Warped

As mentioned last time, I accidentally bought myself a new toy which arrived last Tuesday. It arrived at 9.30am, which is rather good considering I only ordered it on the previous Saturday evening. Anyway, it had to sit there in its box for several hours as I was having a meeting at home with my two lovely colleagues but as soon as they'd gone I tore open that box and got building.

Here it is, my beautiful Kromski Harp Rigid Heddle Loom...

 I seem to remember some years ago saying to myself that I'd never spin my own yarn. Three spindles and two spinning wheels later I then told myself I'd never take up weaving. Oops.

It didn't take me long to get my first warp on the loom, using some Regia sock yarn that had been marinating in the stash for several years.

 This first bit of weaving was so much fun and I learned loads, especially about trying to get the selvedges nice and even, which they really weren't on this first attempt. However, I was thrilled with the fabric that came off the loom and the way the self-striping sock yarn used as the warp created pretty long stripes.

 This was off the loom within a day and I was ready and set to go with my second attempt. This time I used a pretty turquoise sock yarn as the warp and some leftover turquoisy handspun for the weft.

 The middle photo of the weaving is the closest in colour, it reminds me so much of bluebell woods and I love it!

Now, when I was in denial for so long about weaving one of the main reasons was that everything I'd heard or seen about weaving at the Guild or on Ravelry, made it seem like an extremely technical skill, involving lots of maths, complicated charts and vast amounts of new weaving language. Although I was impressed by the weaving I'd seen from Guild members I was also intimidated by it and not always very inspired. I didn't want to weave superfine silk cloth that looked (to me) like it was not hand woven as it was so flawless.

It didn't sing to me.

It seems I'm all about the texture and the colour rather than the technical aspects of weaving. I have no desire to weave a houndstooth check (yet), although I completely admire those who do.

Whilst mooching about on Ravelry I came across the Saori Weavers groups and was immediately captivated, just as I had been by the talk at Guild. This was the kind of thing I wanted to do. Here's a link to some information on Saori Weaving and a quote from that website:

What is Saori?

Saori is hand weaving that emphasises creativity and free expression. No rules, no fear – just pure absorption and immersion into weaving and working with yarn and threads. This ‘non-technique’ is meditative in nature and aims to build self worth from the process and the resulting textile'

 By now I was itching to give it a go and as soon as we got a busy weekend out of the way, the loom was warped and a bundle of handspun and ribbon yarns had been chosen.

This grew really quickly as I just couldn't stop playing and it was the perfect soothing project for a week which started with me being a bit stupid and stressed about crappity work stuff.

This proved impossible to photograph well but I'm hoping to get some better pictures soon.

So, what are my plans for all this weaving? When I started I imagined hundreds of scarves, tablemats and table runners. I've since changed my mind and am now dying to get the scissors out and start cutting into it!

My head is full of ideas for handspun, handwoven bags, cushions, purses, brooches, lavender bags - I don't intend to waste even the tiniest scrap if I can help it.

In the meantime, weaving number 4 is on the loom and nearly done and Mr Moog is very happy at the rate at which my yarn stash is diminishing :)

I'm convinced getting the loom has been a good idea, especially as all of a sudden Mr Moog has started talking craft studio plans with me again!!

love Moogs xxx

Playing with fabric and torturing myself with knitting

 After visiting my brother and his family in their caravan in the Dales at Easter, I came home inspired to make sister-in-law a little caravan warming present for her birthday next month.  So, I made her a cushion.

With a little picture of their 'van, complete with the resident pheasant who stalks them, and their little spaniel Tess, peeping out of the window.

I edged it with some strips of Amy Butler prints, that I bought years ago in bundles of scrap strips for £1 from the Cotton Patch, a lovely patchwork shop that I used to pop into for a bit of a break when I was up in Birmingham visiting my dear old Dad when he was very ill.

I had quite a collection of these strips, about six bundles in all and taking them out to make s-i-l's cushion got me thinking, and the thinking led to a lot of time on Pinterest, a bit of playing and rather a lot of sewing...and the whole island unit and the dining table covered in my playthings.

I tried scrappy log cabin blocks for the first time and love them! These are from scrappy bundles of Kaffe Fassett prints - I'm rather partial to Kaffe Fassett's fabric designs.

Then it was onto quarter log cabins.

Next up was scrappy Courthouse steps.

Then just some tiny 2.5" scrappy squares - the fabric strips are between 1 and 1.5 inches wide before piecing so become very skinny when stitched together.

...and a bigger version of the same (this might be my favourite).

Some random scrappy strips, that I was rather pleased with.

During my play with scraps I unearthed a bundle of 3.5" squares leftover from a fabric flower making session from ages ago and decided to throw them together and see what happened. Certainly not planned but I quite like it for it's complete randomness.

And finally, some scrappy log cabins made with the Amy Butler strips.

None of them have been made up into anything other than squares just yet and I'm not sure what I'll do with them but I lost myself so completely in all that happy stitching and it was so much fun to just do it for the sake of it.

I don't know if you're the same as me but I rarely let myself sit down and play for playing's sake, because I seem to feel I need a definite end product in mind when I set out to do some sewing (or knitting, crochet etc etc!). This can mean that I end up completely stalled, spending a good deal of time thinking about things I'd like to do but not actually doing them!

In other news, I had a lovely day out at Guild on Saturday, in which we were treated to a very interesting and inspiring talk by Ritta Sinkonnen-Davies, a Finnish textile artist, who now lives and works in Pembrokeshire.

Her talk about using fabric strips in weaving really struck a chord with me, especially in light of my recently playing with scraps adventure, and for the first time I felt properly inspired to give weaving a go. It's never really appealed before, partly because many of the fantastic weavers at Guild seem to be very technical and I felt a bit intimidated and that it wasn't for me. However, that may well have changed and I may have had a bit of an accident in Wingham's and there might be a new toy winging it's way to me soon....

Mr Moog took the news of my accidental purchase rather well really. His eyebrows only slightly shot up.

Every September the Hampshire Guild of Spinners, Weavers and Dyers has a stand at the Romsey Show, a one day agricultural and countryside show. I went last year for the first time and we did a 'Fleece to Finished' challenge, in which we carded, spun, plied and knitted some jacobs fleece into a child's sweater in the course of the day. It was great fun and I've signed up again for this year.

This year's show is to have a World War 1 theme, what with it being the centenary of the start of that terrible war and all. We're going to be spinning in Edwardian costume this time around - should be interesting!

As part of that we're having a display of knitted items that are like those that would have been knitted at home for the boys on the front-line. We were given a choice of things to knit, including socks but I plumped for a helmet and came home armed with a copy of an original pattern and this wool.

This is not only a revolting pooey khaki green colour but it is also the harshest, itchiest, most sandpapery yarn. It's utter torture to knit with, like parcel twine, although it's doing a grand job of making my rough old-lady hands feel smooth - I'll be all set for spinning silk after this....or committing the perfect crime, what with the fact that I'll have no fingerprints left!

The thing that has struck me most, however, is that this is completely authentic yarn of the type that would have been used back then. That makes me feel nothing but admiration for the thousands of knitters who spent the war knitting many thousands of scratchy, wire-wool garments to keep their soldiers warm and it makes me feel a profound sense of pity and sadness for those poor, brave men who as well as dealing with the horror of fighting, and the dreadful conditions within the trenches, also had to spend the war encased in torturous, itchy clothing that probably made them wish they could peel their own skin off!

That's keeping me going. I'm knitting it in remembrance.

So, two posts in a week. That must be some kind of record for me! Let's finish with something soft, pretty and not in the least bit itchy. This week's spinning project that I started at Guild - some gorgeous, rainbowy shetland and silk from my favourite fibre shop
Hilltopcloud.





















love,

Moogs xxx

Grown-up knitting...with a bit of fluff too

I have a very serious bit of grown-up knitting to show you today but before we get to that I really felt the urge to show you some fluffy fun. A few weeks ago, whilst having a particularly crappy week at work, I decided I needed to play with something pretty.

So, I delved into my little (that's a relative term) stash of spinning fibre and came up with a mixture of bits and pieces that when put together make at least a jumper's worth of fibre.

The blues, turquoises and purples came from the sales table at Guild last year, the purple plait is some merino that I hand-dyed with food colouring and the bright pink is a bag of mixed fibres picked up at last year's Wingham's Wool Day at Guild (more of that later).

I split it into smaller bits and laid it all out in the kitchen.

Next, I sorted it into little piles of fibre, each with a roughly equal amount of each fibre. I ended up with over 30 piles of fluff! Next step was to break out the drum carder, so generously gifted to me by my lovely friend Maria, and I had a very happy time making up some mixed batts ready for spinning.

This is the first batch. I still have well over 400g of fibre left to blend! So far, I've spun up one full bobbin, with another nearly full and I love how it's coming out.

Once I've got three bobbins full they will be plied together and I reckon it'll be roughly DK weight and should make a really pretty jumper or cardigan.

Yesterday was this year's Wingham's Wool Day at Guild where Wingham's Woolworks come all the way down from Yorkshire and fill the village hall with the most mind-blowing array of fibres in every shade of the rainbow. One of the best bits of the day, other than filling a huge bag with fibre to bring home (and choosing not to worry about having to live on soup for the next two weeks), is that we are allowed to spend the whole day with our wheels spinning up samples of all the fibres on display.

I had a wonderful day, spinning and chatting, and hopping up every half an hour or so to find something else to spin. I came home with a gorgeous happy bobbin full of spinning with lots of colour and lots of sparkle. I think I'm going to spin up a hand-dyed skein of fibre that I've been saving to ply with this and might even use it to knit myself a shawl. For now, I'm just going to look at it and stroke it :)

So, now it's time for that seriously grown-up knitting that I warned you about. Earlier this year I treated myself to a very special knitting book Colours of Shetland by my favourite designer Kate Davies. As well as being full of beautiful, inspiring patterns this book is also full of the story behind each design and it's link to the landscape, wildlife, people and history of Shetland.

The reason I bought the book was that I'd seen one pattern. I fell in love. I had such an overwhelming urge to knit this pattern that I deliberately overlooked the fact that it had a number of features that had formerly filled me with fear.

Namely Fairisle knitting, in Shetland wool, and it involved doing something very scary to my knitting with a pair of scissors.

That there is an action shot of me cutting my knitting open, slicing it up the middle to turn a jumper into a cardigan. It took me about a month after knitting it to actually bring myself to get the scissors out but Kate Davies's brilliant tutorial and a bit of hand-holding from Youtube helped me do the deed.

Although this looks nearly finished it really wasn't! I then had to pick up and knit the buttonbands and the neckband, knit icord onto every edge of the whole tunic, face the buttonbands with grosgrain ribbon, stitch on snap fasteners and then make buttons - not just sew on buttons mind you. No, I had to make them first.

Little handmade Wheel House buttons.

I wore it yesterday for the first time and so many people at Guild commented on it. I was getting seriously big-headed by the end of the day but honestly, without such a fabulous designer and a well-written pattern I couldn't have done it and if I hadn't loved it so much I wouldn't have even tried!

At last, I've strung this out long enough! here is my Scatness Tunic - crappy photos 2 and 3 courtesy of bored teenager who clearly had better things to be doing!

I steeked!!!

That is all.

Moogs xxx

Spoke too soon

It seems I may have tempted fate with my last post, when I introduced you to our lovely hens. This Wednesday Mr Moog and I both had busy evenings and for the first time ever forgot to check with each other that we had shut the hens into their pen, after them being free-range all afternoon.

He thought I'd done it. I thought he'd done it. Neither of us had. Sad to say, Mr Fox took advantage of the situation and I came down to a horrible scene on Thursday morning. Every one of our beautiful girls had been killed. One had disappeared entirely, we assume taken away by the fox. Mr Moog and I were beside ourselves and felt so terribly guilty for such a stupid avoidable mistake.

I came home from work late yesterday afternoon to find four new inhabitants in the hen house - it seems one day without hens was one day too many for the Mr. So, without wishing to tempt fate again...I would like to introduce you to the new girls.

At the back left is a little speckledy hen called Dotty, at the front left is Tango - a Sussex Ranger, and behind her is my girl Geraldine (a dead ringer for my lovely Miranda) and here, laying her very first tiny egg is Fizz - a Blue Ranger. 

I can say without a shadow of a doubt that Mr Moog and I are not going to be taking any chances with these babies. Lesson learned.

This morning I had a lovely surprise brought by the postman. My lovely friend Lucy Locket had warned me he might be bringing something to cheer me up - and it really did cheer me up :)

A bundle of gorgeous goodies that brought a huge smile to my face, including the cutest little felted sheep brooch and a skein of beautiful turquoise yarn that my camera just could not do justice to. It's an absolutely stunning colour and I think I'm going to have to knit a shawl with it as I don't want to make socks and have it hidden in my boots! Thank you Lucy - I love it :)

We have the in-laws here for the weekend and so far I've been on my feet all day in the kitchen, making meals and cups of tea. Grandma has just popped out to the Co-op so I decided to sneak on here for a quick post, while a lovely beef stew bubbles in the oven.

Just before I go, here's a scarf I finished a few days ago, using some handspun by me - the turquoisy-blue is a whole load of mixed fibres that I blended myself, including some sparkle, and the white stripes are soft and fluffy handspun alpaca. I can't wait for it to be cold enough to wear it!

Hope you have a lovely weekend, whatever you're up to and I hope to be back soon with some very grown-up finished knitting!

Moogs xx

Rewind

Yet again it's been an age since I blogged but I finally got here.

Today we've finally broken up for half term and everyone's shattered. An eight week stint at school has left the children overtired and looking forward to a week of long and lazy get ups. I'm looking forward to getting down to some crafting, baking and putting my house in order.

There hasn't been a shortage of crafting since my last post. I went through a phase of casting on socks as if my life depended on it - six pairs in all and now all sitting in the WIP pile as my sock mojo has upped and left!
I did manage to start and finish these scrappy socks before the urge totally left me.

There's also been some spinning, although I've barely dented the ever-growing pile of fluff that seems to have found its way here!


A few days ago I had a text from Lucy Locket, telling me about some lovely crochet brooches she'd been making and before I knew what was happening I was hit by an immediate urge to break out the crochet hooks.

I've been planning to crochet one of these bags (Ravelry link) for months and even have everything ready to go. I'm inspired to crochet a granny blanket or another ripple blanket too.

However, there was something just sitting there all ready to be picked up.Something I started over two years ago and after the intiial euphoria and frenzy of hooking had worn off it sat there, marinating in a plastic crate and glaring at me every time I glanced at it. So, I rescued it from the indignity of the crate and for the past three days have been happily snuggled up each evening under it's cuddlyness.

A perfect project for chilly Autumn evenings and a real touch of summery colour to counteract the dull greyness outside the window. The original plan was to make this big enough for our king-size bed but I'm just not sure if I have the stamina to crochet that much!

I'm beginning to feel a need for some sewing too. I could do with a new skirt or two as the weight loss is ongoing and the wardrobe is in need of a boost and then there's the quilt top I need to finish. I really do need four of me to get it all done but I bet I'm not the only one to feel like that when it comes to all the making we want to do.

So, to help me make some headway I've decided to back away a little from things that take up too much of my time. Those things would be Ravelry and Facebook, where I spend far too long lurking around and achieving precisely nothing. It struck  me that if I really want to do more and make more I need to get off the computer and do and make instead.

Ironically, that means I may well be blogging more :o)

Things I've learned

Being a helpful sort I do like to share the knowledge and experience I gather as I go about my doings, so please think of this illuminating post as a heartfelt gift from me to you.
Thing #1
No matter how much your latest knitting WIP makes you want to kick the dog it really is worth persevering....especially if it means you get to have your feet and legs covered in tiny owls.

Thing #2
Kool Aid does amazing things to wool.....and possibly to your innards if you actually drink it.

Thing #3

Year 7 homework is a lot more exciting than year 6 - if you look up 'wildlife of the River Tigris' on Google images you will get a load of pictures of tigers (not found near the River Tigris) and a photo of a lady in a gstring bending over with her bottom facing the camera.

Thing #4

Even after 3 years of sock knitting and 50++ pairs completed it is still possible to get completely giddy with excitement when you try out a completely new way of knitting a sock (work with me here!).

Cat Bordhi is a knitting genius, as exemplified in her fantastic Sweet Tomato Heel socks.

She's also a lovely woman who will welcome you warmly on her Ravelry forum after you've posted a cringingly effusive message about how awesome both she and her socks are.
Thing #5
Going out in the British summer wearing flip flops and sunglasses, cropped trousers and a thin cotton blouse means you will get rained on....heavily.
Thing #6
Having a teeny weeny new car becomes very exciting when you find the parcel office car park is full to capacity....but you can still park in the motorbike shed.

Thing #7
Despite being convinced that you can still lose weight and enjoy three big glasses of wine a night you will find the reverse is often true. As a die hard
wino  wine drinker take it from me - getting into smaller jeans makes you feel much better than the wine does....2.5 stone down but still a way to go :o)

Thing #8
Your dog does not always like eating the same things as you. I, for instance, would never eat hedgehog poo. Merlin Moog? It's his current favourite food.
Thing #9
No matter how much you love your new spinning hobby it is never acceptable to snigger at the Spinning Guild, or click 'funny' on the UKSpinners forum on Ravelry, when someone is voicing their desire to have a bigger orifice. Get over it and stop being childish or at least keep your mirth to yourself.

Thing #10
Cardboard tubes are possibly the best invention ever. These versatile packaging items can be put to many uses.

Thing #10
Don't believe bloggers who tell you that homemade elderflower cordial is easy and delicious. Ok, it was easy I'll give them that but despite slavishly following Hugh's recipe, spending £10 on pretty bottles, and thoroughly sterilising said bottles you will end up with something that just tastes...meh...and after two weeks grows an interesting greeny grey fungus such that the whole lot gets flushed down the drain. Console yourself that you now have bottles ready for sloe gin which is a much better idea.
Thing #11
After months of no sewing you will get a huge thrill out of cracking out the sewing machine, even if it is only to help your son sew a 1 inch seam securing a piece of elastic to Sackboy's new 'Batman' cape.
Thing #12
Wearing your raincoat, boots and thick socks on a cool, drizzly British summer's day guarantees that the sun will be blazing and you will have sweated off ten pounds by the time you get back from walking the dog.
Thing #13
Even though he's nearly 40 and a grown man with a mind of his own and grown up responsibilities that don't include housework or ironing apparently , your beloved will be too scared to tell his parents that he's bought a shiny new motorbike and will keep it covered when they're visiting this weekend and will threaten the children and the dog with dire consequences should they so much as allude to the big green beast hiding on the driveway.

Thing #14

Your 11 year old daughter will grow up far too fast. When she begins nagging you for highlights in her hair don't be fooled into thinking you saying 'No. I don't want you putting nasty chemicals on your hair at this age. You have time for all that when you're older' will suffice.

She will:

a) suddenly have several helpful friends whose mothers have let them have highlights

b) have a friend with a mother who is a hairdresser who helpfully tells her you can get highlights without 'the nasty chemicals' these days

c) hate you because you are the most overbearing, old fashioned, boring mother in the whole wide school.

d) have to just deal with it cos it ain't happening Minx....noooo way! You got me on the ear piercing but you ain't gettin' me on this one.

Thing #15

That 11 year old daughter of yours has been told what class she'll be in at secondary school in September and not a single one of her current classmates is with her.  You expect tears and tantrums. You actually get beaming smiles of relief as she's finally 'away from all the bitchy girls' and with the lovely ones she's always liked. You will do a happy dance at this point.

Thing #16

Youtube is your friend. Whatever new skill/hobby/thing you want to learn about someone has made a Youtube video about it.

Things I watched on Youtube this week:

Doubleknitting

Knooking

Knitting socks on a knitting machine

Someone unpacking a box containing their recently ebay-purchased knitting machine

Sweet Tomato Heels

Navajo plying

Space dyeing sock yarn

Yarn Harlot talking about the reaction she gets when she tells people she writes 'knitting humour' books.

Cat Bordhi spinning yarn with a tennis ball and an elastic band - you really must watch this one!

Your beloved will find something interesting about 'swimming techniques' on Youtube and will go on at length about how brilliant Youtube is and how he had no idea there were such good things on it and that his friend at work told him about it, even though you've been telling him about if for the past four years.

(I'm not providing links cos that'll stop you having all the fun of discovering them for yourself.)

Thing #17

Slimming World crustless quiche is actually very very tasty and even your husband and children will want to eat it.....and it's free on Extra Easy folks!

Thing #18

You will realise after writing a very long blog post that, in actual fact, you've been far too generous in sharing your pearls of wisdom and could have used this as blog fodder for at least five posts thus saving yourself anguish and sleepless nights as you try to think of something worth blogging about.

xxx

p.s. Thing #19

The blind panic you feel when you've just completed a lengthy blog post and pressing one button makes it disappear from Blogger is a very real and worthy emotion as is the relief when you press a few more buttons and find it again.

ugh - Thing #20

Bloody Blogger does not respond to threats or swearing when it keeps mucking up the spacing on your latest blog post,.