In Which I See Some Valentine's Yarnbombing

 

 

 

Here's my Louisa Harding Hiking Hat, looking out towards Blakeney! It was a gorgeous day, with a dark, bright light - still winter, really. And, below, the cheery sight of some Sheringham yarnbombing!

 

These were at the crossroads by the station, just in time for Valentine's Day!

 

 

There's so often some fabulous yarnbombing in Sheringham: I've blogged here about knitted fish, flags and now hearts! Whoever is doing this, I salute you - it's really cheerful and lovely to spot it. The hearts in the bushes were gorgeous. Sadly, it's all been taken down now, but I'm sure it made other people smile as well as me! It's also inspiring me to mount a knitted onslaught on a local landmark ... ;)

In Which I Venture to Les Tricoteuses & find yarnbombing in Sheringham...

A lovely sunny day in Holt last week - and a browse in a lovely wool shop:

I was really keen to check out this shop properly - I love the name (with its connotations of gallows knitting) and Chapel Yard, its location, has great little shops and galleries. The huge window shows the lovely yarns inside.

This is a pretty good generic picture, actually, of all the Places To Buy Yarn that I like - the gorgeous coloured patty-shaped balls of pure wool. This shop has an excellent range of luxurious wools - everywhere I looked there was more! It was great to meet Mary Pembleton, the owner; she turned down her German rock music to talk about the shop, our dislike of acrylic, "squeaky" wool,  and showed me her newest arrival - *British*, no less - Debbie Bliss Blue Faced Leicester Aran yarn, in gorgeous autumnal shades -

I want to go back and buy the mustardy colour to make some gloves I've found a pattern for in Bronwyn Lowenthal's Love to Knit  - Mary has knitted the swatch here in red and it feels dense and lovely and woolly! She has the Debbie Bliss accompanying pattern book, too. Bravo, Les Tricoteuses! www.lestricoteuses.co.uk

The knitting theme dominated our trip to Sheringham, too; luckily, my Lady Friend is a patient partner. First I had to snap this part of the sea front mural:

But then - huge excitement - we saw more Sheringham *yarnbombing*: fantastic knitted fish and starfish on the seafront -

Aren't these great? I wonder if it's those @NorfolkNinjaKnitters again ;)

On a rainy day, we went to Norwich. While the Lady Friend had  a tour of the Cathedral, I paid a visit to Jarrolds, a great independent with lots of lovely Sirdar wool and good haberdashery bits too. Had a crochet conversation with the sales assistant who was wearing a black crochet collar that she'd made herself. Then, a trip to the Cathedral refectory:

And a scrumptious cheese scone:

I love Emma Bridgewater's crockery - though the use of this Biblical quotation is rather surprising, as the second part of the verse from the Song of Songs reads, "For I am sick of love." I suppose that's why only the first part is on the plate!  I know there's no mention of a Wednesday #WIP - but that[s because my Sarah Hatton jacket is still .... still .... still on the go! 

Wednesday's #WIP, Graffiti Knitting & More Adventures in Haberdashery

So, here is my current #WIP: a jacket, for me. It's a Sarah Dallas moss stitch jacket from Rowan's Scottish Inspirations, using lovely Debbie Bliss Glen  wool I picked up in the Cafe Knit sale. It's beautiful wool; I'm just hoping it knits up like the pattern as I was too lazy to knit a tension square . . . am I the only one?! I am rather too near the sea in North Norfolk in this picture - I had to shift back a bit a few moments after I took this. I'm rather pleased with my cheapy jelly shoes, too!

Norwich  library has a fantastic selection of knitting and crochet books - and look what some knitters have done to the section!

This probably isn't technically yarn-bombing, actually, as it's to advertise a new Knit and Natter group they're starting up there - but it looks great.

No trip to Norwich is complete without a rummage in the haberdashery department of Jarrolds, and here is one of my mug huggers en route:

They have some gorgeous VV Rouleaux ribbon on sale which i'm rather regretting not having bought: lace plus velvet . . .  hm, maybe I can give them a ring. . . .  ;)  I did manage to buy some red "Live...Love...Laugh" ribbon and a Rico Aran pattern - they had lots of lovely things.

I wonder if I can take a break from the jacket - much as I love it - to have a go at the crochet necklace and collar I've Tweeted about . . .  they're beautiful and there are so few crochet things I actually *know* I will use....

Graffiti Knitting hits North Norfolk

I wonder who has knitted these? In Sheringham this week, I saw at least 5 of these lovely knitted crowns, many complete with jewels and glittery bits, between the station and the beach. There are no signs or stickers around them, and the window of Sheringham's wool shop, Creative Crafts, is giving nothing away: it advertises a weekly Knit n Natter, but I can't imagine its usual clientele doing anything as subversive as yarn bombing street lights with freestyle crowns. They are fab! They are glitzy and jaunty and somehow really cheering to see. I think this is the first time I've actually spotted some graffiti knitting without being told that it is there. So, three cheers for the Sheringham Graffiti Knitter(s), whoever you are! I think these are just great!

Having seen these, I began to take more notice of the murals and artwork in Sheringham  - resulting in a rather grim plaque on the Art Trail:

The bronze plaque on the left says that the fisherman on the right are wearing traditional "ganseys", or knitted jerseys. Apparently, the complicated Aran patterns were so that the women could identify their men if they drowned - they would recognise the pattern! Eeek! And, sure enough, though my crummy BlackBerry photo doesn's make this clear, the two men on the plaque have got jumpers with different patterns on. What a horrible thought.

However - who would have thought that Sheringham was so arty? - I *then* came across this just fantastic piece of beach hut art:

I hope the owners don't mind me using this here - the doors were locked and there was no-one around. The back ground is yellower than it is here and the whole hut is a lovely primrose colour, with this black silhouette as the only decoration. Brilliant. If only she'd been knitting instead of reading.

But what of knitting? I *can't* get my bootees right (what a sentence), so I have unravelled them and turned my back on them. But the Sirdar chunky jumper is coming along really nicely. I think my Lady Friend is right, and it is basically a kids' jumper in terms of its school story colours (red and grey), but chunky is speedy and it has cables - which I love - so I am pleased.  I did knit quite a bit of it, in between finding knitted crowns on the streets, but I also spent quite a long time reading the new Patrick Gale, A Perfectly Good Man. His writing is very good: warm, evocative of Cornwall, and witty. I'm not competent to knit and read, so occasionally Patrick Gale won.

I'd love to hear any news of the Sheringham Yarn Bombers!

Finally: quick Wednesday WIP. As I've just mentioned, the Sirdar jumper is the WIP. You can see it in the previous post, where I'm knitting it with a lovely sea view!