The Big Knit

I've been knitting...

Not for myself, but for the Big Knit , a charity appeal whereby knitters make small hats to fit the tops of innocent smoothie bottles. Every hat knitted raises 25p for Age UK, .

I bought 20 20g balls of cotton from my local wool shop (the wonderful Knotty Knits and Kreative Krafts)  and looked up a load of patterns on the net.

Ummm...they're a bit addictive.

It takes about half an hour to make and sew up a basic hat. A bit longer if you're doing more of a novelty one, especially if you have to make legs or sew on eyes or make tails. Most of the patterns have come from the internet, having simply searched 'big knit patterns'.

I've knitted loads...

It's all in a good cause.

Birthdays, Guitars, and Cake.

Can't quite believe it, but Squidgeling T is eighteen this weekend. Where did all those years go?

One minute there's a little cheeky chappie toddling along, the next, there's a strapping six footer - a strapping six footer who is the bassist of a local rock band.

One of his guitars (yes, he has multiple - apparently you can never have too many guitars) was made by Mr Squidge. Squidgeling T had been eyeing up Dingwall 5-string basses, but the prices were well out of his league at somewhere around £3K-£5K. Having made a guitar for his GCSE though, T asked his dad to help him make a Dingwall-inspired one. Mr Squidge ended up doing most of the practical stuff, but T had definite ideas about what it would look like and was instrumental (hah! see what I did there?) in the design.

The guitar was finished earlier this year, and it looks amazing. You can't see it on these pics, but the head of the guitar is coloured to match the body in purple and blue.

Now on his ACTUAL birthday, T will be performing, gigging with Rawkus Redz in Leicester - a charity gig in aid of the Teenage Cancer Trust - so how else could I have decorated his 18th birthday cake, other than with a guitar.

And not just any old guitar, but THE guitar...

Happy Birthday, Squidgeling T xx

Sparky

You'll probably know if you read the Scribbles that Family Squidge are working hard to help the environment. We're big recyclers, have solar panels on our house, save water for the garden, and own a wind turbine.

Recently, we took the next step; we bought an electric car.

Mr Squidge did a lot of research. And I mean A LOT. One obvious issue with electric cars is their range - you have to work hard at planning longer (ie 100+ mile) journeys to allow sufficient time to recharge the batteries. For a long time we ummed and ahhed as to whether to go for it now, or wait until vehicle range increased. But as I pointed out, most of our journeys are short (<50 miles) so we'd get there and back in one battery's worth of 'juice'. And isn't it better to do something now, rather than wait?

Depending on the car we might have chosen, there would have been up to an eighteen month wait on delivery anyway, so Mr Squidge looked at secondhand. Then he discovered the range extender.

Now, hybrid cars are a mix of petrol engine and battery power, but some electric cars have a range extender which - although it requires a small amount of petrol to work - does gice you a few extra miles if the battery's running low.

So we went on a test drive. For those who are interested, it was a BMW i3 with a range extender. (As far as I'm concerned, it's a car, has four wheels and it goes.) It was fairly easy to drive, even though I've never driven an automatic before. We were pretty certain that was the model we wanted, especially as it was very easy for both of us to drive without too many major adjustments to seat positions etc (6'3" vs 5'0" can make it a real faff before you actually drive anywhere).

The hunt was on. Mr Squidge found one in Stockport - and one in Edinburgh. The Stockport one was grey, the Edinburgh one, blue. Electric blue.

He liked the blue.

After a lot of negotiating, he bought the blue one.

Granted, I liked the blue more than the grey, but I did question the sense in flying to Edinburgh, (not so environmentally friendly), stopping overnight, then picking up a new car first thing and driving back home the next day, factoring in stops to recharge on the way.

But that's what he did. And so we took possession of Sparky.

I love driving it - it's really satisfying to be able to charge it via our own solar panels and by the very nature of how you drive. (The only downside was that the day after it arrived, I managed to smash one of the wing mirrors as I backed into the drive. Mr Squidge has since moved the gatepost and given us an extra 10" of manoeuvering room...)

We're still not entirely environmentally friendly in the car department; we decided to keep the diesel estate for the moment. Come September, both Squidgelings will be at uni, and the extra space will be useful to cart student clobber up and down the various motorways, although we have proven we can do a day's trip to Bristol with a charging stop quite comfortably. The insurance companies also won't insure Squidgeling T to drive Sparky until he is 19 and had at least a year of post-driving-test experience, so keeping the Astra means that at least he can get himself to gigs and rehearsals under his own steam. But in the long run, who knows...

Feels good to be going greener...