... when my Advent series of patterns is launched on to the unsuspecting world. It gets harder each year to come up with a new idea that is a) Christmassy, b) can be divided into parts and c) is something I haven't already done.
This year's offering was inspired by Victorian needle boxes where you lifted the lid off to reveal pockets for needles and a thimble in the middle. Mine has something a bit more exciting than a thimble inside.
It took me quite a while to work out how to make a knitted tree stand up on its own (a floppy tree is really not a good look). Eventually, I used an old, thin knitting needle pushed up through the middle - what's the betting I forget I've done that and spend ages looking for that other 2 mm needle one day?
Actually, you could just knit the tree on its base as a decoration on its own; I'm very tempted to knit another one to display separately. Because of course you can never have too many knitted Christmas trees.
For the purposes of this pattern though, the box is actually a house. Here's the front ...
The climbing plant is meant to be a clematis. I found there's a white one that flowers at Christmas called 'Jingle Bells' - you can't say I don't research my knitted flowers thoroughly. I'm particulalry proud of the little snowman and the old fashioned street light on one of the side walls too.
It's hard to design a convincing snowman when he's only about an inch tall, while, at the same time, trying to make him a bit different from all the other snowmen you've designed over the years.
Fancy knitting your own Christmas House this year? The first pattern, for the basic structure, is available here and the rest of the patterns will be published on alternate days during December, starting on Sunday, 1st December. I always have a job deciding how many patterns to divide these big designs into; this year 12 was a better fit than 24. A couple of the patterns are pretty big (including the tree) but they will be published quite early in the month.
As normal, knitters will be chatting about this pattern series on my ravelry group and sharing photos of their progress. Do come and join in - even if you don't have time to knit the house this year, you can admire others' work.
I've been getting things ready for my own advent calendars too. I've got a cross stitch one that my daughter made me and a weaving one that I put together myself. Then there's a little picture one that I bought a couple of years ago and promptly lost. I'm pretty sure I know where it is ...
I don't know if it's got something to do with living on an island (even if it is a big one) but I do feel a strong link to the sea and get fidgety if I haven't seen it for a long time. I suspect I'm not alone in feeling like this; you only have to look at the special place The Shipping Forecast has in our hearts. Viking, North Utsire, South Utsire, Forties, Cromarty, Forth ...' - it sounds like a poem, doesn't it? What with that and 'Sailing By' (which is the music played before the last Shipping Forecast of the day on Radio 4), is it any wonder that, as a nation, we love the sea?
This music takes me back thirty years to the many nights when I listened to it while trying to get my first baby to sleep. You'd think it would have made a good lullaby but it never seemed to work.
Anyway, fast forward a few decades and that baby and I, together with his little sister, have just had a wonderful week's holiday down in Dorset. We used to go there regularly for holidays in autumn half term (when it was cheaper) and decided to go again this year (still in half term as my son is a teacher). I hadn't had a holiday for years so this was very special.
Now the British seaside in the last week of October is never going to be hot ... or dry ... and you can't even count on the cliffs staying where they were last time you looked. Here's the sign that welcomes you to Charmouth beach.
Don't get me wrong, we love Charmouth. The fact that it's rugged and rough appeals to us. You never know what the beach is going to be like from one day to another; it can be sandy, stony or a combination of both, depending on the weather. The walking is great, there are fossils to find and the sea is never boring.
This was the sea on our first night; the waves were crashing a very long way up and, as you can see from the stones, this wasn't even high tide.
This was the view across to Lyme, about half an hour later ...
This sea was as nothing to the one on the day we left, a week later. Gale force winds were blowing throughout the South West and the sea was huge. The beach huts are set back from the sea at Charmouth for obvious reasons and the wind had managed to blow one completely over.
We were lucky in that those two days, at the start and end of our holiday, saw the worst of the weather so we managed to fit in quite a few good walks on the days in between.
You can walk along the beach from Charmouth to Lyme at low tide but, for some reason, we'd never done this before. It's an easy walk and oh, so beautiful.
The beach varied from big stones to pebbles to sand, with lots of rock pools too.
In this part of the world, the stones themselves often hide surprises ...
We thought the group of people we passed as we reached Lyme were admiring an exciting fossil find but no, it turned out to be an old grenade - apparently they turn up quite regularly
We collected lots of lovely sea glass on this walk, it seemed to be everywhere. We found out later in the week that the sea uncovered an old rubbish dump here a while ago so that would probably explain all the glass.
The Tuesday of our week was my birthday and we'd planned a coast walk for that day. Rain was forecast but we decided to go anyway and just turn back if it got too bad. In the event, although the wind got up and it threatened to rain all day, we only had a few showers and the walk was lovely.
You can't say I dont know how to celebrate my birthday in style.
We started at West Bay and followed the coast path through Eype and Seatown and up Golden Cap. A digression here - have you noticed how all those links take you to pictures of sunny beaches and people in light dresses? Needless to say, they're nothing like that in winter. Mind you, the chips at West Bay harbour are the best I've tasted and the countryside is stunning all year round. See that note on the Golden Cap link about Gabriel's Steps being closed? They were a steep flight of muddy steps up the cliff that was part of one of our favourite walks. The last time we tried to do it they'd collapsed and we had to pick our way over huge boulders at low tide to get round to Seatown.
Anyway, back to our walk. It was steep and muddy and cold but we were sustained by chocolate rations and regular stops. We came across this lovely old stone watering place where we stopped for a breather ...
.. and a surpise birthday cake! I thought my daughter was taking a long time rooting some biscuits out of the rucksack and then she produced this ...
One large piece of Dorset apple cake, complete with candelabra and candles. It was too windy to get the candles to light but I pretended to blow them out anyway.
We've re-named that place 'Birthday Cake Well' now. We do that a lot (yes, we are big Arthur Ransome fans); we also stopped at 'Cow Pat Bench' later on this walk.
By the time we got near the top of Golden Cap, the wind was really picking up. You only have to look at the trees to see how rough it can get here.
Those trees look like they're walking up the cliff, don't they? From the top we came back down to the sea at Seatown for a cold picnic by the sea and then took a different (and very muddy) route back to West Bay. We were walking for about five hours all together and the light was just starting to fade by the end of it but it was a wonderful walk.
There was more mud and rain on the Friday when my son and I did the last walk of the holiday (my daughter had to go back home for work on Thursday). We parked on the cliff above Beer and walked along the coast path to Branscombe and back.
That's the view back to Beer which is a beautiful fishing village; there were great views along the coast all the way. Coming in to Branscombe, we had to go down this flight of very steep, very muddy steps ...
We managed these all right but then, at the bottom of them, was a steep slope of slippery mud. It must have taken us ten minutes to make our way very slowly down that particular stretch of the path. Needless to say, we decided to find a route inland back to Beer which was still muddy and steep but not quite so bad.
Beer is a lovely village, with its sheltered harbour and interesting buildings. This row of houses was on the road back up to the car.
I lived in a brick and flint house as a child so I have a particular fondness for them. Here's our old house (in Longstock in Hampshire).
Are you still with me? This is a long post but I've got a few more things I want to share with you from my holiday.
My birthday, for example. There were other excitements, as well as our walk. We started the day with a picnic breakfast on the beach - Jurassic Foot Bread (a date bread), fig rolls and chocolate - plus a cup of tea for me).
I had my presents in the evening - lots of lovely things but I'll just show you one of the more unusual and exciting ones; it's from my daughter.
It's a cross stitch Advent Calendar! There are 24 numbered envelopes and each one has part of the chart in. I stick the chart over the shape on the plan with the matching number and stitch just that part each day. I have no idea what the finished picture is going to be and, as you can see, it only uses one colour. I can't wait to get started on this. I wonder how long it will take me to guess what its going to be. Please don't tell me if you think you know what it might be as I want to work it out for myself. I'll show you how it's going next month.
We had a birthday curry and the candelabra and candles made another appearance, this time fully lit.
I think I look like my Granny in this picture; my children think I just look very small.
I spent quite a bit of money on my holiday, mostly in secondhand bookshops. We went to two of our favourites: Bridport Old Books and Chapter House Books in Sherborne. Funnily enough, both places also have really good bakeries - Leakers in Bridport and Reeve in Sherborne. That seems to me a perfect combination - good books and lovely bread and cakes.
I'll just show you a couple of my purchases; firstly a nice old knitting book (obviously) ...
This is an Odhams book but in a bigger format than normal (and yes, I think that's interesting). I also got some more Puffin Picture Books to add to my growing collection, and this was one of several new / old music books I found.
In a secondhand bookshop in Honiton - Graham York Rare Books they sell paper ephemera as well as books and I got these lovely old cards.
As you can see, these are children's birthday cards but I got some others too.
I can't decide whether to frame them, scan them to use the images in craft projects or actually use them as cards. I'll probably do a bit of everything.
There was a bit of knitting related shopping too. I got some new yarn ...
... and lots of lovely old knitting patterns.
We visited a small art gallery in Beer (Marine House at Beer) where we discovered the work of a new (to us) artist, Adrian Sykes. I was very taken by his paintings which are full of colour and stories. I bought the catalogue of his 2018 exhibition which has pictures of more than twenty of his works.
You can open it at any page and find a treasure.
This is one of my favourites; it's called 'Where the Mountains meet the Sea' and, if you look closely, you can see that the people are playing violins.
Finally, on our journey home, I got two nice pieces of china, both in Crewkerne. This little fruit bowl was in a charity shop; I love this sort of old-fashioned country cottage pattern.
And then, in an antiques shop, I found this beautiful little trio by Beswick.
Perhaps best known for their china animals and Beatrix Potter figures, this was part of a 1950s tea service called 'Dancing Days'. It is even prettier in real life; The pink is a very delicate shade and the saucer and plate have lovely, wavy edges. I'm using this set a lot at the moment.
Speaking of which, it's time for me to stop talking and go and put the kettle on. I hope you've enjoyed this little diary of my holiday. I'm off again next week, this time to stay with a friend in Cornwall so I'm keeping my fingers crossed for kind weather again.
In a follow up to my last post, I've finished the Granny shawl I showed you.
Shawl for Faye is the result of a request from a crocheter who saw my Great Granny blanket pattern and asked how to make a triangular shawl in the same way. It just so happened that she caught me when I was missing having the blanket to work on so I said yes. I never normally design to order so this was a first.
When I looked into it, I found that there were lots of variations on working a simple Granny triangle so I played about until I had a version that was as simple to work as possible. I wanted to avoid any of those 'work into the top of the starting chain' instructions as they're always a pain. So, in my pattern, you only ever work stitches into the top of other stitches or into chain spaces - nice and easy.
I used eight shades of red, pink and brown for my shawl, plus a contrast colour to tie them all together. I used this contrast after a certain number of colours, much in the same way as I had for the blanket. The yarn is Stylecraft Special DK; I use this yarn such a lot. It's cheap, good quality and comes in a big range of colours. As I have colour pegs of all of them, choosing colours for a new project is easy.
I always think that the top edge of a crochet Granny triangle can look a bit unfinished so I added the border and edging to all three sides of my shawl. This is basically the same pattern as that on the blanket, although I had to adjust it a bit to allow for the different tension along the top edge.
I enjoyed making this shawl just as much as I did the blanket. It gave me the same necessary colour fix and, as a bonus, it was much, much quicker. I hope some of you (and especially, Faye) give this one a go and enjoy it as much as I did.
Whenever I finish working on a big design, I always feel the need to start new things. It doesn't matter how many projects I've got on the go, it's as if getting something done frees up space in my brain for new ideas. This last week I finally got all the proofreading done on this year's Christmas series and I also finished my crochet Granny Square blanket. That's two big things out of the way at once so, obviously, I've been bombarded with new ideas and I thought you might like to see a few of them.
You can see where the idea for this one came from. Having just finished a giant Granny square blanket, I still hadn't had enough of this simple technique. A crocheter actually sent me a request for a pattern for a simple Granny triangle shawl and although I don't normally design to order, this happened to coincide with my need to keep crocheting groups of trebles. At least this one should be a lot quicker to make.
I've got another crochet shawl on the go at the moment but it's evolving into a strange shape ...
This sort of thing happens a lot when you make it up as go along; you just have to work with it. I suspect that curved top edge will resolve itself into a design feature - a rolled collar perhaps?
Here's another shawl that I'm letting do its own thing, this time a knitted one.
I was prompted to start this one by a technique I worked out for one of my little Christmas patterns. And no, I'm not going to tell you what that pattern is! Anyway, I think I could also use the same technique as the basis for a picture frame but I'm resisting starting that one for the time being.
The shawl is twisting round nicely at the moment; it remains to be seen whether it will behave itself so well when I get to the other side. I'm going to call this one 'Whirligig' (or possibly 'Whirlygig'). Isn't the yarn lovely? It's Stylecraft Cabaret and it's a beautifully soft yarn with a bit of added sparkle. A few years ago, I made my Lucky Shawl with autumnal shades of this yarn and was glad to discover that it's still around.
Lucky Shawl
For the past few days I've been knitting lots of little samples for this scarf, trying to find the right yarn for one of the colours.
I'm using an exciting double-sided brioche technique which calls for double pointed needles. The stitch pattern is the same on the other side but the colours are reversed. The first problem I had was finding long enough needles in the size I wanted. Mine were just that bit too short and I kept pushing the stitches off the end. I resolved this problem by the simple expedient of going up a needle size - I had longer 4 mm double pointed needles for some reason.
Then there was the yarn. I started off with the variegated one which is a ball of Sirdar Jewelspun, a new aran weight yarn that caught my eye in a wool shop recently.
I chose this rich autumnal colourway (shade 843) and then looked for a plain yarn to contrast with it. I tried cream, I tried navy blue, I tried grey, I tried black, I tried gold ... you get the idea. Eventually, I came upon this purple, soft yarn in Wilkinsons of all places.
According to the ball band, it should be quite a lot thicker than the variegated one but they're both quite softly spun and seem to go together well. I did the 'twist the yarns together and run your fingers over it' test and they passed. To do this, make a loop in one yarn, pass the other one through it so you have two, linked loops. Then twist them both and run your fingers across the join. If it's smooth, then they'll work to a similar tension. This would be easier to explain with a picture, hang on a minute ...
Anyway, back to the scarf. I found the technique in the excellent Knitting Brioche by Nancy Marchant. This book is a wonderful resource, full of detailed stitch patterns and some lovely patterns to use them with too. I've used a very basic brioche stitch for my scarf but there are lots more. I see she's published further books using this fascinating technique; I must look out for them.
As normal, I've got several blanket patterns on the go, two of which I'm keen to get back to now. The first one is going to be called 'Freckles' and I'm knitting the squares for it in one of my favourite stitches - fabric stitch. This produces a knitted fabric that looks almost woven..
Then there's this complex crochet blanket which I'm absolutely itching to get to work on again ...
There are lots more geometric shapes waiting to be sewn together for my starry table runner too ...
Not that this project has been neglected lately but, when I tipped out the bowl of triangles to take this photo, a spider scuttle out too. I really must get on and sew them together.
The last of my new ideas is these little knitted pyramids.
At the moment I'm just knitting them in random colours and playing with them but I have plans to turn them into an actual something.
I hope you've enjoyed this rather random look at what I'm thinking and planning at the moment. I've just started the fifteenth folder of my designs - I'm going to need a new shelf soon at this rate.
