Saturday 28 September 2019


Summer Review

It has been a long hot summer and I have been experiencing some of life's lows and have been thankful for the gift of crafting which has been a salve during very difficult times.

Knitting

In July I went to Fibre East and had a wonderful time discovering lots of new yarns and fibres and came away with a couple of projects worth of goodies.

Two lots of wool for jumpers A Bear in Sheeps Clothing and Belinda Harris Reids Designs - top row, bobbles for hats, The Knitting Shed skein just because
two balls of sock yarn - middle row, shawl yarn and stitch markers from Owl About Yarn - bottom row
The three skeins on the right in the top row became a Soldotna cropped top which was a lot of fun to make.


I also talked to the lovely lady at The Knitting Shed stand and discovered I had two mini skeins I'd bought previously at Unravel to make their free pattern for fingerless mittens and was delighted with the result.


A New Knitting Book

I am in the KnitBritish group over on Ravelry where we are having a read along for Esther Rutter's new book 'This Golden Fleece' a journey through Britain's knitted History.

I went to one of the book launches in Bury St Edmunds at the beginning of September where Esther spoke and thoroughly enjoyed listening to this delightful young writer, knitter and Mum who has obviously worked so hard on her wonderful book and well deserves all the lovely praise and publicity she is getting. It was a lovely afternoon and we were treated to home made cake and tea and were able to get signed copies of the book too.







I posted about the first three chapters on the Ravelry Group page and said:

It didn’t take long before I realised I would need a pencil and tags because there was so much meat to Esther’s writing that would need some digesting. I also found my page anchor handy so I could knit whilst reading.
So I found I needed a system for my markers: 1 = something that I wondered about, 2 = a word I needed to look up eg, first page of Chapter 2 “thole” (new word for me Esther), 3 = something catching my interest that I might have to do more research on, 4 = about sheep breeds, 5 = something with a link to buy or a book to get to read around the subject. I’ll pick out a few at random:
Chapter one Dentdale Gloves page 22 Esther talks about the Terrible Knitters using needle guards which were often made from a single piece of wood as a lover’s token and I would really love to see a picture of these and learn a bit more about them. Then on the next page Esther talks about Soay sheep and St Kilda and I am reminded of a wonderful book I read called “Island of Wings” by Karin Altenberg which I would now like to re-read.
Also in Chapter one is a reference to Penelope Lister Hemingway, ‘Playing with a Piece of String: The Story of a Dentdale Knitter in The Retreat Asylum, York’ in Knit Edge, 3 (May 2013) which I found was available here on Ravelry for £7.17 and is a magazine I was unaware of but am delighted with my purchase and the wide ranging articles and eight patterns.
Here’s another find in Chapter two, a writer I have read but not the book mentioned: Neil Gunn’s “The Silver Darlings” set in the fisheries of the Moray Firth so that has duly been ordered on-line to be delivered to my local library (encouragingly all copies are currently on loan) so I will have to be patient until it arrives but good to also note that Esther’s book is now being stocked and also has all copies out on loan.
I learn that Southwold and Lowestoft were the county’s major herring ports - Suffolk is a few miles from here and now I’d like to explore that bit of those town’s history.
Chapter three and a bit of serendipity as my best friend is reading Stephen Fry’s “Mythos: a retelling of the myths of ancient Greece” and mentions Penelope at the same time I read about Mrs Ramsay and her knitting in Virginia Woolf’s “To the Lighthouse” and Esther points out the relevance of knitting as a salve and mentions Penelope here - now I have another new book I want to read and a re-read of Woolf too.
I am thoroughly enjoying this book and will post again when I have the next few chapters read and digested.

Goodreads

I have also been making progress on my goal of thirty books this year over on Goodreads and this is a quick review of the last one I logged:


Where the Hornbeam Grows: A Journey in Search of a GardenWhere the Hornbeam Grows: A Journey in Search of a Garden by Beth Lynch
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I enjoyed reading this but it felt like a longer essay rather than a book as there wasn't a lot of depth of detail within the writing and found it particularly sketchy in the end about gardening and plants and it was quite repetitive which felt like poor editing or padding. There were some wonderful insights about inner life which was why I gave it three stars. The few paragraphs about loneliness towards the end of the book were very insightful. I don't think I'd like to meet any Swiss people after the observations in this book!

Sewing

I am a member of Ladies Who Sew which is held in the Village Hall and we have been learning patchwork and quilting techniques. So a friend and I decided we would like to visit the Festival of Quilts held in the NEC in Birmingham. What an experience. The hall is vast and to be honest quite overwhelming. That being said it was wonderful to see the stunning work that can be done with needle and thread which was both inspiring and daunting too. I bought this kit (below) which was lovely to sew.


Cross Stitch

I joined FlossTube vlogger 'Halfstitch Cross Stitch' for a stitch along to make the 'Christmas Tea' from Brenda Gervais's Mice in the Sewing Room series. I stitched on mine whilst on a lovely short break in Norfolk. It was a delight to sew along with Dena:
And this was my finished piece:


I have also started a block of the month with Liberty Bell to make the four seasons vintage sewing machine by Buttermilk Basin. This is a new technique to me and I am thoroughly enjoying it.




There has been some dress making too and I will post more about that later.


Local Quilt Show

Today I went to see the Cotton Scatterers Quilt Show at Wickham Bishops which was excellent and spent a wonderful morning enjoying the quilts and, of course, some coffee and home made cake.


i


The Garden

We have had an interesting time in the garden this year. Early in the summer the garden was looking so green and full and we had a bumper crop of cherries and everything was flourishing. Then the sun beat down and there was almost no rain at all and the garden shrivelled up and burnt to a crisp. That's the reality of global warming in the South East of England and it has been concerning to read about what is happening to our planet and my hope is that every little change we can make however small will help. So I will leave you with one of the good things about having the right amount of water and sun - fruit!


🌍Teresa

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