Attic24

These Summer Days

Here we are at the end of week four of our summer holiday, and I am loving these long, slow Summer days. They are so beautiful and kind of full and precious I think. We haven't been up to much here to be honest, the days are sort of bumbling and rambling into each other in a deliciously relaxed sort of a blur. I wake up early every morning not knowing (or caring) what day of the week it is and don't even think to question it as the hours roll by. It's a luxury to have this kind of freedom and I appreciate it more than I am able to put into words.

Our Monday to Friday's have been a whole lot of nothing-much but we have made effort at the weekends to get out and about with the Little People. We've been walking in shady green woodland, picnicking and rambling about the countryside with visiting friends and family. A barbecue lunch by the riverside, a lazy pub beer garden in the warm afternoon sunshine. It's been gentle and enjoyable.

At home I have been day dreaming about so many beautiful projects and exciting new yarny possibilities, feeling buzzy and inspired and more than a little frustrated at the lack of actual available time to sit and crochet right now. It's just typical for me at this time of year when I am flat out with so many time-sensitive projects that I immediately want to kick the deadlines to the curb and dive into something new and pleasurable. Ah well, all in good time I guess.

Days here during the holidays are a constant juggling act, as I'm sure it is for most parents of school age children. I'm attempting to parent the kidletts whilst also working from home against some tight time deadlines and it's not always easy - the guilt sits constantly on my shoulder and whispers naughty things in my ear if I let it. I am doing my best to balance it all out, and so far so good. I tend to adopt the rather lazy approach to holiday parenting and allow the days to meander naturally. We don't plan, we just kind of free flow and hope for the best. The Little People are pretty good at amusing themselves for the most part, although Little B still needs Mummy imput of course, being that he is still only six. We've been baking together quite a bit, Little B and I - we took some over ripe bananas.....

.....and made some delicious banana bread (recipe here, with added sultanas). Warm from the oven and slathered in butter, it was oh-so-good.

Little B loves to sit and do a spot of colouring too, he can be close by me as I sit and work and I can secretly watch him out of the corner of my eye (he gets very self conscious if he knows I am staring). I love to watch his face move as he works with his pens, he truly delights me with his intensity for this simple activity.

We've stayed close to home for the most part during the past few weeks, but there have been quite a few outings to the local shops to buy food or some such thing that we've run out of and desperately need. It feels odd to walk along the canal with the Little Peeps and not be doing the school run, it's a strange sensation of being out of kilter  somehow. We noticed this week how the leaves are already beginning to change on some of the trees, my heart sinks ever so slightly at the realisation that Summer is on the wane already. Not yet, it can't possibly be yet. September is Still Summer!!

We've had many afternoons at the park this past week as it's been warm and humid and perfect for being idle and horizontal on a blanket with a green view.

I've settled us at the very top of the slope in the dappled shade of the trees and encouraged Little B to run-run-run his little legs off as much as possible. We've had balls and a frisbee to encourage the activity levels, but really that kiddlet just loves to run for the joy of it. He would think nothing of running all the way down to the play park there in the distance, throwing himself down the slide a few times, then running all the way back up the hill again, panting and collapsing in a heap on the blanket. It's marvellous actually, all part of my Lazy Parenting technique as I am required to do absolutely nothing physical, just using my eyes to watch. The occasional wave and swell of the heart, and that's the extent of it for me.

The reward for all that activity has been in the form of a daily ice cream treat, which I think is only fair. There is an ice cream van which parks just outside the park entrance, and we've made good use of it this week. Happy Little Peeps, happy Me.

It's not all been horizontal idling mind you, I have actually been doing some crazy stuff at the park myself whilst the Little Peeps loll about eating ice cream. I took a whole bag of woolly sheep with me and spent a happy time arranging them on the grassy slope for a little photo shoot - don't they look adorable? Yes, I did get some rather odd looks, not that I mind too much of course. What amazes me is how OK the Little People are with me doing these things, they pitch in and help and never question the wierdness that is my life.

I have to say I'm so thrilled by this creative project and love love love the way the flock is growing, thank you so much to everyone who has contributed so far. Each and every sheep is a delight, they all have such unique and beautiful little characters! There is still time to make and send a little sheep if you fancy joining in. Details here.

The past few weeks I've been working with my friend Lovely C to create the 2017 Yarndale* calendar. It's been a fun thing to do - we've combined some studio images with some amateur on-location images which has required us to dance about arranging stuff, snapping photos and pretending we are fancy pants stylists hahaha! The above image was a joint project, the flower post was crocheted by C using a rustic carpet yarn, and I made the flowers and leaves using Drops Karisma wool DK.

This is one of our styling type images, arranged in Lovely C's garden one overcast day in early August. We wanted to create a picture which felt Autumnal and cosy, and honestly we got such a kick setting this up and getting it just so perfectly Novemberish. The funny thing is that I realised after a few hours that I happen to hold my breath when I am taking photographs, so the whole day left me hyperventilating and gasping with exhaustion, but ridiculously happy at the same time. I took over 200 photos in the end (to arrive at a select 12) and am really looking forward to sharing them with you soon. The calendars will go on sale at Yarndale* in September, then will be available to buy online after that. I'll keep you posted.

I've been out and about in the evenings a bit this past week and have been struck by just how beautiful this time of year is. I feel so blessed to live in this place where I can walk to meet friends, strolling along the canal side on my way home at 7pm and just loving the warmth and light.

Summer is my very best favourite time of year, these light-filled days make me so happy.

I'm hoping that whatever your days are filled with, that you are enjoying the magic and finding joy in the Little Things. Life is good!

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*in the interest of honesty and clarity and disclosure and all that stuff, I need to just mention that *yarndale is a for-profit organisation and I am one of the five organisers. Details can be found here.

 ps we're off to the seaside now for a week of coastal pootling - see you when I get back xx

 

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Owls and Sheep

One of the things I most love about my involvement with Yarndale* is the creative bits and bobs that I am responsible for. The Yarndale team is made up of five people and each of us have different jobs to do throughout the course of the year. I for one am mighty glad that I don't have to deal with complicated things like Health and Safety, or Accounts as I am pretty certain that I would be an epic fail at those things. But Yarny Stuff, yup that's my thing, and I really enjoy the creative challenges.

Right now we are in full swing preparing for the fourth Yarndale* festival which takes place on 24th and 25th September (six weeks away - yikes!). I've been working hard on several creative projects during the past few months and thought you might like a little peek?

Each year Yarndale* produces an A5 colour brochure which is given to every visitor as part of their ticket entry. A brochure is an essential thing to have at a large festival - it contains a floor plan, lots of practical information about the event, and a full list of the 180+ exhibitors who come to demonstrate, share and sell their beautiful woolly goods. The brochure also contains some short articles about the various creative displays, and an interview with the previous year's "Best in Show" winner. As well as all that practical stuff though, I think it's rather lovely for a brochure to go one step further and offer just a little bit more than the essentials, don't you? So amongst all the blurb contained in the 40+ pages you will find some knitting and crochet patterns included. Just because we can!

We usually aim to have at least three patterns each year if we can manage -  the Tweetie Bird Brooch shown in the picture above was my contribution for the first brochure. It's not always easy to think of small projects that can be written up as short, easy to follow patterns ( I am Queen of the Long Winded Approach and the word "concise" doesn't often figure in my pattern writing). But every year I do my best to dream up a cute little decorative crochet something and apply myself to writing up a proper grown up pattern for it.

For this year's brochure, I designed a Little Owl...................awwwwwww!!!! I find designing anything in three dimensions an incredible challenge, verging on the impossible for my 2-D loving brain. I can visualise flat patterns and images pretty well, but three dimensional shapes and objects (even easy ones) don't come at all easy to me.

I rather love how my little owl turned out, and even surprised myself with how satisfying I found the methodical counting that crocheting in a continuous spiral requires. I made quite a number of different birds in various shapes and sizes and with varying degrees of stripyness before I settled on the simplicity of this one. I used some oddments of Drops Karisma yarn for my owls - we've been using this yarn for a few other Yarndale projects recently (it's 100% wool DK) and I love the richness of the colours which crochet (and photograph) beautifully.

So if you are visiting Yarndale* in September I hope you enjoy the patterns included in the brochure and feel inspired to dig in your stash and whip up a bird or two. I think I'll be able to share my owl pattern here on my blog later in the year too - they make really lovely little hand made gifts and I can even picture some owls sitting in the branches of my Christmas tree. Hmmmm.....I can't believe I just had a festive thought in August and typed the C word. Cripes.

Anyhooooo.....back to summer thoughts, and baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Woolly Sheep have been occupying my mind for a good many months now, in fact they completely took over my creative energies throughout much of May and June. As many of you will know, I am involved with dreaming up and organising a large scale Creative Community project to be displayed at Yarndale* each year. It's a huge undertaking, but something I absolutely love to do - it's such a beautiful way to celebrate the vibrant and amazing yarn community that I've become a part of through writing my blog and in my real life too.

This year we decided to have a go at gathering together a flock of little Woolly Sheep - we thought that as Yarndale* takes place in a rural auction mart, it would be a fun reminder that just days before the festival, the place is indeed full to the brim with real live sheep!

The idea was inspired by a little knitted sheep designed by Frankie Brown that I came across on Ravelry one day back in the Spring. Frankie very kindly gave me permission to take her original knitted sheep and create a crochet version. Ho ho, it's so easy to write the words "create a crochet version"!!!!! Honestly, I can't tell you how difficult it was for me to actually come up with a workable crochet sheep pattern, it took weeks and weeks and many, many hissy fits. First up I had to actually knit the sheep from Frankie's pattern to see how it was constructed and what size it would be. I had to knit moss stitch and everything! But the pattern was very well written and I was immediately smitten by the cute little woolly sheep I managed to knit, complete with it's little knitted jumper made from left over sock yarn.

It's the knitted jumper which really gives these sheep the cute factor - they look absurdly naked and lacking without an extra colourful woolly layer....

.....ahhhh, that's better! You can see from me holding my sheep that they are quite small, measuring approximately 8cm tall. I used oddments of DK yarn and a 3.5mm hook to make mine, and (once the agony of the pattern writing is over) they are pretty quick and easy to whip up. Every so slightly fiddly perhaps (there is some stitching up to do), but they are lovely little things to make.

You know I mentioned earlier that I find 3D things hard to get my head around? Yeah....creating a pattern for this little woolly sheep really tried my patience I have to say. The head is made in amigurumi style (working a continuous spiral in double crochet) and took many failures before I got the shape just right. Too big, too small, too fat, too thin, too egg-shaped, too dog-like.....argghhhhhh!!!! The body and the jumper are both made as flat pieces worked in rows of double crochet. In theory I should have been able to nail this part of the design pretty easily, but in reality it's not as simple as you might think to turn a flat thing into a sheepy thing. I had a lot of issues with the proportions, and so many of my early attempts looked like dogs and ended up flying through the air in the direction of the bin.

However, I am not one to give up easily and after a mini herd of dog-like creatures were made and rejected, I eventually got me a sheep. Pheww.

The other thing I found interesting was how the face could change so dramatically by altering the stitches by mere micro millimetres. Placed too high up, and the dog was back (sheep features need to be right low down, just saying). Stitch the eyes too close together and the cute look is replaced by something rather shifty. Or possibly deranged. But as with everything else, all it needed was patience and practice, and by the time I arrived at sheep number 437 I really think I got the expression just right.

So after several months of rather tense trial and error, I managed to write the pattern and make a neat picture-heavy tutorial, oh deep joy! As always, the pattern is right here on my blog for you to use and enjoy for free and I would be thrilled if you felt like whipping yourself up a sheepette or two. Keep them, gift them, sell them for charity, have fun with making them just the way you want them.

{WOOLLY SHEEP PATTERN}

 As I said a bit ago, before I began rambling about the chew of making a sheep look like a sheep and not like a deranged dog, there was mention of a Creative Community project for Yarndale*, which involves gathering together a whole flock of woolly sheep. I wrote all about the project over on the Yarndale blog if you want to pop over and have a little read. You can find out about how the sheep will be involved with fund raising for charity, and all the details for making and posting a woolly sheep to join the flock.

{YARNDALE CREATIVE COMMUNITY PROJECT}

In fact, little woolly sheep have already begun arriving from all over the world, gathering together to show off their fabulous woolly jumpers.....

....each one has such character, and the Yarndale* team is very grateful to everyone who has already contributed with so much hooky love and creative flair. I have made a start photographing each individual sheep so that I can create a visual gallery over on Pinterest. That way I can share all the beautiful and creative details (there are some real beauties!) and you can find out where each sheep has travelled from. I'll let you know as soon as that's up and running.

There is still another four weeks until we close the gate and round up the final flock, so if you fancy joining in, go grab your hook and have some sheep-filled fun!

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*Yarndale is a creative festival held on 24th and 25th September in North Yorkshire, UK. It is a for-profit organisation, and I am one of the five organisers. For more details, please visit the website www.yarndale.co.uk

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Yarn Infested Thoughts

Whilst I was away from the Attic through June and early July, a great deal of my time was filled with yarn infested thoughts. This is a busy time for me with a huge amount of Yarndale work happening behind the scenes, so I really appreciated a chance to take off for a couple of days at the end of June to visit Woolfest in Cumbria. Being one of the organisers of Yarndale means that unfortunately I don't get to experience our fabulous festival in the same way that a visitor would. And as I had never been to Woolfest before, a visit with no agenda other than to delight myself with a great deal of yarny goodness was a real treat. I loved being at the festival - as expected, it has a very similar feel to Yarndale, but I would say it's rather more "woolly", with a strong emphasis on natural fibres. Where Yarndale focuses on Creativity, Woolfest has it's focus very much on the Wool. It was a joy to see so many beautiful, real, live sheep, to be able to squish and stroke so much lovingly produced yarn and chat to the amazing people who love to share their talent and passions.

But even better than all the yarn put together was the fact that I was away from home for two days and one whole night, child-free (holy smoke, the luxury of that!!), and got to hang out with my most lovely friend Christine. We had such a laugh, and I came home feeling very inspired, relaxed and energised after my break away.

Two weeks after Woolfest and I was off again on another yarn infested jaunt, this time a short train journey across Yorkshire to rendez vous at the Stylecraft Mill in Slaithwaite. Now this was something I'd been really looking forward to for many weeks, a day to meet up with a small group of wonderful knit and crochet bloggers, a day for a heap load of yarn chat over a delicious lunch, a day to inspire, connect, share and make friends. It was completely brilliant I have to say, and there is nothing like chatting to people who share a combined love of yarn and blogging. It was fun, friendly and hugely inspiring to hear everyone's blogging stories, to share our thoughts and inspirations and our plans for the future.

I have been lucky enough to visit the Stylecraft Mill a few times now, but being a part of an amazing new Bloggers Meet-up was a completely new thing for me. I don't always find social situations easy as I am naturally quite a shy person (I am getting better though), but everything about this day was designed to make us feel good from the moment we walked in the door. I was truly delighted to realise that once we all sat down together I immediately felt I was amongst good friends and the day just got better and better.

So you may be wondering what all this was actually about? This is a brand new initiative created by Stylecraft Yarns to celebrate and support the knit and crochet blogging community. Twelve bloggers have been chosen to make up a Stylecraft "Blogstars" group, with the idea that we can all learn from each other, share ideas, preview new yarns, and generally help spread the yarny love. Spreading the joy of yarn and creativity is something each of us does already through our blogs, so this is a way of bringing us together and celebrating the sharing I guess. In the photo above there are nine of us, so three who sadly couldn't make it to the first ever Blogstars meet up. Do you recognise the other bloggers in the photo with me? I'll tell you who they are and give you links to their blogs so you can go have a pootle.....

From left to right > Katherine of Crafternoon Treats : Sandra of Cherry Heart : Heather of The Patchwork Heart : Julia of Hand Knitted Things : Phil of The Twisted Yarn : Helen of The Woolly Adventures of a Knitting Kitty : ME (!) : Sarah of Annaboo's House : Sue of Susan Pinner Yarn Art.

The other three who were there with us in spirit were > Emma Varnham : Jane Crowfoot and Angela of Get Knotted Yarn Craft.

You can also read more about each of the Blogstars here.

Aside from the thrill of having so many amazing writers and designers all on one room, we were treated to a fascinating insight into the way Stylecraft designs and plans their yarn and pattern ranges. As someone who is very much Of-The-Moment when it comes to designing and making, I am really rather in awe of the huge amount of forward planning that goes on in the yarn world. It's the norm for yarn manufacturers and designers to be working at least 18 months in advance, and "trend forecasting" is used to predict the moods, colours, shapes and fashion elements that will be influencing all things yarny in the seasons to come. We were shown a couple of mood boards which will lead the way for  the Autumn/Winter 2016/17 season, and honestly it is so hard for me to grasp that this was all put together way back last year! I can barely think about what I might be doing next week, let alone next month/season/year. The above mood board is influenced by a trend named "The Humble Labourer" and is all about rustic textures, patterns and an earthy, natural colour palette.

And this one is named  "World Marauder" which is all about rich jewel colours and intricate decorative patterns. Fascinating, no?? We got to preview some beautiful new Stylecraft yarns inspired and influenced by these trends, and my favourite (by a long chalk) is this.................

..........oh, so delicious! This is a brand new range of yarn called Stylecraft Batik - can you see how the rich colours were inspired by the Marauder mood board I showed you up above? This photo isn't particularly good I'm afraid (was in too much of a giddy spin to focus properly at the time), but let me tell you the yarn is absolutely LUSH. It's very very soft and springy, surprisingly soft and tactile actually, to say that it contains 20% wool (it's an 80/20 acrylic/wool blend).

The yarn is DK weight and comes in 50g balls. Interestingly it's been designed specifically with crochet in mind - the twist of the fibres is quite tight which makes it smooth and non-splitty and lovely to hook with. At the Blogstars meet up we were given a very generous goody bag to bring home, which included the above 16 shades of Batik. Lucky, lucky me. This yarn has sparked a tonne of ideas to whizz into my Creative Mind, but so far I'm only at the stroking and smooching stage. Did I tell you how soft and springy this yarn is? It really is. So Batik has already hit the shops this summer in all it's pretty yarny yumminess. Do let me know if you start a project with it, I'd love to see!

Here in the Attic, there is lots of yarny stuff simmering on multiple creative burners as usual. I'm already working on a colour palette and new pattern samples for my next blanket which will begin at the end of the year - I'll be launching a new yarn pack in November, ready for an Attic24 Crochet-A-Long to start in January. The colours are really beautiful, inspired by the Yorkshire Moorlands which I love - can't wait to show you more!

In the meantime, I'm working on adding printed patterns to some of my yarn packs which don't yet have them - the first will be the re-make of my Original granny stripe blanket....

....then an updated pattern for my Rainbow Raindrops cushion.

At the end of September I'll have a new bag pattern to share with you too - this is my Weekend Bag, and it's been a long time coming!

I'll be making a full tutorial for this cute cross-body bag to share for free here on my blog, and I'm thrilled that there will also be three new chunky colour packs launching at Yarndale, then online in my shop with Wool Warehouse after that. Two of the chunky colour ways are shown above, plus there is a third one in shades of blues and greys. I am excited to share this with you at the end of next month - better get busy!!

 

Gosh, this feels like it's been a long, overdue catch up, I feel a bit dizzy from spilling it all of a sudden! And breeeeeeathe.............

One last thing to mention whilst I'm on the subject of bloggy stuff and yarny carry ons - I was thrilled to find out that I've been nominated in the British Knitting Awards again this year - these awards have become pretty prestigious and a great acknowledgement of the dedication and passion found within the yarn industry.

I've reached the top five nominations in not one but two categories (sooooo chuffed!) - "Favourite Crochet Designer" and "Favourite Crochet Blog". Wooohooo! If you fancy casting a vote for me, that would make me very happy indeed....voting is for UK residents only (due to the fabby prizes up for grabs), and ends on 28th Aug. Here's the link...

http://www.letsknit.co.uk/britishknittingawards/

♥

As ever, it's a pleasure to welcome you into the Attic for a chat and a catch up, thanks so much for the company as I bungle through my busy yarn infested days. Now I'm going to go grab a cup of tea and take a bit of a breather before cooking dinner.....see you again soon xxxxxxxxxxxx

 

 

 

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Riverside

Ahhh the summer holidays, I can't tell you how much I love these long sweet, slow days we are having here. J returned to work today after having the past two weeks at home, and although we haven't done anything much in this time, it has been soooo good. At the start of the holiday our car broke rather spectacularly and expensively, so we were without wheels for almost the whole week while it was being fixed. At first I was stupidly cross about it, stamping about the place and complaining endlessly about how we weren't able to get out and about like I had thought we would - I had all sorts of ideas for going places that suddenly shrivelled to nothing. But after a few days I realised that everyone else was completely OK staying at home, the Little Peeps were happy doing their own thing with friends, J was content just being home and not in the office, and it was only me being ridiculous. So I adjusted my mind set and slowed myself down, and all was right in my world again. We enjoyed some lovely little local pootles close to home instead - we walked into the green of the woods one day (in the rain haha) and down into town to have a pub lunch another day. I took Little Lady and Little B out into town on separate occasions, small treats and one-on-one time for each of them (new lego for Little B, a new top for Little Lady). The Teen went about his independent ways as usual, happy doing boy-things on two wheels with his buddies. It was relaxed and slow, and the perfect start to the Summer.

Having our car back last week meant that we could finally head further afield, although we still didn't end up going that far. We made the most of the beautiful Yorkshire Dales countryside right on our doorstep and took the Little Peeps to Grassington and off on a five mile walk across hill and down dale. We also enjoyed a couple of strolls along the river at Bolton Abbey, it's a such a beautiful time of year to be at the riverside.

We are still an early rising family even in the holidays and are usually up out of bed at six am here, sometimes earlier. I've grown used to it over the years with the Little People growing up, and have come to love the early part of these long, light summer days.

These photos were taken around 8.45am one morning last week, we hadn't planned for it but the warm sunny weather had tempted us to get together a flask of fresh coffee, some jam sandwiches and orange juice and head out early.

It's not a long walk this one, just a few easy miles along the river on the edge of the Bolton Abbey Estate.

The Little People don't mind it as they know it well and know it's a breeze of a walk (along one side of the river to the big stone bridge, cross over, then back along the other side of the river)

The light was so lovely on this morning, all dancing shadows and lush greenery.

The weather has been very mixed these past two weeks, well this is a British Summer after all, we expect nothing less in this country! It means that the warm sunshine days are even more special when they arrive, and I for one certainly appreciate the snippets of summer time that land on us amongst the days of grey and rain.

We love this river beach and have often stopped here with the Little People.....

....the river moves slowly here, a gentle, shallow babble over small rocks and smooth pebbles.

The beach is mixture of smooth pebbles, golden sand, grass and flowers and the atmosphere is incredibly peaceful. It's a lovely place to spread out a blanket and enjoy a morning coffee and a bit of a quiet ponder.

There is also the usual gentle riverside activity - lots of stone skimming (oh Little B, so nearly able but not quite yet, keep trying!), drawing (Little Lady with her sketch book), stone tower building, feather gathering, duckling and cloud spotting.

After a chatty stroll back to the car, we all unanimously decided that a quick stop at the nearby Strid Wood Tea Rooms would be in order, well it is the holidays after all.

So we treated the Little Peeps to ice cream....

.....and a most delicious cappuccino with a hot buttered toasted tea cake for J and I.

Our Summer holidays are slow and gentle, but I wouldn't have it any other way.

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