World Wide Knit in Public Day June 2017

Here we are at our 3rd WWKIP Day held once again in Yarns Coffee Halt at Theatre at The Mill, Mossley.  We held our WWKIP Day a week earlier than the official date because of holidays etc. among the group.  We had our WWKIP Day on Saturday 3rd June.

Our local Hookery Group were joined by some lovely ladies from
the Knitwits Group in Portstewart who went on to host their own WWKIP Day on Saturday 10th June on Portstewart Promenade. Thank you ladies for your support.   Maybe next year we'll travel
to the North Coast and join you for The WWKIP Day.

We also had some friends from Whitehead who joined us again this year. Thank you ladies. 

The staff at Yarns were very attentive as usual and thanks must go to the Duty Manager and to Heather in the coffee shop.  We had 36 folks who came along - women, men, adults and children, some who could knit and crochet and others who couldn't, some who were coming back for a second time and some who were new.

On the table in the photo above you can see some white pieces of work.  It was quite difficult to get a good picture of the white work.  One belongs to Catherine's great grandmother and was crocheted back in the late 1800s.  Catherine's grandmother worked in the local linen mills and she then attached the crocheted pieces to some linen.  The work is so detailed and one can't even begin to imagine the poor light that the ladies had to do the work and also the material is so white and clean.  Another couple of pieces belong to Helena's sister-in-law who crocheted collars and cuffs for Irish dancing tunics.  All of these pieces of work have Irish roses and shamrocks on them.

We decided on a floral theme this year and everyone pulled out all the stops to come up with unusual ideas for crocheted and knitted garments and other items on the theme of flowers.  The photos don't do justice to the work.

Ladder kindly loaned by Mags and the flowers and vines kindly donated by Judith, Niqi's mum.  Judith was tasked with crocheting 'just a few' while she was over on holidays a few weeks ago. 

  Doesn't Ermintrude look well?  This is one of the cows placed in public places around Northern Ireland.  This one is in The Civic Square at Mossley Mill.  Ermintrude's head was carefully measured to ensure a snug fit of her sun hat!

It was a warm day so Ermintrude didn't really need her blanket but there were a few very heavy showers of rain!

'THE Bernard' as it has become known was ceremoniously cast off on WWKLIP Day.  It had been cast on at last year's WWKIP Day.  

This is a very special little flower.  Maureen was teaching herself how to do this pattern when news came through about the Manchester Arena explosion.  After she had finished the flower Maureen decided to put a single pink button onto the flower to represent each of the 22 lives lost.  

 Some other flowers seen on the day.

On trend cacti ....  Have you noticed them everywhere in the shops, in flower shops, on clothes and in the home decor magazines?  Can you see the dinky red watering can tucked away in the background?  

Here's a cheeky little cacti man made by Chloe ....  And a bouquet of carnations made by me.

 The group are making a friendship blanket.  We have all made flowers according to a pattern from Crochet Now but have chosen our own two-tone colours.  Catherine has started joining them together and some of the rest of us will do some more of this.  It is our intention to raffle it off once completed.

 Meet the members of Hookery Group.  Elaine started to crochet in February and this is her first piece.  It's a labour-of-love blanket for her husband.  The Mayor came to pay us a visit too that day on one of his last official visits at the end of his term of office.

 Evelyn's smiley little happy flower, from an Attic24 pattern, resting against Niqi's Sunshine and Showers blanket.

Maureen's sunshine flower.

 We were lucky enough to have one of our Poppy Pieces on display for our WWKIP Day.  It generated lots of discussion from members of the public who were also using the coffee shop that day.

And so to rest ...

Eight excited ladies and eggs

Oh what a night!  That's almost the title of a song.  

Eight ladies got together tonight including Helena who came along for the first time.  Eggs, chicks, bunnies, food and glorious Easter colours - what more could one ask for?

Miniature chicks and mini eggs

Beautiful hyacinths and tulips

Our very own bunny girls?

Our bunny girls are reported to have gone out today in search of wool and returned with Easter decorations and the ears!  Not much wonder they had idle crochet hands tonight.  Unlike Niqi who has been crocheting at a fantastic rate since Friday and is half way through not only one but two of her own Nanny McPhee blankets.  Well done Niqi!  Niqi also brought enough yarn with her tonight to yarn bomb the whole of the church hall complex.

Fairytale blanket

Bunnies, chicks and Princess Slippers

To prove that we did have some crochet to show case here are Ann's Princess Slippers which match her fairytale blanket .

And Heather Boss's shawl (which does look a whole lot better when worn) with the Glen Gallery wooden buttons purchased at Christmas

There was lots of talk about wool suppliers, wool types and yarn comparisons.  We have discovered that some of the pound-type shops are starting to stock some very unusual wools ....

Another field trip was mooted.  Unfortunately we weren't able to come up with a suitable day over the holidays so later in the season is a more probable time for the diary.
 And a piece of good news - Sheila was crocheting a blue blanket for an expectant mum (see blog 28 Feb 2013) whose new baby boy was born this evening and has been called Robin.  Mum and baby doing well.

No Hookery for the next two weeks as next week will be Holy Week and the week after that is the Easter week itself and folks might be otherwise engaged.  See you all again on 10th April.

Springtime variations

Snowdrops in the garden, snow on the hilltops, and daffodils everywhere - it must be Spring.

A little bit of Spring sunshine

Chicks and eggs

 Birds' nests

It must be nearly Easter?

Tonight Auntie Anne and Auntie Gillian thought that we could be creative in other ways and after their very successful Forage course today at Mossley's Museum at the Mill they brought along some eggs for us to decorate and make an Easter Tree. 

Work in progress was intricate and involved.  We had been warned to come prepared 'to get messy' but we didn't know what that meant.  Everyone took turns at decorating their own egg.  The kind ladies had already 'blown' some eggs for us but provided extra for demo purposes.  Paints and paintbrushes were extricated from Auntie Annes's roof space and brought to life again by ladies in the older generation rather than the young tots who used to enjoy afternoon art play.

Some snap shots for you ...

And the very special Ta-Dah moment when our completed tree was placed in the Foyer of Saint Patrick's Church for everyone to enjoy ....

Could we say that we are now branching out into other crafts?
We also welcomed Leigh tonight and Guru Patricia came back to pay a surprise visit and make sure everyone was doing OK.

First March Meet of this year

Did anyone take photos tonight? Just in case they didn't I thought I'd nip in and reshare my moment of maternal encouragement.  At the top are the best I could Google of the war prints set that we saw at The Mac the other week. At the bottom are the spirals that reminded our house of the prints.  Happy Mummy! So it might actually be worth the grumping to keep on keeping on with the culture thing. (And The Mac really does do a very superlative Mac and cheese on their Kids' Menu!)

What I saw tonight- unbelievable toffee yoghurt cake (that was seeing and eating), knitting dishcloths that could equally become a summer cardi, the final sleeve, berries, a square from a chain, Welcome Myrtle, a Warholesque tin can kitty cressy thing- impressive Brownies again, lengthening beauteous scarf, and the Wave from the Mac. So glad to have been xx

(Niqi, I know that the spirals should have been in a different order but the camera battery has just died and I am going to bed!)

Growing....

The ranks of Hookery at the Dock continue to swell; we are please to welcome Karen and Edwina as our most recent Hookits.

 Heather brought some delicious, if enormous, cookies.

I wonder if they do kits with an 'R' plate over
here for those who pass their Hookery Test?

A quick roll call -


Karen          Anne

 Heather            Sheila

 Rosemary             Anne

 Mags    Niqi

 Edwina