Cosy Toes - Socks

I love the colours of these lovely socks. They are comfortable and warm. I love the autumnal colours in the rusty metal. I photographed this sheet of rusty metal a while ago when I was walking on the beach. It had been washed up near the old boathouse. Amazingly rich colours of the rust and the interesting textures and jagged holes in the metal really appealed to me and had me reaching for yarn and needles even though these colours aren’t ones that I usually work with. I love purples and blues and greens so working with russets and golds are slightly outside of my comfort zone. But it is fun doing something different and I enjoy exploring different colour combinations.

I used one 50g ball of Crystal Palace Sausalito 8107 Fall Herbs and one 50g skein of Artesano 4ply Alpaca 8774 Ecuador to knit these socks. These socks would be equally beautiful knit using two solid-coloured Opal or WYS sock yarns. Imagine how glorious they would be combining a Crazy Zauberball with one of the solid-coloured sock yarns.
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There is nothing quite as beautiful as moorland heather in bloom in a myriad of shades of purples and mauves. The flowers are a heathery mist across the landscape. Broad painterly sweeps of blue sky, green fields and heather carpeted moorland. Lichen encrusted rocks to sit on and enjoy a cup of tea together.

It’s great how effective a simple overall fair isle pattern can be in a pair of socks. The Fair Isle Zig Zag Socks are made using two contrasting sock yarns Seed Stitch Chart a dark purple Opal sock yarn and a lovely mottled purple/mauve sock yarn from my stash.[Read More]

I’ve always loved beach combing for sea glass. For years I searched on every beach that I visited and seldom found a piece of the elusive blue sea glass. Then after Bene came to live with us, we started visiting the tidal beach at Hazelbank. Bene loves the seaside. He loves to paddle and swim in the sea. He loves chasing his ball on the sand. He loves it on sunny days, overcast days, wet days, in hailstones, in snow. He just adores the beach. So walking on the beach has become a daily event every morning for us.

It was while we were walking on this beach that I spotted the first tiny piece of blue sea glass in amongst the pieces of mussel shell. It glinted in the light like a tiny sapphire gleaming in the sand.[Read More]

I love wandering along the beach picking up pieces of driftwood or bits of sea glass. It is so relaxing to walk on the beach in any weather. I feel a sense of calm when I sit and look out at the waves lapping on the shore and feeling the warmth of the sun on my face. On the day we were photographing these socks there wasn’t much sunshine. We didn’t have any shelter during the heavy showers and then we’d have a quick dry spell to try and take a few photos.

We brought a bag of sea glass with us to Crawfordsburn beach. I’ve seldom found blue or aqua coloured sea glass at this beach as there is mainly clear, green or brown scattered on the sand. Our sea glass comes from a tidal beach near to the old city landfill. There is nothing quite like the beauty of sea glass gleaming like jewels on the beach. It is gleaming all the more in these photos because of the showers.[Read More]