Mini Me - "The Bride"

Ok, so maybe I took this a bit too far?
I just sent in my Stitched Self to the London Science Museum!

The Big Knit CHALLENGE!

thebigknit2008

To celebrate WWNIP DAY and benefit Age Action Ireland, Innocent Smoothies is sponsoring the Big Knit.

From the Innocent website:

"Fancy helping older people in Ireland keep warm this winter? Then all you need to do is knit some little woolly hats for our innocent smoothie bottles. For every behatted bottle sold in store, we - that's innocent - will give 25c to Age Action. We're aiming to knit 80,000 little hats this year, so we'd love you to get knitting.

It's a sad fact that every year in Ireland around 2000 people over the age of 65 die from cold related conditions. Which is where your knitted goods come in. All monies raised from the innocent Big Knit this year will go towards supporting Age Action to help keep older people in Ireland warm."

Really? I understand creating a cute campaign to get people involved and invested in the cause. I also understand collecting money from people buying the "hat-wearing" smoothies who might otherwise be unaware or uninterested in the cause.

But seriously, wouldn't older people be warmed more directly by knitting adult-sized hats and scarves to be collected by Age Action Ireland and distributed to those in need? And what about all those tiny knitted smoothie hats? Does the smoothie-buyer get to keep it, or where do they go? The website mentions a goal of 80,000 mini hats.

I challenge my friends and fellow knitters to knit and donate at least 1 adult-sized hat or scarf for every 20 mini hats you make. Maybe even make the adult one first, just to be sure you've got enough wool!

TV shopping = Family Bonding

Last week we thought we were getting a newer hand-me-down TV from a friend so we decided to Freecycle our 10+ year-old SONY crt-style TV (which we also got 2nd hand) while it was still in good working order. It was collected less than 2 hours after posting the offer. Unfortunately the replacement TV didn't work out and we were left without a TV -- shock! horror!

What to do??? So we decided to shop around. First we checked online. DH and I found all the specs we needed, but decided we needed a real looky-looky-touchy-feely to decide. The first shop DH visited had no sales staff in the TV section and most of the TV's were turned off. Hmmm, no joy.

So, we tossed the kiddos in the car and set off to the local electronics mega-shop. The kids, of course, wanted to get the Jumbo 3D telly (pictured). Being a bit more practical, DH and I decided on a nice small one (cheap'n'cheerful.) We quickly paid and the shop assistant lifted it easily into our car. The new TV weighs only 5.2kg, compared to the 27" CRT which 2 grown men struggled to lift. At home we were amazed at all the options on the new TV. I guess a few things have changed since the last time we bought a _new_ TV ... in 1989!

Knithacker

Dino and J. are now happy families :-)
I'm also VERY excited that Dino Super-Knitosaurus has been accepted to appear on the KnitHacker blog this week! I'll definitely be posting when it happens. Now, back to my first adventure with kntting in the round using DPN's ....

Dino, the Super Knitosaurus

I love it when a plan comes together! I have a young friend who has complete and utter confidence that anything she can think of, I can knit for her. I hope she likes Dino ;-)