And this week's minor excitement is...

 So we've done flooding, plague of flies, various leaks etc.  This week for variety I tried to electrocute myself with my iron while simultaneously blowing the fuses to part of the house.  I thought trouble was supposed to come in threes: I think I am over my quota, please stop.

I was steaming a fabric panel I had safety-pinned together, and somehow the iron hit a safety-pin, which somehow unpinned itself and stabbed the iron, resulting in a short circuit, a loud sharp explosion which tingled my hand, half the lights going out and a bad smell of burning. Cue shouts of surprise from elsewhere in the house as computers died, lights went out etc.  I'm fine, the panel is fine, and today we went shopping for a new iron.

The basement floor is drying out well, so while we are still leaving the windows open, we are now shutting the back door which cuts down on the icy draughts sweeping up the stairs to freeze my ankles while I'm working from home during the day.  But every time I shut my room door to keep out the draught, the cat immediately materialises meowing to be admitted or she will die, only to be followed five minutes later by panicked scrabbling at the door as she tries to get out again. Sigh. But in good news, the flies appear to have stopped coming.

I finished my Jeans knit t-shirt ribbing and wet blocked it.  I'm still annoyed about the different dyelot that snuck in there,  which is subtly visible across the midriff in the photo but I don't think it's too obvious in actual wear.  Washing relaxed the raglan seams a bit more so they feel more comfortable.  It fits well and I like how it looks on me. However I'm always a bit ambivalent about short sleeve handknits because if it is cool enough to wear a handknit then generally I want my arms covered too. The pattern also has a long-sleeved version so perhaps I should knit it again.

With the tshirt off the needles, I have started on an early Christmas present which is a pair of fingerless mitts for DH  using a kit I bought online.  The Brodgar Mitts are inspired by symbols carved on the Neolithic stone artefacts excavated at the Ness of Brodgar, Orkney, which we visited a few years ago on holiday.  We were lucky enough to be there when the archeological dig was active, which was really interesting. The yarn included is also from Orkney, Orkney Tweed 4 ply 100% wool, which is properly 'woolly' and excellent for fair isle so far. The thumb is done with a steek, which I've only ever used on cardigans and sleeves, so that should be interesting.  I may have to rip my start out if it won't fit DH's bigger hands and switch to bigger needles, but I'll knit a bit more so I can try it on him.

My Kumihimo order turned up this week so I now have the foam looms and three colours of cord to try weaving with, and some plastic bobbins in case I want to make something with longer lengths.  I went with red, green and white thinking of Christmas ornaments possibly.

Otherwise this week I've been cross-stitching, hand-quilting (working on the final row of blocks now, yay!), bobbin lace, and I've taken apart a cardigan that was too big for me so that I can try cutting it down and overlocking it back together. Work has been somewhat tedious but enlivened by my fairly-universally-disliked manager suddenly announcing that he was stepping down from being a manager. It is unclear as to why, or what will happen to him now, or who is going to be our new manager. We are hoping for new blood and not one of the existing hard-liners (whom my co-worker refers to as the Axis of Evil). They're also threatening that some team members may get moved to other teams, although that seems less of an issue while we are all working from home anyway.  Hurrah for home working!