Hi lovelies, sorry I've been a bit quiet - life suddenly got very busy!
Last weekend was my cousin-in-laws 30th birthday, so the whole family made a special trip to Edinburgh to visit and celebrate with her. As the family are spread all over the UK, we decided to book an apartment that we could all stay in together and spend some quality time catching up.
I was in charge of looking for accommodation, so obviously my (rather selfish) priority was to find somewhere near a wool shop! I had visited K1 yarns before and knew they had a beautiful range of yarns, so I got their postcode and searched for nearby accommodation. To my surprise, I found an apartment that would sleep all 12 of us right next door!!!
I can't recommend The Trust House highly enough. It was like staying in a National Trust property! We felt like royalty. The property was beautifully furnished and maintained, and it was right in the centre of the city - a few minutes walk from The Royal Mile, the Castle, Museums and all the delights Edinburgh has to offer. Unfortunately, considering I had only found it because it was next door to K1 yarns, the shop was closed and had been gutted - builders were in and all I could see was the bare stone. Whether it has closed permanently or was just being re-fitted I'm not sure, but I was devastated!
On our way home from Edinburgh we stopped in Harrogate for the evening - what a town! I've never been before and I have fallen completely in love with it. We arrived on the Sunday before the Tour de France was due to start - all of the streets were festooned with bunting made of thousands of little handknit yellow, white with red polka dots, green and white jerseys:
I called in at Baa Ram Ewe and got chatting to a lovely lady in there who told me there were over 26,000 of the little jerseys and they'd been knitted by people all over the world! It was the most amazing yarn-bomb I've ever seen (and a great promotion of Yorkshire wool!) Whilst there I satisfied my yarn craving and bought lots of Jamieson Spindrift in lovely autumnal colours - it will be time to start thinking of autumn projects soon! :o)
The first stop though, was Betty's Tea Rooms ! My husband took me to the one in York on our honeymoon - what a treat! I must confess all restraint went completely out of the window - we had florentines, fondant fancies, fat rascalls and engadines japonaise (not all at once - over a couple of days!!!)
I also found a lovely fabric shop called The Remnant House - packed to the rafters with beautiful fabrics. I could have spent all day (and a lot of money!) in there. Here are the ones I chose:
But don't worry - through all this I have managed to fit in lots of crocheting! I've made the tops for two more little dresses - one a much smaller newborn baby size that I've made in Drops laceweight merino wool in bright turquoise to go with the campervan fabric, and another toddler sized one in pistachio green cotton to go with a check fabric in turquiose, white and the matching green.
Also, whilst driving through the lake district, inspiration struck me for a shawl design! I started working it up immediately, and when we got to Edinburgh I started to write it up and make some adjustments. I still need to work it all the way through & make a couple of test-crochets, but I'm hoping to make the pattern available for sale in a couple of weeks time.
Now, are you sat down? Please don't faint with shock, but I have also finally got around to re-making my clematis garland/bunting and am in the process of writing up the pattern. It's blocked right now and drying, but in the morning I will take some new photos and add them to the pattern, then publish it for sale on Etsy and Ravelry! It's only taken me a year....;o)
I'd best get myself tucked up in bed - lots to do again tomorrow!
Love & hugs
Claire Clutterbug xx
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