Edinburgh Yarn Festival!

This past Saturday was the first Edinburgh Yarn Festival. It was fabulous, and I really hope they do it again next year! I'll definitely sign up to volunteer. Having a fibre event like this so close to home was great. It really took the pressure off - I didn't feel like I had to see everything all at once, since I knew I could wander back home and come back again if necessary. I didn't take too many pictures, but hopefully these give a feel for the atmosphere.

When I arrived, I was greeted by this bizarre creature.



It was incredibly crowded on my first circuit of the stalls, but by the time I made it around for a second look, it had calmed down a little. Still, the place was heaving.



I dropped most of my loosely-determined budget at Old Maiden Aunt. The stall was placed in a sort of bottle neck / dead-end, which exacerbated the crowds... It is easy to see why everyone was heading there, though. So much beautiful stuff.



Giant creepy clown face watched over the proceedings...



And here's Ysolda's big rack-o-samples. The fangirl in me did squeal inwardly at handling these original, beautiful pieces. I declined the offer to try some on, mostly because I was wearing a soggy raincoat and didn't want to fling moisture everywhere. (The weather that day was pretty awful - all the more reason to frolic inside with the wool).



All in all a great time. It was pretty overwhelming to see all this gorgeous stuff in person - most of my yarn-ogling happens on the internet, which just isn't the same. I always feel a bit awkward chatting with people who do things I admire - but everyone I spoke to was lovely. I picked up so many cards to facilitate future internet purchases, in addition to the yarn I bought on the day. Swag pictures coming up!

Last of the loot

We stopped in Liverpool on our way down south for the holidays, and I had to check out Purlesque. It's an exceedingly cute shop on top of a vintage clothing boutique - not much in the way of yarn, but oh my the buttons! Buttons are quickly become my most-stashed item.


No idea what I'm going to do with 3 kettle buttons, but I'll figure something out. Possibly as decoration on some sort of hat.


I bought these little things with the intent to make more button earrings. As I was leaving the shop, my DH pointed out that Purlesque actually sells these exact buttons made into earrings already. Great minds thing alike?

Anyway, that's the last of the "Look what I got!" posts for now. I'll have some more WIPs and maybe even an FO to show soon.

button heaven

Well. The week kind of got away from me there. I blame the sun. The sun! The last few days have been absolutely lovely, and I've spent lots of time outside away from the hopeless little screen. (But probably not enough.) Glorious. This is our summer, so I should enjoy it, since it'll be proper Scottish weather once again soon.

Ahem. Anyway, I did go to Duttons for Buttons when I was in York. How could I not?



The ground floor is where the buttons are. It's small - there's enough room for a few people to turn around in, provided nobody is flailing excitedly. The small size adds to the impact of the button-covered walls, however.



Since each box has a tiny compartments filled with each of the button varieties shown on the outside, the actual number of individual buttons in this shop is staggering. SO MANY BUTTONS. It was great fun poking around in there.

The rickety stairs up to the other floors beckoned, so up we went. Since it was pointed out on my last post about York, I feel a bit bad about how many of my adventures require decidedly unaccessible locations for those with mobility issues. I'm very very lucky that I am able to walk extensively and climb stairs, and in my situation of privilege I don't automatically think of those who have different abilities. The fact that I can do these things while others can't is sad and unfortunate. There is obviously work to be done - however, in some cases I'm not sure what can be done. Installing a lift in an tiny old medieval house like Duttons for Buttons? Yikes. The whole place might tumble down! Get on it, engineering.

In any case. The other floors of the shop have needlework supplies and yarn, and the very top floor has this gorgeous roof. Between this and York Minster, I was sufficiently humbled by medieval engineering. Built to last, indeed.



My mom is a crafty-type as well, with several overflowing boxes of fun old buttons at home. I grew up rummaging through them happily, and probably developed my button-love as a result. I don't recall ever specifically going button shopping with my mother before this, but given the circumstances it could have been disastrous. As it was, she walked away with a grab-bag of miscellaneous buttons to add to that collection. I goggled over them all and settled for two blue buttons. Perhaps not that exciting by themselves.... but check out what I made with them.



I have my button studs at last! I decided that I didn't want the shiny earring post base showing through the button holes, so I cut a bit off the base and positioned it slightly off-centre like so:



Tada!



The perfect souvenir from my day in York. I don't think I'm entirely finished with button earrings, though. Now I want them in every colour. Naturally.

Memories and Adventures in York

On Monday, we went to York for the day. I first went to York when I was about 12 on my first visit to the UK, and hadn't been back since. G had never been. I have lots of half-remembered memories about that trip, and it was interesting to see what came back to me. In York we met my mom, who is currently on tour in the UK, and she was able to fill in some of the memory gaps and details from that first trip as well.



Maybe it's the North American in me, but I love cities with medieval streets. There's nothing quite like them back home, where pretty much the oldest permanent structures date from the 1700s. It may be cheaper and more efficient to have straight roads and concrete, but it certainly isn't as charming.





We paid a visit to York Minster and climbed all the way up the tower, as has become our habit when traveling. On that first trip to the UK, I remember going to the top of several cathedrals, but not in York. So there's a new memory added. I hope I never get tired of climbing to the top of things and looking down at the tiny world below.



I remember walking on the city walls on my first visit - this time, as we walked on the walls, I imagined what it would be like to have such a monument in my backyard.

Like so many old European cities, York is a fabulous place to explore on foot, and that is my favourite kind of exploring. The old part of the city is compact enough that it is easy to get around, and it's not overwhelming for just a day trip. Of course, there's more to any place than what the tourists tend to focus on, and I certainly wouldn't mind spending more time there.

A crafter's visit to York would not be complete without a stop at Duttons for Buttons, but that adventure is for another post!

swag - fairly restrained edition

After teasing you about my Woolfest swag, I feel I should preface this post with a simple fact: despite the abundance of amazing things present, I didn't buy very much at Woolfest. Part of me isn't even sure why, though it probably comes from two directions. First, I'm not a big spender at the best of times, and I'm still coming out of my unemployed-for-nearly-two-years cheapness hole where I felt guilty about each nonessential purchase (and sometimes guilty about the essential ones). Second, the event was so overwhelming that I didn't know where to look or what to look for.

Anyway. I went to Woolfest with one yarny item on my shopping list: red aran-weight wool yarn for a hat for my Grandma. I came home with the following:



See the red yarn? I thought not.

The yarn I did buy is from Sparkleduck - it is called Stratus, which is a BFL/Silk/Cashmere sockweight yarn. The colourway is Mallard, appropriately enough. It is semi-solid - there's more green than shows in the photo, and it is decidedly not dull-looking in the least. I will probably make a scarf or shawl from this, since there is no way I'm putting a yarn this fancy on my feet. Sparkleduck's entire stall was filled with amazing colour, and it took me ages to pick one to take home with me!

In the above photo, you can also see my fancy houndstooth Woolvember badge, that I purchased from Kate Davies' stall. (She wasn't there when I wandered by, so I was spared an awkward starstruck tongue-tied encounter, I guess. More on this theme later.)



I also bought some fabulous buttons to add to my growing collection of buttons I have no idea what to do with. The ceramic one is large and chunky and would be a good accent on a hat, I think. The wooden square ones are made of reclaimed floor boards, and I just like gazing at them, so who knows what they'll be. I'll enjoy them in the meantime.



Speaking of starstruck encounters, Lily and Amanda France (whose blogging and designing I follow avidly) stopped by the Ruth and Belinda stall, and I blurted out "HELLO! I KNOW YOU FROM THE INTERNET!" or something equally eloquent, and proceeded to babble for a bit. Apparently I was the first to recognize and accost Lily at Woolfest that day, but I'm sure it happened many more times. Haha. Anyway, they were obviously lovely and not phased by my awkwardness.

I also met Heather from the Nude Ewe, and had my mind totally blown when we realised we'd gone to the same high school in Canada. Small yarn worlds! We weren't at high school at the same time, but in any case that has never happened to me before. Amazing. I'm ashamed to say that although I'd heard of the Nude Ewe prior to Woolfest, I hadn't a clue what they were all about. Now that I know, I'm fascinated - yarn spun from the fleeces of conservation grazing sheep. Genius.

In summary, yay for Woolfest! I met so many interesting people, saw so many beautiful yarns, and had great fun communing with the woolly beasts. Now I see why fibre events are such a big deal.

And... Woolfest!

I have returned from Woolfest! It was great fun, exhausting, overwhelming, and inspiring. Also, cold and wet - it poured all day on Friday, causing flooding and transportation difficulties the following day.

Here are Ruth and Belinda selling their wares. It was lots of fun helping them out, meeting lots of great people, and being surrounded by lovely, squishable yarns all day. Because of the awful weather, it got quite cold in the Woolfest barn on Friday, so we all wrapped up in the samples to keep warm.



When I had the chance, I explored some of the other stalls, but found it all quite overwhelming. Aisle upon aisle of yarn / wool / fibre / animals / craft materials... It was hard to know where to look first, and difficult to focus! I admire those organised people who kept track of which stalls caught their eye so they could find them again later. I wasn't so smart, but I bumbled through and saw plenty nonetheless.

I loved seeing everyone wearing their own creations. It occurred to me that I look at lots of knitwear online, but in my everyday life don't see many handknits outside of knitting groups. A fibre festival gives people the opportunity to really show off their handiwork, knowing it is perfectly acceptable to accost strangers and admire their gorgeous shawl or cardigan.


I also saw lots of creatures. These hebridean sheep are possibly the strangest looking ones I've ever seen.


And alpacas. Awww.

One memorable encounter was with an older fellow who was going through examining all the wooden buttons / shawl pins / accessories on offer and identifying all the woods used. He said he wasn't a knitter himself, though he used to help his mum out when she was losing her sight by picking up her dropped stitches with a crochet hook once she'd put the knitting down for the day. He was wearing a gorgeous cabled sweater in perfect condition that his mum had made for him when she was 89. He was in the process of reconstructing the end of the sleeve of another sweater she'd made; it had come unraveled in an aggressive spin cycle, but he was reverse-engineering the pattern using a crochet hook and some pliers. Well, damn. I'm impressed!



I'll be back soon with another post on swag and the rest of Woolfest.

Festivities

Yesterday the Olympic torch relay came to Edinburgh.



We caught up with it in town. I'm ashamed to say I haven't a clue who the torchbearer we saw is. But everyone was pretty enthusiastic, with even the motorcyle cops that preceded and followed the procession arousing huge cheers.

What you don't see on the BBC torch-feed are all the sponsorship buses that head up the procession. It was a bit weird seeing these buses with cheerleaders standing up top, and people walking beside to hand out promotional goods... all this took probably twice the amount of time the torch was actually in view.



Most of my pictures are pretty terrible and blurry, or have other people's body parts obstructing the frame. However, I quite like this one I accidentally captured, with the reflection on one of the torch buses.

Glorious

It's summer here! We've been enjoying the beautiful sunny weather the last few days, especially given the unpredictable nature of weather here. This may be the only summer we get, so I feel obligated to experience it to the fullest. This means exposed limbs, sunscreen, iced coffee / tea, windows thrown open wide... and picnics!

Yesterday, we cycled up through Holyrood Park, and spent the afternoon picnicking on the grassy slopes.



One of the best things about Edinburgh is the possibility to escape to the hills right in the middle of the city. The gorse is blooming brightly, ducks and swans abound, and we even saw a kestrel hovering, on the lookout for rodents / lunch. (But didn't get any photos of it. Ah well).



I've gone for walks here many times, and fancy myself quite capable on the hiking front, but this is the first time I've cycled up - apparently my cycling muscles are non-existent! (Seeing as I can't remember the last time I rode my bike, this shouldn't be surprising. Still, it was difficult.) In any case, the outing forced me to make sure my bike was still roadworthy, so next time I take it out there will be less work to do. I'm hoping this is an incentive to bike more often.

Hogmanay

Happy New Year, blogosphere! Hogmanay celebrations in Edinburgh are A Thing - a 3 day festival to bring in the new year. We weren't in town for it last year, but decided to take in some of the free stuff this time around. Things kicked off on Dec 30th with a torchlight procession through town, followed by some fireworks and burning stuff. (They do like their fireworks here).



See all the twinkly twinkly lights? Apparently there were 6500 people with torches this year. And nobody got set on fire! Amazing. (At least, not that I heard about...) Led by some dudes dressed like vikings, plus several pipe bands, they processed through town up Calton Hill.



Then there were fireworks and pyrotechnics set up in the monuments on Calton Hill. Okay, so this picture isn't very clear, but you get the idea.




And a bonfire - it started out as a straw sculpture of some dancing figures.

I think I get a kick out of all this celebratory fire because none of it would be allowed where I grew up. Not only are you not allowed to drink in public places there, but thousands of people carrying open flames through the streets? Haha - not likely.

I took some shaky video of bits of it, and have inexpertly spliced them together to make a highlight reel here:


Bring on 2012!

Halloween/Samhuinn in Edinburgh

Let's start this NaBloPoMo with some pyrotechnics! That's what I like to hear.



Last night, the Beltane Fire Society put on a show through the streets of Edinburgh to represent the arrival of winter. As we waited for the parade to come through, I was suprised and bemused to see it preceded by a zombie walk - I'm a little annoyed I didn't have the presence of mind to take some video as a gory zombie walked towards me mumbling "Staaaarbuuuucks" and grabbing at my chai latte. Priceless.


St. Giles' Cathedral looking spooky

The Samhuinn parade itself was impressive. It started on Castle Hill and wound down to the big show at West Parliament Square in the shadow of St. Giles. Body paint, costumes, puppetry, dancing, drumming, and, of course, fire pervaded the scene. Although I'm not very familiar with the mythology of Samhuinn, and I couldn't always follow the story or identify the characters, it was really fun to watch.


Fiery crowns



Apologies for the quality of the photos - they are all screen captures from the mediocre video I took. Here are some of my favourite moments, and you can see all of them here.


A red character accosts my boyfriend with a mysterious note.


The denizens of summer march to the oompa loompa theme

What did you do for Halloween?

Adventure!

The other day we set out for a great adventure. (All my adventures are great.) We went to Bantham beach, and enjoyed a sunny day by the sea. I swam in the Atlantic ocean for the first time! The water was pretty cold, which probably goes without saying, but I had so much fun.



From Bantham, you can see Burgh Island, the real-life inspiration for Agatha Christie's island setting of the book And Then There Were None. I find that kind of exciting, since I grew up on Agatha Christie, and always loved that novel in particular.



Getting there was an adventure in itself, since we got lost and had to ask for directions 4 times. We also encountered a tidal road that floods and becomes impassable during high tide. Luckily, it turned out we didn't have to drive down that road to get to our destination. Fun times.

Dickensian Demons

The Christmas decorations are out at the local mall. This is the first holiday season that I've been here, so I hadn't seen how the mall celebrates Christmas.

There's an array of characters decked out in Victorian garb, include a tree seller with a fistful of American cash, some children laughing at their friend who has fallen on the ice, roasting chestnuts, etc.... It's terrifying. I just had to go out and take pictures and videos of it.

There's a full nativity scene, complete with a stunned looked Joseph, a plush Eeyore-esque donkey, and my favourite: a totally smug camel.


Moving along, there are some Victorian carol-singers making unfortunate faces.


And the best part? All of these figures are robots that move. In slow motion.



I imagine "Christmas on Acid" by the Vestibules playing in the background when I walk past these displays.

When I was taking pictures, a woman came up to me and said something to the effect of, "It's such a nice display. An old-fashioned Christmas!" I laughed nervously. She sounded so proud and satisfied that I felt a little guilty knowing I was taking these pictures in order to ridicule them on the internet. But anyway.

Word: Clochard

Oy, Thursday again already?

Clochard
a beggar; vagrant; tramp.
~dictionary.com

Last weekend was Thanksgiving (Canadian edition), but I didn't have any turkey. Instead, I went to a pub and ate fish and chips. I only eat it about once a year - that's enough. Maybe a new Thanksgiving tradition? I'm a fan of turkey, though. Hm.

But today I made my first quiche. This counts as trying a new recipe, although I barely followed a recipe.



And I don't have a pie tin at the moment, so it's a square quiche. (I'm thinking of making a pie in it just to say pie are square...) Anyway, the deliciousness of this quiche does not come through in the flashy wonky photo.

Here's what I put in the filling:
onion
garlic
mushrooms
green pepper
spinach
eggs
rosemary

Next time I may add some cheese, but it's pretty good without. I'm still not used to eating cheese. As for the crust, I kind of winged that, and it's a bit obvious. It is not the most brilliant crust, but I don't mind. Next time I'll follow the recipe. It calls for yeast, and since I didn't have any (and was too hungry to deal with the rising) I just whipped up something vaguely dough-like and went from there.

Toronto adventures, belatedly. picspam

The last 12 days have been full of adventures (and non-adventures) with one of my favourite people ever. But yesterday he went on his merry way and I'm being shocked out of vacation mode by classes and assignments.

I spent a day or so in Toronto exploring (#58!) while waiting for his plane to land, and afterwards. While I did poke my head into Lettuce Knit while wandering around Kensington Market, the only knitting content I can claim for my time in Toronto is this:



In Toronto, we wandered around being tourists


Appreciating detail


Witnessing a practice airshow


And relaxing


I received a beautiful gift from Venice


Lastly, saw some amusing graffiti on a tank in London (ON): contains swears!


Wheeee! I'm excited for December already :)

Epic shower rescue adventure

I should probably stop referring to everything I do as either "epic" or an "adventure" or both, but on the other hand, it's my life and I am rather excitable and easily amused. So, here's my latest epic adventure. In the shower, of all places. (Excessive Long-windedness follows)

A disadvantage to having long hair and lots of it is that it gets everywhere. I probably have no right to complain about the cat rubbing his face on my sweaters and shedding all over them, because I'm sure he's just returning the favour: he has to deal with my long hairs all over the place. Sometimes he rubs his face against my shoulder and comes up with a face full of hair that he has to bat away. But I digress. The other main disadvantage of long hair is the rate at which drains get clogged. I live with 2.5 other girls now, but I think my hair is the longest, so I'm totally willing to pitch in and clear the drain when necessary because I figure it's mostly my fault. I did so today, even though I hadn't intended to do it so soon since I've only lived here for a week and a half.

What happened was, as soon as I got in the shower today one of my beloved golden hoop earrings fell off. I say beloved because, well, I love them and I wear them almost all the time - now I have some new beloved silvery ones that I wear most of the rest of the time. Anyway, I sleep in these earrings because they are seamless hoops that don't have pokey studs or anything, and I certainly don't hesitate to shower in them. But one fell out today, and slithered down the drain, and I cursed and nearly cried, and jumped out of the shower into the frozen air and set about trying to right this problem. Given that the drain was clogged with a mess of gross old hair, I knew all was not lost.

After first setting on the drain with my hands (as gross as it was) I found I needed new weaponry. So, I grabbed a handy tool box and attacked the gross, sludgy mass of drain hair with some thick, grippy pliers. The earring was nowhere to be found in the first layer of grime, which made me nearly despair. At least it would drain faster.

Then I got a flashlight and peered down into the drain, and there it was! A glint of shiny yellow metal in a bed of grayish congealed crap about 3 or 4 cm down from the opening. Gross, but so encouraging. It's this sort of thing that renews my interest in archaeology. The pliers were unfortunately too large to fit far between the crosspieces of the drain, and I know I brought my needlenose pliers with me but I couldn't find them at the time, and anyway they would have been too short.

Out came the Allen key (sp?), with its handy crook that I thought would be ideal for fitting into the hoop and lifting it out of the muck. Lift I did! Alas, the Allen key wouldn't lift easily out of the small hole at the right angle: every time I tried, I had to maneuver the key such that the earring slipped off and back into the sludge. Sigh. I brought out some floss to try to thread through the earring so that when it dropped off the Allen key it would still be attached and within reach. Floss is floppy and doesn't hold its own when poking in a dark drain. I tried using a knitting needle, 5 mm dpn, in addition to the Allen key to convince the earring to emerge. Stubborn thing would not.

Every so often it would disappear in the murk and I thought I'd lost it forever. I'd like to think I'm not so hung up on material things, but in reality there are some material things that I really would prefer not to lose. But more poking and prodding would cause it to emerge once more.

I tried many things, running back and forth between the bathroom and my room across the hall to gather tools, half-showered and in my bathrobe, perplexing a housemate with my bizarre inquiries about long needle-nose pliers and the like, and apologizing for totally monopolizing the bathroom.

But I rescued the earring, finally! With a floss-threader, of all things. You know, those plastic large-eyed needles flung at teenagers by dentists and orthodontists to encourage them to floss despite the impediment of their braces? Yeah. I stuck it down loop-first into the drain, hooked it onto the earring, and lifted. Simple! Why didn't I think of it first?

I only have floss threaders because back in the day I was one of those kids with braces who ignored most dental suggestions that I floss, but accepted the small gift of a package of floss threaders every check-up. I started flossing religiously after getting my braces off, perhaps to make up for lost time, and I'm a committed flosser now, but not in those days. I still have one wire behind my bottom front teeth that I need to use these threaders for, so it's a good thing I have a lifetime's supply.

Needless to say, I'm pretty pleased with myself and the outcome of this harrowing rescue. Now to soak the earring in something nasty and disinfectant for a while.

Getting lost; epic grocery adventure of doom

I have fond memories of wandering aimlessly around Exeter when I first moved there, getting slightly but not irrevocably lost. The romantic notion of getting lost in a new place, however, far outlives the actual experience of getting lost, if my London wanderings are any indication. I don't remember feeling anything other than excitement when learning my way around Exeter, but I probably had periods of frustration that I have forgotten. Or perhaps it's just less fun to wander around in the cold and the slush with several kilos of groceries, fumbling clumsily with a map and asking identical strangers plugged into ipods for directions. Epic.

An epic and ultimately less useful than planned adventure to a big ol' sprawling mall followed my first library class. I was determined to find Bulk Barn, which wasn't where I thought it was, but I eventually did find it after first walking far out of my way to the intersection I thought it was locate at, then wandering sheepishly back where I had come, asking a Zeller's lady for directions. Then, they didn't have any lentils, which I think is inexcusable. No lentils! Especially since I had already gone to Loblaws and bought everything else but specifically had not bought lentils in favour of getting them bulk. Thwarted again! Small battles, small battles.

The distance traveled by foot today was sizable from all the walking in circles, you know. But it probably wasn't as much as it felt like, because like an idiot I decided to go to Loblaws, which was immediately in view, first - before finding Bulk Barn. Whatever. It worked out. I have food enough for days and days, though I have no lentils.

And I even had my first class today which was kind of interesting, and slightly terrifying. The terror I am trying to suppress by telling myself "I survived 4th year Hums; this is bound to make more sense." They are doing their best to freak us out about the workload, so I started my readings today and promptly found out that antelopes may constitute documents. Sweet.

Tempting II will be done in the next week or so, I say perhaps optimistically, and then I'll have more knitting for this blog. Until then, ramble ramble ramble.