Knit and Stitch Show 2011

It’s taken me a while to getting around to writing this post, mainly because I’ve been full of ideas and crafting every spare minute! The Knit and Stitch Show at Ally Pally was great as ever this year, with exhibits by a range of textile artists and new graduates, as well as lots of purchasing opportunities. I even met a couple of new twitter friends. I was lucky enough to go with my Mum, who was feeling generous in the run up to my birthday and christmas, so I did rather well!

On the artist front, I was amazed by a beautiful piece of sculptural work by Jean Bennett which reminded me of Rodin’s Gates of Hell. Mum treated me to a glass tile by Anna Krystyna Casey which had knitted wire embedded in it. It was nice to see a new take on metalwork in glass and her page is worth a look. I was also rather taken by some Faerie Mound Stumpwork pieces by Fleur Oakes. I have been thinking about faux taxidermy and bell jars for some time and have an idea brewing around making a crochet/embroidery terrarium. The problem as always is where to put the finished article as we are running out of art space at home! There was also a show of tradition African beadwork that has given me an idea for a choker.

Purchasing wise, I came away with arms full of yarn, books and fabric. I am currently working on a Fyberspates Scrumptious Cardigan in a beautiful DK yarn 45% silk 55% merino. It looks and feels as luxurious as it sounds! I also purchased lace weight Madelinetosh prairie in two colourways, destined to become a Jared Flood Rock Island shawl. The Black Sheep were selling bulk quantities of yarn at unbelievable discounts, so I bagged myself some Noro Silk Garden and Rowan Chunky Alpaca. Now to convince M that I will look good in a chunky gold sweater. One of my favourite acquisitions of the day was Little Red in the City by Ysolda Teague. Unlike other pattern books, it has up to 15 sizes for each pattern (!) and the bulk of the book is a general guide on knitting garments that will fit well. I’m hoping to gain some confidence in this area as it is not my strong point, and buying enough yarn for a whole jumper is quite an investment to take risks with.

Fabric-wise I was very excited when I saw the fabric for this bustle skirt at Clothkits. Do you remember the Viewmaster toys with the discs that loaded into them? The discs printed on the skirt cover everything from a new life on Mars to making a tomato aspic salad. Here it is made up. I made the waist too big really, but with a long top it looks good and gives a longer bustle. Overall I am very happy with it.

As you can see, lots of ideas floating around and not a lot of time to work on them all now that I’m back at work. I know it’s only October, but a handmade Christmas takes time too, and I’m in the thick of presents, cards and planning decorations. The cooking starts soon with Stir up sunday! Here are a few other bits I’ve created over the past couple of months. The tea set and cake are for our goddaughter, and are being presented in a picnic hamper with bags of sweeties.

Last up, we are really fortunate in Dorchester to have a Pharaoh exhibition visiting from the British Museum at our very own Dorset County Museum. We were proud to be invited along to the official opening and have both been blown away by some of the exhibits. I was particularly taken by a gold ornament from an ointment bottle due to its beauty, historical significance, age and the intricate craftsmanship. I would encourage any of you who are down this way to pay a visit. I have also booked up with a friend for a faience ceramic workshop to make some beads in January. Here we are enjoying some vino with our friend Liz.

Art Crochet

Whilst off sick, a friend of mine bought me a book of Art Nouveau as I am well known to be very fond of the style, particularly the work of Alphonse Mucha. I was looking though Mucha’s work and kept seeing crochet designs within his motifs. There was nothing for it but to make some sort of sampler, and this wallhanging has been the result.

End of the Road 2011

Once again we have been to the fine EOTR festival and I think it was the best ever! The capacity was increased this year, but we also had a new Woods Stage in a big enough area to accommodate everybody. The idea was to relieve the squeeze in the Garden stage area and I think it worked well. We were extremely lucky with the weather which helps keep the atmosphere cheerful. There was a beer festival running throughout the weekend with some lovely local ales on offer. Our favourite was the Entire Stout from Salisburys Hopback Brewery, and I also enjoyed the Gold Spice ale from Sixpenny Handley brewery, right on the festivals doorstep. The food stalls didn’t disappoint - may I recommend the Curry Shed for a range of veggie curries and the Tibetan Kitchen for a lovely rich beef stew with stuffed dumplings.

The most important ingredient to the weekend was obviously the music. Highlights for us were Lykki Li, tUnEyArDs, ‘Allo Darlin’ and Laura Marling. Brakes once again asserted their ground as my favourite live act ever. We have now seen them 6 times and it is always brilliant. The new comedy area was also great – a small stage nestled in a sloped area of the woods. The midnight Storytellers Club and Robin Ince’s Book Club were really busy this year. Less intimate experience but still hugely enjoyable. Anything that persuades M to stay up until 2am on two nights running must be special!

On the craft front their were many more makers stalls this year and I bought a fine set of jewellery from zincwhite.com made from recycled reject colour pencils from the Derwent factory. Truly original and very pretty. Keep and Share were also there offering lessons and an opportunity to make a ribbon scarf for a community project. The book stalls were great too, and like last year I managed to bag a couple of graphic novels at knock down prices. I haven’t even got onto talking about the art and library in the woods…..

Rather than posting a load of photos on the blog itself, click here to see my facebook photo album of the weekend.

I have been absent from the blogosphere for the summer as I have been recovering from a big op in May. Happy to say that all is well and I am due to start a phased return to work next week. I feel more well than I have done in years. You will be glad to hear that I have not wasted my summer sick leave and have been busy on the craft. A lot of what I have been doing are presents for Christmas and birthdays, so I won’t be posting them until after they reach their recipients. Knitting-wise, I made a rather fetching pair of ‘Circle Socks’ for my mum from Noro Sock Yarn, and a Sun Ray tablecloth for Christmas. I used Regia sock yarn as it is machine washable and would come up bigger than lace weight crochet yarn.

I have also found a new fondness for making cards. I am always envious of designers and artists who manage to have an instantly recognisable style, and for the first time, I feel that I have created a range that has a definite individual style. Obviously I am not the first to draw with a scalpel (Rob Ryan has brought this technique to the fore), but I do think they look a bit different to anything I have seen before. See what you think.

Continuing on the art and craft theme, I had a lovely day with my mother-in-law at Walford Mill in Wimborne. As I have said in previous posts we are aiming to furnish the house with original art pieces, and have a new addition to our collection by a very talented artist called Anya Keeley. She uses antique and found objects as the base, and creates scenes with recycled vintage papers outlined with silver soldering. I love the dreamy quality of our sculpture as "Softly the Night is Sleeping”. This isn’t the best quality picture, but you get the idea.

On the vintage/furnishing front, we continue to visit the Bridport Vintage Market each month, and found ourselves a lovely 1960s coffee table with black angled legs and a walnut veneer top.

Eurovision 2011

It’s that time again! I think we are probably in the minority in being big fans of Eurovision and seem to have forged a tradition with a couple of friends to have a small party to celebrate each year. The last few years we have tried to theme our gatherings on the host country, so last night for Germany I was wearing red black and gold, and eating salami, sauerkraut and pretzels amongst other things washed down with wheat beer. Possibly a bit too much wheat beer using this mornings headache as a guide! I happened on a great honey and mustard dip to serve with cocktail sausages and vegetable crudités – 2tbsp mayonnaise, 1tbsp honey and 1tbsp Dijon mustard. It got a thumbs up all round here so give it a go.

I’ve managed to not even mention the music yet. We had actual money on Denmark to win. If only I’d put my £2 on Azerbaijan at 200/1. With such a dull song we were bemused to say the least. There was also a disappointing lack of gimmicks and unnecessary key changes in the final last night. I had a soft spot for the Jedward song, even if their performance of it was terrible. Less said about Blue the better, but it was a huge improvement on our recent offerings and good to see us in the top half of the leaderboard again. Others amongst us thought that Moldova were robbed. I didn’t.

Now back to the main business of knitting. As a thank you gift for taking photos for our friends’ civil partnership, I was given some money for yarn and indulged in some Wollmeise Lace Garn in two shades of green. I ran a strand each of teal green and pesto green together and knitted Niobe from French Girl Knits by Kristeen Griffin-Grimes. It was a bit fiddly starting the sleeves with a quite open lace pattern in fingering yarn on 8mm DPNs, but once it got going this was a really quick knit and a lovely fit with minimum shaping. I really like the raglan shoulders on me and will bear this in mind when selecting future patterns for sweaters

Having got the bug for lace knitting, I thought I’d like to have a go at a more traditional pattern for a tablecloth. I have bought a book originally printed in the 1950’s and am going to knit up a lace pattern using 4-ply rather than crochet thread. The main reason for this was I thought it would be easier as a relative beginner in lace and it is very difficult to find appropriate quantities of crochet thread in colour. The introduction to the book made me laugh as is was very particular that patterns should ONLY be knitted in WHITE COTTON or LINEN if you must, as to do otherwise would NOT be TRADITIONAL! I will revel in my delinquency whilst tackling this one!

I have also just finished another pair of socks from Knitted Socks East and West, this time ‘Tatami’ in Misti Alpaca Handpaint sock yarn, colourway ‘Blood Lines’. The colourway does not quite have the same impact as ‘Birds in Paradise’ I used for my Lacy Baktus scarf, but I am happy with them overall.

I have found a pattern for some socks with a great stitch that I think will really show off the misti handpaint well. I have decided to use the left over ‘Birds in Paradise’ to adapt the pattern and make a pair of cuffs. They will then go with my Lacy Baktus and woolly fascinator I made for the civil partnership.

Plenty there to keep me busy!

The Royal Wedding

The big day finally came and went, and I think we all had a jolly good time! As you know if you have been following his blog, I have spent the past month or so knitting the royal family and finally got them finished in time for the big day! We went to our friends for a party to mark the occasion - big thanks to Ben and Veronica for a great party, complete with wedding cake, favours and commemorative mugs! I had an excellent excuse to wear my wedding dress again, and no homage to Kate would be complete without a mock-up of THE ring – here are a few photos to keep you entertained.

This has been just one in a string of good weekends recently, and one notable one was international independent record store day. We got up early to head to Bridport Music, where Billy Bragg played a few songs in store for us! It was a pretty surreal experience, having been a fan since my teens, to be stood at the front of a small shop next to Billy’s son, having the man himself singing some of my favourite songs. I did my bit for the record store by buying a couple of albums I’ve been after for a while.

We then headed back to Dorchester for a debate on voting reform, where by coincidence Billy Bragg was also speaking. Vote YES for AV!!!!

Speaking again of supporting local independent stores, I have been filled with child-like glee since the opening of The Gilded Teapot in Dorchester. Having been brought up with a Mum who was a big drinker of various teas I have long been a fan. It has been too long that we have been without a specialist shop such as this. We had a Whittard’s for a while, but I’m sure anyone who has shopped at a real teashop knows that the big chains don’t really give you an idea of what real tea is about. I seem to be on a mission to try the whole selection of teas and coffees. Given there are close to 100 lines it may take me a while! My current favourites are a black tea flavoured with belgian chocolate truffle (need I go on?) and Sencha Sekura, a green tea with rose petals and cherry. I have also treated myself to this beautiful ‘We Love Kaoru’ teacup and saucer from the same shop. [Please excuse the white balance on these photos – I’m too lazy to edit them at the moment]. I make no apology for the blatent advertising, and to make it clear I am not affiliated with the store in any way, but the more of you I get to shop there, the higher the chance they will succeed and stay so that I can shop there too!!

What’s on your doorstep?

I am of course not meaning this literally, but in the vicinity of your house. We have travelled the world, and yet I’m constantly surprised by new discoveries nearer home. This past week has got me thinking about this both in terms of people and geography. Apart from spending every spare moment knitting the royal wedding to get finished in time for the big day (more of that later), we have found time to partake in the biggest political protest in Dorchester since the mid-1960s, and go on a couple of walks near the town.

The march was to voice our concerns over plans to build multimillion pound council offices and a new library, at a time when many council workers are facing redundancy. I accept that there is a need for new office premises as the current historical buildings are not easily accessible for the disabled, and there is a lot of redundant corridor space that is costing a small fortune to heat. My question is why the offices cannot be located in Poundbury, where there have been offices to let in new buildings for months, and why now. It seems odd that they have chosen now to move. At a time when we are cash-strapped it seems our priorities are wrong. ‘People not Premises’ as our main message, and I hope that our voices were heard. On the matter of a new library, I totally agreed with our local library campaigner that a new library would be wonderful, but not at a time when 19 rural local libraries are facing closure, and we already have a perfectly adequate library service in town.

All this community activism was a great opportunity to chat to other locals and feel a real part of the town in which we live. I left with a warm feeling in my heart for having done so.

We went for a lovely short walk yesterday a mere 5 minutes away from our house. I have lived here for almost a decade and M has been here since he was a teenager and never new we had a Bronze Age hillfort so close by. Obviously we have Maiden Castle the other side of Dorchester, but Poundbury Hillfort is it’s virtually deserted smaller cousin - I have a new favourite picnic and reading spot! We are very lucky to live across from the beautifully manicured Victorian Borough Gardens, but there are times when only solitude will do. Take a look at a few of the photos:

Continuing on the theme of new discoveries, during our trip to Montreal I picked up a copy of The Believer Magazine published by McSweeneys. I have a few issues of the McSweeneys Quarterly Concern, a quirky literary periodical edited by Dave Eggers which arrives in various guises variously as a pile of junk mail or a pack of cards amongst other designs. Every article was thought provoking and brilliant, with features including hyperbolic crochet and an essay on the difficulties of translating nonsense. I was completely taken and treated myself to a years subscription. Yesterday the Film Issue arrived, complete with a DVD of a silent movie from Berlin in 1930 ‘People on Sunday’. It is an early play by Billy Wilder who went on to write such things as ‘Some Like it Hot’. I would thoroughly recommend subscribing – thought-provoking and pushing me enjoyably outside my usual sphere of experience which is all you could ask for in a magazine.

Back to the important issue of knitting. I am getting a bit quicker, but these are still taking a lot of hours! I am really enjoying doing it though and the resulting giggles at he final ensemble will make it worthwhile! I have watched three series of the West Wing so far…

Celebrations!

I’ve been very busy again with lots of crafting projects as well as starting back at work. I’m happy to report I’m actually really enjoying myself. Last weekend we attended a 2nd birthday party, and I never miss an opportunity to craft a gift. This year the boy in question was the recipient of a crocheted koala from ‘Amigurami Two’. I also had a play with some wood block stamps I bought at the Knit and Stitch Show at Ally Pally a couple of years ago and decorated my own wrapping paper and card to go with him.

Next on the craft agenda was related to my online avatar for twitter. I had intended to use the same image on the blog but I haven’t been able to get it to look how I’d like. Having been to the textile museum in Toronto and seen an exhibition using thread and fibre hung over nails in the wall, I was keen to try something similar. I then saw a photo in this months Selvedge magazine relating to Stroud International Textiles Festival. I have admittedly lifted the idea and used it to create my own version. Here’s how it emerged:

I really like the way the loose threads look like stray light adding the feeling of fluorescent tube lighting. This is definitely one of those projects that has proven very difficult to photograph well and I’m really happy with the result in life. It now has pride of place in our hall.

Now to the very important business of the royal wedding. When we were in Canada we were asked about the wedding by the great majority of those we spoke to. I’m not a particular royalist, but I can see an excuse for a party and it’s good to get together with your neighbours to celebrate something nice. I tweeted last week about a book called ‘Knit Your Own Royal Wedding’. Imagine my joy when M came home with the very same book, a gift from a patient! We are going to a party on the day, and I will be wearing my wedding dress. This is hugely exciting for me as I only got to wear it for five hours on our big day. I am currently knitting, crocheting and sewing every available minute to get as many of the figures finished as possible before their showcase at the party. Each doll is taking about 3 days, so I want something a bit meaningful to do with them after the event. My idea is to try to raise some money for our local hospice by suggesting a minimum £5 donation per doll. I’m not sure if this seems too much but I’ve spent about that on making each one, without the time. Tricky. See what you all think. So far I’ve finished the happy couple. I am proud to report that my version of William is the main photo on his pattern page on Ravelry.

We had a very nice time in Lyme Regis today meeting up with our friends and happened to see Alan Titchmarsh shopping. I did have the dolls with me and it crossed my mind to increase their status by getting him to pose with them…. I thought better of it.

Canada

One month on, and we are home from Canada. I’ve not had much chance to blog until now and been quite busy sorting things out at home before going back to work. It was an amazing trip, and I would fully recommend visiting in winter. Yes it was cold, but it was completely different to any other holiday we have ever done. The Rideau Skateway and Winterlude festival in Ottawa and seeing the frozen Niagara Falls were seasonal must-dos. I have taken 1400 photos (!) and I am having trouble deciding what to put up here. Consequently, I am only going to post a few favourites and suggest you have a look at M’s photos here and here.

During our time away there were lots of sources of inspiration, not least these exhibitions:

Kai Chan: A Spider’s Logic at Textile Museum of Canada, Toronto

Graphic Details: Confessional Comics by Jewish Women at Gladstone Hotel, Toronto

Tim Burton Retrospective at TIFF Lightbox, Toronto

We also made a trip to Drawn and Quarterly in Montreal which was fantastic! I came home with comics in every checked bag and hand luggage on the way home! I have a list of books I would also like to purchase when I have saved up some more cash. It was on this visit that I discovered the wonderful ‘The Believer’. This months issue has a great article on crochet as well as lots more interesting comics/literature related articles. I cannot rate it highly enough and have subscribed already. If you are unaware of McSweeney’s and what they do, I urge you to take a look.

I could go on for pages in a blow by blow account of the whole trip, but that could get a bit tedious. We loved it and look forward to being able to make a return trip, not only to visit our friends in Ottawa, but also to spend more time in Toronto. Queen Street West was our favourite area, and I could see myself spending many more days there than we had available this time.

Whilst we were away I did a fair amount of knitting, and as well as the cowl I posted last time, I managed to get a rather large shawl finished. I made it with Lang Jawool Magic sock yarn purchased at Knit Knackers in Ottawa, and the pattern was Whippoorwill by Carina Spencer (Sweet Mama Small Sugar) via Ravelry. It took between 80 and 100 hours, and looks rather good on.

Since getting back I have started work on amigurami for this years birthdays, but I will only post pictures once they are in the hands of their intended owners.

Now for a short piece about food and household planning. Whilst we were away, we did a bit of brain storming about how we could be more economical with food and make good use of our produce grown at the allotment. We have three objectives: (1) Eat fresh, local produce and make things from scratch as much as possible; (2) Save money; (3) Support local businesses. Whilst we were away an alarming number of small businesses have gone bust with little warning.

Our friends in Ottawa had a great blackboard in their hallway made from a reclaimed door, which has given us the idea to paint the panels of our kitchen door in blackboard paint to keep record of fresh fruit and veg we have at home, and homemade preserves we have in the basement. This is to minimise the risk of forgetting about things and allowing them to go off before being eaten. I have also decided to stick to doing a weekly shop rather than the almost daily trips where extra luxuries invariably make their way into the basket.

I made a trip to the butchers, and decided to buy whole chicken with giblets, joint the bird and freeze usable portions. At the same time I bought a side of pork belly, boned but took the ribs home.I then used half the pork to cure my own bacon, half to freeze for a roasting joint, and the ribs and chicken carcass were roasted with veg and giblets to make a fresh stock for the fridge. There was enough meat left on the bones after roasting/simmering to shred and make a meal and lunch the next day. I fried some garlic, ginger and spring onions with the meat, added white pepper and hoi sin to taste, and used it to fill filo parcels scattered with sesame seeds.

I’m not going to pretend this all took a bit of time and planning, but once we get into a routine I think the new regime will work well!