Adventures in London (Pt 2)

At this point in the story, I have just missed the bus back to Victoria Station.  It’s cold and dark, but I am in good spirits.  I’m even brave enough to get my knitting out on the bus (when it finally comes along) and steadily continue with the socks around Hyde Park Corner (much to the not-so-discreet amusement of the foreign gentlemen sitting next to me, who kept almost imperceptibly nodding his head towards me and looking at his mate).  Anway, the very crowded bus arrives at the terminus and I gathered up my goodies to queue my way down the stairs (I don’t normally ride upstairs in a bus but, you guessed it, there was no room downstairs).  As I was halfway down the stairs I glanced down, and I swear that time seemed to stand still as I saw a red glittery ball of wool sitting on the bottom step and I thought “gosh, I’ve just bought a ball of wool like that…”;  this thought then turned into “gosh, I’ve just bought a purple ball of wool like that” and “wait a minute – those are MY Symphonie Knit Pro double pointed needles!”.  The bottom fell out of my world, and at the same time out of my lovely Liberty bag.

HELP ME, SOMEONE!!!

I should point out that this last exclamation was screamed in my head, because I then had to focus on getting down the rest of the steps:

a)  without treading on my yarn;

b)  without letting anyone else tread on my yarn or, may the knitting saints be preserved, my Symphonie Knit Pro double pointed needles;

c)  also trying to pick up my jacket; and

d)  trying not to force everyone else to be held prisoner on the bus whilst the driver, completely oblivious to my crisis, continued onwards to the other side of Stoke Newington.

I should now take a moment to say thank you to the very nice young lady who tried to help me pick up all my lost items, but as I grabbed each one from her, I dropped something else.  In the end, I mumbled a very embarassed thank you and rushed off the bus, arms full of bags, coats, yarn and needles.

The Liberty bag was consigned to the London Transport rubbish bin by the bus stop.  The rest of the bootie went back into the John Lewis (plastic) carrier bags (and I should point out that at this stage, I was not entirely convinced I had successfully retrieved everything).

Fortunately, this did not entirely ruin the day – once again chanting my go-slow mantra, I refuelled and calmly embarked on the train for the journey home, putting all my bags safely up in the overhead racking (no, really, they were safe!).  It was a busy train home, and I was rather piqued that everyone seemed to be “plugged in” to something or other – but not me – in my true artisan way, out came the sock (I was determined to get to the heel flap before the end of the journey).  I sat knitting quite happily, although getting rather annoyed with the (business) man next to me who was on a laptop, plugged into an I-something, and chewing gum (which I hate!).  Inwardly I was grumbling and being all superior.

Enter the Knitting Gods.

I can’t quite work out how it happened, but suddenly one of my 2.5 mm dpns flew out of my hand and upwards, pinging closely across the face of my gum-chewing neighbour, and finally clattering it’s way (and honestly, it DID clatter) onto the floor underneath the table on the opposite side of the train.  I sat there dumbfounded as I realised what had happened.  Then the bumbles set in and I just couldn’t stop apologising to gum-chewer, who rather sheepishly removed his headphones and retrieved the renegade needle for me (with the help of the people opposite, who thought the whole episode worthy of tremendous laughter).

I would like to publicly apologise to gum-chewer for thinking such bad thoughts about him earlier.  It turns out that his wife is a knitter, and he apparently ends up sitting on her needles all the time (a “hazard of the job” he said).  What a nice man!  AND he didn’t move to a different table, but risked the remainder of the journey sitting right there in the face of extreme needle danger.

So there you have it, an interesting day, to say the least.  But the two things I’ve learned for sure are:

a) use plastic carrier bags when stocking up your yarn stash; and

b) use circular needles when knitting on public transport.

 

Adventures in London (pt 1)

The original plan for yesterday was to go to a (fairly) local Wildfowl and Wetlands
Trust Centre, where I could enjoy the scenery, the wildlife and the cafe with
the huge panoramic view of the lake whilst knitting (not necessarily in that
order!). However, the British autumn (or whatever season it feels like being –
no-one is really too sure these days) let me down and it was wet and gloomy –
not the weather for such a trip. Instead, I made the dubious decision to go to
London and do my coffee shop/knitting/yarn buying thing. “Don’t go – it’s
half term week” said Gary “and it’ll be heaving with people”.

I ignored him – to my peril (don’t you just hate that?).

I mean, really, right from the time of my arrival at our local train station,
where the ticket queue was snaking out of the doors, through to trying to get
lunch in John Lewis, through to getting the bus back to Victoria, everywhere
was absolutely packed with bodies. Fortunately, I was able to keep repeating my
“go slow” mantra, do lots of deep breathing, and by the time I was
sitting down having lunch in John Lewis (Oxford Street) I was beginning to feel
a semblence of peace and calm. I read some of my current Stephanie Pearl McPhee book from my Kindle, to get me in the yarn mood, and then headed downstairs.

Now I mentioned that last time I went to JL they had, rather disgracefully in my
view, downsized their yarn department, and so it still was. However, I managed
to find a good load of stash to purchase, including great book on teaching
children to crochet which I am giving to my almost-god-daughter for her
birthday, together with a crochet hook and some yarn (she’s ten, and she
already knits!). I had a great time with all the sock yarn, and bought far more
than is good for me; but I did manage to purchase my gumboot sock yarn ready
for the January socks, so I’m all set there.

Even the yarn department was heaving, so I then felt the need to head back up to the coffee shop for interim refreshments and, this time, some knitting. Once I had finished the chocolate and strawberry gateau (ssshhh!), out came the ripple scarf (and down went my blood pressure!):

And it was here that I can report a first: the very nice lady sitting next to me showed great interest in my knitting and we had a lovely conversation about how relaxing it is (well, not for her actually, as she maintained that she couldn’t cope with shaping, but apparently her daughter knits very well!).

I then finally made it to Liberty’s, which I had been told had a great yarn department, and boy, was that the case!  It was just LOVELY!  And what’s more, the lady looking after the department was just lovely (I should’ve taken a photo of her, but then she might’ve thought I was a crazy stalker weirdo).  I bought more yarn that I didn’t need, AND some Symphonie Pro sock needles (for the January socks – they deserve no less) and the very nice assistant gave me a huge Liberty paper carrier bag (you know, the sort with rope handles) so I could put together all my yarn purchases into one bag.  I wandered around the craft section, and after arguing with myself for a while that I really DIDN’T have time to do a cross-stitch (even though it was gorgeous), I left and headed back up Oxford Street.

It was about coffee-o’clock at this point, so Starbucks, vanilla latte and ripple scarf it was:

Finally Selfridges, and at this point I feel it moot to give you an idea of the Christmas feel that was Oxford Street:

Outside Selfridges

Selfridges Christmas Shop

John Lewis Decorations

Liberty

Now my adventures didn’t stop there, but I am aware that this is quite a wordy post, so I will pick up the plot line tomorrow … if you want to hear the story of the “Knitter’s Kni(g)htmare before Christmas“, tune in then!

Peapod Wine (finally!), Geranium Soap and Art

Yesterday and today has seen the final coming together of the Vin-de-Boo peapod wine!

The peapods were dutifully washed …

and then boiled on the stove.  Unfortunately there were so many of the little green critters that I had to boil them in two batches in my huge preserving pan!  Anyway, after straining the liquid off, I was left with a rather … er… unsalubrious-looking potion:

After leaving it for the required 24 hours, tonight I’ve added the final ingredients which hopefully will go to producing my very first homebrew.  The acidity was correct and the hydrometer reading acceptable so all it needs now is time.  The bucket goes into the airing cupboard for 5 days when I do another sugar test and move it into a demi-john (hooray!), then I guess it’s forget-about-it for the next couple of years!

Having boiled the peapods yesterday the house was, as you can imagine, smelling rather cabbage-y, so I decided to make some geranium soap.  It didn’t seem to set as well as the previous couple of batches, and the pink clay certainly didn’t make much difference at all – I think I’ll double the dose next time.  However, it did give me the chance to use to new heart-shaped silcone moulds I’d bought in an effort to have beautiful little pink heart-shaped soap….

Not my best effort aesthetically, but it smells good!

Today then Hannah and I went on our (now traditional) trip to the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition in London.  I love the fact that over 1,000 known and lesser-known artists, from all over the world, get the chance to exhibit their work here once a year.  To say it is an eclectic mix is an understatement! 

Hannah and I really enjoyed it, and I’m quite frustrated that I couldn’t take photographs of my favourite pictures.  Interestingly Hannah veered to all the dark coloured pictures, whilst I was drawn to the bright (and I think more pretty) displays.  I guess that’s the difference between a forty-something year old and a 14 year old…

We were both so inspired by all this creativity that we had to take ourselves to the London Graphic Centre (another favourite haunt of ours) to buy sketch books and generally feel arty.  Then, on the way, we happened to pass a huge Waterstones bookstore which is to us as a magnet is to iron filings, so we had a book-fest too!

On arriving back at home, I was delighted to find a letter from Rowan confirming my membership of the Rowan International Knitting Club – my sister gave me membership for my birthday, so I should shortly be receiving the next Rowan magazine, as well as a special anniversay edition book.  Yay!

As a quick footnote, all things “yarn” are going well – I’ve crocheted four squares of the Old Rose Shawl and successfully joined them together; the ripple scarf is coming along, and I spent today’s train-time slowly working through the preparation of the “yarn” for the harvest basket (this involves chain-stitching an entire ball of yarn, then using another ball to go back and single crochet the chain). 

Tomorrow sees the arrival of the IKEA furniture for the children’s bedrooms which means even more chaos than usual, plus we have to drop off their camping gear at church ready for their week away next week.  Somewhere in there I’ll get some time to hoover ….

 

On the Town

Confession time – I slipped in a quick trip to London on Thursday – it’s the holidays, right?  Anyway, I went up primarily for a bit of “away” time, to go drool over the yarns at John Lewis, and also to go to the Afghanistan exhibition at the British Museum.  As a last minute decision, I also decided to go to Loop, having found the most beautiful scarf/wrap on their website which, although still in my infancy of crocheting, I decided to have a bash at.

First thing’s first – having gone to Highbury tube station last time, purposely avoiding the 5,000 ft high escalator at the Angel, I realised that it was maybe worth suffering the escalator so as to avoid the rather long walk down Upper Street in Islington (as lovely as it is).  Anyway, I c**ked up again, and wrongly remembered that Highbury was the nearer tube with the long escalator, so ended up, once again, doing the long trek  down Upper Street, a little confused!  (for those who don’t know, the Angel tube station is 2 minutes from Loop!).  But I made it, and purchased my beautiful galabrigo 4 ply yarn with which to make this:

To see more (and it’s truly worth it), go to the Loop webpage here  and they show you a whole stack of different ways to wear this beautiful wrap.

Then, of course, comes the joy (?) of turning these:

into these:

but then, if you’re lucky, it starts to look like this:

(My trouble will start when I do the next square and it looks nothing like the first one… but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it!)

Back in London I then, according to plan, mosied over to John Lewis in Oxford Street to try and buy some yarn that was a colour other than pastel – it’s actually incredibly hard to find primary colours in decent yarns (please don’t ask me what I define as “decent” – that’s for another time).  Rowan Belle Organic was the only contender, really, so I purchased a couple of balls for Jen and I to share in our endeavour to create a crocheted Chelsea Flower Show!

Next came the trip to British Museum, which was when it all started to go a little pear-shaped.  Got to the museum fine, only to discover that the exhibition had finished on Sunday – yes, this Sunday just gone – durrrrrrrh!!!  I was able to chuckle at my general inefficiency … that was until I went to go outside and saw that the heavens had opened with 2 month’s worth of rain.  The nearest walkable refuge (and next on my list) was Foyles, and I arrived there absolutely dripping wet (I make it a point NEVER to use an umbrella in London – waaay too dangerous!).  Obviously the best thing to do was to gravitate to the coffee shop and enjoy a lovely latte whilst I dried off – well, it would’ve been rude to drip all through the store, wouldn’t it?!  Whilst drinking said latte, I phoned home to check on the rest of the family – well, mostly the animals actually – to be rather reluctantly told by Hannah that Honey had decided my crochet flowers not only looked good enough to eat, but that they were good enough to eat.  OK, so plans for Chelsea a little set back now… just as well I bought some more yarn really?

The day’s adventure complete, I decided (unusually for me) to get the tube back to the mainline station – I prefer the bus as I think it’s far more civilised – only to get stopped mid-tunnel because of a problem further up the line.  In RUSH HOUR!  I don’t even want to begin to describe the heat and sweaty bodies with whom I shared that tiny space for what seemed like an eternity.  I was only relieved that I wasn’t on a home-ed field trip with a stack of exuberant youngsters crammed in with me!

Home safe and well – cuddled the rabbit, glared at Honey, oh yes, and cuddled the children and husband.  I don’t think they’d actually missed me very much.  That’s what comes of raising independent children.

 

 

 

London (again) and “Blood Brothers”

London again yesterday.  It was meant to be Chessington World of Adventures, as a post-exam treat for the kids and a friend each, but none of Joe’s pals could make it, and as we got nearer to the day, there was a distinct lack of enthusiasm for what should have been a great treat.  So, being the spontaneous Mum that I am (or at least try to be), I booked us matinee tickets to go and see “Blood Brothers” in the West End.  Now I’ve seen it before and a couple of years ago, I read the play with the older home-ed group (although we never finished it – can’t remember why, since they all really liked it!).  Joe and Hannah have been itching to see it ever since and, sure enough, they were VERY much more excited with the new plan than with the old.

Hannah’s friend, Maria, came with us too, and all four of us thoroughly loved the show.  OK – I confess – I cried buckets…. AGAIN (third time of seeing it, and it still gets to me!).  Joe was making plans in the interval to come and see it again with some of his mates!  I was slightly apprehensive when we went in, since the theatre seemed to be swarming with school-children and, sure enough, there was the usual squealing at the “naughty” bits, and woolf-whistling at the girls etc, but it wasn’t too unbearable (thankfully we were in the stalls underneath the dress circle, from which were launched quite a lot of sweetie wrapper missiles in the interval, which caused quite some consternation for one or two of the less fortunate grown-ups in the audience).

The day marked quite a moment too, as I let Hannah and Maria wander off on their own – gulp!  I had decided a few days back that I would let them do this, having checked with Maria’s Mum; but then the night before I had second thoughts; then in the cold light of day I decided that I should stick with my original “indepenence-encouraging” plan.  It was really hard.  I had done them a little street map for the Covent Garden/Leicester Square area and, of course, we all had our mobile phones, but the main worry was whether not they would manage to find their way to the theatre in time.  As it happened, all went well – although they did ask a policeman for directions – what sensible girls!

 

London and Loop

Just got back from my day in London and decided I would update the blog whilst it was still fresh in my mind (and before I collapse in a heap into bed, having seemingly walked at least 500 miles!).

My first mission was to find Loop – that treasure trove of a yarn store which I cyber-visit but have never actually seen.  It involved a bit of a trawl out to Islington, but it was actually a beautifully sunny day – which is just as well because I elected to alight at Highbury and Islington which is quite a walk from Camden Passage.  The store was not difficult to find and, although it was smaller than I had anticipated, I think any bigger and it would’ve lost it’s charm.

It was just full-to-bursting with exquisite yarns, needles, buttons, ribbons and so forth, with sample shawls and socks hanging all over the place.

The trouble was, this place was for Knitters (as opposed to knitters) – you know, people who know their stuff.  All the yarn was in skeins (which I think looks fab) and labelled according to weight – “lace weight”, “finger weight” etc.  Now I’m not in that league just at the moment, so I was a little lost.  However, this didn’t detract from my enjoyment, and I did manage to come away with some yarn and a free scarf pattern, a pair of funky needles and (and don’t tell anyone) a crochet hook (blame Mollie Makes!).  I’m very keen to do some more lace work, and thought this scarf would be a good start – see the pattern here.  In fact, the effect seems quite similar to the Noro jumper I made a couple of years ago, which was fairly straightforward.   As I write Hannah is now coming down to the kitchen ready to lend me her hands, as I need to wind the skeins into balls!

The rest of the day was spent between John Lewis and Foyles, and then a trek over to Peter Jones at Sloane Square to check out their yarn/haberdashery department (which was, I’m afraid to say, sadly lacking).

Home now, and ready to start winding.  More tomorrow….

(PS No Louisa Harding yarn to be found – that’ll teach me to buy an old pattern book, from which the yarn has obviously been discontinued….)