Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Don't Panic but...

I'm posting again!! That's twice in one month! It is amid a post-WoolFest excitement that I'm posting but never mind! We had some fantastic weather all weekend and the Thursday night on the campsite there were some lovely clouds and the sunset was truly lovely and kept us all entertained for ages - at one stage it seemed streaked with almost fluorescent pink. And there were shapes in the clouds for us to try and identify too - top left below I sure is a footballer leaping to head the ball!


We started off well with a large group gathering without organisation on an empty pitch next to Mums camper van and this photo shows the evening off well! It was lovely to meet up again with so many familiar faces especially Kath, Becky and Carrie Anne who I'd not seen for 2 years - we will definitely have to do better next time and meet up sooner! The last ones finally called it a night around 11pm - wonder who they were? ;)
And of course we were all excited and woke up early the next day ready to hit the show!

Clockwise from top left: Tony learns Long Draw spinning,
Skye in the van, sheep shearing, the Happy Weaver,
Nadine learns hand-carding, spinning on a Great Wheel, Nadine spins on a Lendrum.

As always there were a load of animals to see and I finally managed to see the sheep shearing which was worth the wait. The lady doing it had a pen full of Rough Fell sheep (the ones with the speckled faces and horns in the feeding trough pictured below) four of which were Hogs (one year olds) and the fifth a large ram with huge spiraling horns who unsurprisingly she left until last! She really did seem to wrestle with the sheep and managed to give a full commentary with all of them other than the ram - definitely a tough job to do. There was also a lady from Denmark doing a workshop on 'Knitting directly from Spelsau fleece' who was fascinating. Pity we couldn't get on her course but we did end up leaving with a bag of raw Spelsau fleece ready to be knitted up at the next Knitting evening - I can't imagine the reaction with myself, Chris and Nadine all sat knitting from bags of fleece but it'll be fun!

Top row, left to right: Angora Rabbits, Rough Fell sheep, Katmoget
Shetland sheep, Herdwick sheep;
Centre Row, left to right: Manx Loughton sheep, Gotland sheep, Hebridean sheep;
Bottom Row, left to right: Angora Rabbit, sheared Alpacas, more Gotland sheep.

The stalls as always were a riot of colour with plenty to inspire and temp you with as always. 'Oliver Twists' were there and after seeing them at WonderWool I knew exactly what I wanted and got it - a sumptuous dyed silk brick in toasty burnt reds on oranges, yummy! I was pretty restrained with my spending coming home with only 1 fleece, some more dyes, a shetland batt, some dyed merino for some felting projects and the softest grey Alpaca/BFL lace weight from 'UK Alpaca's bargain bin - at 70p and 80p per hank I couldn't say no! The only downside to the day was the heat (I was stupidly pig-headed and insisted on wearing my hand spun Green Gable - it was not the day to wear wool!) and the crowds. The aisles do seem narrower than at WonderWool which seems to make the difference in being able to get around the show with ease but at least I wasn't hampered with tonnes of shopping - see being frugal has it's good points!

Clockwise from top left : Wensledale lock Wedding dress,
WoolFest anniversary cake, Freyalyns handspun exhibit,
Shetland 'chocolates' and 'cake', weaving, FeltStudioUK, handknit waistcoat, Oliver Twists,
WoolFest 'shed', handspun yarns.


Nadine and Chris were there from the New Brighton Knitters and I ended up going back to the show on the Saturday with Nadine before picking Chris up from her course. Its was fun going round the show with a 'novice' spinner (she is improving daily!) and seeing her face light up with it all and pointing out all the bargains and stopping her unintentionally shop lifting in Winghams although it was pointed out that most people would try to steal cashmere rather than light grey herdwick!
But for me the bits of the weekend which were most fun were spent sat at the camp site knitting and spinning with like minded people and making new crafty friends even if it did involve late nights!

All in all a really fun weekend which I'd happily do all over again as long as the temperature was turned down a bit! There has been more knitting completed and started but I'll not go into details with those now, after all that could be the basis on my next post!

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

In a Rut

There are times when I feel as if I'm in a bit of a rut - whether it be lifestyle-wise chasing round ad infinitum after a lively four year old or creatively. I've certainly had Cast-On Fever or Startitis lately and right now I've more WIP's than I care to think about and some of them are so silly.

Why for instance haven't I finished DD's little aran waistcoat? All that needs doing is picking up stitches for the collar, I'd converted the pattern to knitting in the round so it's not like there's much sewing up to do. I did start picking up stitches but got all in a tangle when going to answer the phone and managed to rip out all the stitches I'd picked up. It was put away in a sulk I'll admit but why I haven't finished it off which is no more than a days work I could not tell you.

And there's another jumper for DD languishing in the WIP pile due to lack of concentration - I went wrong trying to knit this at knitting group and decided to start again but again little has happened with it since. Small jumper, big wool and needles - quick project (theoretically) so what's stopping me?

Poor 'Laminaria' was started last year to take with me on holiday - fat chance that it will be ready for this years holiday in 5 weeks time. It's lovely soft Posh Yarns Cashmere which isn't exactly a hardship so if someone could lend me a brain to work with (Clarabelle shawl queen might be the one!!) then maybe this could get finished. I think this has been sat there because I'm too lazy to start thinking once little Miss has gone to bed.




And I'm half way through another pair of 'Monkeys' and my heart is not in it. I'm on the heel flap for the second sock and I just can't bring myself to knit it. Even though I know I could make short work of it once the heel is done.

Yet I've have managed to spin a small mountain of handspun, much of it Alpaca (there does seem to be a theme!) which is thanks to this new wheel which is a real production wheel - new yarn seems to just fly off it! I did volunteer to represent my guild at North Wales's 'WoodFest' which was great fun and a whole day (10am til 5pm) virtually continually spinning as well as explaining how wool was made to all the kids and answering technical questions from the men. Out of all the people we saw that day (dozens and dozens) only four correctly guessed my spinning fluff as alpaca, one little girl thought the fluff came from 'carpets'. And I'm eagerly waiting to see Winghams stock another suggestion 2 other children had: 'fox'!


I've managed to knit, and finish (until I decided I'd changed my mind and wanted it longer) a handspun version of 'Green Gable' as well as a birthday surprise for a friend, who may or may not read this hence no photos. And I did knit myself a new jumper which I'm happy with as the yarn has been sat there for ages and the project lurking on my Ravelry queue for ages - so some progress with destashing (partially as there's lots left on the cone) and working through my queue.


So right now I think my creative spirit exists for the new items I knit and not the old but soon enough I'm going to really have to bully myself into finishing things off, especially if the worse comes to the worst and I can't get to WoolFest next weekend and the Tour de Fleece looms so these lamented WIP's are really doomed!

Friday, May 22, 2009

Feeling Glum


We had to have our cat put down on Wednesday at the ripe old age of 13 and I'm being a right old misery guts without him. Silly though it may be he was always a comfort when I was feeling sad - a good old cuddle with him always lifted the spirits.

Still my latest knitting - some hand spun alpaca plied with fine mohair - is black which is showing up his lingering white hairs beautifully and I'm resiting the urge to pull them all out.

I shall return with more details and other stuff when I'm in a better mood.

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Wonderful Wonder Wool!

Well I've not been terribly successful at keeping up with my blog lately - too many other bits to be getting on with I suppose!What better way to get back in the flow of things by giving a review of the wonderful weekend that's just finished namely Wonder Wool Wales down in Builth Wells. And it really was great fun - so much to see, so much to buy and so many people to catch up with and meet! As always we didn't mange to meet everyone, some like 'Remote Knitter' we've been trying to meet with for years now and still failing miserably - must try harder I think!!



It was a real riot of colour which always gets me excited and inspired - 'Oliver Twists' stand was like shopping in a rainbow and was just so stunning it made you want to buy it all! The fantastic Prudence Mapstone was there again and as well as being so lovely her work makes me want to grab a crochet hook and yarn right away and start freeforming something!
I could go on all day telling you about all the lovely things there were on show and the stands too - highlights included 'Artists Palette's stall which was a wonderful show of colour with her fibres and yarns (including some stunning silk yarn which I'd have loved to rehome!) and also
 Spindlefrog's stand which as well as being a blaze of colour had the lovely Helix who I was so pleased to catch up with as she's so nice!

There were so many people I bumped into, some old friends, some new and I'll try my best to remember names! First off was No1AliCat, followed by Wye Sue, AmberMoggie (and Mr Mog of course!!), Laal Bear,the lovely Freyalyn and Sarah (YarnSpider), bloggless lurker Katie (who was surrounded at one point by three of her bloggers she was looking for without realising it!), CraftyMandy, the aforementioned Helix, Toffees Mum, Bluefaced Andy and Fybrespates Jenny as well as members of my spinning guild and Mum's spinning guild. I could go on and I'm afraid my brain is failing me - I knew I should have written down who I'd met! Sorry if I haven't mentioned anyones name it really is down to my shoddy memory!


There were some livestock on show as well which is always lovely to see but not as much as in WoolFest, mind you more sheep will have been shorn by then and I'm sure that would make the animals more comfortable in the show - the Wenselydale and Teeswater all looked rather warm! Compared with last years purchases I have come home with less but this year it's quality rather than quantity - plus they were more expensive buys! Main buy was a fantastic new Majacraft Suzi Pro which I am loving every second of and in no way regretting buying! And of course to go with it I needed a new (competition!) lazy kate and 2 more bobbins. That blew most of my budget so the rest didn't last long after buying a Corriedale/Ryland cross fleece from Olwen Veevers called 'Polka' (lovely knowing the name of the sheep your fleece came from!), some alpaca rovings from UK Alpaca (chocolate, coffee and white!) and some dyed kid mohair from Freyalyn. Feels like there should be more with the amount I spent but there you go! No pictures of my goodies - I'll sort that out later!
As with last year I'd run out of money by the time I got to the MidWales Mouthful section which is a real shame as there was some great looking food on show including some highly tempting Scotch eggs! And I had to take a picture of Dr Who's 'house' (as DD says) on top of the BBC Cymru building to amuse DD.
All in all it's a long weekend with all the driving but the atmosphere, colour and most importantly the people more than make up for being stuck in traffic getting there! Plus I'm going to have to keep an eye open for when Google Street Map updates as I was caught on the road between Newtown and Llandridnod Wells - permanent proof of my drive to Wonder Wool Wales! Maybe I'll have to get a screen shot of it (even if I do know what my car looks like!)

I'll be back (hopefully with less of a gap than before) with an update of all my knitting, spinning, etc as soon as I can stop playing with my new wheel!!


Update - some of you may ahve seen someone elses pictures instead of my Wonderwool ones - not sure what happened there but I've now replaced them with ones that shouldn't dissapear!