one day

I would like to own a wheel that is a little different, maybe a Louet 45 if I ever see one come up for sale, had a play, so so so fast !!.

Well, I can dream, can't I ??

Ghost of a guitar

 We have had this guitar case ( and guitar) stashed away in a cupboard for at least 20 years, probably more, As the Mister plays Ukulele these days and we have an acoustic guitar sat downstairs in case either of us feel a need to play, this beast is now surplus to requirements.

So we have sent it down south where our niece will pass it on to a new home. In exchange, we will have a 5 string beastie heading this way for me to learn to play :-)

Catch up

Hi
Sorry I've not been around for the last couple of weeks or so but a virus got hold of me, twice! which has resulted in time off work and a serious loss of get up and go. To cap it all I've managed to pull  a muscle in my leg and sprain my wrist so my mobility is somewhat impaired today. Needless to say, Christmas was fairly low key around here and as I sit here reading other peoples blogs, I realise that the blog posts that were planned are now somewhat redundant.

One idea was to photo and share the 12 windows of Christmas Cheer where they invited 12 artists to dress up the windows of empty shops here in Nottingham, In the end I only managed to capture one of the shops but was so taken with the cartoon figures that I am sharing it with you now. The artist is Ricky Marr.

Nottingham Ukes strike again

Once again, the public of Nottingham were distracted by the sound of Christmas songs,,,,Uke style. People danced, people sang along, people took photos and film.............a few passed by totally in phased by it all but most were very generous with contributions to the charity buckets :-)

A big thank you to everyone who came and watched, tapped feet and danced x

Victorian Christmas at Framework Knitters Museum

Yesterday my friend Angela and myself found ourselves back at the Framework knitters museum in Ruddington giving a spinning demonstration as part of their Victorian Christmas event. No, we didn't dress up partly because we don't have costumes but also because it seems to classify spinning as a lost art only seen at reenactment days.

We made ourselves comfy on the balcony of the old Wesleyan chapel where the collection of knitwear is housed including Queen Victoria's stockings that were recently featured on the Antiques Road Trip programme here in the UK.

The examples of Framework knitwear are quite stunning.

 

 

During the afternoon we were entertained by the Ruddington Comminity Choir ,  and the Maids of Clfton Morris dancers

 Children were entertained by Father Christmas and story telling in the old workshop, I was taken with the knitted Christmas decoration made using the sock machines.....

.........Hot Chestnuts and crumpets toasted by the fire!

As darkness fell, the lanterns were lit creating a magical place for children to come to visit Santa.

I hope you all had a good weekend x

the goody bag

Not terribly good photos, sort of left the camera on the wrong setting , but this is what I found in the goody bag.

all I can say is Thanks Pete :-) looks like I'm going to be having some fun over winter xxx

woolly wednesday again

 Woolly Wednesday

well, what have I been up to since last month? well I taught a Drop Spindle workshop  at Knit Nottingham, usually we have 4 maybe 5 beginners but just two this time. The shop is really small ( we need somewhere bigger ) and rather full of yarn so 5 newbies, 2 spinners 2 wheels and countless spindles can be rather interesting to say the least :-) So to have just the three of us made a pleasant change, more relaxed and more space to play with things.. We chatted about fleece, processing, texture, all the usual topics and touched on dyeing so I suspect that at some point I may have a kitchen full of fleece and dyes so that one of the participants can have a bash at it.

Angela and myself did a spinning demo at The Framework Knitters Museum, more about this in this post.

The oxford fleece from last months post is rapidly becoming fingerless mittens, confession here....I generally knit shawls so this is my first attempt at thumbs!! or any real shaping etc

but I'm loving the rustic feel to these and they are thick, very warm and remind me of knitted garments when I was little.

The shawl is slowly growing still and  another pair of mitts are on the needles for a friend.

umm....I seem to have acquired this to add to my winter spin collection....please note that I am not stating which winter!!

which reminds me that I was gifted a Jacob earlier in the year and have been slowly, very slowly spinning it up over the last few months between other projects.

 ok not my best photos ! White, light grey, medium gray, dark brown and a gradient skein.

I'm busy sorting out the remainder to spin at a demo on Saturday to show how many different shades can come from one sheep.
Well, I'm going to be really busy today as I was given a large bag of fibre last night which I need to sort through and I have some Swedish fleece samples to have a good look at. Will update through the month and hope to see you all for the next Woolly Wednesday next year!!

Lights

I visited a couple of Christmas craft fairs yesterday in the centre of Nottingham and managed to get round one of them, looking at every stall without a single stall holder saying Hello to me. Please, if you are trying to sell something, at least look up, smile and say hello !
A bit different at the second fair with a couple of really good conversations and yes, I did buy something.

My camera was in my bag so I decided to hang around until it was dark and take a few more photos of the market and the lights.