Travelling, gardening and knitting too!

I seem to have been on the go for a long time.

During the past month or so we have been travelling a certain amount.

First Ian and I snuck in a weekend in the Czech Republic at the end of June, visiting my friend Sylvi.

Ian had to be in Prague for a meeting on the Tuesday, and so we took off on the Friday, and visited Sylvi who lives an hour and a half's drive north of the airport.

We had a good time with her, and saw some sun.

Meanwhile it was raining here!

Then a couple of weeks later we had a quick visit to Hertfordshire for a family party.

The next day we flew from London City airport to Stuttgart to visit Carola.

We managed a quick side trip during the week to see another friend of mine, Tom, who lives very near Basel.

In the meantime it rained here again, and that is why our path looked like this at the weekend:

After dodging about a bit with my secateurs, trying to avoid the ants, it looked like this:

I meant to take a third picture later on, but it was too dark by the time I remembered. It all looks a lot better after being swept.

In order to cope with all the geranium foliage I had to turn the compost heap, so we are all set up to be able to tidy the garden sometime soon.

Sitting out in the garden for breakfast on Sunday (before rediscovering the path) the sun was shining through these honesty seeds:

All of which brings me to the latest socks. This time they are for Sylvi. She asked for reds/rusts, and this is my mix of yarns:

The dull blue one is a pale patterned yarn that I overdyed with a shocking pink to dull it down.

Together it all comes out like this:

The next socks are meant to be for Carola. I haven't decided on a colour scheme yet.

Cloudbursts ... or steady rain?

This is how our weather seems to have been for a while now.

It is sometimes possible with cloudbursts to arrange life so that you miss cycling through them.

Steady rain is another matter though!

So the garden is neglected and lush, but that doesn't mean that lots of knitting or spinning has been done.

I have had to do washing without recourse to a washing line for the drying.

So for the past few days we have had t-shirts on hangers above nearly every door downstairs.

The wettest items have gone straight to the airing cupboard.

BUT today, I have some things out on the line.

Whether they will get wetted again is another matter.

So, no recent photography in the garden, but just for fun here are a few perfect images from earlier on.

An orange poppy without its petals.

A primula.

A sliced pear (not from our garden)

A summer/autumn flowering bulb (slightly dried out).

I had put aside some bulbs to go in pots for the front door, and they got mixed up. As a result this was left unplanted for rather too long.

When I went to plant it, I couldn't remember what it was, but loved the veining so much that I had to take a photo.

Lots of design inspiration here, for spinning/knitting, ceramics, drawing or even enamelling.

More missed events

Wendy recently held a raffle in aid of Breakthrough, and I was one of the lucky winners.

Here you see a skein of Fleece Artist merino in the "parrot" colourway.

Although I received it last week, I had no time to take a photo until today.

This has been sitting alongside my bed, tempting me to ball it up, and try it out.

After a couple of days with long train jorneys my current socks are nearly done, so maybe this will be next.

Saturday saw me off to Cambridge, back to visit the Cambs. guild of Weavers, Spinners and Dyers.

The June meeting was a combination of a bring and buy sale and a talk by Anna Crutchley about Marianne Straub.

Marianne was a member of the guild, and I enjoyed a few brief visits to her house while delivering the guild newsletter.

Then yesterday I was off travelling again, this time to London for Nickerjac's baby shower.

Lixie hosted this gathering in south London (unknown territory to me as a north Londoner!)

Foolishly I forgot to carry a camera with me, so you will have to rely on the pics taken by Nic and Lixie.