Woolgathering

I am thrilled with these, my latest eBay buy. I’ve wanted some for ages but it’s funny how you keep putting off buying the little things, isn’t it? I think they are great and I am certain that they will soon become indispensable. Perhaps I should buy a few more pairs so that I always have some to hand.

I’m keeping an eye open for postie this morning, hoping that my rag rugging kit arrives. I’ll be needing to think about what tools I need to ease the strip cutting.

The Christmas Fair is looming. I may have a good look round for interesting second hand garments suitable for rugging

There’s no doubt about it, this blog is whizzing along this morning. So, now I am going to switch Lightbox back on and see if it slows things down again….

I managed to get the wheel out at around 6:30pm yesterday and filled my second bobbin of BFL. I plyed and skeined it, so at long long last have a skein of BFL to my name! I have been spinning it quite fine and only getting to spin on Wednesday mornings since puppy came into my life - so it really seems to be taking a lifetime to spin these tops up. It’s worth it though, it’s a fine colour and very, very soft. My spinning/plying leaves something to be desired and the skein has a distinct bias, but I am pleased overall - it’s an achievement. There’s still plenty waiting to be spun up, though, and I doubt I’ll be knitting any Xmas presents with it for this year at least.

Do we need a picture? or shall it wait until the job is completed?

Gosh, I am feeling pleased with myself!

I think it’s time we had a picture of the wee girl who is getting in the way of my spinning.

Sadly, I conclude that Lightbox is causing Woolgathering to run slowly and I have deactivated it while I await conformation that the situation is improved. I love Lightbox and I don’t really want to do without it. But why is it less of a problem on other domains? It makes no sense!

I don’t know which change did it, but I think I detect an improvement.

Yes, I only changed one parameter at a time.

Yes, nothing changed when tested.

Yes, it got better on its own… which suggests to me that one of the changes I made worked but that cacheing somewhere along the line hid that improvement from me at the time.

So now I’ll wait to see if Gill detects an improvement and then slowly add stuff back in one at a time if she agrees that things have speeded up. When it slows again, I shall have identified my culprit. On the other hand, there may be no detectable improvement for the reader.

I hate computers.

Woolgathering seems to have developed a terminal sulk. I find that there are significant response issues but cannot track down a reason for them. I spent much of last evening investigating the database and unplugging plugins and changing templates - all to no avail. This morning Gill tells me that she is finding the site unresponsive too.

This is just to say that I am on the case, if a little stumped right now - and to invite comments below as to different readers’ perceptions of response times from the site.

Right now I am so frustrated that I am considering removing this wordpress installation and database and beginning again with a fresh one. Of course, I really don’t want to have to do that, but I know it isn’t my host per se, as my other installations/domains give me no grief at all… can it be the imported posts from wordpress.com that are causing the trouble? are my indices screwed? If so, why does the admin interface also respond slowly? The database itself checks out OK, it’s only 7MB and all the tables are healthy and optimised.

Ideas?

In today’s post - this gift from my beloved

It’s a cushion cover kit that is destined to be a wall hanging.

Inside there was this gorgeous yarn

I have never done anything like this before and am certain to be cack-handed…

I had to try immediately. The instructions were a bit sparse for the newcomer but I had a go…

And this is where I am up to

Half the first row of little squares completed. I love the colours!

I shan’t go much further. I’ll keep it for Monday and get some help at Craft Club - make sure I am on the right path before going too far wrong.