T is for...

Touring

Abbaye d'Ambronay

I've just finished a tour with the Orchestra of the 18th Century and wow, was it fabulous! Intensive, but fabulous!  Actually, to be honest, I'm pretty pooped - two days of rehearsals in Amsterdam, then concerts in Breda (NL), Ambronay (F), Paris, (F) Haarlem, Eindhoven, Brugge (B), Amsterdam, Groningen and Rotterdam, plus the travel days...  Still, it was totally worth it because this group is really one of the finest early music orchestras in the world and I'm still grinning to think that I got to stand in front of them and scream a bit!  Huzzah!

Haarlem - Philharmonie

 

 Brugge - Concertgebouw

Nine different halls meant nine different acoustics, nine different approaches to the music and nine different types of expletive.  I learned a lot of new Dutch words over this past fortnight.  Most eye-openingly entertaining. 

Quite a few of the halls were very dry, so you felt like you were playing or singing into a velvet cushion - the sound being immediately absorbed into the furnishings - so you'd have to play with a bit more oomph and broadness although not necessarily with more volume.  Occasionally there was the perfect acoustic where you could play with and feel your sound was being supported and lifted to the audience, and there were a couple of halls, well, really just the abbey, where you felt you were playing in a swimming pool and your sound rang and echoed for more time than the music needed. A LOT more time! In those instances the trick of maintaining a broadness of tone, but keeping the length of notes shorter was the name of the game.    

 Rotterdam - de Doelen

The weather behaved itself beautifully for 12 of the 14 days of the project, generously endowing us with amazing sunsets in France:

sunset over Ambronay

sparklingly clear days around the Amsterdam grachts (canals):

Egelantiersgracht, Amsterdam

and some sunny hours to be a tourist, too...

the marvellous bell tower of the Westerkerk in Amsterdam

Muntplein - Amsterdam

I was also very lucky to stay in the bottom apartment of a house in the Jordaan in Amsterdam for the duration of the project, in a delightful town-house that used to be a bakery in centuries past.  It's a lovely part of the city, indeed...  So picturesque that you forgive the noise and incessant traffic of tourists everywhere!  Then again, I had to forgive the traffic of tourists, considering I was one, too... a faster-walking, know-where-I'm-going tourist, but a tourist, never-the-less!

bakery built in 1647

Of course, now that the tour is over, I have succumbed to the dreaded end-of-project lurgy and am sniffling and sneezing like there's no tomorrow.  This is unfortunate, however, because my next project starts in 4 days. 

In the words of Calvin, he of tiger-trapping fame, AAAUUUUUUUUUUUUGH.

Vitamin C and some efficacious echinacea, anyone?

S is for...

Stained Glass Windows

from the Royal Chapel in Loches

I have had a love for staring at stained-glass windows since I was a child looking at the square bits of coloured glass in church instead of listening to the sermon.  It was a Protestant Kirk, though, so there were no pretty pictures anyway, just, you know, squares bits of coloured glass!

There's something about the light that shines through coloured glass that has me spell-bound - whether by small portals like the ones above, or the magnificent windows you find in cathedrals. 

 Tours Cathedral

St Donat chapel windows

 reflections on the Grand Hall floor in Blois Château

 another from Tours cathedral

 more from St Donat

 

 and another from Blois

I'm currently touring with a rather special early music orchestra through The Netherlands, Belgium and France, so there's bound to be some more stained glass beauties to discover!

'Tis the Birthday of Sister Mine

Huzzah!

It is indeed the birthday of my DS!  She is cough cough cough splutter years old today!

 that little tongue - so cute!

I won't embarrass her with any more baby photos here, but you can always take a peek at the post I dedicated to her: K is for... 

She's not a totally well bunny at the mo, as she is suffering from costochondritis, which is a condition that causes chest pain and discomfort and is due to inflammation of the cartilage in the chest wall.  Not nice.  It also means she can't drink alcohol at the mo, due to taking large amounts of anti-inflams... poor thing.

Well, I'll have to have a drink for her instead!

Cheers, Toots and Happy Birthday again!

Brilliant Blog Award

ooo!

 Lookie here!
 

Susan nominated me for a Brilliant Blog Award!  I am very chuffed indeed!  (I wonder if I can change the appellation to 'Radiant Wronicle Award'...?!)  This is a web-inspired award for bloggers, by bloggers.  The Brilliant Weblog Award is given to sites and blogs that are smart and brilliant both in their content and their design. The purpose of the prize is to promote as many blogs as possible in the blogosphere.  (Argh - sorry Jesh!)  From my spot on the podium, it is now my job to award the Brilliant Blog Award to 7 of my favourite internet reads.

It may take a while to whittle down the list...  No - I have more than seven, so I'll just have to play 'pin the award on the blog' - pass me a blindfold please...

So here goes... RedScot's nominations for the Brilliant Blog Award are as follows, and in no particular order...

klozknitz 

Klozknitz introduced me to the delights of knitting. She then introduced me to the delights of Ravelry. And through reading her blog, I was introduced to the delights of blogging... damn... wronicling...!  For all of that she MUST get an award!

Tsock Tsarina 

A blogful of lively wit and socks to go into debt for, spinny tales and a deliciousness of designs.  (The new official collective noun for, well, yummy designs...)

Opera Yarns

A fellow singer who makes shawls and socks that look like they've been shop-bought.  In an expensive shop.  And she's getting married soon... Can't wait for those blog entires... Wheee!

Jessie Knits 

A lovely blog with a ever-changing eye-poppingly beautiful header - her photos are always beautiful.

Jeshknits 

Not to be confused with the blog above! Jesh is a genius and she makes me laugh. AND she's making me a drop spindle. (Notice the little girl in me jumping up and down and going wheeeeeeeeeee!)

The Panoptican

Okay, so he's pretty famous, but it'll never be uncool to admit you read Franklin's blog. It's FABULOUS!

Quelle Erqsome

Oh man, the recipes you find here are marvellous! And the knitting. AND the designs.  Yep - Erqsome's a keeper!

SO, there you have it... Go on - read 'em - you'll love 'em too!

Wronicles?

Why yes, yes indeed. Wronicles. (Pronounced rŏn'ĭ-kəl - ron-i-kuh-l, from the Greek ρονικάm, don't you know...) Oh. I see...  You think I've made the word up... May I enlighten you? As blogs are really web logs, then wronicles are web chronicles.

Well, they are now, anyway!  (So, yes, I did make it up - you were right! And anyway, Bronicle sounds too much like something you'd scrape off the bottom of a boat...)

So here are the fruits of your labours!  I hope you like them.  Thank you for voting in the poll, and for your comments and private messages. (I now have to figure out how I can respond by email to your comments, but, one step at a time, I guess!) Oh, and apologies for not waiting until the week of polling was over!  I got too grabby hands with the blogger templates!

But before I go on, I need a little something pictorial in nature here... Hmmm...

in honour of the hairdresser with whom I have just booked an 

appointment - she teaches me the smuttiest of french jokes!

Ah, just what the doctor ordered. 

Now, where was I?  Ah yes.  So, gone is the black. Au revoir, noir!  Readability was the biggest issue in the polling and I do have to admit that the white on black may have given some clarity of text issues.  I did like it, however, as a great background for the photos, but because I am as big a blabber as I am a snapper, readability had to come first.  You'll notice I still added some darkness, just not in the main column!

Colours.  Well, I have a fondness for purple, green, black (well, as non-colours go, I'm still rather fond of it) and, on looking around my apartment, I also find I must be partial to blue, too.  It's everywhere!  But I digress...  Black was out, as, well, you know... Green, well, green is lovely, but as my main website is GREEN already (see below), I thought it would be unfair to the other colours to indulge again.  I tried some blues, but although it looked very pretty, it did smack slightly of being a poster-page for Delft pottery.  So, the obvious choice to keep all those colours from falling out was to choose...  Well, you can see what I chose.  Dusky, heathery purples with a hint of sage for highlights (just to keep green, happy... you never know - could get jealous...! Green - jealous - geddit? geddit?!  Don't worry, I'm sighing and shaking my head at myself as I type...)

green, some green, and just a smidgeon of green

I did, in the end settle on this layout - the actual blog wronicle part is wider than the last one, which means that photos sit better, and the post doesn't seem to last forever anymore!  I found the template amongst the wonders at http://www.ourblogtemplates.com/  They have a host of gorgeous templates that are a doddle to use.  This one has so many shiny, pretty options that I think I wasted a whole day tinkering around with it. 

I know my knitting must think my arms have been chopped off...

Autumn Cleaning aka HALP!

Well, it is that time of year...  Why, I ask, do your annual house-cleaning ritual in Spring when it's already getting too warm for lugging furniture and upholstery around, when you can do it in Autumn, and then you don't mind so much working up a sweat and you keep warm in the cooling days into the bargain?  Okay, so I've posed that as rather a rhetorical question... 

I have to concede that my main reason for my cleaning stint has been to find a new place for my ever-growing stash, which was enhanced by this little lot yesterday:

Angels and Elephants! wheeeeeeeee

I know you'll be shocked to see that I have grabbed a few more skeins from the A & E dye-pots in Cornwall.  Man.  I really MUST MUST MUST stay away from eBay until I can actually afford such beauty, instead of mortgaging my soul to the devil for the same ends...

Here we have 'Plum Crumble' (purple, pink and olive), 'Raspberry Ripple' (pink, purple and blue), 'Candy Floss' (pink, lavender, turquoise and blue) and at the back 'Pentillie' (pale pink, lavender and green). 

Aha! But I forget!  Sock yarn doesn't count as stash, does it?  Heh!

 

Gratuitous yarn shots

So to continue the Autumn cleaning angle, I am thinking about changing the layout of this blog and here, my friends, is where YOU come in!

You may have noticed the addition of :: GASP :: a poll at the top...  If you have the inclination I'd love you to help me decide what to do...  But before I say anything, I'm intending to keep the 3 columns, as that is one thing I do rather like!

Option 1 (to be known as Why change? It's bloody marvellous as it is!)
    is to keep it as it is - colours and layout. 

Option 2 (to be known as 'I'd like to be able to read this wonderful blog properly')
    is to keep the same format but go with lighter colours.

Option 3 (to be known as 'Shoogle it aboot a bit - why not?')
    is to keep the same colours but arrange the columns starting from the left as BLOG POSTS, then 2 thinner columns

Option 4 (to be know as 'A change is as good as a rest')
    is to change to lighter colours and arrange the columns from the left as BLOG POSTS, then 2 thinner ones.

(Lighter colours will be versions of the ones already on the blog. Purples, greens and greys...)

I seriously can't make up my mind!  After polling, (presumptuous? Me?) and if you have the time and inclination, please feel free to post any comments about little tweaks that you think this page needs or, you know... anything - even just a hello!!  I'm open to all hints, tricks and categorical slap-downs!

Well, almost!

R is for...

Resemblance

The Wrong Socks

I've been wracking my brain for topics to write about for this abc-along post... wrangling with a few ideas and wringing my hands when they had to be written-off, to wretched disillusionment...

Heh!

So, I decided upon 'Resemblance' as I've just finished 2 items of the  family knitting, genus sock... subcategory SSS...

Firstly is the finished 'Crooked Cable Sock' by Sockbug. It's very cute in the Phildar 'Phil Luxe' yarn in the Nympheas colourway! 

Then we have the first 'Monkey Sock', by Cookie A. Yes, I jumped on the bandwagon - surely hundreds of knitters can't be wrong?  And, no, they're not! This is such a fun pattern to knit up... (actually the Crooked Cable pattern is a lovely knit, too...)

The wool is the hand dyed Shetland sock wool in 'Damson Delight' by my fave 'Angels & Elephants' team in Cornwall! Man, I love their yarn!

Well, I guess I'd better resume work on the replication of this, um... raiment...? Okay, that's stretching things just a wee bit!  Heh!

p.s. Thank you for all your lovely comments on the treasure chest! I'm VERY chuffed to tell you that the recipient loved it! Huzzah!  I might try and post a pattern for it in the near future...

Unmasking the Stealth

My stealth objects are slowly being revealed... slowly...

. . . t o o   s l o w l y. . .

So, to assuage my thumb-twiddling, clock-watching and hum-hahing I have decided to reveal (drum-roll, please...) the Wire Treasure Chest.  Dun dun DUUUN!

 uh... the Wire Treasure Chest...

Okay, so it's a treasure chest. And it's made of wire. You can tell my naming capabilities have been stretched to the max on this one...

There are a couple hundred gold, silver and pearl beads and bugles adorning the the chest...

pearl necklace an optional extra

The front, back and lid are all 25 stitches wide and roughly 12/13 rows long. (Ah... one of the beauties of knitting with wire is that it can be manipulated to make everything look the same size! Jolly handy!)

arty-farty lid shot

The sides were roughly 15 stitches wide and 16 rows long and I attempted to mould the last couple of rows into an arch shape by doing a k2tog at the beginning and end of each row and I curved the lid to make the overall casket/chest shape.

After sewing all the pieces together, with the exception of adding the lid, I decided that the chest needed a little re-enforcing.  The wire frame itself was quite sturdy, but the box was just on the wrong side of wobbly for me to be happy with, so I cut some board to size, covered them with black velvet then sewed them onto the frame. I did the same to the lid and then attached it to the box. And bygorrah, it fit and everything!

and it opens and closes, too! w00t!

Now I just have to wait and see whether the recipient likes it...

cue music of the nail-chomping variety and fade to black...

Q is for...

Quixotic

Ravelry icons

                                                                                    
Our favourite knitting site is a host for many wondrous things, one of my (many) favourites being the quixotic nature of some words... (I use this in its 'whimsical' and 'fanciful' sense.)  If, when conversing on the forums, you type the words 'cup of coffee, cake, killer rabbit (there's a long story there, but not for the telling right here) and ice cream, to name but four, the magic of Ravelry then depicts the words in a delightful little icon which follows your text.  It is very amusing, and the 'cake' especially has come to mean a lot to the members of a certain CPaAG...

I decided I liked these little symbols so much that I'd try to turn them into 3D knitted representations... I found patterns that I could adapt for three of them, and so determined was I to make the fourth, I made it up myself!

But I run ahead of myself...

Firstly, may I present unto you the ice cream:

um, ice cream...

Notice the waffle cone and the blueberry and strawberry scoops! Heh! This is from the marvellous pattern by Marcie Nishioka, called 'Scooped' of all things!

Next we have some cake. This is a very important part of the 'Very Longest Thread' in the 'Completely Pointless and Arbitrary Group' on Ravelry. Newbies are asked for cake when they post for the first time and it occasionally incurs a bit of confusion along the lines of:

"Cake?" 

"How can I bring you cake?" 

"Oh. I see." 

"When I type 'cake' the icon turns up and you all get Rav cake..." 

"D'oh"

etcetera...

(There's a small possibility that I'm re-living my first postings on the VLT for your delectation right here and now...) 

Childish? Well, yes, but good, clean childishnessy-type fun!

And so: cake.

cake (like you'd never guess it by now...)

Now, I don't know exactly what kind of cake the Ravelry cake is supposed to be - it has a cream-coloured sponge, pink icing and filling and some cream on the top edge...  For me, I think I shall go with a Victoria sponge with a strawberry filling and fresh double cream piped around the edge of the pink icing on top.  And now I'm getting slightly peckish...  This cake is only slightly altered from the 'Let them knit cake' pattern by Hannah Kaminsky.

Then we have the killer rabbit.  Um. Well. How to explain... It involves cake, or the lack thereof...

Once upon a time in a Ravelry Land not far away, cake stopped being followed by its icon. Gnashings of teeth, howls of frustration and tears of despair ensued (indulge me, people, I'm writing a story!) causing an outpouring of grief on a main board.  The multitudes were uneasy, scared and lonely for the lack of the pretty pink frosted cake but were delighted to find out that in fact the cake was being guarded by a killer rabbit. I think Casey, one of the founders of Ravelry and the code monkey, was drinking rather too much coffee that day. But anyhoo, the killer rabbit and its cute little bunny icon made it onto our pages, and therefore onto my knitting needles...

watch out for the fangs...

This little beastie was designed by MeganAnn and called 'rabbit'. (And I shall hug him and squeeze him and call him George...)

Lastly I decided I wanted to make a cup of coffee, as... well, it's as important to me as it is to the list of icons... But could I find a pattern?  Um, well, yes actually, I could, but it was a crochet pattern, and I can't crochet my way out of a wet paper bag... So I searched again but to no avail.  Well, thunk I, maybe I can just do one myself...  It can't be THAT hard, right? RIGHT?

cup of coffee (oh, for a latte icon!)

Actually, RIGHT! Heh. 3 stitches cast onto 3 dpns, m1 on each stitch for the first round, and k1, m1 for the next few, a couple of purl rows for the base of the cup, then k1 and m1 whenever I thought it needed to curve out a bit more... Then a length of browny i-cord for the coffee part and a small i-cord for the handle and Bob's your Daddy's Bro!

And so you have it. My own quirky versions of some Rav icons...

huzzah for arty-farty shots!

(Ah, pants - Q could've been for quirky...)

P is for...

Pianto di Maria

 Tears of Mary

'Il Pianto di Maria' is a marvellous sacred cantata by Giovanni Battista Ferrandini (although the piece itself was attributed to Handel for many years) and is one of my all-time favourite pieces of music, and I've just come back from performing it in Germany.  YEEHAH!  The concert was 2 years in preparation, but the director of the ensemble and I have been dreaming about doing this for much longer...

The concert and rehearsals were in the catholic cloister church residing in the tiny wee town of Pfaffen-Schwabenheim in Germany. I know. Catholic? Germany? And there goes another of my presumptions... WHEEEEEEEEEE  It was a charming church, with a not-too-boomy acoustic which was perfect for this kind of music.

choir screen of the Cloister-Kirk

I was particularly drawn to one of the statues on the choir screen. We adopted him as our mascot although were never sure if we were making him cry with the beauty of the music, or by my coughing all the way through the rehearsals.

39゜ fever or just some amazing music?

Yes, coughing. I was (still) sick all last week, and only now am I able to pass more than half an hour without the need to go searching for bits of lung.  Ick!  Such is the lot of a singer - you are your own instrument and if you're ill, then you're... well, you're rather unfortunate, to put things politely.  My speaking voice was VERY husky due to all the coughing, and that meant that my lower range was also husky and it really hard to produce the sound. Man, I am oh so glad that my concert as an alto was last week and not this one. Funnily enough though, my high notes were easy and pingy. Cool? Well, sort of, in a Murphy's Law kind of way...

I did manage to soothe my throat a couple of times with the local beer, an arty-farty photo of which I shall now present unto you:

 mmm bier

Unfortunately I didn't get much chance to do some major sampling, as most of my free time was taken up by trying to sleep off the lurgy.  I think I knitted (hmm, knat? OO! I like the look of that!  Heh!) 3 lines of a super secret square project, and that was it. Meh.  I have a LOT to catch up on as there are some deadlines looming like thunder clouds on the horizon.  Ach well, I work better when there's a to-do-by date close to throttling distance...  My next post WILL have some stealth objects revealed.  This I promise!  And I'm absolutely gagging to show them off!

P is also for 'Patience is a virtue', I guess...