Busy New Year

I can't believe how long its been since I last updated this blog. In my defence, I've been busy on the Victorian Soap Project so most of my blogging energy has been going on that this month, but I haven't been idle on the  textile front either.

I've been working on some commissions for various regiments, here's a ridle green Kilmarnock that I've just finished, it gave me a biit of a headache as I needed to colour match as closely as possible a sample of  uniform fabric, and it took me a couple of goes to get the dye blend right. At one point it all went horribly wrong and I ended up with a pink hat, but we'll gloss over that and never speak of it again if you don't mind!

I'm currently working on a number of forage caps for another re-enactment regiment. Although some knitters find it boring to do the same pattern several times in quick succession, I don't mind it, there is something quite satisfying about seeing how similar I can get them all and I love getting photos of the chaps in their finery when the order goes off!

I've also started reformatting and uploading some of my historic hat patterns to work as a Kindle download. It seems that in this day and age I ought to be trying to keep up with the available technology, so we'll see how those go and with luck it won't be long before the entire series is available in that format.

I've got lots of plans for new patterns for this year, but untill someone finds me a few more hours in the day, they are having to wait for a quieter bit of the year. More soon, for now its back to my forage caps...

Green Man

Ever since the Dwarven Battle Bonnet came out I've been wanting to do a Green Man bearded bonnet, and I'm delighted to announce that the pattern has finally gone live.

Its been designed so that the pattern as written will give you pretty much the green man pictured here, but like my other charater masks, the idea is that you give your imagination free rein and once the basic framework is in place, have fun adding additional leaves, berries, creatures or other embellishments.

I'm working on a 'Treebeard' Ent version as I type, same basic pattern, but with trailing branches and leaves rather than the more classic arrangement seen here. I'm having so much fun with this!

The pattern is available on my Ravelry page for $3, which is about £1.95 There is still time to knit him before Halloween/Samhain, just right for a seasonal stroll in the woods.

The Victorian Soap Project

As many of you know, one of my main research interests is the investigation and reconstruction of early soap recipes,  partly to record the facts for a book which will eventually get finished, but also so that I can put selected recipes back into production to allow re-enactors and other interested parties acess to soap which is made as closely as humanly possible to the original ingredients and methods, but which also complies with modern safety and quality standards.

This makes each bit of research quite expensive, so I'm trying out Crowdfunding for the current part, which is looking at Victorian gentlemen's shaving and toilet soaps.
Investors can put in as little as £1 and I have set up a system of rewards/repayments for larger amounts. If anyoen is interested, or knows anyone who may wish to assist with this project, the Crowdfunder page is here: http://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/investment/the-victorian-shaving-soap-project-370

Please help me spread the word about this, its not a huge sum as research projects go, but I need to raise the money to cover the certifying chemist's fees and some additional research material and ingredients to allow me to get this stage of the Historic Soap project up and running.
Thank you!

Tough Love Spiked Wristlets

I'm slightly embarrassed at how long its been since I last updated this blog, in my defence its been a very busy summer. I've been very lucky to have had a good number of hat commissions through, but I've also found time to work on some new designs.

Here is the latest one. This is 'Tough Love', and its a remarkably simple to work wristlet in sock yarn. The soft spikes lend themselves well to the use of shaded or variagated yarns, and it may be embellished with beads for a bit of extra sparkle at endges and on the spikes. One wristlet should take about 18-20g of sock yarn, so its a good way to use up leftovers from a sock project.

As with all my patterns, its available through Ravelry, and this one costs just $3

a Romano-British weekend

We've just rolled in from a very pleasant weekend at the Roman Legionary Museum in Caerleon doing various Romano-British things as part of a Roman gladiators weekend. The weather was spectactularly hot, so lovely in many respects, but I must confess to feeling a bit pink round the edges now.

Still, it was perfect dyeing weather, so lots of fleece and yarn got turned into various pretty colours, and as always the woad bath was a huge hit, people love seeing the colour oxidize from yellow through green to blue as the air hits the wet skein, and I did the other classic dyes weld and madder to round out the basic palette.
Gareth worked on some repousse projects (I know there should be an accent in there, I can't work out how to do it sorry!), he had loads of small apprentices, lured to the punches and hammers and raring to wallop pieces of metal for as long as he could cope with them.Annoyingly I haven't got a picture of his finished items, but will try to update this post later, suffice to say, my shield is looking shinier than ever with two new repousse decorations :)

One last picture, the gardens at the museum are looking wonderful at the moment, really evokes the right feel, and I couldnt resist getting a photo with them as a backdrop.

Woad dyed yarns and some caps

I've been doing a bit of woad dyeing this last week and have been particularly pleased with the results. In this instance I started with woad powder as I have no woad in the garden currently, but otherwise the method is much the same as if you were starting with woad 'tea'.

Two loads of yarn later, here's the results. The yarn on the left is a naturally very pale grey which came out beautifully slate blue with the woad, and on the right the larger skein was a natural creamy white wool that has taken the colour very evenly and is a glorious glowing blue.

I couldn't resist knitting some up right away, the two Monmouth 'labourer's caps' here are in the natural pale grey and the slatey blue, and have been through a hot wash to full them, which is always a good way to check that your dye is stable on the fibre :)

Knitting for a Regiment

This week I have mostly been knitting Kilmarnock bonnets, with the help of my ever long-suffering mother (thanks mum!) who did the knitting on two of them, we managed to get an order for six bonnets finished in time for them to go to their regiment to wear at the Waterloo re-enactment next weekend.

Here they are drying on my garden steps, they just need one last steam blocking, and they will go in the post first thing on monday morning.