noro socks

A tryout of the various colour ways possible with kureyon sock yarn and some of my handspun english leicester.

batik today

Today was my second meeting with a group based in the south east of Ireland. We meet once a month at a nearby centre known as Castlecomer Discovery Park which contains a group of craft outlet/studios and a museum featuring the local coal industry history. The surroundings include a couple of fishing lakes and a nice walking trail with a few sculptures sited along the way.
Today the featured skill was Batik, something I have not had the opportunity to try before. I found the process slower than I had expected, getting wax onto the fabric was much slower than painting for instance. However, in the right skilled hands there is undoubtedly much scope for subtle and complex results. If nothing else having a dabble in a new method lets you appreciate the experts work a little better.
Getting the wax out is more tedious than removing gutta (at least on a small scale) I would like to have another day, but using soy wax instead of the paraffin wax we used today, and leave the tjanting to add detail much later in the process.
I am always looking for new ways to get colour and textures into fabric, and may have found another technique to try today courtesy of a local printer who uses mount board to make her relief plates.
The results are most impressive, and the plates end up being things of beauty in their own right.
Maeve Coulter also makes felt and textile pieces, so a real all rounder.
I have used MDF to try some relief carving, but mount board would be easier on the wrists!
So you know, a couple of my hats below

I had a request from a friend recently, a pair of special socks to keep her pinkies warm when the temperature dips. She is travelling , and her footwear of choice will be thongs (flip-flops). So a toed sock is required; not having knitted such a beast before, I naturally needed to do a little research, so looked in the usual likely spots - more of which later - am I looking for a mitten with a toe added or a sock with a thumb? I've got to the right spot now and have to make up my mind soon. However, as knitting leaves a certain amount of brain power unattended, I was musing on the complete lack of justification for the art of hand knitting socks at all in this day and age. I know there are legions of avid sock knitters out there, and indeed I do knit a few of the beasts myself, BUT, how can I justify to the bean counters who rule the world that there is a need for warm woolly socks that commerce just can't provide? Never mind doing this strange activity at all, but with hand-spun yarns too. I may just have found grounds for my certification, but nonetheless I am pleased to give my friend a gift of warm fitted socks to take on her roamings, and hopefully they will bring more than warm toes to mind when she wears them this winter.

Latest work in progress includes a prototype baseball cappish type hat in felt parked on top of a commercial cap. Haven't found anywhere to get hat brims yet, will persevere. Broadband available soon , which will let me do cool stuff here. Meanwhile a pic of hometown for you all.

hello world

I have finally got around to posting my first blog. Hopefully this will enable me to connect with my fibre friends worldwide and help me to keep track of my projects. Today I have completed a fingerless mitten made with homespun . Felted some fuzzy balls and got some spinning time in. Black faced Leicester top. White. Noodling about an idea with embroidery and boxes/caskets.