Howdy!

You know how life tends to get in the way of your blogging? Happens all the time to me. I take photos, dream up stuff to blog about and I actually make it as far as uploading stuff but can never get to publish the post in time. So yeah, this is one of those catch-up posts again.

Last Friday, the UAE Knitters, which henceforth will be referred to in this blog only as the Amiras, met up for a bit of lunch, a spot of knitting and a whole lot of chatting and fondling yarn and each other’s projects. The lovely Jackie opened up her beautiful home at the Green Community for us.

That’s not part of the menu! That is my newly finished Snapdragon Tam!

When Eibee and got there, Jackie was just putting the finishing touched on two and a half pans of lasagna; I helped grate cheese on top. Then they all went to the oven and started giving the kitchen this beautiful aroma.

To accompany the pasta, there was Jackie’s awesome salad with her Mum’s vinaigrette recipe. I have to admit I only ate the cherry tomatoes purely out of choice.

Then as the other Amiras started coming in, the cookies and other sweet treats came piling up on the kitchen counter! Chocolate chip cookies from my daughter Eibee and Jeane plus yummy Lebanese sweets from Hala.

And finally the lasagna made it out of the oven! What a spread, huh? There was a lot of food. The kiddies had the first round and had a helping of lasagna and slices of bread.

Little William loved the food! Him and the twins were munching on bread long before the lasagna was ready.

Further evidence of the little bread eaters!

And more….they got along so well together that we managed to chat with their Mums without having to worry about what they’ve gotten to.

Isn’t he a cute little thing? I will miss that smile when Madli takes him to London.

After two helpings of lasagna (for some anyway), we had the most awesome cup of coffee from Jackie’s trusty brewer. Not sure whose cup this was but you can see it’s a 3-beaner which means it’s a strong cuppa!

And then the knitting! Here is Madli holding up a beautiful Clothilde shawl she knitted using my hand-dyed Dubai Knits – Faith, Hope and Love yarn in the Temple of Jade colourway. Feels so nice seeing one of my yarns knitted up!

Oh and we hooked up with friends from afar via Skype. There’s Caroline, in her PJs, who joined us from Quebec. I think she was holding up her Star Trek coffee mug!

We tried to hook up with Charmaine in Australia but the connection was just awful so we didn’t get to see her or cute little Felix who is apparently being very cheeky these days. We also Skyped with Dutte and we saw her casting on for her Selbu Modern as part of our KAL. But she didn’t stay on too long as the connection again was not good.

So we went back to admire the knitting and the yarn. Jackie was nearly done with her Adrift cardigan but, ever the perfectionist, she was not happy with the pick-ups on the underarm. The cardi looks awesome though and suits Rain really well.

We talked about doing a KAL on Ravelry spurred on by all the gushing on Charmaine’s recent FO which was a tam. As chatty knitters go, one thing led to another and before you know it we were doing a KAL! We agreed to do a mass cast on that Friday. Charmaine actually cast on her Ishbel beret all the way in Oz but we didn’t see it because of the silly internet connection.

I cheated on my first project and cast on a few days sooner. Snapdragon Tam is so easy and such a fun knit! This is my second KAL project, Beret de Printemps using my ginormous leftover of Luscious Single Silk. I swear this yarn is like a Time Lord – it regenerates!

Geez, my thighs are huge!

My daughter Eibee cast on her Hermione Granger hat using a skein of precious Sundara Worsted.

Looking like a pro, huh? Well she hasn’t gone past the ribbing and has not picked up the project since casting on.

The most important part of the day was admiring/fondling/oohing and aahing at Jackie’s stash. This is a basketfull of sample in the sitting room. Dream in Colour Smooshy in lovely colours, cute shawl pins and a skein of my Temple of Jade peeking through.

Then it was on to the good stuff. This is Hala’s photo of Jackie doing unspeakable things to her skein of yarn! LOL! Can’t blame her for getting high on yarn fumes. I do believe this is a skein of precious Skein Queen Exquisite!

Jackie is a role model to her twins. She starts them young on the love affair with fibre. Apparently Nyah is keen to learn how to knit.

And the stash dive/envy begins! This is the Malabrigo bin where there are at least 6 colourways of lace alone!

Jackie had lots of precious onesies like this silk with crystals. How pretty is that huh?

I didn’t get a photo of all of it but this had to be shared. This is our fab co-moderator Hala who is shy but really friendly, daydreaming on top of all of Jackie’s Bugga! yarn. So squishy!

Rain turned into knitwear model for the day. This is Jackie’s awesome Coraline cardigan knit out of Malabrigo Silky Merino in the most beautiful pale lilac/pink shade. It’s just too precious.

It does suit Rain to a tee and we said that she should knit one for herself. I’m tempted to knit one myself but the thought of all that stockinette is making my head spin.

Jackie, Kundi and Jackie discussing the virtues of a crocheted button loop. Or something like that.

And there’s more yarn fondling. This time it’s the Sundara bin. Can you see the awesome colours?

This cute thing is a cardigan Jackie knitted for her daughter. It’s out of a simple cotton yarn, nothing luxurious about it but it is so soft and drapey. It’s more than 2 years old but it still looks good.

And it still fits Nyah! The fabric was quite stretchy and draped really well.

All that eating and knitting and lusting after Jackie’s stash made us thirsty so we popped open a chilled bottle of Moet when we got back downstairs.

Yummy bubbly.

Oh and I almost forgot. Jackie showed us the dress and suite her twins will be wearing to their friend’s wedding in Bali next week. Can’t you just see them looking absolutely adorable in these?

Part of Jackie’s wedding present to her friends was the wedding ring pillow. She knitted it up using a bare Dubai Knits yarn and Rain kindly helped her with the crochet edging. This is the moment when Rain presented it to Jackie.

Would you look at that beautiful pillow? Jackie did a great job with the beads, didn’t she?

And that crochet edging which Rain incidentally whipped up out of thin air is so delicate and sweet. This is going to be an heirloom. The best thing about this joint project is that Rain got two skeins of Malabrigo lace in Paris Night! Lucky Rain!

So that was last Friday. It’s almost Friday again so I better finish with all the catching up posts still to make.

I hope you enjoyed this little peek into our Amiras meeting. There will be plenty more in the coming months.