Although very little actual knitting got done, last weekend was in fact very crafty.
Friday night saw dozens of knitters descend on the Socktopus Socktoshop for an evening of Mad Knitters’ Charity Bingo. There was wine, there were cupcakes, and there were knitters: I knew I was in for a fun night!
I realised that I’ve never actually played bingo before, but luckily the wine didn’t prevent me from grasping the rules. Despite having a lucky red ‘dabber’, I just didn’t have the winning numbers:
Not to worry; lots of money was raised for MSF and a great evening was had. I was too busy trying to win a game that I failed to take pictures of the evening, but you can get a good flavour of the night with pictures over at Alice’s blog.
Continuing the craft theme, I went to the Festival of Living Crafts at Hatfield House the following day (even with a heavy head). It was quite a rare treat to go to a craft fair without being a knitting volunteer, so I made the most of being a regular visitor, and spent a few hours learning a new craft: papermaking!
I spent a fabulous morning learning how to make paper, guided by the lovely and very generous Jonathan. In that short space of time I learnt loads of techniques: laminating, embossing, and adding all sorts of lovely natural inclusions. Super simple instructions:
Mix in a bit of this and a bit of that, mush it all together in a big vat of water…
after straining and forming the paper, press out all the liquid, preferably with an audience of small children…
and ta-da! Brand-new, recycled, completely unique paper. I tried a range of techniques with each piece…
Look – it’s a tree! And flowers! And bits of yarn!
Papermaking blends very nicely with other textile crafts, as various yarns and fibres can be included in the paper – we played around with denim, cotton, bits of old rope, upholstery fabric… and even some regular old paper. My head’s buzzing with loads of ideas now for incorporating all sorts of yarn and fibre.
Why can’t I just focus on actually just finishing knitting something?
What gorgeous paper!