College

I mentioned in my previous post that I had started back at college as a mature student. I decided to enrol at Leek college as it's the closest to home and also I really like Leek as a town, it's full of old buildings and is all wonky/higgledy-piggledy. By some miracle it retains many of its original cobbled street surfaces - I love cobbled streets a lot. It's always a source of enjoyment just visiting Leek and now I'm at college there I get to explore even more!

As my class is so small we occupy smaller classrooms in the old building (part of the Nicholson Institute). I was quietly delighted on my first day inside this new (to me) space, it's full of architectural interest. Sadly somebody at some point has decided the glazed/unglazed interior brickwork ought to be painted over with thick stippled masonry paint, presumably to 'brighten up' the corridors. Madness.

This clock! The surround! I bet a horologist would love to get their hands on this clock, give it a going-over, a service and a clean. It's the nicest clock I've seen in ages. On the clock face it says "I mark time. Dost thou?". I surreptitiously snapped some photos on my phone during a tea break.

I think I'll lug my proper camera in next week or at some point anyway. Honestly, this building is fantastic, it's such an inspiring place to be learning in.
Here are some photos of the rear of the building. It's a very solid, imposing structure from behind, classic Victorian really, reminds me of the viaduct* near to my parents' house.

The 'sticking out' section is a window seat if I remember correctly, that said, I think there's another on the other side, higher up. 

 I believe the large glazed room on the ground floor is the art studio. The space right at the top is the Nicholson Gallery and in the middle is the public library. I've never been into the library so I'll add that onto my list of Nicholson Exploration.

A scholar? (Looks like he/she's wearing a mortarboard). The mason's child? Who knows, what a lovely little face though.

A couple of lovely display cases as you enter the building, I believe Leek was a textile town much like Macc and Congleton were. There are lots of embroidery examples in the gallery upstairs and here we can see spinning... I need to do some Leek history research really.

Cast iron radiators!!!!!!! Lovely to sit on, I used to like it at school when they'd been glossed, they used to smell incredible.

*The viaduct impressed and scared me in equal measure as a child. I'm not sure if it was the sheer size of it, the thought of men up so high laying the bricks, that coupled with the melancholy feeling I always got down there at the edge of the woods with the damp smell of the brook running under the viaduct and alongside the field/wood edge. It certainly made an impression.

Autumn

Well, it's been a lovely year so far and wow, what a fantastic summer! I love summer best of all, although each season has its own charms. We have a tree in our garden which is always the first to drop its leaves come September, and in the spring it is always the last to sprout them! The garden is currently sprinkled with leaves from this tree, it looks like yellow confetti or little petals; I like how the wind gathers them into piles and spreads them about the place. They float past my studio window, looking a bit like snowflakes and they make me smile.

I made 3 hats when it was very hot, all the same pattern (Beloved Aran), all using variegated yarns. The one above is Oliver's, brown of course. I made it using Kate Selene yarns held tripled.
Below is the wrong side of my Granny's Paperweight crochet blanket, a delightful pattern that I'm making for fun, for me really but I'll share with the family of course! Oliver wasn't too keen on it when I showed him my progress, he had requested a blanket and so I've started working on a brown version (larger gauge).

Lots of knitting plans flying around. One certainty is that I am knitting a dressing gown (pictured below), it's from a book called Romantic Style and has a fair few projects on Ravelry.
I know that I will be shortening it, I don't want it trailing behind me, it'll still be full-length though. The dressing gown is knit using Rowan's Kid Classic yarn, rather a lot of Kid Classic. Luckily I impulse-bought a LOT of Kid Classic last year from a Raveller who had a worsening mohair allergy. She was selling it all off very cheap (£3 per ball) and so I ended up with 20 balls of the colour 'Dashing' which is a lovely oatmeal shade.

Non-knitting-wise it's all change here, both my little boys are now at school and I have decided that it is time for me to do the same. I started my lessons at college last week, doing an Access course in preparation for my return to university (hopefully) next year.The college is lovely, old and very, very interesting. I'll take some photos this week!

Here are the RAF parachute team, we saw them at a family fair a couple of weekends ago! I think I enjoyed their bit the most, it was very exciting to watch although I don't fancy having a go at that EVER.

Wool @ J13

I was in two minds about booking tickets for Wool@J13. I've never been to a yarn festival before but I've seen footage of many and they always look too busy for me. I'm the kind of person who will go to the supermarket in the evening and who has driven to the supermarket on a Saturday really needing an item but turned around in the car park because it's packed with cars.
Anyway, last night I made up my mind that I'd give it a miss this year because of my yarn budget. Woke up this morning and decided to go after James asked whether we were going to the wool festival. I am so glad we went!

It was very easy to find once off the M6 and heading towards Wolverhampton. We parked up and although the show ground was nearby there was a tractor/trailer ride to take us there (the boys' eyes were on stalks!), it was very fun to have a little ride up and excellent for spotting knitwear. I saw a beautiful mitred square cardigan and so many lovely outfits. The queue moved quickly and we were soon into the grounds! I had one stall I really wanted to visit (the knackered psycho) as she was selling Lollipop Guild Yarn. I bought a copy of The Knackered Psycho's shawl book too, I can dream of one day being able to crochet a shawl...
The selection of exhibitors was really impressive, I think there really was something for everyone. If I remember I'll write a second post to share some of my favourites tomorrow. The food area was fab, wood fired pizza, fresh samosas, a vegan van, also lots of drink options including a fully stocked bar or 'Baaaaa' as its sign stated (had to explain  few sheep-based jokes to James!).

If you turn right and walk that way (after the entrance but before the food area) you will come to THE BEST playground... It was so good it gave me happy pangs of nostalgia, lots of recycled items, creatively put together. They had an old fire engine the children could get inside and play with, reminded me of the pub up the road from my mum & dad's which had old vehicles in the beer garden... It was lovely and hot, there were farmland birds singing their hearts out, I had a bag full of yarn dyed by dyers new to me. There are also animals just next to the park, lambs, alpaca, pigs, all sorts. Oliver loved the 'baby lambs' and watching a sheep be shorn (sheared?).

Also! My stripey dress was a definite success. It proved to be cool/warm simultaneously, I'm very glad I didn't put sleeves on it in the end. Yarn was bought with a plan to knit another! People were so kind about my dress, so friendly and lovely.

All in all, it was a woolly joy, a festival with a festival feel to it and a really good vibe. Wellies recommended if it's rainy, otherwise flats. I wore chunky heels and got sore feet. The price of vanity.

Mrs Darcy

I had a fit of nostalgia recently and had to cast on the Mra Darcy cardigan pattern (a popular pattern from way back when - 2008!). I used my Scheepjes Stone Washed yarn held double and added a strand of HHF Merino Lace 1200m in a discontinued colourway (Granny). I'd been feeling the need to use this yarn up, but also to do it justice because Granny is a favourite colourway of mine and I'd sold my second hank of it last year (I got seller's remorse badly!!). I only had a small aount left and striped in a strand of HHF Blue Faced Lace (Whisper - a pale pink/beige mix). HHF means Hedgehog Fibres if anyone doesn't know :-)
The Merino Lace is funny stuff, it's lovely, takes the dye really well and of course, it's super-soft. It doesn't bloom much when washed and blocked though, it's not got much fuzz and that puts me off knitting with it for lace projects. The Blue Faced Lace on the other hand, it's grabby, soft and fuzzy, takes the dye in a beautifully subtle way too. I'd not hesitate to use it for any lace pattern.
The Merino Lace works best for me if held alongside a neutral thicker yarn, it gives such a subtle variegated effect.

Lovely flecks of colour from the lace-weight yarn. The Scheepjes Stone Washed was absolutely lovely to work with, really squeaky and super soft.

Finished it very quickly! I was delighted not to have any of the problems I had had with my original attempts at knitting this design back in 2008. I'd only recommend the original pattern (not the re-written one) to experienced knitters, I had to make judgements whilst knitting and slight changes to make it fit.

Equal Night

Wow, I knit this one up so quickly! The yarn is from my Xania dress, it's by Pickles (it was a bit of a splurge at the time) and it was making me feel very guilty sat there half unravelled in my basket. I made myself finish unravelling it and then started to mull over what to do with the yarn, sell it on or figure out something different to make with it.

Anyway, I decided on Equal Night, a blanket pattern by Soft Sweater (Sylvia McFadden). I'd seen this on the Coffee & Craft podcast and really liked it but thought I'd not be able to make it as it uses super-bulky yarn and 15 mm needles and really I can't be buying more yarn/needles at the moment. I decided I wouldn't mind a smaller-sized blanket though and cracked on with the yarn and needles I already had available. Glad I did!
It was such a quick and simple knit. I took 3 of my unravelled balls of yarn with me to Rich's parents' house when we visited and managed to finish all 3. There was an odd morning when I had no knitting left to do, I'd put heels in all 4 of James's socks and finished my blanket wool. I was feeling a bit lost (with no knitting - sad but true) and a little poorly. Went for a walk with the boys and Rich's mum Jane and Jazz the Collie dog - that was fun.
Picked up the blanket again in the evening when we had got home and some washing was in the machine and I'd settled back in. The edging is fun, it's knit-on and you're casting off as you knit your way around. Took me an evening as I kept putting it down to admire it and enjoy the curve which was emerging (it had been so bunched up on my needles it looked like a big sack!).

Folded in two, a nice semi-circle, thick and warm.

Super-drapey! I like wearing it this way best. Cropped my head off as I looked like I'd got a crick in my neck.

What am I looking for?

Still haven't found it... Ah well.

Lake District

The steam trains were running on our first weekend there, here's James in the corridor of the train enjoying the steam coming through the window.

As always I came home with a large collection of pebbles, river pottery and crystals! The crystals are from Mungrisdale, a magical place to walk about, very quiet, breathtakingly beautiful and peaceful.

It was the most wonderful time of year to go (February) I've never been during the low season before, OK, it was bitterly cold (we got lucky and made it home before the unusually snowy weather hit). Brilliant though. I did miss Threlkeld Mining Museum (we always go), but it was closed. Next year!

Stripey Dress

I haven't enjoyed a project this much in AGES. This was so much fun from start to finish, even weaving all the ends in- did that in stages of course, I never leave all the ends to weave in TILL the end of a project like this, it's just asking for trouble really isn't it?

So, I've said this before but the project was inspired by one knit by Kristy Glass, she's the vlogger who does the 'Tell me about your Rhinebeck sweater' videos and LOADS of other videos/interviews. She did an interview with Chantal Belisle recently, I loved it, Chantal was hilarious, I loved how she happily swore with abandon (you rarely hear any swearing on any podcasts) she really is a character.
Anyway, Kristy Glass made this dress and it became one of those projects which preoccupies my mind, I really wanted to make one.

I took some pictures inside as it was so cold. Added a sunhat as it seemed to tie-in with the fact that this is a summer dress!

The yarns are a mixture, some are Aran-weight, some DK, some Sock/4-ply. To mix the weights I held yarns doubled a lot of the time. The white yarn is West Yorkshire Spinners DK (Ecru), I cast on and cast off with this white and striped it throughout the dress to pull it all together. Other than that I went for a colour palette of blues, pinks and lilac. Most yarns were Life in the Long Grass, an old favourite of mine.
Sometimes I would add in a colour and then think it looked awful and then I'd have to spend ages mulling over whether I should rip it back or not. I found that it all went together quite well in the end though! It's a lovely light dress, perfect for the warmer months and very different to my usual dresses which are generally for the cooler months. I was thinking about the UK and our weather the other day, trying to figure out a rough percentage of cool months/warm months. I bet there are charts somewhere which illustrate this actually.

Anyway, it was the perfect car knitting project for our short holiday in the Lake District, much better than the socks I took one year. Long rounds of fairly mindless knitting + lots of colours = happy me!

Carbeth + Instagram

Couldn't resist this pattern. I had just the right sort of yarn in my stash, the use of which I had changed my mind about and so I wasn't sure what to do with it. Then Kate released her Carbeth jumper pattern! The yarn (Berocco Blackstone Tweed) is very similar to Buachaille (Kate's yarn), same metreage, same feel, same thickness. I had just the right amount too so it had to be cast on immediately.

I have since given this jumper to my sister Sam. I'm not convinced that I like oversized jumpers just yet. Sam proved to be a very worthy recipient though, she had admired the jumper on my (deleted) Instagram account and it fits her very well.
Speaking of Instagram, I deleted my account maybe a week ago. I'm not sure. I regret my decision because I discovered Kate Selene yarns only the other day and Instagram is one of the best places to share stuff like that with like-minded people. Honestly, I hate being so impulsive sometimes.
I was on it far too much so instead of limiting it like a sensible person, I deleted it. I've downloaded the app again and will be back on there at some point. I'm not finding it easy to sign back up what with wi-fi and network issues. I suppose that gives me time to think of a username though.
Edited to add that I chose the very original username of Birdsongknits_again... Ha!

Xania Dress

One night I was lying in bed and couldn't drop off to sleep, kept thinking about yarn and knitting, so I got my phone out and started browsing patterns on Ravelry (not a sleep-aid I know). Ended up on the Pickles pattern page and from there to their website where I found the Xania dress! (now on Ravelry by the way).
Xania turned out to be another of those projects which I really wanted to knit straight away, a lovely combination of mohair and merino yarns in the lovely Pickles colourways. I chose the dusky red/pink of the original and was DELIGHTED when my yarn arrived, the plump Merino or whatever it's called (can't remember) is the softest, squishiest stuff - absolutely scrumptious yarn.
So I cast it on, learnt how to do fisherman's rib stitch and knit the dress up over the Christmas holidays. Here it is!

There were a few things I wasn't 100% happy with. The first was the weight of the dress, I found it pretty heavy to wear. The second was the very visible increases at the yoke, I wasn't too keen on that section visually. The third was that after wearing it for a few hours, it sort of morphed into a big shapeless sack on me. It's a shame as I really loved it in the Pickles photos. I definitely made it too long, it would probably be more flattering as a mini-dress. Lessons learnt there, I was very determined to use all of the yarn up but, well that was silly as I ended up with a dress which was too long.

Looking miserable as sin. Miserable/angry! Honestly, I always say this but I find it so difficult to model my knits... I could crop my head out of the photos but I think it looks a bit weird, a headless photo.

But hey ho, Xania is out of my system now! I've unravelled it (this bit was fun) and plan on knitting the yarn up into a big soft sofa blanket, probably following Sylvia McFadden's new pattern, Equal Night. I saw the smaple for Equal Night on the Coffee and Craft podcast on YouTube - it looks gorgeous.