Psycho Delia: ta-dah!

It's here!  It's happened!!  Delia is COMPLETE  :D

Remember when it was all just circles?

...and the cirlces grew and grew...

...and the piles of circles got bigger and bigger...

...and then the circles turned into squares.  It started to get exciting...

...and the excitement grew at each step...

...and along with the excitement, the worry that it might not work...

...that maybe it was just too psycho...

...it required a lot of patience and persistence.

It felt giddy to be joining the last sqaure...

...and sad to find that the border colours just didn't quite reach.

But it got there eventually.  It was worth it...

...and the thousands of ends just celebrated the achievement.

Now take a deep breath.  Stand back and see: ta-dah!

Wow!  I'm a little bit stunned.  All along I worried that it was just going to be a massive mess, and all of that hard work would have been wasted.  And then it got to the end, and I realised that I loved it.  Strange, eh?

*

It's only fair to credit all the hard work that other people put in designing the patterns and techniques I used on this:

The main pattern is Lucy's Summer Garden Granny Square

And the general gist of the composition is inspired by Lucy's Sweet Flower Granny

The border follows this brilliant crinkle-free pattern

My Ravelry project page is here

I used mostly Sylecraft Special DK (you can read more about that in my post here, although I didn't end up using all the colours listed).  I also used some other balls of DK acrylic mixed in.

The finished blanket measures approx 153x108cm, with 13 large sqaures, 98 small squares and a grand total of 1002 ends.  It took approximately 1 month to finish.

It's also an absolute pain in the bum to get a decent photo of the whole thing!

Trefriw Woollen Mills - A Daytrip

Trefriw, I discovered today, is an absolute marvy place.  The bus journey between there and here is brilliantly scenic - lots of rolling hills and dappled forests and grazing sheep.  No pictures of that I'm afraid, so I'll make up for it by bombarding you with others I took today ;)

But of course, you're here for the wool not the flowers!  ;)

Trefriw Woollen Mills are amazing.  Honestly.  A fully working mill, they're completely open to the public to wander round and see the process of tapestry making from raw wool to carding and winding and weaving.

I was particularly fascinated by the spinning mules, since they were invented by Samuel Crompton in my hometown of Bolton.  More-or-less all of my primary school years were spent learning about how the Industrial Revolution wouldn't have been possible without ol' Sam C.  That's probably not entirely accurate, but it was amazing to think that a lot of my ancestors - right up until my grandmother's generation - would have been working in mills like this one on exactly the same machines.  It was spellbinding to see (and hear!!) them in action :)  Have you ever seen the programme "who do you think you are"?  It felt a bit like that, but if I was Welsh and not Northern...

Unfortunately, I didn't take many pictures inside the mill, as I wasn't sure how permissible that was, but I couldn't resist taking this one:

Oh crikey!!  Just LOOK at all those cones of pure wool, spun right there in the same room.  I got quite giddy just at the sight of it all!

And if I thought that was exciting, boy was I happy when I got to the shop!  I really wanted a traditional bedspread (they are seriously gorgeous, but they are also seriously pricey so I'll have to save up).  I settled myself with some wool instead...

And I already have plans :D  I think it'll be perfect for a new pattern I've been contemplating.  More on that to come soon!

I hope that your day has been as happy :)  And if you do get chance to visit Trefriw, I really really recommend it!

Kim x

Psycho Delia

Oh dear.  Blog week didn't go all according to plan here at eggbird did it?  I'm quite sad I missed out, but these things happen.  I wasn't feeling too great last week, and lost interest in a lot of things that I usually enjoy - blogging seemed to be the worst hit.  Sod's law really, but happily I can report feeling much more enthused now and normal service should be resumed forthwith!

The squares you see at the top there are the starting blocks of my new BIG project, which I'm pretty excited about.  But first, I'd like to share a story.

 
You are of course all aware of the terrible tragedy which happened in Japan.  A couple of weeks ago, a group of Japanese students in Bangor started fundraising for the Red Cross.  They did a really amazing job, and raised an incredible amount.  As part of their efforts, they organised a cultural day: an event to promote Japanese culture which would also raise funds to send to the Red Cross.  My friend Yuka asked if I would like to be involved by crocheting things for people to buy.  Since I only had a couple of days, I needed something quick and simple, so I made some Pretty Little Petals (you can find the tutorial in the sidebar) in the colours of the Japanese flag

We asked only for a small donation for the flowers, but people were incredibly generous.  It was a fantastic day, with so much love and support for the people of Japan and for the Japanese students in Bangor.

And then on the way home from evening service on Sunday, we were approached by a friend of a friend of a friend, who from nowhere asked "are you the girl who makes the flowers?"  That was a strange feeling I can tell you!!  Such a strange coincidence, but it really lifted my spirits when I'd been in need of them lifting.  And now I have another Japan flower made which will be passed via friend via friend via friend to someone I don't know.  Awesome!  Just goes to show that kindness and love is always returned somehow or other when you most need it :)

*



Psycho Delia - or Granny P. Delia - is finally making progress.  I had so many false starts, I uhm-ed and ah-ed about colour combos (hence the psychedelic reference in the project title), I very nearly gave in and sold off the Stylecraft via Rav (madness I know!!).  But then I looked again at Lucy's Sweet Flower Blanket from which I'm drawing my inspiration, and decided to just GO FOR IT!  Hurray for Lucy, eh?!

Even though I'm joining-as-I-go, the amount of ends already trailing about is really rather frightning!  Good thing I can ignore those for a while then!!

Anyway, I'm very glad to be back in blog-world - now all that's left is to catch up on all of your marvy posts that have stacked up in my reader!

Much love,

Kim x

Granny in the Attic: ta-dah!

I'm very happy to introduce the newly finished Granny in the Attic (link will take you to its Ravelry project page).  Isn't it gorge?!

It feels so long since I stumbled upon this beauty on Lucy's Attic24 blog; so long since I was showing my mum every granny stripe photo I came across and repeating I just can't wait to make my own!!  (Sorry mum!  ;))

...it feels like a very long time ago indeed since the first batch of yarn arrived; so long since I set up this very blog just to chat about it.  I love that picture of each ball waiting patiently for its transformation :D

I sort of wish I'd taken more pictures of Granny's stripe-by-stripe progression.  Imagine how brilliant a time lapse video of her construction would be!  (Something to keep in mind for the inevitable Granny 2.0 I think)

Granny grew quickly.  Very quickly!  Many people have said the same thing about their own Granny projects - that there's something about them that becomes extremely addictive.

This, I think, is quite peculiar.  When you consider the criteria that many people (myself included) use to distinguish a good pattern from bad, there'll often be a nod to "not too repetitive" or "complicated enough to sustain interest".  By the time I finished my first blanket - an extended granny square - all I felt was relief.  I hated not just the double crochet, but crochet itself.  I despised it.  In fact, I didn't crochet anything else at all for almost a year.

But this time, I could quite happily start another Stripe tomorrow.  Most peculiar!  Perhaps it's watching the colours unfold?

...my colour philosophy for this was simply "balance".  There was no hard and fast rule, just a general idea of not having two colours in the same order twice, whilst keeping the stronger reds and yellows distant enough from themselves that they didn't overwhelm the other shades.  This didn't always work, but I just went off instinct - if a colour choice broke a rule, but still looked good, then what the heck?

Now all I have to do is work out what to do with the leftovers...
 

There are a few ideas up my northern sleeve which were inspired by a recent trip back to Manchester.  All I need to do now is sit down with a hot drink and an episode of Heartbeat, and work out how to bring them to life...

...luckily I know just the blanket to keep me company while I do so ;)

Hatchling

Flicking through my sketchbook, I came across this page I doodled a few weeks ago.  Each of the birds is based on a google image, mixed in with a lot of artistic license.  Incidently, the little robin-esque bird on the bottom left is where the name of this blog came from (it's a happy looking egg I think.)

As always, I doodle these things full of intentions and promises, then semi-forget about them, or forget what they were for.  My attention span at times is just shocking!

But I brought this page out of hibernation to have a go at some embroidery.  It's not perfect, but I'm pretty happy with my first attempt at satin stitch.  I don't think he's finished yet either - I want to change his eye and beef up his wing a little bit, and perhaps give him a border of some sort - but I am excited about where he's heading.

He's taught me a lot (3 strands of floss for the outline was perhaps too much, for example), and I think I still have plenty to learn from him.

Once he's fully finished and looks "right", I might offer up the pattern for free if anyone is interested in showing me how it's done ;)

I hope you're all having a happy first day of Lent :)

Kim

Grannies, Tulips & Butterflies

I'll admit that granny was having a bit of a snooze (no progress for more than a week!!), but as soon as I re-started, I was - as they say - hooked all over again.  ;)

It's currently 41 stripes long (82 rows!  Golly gosh), and only something like 19 stripes to go before it's border time!  Oooh, it makes me soooo happy happy happy :D

But, happiest of all is that the granny-bug has bitten not one, but TWO of my housemates!  Both came and requested I teach them the basics so they could start on granny stripes of their own.  I'll have to ask their permission to take photos, but they're both looking lovely.  Only one more housemate to convert *ahem* inspire...

***

Tulips are without doubt one of my favourite flowers.  These turned up on Valentines Day, during our anti-anti-valentines/embrace-your-singledom celebrations.  I expect that they'll show up in a few doodles later when I get round to scribbling down some ideas.

The trouble is that there are just so many ideas fluttering around my brain like little butterflies at the moment.  That's how my art teacher used to describe my thinking: "a butterfly mind". 

It's not a terrible thing in and of itself.  If anything, it makes me happy because at my lowest points my imagination disappeared completely and that was a terrifying thing to feel.  But having so many thoughts; images; colours; strands of sound at one time, it becomes exactly like trying to catch a cloud of butterflies: they don't want to be stuck down and tamed.

I hope it doesn't sound like I'm complaining though.  I try to embrace these periods - they make me feel well again :)

Green

Here's a little preview of something I've been working on for FAR too long.  Somewhere in the region of 4 months in fact.  And when you discover what a simple little thing it really is, you'll wonder how on earth it's taken so long.  I've not a clue I'm afraid.  What I do know is that it WILL be finished by the end of next week, OR ELSE!  ("Or else" what is yet to be decided.  An extension of the current self-imposed "no WIPs please, your indecisiveness is costing me a bloody fortune in materials" policy?  Probably not.  Maybe just an outright biscuit ban?  Hmm... something to ponder there methinks!)

Anyway, the real reason I start with this is because it's led to a bit of a new thing.  Namely, I can't stop buying plants (my dad will be so proud)

This is Henry.  His label refers to him as "a prickly desert friend", and I'll be honest, that's the main reason I bought him (what can I say, vague anthropomorphism is clearly a plus in my head).

Anyway, Henry is where it started.  Then I spotted Cuthbert (my friend Jo named him, just if you were wondering...)

So sunny and happy looking.  The yellow looks especially good next to the window, where the view is most decidedly un-sunny at the mo.  He reminds me of a couple of sketches I did a while back - there's the same kind of overlapping of petals/feathers/leafy bit going on...



...sort of...  I never did finish that parrot.  I love the shapes in the bromelia though, so no doubt I'll end up sketching that as well at some point.  I see it in a very symmetrical Art Nouveau style (but then again, that's how I see most things).

Probably at this point you're asking what any of this has got to do with that WIP up top.  Not much really, except that I only went into B&Q in the first place to buy the bits that I need to finish it.  I was fatally distracted by the "bargain!" sign (my Mum's turn now to be proud) at the checkout.

And now, even though it's gusting at about 50mph, and the rain is (as it always is in Bangor) falling horizontally, I'm setting off to walk back up to B&Q to buy the orchid that yesterday I decided was definitely too expensive.  It's quite a long walk though, so at least the exercise will do me some good!

Baby Rico's Granny

A surly postman knocked on the door this morn and handed me a parcel. I had a little squish of the bag and giggled. The surly postman got back into his van, mumbling. I giggled again. The Rico Baby is here!!

Admittedly, some Patons Diploma Gold and some Sidar Snuggly have snuck their way into that picture.  That's because I got overexcited about starting my granny stripe, and just had to do something.  Pretty sure you all know the feeling... 

(Although I would like to say that this time the urge to start wasn't even my fault.  It was Lucy's ...  Her blog is full to the brim with inspiration.  Look here at her granny stripe - how could I possibly resist?!)

And so, while I was ever so patiently waiting for my "main" yarn to arrive, I did a teensy, tiny, ever-so-small, little bit of hooking with the Patons, and here is what I have to show for it:

I love it already.  And the best part is that the shop I ordered from had run out of a couple of colours so there's even more on their way!  What a brilliant start to the day!  :D