Water Mark

Long time, no blogging... Doesn't mean no knitting has happened; I've been knocking up samples for the Cottenham course the week after next, and writing notes... But enough of that; I'll do a post on that next, along with yesterday's return trip to Stash. But first, as Mary deB has gone home and used to specialise in these, a pretty picture of the river in Cambridge from last weekend, when Sue and Stewart and I went and saw some beautiful metalwork and pottery at Cambridge Open Studios.


The main FO last week (I finished a sock, but may as well finish the second one before posting the picture) is a bag made of this stuff: gorgeous Fiesta Water Mark, a present from an American friend. 60% mohair and 40% wool...


The pattern has really cool mitred corners and finishes with a three-needle bind-off on the base.

This yarn felts so thoroughly that I had to sit with a scalpel for half an hour and tease the inside layers apart, because pulling with hands wasn't adequate! It started off about 21" long and 17" wide, and ended up the size of a large one-volume French dictionary. I imagine it will felt progressively when I wash it, but at the moment I like how it looks after one wash, and it's sturdy enough that it stands up on its own...

In other news my feet are on Anne's blog! (I'm the one in the red socks...) This sock pattern is really very nice; and although there's grafting involved, it isn't where you'd think on the toe of the socks, but under the toe part... Anyway, it's a great pattern, proof-knitted by Katie and me; and available free as a PDF from Anne's blog...

L'invitation au Voyage

Gill and I both liked the idea of the Baudelaire Socks in this time's Knitty, and are hoping to start knitting them on August 7th. Anyone with us?

In other footwear news, did the second set of felting on the felt slippers I made with yarn from Stash - and they're looking good. Apart from the heels; which I can't see in wear, but are still annoying me; need to work out how to make them look less crude...
The pattern is from Knit One, Felt Too, adapted because I didn't want to use three solid colours. First time using Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride worsted and I can see why all those people across the pond like it for felting. The variegated yarn is Colinette Graffiti. Felted them once at 60 degrees C, and they shrank alarmingly in length, but not in width, which meant they felt like small rowing boats. Then today felted them again at 50 and they've lost a little more in length but a surprising amount in width.

I am currently wearing them until they dry; the only residual problem is that they're a bit high up on my ankles. They'll cut down though because they're very well-felted - I'll do that before I wash them "normally" (I'm assuming that I'll be able to machine-wash them at my usual 30 or so in wear, to clean them and tighten them up somewhat...) I have various bright ideas on how to correct all this stuff now; need to go back to Stash for some more Brown Sheep...

Fair and Flowers

I'm attempting to subvert Blogger's desire not to let me add any photos to these posts by making multiple posts... Let's see if that works. Main reason why I haven't been blogging as often... Yay. It worked.

Last Wednesday night, friends Pete and Helen arrived (armed, unexpectedly, with a large tin of duck confit and some Maille mustard in the glasses I collect) and we drove out for a walk on the Devil's Dyke; it was lovely. It'd been hot, humid and generally unbearable all day, but it had cooled down by then, and Pete had seen lizard orchids near there the previous year. Most of them had already gone over, but there were some still around. Fantastic things: here's the general view:



and in knitterly fashion, here's the detail.

While we were looking for flora, we also found fauna. Or at least, the caterpillar of Saturnia Pavonia, or the Emperor Moth... Who says we don't get exotic species in the UK...

An additional interesting factor has been the Fair. View from bedroom window...

I am not one of those people who chooses to live by a village green and then complains endlessly about the stuff which happens on it. I am enthralled by most of the very loud post-midnight conversations/boy-girl arguments; I am continually reassured by the fact that at any time during daylight hours there will be someone moving about outside the window. I'm also very grateful that my front garden is composed of beautiful lime trees, grass and squirrels, none of which are maintained by me... Over 12 years, I've also been intrigued by the Fair because all of a sudden there are 50-60 people sleeping silently in a space which is usually completely empty.

My only, only request - and it's a modest one given the major decibels a few feet from the windows, is that they get a tape next year which is longer than 30 minutes before it all starts again. I know it does this because on the first evening there was a bad cover version of the BeeGees' Tragedy which played 8 times, followed by Kylie. Also on the second evening. This evening, I fled the village for the climes of Littleport; good company, nice chicken and Battlestar Galactica.

Diamond Fantasy Shawl #2

... is finished and blocked. I've been very loosely following the KAL at Sivia Harding's Yahoo group although I've not been a good contributor... I've wittered about the yarn choice, and guilt, before but this Kaalund Expressions mohair, blocked, is the most beautiful thing; it's almost not there - I have a 2.10m (76") by 1m (39") shawl which weighs just less than 100g... Feels like a completely different shawl to the previous scarf-size version I knitted last year in Wildefoote sock yarn, which I also love... Here it is blocking - 'severely' as per instructions; which is actually pretty easy because the I-cord cast-off Sivia specifies makes the top edge incredibly stable and you know exactly how far it'll go...

Here's the lace detail shot - it's lovely lace to work because there are no complicated stitches to work at all. The only temptation is to put in extra yarn-overs in either side of central stitches; but you can get away with dropping those discreetly once you've realised what you've done, and they come out in the blocking...

As I was heading back into the house, having taken the obligatory 'draped-over-a-bush' shot for the Photos section of the Yahoo files (if I get brave on Tuesday night and the weather's OK, I'll persuade someone to take a pic of me actually wearing the thing at the Cambridge KTog - it's really that nice...) I spotted the Tranquil Face, which is currently bereft of plants, and thought 'why not'...

Otherwise, it's all been a bit weird. Matilda (aka Tild, aka Pig, aka Unwonted-Attention-to-Visitors-up-to-and-including-Trouser-Ruination-Cat) had a fairly major operation on Monday (Medically: middle ear and bulla removal, half her head shaved, uncounted numbers of stitches, polyp sent off to the lab. Financially: think of the French Lieutenant's Woman's cloak. Now think of it knitted in Koigu. Yes.) so I have the Continuing Fun of Antibiotics followed by the frisson of keeping her indoors while allowing the other (pedigree-but-feral) cat some sort of a life. It's not working, folks. But hey. The litter tray has turned into some kind of conquest zone - although small cat doesn't have to use it, she does it to mark territory, and then we're off to the races...

Stash #2

Another of the amazing things about last Tuesday was being handed three large plastic bags containing these

... the original blocks from this book. E-J has blogged this much more successfully than I will (although she sells her own blocks short!) I've been getting ready for a family visit this weekend, but am hoping to lay them out somewhere this weekend and get a look at all of them (and, of course, take pictures!). We had them out on the pub table for much of the evening (although in the photo below most had been put away and Frances (on the back at the right) is looking at the last ones. Also pictured are Kate, Bekki and Rosie - E-J and Jackie were talking to the barman about scarves at the time...

Bekki's finishing of her top-down sweater was incredibly cool - have to investigate that! She just worked down the sleeve, cast off the cuff, sewed in an end et voilà... However, I found out last night that the knitting course I'm teaching at Cottenham in August is going ahead - so I'll be spending the next month knitting and hunting down samples and making class notes. It's a three-day class, so quite a major undertaking...

Stash #1

Very knitty day today, after a somewhat shaky start. This was Not The Day to attempt to go to London from Waterbeach. The train terminated unexpectedly at Cambridge and decanted us onto the platform with 1.5 minutes to get from platform 4 to platform 3 for the 9:15 (which was only going as far as Finsbury Park due to this). On your average station, this would be next door. On Cambridge station, where platform 1 runs into platform 4, and platform 3 is down past two branches of AMT coffee, one branch of Smiths, the entrance hall, the loos, sundry offices and several dozen people waiting for the Stansted Express with, seemingly, 200 suitcases each, you have to be moving at a fair clip to make it. I did - just. The halt, the slightly older, and those accompanied by small children, luggage etc. were trampled underfoot... The 9:15 pulled into Finsbury Park at 11:05, ten minutes before I was due in East Putney. Somehow I didn't think I was going to make it on time...

Thankfully Jan had her knitting and iPod on hand so was gainfully employed when I staggered cursing into the daylight...

We then went to Stash. Which is a wonderful place. Their blog has more pictures, and links to still others... They were fantastically hospitable and let us lounge around knitting, staring, cooing and fondling stuff in the shop for an hour and a half, and even gave us yarn to play with... Here's the damage:

One Lamb's Pride Worsted - I've heard so much about this yarn and its felting properties - and one Colinette Graffiti. Despite appearances these two are both meant to knit at the same gauge and I'm hoping they'll become a pair of knitted slippers. One Koigu; just because. A Susan Bates knitting gauge/measure/swatching tool, because it's pretty and cheap and lovely. A pack of Bryspun stitch markers because I haven't seen the simple ones that small before...

I was relatively restrained because a) Nathalie assured us they weren't going anywhere b) I'm still gobsmacked by a an incredibly generous delivery of gift yarn I received last week, which I'll blog next and c) I was unable to forget the huge vet's bill I paid last Wednesday at the critical moment! But if I won the lottery I'd open a yarn shop, and the stock would overlap more-or-less-precisely with what Stash stock at the moment...

As I can't upload more than one photo to a post tonight, I'll stop there; rest of the day to follow...

Lacy

It's been a scorcher of a weekend, and humid, undermining my Great Plans to have a tidy house and some design work by the end of the weekend. I did get one item finished and blocked though, a scarf:

This is some Blackberry Ridge wool and silk laceweight which is really beautiful to knit with - feels more like a cotton blend - came from Wisconsin and took less than four days to get here! It was the natural cream colour until it came into contact with some grape and strawberry Kool-Aid. There was still too much variegation in it, when I came to knitting it up, so I gave it another bath of grape Kool-Aid once I'd finished the knitting. I'm still astounded you're meant to drink this stuff... The pattern is the Trellis-Framed Leaf pattern from the first Barbara Walker treasury which is a nice one to memorise but not too boring in the knitting of it.

I also re-started the Diamond Fantasy Shawl for the KAL at Sivia Harding's Yahoo group - this will be the third yarn choice, but I think I've found a winner in the Kaalund mohair in Tropical Berries I got for Christmas. Here's the beginning of it:

Purple lace, what a surprise...

The timing of the third attempt isn't coincidental - yesterday morning, a sheep arrived. (No, not that sheep, actually a Folkmanis lamb puppet). I won him in the draw attached to the KAL, which was both exciting and mortifying - exciting because I don't win things in prize draws, and mortifying because I still had the previous unsuccessful swatch on the needles... Anyway, here's the lamb - Blogger won't let me upload the image for some reason... He looks a stubborn little chap (I'm calling him Stackhouse), and has made a home for himself on the flyer of my spinning wheel. Thanks very much to Melissa, who donated him. And, to even things up slightly on the scales of cosmic postal justice, he arrived from the US in five days despite the package being clearly marked SURFACE. It's good to know it happens the other way round occasionally...

Mamluke #1

Enough said, really; I love this sock...

A good couple of days

Suzanne (mum to Lorna of the rainbow cardigan among many other things) came over for dinner last night and it was lovely. Then went over to E-J's at Ely today - we had lunch at the Lamb and then sat in her garden. In deference to photo-phobia, here's a picture of E-J's hands and her crochet...


On the way there, finished the Jaywalkers

and started making the Mamluke Socks from Folk Socks, using the Lorna's Laces Rainbow from Leah, and some black Cygnet. I think they're looking good so far...

According to the directions you need a 245yd skein of each yarn - I have 215yds of the Rainbow so I reckon that'll work - if not I'll do plain toes. Was going to spend a long time thinking of something suitably Washington-like to do with them - and then was flicking through this book again this morning, and fell for the pattern all over again. It was only the 3rd time I looked through the directions that I realised the original sock is from the collection of the Textile Museum in DC so it's just about perfect.

Three found objects, two woolly gifts, one finished thing...

And a partridge in a pear tree. Actually; a dead blackbird on the patio, which lacks poetry.

But otherwise it's been a lucky couple of days here... Sorry, blackbird.

First, Lorna's cardigan - I found these translucent buttons after a bit of a hunt - in my jewellery box. Of course. Where else. Why would I have a nice big button tin and actually put buttons I buy in there? I think these came from La Droguerie several years ago (before the advent of the current button tin) and were presumably lost before their intended sweater came into being... or I just bought them because they looked like sweeties.

Anyway, they turned up, and they're sewn on, and I just have to wrap the cardigan and get it into the post tomorrow with a suitable card...

The second found object(s) - these gorgeous stitch markers I bought from Lixie on eBay last autumn, and then promptly lost before I could decide whether to give them to someone for Christmas or whether to keep them. Decision made, I think. Ahem; and yay.


And then today, I got two presents! First one comes from Leah, who went across the Atlantic to to her brother's wedding in Georgetown on Saturday, visited StitchDC and brought back Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock, colour (yes!) Rainbow.

The circularity of this pleases me so much - I make Lorna a rainbow cardigan; Leah gives me Lorna's Laces rainbow... Somebody needs to do something rainbowy and Lorna-related for Leah now... She also brought back some wonderful tape-type-braid-type felty Noro for herself which I can't currently trace on the Web... I'll ask her for the details tomorrow because it's extremely pretty... So I need to find a toning plain coloured yarn for this; and make suitably Washingtonian socks...

All I had to give in return was a Republicans for Voldemort bumper sticker, the third Found Object from the weekend. One of these days I'll actually tidy up properly, and if this streak continues, will find the Missing Link, the Grand Unified Theory, the Ark of the Covenant and a palatable recipe for okra (although I'm not holding out for the last one).

And the second woolly gift: 300g of fine wool yarn from Zeena, who comes along to my Wednesday night class at Fulbourn. It's crewel wool, but not pre-cut, so it's in lovely skeins. Not wildly visually exciting yet (unless beige-intestines-in-a-bag is your thing, in which case I really don't want to know; Blogger evidently agrees with me as three attempts to upload a photo have proved futile) but it'll dye and felt beautifully and there are hundreds and hundreds of metres of it...

Holiday weekend

And it's actually feeling like that... Yesterday was alternately vile and steamingly summery. Today was almost entirely sunny and warm; I was able to hack down a recycling-bin full of clippings and weeds and can now see halfway down the garden; and barbecued and ate outside for the first time this year.

To celebrate this, an outdoor knitting photo:

This is Lorna's birthday cardigan. Lorna isn't quite 5 yet (but will be next Friday, so I need to get a move on), and her parents are way too busy to be reading this. I'm using basic measurements from the Tadpoles and Tiddlers book and the Soft Chevrons stitch from Jan's ripple stitch book. The yarn is a mixture of Sirdar Rio, a gift/leftover from Jan, which makes up the rainbow stripes, and Wendy cotton DK in a mixed blue/navy, bought at a very good ex-LYS during their closing down sale a few years ago, for the main thing. All from stash (hoorah!). I need to check on buttons - I'm fancying the idea of odd ones in the right colours at the moment - I'll get the box out tomorrow.

At Cambridge Ktog yesterday Avril had various crochet hooks and miscellaneous knitting impedimenta on offer against donations to Rosie in Stitches. Including this

which was too intriguing to leave. I also picked up a set of DPNs in fake tortoiseshell (one of those "look; a shiny thing!" moments... )

Also discovered this week (along with the fact that running a multimillion-dollary company is exactly like running a lemonade stand; allegedly; and that I no longer have any patio chairs, having left them out in the rain all winter to the extent that all the wooden slats have perished) that Sew Creative in King Street have started stocking Brittany needles. I'm reasonably good at convincing myself I have Too Much Yarn (not least because it's true). Beautiful needles with deco ends, not so much. Need to keep out of there even more on my weekly trip in to town at lunchtime...

Off topic

In London yesterday, for a Show of Hands gig at The Spitz with Kate, my newest relative (by marriage; I wasn't taking a newborn out for the night...). Last time I went to Spitalfields Market, a friend was working at the homeless shelter in the Crypt of Christchurch, and the landing window of his flat looked straight out onto the market. This was in 1989-90, just before the old fruit-and-veg market shut down, and it's certainly different... Took us a little while to find it, but eventually we did, and it's a nice venue, up in the rafters of the market; almost feels like a chapel, which fits SoH's style very well. As ever the guys plus Miranda were excellent; heard one bod whingeing on the way out about the lack of old stalwarts like Longdog and The Galway Farmer, but with new material as good as the Witness CD, why would you care...

This is the only usable photo I took of the day, and the gig; and I've included it because it's weirdish. I'm hazarding a guess that those are Phil's hands, because of where we were standing...


Before the gig, met up with Jan (who has blogged the exhibition we went to; and the cover of the rather lovely catalogue we got included in the exhibition price) and she gave me a copy of her ripple stitches book which is beautiful. I think I also, in the whole Venice/birthday Thing at the end of April, forgot to mention that another book of Jan's, for which I knitted some things, came out; I'm still playing 'hunt-the-item' with it at the moment, working out which bits I made, because the hats, scarves, bags etc. look very different once they've been decorated (and in some cases felted) and photographed...

Felted

In another bit of my life, I teach an embroidery class. Last week, crafts collided - we were doing canvaswork, and a couple of the ladies in the class brought bags of tapestry wool of various brands which they had accumulated as ends-of-kits or for other projects, or were unable to sell at a local charity shop. In the end, I was the only one who wanted them, for felting, so they came home... (Nothing wrong with the wool, but canvaswork/needlepoint has moved on and there are so many more materials available now.)

On Monday night, I took possession of a set of US West Wing Series Two DVDs, (The Ones With The Extra Features, as opposed to the UK ones which only have the episodes). The commentated episodes necessitate reading closed captioning while listening to the actors/directors, so while that was going on I mindlessly wound a couple of dozen skeins of browns and pinks into a nice big ball of yarn, and last night I knitted it up. Started with 9 stitches on straight 6mm needles; gradually increased on alternate rows in sections to 99 sts; then carried on on circulars (#10.5 Denises) and seamed the edge of the circular-shaped bit before felting. The finished pre-felted dimensions were 32 cm wide by 33 high. Then I whacked it into the washing machine at 60 degrees C, long wash, with a couple of bath-towels from the washing pile; et voilà. Here it is drying over a vase I made in a long-ago pottery class:

and here it is lounging about on the beautiful Christmas-present throw from Jan.

Finished dimensions are 22cm wide by 15cm high... I know Jan's done this before (and I have a couple of bags of Paternayan from her which I will also now play with) but I was unprepared for how completely and solidly tapestry wool felts in a single wash. Remarkable. I'm hooked. Next time I'll safety-pin some bubble-wrap into the middle though to stop the fabric felting to itself - gave me a couple of Bad Moments and has caused a lot of distortion to the edging...

In Cambridge-specific news, Sew Creative on King Street have restocked with a much larger range of Regia Sock Yarn than previously, having given the impression they'd stopped selling it. Got a couple of balls of this (Skater colourway) at lunchtime.

Tidying up

My Yarn Corner in the dining room had reached ridiculous proportions by the weekend so I culled it (obviously, this doesn't actually mean getting rid of yarn; just shovelling it into carrier bags and taking it upstairs into the Abomination of Desolation which is the back bedroom). I now have

A bag of Current Projects: 1) the as yet un-re-cast-on Jaywalkers 2) the shawl I can't show 3) St Brigid, in her purple but unprogressed splendour.

A couple of imminent projects: 1) the yarn for the shawl after this, which will become the Peacock Feathers Shawl - this is Cherry Tree Hill laceweight from Woolly Workshop in the Peacock colourway.

2) the yarn for the sweater after next (next on the needles will be Eris, using the Mexican Wave yarn unpicked from the sweater-which-didn't-work-any-better-the-second-time), which is an assortment of very beautiful alpaca and alpaca blends.

The main rose-brown and grey yarn at the back is a 100% alpaca brought back from Bolivia two years ago by friends in a stunning act of generosity. This yarn has so far been quite decisive about what it doesn't want to be so far; I started making a Meg Swansen sweater from Knitting in America/America Knits with it and managed to get it catastrophically wrong three times - first time, I made a Mobius-type strip; second time, I made it too small and realised this at armpit-time; third time I got to the same point and realised due to crappy counting that I had 28 sts (or two full repeats) more at the front than at the back... Thankfully it pulls out as beautifully as it knits up. Then I got the variegated pink yarn from Silkwood at Stitch last year - it feels as if it has mohair and alpaca in it - and Elann had a sale so I got the Baby Silk in the other four colours; and the beads may or may not get used... No idea what I'll do with this at the moment, although I think it's going to involve some contributions from this book, but I have time to work it out; and I want to do justice to the yarn. It lives in a bag on a hook which also hangs my ironing board; because the Bolivian stuff still has a real alpaca type smell, and cats find it completely irresistible. I'm going to need to keep the finished sweater in a pillowcase or something to make sure they don't love it to death...

And then finally the Yarn Which Is Too Pretty To Let Out of My Sight. I've got this down to one basketful - there's a fair amount of sock yarn for grabbing at short notice; and some skeins of Koigu, Lorna's Laces, Kaalund etc. This is stuff I pick up and fondle...

Now you see it...

First Jaywalker sock, in the lovely Trekking XXL which was a present from Anne. Love the yarn, and the pattern. (The lilac bits are actually more pink-and-green in reality)...

I got to the bit where the heel starts; and thought "I'll just Google to see whether this Trekking stuff does have a repeat" (because I hadn't seen one so far). Received wisdom (and you can't get much wiser than this; see post for December 19), says no. But while I was Googling, discovered mentions of the 'inflexibility of the pattern', so I thought "maybe I'd better try it on".

Well; mine might fit the calf of a supermodel. I wouldn't know because I couldn't get it past my heel to work this out... The actual measurement of the leg is fine according to the pattern directions; but it has No Give Whatsoever on the 2mm needles I was using to compensate for my usually-ridiculously-loose-knitting-tension.

So, unravelling I shall go, and I'll do them on the 2.5mm needles this time! Third pair running on 2.5mms - you'd think I was developing normal tension; or something... I should stop second-guessing these pattern-writers; except I have, all my life, and it's worked for me so far! Maybe sock-knitters are relaxed people, and differently-gauged...

Also, one knitting-related image from Venice. I never found the fabled Lellabella yarn shop; went all the way along the Calle della Mandola without spotting it, a couple of times (and my instinct for yarn shops is really quite finely-honed; there's no way it would have got away from me if it were still there) but this was in the corner of one of the Murano glass shops in the Piazza San Marco and amused me:

Glass yarn. I bet that has no stretch whatsoever, however loosely you knit it...

Magical

Have been away for a few days - in Venice, in fact, with my parents, brother and SIL. These pics probably say it all:

It was lovely. We stayed at a posh hotel with its own landing-stage, took a water-taxi there and back, and apart from a frantic dash through Schiphol airport on the way back and the quickest plane-to-plane transfer ever (during which, amazingly, our luggage made it onto the plane with us!) it was a really relaxed few days and the weather for the first two and a bit days was wonderfully warm and sunny. I did a bit of knitting; started a pair of Jaywalkers and knitted on a shawl I can't show you.

I also have not one but two FO to show -

The Pomatomus socks were finished on the train north (we flew out of Newcastle airport as that's where my family still live) and here they are, just before grafting, slouching about on the table in the train (for some absurd GNER-related reason, travelling north first-class was cheaper than a Saver return). They were lovely to make, but as you can see, there was a scarily small amount of the Celestial Merino left at the end...

and these are Stewart's birthday socks, in Opal handpaint from eBay.

And finally, and very belatedly, one of the wonderful birthday presents I received from Jan the week before last (sorry, Jan): a skein of Lorna's Laces Helen's Lace (silk and wool) in the Get Knitted colourway: isn't it gorgeous??

Easter update

It's been a weird fortnight. Mainly for work-related reasons which I won't go into...

Last weekend I was around in central Cambridge; although I came here to go to college nearly 20 years ago, it's pretty rare I'm around in the University bits these days. So here's a picture of Old Court, Clare College - I never lived in this bit but ate, drank and worshipped in this court for three years...


Knitting: I had a couple of Finished Objects over the last couple of weeks too - but both are destined for presents, so can't be shown yet. However, I've fallen majorly in love with the Pomatomus sock pattern, and here is the leg on my first one (modelled on a wine-bottle for ease of photo-taking; note Rosie's fabulous tea-cosy in background).

I'm using Lucy Neatby Celestial Merino in Blue Vesuvius from Woolly Workshop and 2.5mm needles. The Celestial Merino has a similar texture to Koigu and Cherry Tree Hill, so the pattern, which has lots of knitting through the back of the loop, is enhanced by the extra twistiness of the yarn... I've finished the first sock apart from the Dreaded Grafting which I'll do tonight.

Here's a detail of the stitch pattern, which is a lot easier than it looks:

The main job of the weekend is painting the bathroom though - I'm changing it from the blue you can see on this photo

to the purple in the can. The emulsion's on, and the stripy blind is all but made - just need to sew on the rings tonight and get it onto the wall tomorrow; and fling large amounts of gloss paint around... It's looking pretty good though...

Spring

Well; sort of. But yesterday I managed to get a couple of loads of washing dry on the line in the back garden, which always counts as Serious Spring Progress; and while I was doing that, I found a primula plant I'd given up for dead had suddenly produced flowers, so I replanted my Serene Face.

This was made by Helen Humphreys, who's not only a fabulous potter but a very nice person, and lives round the corner. Her site has all sorts of other stuff, and she's a regular participant in the Cambridgeshire Open Studios... This face is on the wall in the side-passage immediately opposite the kitchen sink, and makes me happy every time I look at it while I'm washing up; it's had a completely dead fuscia in it since last Autumn though, so the primula is a good step towards making me feel that Spring, and then Summer, may arrive at some stage!

The other harbinger of spring is the lineup for the Cambridge Folk Festival which went onto the site last weekend...

It's not that no knitting has gone on. It has; some of it drunkenly, in other people's houses... They know who they are... But some of it is proofknitting of a Relatively Secret Project; and some is presents for people who may read this. I did finish a scarf for Caroline from the Fibrefusion group though: here's the best pic I have of it...