Off the needles

 My brother had been wanting a new Aran sweater for quite some time - we started talking about it around this time last year. Come his birthday I offered to buy the wool for his birthday present and knit it for his Christmas present. My options were somewhat limited because he specifically wanted both pure wool and for it to be machine-washable. Early last year I had saved something  from an Irish yarn store in my basket, but by August it was no longer available so I had to go back to plan B, which was an English company (Yarn Undyed) which sells an amazing variety of undyed wool - suitable for you to dye yourself. We were both tempted by the merino/linen mix, which is now on my own personal shopping list,  but he stuck with his original wish for pure wool, and I got this finished just in time to send down for Christmas.

As a bonus, my sister-in-law has been doing a textile course in the Crawford College of Art & Design, and has been doing a lot of dying, so I sent her two spare balls of wool to experiment with.

I've been focussing on finishing off old projects, so I finally finished a lace throw that has been on the needles for (gulp) over twenty years. I went off the colour somewhere along the way, but kept going back and plugging away at it whenever I had nothing better to do, and the colour has grown on me again. It was originally a pattern for a baby blanket, but this is more the size of a full length wrap for a woman.

And one last finally-finished project, also on the needles for a LONG time. This was a rainbow cake of wool, and I originally started the shawl pattern that came free with it. However, there was what I considered a very muddy colour transition from purple to green, and I had never liked it. I was at the point of planning to rip it and just give the wool away, but I came across a colour-block infinity scarf on Ravelry and thought it would be a good use for it. I discarded the parts of the yarn with the muddy colour transition, so I had to add in a yellow from my stash which was the closest match in terms of weight in order to get the required length, but I am very happy to have finally got this made up into something. Since it was just a tube knit until the required length was reached, when the ends were grafted together to make a seamless loop, it was the ideal project for this Christmas holiday, requiring no thought or concentration whatsoever. 

Currently working on socks and a scarf design which uses up leftover sock yarn.

January favourites and a beach

 Are very thin on the ground...

I spent a weekend earlier in the month with my sister. On the Sunday morning we went to a beach in West Cork for a walk and a fish and chips (fries) lunch. Although the weather doesn't look great in the photos, it was beautiful for our drive over, and was in fact lovely for our walk. Queuing for the fish and chips was very windy, the beach much less so. 

Long Strand, Castlefreke.

Peaceful Christmas wishes...

 I'm finding it hard to find a lot of merry and happy this Christmas season, peaceful is the way I am going. With my aunt gone, it was going to be my first Christmas Eve with no family gathering as my brother-in-law is too ill for my sister to travel up. But as they accepted our offer to bring a low-key Christmas to them, we will still be having our Bûche de Noël on Christmas Eve. I'll try to take and add a photo while we are down there. I think this one will be mushroom-less, I'm not sure how well they would travel that distance. 

November Favourites

 Another busy month with not a lot of creating time. I don't have any other photos either - a too-blurred one of an interesting utility box cover which is sadly way off my normal route so I'm not likely to pass it again any time soon. Maybe I'll just share it anyway, blurred or not. There was a lot of traffic on the road so I was probably rushing trying to take it. 

 Being the first of December when this posts, I will include a couple of my more favourite Christmas cards from November - it was my main card-making focus as I tried to catch up with myself. Normally I can create enough during the year that I'm only left needing a half dozen or so.

Rainbow over the entrance to the Phoenix Park during Storm Debi

Poor photo of utility box cover in Donnybrook (actually October)

The header this month is an oystercatcher on the mudflats at Warrenpoint, with a low setting sun reflecting off the sand. 

October Favourites

 Hard to believe another month is over - but I can hear all the Halloween fireworks going off as I type, and we've had a handful of trick-or-treaters call to the door.

A few cards and a couple of crafty projects...

The Chinese Lanterns card will go to my aunt-in-law. My aunt who died in the summer always brought Mary Chinese Lanterns, because they won't grow for Mary. This I find almost impossible to believe, because I have always found them incredibly invasive. Anyway, I brought Mary a bunch in September and thought I'd make a coordinating Christmas card.

The hat was knit with leftovers from the sweater I shared last month, for C to bring as a present for his friend in Maine.  I added an extra colour in for the zigzag which did leave me with four colours in each row on occasion, but it was mostly straightforward. 

I was tidying fabric scraps so as to give away what I wouldn't use. I made place mats for my sister and myself from the cat fabric a couple of Christmases ago, and used what was left to make a tote-bag for a cat-loving friend.

The only photos I have from last November appear to be from Wild Lights at the zoo, so that's my header, This year's theme isn't one that appeals to me, so I think we will be giving it a miss. Last year's was biodiversity, and I would have gone twice if I'd been able to get more tickets.

September Favourites / Hot Off the Needles

 Still working on clearing out my aunt's house so creative time and energy is at a minimum, not many cards to share.  I did finally get to use two birthday gifts - thank you Lorraine and Margot. 

Looking at Ravelry  I started this sweater some time in July as a project to use a lot of assorted colours of Irish wool bought on offer. For a while I was able to bring it in to work but once the body got to a certain point it was too bulky. I had to knit in sections to make sure I didn't run out of any colours, so darvon the body, then the two sleeves to match ..

We went to the Botanic Gardens two weeks ago when we woke up on Saturday and it was sunny and mild. I wasn't feeling great and spent the rest of the weekend in bed, so I haven't edited any photos yet but will add a link to the album. I just uploaded the whole shooting gallery to Google photos so that we could look at them on the laptop in bed - normally we look on the big monitor upstairs:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/mj3hMi3VdZWuF3Uh8

The header this month is Warrenpoint up in Northern Ireland, one of the few photos I took last October when C was getting his dental implants.

August Favourites...

 Still thin on the ground as I'm out in my aunt's house on my day off each week. And no other photos,  and still no time to select some French ones. Soon, I hope...

The cat is cut from black velvet paper, so very tactile.

My header is one of the sculptures from the Sculpture in Context exhibition in the Botanic Gardens last year. 

July favourites

 I'll be along soon with photos from France, I promise. But when we got back, my aunt was in hospital and since then it's been a roller-coaster and merry-go-round of hospital, nursing home and then sadly a funeral. So there hasn't been much time for a lot else, and definitely not for uploading photos.

But I do have a few cards that I managed to make or had made ahead of time (C's birthday card: last year he got a saxophone for his birthday). Two pretty quick beach cards are included as a reminder that we did have a break by the sea in June. 

Could it be that I took no photos last August? I couldn't find any - so the sunflower is from the Botanic Gardens in August 2021.

June Favourites

 Thin on the ground, because we were in France for three weeks. But I had a couple made ahead for challenge samples...

France was good!

Although after torrential storms one day in each of our two locations, we need to set the tent up in the garden and re-waterproof it. No damage done...

I like this faux glass technique very much, and it's a brilliant way of using packaging from dies and suchlike, but as it's not very mailable I don't often use it. And normally I make flowers, the butterfly was a change...

The blog header - hmm, I couldn't appear to find any photos from last July, which surprised me. But I guess I could have been pretty busy in work and tired, because someone else was away. The angel's fishing rod photo is from Fota House in Cork, July 21 - a COVID era holiday when we camped in my brother's garden.