Thursday 31 August 2006

Hmm

I accidently purchased a pannini maker. I've only had it since friday. Suffice to say I am now on a fruit diet to counteract the effects of all the mozzarella, tomato and basill panini's I have consumed in the past week. Blimey they taste so good, and they make perfect wool dyeing food.





Friday 25 August 2006

yay!

I have another helper today, Elly, its so much fun having people to help!



I dyed a load of yarn in these colours yesterday:



Mauve_and_green_lace_weight



I wish so much that I had the patience to knit this lace weight up.



Wednesday 23 August 2006

Rainy wales.

So much for my hopes of dyeing loads of yarn today, it pouring with rain and thundering like mad!!. There is only one thing for it on days like these, and thats lots of cups of tea and cake and working in my lounge. I've updated lots of things in the shop, lots of new yummy wools, some hand spun, and lots more colours to come very soon once the rain has passed! Ohh and other lovely news, so I took on my first employee, and hunky young man called Andy who just loves wool. He's a complete star, and works very hard. I might even pop a picture up of him skeining wool later. He-he.



In non knitting news, I've had a bit of a major break through with Anth. Obviously breaking up is a really tough thing to do and as you can imagine tensions have been running high, and unfortunately we work together in psychology and share a great deal of our social life, so its not an option not to see him, but every time I have over the past couple of months, its been torture, and I have felt unjustly persecuted. I went on a Buddhist course  last weekend, ( I'm a Buddhist) and I really really wanted to work out why the hell it kept happening. In the middle of a lecture, the lecturer was talking about how our environment is a reflection of whats going on inside, they are completely linked, there is no separating them. The lecturer made a joke about the fact that if the image in the mirror is not bowing, its probably because you are not bowing to the mirror. That sort of stuck in my throat a bit and I had a huge realization that despite the fact I was trying to be 'nice' to anth I was actually feeling very angry and blaming towards him inside. So I decided to just let it all go because it takes so much energy to be angry with someone than just to be their friend. So Next time I saw him I decided to see all his amazing qualities and let go of all the crap. I was absolutely stunned at the result I got, we had a fab time together, and we both left feeling great. Its continued as well, and I really feel like we are actually going to be able to be the bestest of friends. I am so amazed at how a change in my attitude, changed everything. Anyways, just thought I would share that little experience with you.



J xx



Thursday 17 August 2006

A gorgeous wood turner!

A new line of yarn for fyberspates, its so yummy and soft, and knits like butter. I'm so desperate to knit something gorgeous in this stuff, its alpaca and wool, yum, yum, yum!



Alapca_and_bluefaced



So I wanted to really work on the spinning supplies side of my business, and coming really really soon, I will be selling hand dyed British merino, yes thats right British merino! and some very soft british fibres. Why british you might ask? Protecting the environment is extremely important to me and I aim to reflect that in my business. All of my packaging is recycled, even my labels come from used envelops. I'm sure alot of you are pretty clued up on this, but shipping and flying things accross the world creates a great deal of polution. So by sourcing as much stuff from my England Scotland and Wales means that I support British business and help the environment. Yay!



Anyway so back to the spinning! I set my freind who is a builder a challenge to make me some hand turned spindles to sell in the shop and at ally pally. And look what the result is:



Spindles



These will be for sale very soon, and many more. They spin beautifully.





Tuesday 15 August 2006

The cutest things ever!

So I'm slowly updating the website, and obviously I have to try out all the things I sell, and I'm now completely addicted tho these:



Picture_018



Picture_019



So these wonderful things are mini sock key chains. They come complete with key chain and really good instructions, all you need is the odds and ends of your sock wool to make yourself the best presents in the world. This is my first, and now I just have to make one for everyone! They are £2.99, postage 50p. Heres the link. I just know your gonna love'em!



Friday 11 August 2006

I'm back!

So I've been without a computer for a few weeks now, because I've had some holiday from work and Obviously I can't use A's anymore, so I had to take the plunge and buy a new laptop. So here I am back with lots of pics!



So I've just had a week of holiday, with my friend, we had a lush time, and because we are both skint, we had to thing of ingenious ways to entertain ourselves. Suffice to say we had a scream. I think my favourite day was spent 'borrowing' some plums from a beautiful plum tree and turning it into the most delicious chutney and ketchup. We spent the afternoon stoning them in a beautiful garden, I felt so Mediterranean, it was lovely. We also commissioned something called a rum pot to be made, this is something special also related to using 'free' fruit! Basically its a large pot, and you put say a pound of fruit, what ever is in season at the time.....plums for example! Add the equivalent sugar, and them cover it in rum, then as more fruits come into season the you just keep adding more, making sure it is always covered be rum. You need to have a plate like disk, to keep the fruit down under the rum. The at Christmas you have a rather delicious alcoholic concoction. Apparently fruit is very good on ice cream, is you can still scoop it out by then! So we commissioned a pot to be made especially by Winchcombe pottery I'm so excited for it to be finished!!



In addition, I have been ordering scrummy yarns like crazy for ally pally and the big autumn shop update. There is some seriously wonderful stuff coming, including keyring sock chains. Email me for details, they will be up in the shop soon.



And I have been knitting YAYYYYYY!!!!!



Here are my finished autumn socks:



Finished_autumn_socks



Then I decided I really needed a one skein wonder that fitted, and see how it would work with some hand spun....



One_skein_wonder



And of course I have to have a pair of socks on the go at all times!!!



Summer_socks



I am so desperate to knit all the time, I'm so excited about designing things for ally pally.



Can't think of anything else for now.



j xxx