not yet....

over here spring officially begins on the first of february. and for a week or so it looked like it might already be in the air! unfortunately it didn't really stay sunny and nice - we had several days of drizzle and rain again and then we had snow over night! not too much and most of it was gone by the next day, but still - that put a damper on my "spring spirit"! it feels as if our winter was mostly grey and wet (not sure if that actually shows in the official data, maybe it's just me?) and I am fed up with grey. I want colour! maybe that's the reason why I chose some colourful yarns for a few small projects? I finished the black shrug (no photos yet, because I can't wear it and without anybody "in" it, it looks rather odd), though I am not sure about the size; it looks rather small. if it is too small - I'll just have to make another one, I have enough of the black merino anyway. but not now - black is too close to grey to be enjoyable just now:))

I am making piggies... woolly piggies that is:))

I use odds and ends of handspun - maybe not ideal for grubby kiddie fingers, but I wanted them to be colourful, so here they come. the yarn is a leftover of a batch I dyed for another project (colibri), but it's not enough for a scarf or hat. the pattern is easy enough, just two larger circles and a smaller one for the face. two ears, two legs (yes, I know - it's a two-legged pig:)) and a tail. a zip and a few buttons, that's it. the knitting is done really fast, the putting together takes much more time! 

 this is the base material for the second piggie, just needs putting together. I finished knitting the third batch late last night, but didn't take a photo yet... the "herd" will be shown, when all is finished:) I hope the three little boys like their piggie purses....

this is only the base material for one block of my quilt - I don't want to show more yet; but the upper layer is nearly done, just needs a border. the back will be fleece, that's easy to put together. all the blocks were done by hand, but the rest I'll do with the machine, or I'll never get those long seams done....

tomorrow we are going to have our spinner's meeting - this time the demo topic will be wet felting. not really my thing - I prefer drier techniques:)) I won't take my wheel this time, because it's our "AGM" meeting and we talk a lot at those. it's not worth dragging the lendrum all the way to and from the car - when all I manage to do is to spin 10 yards of yarn! I'll take my knitting instead and a few small patches, to make two small fabric balls with rattle. one new baby in the family and one not quite so new (but I think a 1 year old still likes a ball with bell inside....) - I think a few more baby things are called for! this time it's a girl - finally a "victim" for something frillier maybe?

off to finish some blueberry muffins ....

"pickings" of all kinds

after the storm we had a few days back I checked the garden for any damage. nothing major happened here, though the ash trees dropped quite a lot of dead twigs and branches again. nothing unusual in that, we collect them regularly for firewood. but I also found that a lot of larger lichen tufts had blown off the trees. I try not to damage any on purpose because they grow so slowly, but when they blow down, they just rot away. and if we burn the twigs they grew on, I might just as well collect them - for dyeing. the tree lichen over here don't dye fabulous purples or pinks, but they do give nice light to medium brown tones. and the wool has a very special scent afterwards - a bit like a nice smelling medicine:)

I managed to collect two handfuls of them, which weighs practically nothing when dry. I need to be patient with those - and collect a good bit more during the coming year. I won't be able to dye a huge lot of wool with this, but it should be enough for maybe 2 or 3 skeins of sock yarn - eventually!

 of course spring will bring a few other dyer's delights - one of them just starts to flower (see header pic). fresh gorse flowers give a lovely  lemon yellow - but I need to wait until the shrubs are in full bloom. this makes them far easier to pick, because I just pick around the tip - and not in between the vicious spines that leave my fingers bloody - and tingling for days! another rule for gorse picking: don't choose a windy day:)

I also discovered that the pot with the cyperus esculentus "grass" had finally dried out in the tunnel. time to shake off the soil and pick the tiny brown tubers. somehow they always remind me of small brown animals....they are edible and taste nut-like, though they don't like our climate all that much and I have to grow them in pots. the leaves are rather unpromising - like coarse grass - and they don't like frost! which isn't a problem this winter, but killed nearly all my plants and tubers last winter:(

these are pickings of a different kind:) the white balls are sock yarn with silk. the dark purple is fine lace merino, which was on special offer - which I'd like to knit into a sleeveless lacy vest for myself. the two upper balls are sock yarn from opal - in van gogh colourways, which I like a lot. I also ordered a few more tunesian crochet hooks - can use them myself, but people might also try them out for themselves during my demo about tunesian crochet at the end of march....

our textile group project for this year is our very own exhibition in the "Museum of Country Life" in Castlebar. the exhibition will be in late summer/autumn, but we have to have everything finished by the end of may! the group has chosen the topic of "textile techniques past and present" (or something along that line:)) and we are trying to connect our modern projects to the exhibits of times gone by shown in the museum. I would like to take up the very old technique of sock knitting - and modernize it by chosing a special design with special materials. I will work the final project from handdyed (and most likely handspun) yarns, but I want to try out how my idea works with more readily available materials. I did already dye reds, pinks and rosy shades last summer, but didn't have the time to do greens and blues.

I also bought a darker shade - for a night sky maybe, and some grey/browns for walls or buildings. my plan so far is to design either a rose garden with an old wall/gate - or a garden  and a round tower (typical for ireland and one stands in the vicinity of the museum) in the background. or maybe I should do part of the museum itself? the modern building stands inside an old park and also contains the original old buildings... I just have to make sure to use very fine yarn for the final project to get enough detail into a normal sized sock:) the problem now is to decide what exactly to make. luckily socks are knitted up quite quickly - I think with a larger project I'd need years to finish everything....

I also agreed to knit a lace shawl for an exchange. the shawl will be "in the pink" - which is perfect, because I had planned to knit that pattern, but don't really want it for myself to wear. the construction looks fun, even though all the instructions are written and not charted. normally I'd prefer charts, but I have to admit that with a pattern like this one charting it would take ages, and one cannot really ask a designer to do that, esp. when the pattern is given as a freebie... I spun a very fine pencil roving made from 70 % wool and 30 % silk. three skeins so far, but there's more if I don't have enough. the recipient Uli will paint it with the natural dye extracts she also offers for sale here.....

of course I am also still sewing away on the quilt - so I'd better get back to that one now!

bits and pieces

I've been busy making new (and better fitting:)) slippers in knitfelt. and bingo - this time it worked! I used a different pattern this time, same material, and I even needed less, so that I could replace the "hoof covers" with proper slippers. I felted them once and let them dry and the size looks good, but because they are so small, I cannot try them on myself. those are the two pairs before felting - for giant feet obviously:

 the ruler is a normal 12 inch/30 cm one! the upper slipper is supposed to be a size 42, the lower one size 36. sorry for the bad light, it's always raining outside and the flash has a life of its own:(

this is the larger (my) pair after felting. I had enough to knit a border around the opening for the smaller size, but not enough to do the same for this pair. I've experienced this before - I added a simple crochet edge - and it shrinks differently in the wash! it stays looser, which (with hindsight) makes sense, because normally crochet is denser than knitted stitches - and can't shrink as much. I knew that, it was just hard to estimate how many stitches to work to avoid having the hole too tight! I figured that it's better to have a bigger hole for the feet than one too small:) works fine for me, I just had to add some "anti slippage" goo to avoid accidents on tiles and timber floor!

I also made a pin cushion following a pattern I found in the interweave holiday gifts 2010. the original is done in fine wool, but I wanted to use cotton instead. this is handspun cotton in natural white and natural green. from the top....

.... and from the bottom. I do find it a bit weird that most of the pattern is visible from the bottom - and the fleur-de-lys looks odd the wrong way round! if I ever did that pattern again, I'd start later with the pattern, so that the tip of it is closer to the middle of the upper side...

I added the beads on a whim, because I thought it could do with a bit more colour. I stuffed it with wool, because the natural lanolin is supposed to keep pins from rusting. this one is going to be a gift - I don't think I need another pin cushion, even though it's nice and big with lots of space on it! but it was a fun knit anyway.

no time for diddling about now - I have to get going with that quilt! the main fabric is with birds, but it wasn't all that easy to find fabrics with birds in the right size and colour! I managed to find a few due to the help of quilting friends, but eventually I decided to quit hunting around further. I had some silicon stamps in stash, bought a few fabric paints to go - and started to print my own. the first batch wasn't that great, because I had to figure out how to add the right amount of paint, not too much to make blotches and not too little, to have the motif well covered... eventually I found out that I get the best results if I spread some paint evenly on smooth cardboard (glass or plastic would work, too), dip the stamp lightly into it and stamp - it doesn't leave smudges and gives clear results. you can even make multicolour motives by blending different paints only a little. it's fun to do - and I got rid of the leftover paint by playing mad artist on the last piece of fabric:)  I just have to wait for them to "cure", iron over them - and start quilting. in the meantime I'll cut the rest of the fabrics to shape.

I also finally started on the black shrug made of handspun merino. I found a better pattern than the one I had planned in one of the Barbara Walker pattern collections and did the gauge and calculating yesterday evening. it's only a 4 row repeat, with purled wrongside rows, which makes it easy enough for tv knitting. I won't be able to sew on the quilt all day! off to dig out the cutter and mat now...

Happy New Year!

it's hard to believe that christmas is over again. and the new year has begun! this year everything has been much easier, because we had the usual irish christmas weather: wet, windy and grey. we had to time shopping "expeditions" into town to avoid the heavy rains we had, but all in all this was much easier to do than trying to do everything on impassable icy roads! the forecast is for a cold and maybe snowy night tonight - but we'll be back to mild and wet again from wednesday onwards. I used to miss snowy christmas times, but after the last two winters we had - not anymore:))

the downside of all the rain is this: puddles everywhere, and before they have the chance to dry out we get more water from "upstairs"! all the tanks and bins are overflowing and there's no end in sight. the only places where the ground isn't muddy and squishy is under the old big ash trees - they use up so much water from spring to autumn that the soil beneath them is dry after the first 2 or 3 inches.... not even the soggy times we've had can saturate the soil underneath!

the veggie bed looks desperate, only the garlic stands like a field of little soldiers:) and there's still some kale nero di toscana, but it needs more time to regrow - and higher temps, too... and in the patch underneath the crab apple everest the allium "hair" is growing back again after mowing, despite the low temperatures.

inside a few christmassy bits are visible (apart from the tree and the textile decorations - I am not allowed to put them down before saturday!). normally I make one wreath for the door - but this year DH cut so much greenery that I just didn't have the heart to throw the lovely pine away.so I made a simple one with just a linen ribbon and two pine cone "layers" (they do look odd without the branch in the middle:) for the outside of the porch door....

 and a more elaborate one for the door from porch to kitchen. I try to use a lot of different evergreens from the garden, but I only ever use my red ribbon and real holly, no artificial decorations allowed. I used to hang this in the kitchen, but because it's warm in there and relatively dry, the green used to shrivel and shed needles very quickly. now that it's hanging towards the unheated porch, the lovely scent is kept much better and the wreath looks good well beyond the 6th of january...which means it will probably hang there until it really starts looking shrivelled:)

by now I have put away all the textile christmas projects. the last embroidery I finished didn't make it into a christmas card, but I didn't want to put it away unfinished. (so next christmas I'll have one finished card extremely early :)) this wasn't down to a difficult pattern - just to lack of suitable materials.

I started out with the four denser areas in white stranded cotton. the plan was to add small silvery beads instead of crosses to the more open "darts" - but it turned out that the ones I had were a teeny bit to big for the aida I used; they started to push each other into odd directions, which made the whole star look messy:( I unpicked them and replaced them with one thread of DMC satin thread. it has a lovely shine, which unfortunately isn't visible in the photo. thanks to Renate/stickeule for the freebie pattern....

this year was no exception to my "I have to hurry to get everything done" christmas. I finished several other presents, but had no time (or light!) to take photos. so these are the few bits I did manage to shoot:

I had planned to give a subscription to a german magazine, but wanted to give something handmade with it. I bought a magazine holder made from timber, which I sanded and varnished. then I copied the title of the magazine on a long ribbon made of wool felt and embroidered the title in multicolour thread. it's only fixed on the back with one small seam, could be taken off for washing etc. not a sensational design, but I hope it adds a bit of personal touch to an otherwise rather impersonal gift.

I also made some slippers in knitfelt... well, I tried to make some. I bought two different yarns for this, both are made for that purpose and I followed the instructions to the dot. after knitting they did look rather odd, very high on the foot? but I have felted in the washing machine before, so I wasn't overly worried. again I followed the instructions in the pattern - but it just doesn't work. the length of the foot is ok, but you'd have to have hooves to make the rest of it fit:( the short rows leave a knob of knitting under the heel and the sides are far to wide, even after the second felting. back to the drawing board or rather back to another pattern. not sure if I'll have enough yarn though! if all else fails the recipient has to wait until I can order more.... and what do I do with the two very oddly shaped "bits" now? any ideas?

 not all the gifts turned out to be faulty, though. I knitted Yolanda Teague's "Snapdragon mittens" and the pattern worked out perfectly. the main part is worked like any hand warmer with thumb. then stitches are taken up from the main part and some are cast on additionally to knit the mitten part, which is attached only on the upper side. the rest is a straightforward mitten shape, apart from the small piece of i-cord at the top. this forms the loop to attach the mitten, when it is worn flipped back.

the yarn is black alpaca with wool, quite warm - and deep black, even though it looks more like charcoal because of the flash... the cable pattern around the wrist was interesting to knit - I am sure I'll work that pattern again!

and today I finished my first pattern of the new year! well, ok, I cheated a bit:)) I made another pair of knitfelt slippers - in the hope that the new pattern fits better. so far it looks good, even though the unfelted slippers look gigantic! most of the second one was done yesterday evening, but eventually I had to stop because the countdown for 2012 started! I finished the tip and closed the heel with kitchener stitch this morning and they are "going for a walk in the washing machine" as we speak (yes, ok, I admit, I do wash whenever I need to, even during the holidays...). now I have to hurry to work on a quilt - I'll cut the paper tonight and can hopefully start the sewing tomorrow! high time, too - the next birthdays are creeping up!

I hope all of you had a good start into the new year - enjoy it as much as you can, even those days that don't run quite as smoothly as you'd like them to! and of course - always enough ideas and materials to play with:)

it's creeping up....

christmas I mean! not that it feels like christmas outside -it's cold enough today, but windy and wet at times as well. and somehow - not christmassy, even though it's the 2nd advent sunday today! well, never mind how it feels, it's time for gift and card making etc. and I have been doing a few of the latter. the first one nearly made me go gaga - I should have known of course, but I wanted the motive for a mouse lover and grabbed it up against my better judgement. half stitches and aida don't go as nicely together as full crosses, but a few here and there are manageable. but aida, half crosses plus tiny backstitches - yuck, I can tell you, that will be the one and only time I do this project. the outcome is ok, but the backstitches took me nearly as long as the rest of the embroidery. and because I hate french knots with a vengeance, I took small beads for the black dots and the mistletoe berries...

after all the work on this one I had to make up some time with the next designs....

 .. which is why this star is much more simple in design. a few crosses, normal backstitch and a few beads...

just like this one, but I think they loose a lot of their charm in the photo, when you can't see the sparkle of fabric and beads.

last week we had our final meeting in the spinners and craft group and as usual we did a secret santa. I received a mysterious box - roses at christmas?:)

 not so, the contents are pure christmas colours after all! I thought they are for decoration, but no, they are actually meant to be napkin holders, made from felt. hm, not sure our household deserves something like napkin rings, but I can always hang them up as deco instead.

at the same meeting I stocked up on some merino fibres. I wanted to use more purples with the green tones I dyed last time, but was too lazy to start dyeing again. and then there is that scarf design I have in my head - with progressing colours from white via grey to black. that's the bags on the right....

I didn't make it to the knitting & stitching show in Dublin this year, but luckily one of the members of the group went - and was able to find a few goodies from Oliver Twists that I had asked for. some more multicolour embroidery threads; the one at the bottom is the mix of greens I used for the christmas SAL a few weeks back.  actually it's much safer to send somebody else to that stall with a shopping list! every time I go there myself I buy much more than I should... but the colours are so inviting that it's hard to be reasonable!

of course in the garden it looks bleak most of the time now - no wonder in the constant miserable weather we're having. but bang in the middle of my veggie bed sits the crabapple tree "Everest". and despite the mucky weather it is still full with the tiny fruits! I picked and picked buckets full for juice, but eventually I ran out of space (and steam:)... pity about the apples, I thought and when I heard that somebody is using them like sloes to make a liqueur, I thought: why not? ok, the 800 g I picked didn't make a dent in the stuff that's still on the tree, but the result looks nice - and smells gorgeous! not for me though - another christmas goodie to go away eventually....

I plan to put a few of the best looking apples into the small bottles for decoration, but I am not sure if the rest will be edible. the sloes are too acidic and bitter for this and I assume the crabapples will be as well.

of course I've been knitting as well  - nothing like a bit of that in front of the warm oven! this is a small giveaway project, a cowl. I used the same pattern I knitted for the slouch socks, which gives a wrinkly furrowed look to the cowl. I used smaller needles for the top and larger ones for the bottom, that's why it looks a bit odd in shape. but it feels quite nice around the neck and is long enough to cover v-necks or larger neck openings. they knit up quite qickly with needles size 4 mm and I was able to use exactly one ball (50 g) for each - couldn't stop myself, had to make two, because I had two balls of this yarn:)

spinning has been all purple these last few weeks - because I wanted to finish all those yarns dyed with logwood (they do stain the fingers a bit when spinning, but after washing the yarn this stops). all of those are from the same dye bath, several dips and everything is purple:) the lightest one on the left is alpaca; there is some wool/silk blend, some mohair, and the darkest one on the right is south american top. I wasn't sure what to use the yarns for, but after translating the article "handspun gallery" for the latest spinoff I decided that I will make a vest like the one featured - only much longer than shown. and I think to set of the purple a bit better, I'll spin some contrast colour, maybe a darker green? not sure yet, but nothing will happen on this front before christmas, so I still have plenty of time to get inspiration on that matter.

 enough photos now  - back to more knitting (mittens) and spinning (green silk/wool this time!)

special request - or "water management"

Leigh from "5 acres and a dream" asked me if I could post photos of our water supplies. so here it goes:

if you come from a civilized country in the western world, chances are that you just open the tap in the house and out comes clear water. of course - this comes with a price tag, too! I don't know how it is in other countries, but I know that in Germany you pay more for waste water now than for the water itself. which makes perfect sense, because cleaning waste water is a huge effort and has to be paid for. in our temperate climate a lot of people seem to think that water is ubiquitous; there's enough rainfall, so why the high prices? but clean water is not a matter of course; it's not just "there" to be used up! and when we came over we realised quickly that we've been spoiled in Germany. over here in the countryside water supplies are private schemes. and let's just say that their running isn't always as efficient as it should be. the result is that some of the time the water in our area is not fit for human consumption. that is why we didn't get connected to that scheme! luckily rain is usually in plentiful supply in the west of ireland. so we installed tanks. small tanks, large tanks - all to be used to collect water for the house. we have two wells within walking distance, where we can fetch drinking water in canisters, but the rest of our water consumption is covered by rainwater.

the picture above shows the most important part of it (apart from the rain that is:). to use water inside the house you need at least some pressure. this is provided by height - as you can see, we have one large tank installed  higher up than the main house (and there is a very large concrete tank underneath!). this gives the water enough pressure to flow inside the pipes easily - though you can see inside, when the level is lower, the pressure sinks! of course this tank doesn't hold nearly enough water for our needs. there are more:

 those drums are at the back of the house. they are connected, so that the overflow is caught by the next drum - until they are overflowing. which has been happening a lot lately, because of the extremely wet summer and autumn. that isn't a problem however, because there is a small "cherry laurel forest" behind the house, which can take up all the overflow without getting too muddy.

there are more tanks alongside the shed. same here, tanks are connected to make the best use. just in the corner to the bottom left you can see a black pipe. this pipe is used to pump water from the tanks into the main tank higher up. the same set-up is on the other side to empty those thanks. the pump is installed inside the shed and runs on electricty. unfortunately, but no other set-up has been viable so far. and it needs to be inside, because the pump can freeze during winter, which we had to discover last year in the very cold spell:( the shed isn't heated and after 6 weeks of near permanent frost the water inside the pump turned to ice and the pump exploded - and had to be replaced.

 this is another tank - which holds about 1000 l and is fed by the porch roof to the side of the house. the white wall to the right belongs to the tank in the next photo.

 we also have two large concrete tanks. one is below the black "egg" in the first picture. and the second one is in this photo. from the outside it looks like part of the house - but the lower part in front is actually all tank. with a tap at the bottom - and a roof on top, which also feeds the black "egg", which is behind the white part.

 of course there are drums close to every roof, never mind how small. this one is at the front porch (with gravel underneath to catch any overflow), but there are others for the greenhouse etc. all in all we have well over 15.000 l of water, if all tanks are full. since we started this system, we have never been out of water, even in drier years. of course, even this water isn't really "free". we don't pay money (apart from having well and rain water tested for pollution each year, the electricity for the pump and water filters, which need replacement every now and then) - but I can tell you that it takes quite a lot of work to manage it all. you have to keep the gutters clean, and of course the tanks need regular cleaning as well. you have to monitor the water level in the upper tank or you might run out of water just when you're all soapy in the shower:) but all in all we are lucky to have such good water - no need for softener or calgon etc. in our household! and of course, being a natural dyer - I value my very soft water as well:))

unfortunately there are still no proper water charges here, related to consumption of the user, at least in our area. you can still see leaking water troughs in the fields and nobody looking after them. farmers still spread slurry willynilly close to wells etc. it takes a long time to seep into some people's minds that having good water is their right - without doing anything for it!

not much time to blog

more than a month without entries - where have the days gone? I have the intention of putting something up and woosh, the day is over again....

I haven't been lazy, I did finish my christmas -sal and added to my house-sal. I spun and dyed and knitted... but not everything can be shown in photos! just in case people read my blog without me knowing - it's closer to christmas now and presents are "growing" in every corner of the house....

this is the middle of my house-sal, it's so large that I can't show details and all the houses....I still have to add more detail here and there, but with christmas coming closer, I had to pack it away to get going with the more pressing things... I'll grab it  again after the holidays!

4 close-ups, some my own designs, others changed from charts I found in my stash. as you can see the proportions aren't correct, but they aren't in the houses either - unless they make gigantic toys etc.:) I just made sure not to add winter impressions on one side of the town, when there are cherry blossoms on the trees in the churchyard:) my favourite are the three dogs (our three dogs, two of which we lost). one pees on the lantern, one chases a cat - and the last one, which looks a bit odd, is Timmy, our sheep dog....

the next thing I finished, or rather nearly finished, is the christmas -sal from the same designer. I changed a few things, mainly due to the fact that I miscalculated my yarn requirements and had ordered only one skein each. in fact I just made it with the red, only a few cm left. I changed the colour of the writing, and Renate, the designer was kind enough to change the german title into an english carol - thanks for that, Renate! (she also made one for french embroiderers.....what a service!) I added mohair and wool embroidery threads for the coat, beard and angel's wings. and I added beads and put beads instead of thread in for the showflakes... at the bottom I tried a multicolour yarn from OT, which worked rather well, too. all that's missing now are loops for hanging and wadding plus fabric as background and frame.

 the angel in detail - I think the fluffy wings are just about visible. I used the madeira lana yarn again, which can be brushed to show fluffy fur coats - or angel wings:)) the small snowflakes are done with mill hill sead beads, but the few larger ones are silver-lined rocailles - not enough of the white ones ordered...

 same for santa - a mohair beard and the coat is fur lined as well - it's so cold where he lives!

I did some more dyeing, when I saw that the rhamnus berries had ripened, apparently without the birds noticing. I picked as many as I could and dyed on wool, after I left them to "pickle" in vinegar for a few days. the yellow is from another dye...

I also spun up all my purple logwood dyed fibres, so that now I have a heap of them, ready to knit into a shawl - rectangular I think. and I made a few inserts for christmas cards, some ornaments for secret santa exchanges - and started on a knitted pin cushion, another giveaway.  but in this weather and season photos can be difficult to take - it's either grey or wet or windy or dark - or everything together. and in those rare few sunny dry hours we get - there are many other things to take care of! well, maybe in the next entry:))