Out for a Walk

The great outdoors!

Look at those chickens... I'll get them one day...

Inkle Weaving

I've been inspired to dust off my poor neglected little inkle loom lately. I made some bookmarks to practice pick-up patterns, and they came out not bad! (someone even bought one of them!)

The cats give me no peace at all in the house to do anything crafty, so I was lucky to get a couple of sunny days to give it a proper go in peace and quiet.

I made a guitar strap, that I'm really very proud of :) ....

And now I'm making some more practice bookmarks to try and get used to this more complicated pick-up pattern. I thought I'd be able to knock a few of these out pretty quickly, but I was wrong! This takes forever! It doesn't help that I'm using a lolly-pop stick as a pick-up stick. I bought a lovely little handmade pick-up stick on etsy, which arrived yesterday. Unfortunately I made the mistake of leaving it on top of the parcel on the kitchen worktop overnight, and when I woke up this morning it was gone. I found it under the shoe mat, chewed to bits by kittens (Pixie - I know it was him!). So it's back to the lolly-pop stick till I can afford a new one.

It's nice to be making things again. I have 10 days off work soon, so might actually get some time to do a bit more!

C xxx

The Chickens have Landed!

Yesterday evening I brought home 4 new little additions to the family...

I don't have names for them yet, I really need to get to know them first! They're all very lovely, and surprisingly tame considering they've been 'free ranging' in a field until now, with not much fuss from humans (until now!). They settled in pretty much straight away, and were down the ramp and into the run as soon as I put them into the house. They even managed to put themselves to bed when it got dark!

I opened to coop this morning full of expectations, but there were no eggs to be found.

But then...

... as the day went on...

... there was one little egg from each of them!

They turned out to be 'jelly eggs' when I opened them, really not very appetising, and I couldn't bring myself to eat them. I'm not sure if this is because they are young (26 weeks) and have only just started laying, or maybe if there has not been enough protein in their diet before now. Hopefully they'll be lovely and delicious before very long!

They're lovely!

Carrie xxxxxx

An update

I'm about to embark on a new project that I'd like to record on my blog, so I'd better do an update to fill in all the gaps since last summer. A lot has happened, so here are the main bits.

We had a lovely summer and autumn, and enjoyed watching the farm and fields going through all the changes of the seasons.

Christmas was just around the corner when my little Charlie was knocked down and killed by a van on the farm track at the back of the house. I was devastated and moved out that day. I stayed at my mum and dad's for two months (it also didn't help that the boiler burst, and I was without water for all of that time). I very nearly gave up on the house altogether then, I could hardly bear to come home. I'm glad I did in the end, but it was miserable all alone.

So I got two new kittens, Pixie and Willow, to come and live with me. I can never replace Charlie, he was a very unique little cat, but he left such a void in my little world. I would like to keep these two as indoor cats. They will certainly be staying indoors until they are spayed at six months, and if they show no interest in going out after that I'll be very happy.

And so we've slowly gotten back to normal. Spring is slowly bringing the garden back to life, and the nights are getting brighter.

I've made some improvements to the garden, including the addition of a raised bed for veg.

My new plans have to do with the garden, but more on that next time!

Carrie xx

P.S. I finished my blanket!!

A Busy Few Months

Well hello again! It's been a while, hasn't it? I've been so incredibly busy this last little while I can hardly believe it's been 5 months since I last posted an update. I have been without an internet connection for 4 of those months though, which hasn't helped really! Life has changed quite a bit since I saw you last...

I have moved into my own little house!

It's a little cottage on a working farm not an awfully long way from where I've always been. Except that it's out in the countryside! It's so beautiful and peaceful here, and the whole place is buzzing with wildlife. There are hares, roe deer, owls and foxes, and last night I had a little baby hedgehog snuffling around the garden! The land's quite flat here, and the view stretches on for miles and miles.

Moving in and getting settled was hectic and just a bit stressful, but this last month or so it's really properly been starting to feel like home. I'm having great fun adding little finishing touches to the newly-painted walls, flowers to the window-sills, roses to the garden...

But there was something missing.

There was no-one to talk to.

Until I found Charlie.


Now I have all the company I can handle!

He's a right little maniac, but I love him!

There's not been much time (or peace!) for crafty stuff in all these months, but my creative side's been getting more of a look-in over the last couple of weeks. I've finally managed to locate some Rowan Pure Wool DK in elusive Hydrangea (shade 27). It's been discontinued, but thanks to Jannette's Rare Yarns (who I can highly recommend, by the way!), work on the border of my Attic 24 (not-quite-so-big) Big Blanket can finally continue. It's been a year in the making, on and off, so I'm feeling ready to get it finished!

(Apologies for the picture quality on that one!) I started out making it for a single bed, but I've upgraded my sleeping arrangements (finally), so I have no idea where its home is going to be. Though apparently these little houses cost a fortune to heat in the winter, so it will probably be wrapped around me most of the time.

There's still a lot of work left to do to make this place really lovely. There's painting to be done, and the garden's not quite finished. More on that next time though. Charlie's woken up, and he's attacking my laptop and trying to eat my Wotsits!

It's good to be home!

Carrie xx

Busy for Christmas

I haven't finished any projects this last little while, becuase I've been putting all my time into a spontaneous, last-minute christmas present - a ripple lap-blanket for my grandad:
I don't want it to be too big or heavy (his house is always roasting!), so I should have it finished in time, hopefully. Yarn used is Rowan Pure Wool DK in Kiss, Indigo, Honey, Port, and Emerald (hopefully a christmassy combination!).

Here are some other little bits and pieces I've been doing in-between crochet and work...

Updating some garden planters from dead summer plants to shiny new winter ones:
(Little red bells from Paperchase)

Little crochet flowers:

Sitting in my lovely warm car listening to Newton Faulkner while my brother braves a freezing cold howling gale to get a few photographs (it was a lot colder than it looks in the photo!):

And trying to stop Truffs from walking all over my other crochet blanket while I'm trying to block some squares (she's starting to look a bit protective of it!):

Not much else to report this time around. The bookshop I'm working in has gone into administration though, so come the new year it looks as though I'm going to have all the time in the world to finish off all the little projects I have lying around the place!

A New Technique!

I've been doing a little bit more spinning since my last post, though of course not as much as I should. I want to work my way through the rest of my Wildcraft stash, before I order any more! First up was this Shetland top called 'Seaglass'.

It's a little softer than the English Wool blend, though still a bit coarse for navajo ply I think, so it's another 2 ply.

Again I had a problem getting the colours to match up, and ended up with about the same amount left on one bobbin as before. I can't quite work out how that's happening! I've also found out that my plying technique has been all wrong. I usually separate the 2 threads and control the twist with my right hand, leaving the left hand completely free for tea drinking! I realise now that I should have been controlling the twist, and feeding the yarn onto the bobbin with my left hand. I should have realised it wouldn't be that easy! I got a pretty good mileage out of it though, 228 yds at 10wpi.

I've had some plain pink merino sitting on a bobbin for quite a while, so I used that to have another shot at navajo ply.

It actually worked quite well this time! Well, the yarn snapped at one point, and I had to tie a knot in it to continue. I was surprised how quickly it came together though, once I got into the rhythm of it.

It gave me some confidence to try it out for real on some of this delicious Wildcraft Organic Merino (colourway 'Violets').

I'm stupidly pleased with the way this has turned out! It's not flawless, the yarn snapped a few times at the start, so I had to cut off a fair chunk of it to get rid of all the knots, and I think it's a little over-twisted at some points, but I don't think it's too noticeable. I love the way the colours have come together though, hopefully it will make for some decent colour repeats when it's knitted up. Actually I haven't decided what to do with it, or any of my handspun, yet. I'd like to try weaving some of it, but I'm reluctant to waste it all (my little bits of weaving leave much to be desired!). This one's 150 yds at 10wpi.

On another subject, I got my last harvest out of the garden before the winter...

Jerusalem Artichokes! Not exactly pretty, are they? I actually cut the plants back ages ago, and forgot all about them. I found them the other day when I was tidying the garden. They seem to have coped though, and were still nice and fresh looking when I dug them up. This is the first year I've ever tried them, and I still have no idea what I'm going to do with them. Apparently you can cook them like tatties, or make them into chips. We'll see!