Thursday 20 September 2007

I baffled the doctor

In the early hours of Wednesday morning I woke up with the skin on my thighs on fire and not in a good way!!


The doctor didn't actually know what might have caused the big, red, burny, itchy welty rash that covered both my upper thighs and stomach but finally after sitting around trying not to scratch for 2 days things have finally starting to calm down. Not sure if my body has just weathered the storm or it's all the steroids I'm ingesting in the form of prednisone and aristocort, don't really care as long as it goes away soooooooon.


And for the brave here's a very sexy picture of one of the welts on my leg!

Friday 14 September 2007

Back from holidays and back to reality


Just spent an amazing week driving around the South Island of New Zealand, it’s so incredibly stunning, so many snow capped mountains and rampaging rivers and the quiet, the blessed quiet.

Then back to inner city living, where there’s nothing but the constant hum of traffic and rev-heads who think it’s fully sick to do burn outs around the round about 7 floors beneath our living room.

Anyway, back to NZ….

We landed in Christchurch and drove to Hamner Springs, which was a gorgeous little town surrounded by huge rolling hills. Soaked in the hot springs, mmm rotten eggs….but man were they GOOD. It was like 20 years of dead dry skin just rubbed off me when I was getting changed, my elbows have NEVER been so soft! And oh, soaking in that hot stinky water was like melty, gooey heaven.

From there we headed down to Fox Glacier, where we were all set to go Heli-hiking, but the clouds rolled in and the helicopter was too scared to fly us to the top of the Glacier, so we just walked into the face of it and ooh and ahh’d at the sheer massive, magestic nature of it all.

Onto Wanaka and lakeside tranquility. Apparently this town is the less (s)wanky place to go skiing in NZ and it was so lovely. Even though there were people hustling and bustling about the place, it was so tranquil.


We flew over to Milford Sound, across the mountains, again stunning. Hubby poo’d his pant when the 10 seater plane we were in got jolted 200 feet straight up, when an updraft off a mountain caught us, which was kind of funny, but I was cucumber girl and it didn’t bother me that much. After cruising around the sound (I’m not even going to bang on about how gorgeous that place was) and flying back, we spent the rest of the afternoon pottering around a toy and transport museum, which had a wool shop attached.

Ah, yes, I’ve finally gotten to the yarny bit.

Got some lovely handspun things in Wanaka, nice dark brown stuff that was the natural sheepy colour and some very pretty lilac and pale blue 2 ply, both will make great scarves.

Apart from that the wool situation around Christchurch wasn’t that crash hot, I popped into Knit World and Knitters Warehouse and both had a FANTASTIC selection of Cleckheaton and Patons, but hey, that’s what Spotlight’s for. Knit World had Jo Sharp and Rowan, but there was nothing I couldn’t buy over here or source cheaper on the net. So it was a lil disappointing on that front, although I did pick up the Rowan 39 book for about $45, so YAY and some Twilleys Freedom Spirit (in the Fire colourway) for $5 a ball.

As for possum yarn, definitely not for me, it did feel lovely and soft and like it would be toasty warm, but the actual possum fibre is really short, so when it’s spun with Merino, you get lots of sticky outy fibres just falling about the place that would have just driven me mad with all the fluffing and getting all over everything, so it stayed in the shop.

Christchurch is a pretty little city too, strange mix though, the “cultural precinct” lasts about 2-3 blocks between the river and the Cathedral, but anything away from that is all second hand clothing stores or empty shops. We did find this gorgeous little art deco street called New Regent St, that was all divine little nick-nack shops and Hubby found a Cuban Cigar place, that also sold cuban coffee!! I won't even mention how I pawed pathetically at the windows of the Cashmere shop, the stuff in there was soooo grown up and stylish, so I didn't go in :p

Coffee is just divine over there too, lattes served in near bowl size cups, which you sip to wash down your freshly toasted bagel (like the French Toast Bagels we had for breakfast one morning at Yellow Rocket) YUM!!

Speaking of sourcing yarn cheaper on the net, just invested in 10 balls of Noro Silk Garden Colour 252, at $11 a ball for my Lady Eleanor Entrelac Stole.

Just have to get the Clapotis out of the way (GOD DAMN that Handmaiden Seasilk is like sex in yarn form), oh and the Montego Bay Scarf and the Blue Sky Cropped Cardi.

The brother-in-law just got engaged too, there was vague talk of a Christmas wedding, so I might have to whip up some of interesting lace stole-like creature for that, just so everyone can ooh and ahh at my pointy stick prowess, or not.