By Karen Holdup

…The dwarfs said, "If you will take care of our house, cook, make the beds, wash, sew and knit, and if you will keep everything neat and clean you can stay with us and you shall want for nothing."
"Yes," said Snow White, "with all my heart." And she stayed with them.
She kept the house in order for them. In the mornings they went to the mountains and looked for copper and gold, in the evenings they came back, and then their supper had to be ready...

Now the dwarves were a messy lot and would get very dirty from mining in the mountains, so every evening when they got home Snow White insisted they washed and changed for dinner. However when they did change they scattered their clothes rather than take them to Snow White to be washed. So Snow White decided to knit each one of them their own laundry bag to hang at the end of each of their beds, to put their dirty clothes in ready to be washed. This way she didn’t have to pick them up off the floor and didn’t trip over them all the time.
She wanted the bags to be fun and bright and remind the dwarves of herself, so she modelled them on the sleeves of her dress in bright blue and red and gave each one a tag, on which she embroidered their names.

Posted by Robynn at 08:21 PM | Permalink | 1 cups of tea on the table | TrackBacks (0)

I do love a reader who takes things literally. Thanks, Anne! Too right, it's Wednesday night already and I still haven't said a word...

But if it's words you want, here are some choice ones.

1. Price cuts! Yeah, you like that, don't you? That lovely downhill meander of the dollar means we've been able to lower a few prices — despite some increases from our suppliers. All Colonial needles are now a bit cheaper (by between 50p and £2.75), and so are most Lantern Moon products. (I must admit that a few of the smallest LM needles have actually gone up a titchy bit — 25p or 50p — but I'd say at least 90% of prices have gone down. And the cuts are bigger than the increases. So that's good.)

2. Shiny new stuff! What do you think of these cute shawl pins? LM have some seriously good stuff coming out in the next few months. Very soon I should have a new crochet case for you — how lush is this:

We've also got some new colours in the silk taffeta bags. I'm a sucker for this kind of orange and silver.

3. Winners! The Puss in Boots winners have been chosen; go take a look. I guarantee Castle Cat Couture will knock your socks off. As it were.

Now I'm going to post that honourable Snow White mention that I have so sadly neglected thus far. And tomorrow, if the gods smile on me, I'm going to learn to take better yarn pictures. And then you might even get to see a little knitting. Or not. Best not to count on anything, I reckon.

Posted by Robynn at 07:56 PM | Permalink | 1 cups of tea on the table | TrackBacks (0)

Yes. I have been one slack-ass, lazy, hopeless, no-good slacker of a useless can't-call-herself-a-blogger. I am so sorry. I love talking to you all, and I love hearing from you even more than that, and I'm just not holding up my end of the bargain, am I? That sucks. I don't know if it helps to say how good my intentions are, and that I really really mean to do better now, I swear. But I will tell you that I have plans to get some better pics up here in future (because really, what's a knitting blog without yarn pr0n?)... although a lot of my WIPs I can't actually show you yet. Hm. Conundrum. Still, I'm sure we can come up with something.

What I have to tell you today is not about the great knitting I've been doing, or the gorgeous snow we had yesterday (all quickly melting 2 inches of it), or the brilliant things I'm lining up for the shop, or the imminent price cuts on a few (I said a FEW, calm down there) products (thank you, falling dollar!), or even how happy my cats are making me. (They get really affectionate in the winter. Funny that.)

No, I just wanted to point out that the Snow White winners are up. Have you seen them? Good stuff. And Puss in Boots winners will be published by the weekend. One of em's a stonker, I tell you. (Hey, have you seen the yarn Kirsty dyed for Cinderella's Secret Stockings? How much are we looking forward to that pattern?)

Kirsty also mentions a little bit of news that isn't quite ripe yet, but what the hell: there's talk of getting the winning designs included in a textile art exhibition later this year, in Hereford Art Week. Isn't that brilliant? I'll keep you all posted.

Meanwhile, this little guy wasn't entered into Puss in Boots, but I can't imagine why. Maybe we'll adopt him as our mascot. (Borrowed from cuteoverload and sent in by Temperance; thankee dear!)

Now, in the interests of managing expectations, I have to tell you that I'm going to be very busy this weekend and it's extremely unlikely that I'll get around to blogging before sometime next week. As much as I want to. But if you don't hear from me by Wednesday, yell. Yell rude things. That ought to get my attention.

Posted by Robynn at 09:48 PM | Permalink | 1 cups of tea on the table | TrackBacks (0)

Can anybody think of a celebrity with a craft hobby *other than knitting*? Needed for an arts & crafts guide from the Guardian (coming out on 3 February, so keep an eye out for that).

(Edit: Crystal left a comment pointing out that Rosie O'Donnell is very crafty, which I found really interesting. I love Rosie. But I accidentally deleted the comment - permanently - in the flood of junk comments that arrived at the same time. Crystal, I'm sorry! I am drowning in spam these days. Grrr... I wish there were an easy way to ban comments on all entries older than, say, 30 days. Anybody know of a blogging programme that can do that?)

Posted by Robynn at 05:30 PM | Permalink | 2 cups of tea on the table | TrackBacks (0)

No, surely you jest, it can't possibly be the 11th of January already.

It can?

Oh.

Well I hope you all had a simply marvellous Christmas, and New Year, and *cough* a thoroughly energetic and inspired start to 2007. I know I have. I successfully introduced Christmas pudding to the Swiss in-laws; I learned to ski (scary!); and now I'm back with my head so bursting with ideas, I can barely sit still. That might be why it's taken me so long to get back to the blog.

I love New Year. Always have. I know, I know, it's thoroughly artificial and all, you may as well pick any day of the calendar for a new start; but there's something marvellous about those fresh blank pages in the diary. It helps that for much of my life, different phases have roughly coincided with different calendar years, so I have lots of associations of change and fresh new things when January rolls around. (And I love change. Thrive on it.) And of course, the days between Christmas and 1 January are generally pretty quiet; so it comes naturally to reflect on the year behind, to crystallise what you want from the year ahead, and whether you call them goals, resolutions or plans, to form some good intentions as to how you're going to get it.

My goals for this year revolve around balance. How to keep improving Purlescence, while preserving some personal and social life. How to balance quiet time with seeing friends — they've been sorely neglected of late. When to say yes, when to say no. How to look after my time, my home, my body. How to be more productive, more disciplined, and have more fun. It sounds like a lot, doesn't it? But I have a fairly clear idea of what I need to do. I think I can handle it.

And I have knitting goals too, of course. Socks is one item high on the list. For the others — well, you'll just have to wait and see.

Here's to a gloriously creative, creatively organised 2007. Cheers!

Posted by Robynn at 09:35 AM | Permalink | 1 cups of tea on the table