Tea and Cakes

Well then. Seeing as I don’t seem to be getting around to writing about the rest of the honeymoon (it was fab, Florence is fantastic, Lucca was lovely, we had a super time), I think I should at least talk about the wedding day.

All the pictures in this post are from our wonderful photographers, MaC Photographic. Mike and Ceire were really brilliant. I don’t usually enjoy having my photograph taken, and I don’t know if my picture has ever actually appeared on the blog, aside from knitting shots with the head cut off, so this will be a first, and these are the first photos I’ve had that I really enjoy looking at. If you need photos for anything I can’t recommend Mike and Ceire highly enough.

We had a grey, and mainly rainy day for the wedding. It didn’t matter though – it’d take more than a bit of weather to spoil such a happy day. We started off early enough, with a trip to the registry office with immediate family to get the legal bit out of the way, then popped round the corner for coffee and pastries -yum. Then we divided up into teams and headed off to our respective duties – mine was to get my hair done and get to the hotel to get ready properly and have my make up done. Sarah-Jane is a wonder with make up. I don’t wear any usually, and whenever I’ve had it done before I’ve looked pretty terrifying. Sarah-Jane did it perfectly for me, and made the whole thing totally stress free. She is a make up genius as far as I’m concerned.

E kept me sane through the whole day, and my beautiful flower girls were adorable and perfectly behaved.

Our wedding and reception were at a small country house just outside of Dublin, and we had our own humanist ceremony out there, which was really personal, and just right for us. I was nervous walking down the aisle, I don’t know why, and I was glad that we decided to walk down together, as it meant I had D’s hand to hold.

One of my brothers sang a song that he’d written for us, which almost made me cry: A Song for Issy (The video isn’t from the wedding, but it’s a beautiful song)

Our mothers both read for us, and our friends and family spoke about us as a couple.
We said our vows, exchanged rings, and became husband and wife.

We dragged everyone outside in the rain for a big group photo, took most of the rest inside, but the rain stopped again just long enough for us to get some lovely shots in the garden.

We had a delicious vegetarian dinner, and many, many speeches (well, ok, seven, but I think that’s quite a lot for a wedding), which made us smile and laugh, and we were surrounded by our closest friends and family, and I felt very loved.

Then there was cake, and dancing, and talking, and more dancing, and more friends and family, and it was over before I knew it.

I’ve been unsure about blogging this, but it’s most definitely behind me now, so I’m going to go ahead.

I was quite relaxed in the lead up to the wedding, I thought. I finished work on Monday, went to pilates class in the evening, and then Mum and my step-Dad arrived. All was good.

Tuesday I went out to the wedding hotel with the parents, then had a coffee and scone with them at M&S, and saw them off safely to visit their friends.

I headed into the city centre to buy a few bits and pieces, pootle a bit, and collect some of the wedding suits. I was in and out of Arnotts and Debenhams a couple of times. (This may be important)

When I got back to the car my face felt a bit hot, and I noticed I was getting a couple of spots on my cheek. it had been a warm afternoon, so I thought nothing of it.

I got home, had a cuppa, and waited for L and S to come over so that S could do a trial for my wedding make up. (Incidentally, S is awesome at make up. I don’t usually wear make up and was nervous but she is wonderful).

My cheeks and neck were quite warm, and my skin felt really rough all of a sudden. I freaked out a little bit but the lovely people on Ravelry calmed me down and pointed out that it was probably just a stress thing. That seemed most plausible.

All was good. Late in the evening it got bad again. Itchy, rough, and hot. Off to the late night chemists I went, where I confirmed that I hadn’t eaten anything unusual and had no known allergies.I didn’t mention the make up trial. I knew it wasn’t a reaction to that: it had started before, and was on my checks and neck rather than where the make up had been. Stress, was the diagnoses through the window, and some weak anti-histamines were given to me.

~~

Wednesday morning I still felt bad, so I planned on going to a different chemist to get something stronger. Then I got up and looked in the mirror.

My face and neck were swollen. I looked like the young Monica from Friends. It was not pretty. It was not how I wanted to look on my wedding day.

I rang the GP.

My morning plans cancelled, I sat at the doctors trying not to freak out and cry. What if I was contagious? What if we had to cancel everything? What if my face stayed like that? What about all the things I had to do?

I go to a great doctors’ surgery. They are lovely and friendly and sympathetic and they listen.

The best guess was an allergic reaction. As I hadn’t eaten anything unusual, and my lips and throat weren’t swollen, it seems likely that it was something in the air when I was shopping on Tuesday. Hence the relevance of walking in and out of Arnotts and Debenhams a few times: I suspect there’s a purfume out there that doesn’t like me. Even then, that’s a bit odd. I’m not allergic to anything. I have easy, not sensitive skin. It was all very strange. I’m possibly allergic to getting married, but once should be enough for that anyway.

I left the doctors with instructions to get some better anti-histamines, and prescriptions for antibiotics and steroids. There was talk of IV steroids too, but thankfully that wasn’t necessary.

I went off to meet my Dad and step-Mum at the in-law’s house, took my drugs, and everybody watched as my face went down.

That evening I went to hang out with a bunch of my family, and if anyone noticed they were too nice to say. It was a lovely relaxed evening and I’m glad I ventured out, I wasn’t sure about it at first, the way I looked.

Back to the doctors again the next day, with more wedding preparation plans scuppered. More waiting, more prescriptions, but a lovely doctor who didn’t charge me for the second visit, and who assured me that all would be ok in the morning, which it was.

The family and friends that knew what was up were brilliant. I know that there are loads of you reading this now who would have helped too, if I had asked. I didn’t want the wedding to be all about me and sympathy for my swollen itchy face though. I wanted it to be about my love for Donal, and the two of us making a commitment, and having a lovely party with our closest friends and family. Which is what it was.

~~

Unfortunately, as my cheeks and neck cleared, the side effects from the steroids kicked in, and the day after the wedding my forehead broke out into really nasty acne. I weaned myself off the drugs sooner than I was supposed to (but still gradually in case anyone is worrying), and my skin is almost clear again.

So.

Our first full day here in Tuscany we spent relaxing outside until the sun went down over the mountain across from us. It was lovely.

The mosquitos think so too. I have 19 bites. My neck is clear, my cheeks are clear, my forehead is clear, and my legs look like I’ve been attacked by a small octopus.

Still, my heart is happy, my brain is happy, and we’re off to Florence for the day tomorrow, so there will be no more self-pitying posts.

Today has been (and will continue to be) a lazy one.

We’re relaxing in our little villa in Tuscany, surrounded by vineyards, enjoying the sun and the sound of crickets on the hills.

I’m knitting, and reading, and eating delicious food, and later I will drink more yummy local wine.

Exploring is for another day.

I have a small fear of crossing bridges, and driving through tunnels. It’s not usually an issue, and although crossing the Liffey on the M50 bridge makes me a little nervous, it’s over in a second so I don’t worry about it.

When we decided to drive to Italy for our honeymoon, my brain mentally erased the Alps. It’s not that I didn’t know they were there, just that whenever I thought about the route down, that part was, well, sort of fuzzy.

Yesterday we crossed the Alps. The road had been rising and rising, then without warning we hit a tunnel, which was a bit too long for my liking, and emerged into the mountains, on a huge bridge.

Yikes.

Many, many bridges and tunnels followed, including the 11km one underneath the spectacular Mont Blanc. I tried not to ponder the feat of engineering and the massive amount of rock above us as we passed under the mountain.

The scenery in the Alps was breathtaking. Really, really stunning, and I’m very happy that we drove through.

We reached the shores of Lake Garda last night, on a balmy summer’s evening, and woke up this morning to 18 degrees, grey sky, and pouring rain. I don’t care though. We’re on our honeymoon, we had a wonderful wedding, I’m relaxed, and very, very happy.

“I’m not knitting anything for the wedding,” I said. “That way madness lies,” I said. “There’s enough to do already,” I said.

Then I bought my dress. I love it. It’s perfect. And now I want a hand-knit shawl to wear in the evening, after the ceremony.

While I was pondering this, R rang. there were still spaces left on a lace knitting class with Carol Feller at This is Knit. (I’m blogging from my phone and can’t work
out how to get links in but Carol’s website is called Stolen Stitches, and she has fabulous designs, so do look for it). Carol has a design that is perfect for the wedding. I hadn’t signed up for the class before as I was supposed to be working that day, but the schedules had changed and I was free. If I was that way inclined, I’d think that the universe was trying to tell me something.
Carol very kindly allowed me to work on the non-class pattern during the workshop, but I’m also completely in love with one of the class shawls and will be making it at some time in the future.

Next then, I needed some yarn. I don’t wear silk, which limited my choice for laceweight. However, TIK have a lovely laceweight yarn called Cashwool, which is 100% merino, really soft, and great value, with 1.3km of yarn per skein. No white left in stock though. It’s ok, I can deal with that. Lilac then. Very me.

I was all set to swatch when I got an excited text from R. D had the cashwool in white, and would pass a skein on to me. To top it off, R, who works something like 23 hours a day, finished work for the night, kidnapped D, and like wonderful yarn ninjas the two of them arrived up at my place with a late night emergency delivery of white laceweight.

So now I’m knitting for the wedding.

The last couple of weeks seem to have flown by. Work, college, life, eh, it just seems to have been a never ending stream of things to do.

This morning (just) I checked twitter, realised it was the day of the Dublin monthly spin-in in Powerscourt, grabbed my spindle and headed in. I ran out of the fibre I had with me just before it was time to pack up, so I did a bit of knitting too, and spent a very relaxing few hours in good company playing with fibre. It was super, and just what I needed. The spindle was spinning instead of me.

The consensus on the cardigan is that it is indeed too big for me. (I say consensus, and what I mean is everyone thinks so except the eternal optimist R, who insists I’m just wearing it wrong). So, friends and family, anyone want a cardigan? It’s lovely. I’ll even put a button on it for you.

So, here’s me in the cardie. Granted, it doesn’t really go with the dress I was wearing today, but it was a quickly grabbed photo. It also doesn’t have a button yet. It needs one, at the top.

See? It’s lovely, it’s just too big. It’s very squishy and stretchy, and it swamps me a bit.

Frogging it is not an option. There are 10 balls of yarn in there, plus 2 out of every 3 balls had a knot, so there are many, many ends that I sewed in. I’m not ripping it out. Shrinking it won’t work either – the yarn is machine washable, and really, it’s too lovely to mess around with like that.

So. I’m thinking. I don’t think it’s meant for me. Which means I need to work out the best way to go about finding the right home for it. I’m open to any suggestions.

This is my Six Nations cardigan.
It’s a lovely pattern (Shalom Cardigan, from Involving the Senses), and lovely yarn (Rowan RYC Cashsoft Chunky), but I do not love the cardigan.
It’s too big for me.
This is the sort of project where that shouldn’t really matter, and I made it slightly smaller than called for anyway.
But it’s still too big. (No, I didn’t swatch, but I don’t think that would have helped, it just doesn’t suit me).
Right now it’s drying, so you’ll just have to take my word for it. I don’t see myself wearing it.
So now I’m a bit stuck, as I don’t really know what to do with it.

To cheer myself up though, I’ve cast on for some Garter Stitch Mitts for myself, to replace my Fetchings as spring/autumn wear, as the missing one never showed up. I love this pattern. It’s simple, pleasingly constructed, and works really well in the tweedy yarn I’m using.

In an attempt to start blogging again, I’m copying Chris, and posting a list of things. This is mainly because I have too much that I want to say, and don’t really know where to start, and I’m finding it a bit overwhelming. I’m finding a lot of things overwhelming, at the moment.

Thing 1: I’m supposed to be studying right now. I’m not though, clearly, but I’m not beating myself up about it. Instead, once this is done, I will make myself a cup of tea and sit down to read some more of my book.

Thing 2: I’m currently reading The Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood, and for the life of me I can’t work out why I haven’t read it before. It’s hard to tear myself away from it to do the other things that have to be done, like housework and washing clothes.

Thing 3: Even though the sun has gone in I have clothes outside on the patio on the airer. Technically this is against the rules, and it’s probably not much use anyway as it’s a bit chilly today, but I do like my clothes to get some fresh air every now and then, and if the sun would come out for just a little bit too it would be super. So much nicer than clothes dried in front of a radiator.

Thing 4: I should really also be sewing the many ends in on my Six Nations cardigan, which I finished yesterday. It started out as my Knitting Olympics project, but I didn’t finish in time, and worked on it in front of most of the rugby matches instead. I should be taking advantage of the long weekend to get it washed and dried while I’m home and can leave things outside to dry. I’m not sure I like it though. Which is often how I feel about the bigger things I have knit. I will get it finished and washed and dried and I will take pictures.

Thing 5: I got engaged. Or rather, we did. That was a little while ago now, but it’s been more than a little while since I blogged. I have a beautiful ring that’s from my paternal grandfather’s family, but right now it’s with the jeweller waiting for the goldsmith to have a look at it and see if it can be re-sized down enough to fit me.

Thing 6: I’ve spent some time finding out about family recently, and have some lovely photographs and interesting histories, and I might put some here, for me to remember.

Thing 7: This is me. I’m quite fond of this photo.