MAKE: Harvest Knot Commission

I was commissioned by a lovely Bride-to-be, to make a series of harvest love knots for her wedding. She had as a young woman, come across the knots, and always thought them lovely.

She discovered an old blog post about harvest knots, and contacted me to ask if I could make some for her. She was very apologetic about her request, incase I found it odd, but infact she made my day, I love odd requests and unusual commissions. It was a lovely idea to include such a traditional craft, in with a modern wedding. I was only too glad to make them for her!

Lino-printing Workshop with Ed Ryan

Straight after the weekend in Kenmare, I took part in a little lino-cutting workshops with artist, Ed Ryan at Meitheal Eithseala.  I love print, probably because I love book illustration, and most of early illustration was print in some form. I did a small bit of printing in college, from screen-printing to etching, and I enjoyed it immensely.

Post Picnic Blog Post

I've a backlog of posts to get through, a few lovely projects I've been working on over the past month. So I'm going to do a quickie post on the Picnic.

The handiest of Chest of Drawers

I was given two sets of small chest of drawers. They looked fine, but were quite wobbly, and well, didn't fit in anywhere properly. So, I turned them into several things...

We had a Really Rather Very Good Time - Tiki Tiki style!

The car has just been unpacked, and packed again. I'm heading away on a road trip of sorts for a week or so. I thought I better get a blog post in before I get embroiled in another project.
The Really Rather Retro Romp Vintage Market and Disco took place last Saturday in McCarthy's Bar, Dingle. And PHEW! it was a long day and night, but a good one. I won't post all the pics here, you can see them either on Facebook  or on Flickr 

Open Fair (...and a little rant)

About 2 weeks ago, I took part in Open Fair, held in the Carlton Hotel in Tralee. I had decided after Christmas, I was going to take a break from doing craft fairs, but Open Fair was different, it was not just a craft fair, but a skills fair, hosted by Rural Resettlement Programme. A programme dedicated to bringing life back into rural areas of Ireland. To use its own blurb its "national movement of free, community-based talent exchanges. The aim is to help you to make a living from your own skills, ideas and initiative. Every enterprise starts with one person. With the Open Fair, you can be that person."

I think this is a fantastic idea, and development away from traditional fairs which can be fairly repetitive. It was great to have a mix of business from craft to websites, PR to publishing. If nothing else, it was about setting up a community. So, I did what I seem to do best at craft fairs, made very little money, but meet up with lots of lovely people. But I went with that intention, not so much to sell stuff, as to sell my crafting soul. (I think I will just declare myself a 'not for profit company', since I am so crap at making a profit)

I've been stuck, the past few months, about where I am going, with my work, my time, and the effort its costs me sometimes to keep going, to keep crafting. It’s not a rut, more like moral dilemma. It is very disheartening to constantly be asked to work for little or nothing in my own area, and then not be asked to work in other places, because I am too far away. (But, thats what I get for living on the edge of the known European universe. It’s probably why I have become a geek, more of a virtual crafter. ). Yet I see 'outside' artists and designers brought in and paid well, to do the same work I know half a dozen locals could do. Having a well known name does not actually mean the work is better. I think committee members need to be told this..bluntly.

As a friend of mine repeatedly tells me I need to become a 'me feiner', I need to be more about me. But it’s something I don’t believe in. I just don’t have the ego or patience for it. I think for too long the egos have ruled the art/craft system, and it should be just about the work that needs doing. Even within a rural community there is always an inner circle, and I don’t believe in that either and I won’t be part in it. It's probably my undoing, but the older I get, the more I feel I have to live by my principles. An artist is no more valuable to society than a carpenter, a plumber, a gardener, etc, we all have our role and our place to form a functioning society, and the barriers and egos have to go.

Rant over, I don't mean to complain, but lately I've just seen too much money wasted, budgets blown, because of this system. And it really, really bugs me, I am prepared to get myself blacklisted by the powers that be, if it means sticking to my moral guns. I just want to make stuff! Its that simple, but sometimes its easy to forget its that simple.

If there is an Open Fair going on near you, take a stand, visit it, chat to people. It is fantastic to see so many people trying to create businesses, create a living, from doing what they love best, in these crazy financal times. As the expression goes, best foot forward....

Because I only decided to do the fair at the last minute, my usual unorganised self, I didn't have time or energy to do leaflets/flyers etc. So, I had to come up with a different advertising strategy. I have forever been meaning to do up a proper portfolio/photo album of work, and well, still haven't gotten round to it. So this is what I did instead...

Combined geekery with recycling! I made a slideshow of my work and past projects on the laptop, and made a tv to go over it. As well as showing images of my work I peppered it with other images, not so subtle 'me feiner' ads, and some craftivist propaganda, that hopefully, got into some peoples heads...

The TV now doubles as a puppet theatre for the bored child. Muti-purpose recycling! 

One too many paper chains, perhaps...

In a previous blog post, I had talked about the fun we had making our Halloween Decorations, and talked about bringing back the paper chain. Well, over the past 2 weeks I have gone a bit mad with the Christmas decorations. It’s my first year in my new house (and hopefully the first of many, many years in the same house...). So, because of a combination my Yarnaholics Programme*, and the appalling weather we’re been having over the past month, I have managed to have nothing to do! I don’t mean nothing to do, but no crazy community projects or deadlines, having to be here there and everywhere. And my god, it’s tough! Its way harder than working hard. I am usually rushing around chasing after projects as time slips away, but now I am humming and hawing about what to next. So, for my first year in my new house, I have managed to make nearly all the Christmas decorations.

Firstly I made these....

Then I made these.

Lots of these. These were my favourites as a kid, and with a few different coloured packs of crepe paper, it’s amazing how many you can make, and get carried away with...

The tiny little synthetic tree was unwrapped, and we made angels

Then a lino-printing session to make all the Christmas Cards

Then, I had to crochet some snowflakes, and well, got carried away with that too, and made a few for the tree, and the window by the front door, and a bunch for token presents to friends and family

Snowflakes blocking

Oh, and we painted the front door...

Inside and Outside

PHEW! To top it off some Christmas tunes from The Rat Pack and Leon Redbone... It’s a festive, very cheap and cheerful Christmas. I'm almost ready to be snowed in...

*Must update the Yarnaholic Programme, it'll be my New Years Resolution...

Happy Christmas

Spindles, Nice Packets from the Postman, Lemsip and Calpol

I have a kind of ignorance, soup and garlic attitude to sickness. I am not a very good patient, and usually decide to clear out that cupboard as soon as I feel the onset of a cold. Like I'm keeping myself busy just to ignore feeling sick. Then its daily doses of soup and lots and lots of garlic. I found a herbal remedy for colds which is basically chopped raw garlic marinated in honey for a few hours, then take teaspoons of the honey on a regular basis. The fact the child also takes it is astounding, (he thinks medicine is a treat, any kind of medicine. I sometimes give him a teaspoon of honey and say its medicine just to stop him nagging for more medicine!...Weird kid...).

But this time its different. The last 2 weeks have been very tiring as the whole household has come down with a bug. More the has enough time passed yet so I can take more drugs? Feck the herbal remedies at times like these we need the drugs. So we've been holed up at home watching hours of kids TV, administering Lemsip and Calpol with an eerie precision.

So, because of the general nasal noisiness from sneezing to blowing, I felt I should give up the spinning for a week or two, until the preboscus passages are back on track. (My nose isn't big, I swear, I was just trying to find another word to describe nose...)

I was scared my little fella was allergic to my new hobby of spinning, which usually left me and the sitting room covered in fine bits of sheep. But now I'm sick too, with the same symptoms, I don't think he's allergic. I can spin again as soon as we're all cleared up. My ever-useful partner suggested I only spin at night with the window open. Thanks! Just as well we don't have a tower in the back garden, he might expect me to lock myself in it, grow my hair really long, and spin gold from straw..Well. I suppose I'll finally make all the money I've been promising..I really need this tool, or this type of wool, then I'll be able to make stuff, open an Etsy shop and make loads of money!!

So, I'm going backwards, that's the Lemsip and Calpol story, now here's the Nice Packets from the Postman...
Recently I received a lovely LOVELEY packet of fibre from Rockpoolcandy. I was moaning about not being able to enter the St. Patrick's Day Competition, and win that great prize. So she kindly sent me some fibre as a consolation prize. Thank you, Thank you!! I love it, and can't wait to start spinning again..

Also, in the post was a packet from Stephanie from The Yarn Room. The packet arrived late into my hands, not because of Stephanie, my order went through very quick, but because of the bloody postman, who for some crazy reason put the packet through the window into the other half's workroom, where it lay hidden un-noticed for days. So now, if I am expecting something in the post (like my Travelling Scarf*), I will check all the windows every day. In this packet was a fantastic gadget, the Clover Yarn Cutter, yarn cutter and pendent in one! A brilliant gadget I saw Peeko use at the Knit and Stitch show last year, and I have coveted it since..I previously used a very small, sharp needlework scissors that my little fella is very good at finding, so this is great. I have to make a nice cord for it yet.. I also received a pack of Merino/Silk Sliver, this is just beautiful fibre and can be spun or felted. I am dying to try this out too, that is when I can spin again..Thanks Stephanie.

Now for the Spindles..
I have always been interested in history, and guess what...the history of textiles. I have books on Mexican, Indonesian, Egyptian textiles, all full to the brim with lots of great pictures and diagrams. But I always found when it came to Irish textile history, its a bit lacking. I have Mairead Dunlevy's Dress in Ireland book, but its a bit vague on the earlier periods. I mean, "unspun black horsehair in herringbone twill carefully woven without a prominent selvage...with a separate band woven independently and sewn inter place" Do you understand that? I sure as hell don't. this is the start of the book. This is c750! If they could do that, what else could they do? Herringbone twill is not on any beginner weaving course I know, and horsehair isn't the easiest to work with, so where did the knowledge come from, what other textiles were they doing at the time? Sorry, I'll try not to rant...

Recently I joined up the Irish Living History forum. Unfortunately, its more swords and helms then any practical textile how-to advice. I mean, they all do a good job of getting their kits together, can be very fussy about getting it periodically correct, but its still a bit lacking in detail about how. I want to know HOW!

So, I have embarked on a crazy scheme, to try learn everything there is to know about early Irish textiles, the hard way. By actually doing it. I must admit it has been a goal of mine for years to do this, and I am thanking the economic downturn for giving me the hopelessness of finding a good job, so I can finally take some time to start this project without feeling guilty at not having the good job...So, feeling very lousy with this cold, and trying to amuse the child, I embarked on a spindle making session. He had his Playdo, I had half a bag of self-hardening clay.


We both made a mess, he got bored and went off to watch Socky and Emma and I came out with these.

I've been reading all about spindles, of different sizes/weights for different yarns. So, rather than buy several spindles, I decided to make my own. I read somewhere something about the difference of spinning with the weight centered in the middle, by using a conical whorl, so I made both to test out. These are the rough weights of each whorl, so they range from making lace to bulky yarns

.5 oz/15 gm
1 oz/28gm
1.75 oz/50gm
2.5 oz/70gm
3 oz+/85gm

I will leave them another few days to make sure they are fully dry, then I will get some doweling to make the rest of the spindles. I'm just wondering, does the wooden part of a spindle have its own name?

(*ah, the Travelling Scarf Saga. I joined a Travelling Scarf group on Ravelry. This is where a small group of people each start a section of a scarf, then post it on to the next person, who adds a section, then posts it on, etc, etc. It's a lovely little project, it takes a couple of months, and you get to chat to other like-minded folk, and end up with a multi-country scarf. Trouble is when your scarf goes AWOL, then someone elses, then someone elses, so you start a new one, then that also goes AWOL, then the original turns up , then the 2nd one turns up...As I said Saga!

A Big Big thank you to happysunshine, the poor sod who has been trying to keep control of our un-ruley group!)

All love and hearts

Its a bit late for me to be putting up how to make Valentines stuff, thought it was the plan. So, here is some stuff, maybe I'll get the instructions together for next year..

I just couldn't get some nice photos of the smaller ones.. so I just ended up scanning them..pics are a bit rough...

Ideas for Emergency Valentine Cards

Materials: different coloured Card, last years valentines card, shiny sweet wrapper, string, glue



Woven paper Heart

Materials: paper, scissors


Valentine Cards

Materials: Red card, red paper, sweet wrappers, glue, scissors, red bead things, glue


Paper Flower

Materials: 3 paper bun cases, 1 handle of paper bag, scissors

Crocheted Flower

Materials: 1.25 hook, thin wool (2 shades of red, 1 maroon)

Belated Happy St.Bridgets Day!

The night before St. Bridget's Day, I decided to make a new cross. But it was dark, and I have no reeds growing in the garden, so I had a go at making one out of drinking straws. Not the best, and a bit psychedelic looking, but it held its shape. Not to waste anything, I made a little God's Eye, with the cut off ends of the straws.




I went up to a friends house the following day and raided her garden. Luckily she lives beside every boggy ground, so I could get a good bundle of rushes. So, together we made some St. crosses. I only got one style done, I was hoping to get a few different designs done, but with the coffee and chat flowing, it was all I could manage for now...

Its a lovely tradition, to celebrate the coming of Spring. Even though it is freezing outstide, and not very Springlike and you almost feel sorry for the few flowers that have come out already. "Get back inside, its gona get very very cold..."