I have been watching Youtube videos from Snapdragon Life and in one of the old ones Jane explained that her auto-immune condition, and the medication which helps her manage it, mean that she needs to start the day slowly so she lies in bed doing some simple knitting until she feels ready to get up. Ever since I was pregnant with my first child (now aged 50!) I have taken a mug of tea back to bed in the mornings before getting dressed and starting the day and since John died I have read whilst sipping. But the idea of knitting appealed to me. Not a jumper or anything else large and complicated which would need too much concentration and be difficult to handle in bed but a small simple project.
As a child my favourite Aunt and her husband had one of the early Dormobiles and travelled around Europe every Summer in it. On the beds were blankets made of knitted squares in lots of different colours made by Aunty Nan and she always took some yarn and needles with her on those trips and made more squares which she stitched together over winter and gave to charity. I loved the tales of adventure and discovery she told of their trips.
My Dad was a keen beekeeper and over each Summer we went with him on visits organised by the Beekeepers Association to members’ apiaries. One was in a field where a couple kept their bees and spent their summers living in a re-purposed railway guards van. I have no idea if they went ‘home’ when the weather was bad or where they spent their winters! They, too, had blankets of knitted squares on their beds. I loved their spirit of adventure and the idea of living in a small cosy space.
So two couples who, to my young eyes, lived lives of adventure and unconventionality connected by their choice of bedcovering – no wonder I also love blankets made of knitted squares or granny squares! Periodically I have made a few squares when I have wanted to knit but inspiration has been slow to arrive. I have a large collection of small balls of leftover yarn. So for the last few weeks I have been knitting simple 6 inch squares in the morning and have found it a lovely way to start the day. This is my collection, old and new, so far.
Check out the blogs of the other members of the group for more inspiration.
In November I was debating what goals to set myself for 2026. Those for 2025 which I reviewed in my previous post had been helpful and I want to go on exploring local places (But hopefully not Hospitals!), trying new ways of growing and new plants, making different meals and sitting down to enjoy them and marking the 8 pagan / Celtic Festivals. But I didn’t want to add more of that type of aim. When I was learning Welsh the tutor spoke of asking an elderly neighbour how she was and her reply was Cadw Mynd, Cadw Mynd – Keeping Going, Keeping Going. I concluded that that would be my goal for this coming year.
After all I am in the middle of the redesign of the veg patch and when I finish that, including building a fruit cage, there will be only another acre or so of garden to do! And as I get more tree saplings the new Woodland which I started in memory of John will continue to need planting and the paths will keep on needing clearing. Then there is the knitting for Gaza – both my own knitting for the refugees and the encouraging of others to do the same. And I am still a Trustee of Dyfed Permaculture Farm which means attending meetings and workdays if I can, plus sometimes work in between researching or setting out ideas for discussion. And I am a director of the company my daughter set up with the money from her divorce which owns a student flat in Falmouth. At the moment that requires very little from me but it may demand more in the future. The kitchen needs redecorating too if I can manage it. Surely that is enough. No need to add any more.
Then Danny and Helene left and I started to reclaim the workshop which I had invited him to use and he had taken over more and more. In doing that I realised it needed another major declutter. I did it a few years ago but was still unsure what I would feel I wanted to take on in the way of repairs and maintenance and so which tools and materials I would use. Well now I am pretty sure I know what I want to keep but also what I want to add – like a big sturdy bench all along the South wall. And guess what? I have another big project! But at least it is a rainy day one.
Then the gutters fell off. I have paid a very nice handyman to cut away all the rot and redo the timber and plastic and put up new gutters re-routing some of them. I will be paying someone else to pressure wash the walls so that I can repaint the concrete render, at least all the high up stuff, while the scaffolding is up. Which means that has to be done by March or I will be charged extra by the scaffolders but it can only be done in dry weather with no risk of frost. Hmmm.
My eldest Grandchild, my son’s daughter, now lives in China and has got engaged to a Chinese airline pilot so it is unlikely she will be returning to the UK to live. As she is in her late 20’s she plans to start a family soon and has asked me to use a website called Remento to record, on video, answers to various prompts she has chosen. When she asked if I would be willing I thought how much I wish I knew more about my grandparents. Both my Dad’s parents died before I was born and my Mother’s mother died when I was 2 months old. I have a photo of my maternal grandmother holding me at my Christening but of course never knew her or spoke to her. My Mum’s father was bedridden until he died when I was 8 so I hardly knew him either. So I agreed to do the recording and my son paid for a camera to go on my computer and Laura helped me set it up. Remento will send me one prompt each week but I can do them in batches if I prefer. Each recording is at most 30 minutes but I want to do it properly so there is time thinking about the prompt and what I want to say. Not a huge project but another one to add to the list.
Way back before Covid I contacted the local Council’s footpath Officer because I wanted to see if I could find an off-road circular walk I could do with the dogs without having to drive somewhere first. He was very helpful and printed off for me copies of bits of the ‘Definitive Map’ which is the legal record of Public Rights of Way. There are quite a few near here but most are overgrown and crossed by barbed wire fences because they are rarely used and where there were wooden bridges over the river those had gone. Between one thing and another I didn’t do much about most of them. I am not a good map reader and it was hard to work where the path should be if it had become invisible. But I did use one section which ran through 3 fields until the farmer put a chain on the gate. There was no real reason for the chain – there was a working bolt to keep the gate closed and he didn’t ever put cattle in those fields. When he realised I was undoing it and putting it back as we left (but not necessarily quite the same way) he started making it tighter and tighter until I had to climb the gate and lean all my weight on it from the inside to be able to undo it. So I contacted the Officer again and he had a letter sent to the farmer explaining that he had to allow access. But my query and the ensuing conversation prompted him to send one of his team to survey the paths around here and quite by chance I met her when I was walking the dogs. She was lovely and reckons it would be fairly easy to re-open most of them but the footpaths team rely on local volunteers to do the work – did I know anyone else who might be interested in using them and putting in some effort? Well, I had been asked by one chap who has recently moved in if there were any good dog walks and Laura is up for it. As it was me who started all this I think I have to get involved and do some of the work. Whoops! Another project! I have downloaded the Ordnance Survey App which the surveyor was using so that is a start.
I started to feel overwhelmed! But I have decided I just need to go back to Cadw Mynd, Cadw Mynd, and keep nibbling away at them all. There is a Permaculture Principle which I find very useful and reassuring – Start where you are, Use what you have, Do what you can. The first 2 are fine, the third may turn out to be ‘ not much’!
I am effectively housebound today. We have had days and days of rain culminating in a heavy downpour yesterday which resulted in widespread flooding along the river valleys. Looking at a plastic container left out in the garden we have had about 8 inches / 200 mm of rain in the last week or so. I am fine. The stream at the bottom of my garden is very high and very fast but the bank on the opposite side is lower than on mine so if it overflows it goes away from me and also my house is higher up the hill. There is a shallow lake outside the back where water coming off the ground above gets stuck for a bit but so far at least it hasn’t breached the damp course. But the roads are a mess and we are being asked not to drive unless we have to. Gravel and dead leaves have accumulated on the bridge and new potholes have been gouged by the fast flowing water running down and over drains and gullies blocked by fallen leaves. I am staying home where I am safe, warm, dry and I have ample stocks of food even if some more fresh stuff would be welcome. There are many people in many parts of the World who are not so lucky.
In particular, like many of you, I have watched the conflict in Gaza unfold with increasing despair. To put it into context I worked out that the Gaza strip is roughly one fifth the size of Ceredigion or Pembrokeshire and one eighth the size of Carmarthenshire, the 3 counties which surround me. During the recent conflict 50,000 people have been killed including 412 Aid workers and at least a million people have fled their homes. Whilst some of those who have been displaced may now be able to return, most of the places they go back to are piles of rubble. Homes, workplaces, schools, hospitals and much of the infrastructure supplying electricity and water have been destroyed. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the conflict that is a huge number of people in serious need. And most of them will be innocent civilians including children, the sick and the frail. I tried to imagine how we would cope if that happened here, or near you.
I am appalled at how the International community and my own Government have stood by and let it happen with seemingly nothing more than hand wringing. But what can I, an older woman living in remote SW Wales do? Writing to my MP seems to have no effect. Demonstrations are ignored. I have felt powerless.
My son, Hassan, converted to Islam over 30 years ago and shares my concerns. He has spoken out in all the ways he can find to no avail. But together we came up with a plan.
I may not be able to do anything to stop the conflict but I want to help in some small way. So I am knitting. Knitting garments for people who fled with only the clothes on their backs. For people who are sick or injured and unable to get the drugs or operation they need. For babies who were born on the run to exhausted and terrified mothers. For people who are hungry and have no access to food or clean water. Garments that say there are people in the world who care enough to make them a useful gift. Warm clothing is a practical gift for the cold winters. But also a demonstration that I cared enough to put my time and skill into making something for them at a point when the World seemed to have turned away from their distress. And I could ask other kind hearted people to help me by offering their time and skill to make things. So far I have enlisted the help of businesses in a number of local towns who are displaying posters and holding boxes to collect garments. I need to find more but it all takes time and energy so progress is slower than I would like. Once we have accumulated enough for a consignment my son will take over.
His part in all this is to use his wide network of contacts in the Muslim community to find the best way to get the gifts to where they are needed. At the moment the Aid Agencies are focused on food, water and medical supplies and rightly so as they are the most urgent needs. But one day, eventually, other aid can be sent and we hope to be ready with plenty to send.
If by then the only people left alive in Gaza are Israeli military personnel and ‘settlers’ Hassan will consult the Palestinian Authority, through their representatives in London, on the best use of what we have made. There will be refugees who managed to cross the borders and other Palestinians in need in the West Bank. Nothing we make will be wasted.
If you live in Pembrokeshire, Ceredigion or Carmarthenshire can you help me please? If not could you organise something where you are?
By knitting or crocheting any garment in any size / pattern / colour / yarn and taking it to one of the collection points (email me for your nearest) or contacting me to see how we can add it to the collection.
By encouraging others to knit or crochet (I can supply posters as a PDF if that would help)
By collecting what is made (I can have plastic storage boxes delivered to you and collected from you when full)
My contribution this month is a child’s jumper. I didn’t have enough yarn of any colour to make it so combined 3 part balls. I used a very simple pattern given away free when there was a project in Cardigan to knit jumpers for refugee children. The shape made it easy for me to work out where the colours should change!
A simple bird made entirely from knitted squares. I saw one somewhere online and decided to have a go – no pattern just knitting the body square and then making wings and tails to fit. I plan to make more and construct a mobile for the conservatory just for fun.
Scrap Happy is hosted by kate and Gun and anyone who makes things out of scrap of any kind can join in – just contact one of them using the links below. Not all of us post every month but all the blogs are worth looking at anytime.
I was planning to wite a post this morning about heating my home but paused to read the new posts from bloggers I follow (as you do!). One was from KDD designs, part of a series of posts by guests about working with colour. They have all been interesting but I found this one particularly inspiring with its suggestions for exercises to do, and thought I would share it with all you other crafty folk.
My Scrap offering this month is the second cover for a chair seat for Mrs Snail (see the link to Jan below) for her new shop. This one was knitted using a base colour of oatmeal with flashes of green, lilac and brown, stripes of a novelty purple yarn – think tinsel in red green and blue with lots of soft purple strands mixed in – and several small balls of other plummy colours.
Newly knittedAttached to it’s backing (part of an ols curtain) and stapled to one of the chairs in the shop. On its left is the first one I did in crochet.
Scrap Happy is curated by Kate and Gun (links below) on the 15th of each month – a glorious collection of posts about making things from all kinds of scrap. Do have a look – inspiration may strike!
Last winter I knitted quite a few pairs of socks and for each I bought a ball of yarn. But each pair uses less than a ball so I had a basket full of 4 ply yarn in various colours. It sat there looking at me reproachfully! But what to do with them?
The first chilly morning of the autumn came a week or two ago and when I put on my coat to walk the dogs after breakfast I decided it was time to get my gloves out. One pair was in holes and when we got back home the other was soaking wet because it had started to rain. I really need two pairs each winter so that I always have a dry pair. Inspiration!
The pattern I used last time was for DK yarn but looking through my books I found this one I bought second hand at a craft fair a few years ago.
And in it a pattern for gloves in 4 ply with a fair isle pattern. It is such an old book the pictures are all in black and white!
Unfortunately for me the pattern said to buy one ball of the background colour and one each of the pattern shades. Clearly it did not takes several balls of yarn to make one pair of gloves! But there I was with an unknown quantity of yarn in each left over ball and an unknown quantity required for the gloves. Hmmm!
Putting different balls side by side I decided to use some plain purple for the unpatterned parts and some self striping blue for the area where the fair isle should go. I rather like the result.
I still had yarn left over on each ball and would probably have had enough of just one but I think the contrast works rather well. Now I just have to decide whether to make more gloves or find another use for the rest of the yarn. Mrs Snail’s granny squares look nice so maybe….
You may remember that a while ago I wrote a post about things I had been making, including 2 cushions. (If you missed it you can read it here) One was a present for my daughter and made of fabric, the other was knitted using some wool left over from another project. I noticed that I made the fabric one during the day and the knitted one in the evening whilst sitting with my feet up. Which sort of made sense – to cut out fabric on a big table or to sew on the machine I go into my studio over the utility room. To go up there after dark when it is colder took more effort than sitting in front of the fire.
But now spring has come, the evenings are light and the weather is warm and still I only do sewing in the day! Then I realised that I had inherited this pattern from my mother. The more I thought about it the more curious it seemed. It was only when I began to remember my childhood home that it all began to make sense.
My mother kept her hand powered singer sewing machine (so no integral light!) in the tiny ‘boxroom’ which had a fold out camp bed for visitors but was essentially used for storage. To use the machine she carried it down to the living room and used the dining table so it had to be put away in order to serve the evening meal. After that she would sit with my father and watch TV – and knit at the same time.
I also realised that, like many houses of that era, there were no table lamps, and certainly nothing like the flexible task lamps we have now. In fact, I now remember, there wasn’t even a standard lamp which she could have had by her chair. Each room had a central pendant light so that to do sewing involved moving a table so that the light fell on it (but never as bright a light as I would expect to have now) or positioning it in front of a window. Another reason for sewing in daylight. Knitting, of course, can be done with weaker light – at least if it is fairly simple. Hers always was rather ‘functional’! Endless plain jumpers in sensible colours.
Now my studio is well lit with strip lights down each side of the ceiling and a choice of task lights. I have a fan heater in there so that I can be warm whatever the outside temperature.
So Why? Oh Why? can I not sew in the evening or knit in the afternoon? But I feel ‘all wrong’ if I try!
If you are still bound by old, irrelevant rules I would love to hear about them. I would feel less stupid!
I love making things but haven’t posted about the creative side of me for a while. It was only when I was reviewing some photos that I realised how many things I had made recently.
The first was a blanket for my grandson Sean. Since he started at Swansea University (read about him here )he has been saying that he is sometimes cold in his room. I suspect that he has been sitting still for too long late at night – hopefully studying but probably gaming on his computer! He had been taking his duvet cover off and wrapping himself up in that so I thought I would make him a blanket. He is young, male, only recently domesticated and there is not much space for him to store things in his room in Halls. So I used synthetic double knitting in boy colours! And since I get bored knitting a whole blanket in one piece I did squares and crocheted them together. To make it more fun I devised a number of variations on a theme of stripes of stocking stitch and reverse stocking stitch.
Then it was my daughter’s birthday and I spotted a remnant of linen in the Ecoshop in Cardigan. Just enough to make a cushion. I had some felt left over from making Christmas decorations and there were tulips beginning to flower in the garden. Hey presto..
Looking for the felt I saw most of a ball of Aran weight wool left over from a jumper I made a few years ago. Several of my own cushion covers are coming to the end of their lives so I fiddled around and devised a pattern. There is a similar amount of blue in the same yarn so maybe there will be a pair soon.
Then Mrs Snail and I went on a course at Studio 3 in Cardigan to learn how to make a coptic bound book. She has already blogged about our day so you can read about it (here) Mine was a birthday present for my son so I had to stay quiet about it until now!
Finally my new friend Roni came over and showed me how to turn a bowl on the lathe. She is a professional woodturner (find her here) and makes some beautiful things but also proved a very good and patient teacher so it was great to learn from her. We found an old piece of wood which was already cut into a disc shape but it proved to be rather rough and a bit too old so it was not worth sanding and polishing. Even so I was quite pleased with what I produced and have started on another with a better bit of wood.
Apart from the book they have all involved designing as well as making so my creativity has had quite a good workout recently!
Going Batty in Wales 