Summer
A long overdue post as summer has flown by so fast! It's taken until now, the middle of October, to take a breath and a break. I'm currently sitting in an airport hotel waiting for my afternoon flight home to Shetland after cancellation last night due to Ophelia. A change of scenery and very chilled out company the last few days has definitely helped my post-Shetland Wool Week recovery as well as given me space to take stock of everything this year has offered so far...
My last post (way back in June) touched on my move from Voe down to Bressay in spring. Over the summer I've settled in and love the surroundings, community and daily ferry commute (note: that's not the ferry in the picture below! it's the Noss RIB). I also made a start on the garden with some vegetables, herbs and calendula which I'm quite happy with for this year.
The summer has been a succession of little trips here and there, most around Shetland, with one for work to Woolfest with my friend and fellow J&S shop girl, Ella. It was a fun road trip with a van full of Shetland wool all the way down to Cumbria! The first time in a number of years since Jamieson & Smith has had a stand at the show and we were overwhelmed by the response with so many visitors saying how happy they were to see us there.
My summers always include family get togethers - actually the whole year does... usually revolving around tea & cake, with a few walks thrown in to balance it all out - and of course, Yell features quite heavily.
We visited as many beaches as possible, the one below is Spiggie in the south mainland.
One of the best places we explored was on the west side, Littlelure near Burrastow, where we stayed in an amazing little bothy with a tiny woodburner and no electricity. I'd love to go back next year and spend a few days longer as there was such dramatic scenery.
Textiles-wise I finished my first blanket and have another in progress on the loom at the moment. I've been rethinking my weaving and plans for the winter so I'll update more on this later as it's changed a bit from what I mentioned in my last post. As always work has been very busy at Jamieson & Smith, particularly at the end of last month with Shetland Wool Week (you can see the beginnings of a Bousta Beanie below), and we launched our second book, Jamieson & Smith A Shetland Story, which has been under wraps for a while. We were so excited to be able to release it at Shetland Wool Week and I even have a knitting pattern in it! I designed the Noostigarth cowl, knit in J&S Shetland Chunky, with boat noosts in mind. Noostigarth is the name of the small bay past Westsandwick beach where generations of crofter/fishermen (including my granddad) used to pull up their yoals from the water.
All in all it's been a pretty good summer!
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