Wild and Woolly

Ravelympics

Today is the start of the Ravelympics. It's another caper started on Ravelry, to coincide with the Winter Olympics in Canada. Participants can join different teams (I'm in Team GB) and enter knitting projects in appropriate events. The idea is to knit while watching the sports and complete your projects during the two weeks of the Olympic Games. The project has to have sufficient challenge, so I have chosen to cast on for Benbecula by Marie Wallin from Rowan Magazine (number 47). It has lots of cabling and moss stitch so I have entered it for the Sweaterboard Cross and Cable Cross-Country events! I found the very patriotic zip up bag in Accessorize and it is perfect for holding circular needles, tape measure, scissors etc.

Benbecula by Marie Wallin (Rowan Felted Tweed Aran 726)

In fact, I shall be doing the first half of my Ravelympics in Cornwall, as we are spending half term in a thatched cottage by the sea. It has thick stone walls to keep us snug should it turn stormy and a huge fireplace. I am going prepared for plenty of lazing by the fire at the end of the day with the new Designer Knitting and Marie Claire Idées to read, plus a Henning Mankell thriller. A lady who lives a few cottages along the row, makes the most fantastic pasties to order and Roskilly's Farm is not far away for supplies of clotted cream for our scones! Just as well I am also packing walking boots and running kit, too...

Gypsy caravan on Roskilly's Farm, St. Keverne, Cornwall

Mothers Day

We spent last weekend in the Elan Valley in mid-Wales.  I was running in the Rhayader 20 mile Round the Lakes mountain road race on the Saturday and it was Mothers Day on Sunday, so we decided to make a weekend of it and stayed in a cottage from Friday evening until Sunday.  It was a perfect weekend and the cottage was remote and peaceful, a short walk from where the photograph below was taken.  Last year, when I ran the same race, it poured with rain and at the highest point (1600 feet) you could see nothing but mist and moorland.  This year, I had to buy a pair of sun specs before the start and the view from the top and around the lakes was spectacular.  Not a PB for me but the sunshine and the rest of the weekend made up for that.

 

 Garreg Ddu

On Sunday, Hatty and George had made me cards (Hannah didn't come with us):

  

We went for walks, sat in the sun, watched red kites circling overhead, rediscovered board games (Othello, Scrabble, the Game of Life), warmed ourselves by the wood burner stove.  I didn't do any knitting, although I had intended to start on a Thermis. 

Back home, my Trillium is going well now, although I did go wrong and had to frog quite a few rows.

 

The cotton, colour and nubby texture really appeal to me and I think it is going to be lovely and airy to wear in the summer.

And I've got to showcase Hatty's textiles project which she has just finished for her Textiles GCSE (exam). She's fifteen and designed and made this prom style dress (modeled by her big sister).  She screen printed stars on to the fabric, sewed on sequined stars, layered striped and net petticoats underneath, put in boning in the bodice, made cut-away shapes so that the under skirts would show through. Isn't it great?