Dates...

That's "Bockers", as in "knickerbockers," Mary-Lou (Comments, last entry)  The sort of underwear into which one might have been sewn in winter.  The pattern features a gusset, and presumably no picture for fear of offending public decency.  It would have been helpful for the knitter though.

Just as much of its time is this set of patterns from a booklet called  "The Aran Look" - pre-decimal coinage, so sometime in the 60s perhaps.

  Would anyone have left the house dressed in this get-up?  And imagine a country walk in Aran gaiters like this. 

A change of theme - around our village, various dated properties.  This one once fronted up the King's seeds site.  Growing plants for their seed was a major enterprise locally until quite recently.
(Click on the picture to enlarge.)

By the bridge over the Blackwater, this blue plaque:

 

 

Coggeshall Abbey was an ancient foundation, standing to the south of Coggeshall.  The remaining buildings are now a farm in private ownership, but the Grange Barn, where the monks stored their harvests, is run by the National Trust.

This one kind of brings it home to you, doesn't it?  Twenty years ago we had an allotment on that same Vicarage Fields.

 

Here's one where the date is very precise - and probably correct.  However, I used to rent a flat just behind this house.  The owner had brought up her children in the house pictured and one of her sons had trained as a wood-carver.  I think that horizontal beam - the bressumer - in the picture may well be his work, from about 1967.

 

 

And, finally, the clock tower from the village square, above the Clockhouse tearooms.  This counts as modern, for us.

 

 

 

 

Camibockers, anyone?

Alternate days of lovely, sunny, spring-like weather and bitter chill.  Last Sunday,  we ate lunch out on the patio.  Yesterday, it was a huddling sort of day.

Browsing the bookshelf at our cottage recently, I came across this little booklet, published, I think, in 1933.

I do remember the Scotch Wool Shop in our local town, Whitehaven.  It was right next to the department store, The Beehive, where we often shopped.  It did look like this on the outside, as - I guess - did the other 350 branches -  "a mile of shops."

In the booklet a wide selection of patterns, some impossibly archaic.

And the illustrations even more so.

 

However, one could possibly knit a cricket sweater for a twelve year old from this pattern.

 

 

Unfortunately, no illustration accompanies these instructions.  It does say "Begin at the knee..."so you would have some clue, but it is a while before it reveals that you are knitting one half of the garment.  I'm almost tempted to try knitting it, or should I say, them...

 

 

 

 

Colour Therapy

So - a smallish jumper for Knit for Peace, in a yarn so thick that each row adds about a quarter of an inch.  Should be a fun knit, you' d think?  Sadly, it proved very wearing on the fingertips.

This is a yarn recovered from a giant jumper I knitted for myself some ten years ago and never wore.  Nowadays it's layers of fleece for me on winter walks.  But this jumper looks thick enough to keep out the chills.

A pair of Newfoundland mittens in a colour scheme which hurts my eyes.  Strangely, someone from South Korea commented on how pretty these look, so maybe they will find a taker.

And, a third pair, using up thirteen different colours of acrylic yarn.  These really glow in the sunlight and were both quick and fun to knit.  Colours like these really lift the spirits.

Knitting from deep stash

On Ravelry recently a group was started aiming to knit only from "Deep Stash" for a while.  Non-knitters might not recognise this term.  "Stash" in this sense is your store of knitting yarn, and "deep stash" has been in there for a longish while - up to fifty years in my case.

Hard to believe, but there are some addicts who spend hundreds of pounds augmenting their stash, but never actually knit any of it.  Or else, they have lots of yarn in store, but always feel the need to buy more for new projects.  Now, that seems quite reasonable to me.  As does picking up bargains in the yarn line from charity shops as the opportunity arises, without a clear idea of what it might be used for.

Around our house I would say I have reached Peak Yarnage - ie almost all the storage spaces are full already.  Several carrier bags are floating free in our lounge, where they ought not to be.  So I am setting myself a challenge.

It is this: How many garments can I make from yarn already in the house? 

In fact, I made a start with those Sanquhar hats.  Many years ago, when my nephew was a small boy, I knitted a dark green jumper with a bright red tractor worked in intarsia on the front.  That dark green yarn must be almost forty years old.  Good to see it used up.

Just posted off already, to the same organisation, is this oatmeal pullover in Jaeger Shetland, made to The Una Vest pattern by Marie Wallin in "The Knitter."  It's a straightforward pattern and should be warm, but the finished effect on me was a little more rustic than one would wish.  It looked great on the young girl modelling it in the magazine, as is always the way.

Next up, these Newfoundland Mittens, a satisfying and quick knit.  The pink here is the remainder of two skeins of art Yarns sent to me as a prize for having knitted fifty of the Innocent hats for someone.  Lovely yarn, but with sufficient variation in the two skeins to make it more suitable for small projects.




 

Mountain Scenery

Meanwhile, seven and a half hour's drive to the north, winter still has a firm hold.  Scanning the forecasts before we went, we could imagine lots of cups of hot chocolate, huddled in the Dunes Coffee Shop.

 

However, we were pleased to find that walks were possible, with snow just frosting the peaks above us for maximum photographic appeal.  We began by climbing Dodd, just under Skiddaw.  Distances were hazy here, and there was a biting wind on the summit.  We met a family, Mum with small boy, Dad with even smaller girl.  Girl threw her head back and whined "Why do we have to do this?"  You have to say that she has a point there.

On the way down, the same family, transfixed before a tree, in which there was a flock of birds.  Chaffinches?  "No," my husband said. "Crossbills" - a bird he has never seen before.  They were feasting on pine-cones, using their crossed bill to scissors out the seeds.

So then we walked over Sale Fell, and round by the old, ruined Wythop chapel and the forestry road.  Very few birds to be seen anywhere.

On a day of brilliant sunshine and biting cold, we decided on the Newlands Valley, and we were not alone.  Families were herding their offspring up Cat Bells.  This was the day for views, with all the tops clear and snow etching the contours.

Finally, another day saw us on the well-trodden High Nook Tarn walk above Loweswater, one of our favourites.

Quite a bit of knitting went on during this trip, with its long journeys and quiet evenings in.

That's three little red cardigans, three children's hats in Sanquhar patterns and two pairs of baby mittens.
 

Signs of spring?

After a mild, wet winter some bitterly cold, bright days.  Up at the Marks Hall arboretum, things are stirring, perhaps prematurely.

 

Great drifts of snowdrops.

Early primroses.

Catkins.

Blossom in the walled garden.

Meanwhile, this spectacular variety of willow makes a good show.

On the knitting front, a batch of hats in the Sanquhar knitting tradition.  These may look similar, but each  has its own name and history: The Duke, Glendyne, Cornet and Drum, and Rose, named after Princess Margaret Rose in the Thirties.  Very satisfying to knit.

In Wonderland

To London, to meet my younger sister for lunch.  We had both noticed the exhibition of children's books at the Foundling Museum and so this is where we went.

 

 

The statue of Thomas Coram, founder of the museum.  The theme of the exhibition was "Orphans", of course, and focused on the illustrations.  An eclectic mix of pieces nonetheless.

We were very moved by some of the modern art work produced by artists and students, on the same theme.  A row of little white shirts on cloakroom pegs, the name labels replaced by things people said to the children.  A sheet of densely packed pins, with the bottom row somehow outlining letters.



 

 

From there, following Jean's example, we moved to The British Library, for the Alice exhibition, and tea.

 

Some more little jackets and hats.  I seem to have speeded up my rate of production.  I think that this is down to the stranded patterns which just seem to go faster, or motivate me to continue, or something.

Jolly hat and cardigan

 

Rosy hat and cardigan

Princess hat and cardigan

Scraps

 
 
 
 

 

 After all those little jackets, I end up with a huge bag of scraps, all DK acrylic.  So now, a series of jackets trying to use some of them up.  Yarn has a habit of multiplying when your back is turned, so I don't expect to get to the bottom of the bag any time soon. 

This first one worked up quickly - a simple Fair isle design from Sheila McGregor, repeated, and a rotation of pattern to main colour to give a bit of coherence.

 

 Interesting to see how the same theme in a different colourway looks.  Different Fair Isle patterns on this one.  I made the sleeves plain, as it occurred to me how tricky it might be to insert a new-born's arms into a stranded sleeve.

And a third one! It has been bitterly cold here, so I've done the odd stripe during the day, something I don't make a practice of.  This one looks like folk knitting, or the sort of thing you still see in hippy shops. 

And the bag of scraps looks as full as it did at the start.