Journeys

Yesterday my colleague and good friend LH took me to the wonderful The Royal Edinburgh Repository and Self Aid Society on Castle Street. Kate Davies has written a whole post on it (and weaves in a bit of Jane Austen too), but nothing prepared me for the actual shop. It reminded me of those summers when I would pretend to be Anglican for one day. I helped out in the home produce stall at the annual summer feté at the Anglican Church in Copenhagen - mostly as a favour to friends, but also because I could grab some really tasty homemade jam and sneak off with awesome homemade cakes (and cheap books). The shop was filled with all sorts of homemade goodies: jams, cakes, fudge .. oh, and knitting.

Oh, but the knitting. I had several moments of weak knees and uncontrollable knitterly glee. Plenty of pretty baby garments, practical gloves and neat scarves .. and then you would uncover one Shetland shawl after another. One-ply Shetland shawls - yes, cobweb Shetland shawls. The most beautiful, astounding things you could ever want to see in your entire life.

LH is holding one in the photo. I think at this point the two shop assistants had decided that we were bonkers, but harmless.

They pulled out more things for us to marvel at: fair-isle gloves and delicate lace scarves. I looked at prices and my heart nearly broke: for a full-size cobweb Shetland shawl (similar to the bottom shawl) the shop asked £75 (a quick price comparison). It is heart-breaking to see people of exquisite skill selling their handiwork at such a price - it is devaluating their work, their skill and their time - and I wonder why a centrally-placed Edinburgh shop is selling the shawls at such a low price? Does this reflect the market for such shawls or does it reflect that they are unsure about how to price the items?

LH said something profound about knitting journeys yesterday and I have been thinking about her words. Whilst I was physically taking my knitting on a journey yesterday, I began thinking about how knitting is also taking me for a journey.I am somewhere very different to where I am just a few years ago when I got back into knitting and that journey has only just begun.

In my head I'm playing around with a complex set of 'identity markers' and I am trying to work them out through knitting. I am getting increasingly interested in my knitting heritage (primary Danish and Faroese, of course, but with several detours because I am essentially a flâneur) as well as British textile history. I like to think of knitting as something intensely personal - the yarn runs through our hands and we touch every millimetre of the material we are creating - and I want my knitting to reflect me whoever I am becoming.

And to keep me warm and cosy so I will not die during the forthcoming Scottish winter. My cardigan's coming on nicely, non?

Sunday Sunday

Sunday, Sunday here again a walk in the park.. The day started with me drinking my morning tea whilst listening to BBC Radio 4's Women's Hour where I was informed that knitting was a "post-modern, ultra-chic habit adopted by the very, very cool." So now we know.

Then I began preparing for the Barcelona skirt sewing demonstration I'm doing Wednesday. I cut out the pattern pieces, read the instructions, and then laughed with relief. The skirt is very easy - just three pieces plus zipper and lining - and although I've not done much dress-making in the last fifteen years, I am confident I am not going to mess this up. Famous last words, of course.

The afternoon was spent in the communal garden. We live in a Victorian tenement flat and we share our garden with four other blocks. The plan is to make our communal garden sustainable and organic - today we attended a workshop on turning a tenement garden into a place to grow food (alongside all the other needs it has to fulfil: drying space, bicycle sheds, bin sheds, recreational space etc). A lot of the residents realised that edible plants were already growing in the garden - some planned (like potatoes, various herbs and strawberries) and some rather unplanned (St. John's Wort, barley and gentian). We discussed getting some fruit trees whilst having herbal tea and cake under the existing Cypress trees.

At this point I felt very middle-class.

Then D & I meant to go blackberry picking. Well, bramble picking since they call blackberries brambles here in Scotland. As you can see, though, the berries are not quite ripe yet (neither are the elderberries). So I went for a little walk through our neighbourhood instead.

The North Kelvin Meadow is just around the corner from our flat. There is a short video posted on its site which lets you see the beautiful space for itself - it is basically a waste ground between tenements which has been "adopted" by local people. There are tiny allotments on the site now but mostly it functions as breathing space for local wildlife and as a "wild" natural habitat in the middle of a busy city. I like looking at the ex-whiskey barrels that have become micro-allotments. Actually, I like spending time there, full stop. The Meadow is very peaceful.

(As you can imagine, though, developers are quite keen on getting their hands on the Meadow (it is right in Glasgow's prime property area), so there is an ongoing campaign to let the Meadow remain a meadow.)

On a personal note, I went for a walk (and a good cry) because I had some very sad news from Denmark. Sometimes I feel very far away from family & friends, and I am unable to travel back right now (for various reasons). It makes me feel powerless and downright awful. I love Glasgow - it feels more like home than anywhere else I have ever lived - but sometimes I do wish I still lived in Denmark. It would make moments like this one a bit easier to handle.

Thank Yous Are Long Overdue

I'm having a pretty awesome week for various reasons and as a result I have not had much time to 'grap a cuppa' (as they say here in Blighty), sit down and think about what's going on. I am not complaining about awesome things happening, but I do appreciate having time to breathe and having time to reflect. First, though, a big thank-you to some very generous people.

Roobeedoo and I had a quick conversation whilst at Knit Camp and it went pretty much like this:

Me: You look like you! R: You look like you too! Me: I have some vintage sewing patterns. You rock vintage sewing patterns. You want them? R: OK! Me: Cool! R: I'll take a photo of you first before I go look at Knit Camp vendors! Me: Ughdfsagr..

And so vintage patterns were sent north-wise and in return I received a very chic 1960s sewing pattern. Oh, and some yarn which was totally not part of the deal but who am I to complain when it's two balls of Drops Alpaca in a very fetching coral-pink-red shade. Funnily enough I have some grey Drops Alpaca in my stash and I'm sensing stripes + wristwarmers + hat ..

Earlier this year my friend Paula ran The Race For Life and I had chipped in as part of her sponsor deal. As a thank-you, Paula made me a personalised scissor fob in my favourite colours and I received my gift this week. I'm using the fob as my keyring (alongside a felted sheep - don't ask) because that way I'll get to see my gift every single day. I'm a huge fan of handmade presents.

And finally Ms Old Maiden Aunt handed me a Knit Nation goodie bag, a Sanquhar gloves kit (because I'm a big sucker for local history & knitting traditions) and her Tangled Yoke Cardigan. When I protested about the amount of gifts, she told me that she was bribing me into knitting her a Laminaria shawl. Hmm.. cunning plan, Lilith!

Now, I'm off to sit down with my new autumnal knitting project and hopefully having time to ponder various going-ons. It's been a mad week so far and it's not over yet.

Far-Flung

One of my favourite dishes is the humble tabouleh - a Middle-Eastern bulgur salad. Whenever I make it, I try to make enough for several days but I always end up (like tonight) scoffing down whatever is left over from dinner. This is a pretty good, basic recipe. When I chop the tomatoes I remove the seeds beforehand (this makes the salad less soggy) and I use a blender to chop the herbs because I'm too lazy to spend thirty minutes chopping parsley/mint. Whenever I make tabouleh, I think of my friend Liz. Liz grew up all over the world - a true corps diplomatique child. She spent a good part of her upbringing living in far-flung countries and she would hang around in the kitchens watching local chefs preparing food. Liz's arsenal of dishes is therefore very different to all my other friends. Not only did she introduce me to tabouleh, she also taught my taste-buds to appreciate fruits used in savoury dishes, made me fall in love with American pancakes, and made me dream of zabaglione everytime I see ripe raspberries.

And then there is Atole.

Liz would cook Atole for us on cold winter nights. We'd clutch our hot mugs whilst standing on her balcony overlooking Frederiksberg and the world would be reduced to hot milk with cinnamon and sugar - and so everything would be alright with the world.

I miss Liz a great deal. She's here in the dishes I cook and in the things I enjoy, but good cups of tea and hot mugs filled with Atole are scant replacements for her company. When I miss Denmark, I miss people rather than the country. I left Denmark four years ago. In so many ways it feels like it has been a lot longer.

Ah, homesick for Denmark. Let's put on some (Swedish) music and dance around for a bit..

Linkage & More

My commuting project is zipping along nicely. I'm currently knitting the Larisa scarf for myself in Kidsilk Haze, shade 582 (Trance). The beads are teardrop-shaped beads from The Bead Company. Recently Rhiannon finished knitting Larisa and seeing somebody else's version of your own design is the coolest thing imaginable (it felt even better than when I got published some years back and that felt pretty good). I have no deadline for this scarf - it is just a portable project and if I can sneak in one or two repeats of the lace pattern on the bus, I'm happy.

I'm currently waiting for the new Kim Hargreaves book, Touching Elegance. Clever people have tracked down some blurry photos from eBay and I've been trying to guess which yarns were used for the various designs. Straight off the bat, I'd say that Patsy is my favourite. Not that long to wait, though, as the book should be arriving in stores next week (should being the operative word). I was wearing my Icelandic jumper earlier today in anticipation of proper autumn knitting (the weather is still a bit too warm, though) and I cannot wait to get started on some lovely woollen cardigans.

Mmmm. Wool.

Some linkage:

• Frank Kermode has passed away at age 90. Absolutely devastating. In the words of one of the Guardian's commentators: "On behalf of English Literature graduates the world over, thank you Frank. R.I.P."
• Morrissey's 13 Favourite Albums are exactly as you'd imagine: glam rock, Iggy Pop/New York Dolls, Jeff Buckley and people who sound like Morrissey.
• Delivering Gatsby - "How effective is it to use literature to seduce men?" (Thank you, Emme).
• Sympathy for the Devil - Looking at the Facebook fan groups for British killer Raoul Moat, this article is as far removed from tabloid sensationalism as you can get whilst still not budging an inch. Highly recommended read.
• Bree Sharp: 'David Duchovny' (youtube). I showed this to D last night as a response to a certain pop song about Ray Bradbury (no link: very NSFW, very crass, very funny - go seek it out). I could not believe D had not heard of Bree Sharp's 'the man, the myth, the monotone' song. It was huge in my student hall circa 1999.

Turning Pages

James Robertson is a writer whose books I enjoy very much, but I do not see him mentioned much. I was surprised and delighted to see a two-page feature on Robertson in The Guardian this past Saturday; the feature coincides with a new novel, And the Land Lay Still. I could have done without the Guardian proclaiming that Robertson was aiming to write the Great Scottish Novel that this country 'so desperately needs', though, partly because I think the Great Scottish Novel has already been written and partly because I think Robertson is aiming for something else. I picked up Robertson's The Fanatic on a whim some years ago and thought it a great, complex read about Scottish identity, the Scottish psyche and Scottish history. A very clever and entertaining book. I was less enamoured by Joseph Knight which read more .. postcolonial, if you like, and I am mildly allergic to postcolonial novels after certain university courses (long, sad story). The Testament of Gideon Mack was Robertson's big breakthrough novel and I really enjoyed its sinister humour and subversive take on a psychological thriller. It felt more mainstream/accessible than The Fanatic and also reminded me a bit of Mikhail Bulgakov's marvellous The Master & Margarita.  I'm yet to read And the Land Lay Still (I'm still reading Ulysses and then David Mitchell's latest will be next) but, yes, I'm really looking forward to a new James Robertson book.

If you are in the UK, I warmly recommend watching Women's Institute: Girl Talk. A simple premise: visiting the educational HQ of Women's Institute and talking to some of the ladies participating in the courses. And then as you learn a bit about some of the nice ladies, your eyes might just get a bit misty. One of the best hours of television I have watched for quite some time. Yes, I feel profoundly middle class now, thank you.

(I have also just checked out some of the available WI courses and am drawn towards Victorian Corset Making and Copperplate Calligraphy which should surprise absolutely no one)

Finally, my parents recently went to the Czech Republic on holiday and as a souvenir they bought me a book on Czech cooking. I was very amused to find a recipe for "Home Pig Feast" which starts: 'put the pig's head, knee and tongue in a pan..' The entire thing is served with a sauerkraut salad which is basically some sauerkraut mixed with horseradish. I think I'll politely give that one a pass.