The knitting mojo

During a conversation with our friends last week, one of whom is an expert knitter, I heard my hero wax lyrical about his hand knitted socks.  I knew that a couple of pairs had gone to the great sock graveyard in the sky recently and thought to myself that it is time that I replaced them.  So, yesterday, on a quiet afternoon here, I got out the knitting bag to gather the ingredients.

The knitting bag is an altogether different thing from the crochet bag, though I could see a sneaky knitting needle had found its way into the wrong place and retrieved it whilst I was on the case.

Oh my goodness.  Jordi, I might need your knowledge here, since these two scraps of weird knitting were amongst the first bits to be pulled from the knitting bag.  I have no idea…

Next came the “so far” of a long cowl in an interesting stitch, together with another eight balls of the same lovely yarn.  I really must have wanted to knit this if I bought so many balls of what must have been quite pricy Debbie Bliss yarn but you know, I can’t remember what it is or where it came from and unusually for me, there’s no pattern in the bag. 

I put it into the bag and decided to leave it for another day.  Yes, in a few years time it could feature in an exhibition like the one I visited in Cirencester recently!

Oooh, look, another of those funny shapes!  (I think they were knitted roses which were supposed to be stitched onto a scarf I knitted years ago, but I thought better of it and took them off)

I found three crochet motifs in the wrong bag. Clearly, my filing system isn’t what it used to be.

There was a part finished mini sock.  why?

Another part finished mini sock – but I know why this one was done, because it’s one of the weirdly shaped designs by Cat Bordhi and I needed to work it out before knitting the full sized version.

Getting nearer to the bottom, I found a part finished piece of lace knitting in a magenta linen yarn which I recognised to be Swedish because it’s on the needles I bought in Umea.

It’s not lace any more.

All that remained at the bottom of the bag were a few odds and ends of yarn, a pot of beads and a few stitch markers which had escaped their box.

One extremely large button, and…

what I’d been looking for all along!  Though I work from a basic sock pattern I have made some changes to perfect the fit for my hero’s foot and I knew these notes had to be somewhere.

Phew.

The knitting mojo is back in the building.

Familiar territory

Unfinished embroidery projects, bits of half worked needlepoint and carrier bags with odd pieces of knitting in them, rolled up with the magazine which contains the pattern.  I think we all have such things tucked away somewhere and occasionally, I pull one out and think I’ll finish it.  But more often than not, the mere sight of it is enough to remind me why I became bored with it in the first place and I put it all back in the bag and stuff it back where it came from.  At home, these things were put behind the sofa and when we cleared Mummy’s house, sure enough, there they all were.  Did I add her UFOs to mine?  I’ll admit to keeping a couple!

So when I finished my meeting in Cirencester this morning and poked my head around the gallery door, my eyes fell on some familiar things.  There they all were!  All those half done cushion covers, the single socks and the pieces of embroidery with the needle still tucked in.  Tales of the Unfinishable is in town and clearly this project has hit the spot with a good many people, just as it did with me.

The exhibition is a kind of tent, with the colourful pieces on the outside tempting the visitor inside where the background stories are being told.  As I wandered around reading some of the short tales accompanying the actual pieces, I heard the voices of the contributors playing through the loudspeaker.  I was the only one there, so had a good look around, untroubled by anyone else – lucky me!

Of course, I had favourites.  Who hasn’t started a blackwork project like this with great enthusiasm, enjoying the rigour of the stitch without any of the worry of which colour should be in the needle?  But after a while, such detail begins to challenge and even after many hours work, there still seems so much still to do.  This is exactly the type of embroidery which I could find, stuffed in a cupboard here at home and which I have undoubtedly thought that I will finish some day.  One day.  Maybe.

Occasionally, at WI, we’ve had a bit of a swap shop, where people bring their unfinished projects and swap them for a different one.  Somehow, someone else’s unfinished work is more interesting than my own and of course, it doesn’t come with any …  well, I’ve tried hard to avoid the word, but I think you’ll know I’m talking about “guilt” here?  Is there guilt packed away with those bits of unfinished work then?  I don’t really know why, but yes, there is.  Not always, but definitely sometimes.  Did anyone mention feeling bad about having so many unfinished pieces of work stashed away or was it just me?  I looked around the exhibition to find a piece which took me home, so to speak.

And there it was.  In the last case I found the piece which was so typical of the kind of project I found behind the sofa.  A half finished cardigan, started with enthusiasm and the best of intentions but ultimately just too boring to knit.  I loved reading the story which accompanied it and wondered just how many such things there are in the world.  Why do we hang on to them all when we know, in our hearts that we’ll never finish them?

What a great concept for an exhibition, then!  What a marvellous idea to bring out all of those half finished wonders and prompt our memories like this!  If only I’d thought of it first, I could have populated the whole exhibition with my unfinished work alone

Highly recommended, the exhibition seems to finish here, having travelled all over the country already.  Quite how I missed it previously, I have no idea, but I’ll enjoy reading the ongoing blog and might even explore some of my UFOs and see if there’s something I fancy finishing.

Of course, I’ll put it all straight back again after I’ve looked, though.

Feet. Haven’t. Touched.

I wouldn’t have it any other way, really.  We’d had a really lovely weekend with friends here for a couple of days and Edward, too.  We went to a couple of thought-provoking events at the literature festival (Melvyn Bragg and Michael Dobbs) and had a fun supper at Jamie’s Italian in Cheltenham afterwards.  We accepted the management’s birthday greetings and subsequently, their apologies in complimentary bottles of prosecco and after that late night spent Sunday afternoon in a bit of a heap after an indulgent lunch at home. 

All of that made it extra hard to get up at 5am on Monday morning, to take Edward to the station on my way up to Lancashire, where I was heading to teach a group of potential WI Craft Judges with my colleague and friend, Linda.  They’d sent me all their portfolios already so armed with bags of tracking sheets, assessment criteria and related paperwork together with a boot full of handmade “exhibits”, otherwise known as the contents of my studio, I set off up the M6.

I’ve said previously how much I enjoy this and what a privilege it is to spend time in the company of these talented and extraordinary women and the last three days have been no exception.  As they arrived on Monday afternoon, I realised that, although I felt I knew them really well from our email conversations over the summer, I might not actually recognise them at all!  

I needn’t have worried – of course I did – and over the next couple of days we had great fun “identifying techniques, acknowledging skills and offering encouragement” as we talked about such things as crocheted fish, made from “plarn” and exquisitely knitted socks  (thanks Aprille!) which came with both siblings and cousins, depending on how well the stripes in the yarn had been managed.

Our clever and talented friends had lent us some remarkable items to judge (thanks Marion and Nina!) and the conversation prompted by such beautiful things never stopped.  Shirley kept us well fed and Linda had remembered everything else, so that we could focus on the things which interest and intrigue us all – a huge variety of hand made beauties.

Linda and I weren’t the only ones to pull exquisite items from our bags, though.  Chris casually took this gorgeous flower out one afternoon and soon had a little crowd around her as we wanted to know who, how, where?  (The answer is here by the way and yes, I do want to have a go myself!)

The days were long but sped past in no time and by yesterday lunchtime we were finished.  Eight new NFWI Craft Judges left the building and very generously entertained Linda and I to lunch nearby.  For almost two hours we never stopped talking and if we’d been able to bottle the knowledge, experience and enthusiasm for crafts that was concentrated on that table, it would have been priceless.

The other lovely thing is that I said ‘bye to eight new friends.  That’s priceless, too.

Instant Gratification

I’d spent the morning writing lesson plans and other, similar programmes when I looked at my watch.  11.30am and I’d more or less completed what I needed to do so I looked forward to an afternoon to do as I wished and clicked Pinterest on my toolbar thinking I’d mooch about the internet until my hero was ready to go to the pub for lunch.

Well, it is Friday, isn’t it?

Oh, those are fine green shoes…and hmm, my friend Jordi has posted a video.  What’s all that about, then?

Butin Collar cast on?  What?  I think I need to investigate further.

As usual, Ravelry has the answer and this is looking interesting.

Ten minutes after seeing that little video on Pinterest, I’ve bought the pattern, paid for it using PayPal and am downloading it.

A couple of minutes later, it’s printing out and I’m looking in my bead drawer for #6 and #8 beads.

I think I have some, somewhere…  I’m pretty sure I have the needles and the yarn as well.

Well, that’s what stash is for, isn’t it?  Why we keep these things on hand?  And, having assembled the “ingredients”, we went off to the pub for lunch. 

No, don’t be silly, of course I’m not wearing the necklace this afternoon!

It’s blocking on the ironing board

Ordinary days

Thursday must be “my day”, because I just opened my blog to write a new post and see that it’s a whole week since I last had anything to blog about!  Well, that’s probably not strictly so, but I’ve been working the last three days and in between the report writing, class visiting and meetings, I’ve been assessing portfolios which the postman has been delivering at regular intervals.  I enjoy keeping busy, am always pleased to see days filled with mixed activity and like to tick things off my list.

Are these “ordinary days” then?  Days with nothing special to write home about, as my Nan might have said?  When the only photograph I take all day is a little heap of fallen leaves, blown into a heart shape by the wind?

Or when the news of the day is that one tree over the valley has turned the most amazing shade of fiery red?

Today was “my” day, once I’d finished a heap of assessment work and tied up one or two loose ends of admin and I was pleased to spend it at home.  The rain was pouring down until an hour or so ago when I snook out into the garden for ten minutes and enjoyed “the sweetness of the wet garden”, a phrase which brings back days of a Cat Stevens LP and a Dansette record player in my bedroom.

I wasn’t the only one to be making the most of the break in the showers – the caryopteris was abuzz with activity and I only had to take around twenty or so photographs to get one with a recognisable bee – the others were just a blur!

But in between the files and folders, I have done a bit of broomstick crochet as promised.  Not a great deal, but then I’m not sure that there’s much to learn, once the basic principles have been grasped.  I’ve done enough to recognise that yarn choice is key, however, and that a fairly loose twist cotton isn’t the best one for a beginner.  Anyway, I pinned a few ideas on my Pinterest board and we’ll see if I feel inspired to do more or not.

So for now, let’s hear it for quiet days like this.  Days when we have enough to do but are not overwhelmed.  Days when an email from faraway friends arrives with exciting suggestions and plans for sunny days to look forward to, when there’s apple crumble in the oven, I’m in the middle of a good book and there’s something good on the telly!

Who needs excitement?!