Tag Archives: wisteria

I would like to live in a house like this

Posted on by

6

So, following on from my last post, here is the Christmassy National Trust property we visited. Greys Court is somewhere that we’ve visited in the summer, mainly because they have a sculpture exhibition and so the grounds are filled with all sorts of impressive and also weird and wonderful sculpture! Lots of it’s available to buy and some of the fun is in looking at the price tags. However we’ve never visited at Christmas. It’s absolutely lovely, as you will see…

  • Such a bright and airy room. I got Someone to pose by the piano as if it was his sitting room. The effect is spoilt by the fact he’s wearing raincoat and mask!
  • Absolutely loved the train set which circled the tree. You can imagine excited children coming downstairs on Christmas morning. The train was going along through a box tunnel and weaving around the presents. Lucky children!
  • The stockings were laid by the (beds) chimneys with care
  • The animals went in two by two
  • Downstairs in the kitchen I absolutely loved these knitted chains
  • And the selection of knitted goodies. There are handmade items throughout the house; from patchwork quilts on the beds, to tapestry cushions, little sewn decorations, and homemade jams in the pantry. This makes sense when you read the paragraph below.
  • The last family member to live in the house: ‘Lady Brunner was chair of the Women’s Institute and closely involved in the Keep Britain Tidy Campaign, for which she received an OBE in 2000.’ From the Greys Court National Trust website
  • It was a beautiful day! We walked a 3 mile circular after exploring the house
  • Wow what a huge bull
  • The Greys Court wisteria is 130 years old

And my crafting? Lady Brunner would not be particularly impressed. (Still haven’t made that chutney.) But LOOK! I’ve crocheted a brussel sprout! I know, it’s only one but at least I’ve made one.

Next time I need to get some safety pins to hold the leaves in place, as I found it really really fiddly to hold them while I sewed them onto the sphere. I still need to glue on the eyes and thread some sparkly thread so it can hang on the tree, when we’ve got one.

Here’s the pattern I used

I’ve also added some more rounds to a new block for my coast blanket. You’ve seen that quite a bit recently, so I haven’t taken any new photos.

What about you? If you celebrate, how is your Christmas prep going? Are you feeling Christmassy?

Mock Cable Wristies 

Posted on by

6

All sewn up and ready to wear  for Autumn.

 It’s hard to get pictures showing the true colour; I think because the sunlight glints off the sparkles on the finished wristies, but these are very close.

Can you see the sparkles? It’s such a pretty pink yarn and incredibly soft.  It’s Louisa Harding Orielle, cerise, and is a DK yarn with 97% baby alpaca and 3% metallic polyamide – aka the sparkley bit. There are many other lovely colours too. I didn’t even intend to buy it, but saw someone in the yarn shop knitting the wrisites with the same wool, and before I knew it my purse was out and I had a bag with a skein and wristie pattern in hand. They get you like that, don’t they?
The skein was 50g and plenty for the pair of wristies. I knit them with the 3.75mm needles specified in the pattern. Now the 3mm I’m using for the sock yarn feel even tinier.

If you want to knit your own wrisites I’m not really giving much away when I say you knit some rows of double rib for the wristband, mock cables until they’re the desired length, then a few more rows of double rib to finish them off. You can probably tell that just by looking.

You have a rectangle to sew up (mattress stitch is best I reckon), leaving a hole for the thumb. Make sure you carefully check that the thumb holes are in the same place for both….unless you fancy wonky mitts. Then go for it anyhow you please.

Earler I left my (still excellent) audio book, sofa and cold pack to venture outside, into the real world! I dropped some smoked trout off at a friend’s and admired that gorgeous wisteria. Then popped to Sainsbury’s. Getting in and out of the car with a tubi-grip on my knee made me pull ridiculous faces. I probably made a few Ow and Ouch sounds too. Well it hurt. I noticed an elderly woman in the car park with a “Buck up your ideas, for goodness sake!” expression on her face, and wanted to explain what it was all about. We don’t do this in England generally, so I hobbled inside towards the salad veg instead.

These two blog posts have cheered me up and made me laugh this afternoon: The Cat isn’t Speaking to me on Yarn Harlot and  Carry-all: a Soup Story on Cosy Made Things.

I felt dull witted for a little while in a ‘Where’s the problem?’ kind of way, because I’m not much of a knitter, then pretty superior: ‘I would never do that!’ in response to Kristen’s post. So all in all I feel fairly balanced now.
You?