Stitches Galore

Almost a year ago, I was busy planning flowers for a very special wedding. My cousin’s daughter, Claire, was getting married and there were to be flowers. Lots of them. I was excited to catch her vision of what she wanted, but also anxious as this was only my second experience of planning and arranging wedding flowers. I worked closely with one of my cousins who, like me, had handled flowers before as we planned out our strategy, which was thwarted once by the coronavirus-COVID19 restrictions (the wedding date had to be moved from July to September) and was shadowed by an increasing number of cases and the potential of further last-minute changes right up to the last few days before the big day. Thankfully everything worked out the day proceeded as planned and was beautiful – but back to the flowers… First up there was the floral arch. Providing the backdrop to the ceremony, this was to be colourful and bright and was to use silk flowers as it had to be transported to the venue thr

It's been a long time since I posted. So much has happened that it is hard to know where to start. Mum died unexpectedly in February this year. I miss her so very much that I still have a very physical heart ache when I think about her - which is almost all the time. To be honest, I would not want it any other way. I am just sorry every day that we didn't have longer together and that I wasn't able to do more for her. I'm not going to write much about it. There have been many, many things written about grief and loss and while everyone's grief experiences are unique in the way that everyone is a unique individual, there is more commonality in grieving than you might expect. What I do recognise, however, is how life changing events can impact on living. Some may think of life changing events as graduations, finding the person you share your life with, weddings, the birth of children. I see these as life affirming events rather than life changing. For me a lif

I have been thinking a lot lately about friends and the meaning of friendship. As a child, making friends didn’t come easily to me, so those friendships I had were very precious, and I suppose that established a pattern that followed me into adulthood. Working full time in a demanding job with a 3-hour commute several days a week has meant that some of my closest friends and confidants are work colleagues. It makes sense as we spend most of our time working together in a tight knit team, supporting and encouraging each other. Consequently, I have had less opportunity to cultivate friendships in other areas of my life. Where we have invested in friendships in the past we have often found that a change in circumstances was enough to cause the connections to wither. This happened some years ago when we were struggling with infertility and, as each couple in our circle of friends began their families, they inevitably moved on to establish friendships with other parents with whom t

September saw the publication of the Year of Techniques book - in a way it turned out to be bittersweet. The surprise element that had been so much part of the experience had gone as we were able to see the remaining six patterns, yarns and techniques. While each of these were super patterns, there was, for me, a sense of very slight detachment from the forums as there was no longer the excitement of guessing the technique and designer. In reality, the mystery phobic me had turned out to be someone who found that actually, mysteries were not that bad after all! The book itself was perfectly formed - and it was so good to have a step by step photographic reference to the techniques alongside the patterns themselves. Clearly laid out and very engaging, it will be a go to source to refresh my memory about the techniques in the future. Indeed, the accumulation and integration of several of the new techniques in subsequent patterns meant that having the physical book for the last six mo

The next techniques and patterns introduced me to new challenges and to new yarn and I was really enjoying the anticipation and surprise and the camaraderie and support on the Ravelry threads for each project. The accompanying videos were so clear and informative you were never at a loss for direction. Knitted on edging - this was the first real hurdle for me. I tried the cast on several times before I was happy and did proceed to knit the whole hat, mastering the complex lace repeats until I reached the edging. To be honest, I did not complete the project and block it to ensure that it was the right size. I tried it on and it was too small before the edging was added. I had to be really honest with myself and acknowledge that I was unlikely to wear the hat and thus it would probably be wiser to quit while ahead, and reuse the yarn in another project. This is did successfully within a couple of months, but more on that later. Turning a heel - I have knitted many pairs of

For a long time I avoided knit-a-longs, and in particular mystery knit-a-longs. I'm the sort of person who quite likes to know what I am going to get, and although I nearly always admired the end result when I saw pictures of the finished objects, and thought that if I had seen the picture first, I might have joined in. I envied those who could blithely trust the designers to produce a worthy design. So when I heard of  A Year of Techniques (AYotT) I wondered who could commit to a year of projects without knowing exactly what they were getting into. A few weeks passed and gradually I began to realise that this was just what I needed. I signed up in February in the middle of trying to deal with Mum’s confusion and inability to recognise me. I was finding it hard to concentrate on any crafting or knitting, but recognised that I desperately needed the therapy that only yarn and needles can deliver to the confirmed knitter. So, AYoT came along at just the right time - a pattern a