They all did very well!

Firstly all of my A level Geography group achieved a grade B in their final exams! I am soooo pleased & proud of them (There were 5 in the group & I know that at least a couple of them call in here from time to time to see what Mrs J is up to!) I don't yet know the details, but hopefully it will help them all to the uni. places of choice. Remember guys, 'Geography is everywhere'! We will have to see what Thursday brings along with the GCSE groups. Actually it was my wish to find other ways of supporting my students that led me to blogging and to this blog. So a big thank you from me to them! I know some have caught the blogging bug and thank/ curse me for it! Last Thursday was also A/S results day, so son & heir was up for his results. Not too shabby fortunately. They put him on course for his favored uni. course & as he is fond of quoting what Mum actually said 'That's OK, they are a good building block for next year'!!!! Teacher speak for OK, can do better! It will be about working smarter & just a little harder! Thursday also found me with NO KNITTING ON ANY NEEDLES!!!!!! I finished my prairie shawl & love it! That was not on! I needed something to focus on whilst waiting for THE phonecall from s&h (Mr J was at school (as a Head of Sixth Form this is his BIG day!), so I started my Christmas knitting! How many days until Christmas????? I still had huge amounts of Rowenspun 4 ply left from my Cherry Leaf Shawl, so I looked through Victorian Knitting Today & decided to knit Mr J's mom (MIL) a scarf for Christmas. Its the scarf with striped border. The border was complicated enough to have to concentrate pre phone call, the body of the scarf is an easy peasy car/ tv knit. It will of course have cost something as I defiantly need to buy some blocking/ dressing wires now! I think this pattern or something similar may feature in several christmas stockings this year.

I am also awaiting the arrival of Gryffindor Sock yarn form Bright Dyes etsey store! It was hitting the dye whatever yesterday! I will post pictures when it arrives! The wonders of t'internet!

Please note the addition of a new badge to my side bar! It is a the “Talking Knitting” Badge - Required for all Knitting Scouts from Brenda Daynes brilliant podcast 'Cast on'. It states that 'The recipient must conduct himself/herself in such a manner as to talk knitting whenever an opportunity presents itself. Not easily fazed by looks of disinterest from friends or the act of “zoning out” by well-intentioned loved ones'. Easy! I must load the latest podcast to my MP3 player -I like to listen whilst taking the dog for a walk. He doesn't think its at all odd when I get excited about some new pattern, yarn or technique that Brenda mentions!

On a final note. My day seems to start & finish with a trip to the poly tunnel to tend my plants & remove slugs and snails!!!!! I am trying so hard to be 'organic' but after they destroyed all of the Calabrese heads & some of the cauliflower it is verrrry difficult! However we have eaten some home grown cauliflower (& I am guarding the last few carefully), carrots & cabbage. ..... and oh yes, runner beans, lots and lots of runner beans! The cucumber plants is also doing well & the peppers are growing slowly.

Two finished projects and some eye candy!

The ironing has all been done but I have managed to complete the Yorkshire (French!) Market Bag (including felting!) and the Anonymous Sock Knitters August Sockdown. There are pictures!

The bag before felting:

The bag after felting (two trips in the front loader on 30 degree quick wash produced a shrinkage of about a third & lost the stitch definition -one trip =25% and some stitch definition remained)

It was accompanied by one of the dog's towels, which has a slight browny hue now!

It was then blocked on a box wrapped in a towel (also belonging to the dog!):

The finished (but not lined) bag:This afternoon it went to market..... well at least to the butchers in Pateley Bridge & did the job very nicely thank you! (No pictures- it was chucking it down with rain.... again!).

I saw some yarn on Ravelry...... I had to have it .....I found it on ebay...... it arrived this morning!

Its Trekking XXX in colourway 100. Colourway 187 came too! Well, you save on postage if you purchase more than one skein, right?

The sock yarn that I actually NEED though is some in Gryffindor House colours! Whislt on holiday my sisters Mr requested a pair of socks, he was reading Dark Hallows at the time so I suggested Hogwarts House colours. He did an online Sorting Hat quiz & he was sorted into Gryffindor -so gold & dark red it is! Any suggestions? Me? I am in Ravenclaw!

The Embossed Leaf Socks are finished & ready for proud(?) display on Ravelry. I am very happy with my first (kind of) KAL.


Thank you all for the lovely comments about my photographs from Tiree. I will throw in another one...

Sunrise from Stevie's Bothy. Taken by Mr J. I was fast asleep! Glad he took it, means we can all share it!

Tir-iodh

Tir-iodh, the gaelic name for the Isle of Tiree, means land of the corn. The island was as lovely as ever. As you can see Moss was happy to be there.We have had a great holiday, despite a couple of lows. One low (or several) was low pressure, bringing a few days of rain but that was OK. The other was son & heir having a) a bout of tonsillitis & b) an emerging & very painful wisdom tooth! Its along time since teething had an impact on our holidays! However he is recovered & managed to get some excellent windsurfing & surfing in, especially in the sunnier & windy first week. The cottage in week one was OK. It had an excellent location near the windsurfing base & west coast & had all the right equipment but cottage two 'Stevie's Bothy' was superb! Gorgeous inside and out & right on the beach edge near to the south east tip of the island. We were joined by my sister & her DH for the middle 8 days of the holiday & despite their excellent company, plus that of S&H & my DH I managed some quality knitting & reading time!

Somewhere in Ravelry I found the question 'Where will you read the new Harry Potter book?' -answer is here....... or at least some of it, whilst finishing the yarn over cable socks & waiting for the two Kayaker's to arrive after a paddle up the east coast of Tiree from Crossapol Bay to Scaranish. I knitted the socks a bit long for some reason but they are OK when worn.

The 'Yorkshire' Market Bag provided easy driving in the dusk/dark knitting & a bit of ferry boat time (We had to be on the dock at Oban for 6.15 am!). We actually arrived in the middle of the night & drove down to the Kerrara ferry & grabbed a couple of quiet hours sleep there. DH really enjoyed the empty roads & the drive across from Stirling! The Market Bag is nearly finished. I did start on the handles last night but I think I am going to frog back to the main bag after a look at some finished French Market Bags on Ravelry. Some re-positioning of the handles might be a good adjustment to make. The Brigantia yarn is a warm treat to knit with & I am a) looking forward to and b) a bit nervous of the felting bit! The advice from my LYS is 'go gently' so I guess that means start with a 30 degree quick/ mini wash programme & see what happens?

The prairie lace shawl from 'Folk Shawls' was my cottage knit & is also nearly finished. It grew fairly quickly & is soft & toasty warm. If we had been camping & would have finished it! The gale force 6 north west wind kept temperatures down for the first 10 days although there was plenty of sunshine. The 1st August was the start of the 'Sockdown' in the Sock Knitters Anonymous group on Ravelry. Chosen project for August was for me to be a lace sock. Again nearly finished (Half a sock to go!)..... The yarn has knitted up really well & the colours are great. A long post if you are still with me! I will update as I finish the WIP! A large pile of ironing awaits!

day wear?

Will this be my day wear for the next few weeks? We are off to the Isle of Tiree at the weekend.

Tiree is technically an 'Inner Hebrides' but as you can see it is pretty 'outer' in that it faces out into the Atlantic -next stop Canada! Weather wise its in the way of whatever is coming in from the west. It does hold the sunshine record for the UK though & they do say that if you do not like the weather, wait ten minutes & it will change! The forecast is fairly mixed! We should have some sunny days anyway. The wetsuit was bought to make a bit of body surfing possible, DH & son & heir will no doubt be wind surfing, kite surfing, kayaking..........!!!!

The knitting projects have been identified -French (Yorkshire?) Market bag for a bit of journey knitting.

The yarn is called Brigantia Fussion & is actually made in Yorkshire! It came from Sheepish, my LYS, & I am assured that it will felt beautifully. I have not knitted the base 'in the round' as I didn't have any 4.5 dkp's so I went for the other option. I also have my 'yarn over' socks to finish (thanks for all the reassurance about the bind-off). The prairie shawl is going to be the 'main knit' I think but I am all ready to 'go' on the Anonymous Socknitters Sockdown, starting on August first. For those of us hooked on Ravelry this is a twelve month 'project' with targeted socks each month, choosing a pattern from the named designer or a specified design element. First up is 'Knitbug' or 'Lace' so I will I think have to knit (again!) Embossed Leaves
by Mona Schmidt, which I loved knitting & wanted to knit again. The yarn...... this yummy gifted yarn. Thank you Anne! There are 'random' prizes & no compulson to 'do' each sock. There is a two month 'window' for each set of projects. Although I am starting with a pattern I have knitted before I do intend to use some of the projects to challenge me! Fair Isle for example! I think it means that presents will be sock shaped this year! Hopefully this is what Sunday will look like & this is where we will be, Traigh Bail on the west coast of Tiree! This was taken three years ago on our first vist -can you see why we return?

Just a last bit to add, I am now a proud member of the 'Cloud Appreciation Society'!

Late note! This arrived this morning! I want to knit them ALL! Just time to slide it into the packing!

Teachers do it in the Holidays!

At last! ..... OK..... moan....mummble.....bloomin teachers.... all that holiday...... !!!!!! and yes, on the holiday front, we do OK. Yes we have no choice of dates, prices are sky high and yes, the weather WAS better in May but we teachers do relish & cherish our big hols. Mine started two days before the male part (not the dog -he is always on holiday) of the family, so yesterday the dog & I packed a picnic & set off to Fountains Abbey which is about 8 miles away. We wanted a walk that was fairly dry under paw & I thought we should make use of the National Trust membership which tends just to act as a season ticket to the car park at Brimham Rocks. We parked at the west gate. Still dry at this point, and then walked in past Fountains Hall to the Abbey itself. Its probably a couple of years since I have been to the Abbey so it was good to have a wander around again. Still dry! I then decided to walk towards the water garden & the deer park, thinking about finding a suitable picnic bench when this happened!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Rain, lots of it, coming down in 'stair rods'. The very large brolly was fast into action so I stayed dry & we headed to the trees, following a sign to 'Anne Boleyn's seat'. Up at the top of the hill & in the trees this proved to be a huge, dry, unoccupied open fronted summer house, with seats & views out in to the rain and back to Fountains Abbey. Dinner time! The floor was flagged so Moss could lie down in the dry and we spent a very pleasant half hour here. We eventually returned to the car as the rain stopped & returned home to knit, watch the cricket (robbed by the weather at the death! Shame!) ........... and do the ironing! I could get used to this life!

I have finished the first 'cable over yarn' sock in Regia Bamboo. I like the pattern & the yarn but the bind off (I have had another go at toe up construction) is less pleasing. I used a stretchy bind off recommended somewhere, which was OK for Mr J's woollen socks but I am not so sure that a heavy handed bit to blocking will deal with this. What do you think? It looks OK when worn but I know its not quite 'nice'!

Garden moments

Some garden photos! Starting with the first ripe tomato of the year! A hanging basket plant.

Another first, this time a first ever pepper. There are four plants (all from Dobbies) & they are all showing promise.

I am also experimenting with growing a cucumber for the first time this year, again indoors (thank goodness) & that is moving upwards at least.

As you can see the weeds are growing well! Outdoors things are a little damp but fortunately we have not had the monsoon that has hit further south, just too wet for cricket rain. The runner beans are showing promise. In a dry summer I spray them with cold water to help the flowers set, so no worries there!

The variety of runner beans is called 'Painted Lady'. I like the red and white flowers, which is why I grow this type. They are good to eat as well. The french beans have flowers on & hopefully will freeze well if we ever get enough heat for them to grow!

The flower garden is still pretty, despite the weather. I think this clematis is called 'Elizabeth'.

Faith restored

I have had two great days. One in the rain & one in hot sun! We have taken two groups of students to Malham in the Yorkshire Dales. It was nominally a 'geography fieldtrip' and was offered as an option in the 'enrichment programme'. Yesterday we took a mini-bus full of year nine students. It tipped it with rain down once we reached Malham Cove. The students were impressed by the scenery, awed infact at Goredale Scar, paddled in the stream & a few hardy souls splashed close to the waterfall (Yes, it was in the risk assessment!). One even said 'There's alot of Geography out here Miss'! Today we took a coach full of Year 7's. The sun baked down. They picnicked, they paddled, they socialised, they watched the Peregrine Falcons & had a go at the village quiz, ate ice creams & didn't want to come home & said they wanted to come next year! The staff (the staffing was fairly generous) all felt really privileged to spend time with these kids away from school & targets & assessments. How can we measure their level of interest & engagement? The standards in our classroom? Intellectual safety? Quality of the teaching environment? (classroom climate its called!). Look at these pictures. This is why I teach Geography, damn it!

In the mini bus I was able to knit & finished Mr J's socks. Today the coach was a different proposition & knitting would have led to sickness! I have, however started knitting the Regia Bamboo into some toe-up's (I had to use a larger circular for the Turkish cast on as I have yet to replace my broken 2.5's) & with 'yarn over cable' from Sensational Knitted Socks. This is Mr J actually wearing his finished Opal Mexico sock! Colours are a bit more vibrant, but the flash seems to have washed them out.

The biggest news? I AM IN! In what? In Ravelry! Oh what a basket of delight lurks there! We break up for summer tomorrow!!!!!!!!! Forcast rain....... Guess what I will be doing? Good job I picked up on the fact that you can see where you are in the queue. My invite had come in two weeks ago & into the junk mail!