My little brother

We're a competitive family... for years my brother and I competed about GCSE and A-Level results. My parents were the first generation of their families to go on to further education, they met at teaching training college, pretty impressive considering my Dad still doesn't have a Maths O-Level.
It was always expected that my brother and I would go to university, I went to Sheffield and got my BSC in Biology with a 2:1, Nick however had to go one better. A week ago he graduated, a First Class Masters degree in Aerospace Engineering. He starts his PhD in September.
The Boy done good...

Texture

Just up the road from us is Lake Vyrnwy, it was built by the Victorians to provide fresh drinking water for Liverpool, in true Victorian fashion even the water tower is ornate. Doesn't the photo above look like something from Europe?

Everywhere around here is "off the beaten track" very few people walk the footpaths through these hills, stiles are old and falling down. Lots of the fence posts were covered in Lichen. Such beautiful colours and textures.







The dogs had a great time pouncing through the grass pretending to be wolves, at times all your could see was Gwen's wagging tail!

Some more spinning

But not by me, it's some more yarn from one of my customers, and it's so gorgeous that I had to share.

This is one of the batts I made for the Tour de France this year called Maillot Vert, it's not available right now, but might make a re-appearance for next year's tour. It's a blend of Merino, Gotland Wool, Tussah Silk and Yak down, Elin, who spun it said that it was softer than she expected with a lovely halo (which will be from the Yak down).

Thank Elin for permission to use the photos, your spinning is wonderful. Elin blogs here if you would like to see more photos of her beautiful spinning- http://theknittingseaman.blogspot.com/

Mynydd

I've been a bit quiet on the knitting front recently. Lots of things going on behind the scene, but one of those things can now come out in to the open.
Meet Mynydd (welsh for mountain) it has a twisted stitch panel down either side of the leg and then rather cleverly (in my humble opinion!) splits at the heel to become a bit different as it goes along the side of the foot.
It's a really simple knit (the charts look harder than they are, but there are written directions as well), that works best in semi solids yarns.




The pink yarn is some rather bright pink from Collinette (I live 15 minutes from the factory), and the green is some Merino Dream from Fyberspates. If you like it then it's available to buy from Ravelry (you don't need a Ravelry account).



Gwen certainly seemed to like it as we were taking the photos!

Finished Objects

Now that my shop has been open for a while it's been really nice to see some finished things made with my fibre. My friend Jane was one of the first people to hear about my plans for my shop after I decided to leave teaching, she was also one of my first customers.

She bought this fibre



Some Merino, Alpaca and Silk, and spun it in to this yarn.


This is typical of how my fibres spin up, random patches of different fibres, to create something that's quite tweedy looking. I was amazed about how quickly she spun it up, I was even more amazed 2 days ago when she posted a picture of the finished shawl on Ravelry!


The pattern is Holden, and as ever with Jane's knitting is really beautiful. Go and have a look at her Blog, you won't regret it!

Gardens

I gave myself the day off today, partly because I needed a break (there's only so much fluff you can inhale in a week before you start to get high on the fibre fumes!), and partly because we needed to go food shopping.
Our nearest supermarket is 35 minutes drive away so we try not to go too often. We also call in the butchers in town. He wins lots of awards for his meat, and the service is fantastic, they always give us a bag of bones for the dogs too.
We also called in at the garden centre, the garden was a wilderness when we bough the house, and while there are some hidden gems, the brambles and nettles had taken over. Apparently our house used to be famous for the rhubarb it produced, and we did find a few very sorry looking plants hiding in the undergrowth, we're slowly nursing it back to health, but these things take time, as does filling 3/4 of an acre. We keep going back to the garden centre, and car boot full at a time it's filling out.

This was when we moved in, you can't see the giant conifer tree just out of shot, but a sense of the undergrowth is there just above the house. The drive was also a grassy, muddy mess, it took 18 tonnes of slate chippings to solve that problem!



Eighteen months later and the shrubs are becoming under control and the giant tree is gone.



Some of the few surviving plants were roses that were positively thriving despite years of neglect, after a good prune, they're growing really well.



This winter we dug a pond, the garden is full of springs, and has loads of land drains hidden away so we designed it to be filled with spring water, and have a natural overflow in to the other end of the land drain. The constant flow of water keeps the pond really clear, and the wildlife seem to love it.


In this picture you can see the gaps though, and gaps mean the weeds just keep growing, so the gaps have to go.
I think it will take a few more car loads though!

This time of year

I love this time of year, the days are at their longest, the garden is starting to grow, and it's time for the Tour de France. Now I don't really do physical exertion of the kid that involves riding a bike, but I love watching other people push their bodies to extremes. I've managed to watch most of the coverage for the past couple of years, one year I managed to contract something that was suspected to be Swine Flu so was kept off work so I didn't contaminate the whole school, and last year I was off sick.
This year of course I can pick my own working hours, and I can definitely sit and drum card while following the early stages of the race. If we get some sprints like last year though all activity requiring concentration is definitely off the cards!

I also love this time of year as I can sign up for some different kinds of challenges, while the cyclists are travelling around France, I'll be trying to spin something for every day that they're riding. I want to see just how much of this Shetland fleece I can spin up. I've already washed it, but I'll be carding it as I go along, so I don't expect to get the whole thing done. Sounds like fun, the Tour de FleeceGroup is on Ravelry.



If you feel like really getting in to the spirit of Le Tour then maybe you might fancy the Tour de France jersey's in batt form. The winners of various competitions with in the race get to wear jersey's of various colours, Maillot Jaune for the race leader, Maillot Vert for the best sprinter, and Maillot a Pois Rouges for the best mountain climber. If you buy the Tour de France batt set from the Shop then you get free postage.

I'm also doing the Tour de France knitalong again. I started knitting a lovely blanket pattern back in February, but since then progress has stalled so I'm using this as incentive to try and finish it off. I've done 2 of the 7 panels, so again I might not finish it.