I frogged the silken scabbard and started on the baby cables. I also sewed an evening dress as I'm going to a ball with the bf at the end of january. As soon as the shoes are delivered you will get pictures!

I also got lovely, lovely yarn from my secret pal - it 's soo soft and the colour I really nice. Thank you again so much! Pictures of that also soon.