moats and boats and waterfalls

hurrah I'm back in Galway again once more. Among the best things about being here are the people (see Ellenfriend looking lovely) the time for crafting, the hours for knitting, the water the sea the swimming the walking by the waves and the fresh salty air.

poh-tay-to , poh-tah-to

Vegetables. You wonderful herbaceous plants full of beautiful nutritional goodness, how I adore thee. You're best for eating but I know you're no one - trick ponies. No no you don't fool me, you useful little superstars I know you have many tricks up your sleeves.

I shall tell you what a magic show the vegetables and I performed together today. Turning the print room into a laboratory of culinary textile experimentation I extracted juices from various food stuffs, added combinations of mordants, and attempted to successfully dye sheets of flock. Flock is a term used for a textile process wherein sheets of densely packed short length fibres are transferred from their backing sheet onto the glue with which you have printed your fabric. Or, in this case, wall paper. Because the purpose of trying to achieve this particular colour palette in this particular way, using this particular technique, is that it is part of a commercial interiors competition I am working on.

Some of the colours, I would say, came out rather well.

who invited the wheel?

Early morning, rise and shine! Still dark outside? Ah yes, well let's pretend. Head out the door, hello gym. What a lovely way to start the day - spinning class, sweat it out. Later morning, lets get going! Still rather dim outside? Ah yes, well that's how it is. Head to the studio, hello stuff. What a lovely way to spend the day - spinning, churn it out.

Firstly what you do is take the big, massive sheep's fleece from the black bag you've been keeping it it. Lay it out and take a look. Wonder with awe at it's expansive size. 

Next what must be done is pulling out the good bits. It's all terribly stinky but some parts are particularly poo-y or have lots of twigs and clusters of dirt. That can be discarded.

Then to clean it. Proceed to gather some large vessels and hot water. Baby shampoo is the surprising yet actual secret ingredient to the cleansing process. Each batch of fleece needs to be soaked in a tub of soapy warm water for twenty minutes at a time, changing the water shampoo until it runs clear. Then a water-only rinsing process must be carried out. The fresh fleece should then be laid out to air dry.

When all that is done, the carding is next. To brush all the fibres in the same direction, which makes it smoother for spinning with. This machine is an invention like the toaster - does the job better and faster. What I would do without it I simply don't know.

Finally the fun can begin! Sit down at the wheel, take about two hours to figure out how to get it going and retain patience. It will work out in the end. Extra amounts of concentration are needed at this stage.

Don't forget to admire what is happening as you go along; it's quite a satisfying experience to watch something you're making grow right before your eyes.

And last but not least, stand back, feel proud. Love your new wool. Take a photo and show off by sharing it on instagram. Tag it and begin to make plans for what you will use it to knit.

splish splash

seven follow in a row

The rain falls throughout the day these days and as the grass can't look green I can only assume the ducks are happy. The trees stand in line these days and as they can't help but look woebegone I can only assume the hedgehogs are having fun. The mornings start slow, the evenings come fast, day is night and night is all day. These are the days.
When inside in the studio I hold for the first time a ball of yarn spun by mine own two hands. Spin stop spin stop mumble and grumble stop spin stop spin spin spin stumble and fumble spin spin spin. One day I will create mine own very beautiful sustainable textiles with materials known from sheep to shop. That will be the day.

autumn in the air

The Thought-Fox by Ted Hughes

I imagine this midnight moment's forest:
Something else is alive
Beside the clock's loneliness
And this blank page where my fingers move.

Through the window I see no star:
Something more near
Though deeper within darkness
Is entering the loneliness:

Cold, delicately as the dark snow
A fox's nose touches twig, leaf;
Two eyes serve a movement, that now
And again now, and now, and now

Sets neat prints into the snow
Between trees, and warily a lame
Shadow lags by stump and in hollow
Of a body that is bold to come

Across clearings, an eye,
A widening deepening greenness,
Brilliantly, concentratedly,
Coming about its own business

Till, with a sudden sharp hot stink of fox
It enters the dark hole of the head.
The window is starless still; the clock ticks,
The page is printed.

sit down have a chat

MOFFAT

the town to stop off at

Undertaking a project that focuses on sustainable rural development, myself and my lovely co-working partner in collaboration decided it was time to do some proper field research. So we hired a car and headed on the road west to experience the rural for ourselves.

Having passed through Moffat this summer on my way home from a hike up the Gray Mare's Tale (a National Trust hike with a mystical glacial lake at the top) the town made a fantastic impression on me. A pub serving baked potatoes and a good glass of guinness will tickle my fancy on the best of cold days, but to witness the spectacle of a whole town heaving with people out for the annual Sheep Race really was something else. Cue the one main street of the town barricaded off and rounds of six sheep running the length of the street with miniature knitted jockeys strapped to their backs, with locals cheering on waving their betting tickets in good humoured £1.00 a piece gambling. Yes, this is indeed the reason why we went back. They seemed to have a solid tourism structure in place, a strong sense of community and events and run on the time of volunteers - the exact criteria on our list of things we needed to find out. And why, for three days and three nights we met with some of the most interesting characters who make the town what it is and who were as kind as to give us so much of their time and assistance. 

Doing work and being in the countryside at the same time? #dreamlife.  

the basket weaving circle

It was the first Saturday in October and a crisp autumn day. I took the bus from Edinburgh along by the coast to a small town called Tranent to participate in a basket weaving workshop. Generally categorised as an old-folks activity, traditional handcrafts are actually, in fact, just that. My twenty-something year old self showed up to the given address and found there a small gathering of ladies well past their forties, each holding a cup of tea. All the boxes ticked? Yep. However, as an unashamed fan of aformentioned pensioner-style pastimes, I really enjoyed my time there.

The sun came up enough that once the morning had passed, it was surprisingly warm. We therefore decided to relocate ourselves from the workroom and place ourselves and our willow outside for the remainder of the day. Provided with endless cups of tea that were drank mostly out of politeness to our host, I concentrated in silence enjoying listening to the real, live BBC radio 4 happening around me.

To watch something that you are making grow right in front of your eyes through a meditative passage of time is a satisfaction I wish everyone could have the good fortune of experiencing. My own final basket is one called a 'Mudag' style. It's woven but not yet photographed... looks a bit like an egg.

chalk, cheese and cardboard

And the new academic year begins once again. 

Beginning the term by compiling a Materials Bank of various forms, textures, and colours that are interesting to us, we provide ourselves with an easily accessible source of inspiration for the projects to come. However, my little library features two halves, each very distinct to the other. On the left we have the natural, organic pieces whose essence is of great importance and whose value I feel so strongly about. On the right we have a box of fun; it's pink, fluffy, glittery, sparkly, shimmery, shiny, plastic, and oh so barbie. Please don't make me pick a side of the fence to sit on. My challenge will have to be finding the middle ground.

First to experiment with the natural. Inspired by a tour of an old paper mill in Amalfi, Italy over the summer, I try to re-create the process in a sustainable, vegetable loving, way. Maybe the results are not so beautiful but they are a successful sort of cardboard.

youfoundlunch

Every year graduate students from art colleges around Britain exhibit their collections in London. The event in question is New Designers where we flock in the hope of having our work seen by somebody in the industry and *eek* being offered a job!
A venture on the expensive side of expensive, Chloe and I decided to get together and fundraise ourselves some money. Current target: £400. That covers the cost of our stand in the Design Centre alone. After that I think we'll be ringing on friend's doorbells looking for a couch to crash on for the week.

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During the summer we had splendid success selling salad boxes. But now the days are colder and the students newer, we thought a bake sale was in order. Theme? OATS!!!

Calling our day 'oatily delicious' we stood outside the main University of Edinburgh Library with an array of sweet and savoury bakes, each containing that one key ingredient.... oats!

For the savoury bakes we prepared small stacks of oatcakes, with a choice between spinach, pumpkin seeds or cracked black pepper. Sold as a set with a nice British apple and a wedge of either Danish blue or Gouda cheese, they were a perfect snack.

Over on the sweet side we had - Ginger and Dark Chocolate Cookies - Chewy Apple Cookies - Peanut Butter and Banana Flapjack - Banana Bread - Raisin and Pumpkin Seed Flapjack- Jars of Granola.  Many credits are due to DeliciouslyElla for her wonderful vegan recipes, thank you. 

Talk about a two-way twister

   

"Never knew how much I missed ya..." Gone are the days of having a 30 minute tv allowance in the evenings, being made by parents to choose the one programme you want to watch for that day. Here are the days of internet streaming and too many hours wasted away in the lazy indulgences that being grown up entitle you to. Here's to hoping my eyes don't turn square.

beginning a new chapter

They say it is the intention that counts. And so listening to whoever "they" are, those spoken of wise people somewhere someplace, I shall begin again the blog. Because a friend is a very special thing to have and one should endeavour to make happy those who make one happy.

Much time may have passed since I last wrote, but in terms of things changing during this sojourn, well, little has. Knitting still happens and small projects are undertaken. Today I worked my way toward the toe of this sock, number one of two, which shall be a present for my dad, a man who asks every year for socks for Christmas, though how he makes his way through so many pairs in a year to always need more, I'll never know.