Quick knitting update

 Hi, I'm sat in a coffee shop , on my way to the Notts and District branch of the guild of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers, and I've realised that I haven't posted a knitting update recently.

                                         This beanie is my current knit, nice simple repeat.

This hat was a commission that I finished last week, the one below is a beanie from the same pattern.

I took a lot of oddments away with me when we went to Wales.

All but two pairs of mitts and the cowl were holiday knits.

My plan is to finish this beanie before the start of tour de fleece although I will always have knitting in my bag whilst out and about.

a brief diversion into Downton Lace

 No, nothing to do with Downton abbey but a style of lace similar to Bucks point from the village of Downton near Salisbury. just a bit of fun before setting up the next piece of Bucks for the bobbin along.

Two more books have joined my original pattern book, one is a more detailed history of the lace and the other has patterns to work. This link will take you to a page on the fashioning the world web site.

My next piece of lace will be a small Bucks point medallion.

Its nearly that time of year again......... Tour de fleece 2025 !!

  Here we go again, I've lost count of how many times I've taken part in this challenge 😁 but the sun is  out so the fleece needs to be washed. 

I've no idea how much I need but to be honest I really need to carry on spinning into August to restock my yarn supplies. At the moment I'm knitting hats from scraps !

So far I have about 1200 gm prepped, mainly fleece to be spun on the Ashford E-spinner, I'm thinking of a separate project for the nano as I have had a braid of Merino/baby alpaca in my stash for some time now so it makes sense to spin it us as a laceweight for a future project for myself. I know it goes against my usual ethic of only spinning from fleece but its just been sitting around for years.

So, Romney is next up to be washed and then its a case of see what is in the bags in the shed

A touch of Italy in Wales

Portmeirion, designed and built by Sir Clough Williams-Ellis between 1925 and 1975 has long been on Ians bucket list. I've actually visited a couple of time but that was more than 40 years ago so a return was long overdue. The Italian style buildings tumble down the hillside set amongst gardens and edged by woodland walks.

The TV series, The Prisoner was set within the village in 1965 (still available on DVD)  using the houses and woodland as the backdrop for the drama. We are currently re-watching the series and the one thing that has really stood out is how good the gardens are looking compared with what we see on the programme.

There are two hotels and most of the buildings are now self catering cottages, also they have now built a small motorhome / camper park at the entrance. The price seems daunting until you realise that it covers the entry fee ( currently £20 per person) and gives you residential access to the village before and after the usual opening hours and as you are a resident , use of the hotel swimming pool and bar is included.

We stayed a couple of nights so had access on the afternoon and evening of our arrival and the next day. On the day when we had to leave the camper park we were able to park up in the main car park and have a further days entrance. I think that for a lot of people just one night/day was enough but we were there to chill.

At night the buildings were subtlety lit up, it was a wonderful experience to be there without the hoards of visitors.

For me, it was a couple of days of relaxation, just taking it easy and enjoying the sunshine. This became my regular coffee spot during our stay, people watching as I was spinning.

I'm in love with this shop... Ewe Felty Thing

I don't often post about yarn stores, mainly because, as a spinner, I use my own yarn and my personal restriction of only spinning British breeds ( I have Saxon Merino and Bowmont but both sourced as fleece in the UK ) and always spinning from fleece means that my shop purchases tend to be knitting needles.

However, I will often have a look inside when the colours call my name, I came across this lovely place last month whilst we were wandering slowly around Shropshire and North Wales.

Nestled in the the old town of Conwy I spotted a sign outside one of the old buildings.

                                                                  Ewe Felty Thing

With this view from the door step, how could I resisit ? The colours called out but to be honest, the spinning wheels shouted to me as well.

 I had a lovely warm welcome from Andy who was looking after the shop and he was happy to show me the spinning wheel collection, even making sure that I didn't miss the one in the vault. I will add here that having worked in a bank for 42 years I am always amazed how many times I walk into coffee shops etc and recognise the signs of its former use, most of the ones that I have worked at have been reborn as coffee shops over the years.

The shop sells yarn, needles, felting supplies, looms and wheels however the antique wheels are not for sale and they are being retained as a complete collection. They are beautiful.

There are over 20 wheels in all, different shapes, sizes , from different countries around the world.

However, I do think that we have an interloper, I may be wrong but the next one looks more like a bobbin lace bobbin winder.

I found this on Pinterest to show what I mean

there are a couple of winders in the picture.

BAL part nine (bucks point lace)

 I started this piece before we went a away and finished it a month or so later.

Duke Garter, this time its a version from the Pamela Nottingham book and includes a corner where extra bobbins have been added and discarded.

compared with the last sample of this lace, you can see that this is a slightly different version with the pattern inverted.

We can select the next pattern from the Jean Leader book so I'll leave it as a surprise. In the mentime I have a couple of books on the way so I may see what's in them, watch this space.

Briefly back to lace. Nottingham Society of Artists exhibition featuring textiles and lace.

 I'm just adding this post as the exhibition motioned opened yesterday 27.5.25 and runs until the 31.5.25.

The current exhibition is called Found and I attended the launch party last night, rather last minute as I had been intending to go on Thursday. I may still go back then and take a closer look.

The three artists are very different, Christina Williams produced cards, hand made books and exhibited a collection of spoons made from found objects

.

I apologise for the reflections, glass is always a little difficult.

Like many people, I was studying these hard, trying to identify what had been repurposed

Jackie Ward makes amazing figures of people being people, absolutely loved them.

However , I must admit that the main reason for going was to see the Suzanne's lace.

and on to Chirk

 

Chirk dates back to 1324 but little of that remains. The village grew in the 17 centaury and by 1826 the main road London to Holyhead had been built and the Hand hotel became the post office for mail Oswestry to Llangollen. The railway soon followed but this remained as the main route into Wales until the A5 was built.

 

Nowadays it is a small town, set alongside the canal and the railway, with a sweet centre at its heart as its home to Cadburys factory and the smell of chocolate occasionally wafts by

There are a few shops on the high street, an excellent cafe set in a wool and teddy bear shop along with a quilting shop, butchers and the other essentials.

An easy walk out of town brings you down to the canal where I stopped by the coffee boat for a drink and had a long and interesting conversation with a gentleman carrying a barn owl on his bike.

The local church was open and I was pleasantly surprised by the number of information boards about the towns development.

Also the needlepoint/tapestry hassocks

The roof bosses were repainted in the 1970's and add a splash of colour amongst the wooden beams.

Almost forgot the beautiful castle gates just past the campsite entrance.

and the railings in the town

along with this wooden bench.

I suspect that we will return to this campsite as a stop over on the way into Wales.