I've been slimed!

Aven has tagged me for a meme!

Now, ordinarily I would sneer condescendingly, ignore the tag and refuse to do the meme. However, a) It's Aven, how could I refuse :) b) it wasn't too time-consuming and c) it was pretty interesting. So I enjoyed doing it. The meme is as follows:

id·i·o·syn·cra·sy

Pronunciation Key n. pl. id· i·o·syn·cra·sies -A structural or behavioral characteristic peculiar to an individual or group.

Write down five of your own personal idiosyncracies.
Then, if you wish, tag five people from your live gerbil or friendslist to do the same.

1. You know those jelly-centred cream-filled cookies that Peak Frean (and various imitators) make? I must eat them in the following way: First, I bite off the top layer while leaving the jelly intact. Extra points if I can leave all the cream on the bottom layer during this phase of the operation. Then I bite off the bottom layer, again leaving the jelly intact. Then, using my nimble-as-all-heck teeth, I separate the remaining bit of cookie from the jelly centre and eat the cookie. Finally, I savour the jelly.
2. I anal-retentively organize the clothes in my closet by colour. Starting at the left are patterns; followed by grey-spectrum neutrals moving from black to white; followed by brown-spectrum neutrals moving from dark brown to cream; followed by reds, then purples, then blues, then greens, then yellows, then oranges. (Except that I don't have any yellows or oranges, so the point is moot - however, if I did have any, I'd know where to hang 'em.) Sadly, this does not make up for the fact that most of the rest of my life is really messy.
3. Once I get in bed for the night, I usually have to nuzzle my feet around squirmily for a while before falling asleep.
4. I suffer from 'perma-wedgie'. Regardless of the cut of the panties I am wearing, they will wedgify within about ten seconds. I think it's the shape of my ass which does this. There is no cure.
5. Over fifteen years of ballet training in my younger days means that every now and then I will break into spontaneous ballet steps. Fortunately this is controllable - I don't do this in public. However, my family members are frequently treated to the sight of me pirrhouetting around the kitchen for no readily apparent reason.

There. I hope you enjoyed it. (Or at least didn't get so frightened of me that you ran away screaming.) But I don't think I'll pass on the tag. :)

Lacy shawl for baby Muth

In an attempt to stop the fruitless attempts at designing a decent-looking pattern, I made a template of how the motif should look, in pen, and then attempted to put a lace design within that template, in pencil. This was a good decision. I'm now testing the latest stab at the design, which has the motif worked completely in lace, surrounded by solid stocking stitch. So far it is looking very hopeful, although admittedly I'm only about eight rows into it. I'm crossing my fingers that the pattern will emerge properly as I keep going.

Stornaway sweater for BIL (blue)

This is now measuring twelve whole inches - eleven and a half when I stretch it the way it would look when blocked. I should be able to start the underarm gussets sometime this weekend.

What I am finding a bit annoying is how the colour displays differently every time I take a picture of this thing. All the previous pictures were not blue enough, but in this picture it is a bit too blue. Ah, the vagaries of photography...

Herald's tabard for moi

The NZ wool seller on eBay now has an auction up for worsted-weight wool in pretty much the perfect yellow colour. Problem? There are over three pounds of it. Yeesh! I don't need three pounds for this project! I need, like, fifty grams, one hundred max! And trust me - this is not a colour that I would be able to find a use for once I'm done with the tabard project. This is a strong yellow that I personally would not be caught dead in, nor would I dress any of my loved ones in it if you paid me. I think I should just email the seller and ask if he would mind doing a private sale of a smaller quantity of yellow wool. Hopefully he'll go for that.