And the runner up is....

...me! Like I expected (having had a quick vote for the others in my category to check on their totals), I came second in my section of the blog awards. I am so chuffed to have been nominated that I could have come last and not cared :)

This entry will probably be shorter than usual, as I am missing my faithful amanuensis. For the last few weeks I have been dictating and the Beamish Boy has been typing, like Eric Thingummy for Delius. Except I don't write music... Anyway, this week I'm flying solo!

I've almost finished my swatches, and I'll soon be onto the sketches. I love doing those, as I've only discovered in the last few years that I can make marks on paper which can be recognised as the thing I intended them to be! Until I was 12, I attended a school where art lessons were all about free expression, which was great; unfortunately I had a teacher who constantly put my work down and told me I couldn't draw. Then I went off to my convent high school, where we had lessons with a rather eccentric working artist - great at her own work, but didn't teach us much, and used to tell us all we couldn't draw. So, when I left school, I was pretty much convinced that I was a dud at art.... It was only when I wanted to keep a note of my design ideas that I tried sketching figures, and found I could produce rather stylised models which were ideal for hanging my pieces on!

The yarns have all been very pleasing to work with, but I am the most impressed with Inca Cloud by Artesano Alpaca. I've been wanting to use this for a while, as it is a Fair Trade yarn (something in which I believe very strongly), and I finally found the correct project for it. I swear, the stuff is like knitting with butter - there's just no effort needed to make the stitches and move them along.

I love alpacas, with their funny little teddy-bear faces. I wonder if I might be allowed to keep one on the lawn in front of the bungalows here? It would be so much more pleasant than putting up with the council's earsplitting, stinking petrol mowers, and would be lovely to look at:

(Thanks to the Beamish Boy for the photoshopping!)