Jam!

A few weeks ago now I entered the Fennel and Fern competition to win a jam making kit from Wiggly Wigglers and I was majorly excited to be told I'd won! The jam making extravaganza will be here (as soon as that kit arrives). I shall be reading the Preserves Handbook for preparation in the mean time...

Woad

I was thinking a little about my plot today and what I want to grow over winter and into next year when my mind turned to woad. I then (with a little help from google) came across these excellent sites - so excellent I can't believe I've never seen them before. I'm now on the hunt for woad seed to sow in November.... I mean dyeing my own wool is no different from D building his own bicycle wheels is it?

All About Woad

Wild Colours

Woad-inc

Experiments

I've been working on my fingerless gloves/mittens for that wedding. Sadly, the first experiment came out far too big. Maybe not from the top...

...but the side view is very saggy indeed.

I think I have to resign myself to some sort of proper shaping in the arm instead of trying to rely solely on ribbing and take out a couple of those lace ribbing repeats too. Back to the drawing board!

It's a Pleasure to Shop at JACKS'

Some recent knitting related ebay purchases have been making me smile to myself recently. First up, this is not a mini beehive made by perfectly colour co-ordinated bees. It is in fact a bakelite wool holder made by Patons to match their old Beehive line of yarn.

It even has a needle gauge in the bottom...

I have a couple of Patons Beehive DK vintage patterns I picked up in a charity shop yonks ago and I now feel compelled to knit them from my wool holder immediatly.

The second item was somewhat larger and a lot heavier... an umbrella swift, featuring a cast iron base.

I bought this somewhat on a whim, it has to be said. I was a little embarrassed that I'd bought such a big, heavy contraption, but I will also admit I fell rapidly in love with it. First of all it arrived coated in cobwebs and tied up with this old paper ribbon (which I kept).

Then, when I opened it out for the first time, I was confused. I'd read up on swifts while I was waiting for this one to be delivered and they seemed to involve lifting up from the bottom and securing. This had no such method to hold the expansion of the arms, I was confused. So I started cleaning it up, eradicating the cobwebs and making a couple of minor repairs (it was pretty old). As I attended to the grime it became obvious it was no ordinary swift, or at least not shop bought. It became obvious quickly that it was handmade, and then when I was looking at the base, it clicked.

This was a reduce, reuse, recycle at it's best - resourcefulness the old fashioned way. The swift had been a standard lamp in a former life. The central pole had been sawn off at the base and a brass metal rod inserted through the bottom and secured. The top and bottom cogs that hold the arms in place had been carved from the same central pole, but from a bulbous decorative section that probably held the light fitting. The swift moves easily on it's metal rod, but the heavy nature of the cast iron base and the arm holder at the top meant that it was designed to rely on gravity alone...

When you looped the skein around the arms and let the top of the swift drop, the yarn held the arms in place naturally. No securing necessary. As it twirls around it creaks gently with it's age. As a wound my first skein into a ball an entire romance formed in my mind based on this swift....

A farmer short on time in harvest season, had no time (or patience) to help his wife wind her skeins. This familiar duty, with arms held apart, had become irksome. She, on the other hand, was trying to get a jump on the winter chills approaching - the two feelings were not compatible. One night the farmer stayed out late in the workshop, he'd seen a contraption in a fancy department store in town (It's a Pleasure to shop at JACKS') that would solve this problem. He had in his hands an old standard lamp from the days of gas. They had electric lights now and this lamp had no further use. Measuring, sawing, carving the swift began to take shape. The farmer loved his wife, despite his lack of desire to help with wool winding, so he finished it with care. He added a decorative finial on top, and matching elongations to the uprights of the swift. Sanded the edges. Stained the wood pieces and coated with varnish. He presented the swift to his wife somewhat sheepishly, but she was over joyed.

As she wound the first balls from the swift she planned a jumper in her minds eye. That first jumper went to the farmer to keep him warm through winter, with a few extra details in the neat finishes and seams - made with love. The farmer didn't appreciate these details consciously, but the jumper was exceedingly warm, and kept out the wind in an unparalleled fashion. He wore it every day of winter, every winter, for the rest of his days - with only a little wear that needed darning in the elbows...

A finished pair of socks

I finished up this pair of socks for D just a little while ago. I saw the wool first on Jane Brocket's blog, and when D requested orange socks the choice was obvious.... It really is a great colour combo - loud, but composed too with the two shades of orange. Sadly my photography skills aren't quite up to the same standard, not helped by the intervention of cat...

Liberty prints

It's all to easy to get too obsessed with Liberty fabrics, there's nothing quite like them. I just bought this tunic from howies...

... and in my inbox today flopped a sweet little message from Liberty about their new Liberty Art Fabric range. *sigh*

A Wedding Cloche

I have a very important wedding to attend in December, and my mind is turning over what to wear. It's winter, it will be cold outside at least. The dress I really want to wear is kind of white though, albeit with a black print and touches of royal blue. To tone this down I was hoping to create a few accessories in tones of dark blue. In particular, Anna socks (rav link) in the marine shade of 4 ply soft; some slightly more delicate wrist warmers/fingerless mits than the ones I wore to my brother wedding (which I love, but are a little loud, below); an undecided scarf/shawl/shawlette (possibly ishbel (another rav link); but perhaps most importantly, a hat. A cloche to be specific. And having trawled Ravelry and even the internet to find a pattern, I cannot come across one that meets my requirements - which means I'm going to have to design one (eek!).

I mean, this needs to be a HAT. A proper wedding hat. Two reasons: a, my family has a strong hat wearing tradition at weddings and I don't want to let the side down; b, this is a special friends wedding in a beautiful location and I want to make sure I live up to the moment. I realise I'll probably end up wearing said hat for about 5 minutes before I get too hot inside, even in Decemeber, but I want to have it!

So, requirements (the client brief as it were):
1. Knitted, felted cloche - dark blue, marine/royal blue
2. Not to thick on the felting side, but dense enough to have good structure
3. Asymmetrical, with pleats and I like the idea of some ridges on the 'bell' too. Quite low over the brow, and cutting down close to my shoulder on one side.

Points of inspiration -
The Miss Fox cloche in the V&A exhibiton
The cloche's in lizarietz's etsy shop
And this purple vintage number

First things first, I ned to find the wool and swatch the hell out of it. To get the pleats just right I think I might need to make the bell first and add the pleats on, like the V&A hat.

Valentine

I know it's a little late but this is the valentine I made for Dan this time around

Potential

I have a lot of work right now, but this arrived in the post and it's so tempting...

New project

I've been wanting the make another cardigan for a while, but something lighter I can wear more often than the last one I made, which is really more of a jacket. After much thinking and flicking through Ravelry I settled on Alice, by Kim Hargreves (Rowan 35). I cheerfully cast on all 339 stitches of the bottom edging (less cheerfully towards the end there) on needles about six inches too short... After hoiking my way through that lot and doing all the cast offs for the frill effect, I'd pretty much decided I didn't like that particular detail - too fussy by far. I've cast on a sleeve instead, just three rows of straight garter stitch for an edge - less fussy, but prettier I reckon. I've yanked out what I'd knit on the back panel now, but you can see the comparison below. My new resolution: always start on a sleeve so you can really see if you like it or not before you've committed too many (wo)man hours!