magnusmog

Routine Rules.

2012-01-26T17:48:00.000Z

Rough winds blew me away from home last week on account of a family emergency. Everything is fine now, thanks for asking, due in no small part to the organisational skills and general brilliance of Fife Council's finest. There was a home visit within hours of broken bones being reported and a plan of care in place the very same evening. Much relief all round.

Bread on the way to the oven.

It was only a few days and nights but it reminded me how much of a homebody I am. I love the familiarity of things. I love the freedom to spend a day in my pajamas waiting for a loaf of bread to rise and the daily conversation with my lad as we lean on the kitchen counter and watch the latest activity at the bird feeders, observing the starling numbers ( thirty five yesterday ) and laughing at the goldfinches as they hang upside down and squabble over seeds. I love it that we live in a house full of books and yarn and pictures.

Toy dog collapses under the weight of all that knowledge.

Even Magnus, the most unpredictable member of the household has a reassuring routine. Each morning he wakes us up with the sound of his substantial furry body flinging itself at the glass door which is all that separates a cat from his breakfast. Half past four every afternoon he tries to persuade us that it really is five o' clock and that teatime must be imminent. Every afternoon I have a pointless conversation with him explaining in words I know he can't understand, that it is only four - thirty and that teatime is still many minutes away.

Some spun fibre.

As far as I'm concerned, familiarity breeds calm, not contempt. My wee quiet house with the birdwatching window, the lad in the study and an attic full of fibre is what builds me up, keeps me well and sends me off on new adventures knowing it will all be there waiting for me when I come home.

Unspun and waiting to be transformed.

So far so good.

2012-01-10T16:17:00.001Z

Happy New Year!

Birdfeeders illuminated by this year's best sunset.

So far 2012 has been unseasonably warm and prone to spectacular sunsets. The golfinches in the garden are as grumpy and territorial as they were last year with many a wing being raised in anger. I love to watch their squabbles but should really take some time out to wash the bird watching window, you may notice a smear or two.

Squabbly goldinches.

Magnus survived the celebratory fireworks but remained suspicious of the new sofa until this week. Hard to tell what has changed, maybe the new smell has worn off but whatever happened, he is now back in charge of seating arrangements. That leaves three of us to fight over who gets the reclining seats. Maybe it won't just be the goldinches who will squabble this spring.

Magnus - King of Seating.

In other news, I did a little spinning.

Some odds and ends of merino tops that needed a purpose. Most likely to turn into part of a pair of socks.

Ho Ho Humbug.

2011-12-24T17:38:00.001Z

Compliments of the season from all at Mog Towers. We wish you a peaceful and happy 2012.


Magnus isn't very good at being festive.

Shiny.

Jam and dodgy socks

2011-12-19T16:51:00.001Z

Old leaves - may be responsible for drabness.

There are times when making something is a slog. The awfulness of the slog is tempered with the knowledge that the end result will make everything worthwhile. Many hours of knitting stocking stitch round and round and round is forgotten when a Cobblestone or a Peasy. is created from them. Then there are the times when the slog and the end result are equally awful. Take these just finished socks for instance. Please take them.

Maybe I should iron before taking pictures?

These socks are part of my plan to use up every scrap of my handspun no matter how scrappy that handspun might be. They were an absolute pain to knit, being made made from the sort of thick and thin yarn that only an enthusiastic but skill-free new spinner can create and then dyed with a variety of sticks and leaves and old tea bags. Combined together, the yarns look like something that Magnus might throw up, minus the distressing bony evidence of whatever he ate to make him sick in the first place. Before synthetic dyes were invented there was a colour named drab. I may have unwittingly made the drabbest of socks.

They are knitted two yarns to the row in Lice Stitch creating a double layer which hopefully cancels out the worst of the thick and thin and whatever else might be wrong with them they will keep my feet from freezing at night and so prevent marital disharmony. For that I will be thankful.

Checking the jellification of the jam.

In other news I emptied the freezer and made jam with the last of the summer's raspberries and redcurrants. The jam is beautiful and tasty without a hint of cat sick or drabness.

Wooden spoon is no match for the stain powers of raspberries.

Gatecrashing London.

2011-12-06T12:53:00.001Z

London was glorious, we divided our time between Richmond and Deptford, two very different riverside communities. Deptford was our base and I quickly became very fond of it. There is a proper sense of community on the water as well as on land, a cat called George who lives outside a grocer's shop and a friendly postman called Peter. Other highlights include the Waiting Room Cafe with the Elvis Shoe Superloo and the best ad hoc Christmas tree I have ever seen.

Richmond was home to the Literature Festival. We learned a lot from the many writers that we listened to and in particular we learned to pay more attention to our surroundings. Our downfall came after a romantic walk along the Thames prior to attending a talk in a Boutique Hotel accompanied, according to the programme, by specially blended cocktails. Instead of walking in the front door like normal people, we took a short cut from the river through the garden and found ourselves in a room filled with wonderfully dressed people. We were equally wonderfully dressed in big coats and beanie hats and may have stood out a little. However the sight of a table full of cocktails reassured us. That is, until I noticed the other drinks, the posh canapes and the uncanny sense that we were the only two people in the room who didn't know anybody else. My companion and I hastened to the exit and didn't stop until we were in the main reception with two signs in front of us.

One sign pointed to a room on the left and it said: Richmond Literature Festival, Hallie Rubenhold and Rosie Thomas.
The other sign pointed to the room we had just fled and it said: Catherine's 50th Birthday Party.

Must pay more attention.

The incredible Elvis Shoe Superloo.

My favourite tree. I think this qualifies as Outsider Art.

In other news - if you haven't already, rush over to Wovember to have a look at all the brilliant pictures in their 100% Wool Photo Competition. You might see some of mine too. I was going to enter this picture of my pre-Winter scarf washing but I realised that many of the items are so old that they are 99% acrylic.

Not many natural fibres here.

Becalmed.

2011-11-15T22:52:00.004Z

Scruffy chair, yet to be fixed but already much loved by Magnus

Victoria Sponge from the Arch Cafe, Fettercairn

Home made bread, pears and Dukkah.

Things are a bit flat around here, I've taken to my bed like a Victorian heroine, which is rather appropriate because the book by my bedside is this one, all about 19th Century women writers. I bought it on a whim after it was mentioned in a ( now forgotten ) newspaper article and am enjoying it very much indeed. There's only one snag. It is huge, seven hundred and sixty two pages of huge. Which means that while there is a lot to learn about women writing in the 19th Century, none of that learning will take place in the bath. A great pity as I find that a little steam helps the knowledge to sink in.

The new spinning wheel is settling in well. Having assembled it single handed I'm sensing that Archie is feeling just a bit proprietorial towards his creation. He's been checking that my maidens are aligned and looking critically at the drive band. In return I knitted him a pair of snazzy house socks made from the first two spinnings. No pictures as yet because there has been no light other than grey for many days now. I've been snatching the odd snap when I see a rare sunbeam. Not that there are too many of those about, leaden is the sky colour of choice for this month.

Tomorrow brings big changes - I'm dragging myself from under the duvet and heading for London to catch up with some family and check out the Richmond Literature Festival. The festival has a snazzy Literary Salon and my plan is to take up as Knitter in Residence. I have a book and about ten balls of sock yarn. If all else fails I can knit myself a blanket and snooze .

Wovember.

2011-11-02T13:52:00.002Z

Exciting things are happening in the Scottish Wooly world. Wovember is here. Have a look at Kate Davie's blog to find out more. Actually, I'd recommend you have a look at her blog any month of the year. It is stuffed with inspiring design, damn good writing and beautiful photographs.

One of the aims of Wovember is to raise awareness of the difference between wool and yarn. I sometimes feel a bit of a pedant about this myself having grown up in a place where wool was used to describe anything you could knit with. It still happens, go into any traditional Scottish 'Wool Shop' and I can promise you that at least two thirds of the stock will never have seen the back of a sheep. There are some honourable exceptions, like the wonderful Twist Fibre Crafts in Fife but it is quite normal for a knitter to enter a Scottish shop looking for wool only to be shown the acrylics.

One thing that taught me the value of wool, real true wool, was learning to spin. It was magical watching the fibres grab onto each other to create a thread, albeit a lumpy one. I have early handspun fit only for felting. This week my spinning took a turn for the better with the arrival of my new wheel, an Ashford Traditional. My old wheel is a Louet 10 which is great for thicker spinning and I hope the new one will lead me down the path of finer things. Many thanks to ever patient Archie who put it together with the minimum of swearing, and to Kay, my spinning guru who cast her experienced eye over his work and pronounced it good.

When I first started knitting I choose my yarns according to colour not fibre and I still have heaps of acrylic blends that I'm trying to use up/fob off onto others. Likewise with the spinning. To begin with I bought up lots and lots of dyed merino tops without a thought to how much fibre was needed to make a decent amount of yarn and even now many bags of multi-coloured fluff haunt Knitting Headquarters. My plan is to use as much of this up as I can while I get to know the wheel and what it can do. My first finished yarn is made from appropriately autumnal colours and I'm hoping to make it into thank-you socks for Archie. I don't have quite enough of it yet. That's a perfect excuse to spin some more.

Someday My Quince Will Come

2011-10-20T21:05:00.002Z

In the news today - sixty-odd thousand geese have flown many miles this month to spend the winter in Angus. Lucky for us we also had a flying visit from the marvelous Mary Jane Mucklestone. We met up in the not quite so marvelous Travelodge at Aberdeen Airport as MJ swept in en route from from her star appearance at Shetland Wool Week before heading home to the States.

In her luggage was a copy of her brand new, not yet released book ( you can see just how excited I was to get my hands on it ) and many many beautiful swatches and samples of Fair Isle. Complete and utter knitterly Heaven. We managed to squeeze in a meal and a whole lot of talking and it was great to catch up with her. Next time I hope we'll be in more salubrious surroundings with a lot more time to talk and knit. Archie came with me and took these pictures. He had fun and said that we didn't talk about knitting too much.

So many samples and swatches

I used to have a face like this on Christmas morning!

Also this week - our one and only quince was picked. We've had the quince tree for years, bought as a sad looking sapling after I read about making quince cheese in a cookery book. While every year it has given us the most beautiful flowers only now has a fruit appeared. It smells amazing but is rock hard. I'll cook it gently with some apples then eat very very slowly.

Oh, and I finished a pair of socks with some hand dyed yarn from Ripplescrafts. I know there is only one of them here but I really like the light in this shot. I believe it might be that elusive thing called sunlight. Not a lot of that around these days but I have the memories of Mary Jane's colourful samples to cheer me through the winter.

I know, bad pun.

Stitch pattern comes from Hedgerow Socks on Ravelry.

Plummy Evolution and Parental Revenge.

2011-10-04T17:51:00.002Z

When I was a teenager I spent many miserable Sunday afternoons traipsing around furniture stores. As my folks admired the shiny new matching suites and nests of tables I lurked in the background perfecting my slouch and wishing I was anywhere else. There I was a sensitive Bohemian stuck in suburbia when I was meant for higher things. I'd loudly complain about the ugliness of pretty much everything on sale and secretly plan my escape to a place far far away from the middle class awfulness that was stifling me. A place where I would be appreciated as the genius I so obviously was. It was torture. What my genius didn't realise, was that as far as my parents were concerned, the torture was mutual.

A few weeks ago I was back in my teenage purgatory only this time I was one of the grown ups. We needed a new sofa and after extensive research in the same horrid shops we chose a successor to the scruffy collapsing thing we've been sitting on all these years. I happened to mention this in an email to my father and this was his reply.

Jeni
I think someone must have hacked into your emails. This mention of G Plan just can't be coming from you - the very essence of middle class aspiration, and someone expects me to believe that you have succumbed.

It might have taken him twenty seven years but my dad has had the last word!

In other news. The nights are getting darker, the shelves are looking bare. Time to make plum jam. I wonder what my teenage self would think of that.

High Winds, Low Energies.

2011-09-12T18:01:00.000Z

Magnus takes umbrage at the news.

Rainy Glasgow.

Sofa time.

The purple is logwood and the yellow one is eucalyptus leaves.

it is a day for staying on the sofa. A day much like yesterday and the day before that. Lots of snoozing, gentle knitting and stopping to laugh at Magnus taking his anger out on Channel 4 News. It isn't the weather for leaving the house anyway, there are high wind warnings for our area and the sky is grumpy and damp.

My gentle knitting consists of some handspun that I dyed with logwood a while ago and the few balls remaining from a cardigan that I knitted last year and have inexplicably forgotten to photograph. I'm making a witchy coloured purple and green striped scarf, knitted in stocking stitch so that the ends curl inwards in a tubular fashion. It will be as long as the yarn allows. Soothing and hopefully idiot proof. The sort of knitting to be carried out from a supine position on the sofa while wearing badly matched pajamas and socks that have felted so much that the heel is much closer to the toe than the pattern intended. I'm going to stay here till teatime listening to the weather and dreaming of warmer days.

Moving on.

2011-09-02T17:45:00.001Z

Time is moving on again, the swallows are tearing around the fields filling their bellies with as many flies as possible before the long trip south. Even when the sun shines there is a chill in the air and I'm already thinking about mittens in the mornings.

There has been a good bit of spinning and dyeing. I used the eucalyptus branches and bark to dye some fibre. I had been hoping for brown, or even purple but yellow is what I got and yellow is what I'll be knitting. The kitchen smelt like cough drops for days. Of course I have no pictures of the yarn. I'll do that next time the sun shines.

I nearly took a great picture of this poppy, one of the many gifts that the garden gave us when we neglected to weed at all this year. However a blade of grass got in the way. The colours are still pretty though. We have the most incredible collection of flowers and I have no idea where half of them came from. I'm thinking that the birds might be dropping seeds en route to the feeders but who knows. The feeders have been a great success, I was looking out of the kitchen window far too early one morning and saw two tiny willow warblers and a red squirrel in our big silver birch tree. First squirrel in fourteen years.

In other news, Magnus has learned a new skill. He has taught himself to pee in the drain outside our house. I caught him in the act while I was testing out a new zoom lens. Should save us a fortune in kitty litter.

A little feline interlude.

2011-08-17T20:14:00.000Z

Cat notices change in bird feeding routine

Crackling from tonight's pork roast

An attempt to storm the feeders

Then a dismount and a wistful glance.

Sheep and the Seaside.

2011-08-02T09:20:00.000Z

This is the only road to where I'm staying. The sheep have right of way!

The breed is Cheviot.

Stoer beach.

A few shots from my walk this morning. You can see why this is my favourite part of the world.

For Those in Peril On the Sea - A Hymn to The Fisherman's Mission.

2011-07-27T09:11:00.000Z

Local Salmon with locally sourced wild mushrooms.

Where it all happens.

Langoustine, one of the area's best catches.

It was the Lochinver RNLI Fun Day on Saturday but we were late arriving and most of the fun had already been packed up. I managed to buy a book and to dodge the wet stuff dripping from folks who were raising money by having soggy sponges thrown at them. Dangerous stuff water, as the people of this area know all too well. For many years there was a Fishermans' Mission supporting the town and that building has now been transformed into a community venture with a bunkhouse and the most wonderful cafe. I'll be coming back very soon and next time I'm having chips!

Heading North.

2011-07-21T11:45:00.001Z

Borage and a bee.

Graduates.

Redcurrants and their insect tormentors.

Euphorbia - grows everywhere but I love it.

Inkle Braid.

Its been a hurly burly sort of a summer with trips away and family visiting. We were in Glasgow only a week ago when my eldest Step Daughter graduated from Strathclyde University. ( First Class Honours, thank you for asking. ) and now we're heading off again to the North West Highlands to cat/hen/ guinea pig and assorted wee furry thing sit for a friend. I can't wait to spend time in one of the most beautiful places in the world but the responsibility is making me a little nervous, especially the cat/hen/small furry animal combination. In my experience that spells doom for the smaller of the animals. Hopefully Clare's cats are less bloodthirsty than Magnus.

The garden has been cruelly neglected over the summer and has repaid our neglect with beauty and productivity. The redcurrants and raspberries have been stuffed into containers and frozen, waiting for a rainy jam making day. Even the weeds look gorgeous and are keeping the local bees happy.

I'll be taking a selection of knitting and sewing away with me but decided to leave my new hobby at home. I've been learning to weave on an Inkle Loom. Although it looks fiddly it is a gentle introduction to weaving and I'm finding it a soothing occupation. The braids themselves are beautiful, trouble is I can't honestly think of many things I can do with them. Suggestions gratefully received. The site I've linked to here suggests making Belly Dancing belts. Maybe that's a hobby too far?

Sweden is wonderful.

2011-07-14T07:45:00.000Z

After my big screen knitting escapades it was time for a holiday. Our hospitable friends Lena, Malin and Findus live in Stockholm and we didn't need much persuasion to come over for a visit. With a little serendipity on our side we managed to spend time in the city and also to take it easy in a cottage in the country.
We fell in love with Stockholm's cafes and cardamom buns and ate tremendous amounts of cheese. I have developed a new found love of the crispbread and saw some being made at the brilliant outdoor museum and zoo at Skansen. Even getting to the museum is an adventure, taking a ferry ride from the centre of Stockholm.

Then it was off to the cottage by the lake. Many Swedes have holiday homes in the country and it is easy to work out why. Every day we made our dinner, packed it up in wicker baskets and walked down to the lakeside to eat in the evening sun. Swinging in the hammocks, knitting and reading with nothing more strenuous than a game of darts to round off the day. A lovely pace to live by.

Let me show you what I mean......

Stockholm

Tasty beakfast at Lena's

Waterside coffee drinkers in Stockholm

Lakeside

Flatbread heaven

My mosquito bitten pins by the lake.

Rainy day Irony.

2011-06-29T13:59:00.001Z

Photo - Ian Dodds.

photo - Ian Dodds.

One big ironies about blog writing is that when nothing is happening the blogger has tons of spare time to write about it. On the other hand, should life suddenly fill up with new and wonderful experiences, there isn't a minute to spare in order to record the events. In my case, there is the added complication that when I do something really interesting I need a lie down for about a week afterwards. Life has slackened off a bit now and I have a conveniently rain filled day for remembering and writing.

It seems like months since I was eating pizza with Evie in a Boston Bowling Alley - and that's because it was, months and months. In the meantime I have been learning how to Inkle Weave, speaking dreadful Swedish and overcoming my fear of being in front of the camera. Lets start with the camera. I hate being filmed. In home movies I am usually the back you see leaving the room. I'm awkward, self conscious and I sound wierd. All of which should make me a poor choice for appearing on screen. However, a film maker called Matt Hulse needed a knitter to create a couple of jumpers for his film about a deaf Scottish cyclist and his trip to the Arctic Circle. What started out as a contribution to the props developed into knitting action shots and finished with me standing on the Cairnbulg shore casting off one of the jumpers while it was being worn by actor Samuel Dore

The film is shot on location in a tiny fishing village on the North East Coast of Scotland. The budget is tiny ( all donations gratefully received ) which meant that the crew was small and select including the director's mum who was Director of Catering. Lots of room for collaboration and a refreshing lack of ego. There can't be many film shoots where the action culminates in a Coffee Morning in the village hall, complete with period costume and a school flute band. Or where one of the collaborators brings along a home made tricycle just in case it comes in handy - and it does. So many people helped along the way, you can find out more at the Dummy Jim website, a thing of beauty all by itself.

Next time - Sweden, rye bread and some Inkle Weaving. Roll on the next rainy day.

photo - Archie Ramsay.

Photo - Ailsa Macwhinnie

A short lesson in how to follow your bliss.

2011-05-25T13:32:00.000Z

This is the last of my catch ups from the USA which is just as well. Exciting things are happening at home too and I'll need to blog about them very soon. In the meantime, let me take you to Starcroft Fiber in Maine.

Jani and her daughter Leah are two of the most effervescent fibre enthusiasts I've ever met, with just my kind of business ethics - simplify, stay small and enjoy what you do. The fleeces that they use for spinning, dyeing and felting come from sheep who live all year round on Nash Island, off the coast of Maine. The resulting yarns are beautiful, I was lucky enough to be given some, dyed a soft smoky grey. Handspinners can also buy the fleeces for spinning at home.

I visited with my trusty companions, Mary Jane and Ellen and we were shown round the mill, with its wonderful wool washing system, the felt making machine and all the equipment needed for creating yarns. Although the fleece is processed by machine Jani checks the yarns by hand to make sure they feel right, just like a handspinner would. What impressed me most was how happy Jani and Leah were with their work. The business is just big enough to be challenging and fulfilling all at the same time. A truly inspirational workplace, next time I want to come back for the shearing!

Why one of these photos is a bit blurry.

2011-05-09T11:09:00.000Z

Knit a fish for the fish exchange.

Show fish to cat.

Lose all control of fish.

Return to house and nurse scars.

where was I?

2011-05-05T11:07:00.001Z

Oh yes, peering into a classroom at WEBS watching as Mary Jane explained something tricky to her students. Later that weekend we hopped into the car, bought some snickerdoodle flavoured coffee at the gas station and headed for the hills. I learned a valuable lesson that day. Never buy a coffee named after any foodstuff other than coffee. The hills, on the other hand, did not disappoint.

We were en route to Ellen's, Ellen lives in New Hampshire with her family in a house stuffed with all the beautiful things she finds in thrift shops. Everyone in that household makes stuff - music, cookies, knitting patterns, semi-conductors, snow machines. We had a blast and made plans to meet in Maine later on.

Mary Jane and I set off to Maine in the midst of a snow warning. I didn't take the warning too seriously until I woke up the next morning to find many inches of snow outside my window. Beautiful crisp new spring snow. A perfect reason to spend our days knitting by the woodstove. And that's just what we did. I have some lovely pictures of MJ but most of them show her knitting top secret patterns for important magazines. Instead, here is proof of the usefulness of knitted items. Perfect for snowbound log collecting.

It wasn't all snow and yarn, I also met some of the nicest people in Maine. And dogs, and ducks. There was so much to see and do and eat and photograph that I think I'll just have to come back again. Still more tales to tell of this journey. Next time I'll tell you all about following your bliss at Starcroft Yarns.....

Catch Up.

2011-04-24T15:56:00.000Z

I've had a little time and it seems as if there might be a semblance of normality returning. I haven't done anything outstandingly stupid for a few days and all of my holiday photgraphs have been sorted out. I'll share a few with you and leave the other six hundred or so back in the files where they belong.

My first stop was Boston, meeting my dear old friend Stef and a new small friend, her daughter Evie who is two and a half. They showed me round their neighbourhood with stops for bacon and ice cream. We talked and talked, watched some truly dreadful movies and talked some more. Then bowling and pizza and finally more bacon. Evie loves bacon. I love Evie.

Karin, of Periwinkle Sheep fame has long been a blog buddy. We arranged to meet at WEBS with Abby and Martha from the Ravelry Stash Down group as our trusty cohorts. Abby very kindly collected me in Boston and we talked all the way to Northampton and back again like old friends. Martha was a chatty whirlwind rushing in to meet us in between errands. What fun. There is nothing like taking a chance on meeting up with imaginary friends and finding out that they ever even better than you imagined.

Also at WEBS that day, tucked away in a room with a group of students, was Mary Jane. I'll tell a story or two about her next time.

Lagging.

2011-04-08T22:03:00.000Z

I'm home.

It was wonderful.

I'm so jet-lagged I followed the wrong man to the super market checkout today* and earlier on in the week I poured boiling water into a kitchen drawer in stead of my cup.

I will write more when I can think.

Till then I will knit a sock slowly and with many mistakes.

* The lady at the till said there are names for women like you and most of them aren't nice!
I think she was kidding.

Off on a Spree

2011-03-12T08:33:00.001Z

Magnus can tell that something is up. There are piles to be sorted and passports to be located. You see, I'm off on a spree, visiting an old friend in Boston and then meeting up with Mary Jane for a mini road trip and some serious knitting time. Although I can't wait to go, I do have some questions:

1. Can you ever take too much knitting on holiday?

2. Am I being paranoid to want to take pictures of my socks before I go in case they get lost over the Atlantic and I have to claim BIG on the insurance?

3. Could I put my socks in my hand luggage? All of them? Where would I put my books, my wallet, my passport?

4. Why is the cat sitting on my travel insurance documents? What does he know about the risk to my socks?

5. Where is my passport?

March sunshine.

2011-03-01T17:09:00.001Z

I've just finished closing all the windows in the house which is an unlikely cause for celebration. But the windows have been open all day and I have been sitting in the garden in what I seem to remember is called sunshine. Today is the first of March and spring has arrived. Hopefully it will stick around.

Last Friday saw me make my not-quite-acting debut. I have been knitting a jumper for a film called Dummy Jim and Matt the director and his trusty cameraman Ian came along to document my part in the story. Everything was going so well until Magnus showed his photogenic side and upstaged me. My knitting will still appear but there is a chance it will be joined by some feline filming. Typical!

Quick! Catch Up.

2011-02-18T09:02:00.001Z

I am horribly behind with the blog. Things happen and I make a mental note to write about them here and then the mental note disappears along with the memory of whatever it was inspired me to make a mental note in the first place. Thank goodness I take pictures.

Here are a few of them. I promise to have something interesting to say next time.

I remembered something! I remembered how confused everyone was when I listed the Spug on my birdcount. Thankfully I took a photograph of the elusive bird.

Trying.

2011-01-29T11:09:00.000Z

I'm trying new things. After seeing Jane's blog this week with its beautiful big pictures, I thought I'd have a go at growing my images. Like many things it is not as easy as it looks. I'll practise a bit and who knows what wonders will appear. Or not. Don't panic if the blog changes a couple of times, I'm not the most technical of souls and it might take a while for things to work.

I found this knitting pattern last time I was in the shop. With all the chatter in the UK about Royal Weddings it might be time to bring this one back out. I love the note at the bottom which says adaptable to your own romance. You can adapt romance? What an odd thought.

In other news, this weekend is the annual RSPB Birdwatch where volunteers sit for an hour watching their gardens and counting how many visitors fly in. I found myself at the kitchen window with a cup of coffee and a small friend for company. So I took a picture, which it got me thinking - imagine what would happen if Amazon sold birds and Magnus got to make a wishlist.......

The joy of eggs.

2011-01-12T17:26:00.002Z

I often have big plans to write wonderful insightful blog posts. This week I've been thinking about mudita which as far as I can make out is the Buddhist practise of finding joy in the joy of others. Sort of an antidote to envy. Mudita would have come in handy this weekend when I found myself under the duvet instead of around a friend's table. My first cancellation of 2011. Thankfully my chums delivered a large piece of chocolate cake ( and the accompanying orange ) to me later on, so I didn't miss out completely.

As usual, I strayed onto smaller but no less satifying things. This morning I learned how to tell if an egg was fresh. Somehow we had built up quite a collection of eggs in the fridge and there was a box of six which was older than it should be. All I needed was a bowl of water - fresh eggs sink and the ones you really don't want to use float to the top. My dodgy half dozen all sat at the bottom of the bowl and despite being at least a week past their sell by date shed their shells and became a tortilla which I'm planning to have for my dinner along with the bread I made this afternoon. I had a lovely peaceful time watching the birds from my kitchen window while I waited for the dough to rise. There was a cake too, really simple and filled with apricots and nuts. I based it on a recipe from Jon and Sarah. Hopefully it will bring some joy to everyone who gets a slice.

edited to add an answer to Michelle's question - the bird in the reflection is my cut out bird that I've stuck on the window to stop the real ones bashing into the glass!

Happy New Year.

2010-12-31T20:50:00.003Z

Tonight I'm going to stay on the settee with a good book and some bread and cheese. The cat is on the window ledge and the man is on his way home. I have some lovely festive memories and no expectations of what 2011 will bring. I'm just going to wait and be surprised when it happens.

Merry Christmas

2010-12-23T22:43:00.000Z

I'm grabbing a few minutes before the festive chaos takes hold to share a few pictures with you. All is quiet for now with an almost full moon shining on the white fields around the village. The snow is beautiful but painful on the paws, as Magnus found out.

When the weather is cold all I want to do is stay at home and keep warm and my newly found obsession with all things yeasty has been perfect for days such as these. I'm still learning though, today I had to leap out of the bath when I realised that I'd mixed up a huge batch of dough and left it to rise but forgotten to add any yeast. Thankfully it turned out well in the end.

Whatever you do and however you celebrate at this time of the year, I wish you every happiness.

Bread and circuses

2010-12-13T16:52:00.000Z

Well, maybe not a proper circus, just some snazzy bunting. This was one of my stupider pre-Christmas ideas. Wouldn't it be a great wheeze I thought, to make bunting to give to three of my favourite small girls as presents. Many millions of triangles later I realised that as I had drawn round the template with dressmaking pen, I would also have to hand wash and dry many million of triangles rather than risk them in the fierce spin of the washing machine. I still have to line them up in some semblance of colour order and sew them together. I might even make the girls' names out of felt and sew them on too. Thankfully they all have very short names. By that time there may be no posting days left till Christmas.On the other hand I might just stick with plain pennants and have a fighting chance of them arriving on time.

The goo in the jar is my new best friend the sourdough starter, by day it lives in the fridge but mix with water and flour and leave overnight it will turn into the most incredible mass of life and bubble. The bread is tangy and chewy and I'm filling the freezer with what is left over. At least if the weather turns again ( as the forecast threatens for this week ) we'll have enough to eat.

I've been thinking a lot about photographs and their context this week. It is wonderful how good something can look when you don't see that is going on in the background. As an example, I give you the arty shot of my sourdough and then the reality of me in the kitchen balanced on a chair wearing stripy pajama trousers. And yes, I did knit those socks.

A dripping story.

2010-12-04T15:20:00.001Z

After looking after the birds with such loving care over the summer and experiencing the ultimate in feline stir-craziness, it seemed a little unfair to lose them to a cold snap. According to the RSPB the birds rely on having enough fat resources to see them through our freezing winter nights. What is doom to our arteries is a life saver to the robin and the sparrow and the blue tit.

Which goes a long way to explaining the purchase of two large packs of beef dripping yesterday. This morning it was the star ingredient in my bird cake, along with some sesame seeds, bread and some coconut that I found in the cupboard marked use by 2009. Melt, mix and leave to set.

The birds seem to like it. Unfortunately so does Magnus.

Confusion abounds.

2010-11-27T17:35:00.002Z

The house is proving to be a source of confusion for Magnus and the local birds. Magnus can't belive that the living room window sill should be used for purposes other than his own ( the radiator underneath is pleasingly warm) and he was most put out this week when I needed it for :

A - Hat blocking. This is the Cabled Beret by Ashley Hasse. A lovely fast knit and the first time I've used a plate for blocking, not that Magnus cares.

B - Sourdough. Inspired by the yeasts of Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall I've been wandering around the house gathering my own for a sourdough starter. It needed a warm place to get going and once again the Mog was not best pleased.

The poor old birds are also very confused, they think that the kitchen window is fresh air and have been bashing into it at regular intervals. This time I found a dazed goldfinch lying on its side looking like the end was nigh. A few minutes held in the warmth of my hand and then a quiet cat-free spot for recovering was all that was needed but in order to prevent another dull thud, I made a bird sillhouette and stuck it onto the window. You can see by the picture why I never pursued a career in fine art. The birds seem to be fooled though and that is the main thing.

We were all surprised by the view from the kitchen window the next morning. The first snowfall of 2010.

Pink in the middle.

2010-11-04T16:26:00.007Z

The clocks went back last Saturday which means the official end of British Summertime. The light begins to dim around three in the afternoon and the curtains are closed against the chill by tea time. Which may go some way to explaining the peculiar outbreak in the Mog household. There is a lack of colour in the day that needs to be addressed.

Now I'm not really a pink sort of a gal - I wanted football boots for Christmas when I was little and was more inclined to arrange my dolls into various tableau than to dress them up in snazzy frocks. I remember creating wonderful fairy lands on the spare bed and in the bottom of the wardobe. I remember greens and blues and the brown of my rug with the horses on it. It has taken until this gloomy autumn for the pink to appear.

I've had plans to make a quilt for ages and have collected many different old shirts from Angus' finest charity shops. The quilt remains unmade but I have sacrificed some of the fabric and cut them into strips for a scarf. The backing is an old man's flannelly dressing gown that I bought second hand and subsequently boil washed against lingering germs. The end result is vibrant and shiny and bold and far too much for me. The next step is to slowly hand stitch across the lurid side in a simple Kantha style. I have a long train journey in front of me next week and this looks like the perfect project to take with me.

Curious Questions.

2010-10-31T11:18:00.003Z

I'm subscribed to YouGov, a pollling site where you fill in surveys on a variety of subjects. Eventually after what feels like years, YouGov send a cheque for £50 as a thank you. Every week or so a new survey appears in my inbox and most of them are about things I care nothing about, like mobile phone companies, or banking.

This morning a much more relevant survey appeared. I'll leave you with a few of the questions. Silly answers much appreciated! You may need to click the pictures to read some of the options as they came out a wee bit small.

In other news, I have been tidying up the plates of tomatoes that I saved from the outside plants when the frosts threatened. These poor fellows have been languishing by the kitchen window in the hopes of finding a few rays of sunshine to aid their ripening. There are some smaller than my thumbnail and all are beginning to show their age. I decided to hasten their shrivelling and have sliced them in half, sprinkled on some sugar, salt and pepper and I'm hoping the house will smell like a small Italian town in summertime. The kind of place where the tomato harvest is laid out on the rooftops to dry in the heat of the sun and the locals dip their focaccia into extra virgin olive oil while tearing basil leaves just for the joy of it. Instead of a damp Scottish village where two platefuls of old toms are stuck in a fan assisted oven.

First frost

2010-10-20T10:25:00.005Z

The daylight is changing to Autumn colour. Glowing to match the golden leaves falling from our big Birch tree. A time to savour. A time for reflection. A time for guilt when you remember something that should have finished long before the chilly nights set in.

I'd promised to knit Archie a jumper and after painstaking pattern observation he chose the plainest, simplest one and asked for it to be knitted in black. The pattern is so old it doesn't even merit a mention on Ravelry. The helpfully named Patons Sweater C 3615 was started many moons ago and knitted inbetween more interesting projects. It has no shaping on the body, minimal shaping on the sleeves and posed no challenge whatsoever. The sewing together of black pieces of jumper with black yarn in a room with poor lighting caused an outbreak of swearing not usually heard in this household. It is all over now. Archie loves the jumper so much I just know he will ask for another one.

Here he is with Long Suffering Bear, renamed Tomten Ted in honour of the jacket he is wearing which was beautifully knitted by Mary Jane. It all got a bit much for Ted. I think he must have overheard the swearing.

Knit Camp Tutor Fund.

2010-10-11T20:00:00.001Z

As you might know, many tutors who taught at the UK Knit Camp this year have not been paid. Not only that, but many have not been reimbursed their travel costs either which is quite a loss if you consider that a good few came to Stirling from the USA. A fund has been set up to support the tutors and here is some information about it.

I had a great time at Knit Camp in spite of the goings on that went on and it hurts me to think that the tutors who made such an effort to teach in difficult circumstances have been let down. Jane who has set up ( but won't benefit at all ) from the fund talks about it here and also links to some blog posts from tutors who had first hand experience. Thank you very much Jane for all of your hard work in getting the fund going.

Many people have expressed a wish to help with the situation regarding non-payment of teaching fees and travelling expenses to most of the Knit Camp Tutors (Instructors), so a fund account has now been set up. Respect & privacy for tutors and security & confidence for donors are paramount. Therefore the fund is being managed by Accountants, the cost of which has been donated, so every penny/cent donated will go straight into the Tutor Fund.
The Knit Camp Tutors have got together as a group and all money donated and raised will be paid by the accountant directly to each individual within the group. The group as a whole will decide distribution and this information will remain private.
The account is being managed by Clifford Towers Chartered Accountants, and audited accounts will be made available – note that details of individual donors and recipients will remain private. Clifford Towers is registered with the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.
The fund will be open for donations and proceeds of fund raising until the end of October 2010. There is a need for funds to be donated and distributed asap. Anyone with fund raising that may go on longer, please contact JaneKal.
If you wish to donate to the fund using PayPal click HERE
If you have any queries you’d like to remain confidential, you can contact Ros Tatum at rostatum@cliffordtowers.com or telephone 01788 577613 (hours 9.30am to 12 noon, UK time, Monday to Friday)
If you prefer to pay by cheque (UK only), please make it payable to Clifford Towers Chartered Accountants, and mark it Tutor Group Fund, or Stirling Tutor Fund on the back and the envelope , then post to:
Ros Tatum
Clifford Towers Chartered Accountants
1st Floor Suites Units 8-9,
Webb Ellis Business Park
Woodside Park
Rugby CV21 2NP
Casey & Sarah have kindly given permission for this fund to be discussed on Raverly. Please respect this by asking moderators before posting in a group. Please don’t spam, but do feel free to otherwise contact Rav friends and spread the word to individuals and groups that have an interest in the affected tutors. The aim is to inform everyone who may be interested that there is a means for them to respond in a safe, meaningful and practical way if they wish.
(The total amount of money owed to the Tutors is huge, but so that everyone is clear from the beginning, if we raise and donate an amount greater than that before the end of October, then there are obvious groups of people in unpaid KC employees and volunteers who didn’t receive expenses to consider but this will be fully and openly discussed in this thread.)

In happier news, I made a hat, finally finished the plainest jumper ever ( a specific request from my lad ) and today, ate the world's largest custard cream. Seen here with a banana and a cat's head for comparison. And we all know that's no ordinarily sized cat!

I may have unvented* Boucle.

2010-10-09T11:05:00.000Z

Every now and then someone will ask if they can buy my knitting or spinning. It happened last week in a cafe in St Andrews while I sheltered from this year's worst rainstorm. The waitress loved my home made hat and asked to buy one. My reply is always the same, I don't know how to put a monetary value on what I make How on earth could I factor in the cost of my time, my knowledge, the years of practice and then subtract the fun that I have in the process in order to reach a sensible price?

That's what makes trading with another craft person so enjoyable, you can be assured that each person knows the true value of the other's skills and appreciates the time it takes to make something by hand. My knife making chum Chris recently set me up on the trading equivalent of a blind date with one of his friends. Jon makes the most beautiful hand carved wooden bowls and spoons and I fell in love with them the moment I laid eyes on them. But would he have any use for a pile of handspun yarn? Thankfully for me, Jon's partner Sarah is a knitter and she was really excited about the possibility of a swap. We chatted about what she would like and then I got down to the spinning.

The plan was to make some lightly felted single plied yarn and to dye it with walnut hulls. Unfortunately I erred on the side of heavy when felting. The yarn turned out kinkier than I'd hoped but a lovely colour, as if some boucle yarn had been dipped in a cup of milky cocoa. I trusted to serendipity and sent it off to Sarah with the promise of more ( and smoother ) yarn to follow.

In return for the milky boucle and an IOU for better things, Jon made me the most beautiful spoons. One for measuring out my coffee a la TS Elliot and the other one slightly longer. All visitors to my house have to stop and admire them. I love the idea of the spoon spending time in the jar, every day absorbing more and more of the coffee smells.

The observant among you will notice that there are in fact no pictures of the wonderful coffee spoon. In fact, neither the spoon or the kuksa in the pics are mine. They belong to Chris. I haven't used my coffee spoon yet. I'm holding off until I find the perfect jar to store it in. As most of my shopping is done in charity shops, this might take some time. Storage suggestions will be gratefully received. I don't want to show it off in public until I've found its perfect mate, although I am of course willing to trade handspun for coffee jars.

* Unvented? See Zimmerman, Elizabeth.

Marvellous Mary Jane.

2010-09-20T10:32:00.000Z

The third and final smart woman on my round-up of Knit Camp adventures is the wonderful Mary Jane Mucklestone. We are old internet buddies and it was such a joy to meet her in the real world and to show her a little bit of life chez Mog

MJ was a stylist with Interweave Knits and thus perfectly qualified to teach a class on Styling Your Knits. As her class assistant/stooge* I was equally qualified to act as the paper fetcher and stand-in model. The students brought shawls and all manner of beautiful knits to photograph and we were able to use the University gardens as a backdrop. Amongst many other things, I learned how to pose using the time honoured Picking Peanuts technique. The classes were great fun and informative and far far too short. I think we could have spent a couple of days covering the same information in more depth. Maybe one day...

At the Saturday morning class I spotted Debbie Stoller nearby and she very kindly agreed to pose for some pictures for us. Smart woman number four. She wrote the book which taught me to knit. And did I say thank you? I was too shy. Stupid woman number one!

There has been a lot of talk about Knit Camp and I'll not add to the debate except to say that my most positive memories are of the students who tried and I think succeeded, to make the best out of a tricky situation. And as for the tutors, every one I met was so determined to teach, to share their knowledge and to make the students' experience a positive one. Not forgetting the volunteers who had an incredibly difficult job and the Stirling Uni staff who helped patiently every single time I got lost. In amongst all of the disorganisation and frustration there was a lot of kindness, friendliness and grace. I'm very grateful to all who contributed to that.

*Except for the Tuesday class.

A rare breed indeed.

2010-09-08T13:38:00.003Z

Following on from the theme of last week's post, may I present another smart woman, Deb Robson. Deb was the Editor in Chief of Spin Off magazine and is currently the editor/publisher of Nomad Press. As an enthusiast and supporter of rare breeds and the yarn they produce, there was no better person to teach a class on UK Rare Breed Sheep.

I'm a spinner who knows very little about the wonderful stuff that I've been given to work with so this class really opened my eyes to the beauty and variety that different breeds produce. And what a variety, we had bags of the stuff to handle and prepare and spin. Big thanks must go to Sue Blacker and the Natural Fibre Company for donating it to the class. Deb's knowledge and love for the subject shone out like the Stirling sun which for once, was so hot that we needed to stop for ice cream.

I now have a much greater respect for my ovine companions and a terrible feeling that there will be bigger bags of fleece appearing in the future.

Norah Gaughan fixed my slug.

2010-08-30T14:09:00.002Z

One of the things I really enjoyed about Knit Camp was being able to spend time with smart people. Not just smart knitters, although they were there in abundance, but all round smart people.

Norah Gaughan scores highly on both counts and I was lucky enough to have a whole day of teaching from her. There was a morning lecture about Knitting Nature and an afternoon practical, making hexagons and octagons. Most people that is, made octagons and hexagons. I managed to make a complete fool of myself by misreading the simplest of directions and making something resembling the sea slugs that live in the darkest depths of the ocean. Norah very kindly took the odd looking shape and fixed it to look a little less slug like. Regardless of her knitting genius, I fear it will never lie flat like the other hexagons.

One of the interesting things that I found out about Knitting Nature is that the samples were sized to fit people of non- model sizes. The proof? Me wearing the Basalt Tank from the book, a piece I would never have considered knitting until I saw how it fit a person of my shape. Of course I will have to brush up on my hexagon knitting skills too. This was taken in the bathroom next to the class. Possibly the nicest graffitt I've ever seen.

I went away from the class inspired, enthused and the owner of a beautiful alpaca cat toy. Oh, and desperately wanting an I Pad.

So many stories to tell.

2010-08-23T09:51:00.001Z

Almost a month since I posted, I can hardly believe it. So many good things have happened that I will take a couple of posts to cover them all rather than bombard the internet with a mammoth tale all at once.

First to appear was Mary Jane Mucklestone, all the way from Maine and en route to Knit Camp via Shetland. We are old friends from the internet but this was our first meeting in real life. Thankfully we really did like each other and spent too short a time knitting, talking, eating the local delicacies and hanging out with Magnus.

Then it was off to Bridge of Allan to stay with a friend who has the most lovely house. Helene had kindly offered to put me up while Knit Camp was on in nearby Stirling. Helene is very interested in ironmongers and has a website devoted to them. If you have a story to tell about your local ironmonger, wherever in the world, please get on to the website to share your tale.

By the way, the two lovely portraits of Mary Jane and Helene were taken by Lena Karlsson from Stockholm. More about her in another post!

Sunk

2010-07-27T19:45:00.002Z

Its been a fruity old time here at Mog Towers, the sun is shining and the fruit bushes have been generous. But after all the effort spent saving the birds from Magnus, the little blighters have been raiding the strawberries, the raspberries, the redcurrants. Still, the babies have all grown up now and Magnus has been busy guarding our new tent. We are off to this festival at the weekend and needed a home that we could carry easily over some distance.

I tried my hand at baking muffins after getting hold of a copy of the Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook in a charity shop. What I had underestimated was the need to use proper muffin cases. Or possibly to use fresh and not frozen fruit, or maybe even lighter fruit. Whatever I did wrong, the fruit sank to the bottom and stuck onto the baking tray. Thankfully they were so tasty that we overlooked their less than sparkling appearance. Next time I'll be using muffin cases if only to save on the washing up.

Cat is still bored.

2010-07-14T21:35:00.000Z

I wish the birds would grow up.

Rain and roses

2010-07-03T18:02:00.002Z

It is a languid grey sort of day, the heat of the past few weeks has been replaced by a slow drizzling rain. It is still warm enough for the windows to be open and every now and then a breeze sends the gentle smell of old fashioned roses drifting from the vase on the mantlepiece. I've put the houseplants out on the steps for a bath and even the cat is pleased to be indoors. There are no plans except for finishing a handspun shawl. Only ten rows before cast off but for a triangular shawl, those ten rows go on forever.

It wasn't like this last week - last week was a frenzy of visiting and watching and joining in. I took the first and probably last steps into light entertainment, taking part in this very silly dance. You can see me some rows from the front resplendent in bright orange with a pale green hat.

The garden is growing and thankfully, the birds are growing up. All we have to do now is wait and see if there is a second brood for us to worry about.*

* we have to worry - the chick in the middle of Archie's very clever feeding station is definately a young-un. More cat placating required.

Cat is bored.

2010-06-13T12:02:00.002Z

We are still continuing our policy of feline containment. So far the cat flap has been destroyed and rebuilt three times. Cat has once escaped by either learning how to turn the switch on the flap or by applying brute force ( we were out and can only speculate.)
A large cardboard box filled with books and clothes destined for a charity shop and placed in front of the door was shoved rudely aside by cat trying to gain access to the cat flap. And yesterday, while the chap of the house was quitely sitting at an open window watching the baby birds in the garden below, he was joined by the cat who then leaped out. Remember we live on the first floor. It was quite a leap. Cat is unscathed but our nerves are in tatters.

We are attempting to entertain the cat with a variety of expensive toys. He prefers, however, to play with a handmade bow tied to a length of wool and the very favourite thing, a piece of stringy stuff ripped from the towel basket by himself and then thrown around the house. Or a newspaper, preferably one in the process of being read.

I can't wait for the birds to grow up.

I have been

2010-06-03T19:41:00.002Z

taking it easy so there is little of note to report. The garden has been doing all the work in this household, it is bursting at the seams with new growth and colour. Archie has been building beautiful staging for the greenhouse and I have been sitting in the sun with a knee full of knitting.

Magnus is not impressed with our new regime of keeping him in at night. Our big Silver Birch tree is playing host to many bird families and we thought it best to keep the beast inside between dusk and dawn to give the new folks a chance. The cat flap has been destroyed twice in escape attempts and the noise of a cat throwing himself at the front door at 3am is our new wake up call. Thankfully it is a very thick door.

ME Awareness Week.

2010-05-17T19:54:00.002Z

I'm no stranger to irony but this really take the biscuit. My ME was epecially bad last week and I spent most of the time in bed with only DVDs of Buffy The Vampire Slayer for company. I'm a wee bit better now but still feeling flimsy and, if I'm being honest, not a little grumpy.

So what did I miss when I was taking it easy? Only ME Awareness Week.

Thankfully the weather is improving and I have plans to sit in the garden, knitting, gazing at the tulips glowing in the fresh spring light and occasionally scaring the living daylights out of the little blackbird who has taken to following Archie around while he plants seeds. That might sound nasty but he will have to be a lot less tame if he's going to survive sharing a garden with Magnus.

By the way - that's my finished sashiko table mat and an interesting knitting project glowing along with the tulips.

Call to Arms - or maybe needles!

2010-05-04T20:21:00.003Z

A report has reached me that Shetland Council has decided to stop providing knitting lessons in schools. It is part of a cost cutting measure and while I acknowledge that we are in the midst of some pretty scary financial goings on, it seems incredibly short sighted for the Council to restrict information and training about a skill that the Shetland Islands are famous for. At the moment every primary school child ( aged 5-11 ) is taught knitting including Fair Isle techniques. Our craft traditions help to define and enliven our culture. They are far too important to give up without a fight.

Here is the article in the Times newspaper and here is the link to Shetland Islands Council if you feel inspired to let them know how important our knitting traditions are. Please pass this on and send your opinions off to the Shetland Islands Council.

Thrift, Thread and Print.

2010-05-02T10:17:00.003Z

I had a lucky find this week, a beautiful ring in a Charity Shop for all of 50p. I stuck it on to a finger straight away and spent the afternoon in the Kirriemuir Wool Shop wondering if someone would come in to buy some sock yarn and then recognise the treasure on my hand. I love the changing shades of blue and violet that move across the surface and if you look carefully, you will see me in the reflection too.

More treasures this week included a day of printing with Tessa. I had fun with my home made stencil and some stamps. Next time I'm going to try lino cuts. I don't know exactly what to do with the fabric I have printed. Any ideas?

One piece of fabric I do know what I'm going to do with is my little sashiko practise. This is going to be a matt for our coffee table. It is also my way of thinking about a larger sahiko project I have planned. A quilt made from old shirts. The sashiko thread is great to work with - it is not as tightly twisted as the usual embroidery floss so it doesn't kink and protest when you sew.

I finished the orange cardigan and it is awaiting buttonage. Photos to follow, I'm sure.

Rest in Mayhem, Malcolm Mclaren.

2010-04-23T10:30:00.003Z

This is a little piece of wonderful from some clever people. God Save The Queen by the Sex Pistols in British Sign Language. Thanks to Matt Hulse for sharing this with me.

Talking to myself.

2010-04-22T12:45:00.003Z

I've never been very good at keeping a diary. My childhood attempts would begin with great enthusiasm in January and tended to peter out about March leaving only a few entries for posterity. Poor old Posterity faced with my listings of what I ate for lunch or my fondness for Starsky and Hutch, written on pages decorated with red felt pen hearts.

These days I'm determined to keep a notebook of ideas and inspirations but the old reticence is still there. I don't like the blank pages and the expectation of what should be put on them. I talked to Miss Frugality, who knows about this sort of thing and she gave me some sage advice which I can paraphrase as - just get on with it and don't worry too much about a page being rubbish as you can always cover up that bit.

I have been filling the empty spaces with daftness and thought and along with the slowly ( very slowly ) improving drawings, conversations are springing up. Little chats between me and what is happening on the page. Limbs? I ask myself when drawing a prototype felt cat. Make it less like Hitler is the comment next to a pig who doesn't look like a pig. A page with the design for my headscarf has the note, tadpoles are too weird.

I like talking to myself.

Reverse, Reverse.

2010-04-12T10:10:00.001Z

I'm honing my sewing skills this week as well as knitting my way through what feels like a vat of orange. One day the orange will be a beautiful cardigan, I just need the patience required by eight million rounds of stocking stitch.

More orange on the scene comes courtesy of Alabama Chanin and two t-shirts from a charity shop. This is the headscarf pattern from the Alabama Stitch book and it was a lovely soothing thing to do. All hand stitched and cut, I even did a rolled hem although the original pattern calls for raw edges. I love the way it looks on the wrong side too.

Observant souls will notice that I am wearing the headscarf sitting outside. It must be truly spring. Yesterday was glorious, the sunlight shone through our daffodils and it was warm enough to eat dinner on the steps. We could enjoy the last rays of the sun and at the same time avoid the peculiar scrabbling noise coming from the kitchen walls.

A pair of starlings has decided to nest inside our house. That's spring for you.

Hanah.

2010-03-30T19:53:00.013Z

When I wrote last week's post about brand new baby Hanah ( who has her own special spelling of her name ), I thought a lot about what I wanted to say about Hannah, her namesake. It turns out that one of the family, Hannah's nephew Ron, had already described her perfectly. This is what he said.

"When I was a boy it seemed as if Aunt Nan's love could eclipse the sun. Nan cared about her nieces and nephews with a passion. She was a lioness if anyone threatened them or did them harm. She watched over the following two generations - her grand-nephews and nieces, and then her great-nephews and nieces - with the same unqualified devotion."

I can see Hanah inspiring the very same devotion.

New stories to tell.

2010-03-24T11:01:00.003Z

I became an Aunt this week. I have the strangest feeling that life may never be the same again. Hanah Maria was born on Monday 22nd March and she is named after her Great Great Aunt.

Hanah's namesake lived in a small Scottish town and worked as a weaver in the local mill. She was a woman who knew that the most important things in life can't be valued in material terms. Happiness came in the form of family, friends and a passion for music. I inherited Hannah's small hands and her love of clutter and shiny jewellery. I hope that her legacy of contentment and happiness passes down another generation to new baby Hanah.

No pictures as yet to show so you will just have to take it from me that Hanah is the most beautiful baby ever born. The black and white image is of Hannah Macdonald and the Queen Mother.

Spring Fever 2.

2010-03-12T10:06:00.003Z

Cat fever more like. This image of the Mog during his springtime roll around the garden was so lovely I thought it should have a post all to itself.

And here it is.

Spring Fever and Sashiko.

2010-03-12T09:34:00.005Z

I don't care when the official start date of Spring is meant to be, as far as I am concerned, Spring sprung this week. Two days in a row I was able to sit on the bench in the garden without the aid of a balaclava. At one point I removed my jumper and there were only two layers between me and the elements. Strange time of year, it was warm with a hint of freezing. I supervised the gardener at his pruning and Magnus supervised the pruned branches as they fell.

Monday saw me in Glasgow at the Collins Gallery for a marvelous Sashiko workshop led by Sara Keith. There were many interesting people there including fellow blogger Hazel/The Art Room Plant. The workshop was a lesson in the beauty and complexity of very simple stitching. I was reminded once again that there are times when it pays to slow down and be precise. Thankfully there was a sunny bench this week where I could sit and practice being meticulous.

And if meticulous lets you down, you can always make the failed project into a stunning cat toy which will be sniffed at once and then left hanging on the side of a chair.

Long Suffering Bear, an apology.

2010-02-28T11:54:00.009Z

You see, Long Suffering Bear isn't even my bear, it belongs to my other half. I call it Long Suffering Bear on account of the droopy frame and world weary expression. I have to prop the fellow up in order to take half decent pictures.

Poor old bear has been dressed up a lot recently and I fear more indignities ahead. I am knitting tiny things for a not yet arrived child and that makes photographing the finished object a little difficult. Even when the arrival actually arrives, web etiquette suggests that it is not the done thing to post pictures of someone else's child on your public access blog. So the bear it is.

There has been sewing too - but nothing finished as I concentrated on the tiny knitting. And three days in Glasgow with three films a day - which was magical, terrifying and sobering all in one big lump. Magnus has been on the case, helping with my knitting and being a general menace. We went out for dinner last night, to friends in the village and the cat followed us. He gatecrashed the party and ate cream from the pudding bowls before falling asleep in a menacing manner just above our hosts' rat's cage.

The observant amongst you might notice that I am wearing pajamas in the not so flattering picture. It was only just after lunchtime and I had sworn to myself that I would finish the little white smock before doing anything else that day. Including getting dressed.

A good blue day.

2010-02-18T14:26:00.004Z

I have been making this beast for months and it is finally finished. Made from thrifted and gifted pairs of jeans and mattress ticking from a second hand shop, it cost me practically nothing except blood sweat and toil. Literal blood - my softy knitter's fingers were unprepared for the hardship of sewing without a thimble. At one point I needed to call upon Archie's pliers to help me through three layers of fabric.

The crockery in the picture were the templates for the circles that I embroidered in my own sashiko-ish way. One dinner plate, a side plate, and a bowl that my chum Marianne had brought one day filled with cholcolate brownies and I'd failed to return.

I like it very much. So much that I ran outside and threw it in the snow so that I could take some snazzy pictures. The light was blue with cold and so was I.

Curtains, why bother?

2010-02-14T10:50:00.003Z

I've never liked curtains. Not for me the the big fully lined blackout that keeps a room in darkness till noon. I want to know that the light is changing and to lift my head, half-awake and catch the dawn as it breaks. Or, as happened in my teenage bedroom, to lie on the mattress* on the floor and watch as the ceiling changed colour, reflecting of the flare from the local Gas Plant.

It all went horribly wrong when I moved to Glasgow and lived in a flat on a busy road. I continued my no-curtain policy till one day I wandered into my room naked from a shower. A movement from across the road caught my eye. In the window opposite, stood a group of young men waving enthusiastically. The curtains went up that same day. As if that wasn't humiliating enough, a few weeks later I told the tale while having a drink in my local pub. A young man at the table leaned over saying: " So that was you ! " He had been one of the window enthusiasts.

I may be softening though, last week saw us back in Glasgow shopping for the things you need after a bathroom and a living room have been decorated. I wasn't convinced that we needed a blind for the bathroom, after all we are one floor up and have frosted glass. Then I found the most beautiful blind ever - a Lucienne Day design in perfect colours. It has been purchased and placed with great care in our loo and I find myself wandering in every now and then just for a look.

In other news Kat was the winner of my pick a picture competition. My mother very kindly drew the winning name from a paper bag yesterday. Let me know what picture you would like.

* Not that I was was forced to sleep on a mattess due to parental cruelty. I was sixteen and thought I was being cool.

Kerchief? Bless You.

2010-01-27T15:31:00.004Z

I've been exiled to Knitting Headquarters while the live in decorator paints downstairs. The living room is shrouded in dustcovers like some neglected eighteen century ballroom and I'm in the attic with only Magnus and Daphne du Maurier for company. Neither of whom are great conversationalists although Daphne tells the better story. I've been working on some simple crafty things after realising that good concentration and DIY just doesn't work for me. So I've neglected my socks and lace in favour of a log cabin square and when that fails I have been sewing some little fiddly things.

Today I made a scarf out of some second hand fabric and the lining of an old skirt. It is a triumph of my sewing machine skills, none of which include either neatness or accuracy but the end product looks just fine. I had planned to make a kerchief/bandana but on reflection found that a rectangle was much easier to sew than a triangle. Later on in the quiet of the room with only the distant sound of sandpapering for company, I did what anyone would do under the circumstances.

I dressed up the cat.

Pick a favourite picture

2010-01-19T08:13:00.006Z

First of all, thank you all very much for the catty good wishes. Magnus is extremely well indeed and was last seen in the middle of a tree helping Archie fill the birdfeeders. ( It is still dark here which explains the rather poor quality image. )

Talking of images, I'd like to offer one of mine. I was looking at Craft Hope this morning and all the items that have been donated by the kindness of the craft community to support the people of Haiti. It got me thinking that I'd like to offer something. Then I looked around a house filled with dust, bathroom renovations and badly shaved cats and realised that there was no way I would be able to sort anything out before the deadline for donations.

So I have come up with an alternative plan. A competition. I would like to invite blog readers to donate to MSF or the DEC or any other charity supporting the work in Haiti and to leave a comment letting me know that you have donated. I don't need to know how much and will take it on trust that a donation has been made. If you have already given, then that will still count although if you would like to donate again then feel free.

There are many designers on Ravelry who are donating profits from pattern sales this month and that would be a great way to support independent designers and make a donation at the same time. Here is just one example - Ysolda Teague

I'll leave the comments open until the end of the month and will then randomly pick a winner.
The winner will in turn be asked to pick a favourite image from the blog, or my Flickr pages and I will get a print made and sent off. I hope that all makes sense - bathroom up-doings aren't very good for the concentration.

One of us

2010-01-10T18:03:00.005Z

Has been in the wars. We are not exactly sure what sort of war, if it was a catty virus or a bad bird eaten but he was very poorly indeed. For the first time in living memory Magnus went off his food. Emergency enough coming from a cat so greedy he has been known to eat slices of bread left out for the birds, but coupled with a general malaise, floppiness and look of utter misery, we were worried enough to take him to visit David the vet.

Lots of tests were done, blood was drawn on both sides and Magnus was left overnight with a drip to restore his fluids, if not his temper. The boy is now officially the most aggressive cat the surgery has ever known but thankfully the results of the tests indicate that nothing awful is amiss.

We took him home the next day, stinking and grumpy ( he wouldn't let them clean him up ) so our home currently smells of wee and disinfectant. He is feeling much better, eating like a cat possessed and within minutes of arriving home was on the kitchen worktop licking the breadboard. He was shaved in three places for the drip and for some x-rays so he looks for all the world like a bridegroom after a particularly raucous Stag Night.

In the meantime I'm knitting socks, making jam, and hoping that the smell will go soon.

Comforting Soup.

2010-01-06T09:29:00.005Z

Ingredients.

First find two leeks, two onions and a handful of small potatoes sulking in the blue plastic tub in the cupboard under the sink. Seek out a couple of cloves of garlic. Some honey in a jar. Spices.

Remember there is no milk in the house.

Method.

Wash and slice the leeks, peel and slice the onions and garlic.
Add to a pan with some olive oil and butter if you have any.
Peel potatoes in readiness.

Let the leek, onion and garlic fry away gently till very soft and a bit mushy. Take this slowly, it brings out the sweetness in the veg and allows you the time to realise that you are wearing inside out long johns and no socks. For no apparent reason.

When the onions, leeks and garlic are soft, add a teaspoonful of the Scottish Heather Honey that was recieved as a gift then left on a shelf and forgotten about. Which is daft as you really like honey. The honey will help the mixture to caramelise and to further aid the process, turn the heat up and leave the pan alone. Don't stir, take the opportunity to stop cooking and look out of the window. Count the goldfinches on their special birdfeeder and enjoy the sight of someone else clearing the path outside. Return to look at the pan when it begins to smell toasty but before it smells burnt.

Chop the potatoes, add to the pan and stir, making sure that you dissolve the toasty brown stickiness on the base of the pan, this is where a lot of the flavours are hiding. Add stock ( bouillion powder and boiling water in this case) and cook gently for about 45 minutes till the potatoes are beginning to melt into the soup. Don't add too much stock as you are just about to ask the path-clearer if he will go to the shop and buy the milk which is needed to finish off the soup. *

On his return, place a cup of milk in another saucepan, add a couple of bay leaves, a clove, some peppercorns and some fennel seeds. If your spice collections boasts a little packet of juniper berries, now is the time to bash one or two with a spoon and add it to the milk. Bring to the boil and then straight away turn off the heat and leave to cool down.

When the soup is ready, strain the spiced milk into the pan and gently reheat. Do don't boil. Boiling can cause upleasant curdling.

Divide into bowls to share with the path-clearer/milk buyer and saviour of the bird table. In the best of all possible worlds, eat with some oatcakes and sharp cheese and a glass of whisky.

* More organised households would have enough supplies in order to allow the spices and milk to be prepared in advance to allow for the fullest flavour to develop.

December 25th 2009

2009-12-25T08:23:00.003Z

Vote Magnusmog!!

2009-12-21T09:47:00.002Z

Someone, my mum actually, has nominated me for a blog award with a breakfast cereal company.
Scroll down the page to the Blog competition and add your vote if you fancy.
I'm in there somewhere under the Lifestyle blogs. If I win I'll let you share my mueseli!

Dizzy, Grumpy and Puggled.

2009-12-19T14:42:00.004Z

Is a description of the state of me, rather than the names of Santa's new reindeer. Too much excitement has taken its toll and my energy reserves have run out. I've been confined to barracks for most of the week, bumbling around the house like a bee with a defective flight plan.

When not lying on the sofa playing a furry game of Russian Roulette with Magnus ( he sleeps on my chest, I try not twitch in my sleep and cause him to strike with all claws ) I have been knitting simple things to keep me sane. Two scarves of the Baktus persuasion have been finished off and the sainted Mary Jane came to my rescue with her Cabled Chullo pattern which is super easy but looks really impressive. It is finished and blocking on a balloon in my window, much to the confusion of the neighbours who mistook it for me when they walked past. I say the hat is finished but in reality I have still to rustle up the energy to make two pom poms. Any day now.

I have been entertaining myself by taking pictures of the cat 'helping' with my craft endeavours. Here are some of my favourites. The project on the ironing board is in fact my very first ever patchwork quilt made from rectangles of denim. It has been sent upstairs to Knitting Headquarters for Christmas and I confidently anticipate that it will be finished in January just as soon as I have taught myself how to make a border.

Winter sunlight on my toes.

2009-12-12T11:12:00.004Z

Time for a fibre update. The cold weather has made the knitting of bedsocks imperative and I used my beautiful Fyberspates green to make these chaps. I had thought of teaming the green up with some hand dyed purple yarn but the more I knitted the less the sock looked like a chic take on the urban goth look and more like the work of a knitter who was colourblind. Or completely lacking in taste. Thankfully I had an emergency supply of sensible white yarn which did the trick.

Our little weeping willow tree gets pruned every six months or so otherwise the branches get so thick that they deny light to the surrounding plant life. Last pruning I rescued the trimmings and soaked them in a bucket of water till they grew mouldy and fragrant. The resulting dye is a subtle warm peach, spun into a thick-ish single ply. Imagine my smugness, fibre spun on a Friday, yarn washed and dried over the weekend and a shawl knitted by Thursday night. Only the yarn was too thick for the pattern and there really wasn't enough of it. The teeny shawl that was the result of all that effort made me look like Jemima Puddleduck
This afternoon I will be listening to the football on Radio Scotland and turning a too small shawl into a just right scarf using only some 5mm needles and a strong sense of hubris.

New Views of London

2009-12-07T22:33:00.004Z

View number one: Distinguished artist Grayson Perry, view obscured by fawning fan who had made him some hand-spun wrist warmers and was in the process of handing them over. Mr Perry kindly noted that he looked forward to having warm wrists.

View number two: Empty plate, Carluccio's restuarant, Richmond. Very fine food and good company.

View number three: The view from our first hotel, the Euston Travelodge. It is fair to say that the Travelodge chain is not renowned for its love of the picturesque.

View number four: Knitter near Euston Square finds that pointy sticks are no match for urban flying monsters. Subject is relieved to look slightly less like the back of a ( London ) bus than in view number one.

Thank you to Archie for taking views one and four.

Rain warming.

2009-11-19T10:37:00.004Z

Its raining today. It rained yesterday. There's fair chance that it will rain tomorrow. The builders working on the roof across the road are wearing oilskins and every photo I take is edged with grey. A person has to try hard to find colour in this dripping world.

But I am trying. A chum brought me some of her Japanese Quinces, enough to fill one and a half tiny jars with jelly. As a time and motion exercise it fails at every turn but the smell of the kitchen and the pale orange glow of the jelly, shining like a weak winter sun made every minute count.

It was raining on Monday morning when I walked to the Doctors to get my (not swine) flu injection and as I stuffed my hands into the pockets of my coat I found two ear plugs and a crumpled gathering of paper streamers. The reason? A Sunday night adventure with The Flaming Lips. Joyous, openhearted and absolutely colourful. Have a look at the little Youtube clip for details. The sound quality is rough but the images are perfect.

Imagine.

2009-11-12T22:51:00.006Z

In between Soctoberfest and Mousecapades, I went on a trip.

First of all was a visit to London and the delights of Bethnal Green
( thank you very much Sammy Leigh.) I visited Grayson Perry's tapestry which was an overwhelming delight. Next to be seen were Anish Kapoor's grey worm casts and red wax cannons. It was half term and the gallery was filled with children trying to get their hands on the red goo.

The BFI film festival was on at the Southbank and I spent hours in darkened rooms watching films. The absolute highlight was nearly three hours long, black and white and silent. It was also set in Norway and filmed in 1929. If you ever get the chance to see Laila, grab it, especially if there is a real silent film pianist to help you along.

I was thrilled to find Prick Your Finger, a yarn and spinning emporium which sells all sorts of glorious things. When I visited the fibre being prepared in the shop was given the title Paris Hilton and it was as pink and sparkling as it's namesake.

Off I went to Kent for the weekend and the company of two small girls and their lovely mum. I learned all about High School Musical and the potential perils of chicken flying into beds. It was fabulous to spend time with small people whose every sentence begins with; " Imagine if....."

* embiggen the pictures of Grayon Perry's tapestry to enjoy the detailed beauty and Anish Kapoor's shiny sculpture to see the wee face peering out of the bottom layer.

Sometimes it is better if the cat loses.

2009-11-04T23:39:00.007Z

Rescued.

Refuelled.

Rested.

Released.

I wish I could have kept him.

With one lousy pair of socks.

2009-10-26T10:30:00.005Z

I'm just about to head out of the door for a week of friends and culture in London, followed by a weekend of children and more friendliness in Kent. Probably followed by a further week of sleeping while I recover from the excitement.

I've been lying low, gathering my energies and getting a new haircut, ( a fringe! a fringe! ) Not much to report then except some very tasty eating and my puny contribution to Soctoberfest. I do have another pair on the go and have packed some sock possibilities to knit along with the culture. I'm planning to sit in the BFI cafe knitting and people watching. I can't wait.

The peanut that tasted like Halloween.

2009-10-20T21:21:00.004Z

I ate a peanut this week and was immediately reminded of the taste of the nuts that we would eat from their shells on Halloween evening as we wandered around the neighbourhood. Scottish kids of my generation didn't know anything about the dangerous sounding Trick or Treat activities of children across the pond. We went guising instead and tried the patience of those we visited with half remembered rhymes and bad Knock Knock jokes.

I have a terrible memory for dates, names, places but give me a taste or a smell and I'm transported to another time. And if that wasn't Proustian enough, on Saturday I made madeleines.

Long shadows.

2009-10-14T16:21:00.003Z

It's getting dark at around 6.30pm and that's before the clocks go back. Time to settle in with the instructions for my new sewing machine - it's a Janome something or other. Sewing seems a lot more complicated than knitting even before I get down to thinking about patterns and fabrics. Even the Beginners guide I took out of the library today jumps stright into seams and interfacing and all manner of fiddly things. I think I may have to sit down with the machine and just practice going in a straight line for a while. That's a lot harder than you might think.

One good thing about the new machine is that it gives me a great excuse to go to the charity shops hunting for cotton and prints. I bought the most amazing dress yesterday that can only be described as a muumuu. I have plans to turn it into a skirt and use the rest for patchwork. I would take a photo but, as I said, it is already growing dark.

Sewing is dangerous.

2009-09-29T08:06:00.005Z

I've been trying to coax my grandmother's old sewing machine out of retirement but after days of fiddling around I have decided that it is beyond me. Some essential parts are broken and if I knew more about sewing machines I might be able to work around them but as a novice, I fear it may be time to give up and buy a new one.

Not that I haven't had fun trying. I made a bag out of a lovely old apron that I bought from a charity shop and it is now the holding bay for socks awaiting handwashing. And this lovely pin cushion rectangle that should have been a square had I followed the directions properly. I've been trying to improve on my hand sewing too with the result that I now have about four squares of crazy patchwork that I don't know what to do with. Maybe when my new sewing machine arrives I'll have learned enough to make them into some semblance of a quilt.

Its dangerous stuff this sewing. I've kitted myself out with a special quilters' ruler, a cutting mat and a rotary cutter. I was warned to be very careful of the rotary cutter on account of the deadly accuracy of the blade. No-one warned me to be careful of the packaging and I still managed to cut myself - on the box.

This is what I sound like!

2009-09-19T16:05:00.003Z

My mother, the unflagging competition enterer has won me a tiny little video/dvd camera. I had no trouble finding a subject to focus on.

A last hurrah.

2009-09-18T08:33:00.005Z

Summer is fading wrote Phillip Larkin in September 1959. Its fading here too fifty years on. The swallows have made their arrangements and left after a week of checking their plumage on the telephone line outside my window. At the front door this morning the air smells colder than yesterday.

The garden is hanging on to the colours of summer, the french beans and mange tout are refusing to give up hope, still producing enough to turn into soup. Me? I've started wearing cardigans and spinning thicker yarns.

The Grantchester Walnuts.

2009-09-09T09:16:00.007Z

One of my fellow Pilgrims has a tree in her garden. It's a walnut tree and it sheds many nuts. Now walnut hulls - the fleshy green outside part which decomposes gently into black mush if you leave it alone long enough, makes the most beautiful natural dye. You can imagine my glee when I came home one night last week after a long and tiring day, to find a box at the top of my stairs. I shook the box, the box rattled with a satifying walnut-like rattle. Sheer bliss.

I have commenced my dye experiments with this bounty and so far have discovered that walnuts dye skin a light brown, (bad idea) latex gloves go bright bright yellow, ( much safer ) and alum mordanted white fleece turns a glorious multi-layered dark brown, like a glamorous brunette.

Thank you Elspeth - I'll post photos of the yarn when the sun cooperates.

My day looked like this.

2009-08-27T12:27:00.003Z

Today was a day for noticing a change in the seasons.
A walk in the woods with my young man, basket filled with chanterelle mushrooms and plans for dinner. The fields around the village are turning gold and yellow, the hum of the Combine Harvesters working all night long. Blackberries are ripening and I can imagine pots of jam and apple crumble. Cosy thoughts.

Look!

2009-08-21T08:36:00.007Z

The Pilgrimage Film festival that I attended is raising money (probably to pay for the extra transport after Bus Number One broke down on the first day. ) So they have added this page to their website. And look - my hat is one of the stars! It's a Felicity hat made with Blue Faced Leicester handspun and dyed with silver birch bark from my back garden. If that isn't wonder enough, the picture of the snazzy young man on the bottom right hand side was taken by me. So much excitement for a Friday morning.

Home again and all's well.

2009-08-20T09:53:00.004Z

It's very different from the Pilgrimage but I found a lot to welcome me home. Magnus had reclaimed the tartan blanket before I had a chance to unpack and the garden had saved up some of it's bounty to share. Back to the more peaceful rythms of life and some homemade bluberry and coconut muffins.

I returned full of good memories and inspiration. You can't ask for more than that!

Dancing and cake in the Cinema

2009-08-16T18:18:00.003Z

Pulling the Magnificent Screen Machine.

2009-08-14T09:49:00.002Z

The Magnificent Screen Machine.

2009-08-13T20:44:00.003Z

And it's lovely driver, Iain.

Gifts.

2009-08-12T11:17:00.004Z

I did have a wonderful time at the Festival - so wonderful that it'll take more than words to describe. I'm sticking to pictures this time and I'll post a variety of them over the next day or so.

Gifts and adventures

2009-07-31T18:46:00.003Z

I'm off for a week or so to this festival. I've got a seat on the bus and I'm intending to have a wonderful time.

I made some knitted gifts to say thank you to the organisers - with the weather forecast I've seen, we'll need all the warmth we can get!

The sky and the stars.

2009-07-16T15:27:00.003Z

I've been knitting my first real lace project - Gossamer Stars, a scarf by Kat Coyle. It is a beautiful pattern, complicated but not too much for the average brain and with lots of little knit one row or purl one row rest stops along the way. You can tell that I haven't worked out how to follow the chart yet. Everywhere I look now I'm seeing stars like this little pile of home grown rasps, or the fallen yellow flowers that I saw on the pavement yesterday on the one day in history I was without my camera.

I've been impressed by the sky too this week. Blue, black, grey, with many different cloud combinations and the inevitable rain that follows. Yesterday Magnus and I sat on the top step watching the sky darken and waiting for the thunder to begin. There was one magical moment of silence when even the birds stopped singing and then the crashing and pouring began. Time to retreat inside and continue knitting the stars.

Gifts from the garden.

2009-07-09T14:47:00.002Z

Flax flowers

Rhubarb

Sweetpea, pea and wild strawberries.

A small problem with rain.

2009-07-06T19:53:00.005Z

Woolfest was not to be after all due to a pet emergency ( not Magnus, just in case you were wondering. ) Next year we'll be super organised and I'll have more time so save up.

This weekend saw me dressed oddly and spinning in public at the Letham Victorian Market. My chum from the Spinning Guild, Brad, had organised a spinning demo and roped in some volunteers. Volunteers who had to dress in a Victorian manner. I look more country bumpkin than dandy but it was great fun. We spun and people watched and all was going so well until the sky filled with clouds and a ton of rain fell in half an hour. Our little gazebo bravely withstood the deluge. The people watching were not so waterproof. So we consoled ourselves with some cupcakes and pondered on the rainproof properties of fleece.

Here we are then - me, Julie, Brad and some cakes.

Blimey!

2009-06-25T11:44:00.003Z

I'm in a tizzy of excitement. I've just had a last minute invite to Woolfest. Must go and organise knitting to bring, fleece wishlist and try to remember some self control.

In the meantime here are some pictures of the wonderful things we found in the Cotswolds the week after Ravelry Day.

The wonder of UK Ravelry Day

2009-06-17T09:04:00.006Z

The wonder of UK Rav Day started off rather damply and if you look at the group pool on Flickr there are many pictures of a pair of rather damp alpacas. They and the stallholders stoically withstood the driving rain for the delight of the Ravelry members and the city of Coventry.

The event was held in Coventry Central Hall which is in the care of the Methodists. They made us feel extremely welcome with a minister on hand in case we needed Divine Intervention and a fine line in cakes. On every table in the cafe there was a leaflet, specially written for the day with a welcome and an explanation of what the Methodist church was all about. I thought it was a nice touch and wished we'd had a Ravelry leaflet to leave in return.

I had decided to do a workshop that challenged me so I chose to learn about Kitchener Stitch with Woolly Wormhead. What a revelation, Wooly W. thinks about knitting in mathematical, technical terms and that shines through in the way her hats are designed. I came home with new skills and an ardent wish to go back to school and get my maths O Grade.

Next time? What we did the rest of the week!

It's in the blood.

2009-06-14T21:26:00.003Z

I promise that I will tell you all about the wonders of the UK Ravelry day last week but in the meantime here is the proof that I come from a long line of fleece wranglers.

The shearer is my father's grandfather who was a shepherd for all of his life as were at least two of his sons. Dad sent me an email this evening bursting with family snaps. I love the way that technology can keep us in touch with our ancestors.

A camp adventure

2009-06-01T12:04:00.003Z

The lad and I went North this week taking a car stuffed with camping gear and emergency chocolate. We were headed to the aptly named Archiestown in Speyside. Our tent has it's own living space with room for a table and chairs. We also had a dishwasher and a fridge - of the camping kind.

We had true Scottish weather - rain, hail, wind and evenings so cold that you could see your breath, making me thankful that I packed mittens. Many an hour was spent listening to the rain and reading. There was time to let imagination flow - I thought that the view of the trees through the tent window plastic looked like an Impressionist painting.

And then the sun came out and the world became even more glorious.

Thank You

2009-05-22T09:16:00.002Z

Very much indeed.

Good things versus bad things

2009-05-16T13:01:00.005Z

It's ME/CFIDS Awareness Week ( actually I'm late, it was last week) and it made me think that it was about time I came out of the ME closet and confess to being one of the many people who have the condition.

So, I wrote a long and rambly post outlining the whys and wherefores that led me to develop ME (never trust the Varicella - Zoster virus ) and what rotten things had happened as a result. I wrote about losing the ability to enjoy reading books, being unable to work, having limited or no concentration span, about needing to use a walking stick on dizzy days. I wrote about being let down by a body and mind I can no longer rely on to do what it's told and about the exhaustion that is so great that there are days when the effort of just existing seems too much like hard work.

I thought about it for the week and decided that it really wasn't what I wanted to write about. The blog is my way of celebrating the good stuff and although I have a truly frustrating and limiting illness, the very presence of that set of limits allows me to slow down and take stock of what is in my life and I'm grateful for that. That doesn't make me Pollyanna believe me, there are tears, extreme grumpiness and a tendency to gloom when things are tough. The good stuff, however, is jolly good indeed.

So, in the spirit of the Mog blog, I offer you this week's activities. Some rhubarb donated by Sandy and Anne transformed into Rhubard and Ginger Jam, a hank of yarn hand-dyed and a mouse overseeing a shelf of ribbons. Like I said, the good stuff is good.

Back to normal.

2009-05-07T08:43:00.003Z

After the glitz and glamour of the past wee while, things have gone back to what passes as normal in Mog Towers. A horrid cold and general feeling of post wedding flatness has caused an outbreak of domesticity and comfort food.

A trip to the Arbroath Charity shops unearthed a strange machine which has come to be known as the cookie pooper. The results are small but very tasty indeed and they may be the cutest biscuits I've ever made.

There has been dyeing and knitting too - a stripey pair of socks, the shades of spring sunlight in the garden and in progress, a Baktus scarf made from onion dyed handspun Blue Faced Leicester. The colour is less vibrant than usual on account of the mordant being copper rather than the usual alum but I am enjoying the subtle shifts of colour.

We've been wed.

2009-04-27T15:52:00.005Z

Tom and Lara's wedding sped by in a blur of kilts and cake. The speeches were heartfelt, not to mention bilingual, the weather was kind and my shoes didn't hurt at all. I had a great time getting to know Tom's new family and hope they enjoyed meeting mine. Heaps of singing and dancing, including my mother doing the twist, a sight that will live with me forever.

Best of all was seeing the bride and groom having the time of their lives.

It's all a bit anti-climactic now so thankfully my chum Rangercraig came up trumps with bags full of nettles and tansy for me to dye with. The kitchen smells like a woodland gone foosty and the dyed fleece is pale but interesting. I have no plans other than to spin it and see what it would like to turn into.

A golden transfomation

2009-04-17T19:31:00.004Z

As I mentioned in my last post, I do have some clever chums. None more clever than Sylvia the jeweller who makes the most wonderful things. So, as the countdown to a major birthday loomed, I asked her to make me a ring as my present to myself for turning forty. It reminds me of one christmas when under our tree was a present labelled " To Mum. Love Mum. "

The materials for my ring were special - my grandmother's wedding ring and another diamond ring provided the gold, along with a key charm that had been given to my mother for her twenty first birthday. I helped with the design and the stone setter was the man who set Lady Di's engagement ring. Though, come to think about it, that didn't turn out too well.

My ring turned out beautifully and it reminds me of the sea, just as I'd hoped it would. It might sound like an odd thing to say about an inanimate object but it already feels like a friend. I love knowing that it has been made from objects belonging to my mum and her mother and that it was made by someone who knows me well.

Tonight finds me sitting on the sofa with a full face of make up on and wearing high heels with my jeans. I'm practising being smart for my brother and Lara's wedding tomorrow. Believe me, I need the practise. In Lara, Tom has picked just the right partner for him. A real other half. I wish them lots of love and happiness.

In praise of clever friends and new cookers.

2009-04-06T10:23:00.003Z

There are many things I don't know about but luckily I have a selection of friends who can help me fill the gaps. Want to spin dog hair? Ask Julie. Not sure if a mushroom is edible? Check with Anne. Medieval history and recipe advice? Grahame every time. Sometimes it feels like I live in a small country surrounded by experts. It is a very nice feeling.

Take last night, a visit to Perth Concert Hall to hear music by Gorecki and Szymanowski. My knowledge of classical music is so limited it could be written in big letters on the back of a very small concert programme. Just as well then that our chum for the evening was Haworth, who had the knowledge to lead me through the performance and recommend further listening. Glorious music and a timely reminder to broaden my horizons some more.

On a more prosiac note, this week saw us take delivery of a new cooker. The old one had holes where there shouldn't be holes and an oven door that didn't shut. No souffles for us. The new one is a thing of wonder. There is a light inside the oven so that you can lie on the floor, accompanied by a puzzled cat and watch the sponges rise. Our first meal with the new cooker was cheese on toast, follwed by an orgy of baking. I made madeleines which were eaten outside in the sunshine with Marianne ( sewing and painting advice ). Most of us were on our best behaviour.

Dangerous tomato

2009-03-27T08:53:00.003Z

It's been a quiet old week here in Mog Towers. I have been slumped over a pair of circular needles trying to finish off Archie's jumper before the summer arrives and renders it obsolete. Heavy work, and I don't just mean the short rows. A whole man sized pile of yarn is hard on the wrists. It fits and is liked which makes up for the pain and swearing that accompanied the knitting of it.

My other main achievement this week was making enough lasagne of the veggie variety to feed about twenty people. I started off making a big pot of puy lentil and tomato sauce only to be attacked by a tube of tomato puree. Dangerous things tomatoes.