Wibbo's Words

Craftaganza on Jubilee Bank Holiday

I'm at Craftaganza with Brighton Craft Guerrilla on both days with my lovely hand dyed yarn, stitchmarkers, embroidered and beaded jewellery.

 

A good day

We had a good day at Craftaganza yesterday. The other stallholders were friendly, there were masses of people looking round (some buying), the weather was kind and lots of friends came along to see us. Notable mentions go to Penny and twins for banana muffins and to Jamie for very welcome cups of tea at the end of the day.

First cup of tea

The first cup of tea in the morning is the best one of the day and I'm drinking mine right now. Not much time to linger over it this morning as me, wheelie suitcase and very large bag of yarn will soon be on our way here. Must remember to take photos....

It's the end of the month

Well, here we are at the end of November and NaBloPoMo. A big pat on the back to myself for posting here every day, as well as on Archive and Hove Daily Photo.

November's been a fairly productive month at Wibbo Towers. I'm almost ready for the Craftaganza Craft Market, most of my Christmas shopping is done/ordered  and I have a couple of things on the needles for me.

I'll leave you with this Groucho Marx quote: "Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies."

Get pinning

Have you discovered Pinterest yet? It's a clever virtual pinboard that I use to keep track of images that I like as well as for practical stuff like recipes and crafty tutorials.

If you're already a pinner, you can see my boards here.

New Moo

New cards from Moo. I'm nearly ready for Craftaganza, just a few bits and pieces to do.

I'm a busy bee

Met up with Steph and Emma (the other Brighton Craft Guerrillas) yesterday and we're beginning to realise how little time we have until the craft market is here. Most of my stuff's done apart from a pile of embroidered and beaded brooch fronts that need the finishing touches, backs and brooch pins added. I may be some time...

Coming in December

I'll be there with Brighton Craft Guerrilla selling my hand dyed yarn, beaded stitch markers and lots of other goodies. Exciting!

Busy, busy, busy

Brighton Craft Guerrilla will be at Craftaganza's Christmas Market at Fabrica on December 10 and I'm busy dyeing, stitching and crocheting all manner of stuff for the stall. The venue's nice and central and we're looking forward to plenty of visitors wandering round and (hopefully) buying! I'll post more details nearer the date.

This is the latest batch of sock yarn ready to be skeined and labelled; I'd better go do just that...

My knitting and crochet time

Write about your typical crafting time. When is it that you are likely to craft - alone or in more social environments, when watching TV or whilst taking bus journeys?

I'm happily retired and these days can do as much or as little knitting, crochet, embroidery, sewing as I fancy. After over thirty years designing and making things for clients and publishers, it's a joy to be able to make exactly what I want.

I ease into a typical day with a mug of tea and an hour or so's knitting or crochet.

I'm usually supervised by Fearsome Miss Flossie who sits by my feet waiting patiently for her breakfast. 

I haven't had a television since 2001 and much of my crafting is accompanied by audio books, radio programmes or music, with the occasional film DVD when I'm knitting something that doesn't need concentration.

I live round the corner from an excellent library (name-checking Hove Library) which has a really good, constantly changing audio book selection (above is yesterday's haul) and I also have a subscription to Audible. Music-wise, I listen to classical music, opera, rock, folk, jazz and I'm a big fan of Radio 5 live's football coverage.

I try and balance hours spent crafting by myself with regular company in the shape of a couple of knitting groups (Brighton Knitters and Knit & Natter at Cocoon) and with regular exercise walking by the sea. 

This is the last of this year's Knitting and Crochet Blog Week's posts - thanks for the comments and see you again next year :o)

Snigger...

20 Sad Etsy Boyfriends

Mmmmm

Christmas present - a selection of buttons, colourway Wuthering Heights. Delicious.

Scandinavian Red & White

Free cross stitch chart download at Tom Pudding Designs.

Ooooh, shiny!

I decided to leave the Christmas tree in its box this year; the out-of-Flossie's-reach spot where it usually goes is already occupied so I made a quick garland of baubles to hang across the centre of the window bay.

6 packs of tiny shatterproof baubles, some Anchor Artiste Metallic yarn in white, 2.75mm crochet hook. It's basically a long crochet chain with a bauble added every 4 chains by working a dc (US sc) through its hanging loop. 

Christmas crafting

If you're bogged down with knitting, sewing and other crafty makes for the festive season, do yourself a favour and read this.

Dyeing

DK weight wool in a range of semi-solid colours. I think there may be more ripples in my future crochet planning...

Saturday

I'll be here on Saturday with hand dyed sock yarn and stitch markers. 

Cranes & buttons

More stuff to show you from the last two Brighton Craft Guerrilla crafternoons:

Last week, we had a go at Japanese paper cranes; this week we strung and layered buttons to make bracelets and brooches.

 

 

More pics over on Brighton Craft Guerrilla.  
 

Easter Monday squiggles

Mug decorating at Sam's with Emma and Steph; more pics (and an evil grin) on Brighton Craft Guerrilla.

This was fun!

 
It's been a very crafty week by the seaside. On Monday, Emma and Sam dyed sock yarn in my kitchen with Wilton's Icing Dyes - I've not used Wilton's before and was really impressed with some seriously saturated colours. Friday afternoon was a Brighton Craft Guerrilla crafternoon round at Emma's and these are some of the badges I came home with. She's got a brilliant badge-making machine; a proper professional number that's really easy to use and all sorts of stuff got badged. I used old maps and cuttings out of magazines and an old encyclopedia; Annie and Lucy tried out fabric, threads, crochet and sparkly bits and were very happy with the results. I think another badge-making afternoon will be on the cards soon....