Wednesday, May 15, 2013

teaching, drawing, knitting, autumn trees, good pirates and soup

teaching Class 3 about measuring...the "Iron Ulna" being presented to the King!




drawing going on all over the floor right now...




knitting:
-finished my big girl's hat ready for horse riding camp next week, gorgeous pattern: Oaked, though I only did one panel of oak leaves rather than all the way around.
ravelled here

-started a cowl for same big girl because I just have to stay awake the night before the camp knitting until the wee hours in order to feel like a good mother! The pattern is Gudrun Johnston's Crofter's Cowl .
ravelled here

reading (well, gazing at really) Knitting Vintage Socks by Nancy Bush which just arrived in the post today.  This winter may just be sock winter...

 We visited the best goodliest pirates who ever sailed the seven seas!
Sea Shepherd had three ships docked for repairs after their confrontations with Japanese whaling ships (who were targeting protected and endangered whales in a whale sanctuary!!!). It was a very successful summer campaign down in Antarctica and I was moved to tears by the  dedication and heroic deeds. We were shown  around the ships, (which were gorgeous inside- original 60's(?) furnishings and trappings) and heard inspiring and sometimes hair-raising tales. We were not even off the first ship when my middle girl announced, "I want to be a Sea Shepherd. How do I get on!"


and leek and potato soup, again!



Joining Nicole for Keep Calm Craft On
and Ginny for Yarn Along

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Red Knits in an Autumn Mood

It's the first of May, and here we are descending into the inward time, the cold nights, the darker, shorter days,  carpets of Autumn leaves already rotting underfoot, and regular Leek and Potato Soup evenings. I was so lucky to spend the day knitting and sipping tea with friends.
Since I became hopelessly addicted to knitting, this time no longer daunts me. On the contrary, I feel excited by the thought of cosy nights knitting and rugging up in those knits, the warm soups and the time for introspection and quiet connections with home and family. There's a beautiful verse by Rudolf Steiner that the teachers meditated briefly upon each morning during my week teaching a couple of weeks ago:

When to my being's depths I penetrate,
There stirs expectant longing
That self-observing, I may find myself
As gift of summer sun, a seed
That warming lives in Autumn's mood
As germinating force of soul.

      
                                 Rudolf Steiner                                                     

It's from the Calendar of the Soul and given the space and time to contemplate, provides such a possibility to open to that nurturing inner glow ready in the soul to ignite at this time of year.

and onto knitting...as usual...
Here are the Autumnal knits in my life at the moment!




I finished Mr P's pixie hat, which he loves! (free pattern on Ravelry by my friend Dee
Love the soft red(American Beauty:one of the solid colours) in Malabrigo Worsted  
Ravelled here 


And, cast on today for a hat for my big girl chicken who is going on a week long horse riding camp soon and needs a hat!
Pattern is Oaked by Alicia Plummer, in again, Malabrigo Worsted in Sealing Wax colour, a rich russet orange-red.

Joining Nicole for Keep Calm Craft On.