Slow going

I haven't been crafting much but I have been naughty and bought Neat Stuff.

I am 2/3 of the way through a crochet pram toy. I have made seaweed, the handle ring and dangly strings to hold fishes. Now I must make the fishes. I regularly debate with myself over whether fishes really need faces, as I find putting eyes and mouths on a chore.

I am halfway through the first hat (see below) for my stepdad. I had a break while dreading changing colours but did so yesterday and am now making good progress.

The Project Which Shall Not Be Named is still lurking. I have some new needles (see below) that should help.

Now, the naughty list...

I bagged a bargain on eBay; I got several sets of very chunky knitting needles from a store closure.

A company called Denise makes crochet/knitting sets - interchangeable tips that attach to various lengths of cord - which I have obtained. These are apparently airline-safe, too, which is nice. The uses are too many to list here but they will come in handy.

I also bought a huge collection (17 different sized sets) of double pointed bamboo needles from China (on eBay, direct from the factory), the right length for socks/mittens or the tops of hats. These were sooo cheap and came really quickly. I will definitely buy this way again for bamboo, the price difference is incredible. A 5-needle set in the UK may cost £3-4 with little choice of lengths/materials available, 17 of these sets cost me £14 including shipping. There's no contest really.

I bought more yarn... I have some lovely fat merino wool to make a second, bulkier hat for my stepdad for use in colder weather. I'm looking forward to knitting this, it should go very quickly due to the size of the yarn/needles. I also bought other yarns... mumble mumble...

So, hopefully I'll soon have some finished products to report on!