My Advent Calendar has arrived!

I knew this had been dispatched but then it appeared to be stuck and tracking wasn't updating for a couple of days but its fine, its here now.

Two layers of packages, 25 in all.

I now have to be a good girl and not go looking at anything, especially the book!

It just jumped into my shopping basket by itself, honest...

Ha, ha, ha, of course it did, that is my story and I'm sticking to it.  Last year they were earlier than the previous year and this year they are even earlier!  5th September last year is the date that World of Wool released pre-order for their annual Fibre Advent Calendar.  This year it was 31st July!  That is that date that I ordered it, no messing around.  The price has gone up a bit, again, but I was kind of expecting that anyway.  Because of the amount of money it costs it automatically triggers a 5% discount on the website and the money you save pretty much covers the cost of delivery within the UK.  

Last year it was a limited edition of 250 and this year it has risen to 500.  Last year there were 24 x 50g bumps of fibre, this year it has risen to 25 x 50g bumps of fibre.  This years theme is "Christmas Characters", inspired by Christmas Characters past and present.  This is their fourth Advent Calendar and it will be presented in a black gift box for the third year in row and the individual bags are similar to last years but feature a different style of design printed on the bags. They have now released some photos and I am pretty excited.  The designs on the bags appear to be a mix of modern and nostalgic Christmas wrapping paper patterns and it looks like the bags will only have a number printed on them this year, rather than all the details which kind of ruined the surprise a little last year whilst looking for the right bag to open each day.  All the fibre details and information about the Christmas Characters are printed in a booklet.  The Advent Calendars will be shipped from November.

This year they are also doing a matching Yarn Advent Calendar, exactly the same blends and fibres as the Fibre one but it's pre-spun for you.  It is considerably more expensive though but then once you factor in the labour costs of spinning it, it's probably not that bad.  It is a limited edition of just 100, I guess that is to see how popular it will be. 25 x 50g of Double Knit yarn in a handy cardboard tubes within the black gift box with the same book as the fibres.

I've ordered myself something for Christmas - again!

I enjoyed last years Fibre Advent Calendar, I've not spun much of it yet, but I will get to it soon enough.  They've changed it a bit for this year.  There will be only 50g of fibre each day but it will be more luxurious than last years and it will be lower priced too.  I was happy with last years price and the fact that you had 100g a day which meant that you could make something decent with each fibre braid.  I don't really mind it being a smaller amount, I've still ordered one.

Again, its a limited edition of 250 so once its gone, its gone and it won't be dispatched until around about 18th November.

I can't wait to receive this now, sounds intriguing what they've been chatting about on the groups etc and instead of individual slips in the packages we are having a scratch card this year with the details on it.

12 Days of Christmas 2018 Part 2

Back in November I wrote a post about the 12 Days of Christmas "advent calendar" of fibre that I bought myself.  Well, obviously we are well into the New Year now and I have opened all of the little parcels inside.  I was a good girl and only opened one packet per day.  I didn't peep, even though it was really tempting to do that.

I have added the days and the names of the colours to the photos below but they might be quite small to read.  The Tussah Silk are in order from the top right going downwards and then turning left along the bottom, 20g each of Sunrise, Fir, Milk, Storm, Twilight, Wood, Cloud, Tuareg, Fog, Thyme, Paradise.

The spinning tips for the main braid is to spin it over the fold as the Yak fibres will be shorter than the others and that it likely to be comfortably spun somewhere between fingering and double knit weight.  Some people have blended the silk with the main braid and then spun and plied that, others have blended the silk with other fibre they have and used some or all of it to ply with the main braid, some have spun them all up separately and will use all 12 yarns in some kind of stripey or patterned item.  I like the idea of keeping them separate but I've never spun pure silk and it frightens me a bit but apparently that is also easier to spin if you spin it over the fold.  I've never spun over the fold but all that means is that instead of spinning it from the end of the braid in one continual length you pull pieces of and fold it over your finger and let the fibres go into the yarn from there.

I also took a photo of the free coaster that we got in the pack, which is really pretty.

Individual baubles - all done

Way back in early 2012 I was playing with making fine crochet lace covers for Christmas baubles and decorating them with ribbon roses to create an olde worlde / Victorian style Christmas decoration.  I kept it all quiet and hush hush because at the time I had a couple of other makers that seemed to be copying everything that I did and undercutting my prices so much that they clearly weren't making any profit on them whatsoever and I didn't want them copying this idea.

I put this idea to the side for a few years and all of a sudden fast forward 5 and a half years and I have been making more of these baubles on and off over the past year but again keeping it all quiet.

I have made three different styles of baubles.  One is a bauble that is completely covered in fine crochet lace of different designs, usually made in two halves and joined to each other around the middle and then decorated with ribbon roses and the second is a crochet lace cover that only covers part of the bauble, all of the designs are the same but in all sorts of colours and decorated with ribbon roses and beads hanging off the points of the crochet lace. The third type was very simple, using Twilleys Goldfingering like I did for the boxes of 6 baubles, and I made just two of them to finish up the baubles.

Trying to enclose a bauble in crochet lace is not easy, trying to keep the bauble inside the partially joined pieces whilst crocheting the pieces together is tricky, not to mention trying to crochet around a solid object without the free space that you would normally have to work in is awkward too.  There was no need to glue the cover to the bauble on these designs as the crochet cover is stretched over the bauble and stitched to itself.  The covers with the hanging beads were easy to create but then I had to attach the beads.  At first I was using special beading wire, which is actually like a thick nylon thread but this was problematical for me and quite stiff and then I changed to dental floss, which gave the same strength but was more flexible.  Don't worry, it was a brand new one that I bought from the Chemists specifically for the purpose and no teeth or dentists were hurt in the making of them.  These half-covers are actually glued to the bauble to keep them in place.

Today is about food

Thankfully our tomatoes have survived our few days away thanks to a special watering system we have so I have harvested some today now that they are finally ready.  There are lot of fruits on them, a good crop, but only a handful are ready.  The beetroot and carrots are doing really well and we've been harvesting those when we need to as well.

We have cherry tomatoes and chocolate cherry tomatoes, yes, CHOCOLATE.  They're not made of chocolate, nor do they taste of chocolate but they are a brown colour and taste very nice, better than those in the supermarkets which are forced grown and not particularly flavoursome.

I have also got my backside into gear and made the mincemeat for Yule and Christmas.  I usually do this much earlier in the year but it should still have time to mature in the brandy.

Baubles - November 2016

This will be the last and final post about baubles cos I don't know about you but I am getting a bit fed up of them now, despite how beautiful they are.  These are all of those that I made in November.

80mm black glitter baubles with vintage gold Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with vintage blue in 3 shade of Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm red matt baubles with vintage bright green Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm bright red shiny baubles with vintage pale gold Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm dark red matt baubles with vintage pale gold Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm red glitter, shiny and matt baubles with vintage gold and silver Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm bright blue shiny baubles with white Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm blue matt baubles with vintage silver Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm pale blue matt and shiny baubles with vintage navy Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm champagne glitter, shiny and matt baubles with vintage brown Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm white glitter baubles with vintage silver Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with bold colours of vintage Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with vintage bright green Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with vintage silver Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with vintage 3 shades of pink Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with white Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm white matt baubles with vintage black Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm white shiny baubles with vintage bright red Twilley's Goldfingering

Baubles - October 2016

I am enjoying making the baubles, seeing what colour combinations I can come up with.  Other than the first two sets made way back when I was figuring out sizing and designs, no two sets are the same colour combinations and if there are then different designs have been used  These are Octobers offerings with some unusual combinations just to be different to anything else out there.

80mm silver shiny baubles with vintage purple Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with vintage purple Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm silver glitter, shiny and matt baubles with vintage pink Twilley's Goldfingering

 80mm silver glitter, shiny and matt baubles with vintage pale blue Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm red shiny baubles with vintage gold Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with vintage lime Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm silver matt baubles with vintage blue Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm red glitter baubles with vintage black Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with vintage burgundy Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm denim blue matt and  shiny baubles  with vintage silver Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with vintage cerise pink Twilley's Goldfingering

Baubles - September 2016

Carrying on from my post in August about making Christmas Baubles, these are what I made in September.  There are quite a lot!

80mm cerise glitter baubles with vintage pink Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm gold, silver and dark gold smooth baubles with vintage Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm gold glitter baubles with vintage bronze Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm gold glitter baubles with vintage green Twilley's Goldfingering

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80mm gold  smooth and glitter baubles with vintage royal blue Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm glitter, shiny and matt gold baubles with vintage black/multi Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm gold shiny baubles with vintage burgundy Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm silver matt baubles with vintage bright red Twilley's Goldfingering

80mm black glitter baubles with vintage bright red Twilley's Goldfingering