Oh what a grey day.

Bleurgghh. We are in the cold grip of 'storm Frank' a wet and grey name for a wet and grey weather front - oh, and windy too. So walking with Maisie is a thing which has to be done, but it is a trial, let me tell you. Also it is difficult to avoid walks near trees (a danger in high winds). Perhaps that little spice of adventure is what keeps us going - or maybe not. I feel the grim hand of duty upon me when the wee dog and I venture forth, but at least she remains ever hopeful of meeting someone interesting on our perambulations. And the break-dancing on the carpet to dry herself when we return is quite entertaining.

In more cheerful news, having finished the marathon of Christmas Market related crochet and felting of Santas, robins, Star Wars characters and penguins, I have now been able to return to the Lily Pond Blanket which I made a very brief start on back in October.

It is so lovely to sit in the comfy armchair with the bag of yarn alongside and Maisie sleeping on my knee to set to work on a new and gorgeous blanket. This is made with Stylecraft 'Life' yarn which contains 30% wool, 70% acrylic, so it's a bit more expensive than the ordinary Stylecraft pure acrylic, but this pattern is so pretty that it's worth making it that bit woollier.

So far I have made the four blocks of patterns 1 & 2 and have done the first block of pattern 3.

As you can see, the colours are gorgeous, and the patterns are interesting. Each block introduces a new technique and so I am learning as I go. The 'Lily Bud' block which you can see in the bottom right of the picture is the most complicated pattern I have followed so far.

In fact, now I've done the second one, I realise that I was concentrating so much on the stitches that I've used the wrong colour (Lily instead of Rose) for the main petals. No worries - I'll do 4 blocks of the right colour and use this first one as a centrepiece for something else. It's far too pretty to waste, don't you agree?

In other news- if you are a yarn-aholic and based here in Scotland, perhaps you might be interested in the Big January Destash http://www.edinyarnfest.com/the-big-destash/run by the Edinburgh Yarn Company. A chance to swap some ill-chosen impulse buys for something more useful maybe?