Thursday 27 August 2009

Media Fame and Another Knitted project!!

Well Create has been featured in the Ilkley Gazette today. They came in and took photos while we had the pottery wheel working and the kids throwing some amazing pots last week. Here is the link to the article on line - Ilkley Gazette.

We are hoping to set up after school Children's Art Classes starting after the October break which will include learning to throw pots as well as other art forms - information to follow. We are also going to be running a 10 week course on Learn to Sew for ages 7 plus again after the October break - we have got loads of great sewing projects to do. So when we finalise the days they are running we will let you know and put them on our website.

Well here are the pictures of my latest knitted project! Its a sort of mobile and yes they are birds!

The pictures show it hanging in Create and one of it laid out flat. We painted the beads at Create that you can see, which makes it a very original piece of work!! Anyway you can see it proudly presented at Create for a short time and then I am going to give it as part of a gift for my goddaughter at her christening. Her name isn't the one shown but for secrecy purposes have disguised the true owner!!! Sure if the parents are reading this blog they will guess its for them as I haven't been made Godmother to too many children this year!

The pattern is in Erika Knight's beautiful new book - Natural Nursery Knits. Miranda has knitted the rattle from there which she showed in an earlier blog. I knitted the birds and the covering on some of the beads in Rowan's Fine Milk Cotton - which is such a soft beautiful yarn - joy to knit with. Anyway I am really pleased with it! I wonder what my goddaughter will make of it in years to come .............! Guarantee there will never be another like it though!


Its knit night in Create tonight which I am looking forward too as need a bit of help with my new knitting project. Trying to stretch myself with this one but it may be a little tooo far! Do have some others to finish off, so it may not be the next project, I post in fact it maybe years before you see it! Miranda is back off holiday now so it will be good as it will be the first evening we have had together since the summer holidays started. Bit of gossip to catch up on. Anyway anyone is welcome to our knit nights - we have them every other Thursday from 7.30 and quite often there is wine - helps with the knitting I find and definitely with the chatting!!! Give us a call if you are interested in coming along - any standard of knitter is welcome.


Emma

Sunday 23 August 2009

Emily's first knitted item! Busy Saturday at Create!




Emily is one of our teenagers that works very hard at Create at the weekends and I am very proud to present her first knitted item (well maybe second think she did a sheep for her first!) Emily has had very little guidance from us, borrowed a book and taught herself. She has knitted the elephant in Adriafil Knitcol which is a self patterning 100% wool. Looks great!!

Had news of the A'level results and were very good! Off to their chosen universities.

Very busy at Create this weekend, a lot of pots painted and wool sold! We had a great group in on Saturday afternoon. They all came in to paint a 4 inch tile each to give to their parents / grandparents for their Ruby Wedding Anniversary. There were 20 of them (10 children, starting at a couple of months old and 10 adults). The parents arrived not knowing what was going to happen. Thought it was such a lovely idea and they produced a great selection of tiles. Here is a picture of some of them before they go in the kiln. The colours look quite dull at the moment but once they have been glazed and fired they will be shiny, bright and very colourful. They are going to put them all together as a picture.

One more week of summer courses - learn to sew, quilling, wet felting a small bag / ipod cover and pin felting and of course pottery painting - should be fun.

Anyway till next time

Emma

Friday 21 August 2009

Beautiful Painted Pottery Jug



Just sooooo love this jug that one of our very talented staff painted for me this week. Charlotte has just finished an art foundation course and is off to Newcastle to do an art related degree. She has been working part-time at Create for over 3 years now. Hopefully we aren't saying goodbye as we seem to (luckily) get our staff back during the holidays.

Anyway she painted this up for me as I am off to a wedding next weekend and this is part of my gift. Its a good thing that we wrote a message on the bottom or I may have kept it!!!

On tender hooks at the moment waiting to hear how some of our other staff have done in their A'Levels. I think we are incredibly lucky at Create to have such a great crowd of staff who work for us part-time, after school, weekends or holidays. Some of them have been with us since we set up. They are all really hard working, committed, cheerful and talented.

We had a lot of people into Create today for the enamelling which was great. Think a few sorted some Christmas pressies out! Very organised and am sure those grandparents are going to love them!

Anyway better get back to my knitting I am soooo close to finishing off my next project!

Emma

Monday 17 August 2009

Enamelling



Well as promised a photo of some of the items that my 7 year old daughter has produced enamelling. It really is very easy to do with some great results. We have the enamelling kiln working again this Friday - 21st August (10.00 am - midday) so if you fancy having a go give us a call and reserve a table. All our contact details are on our website www.createcafe.co.uk. We had more adults enamelling than children last time the kiln was on. Michele is coming back into Create tomorrow to teach more people how to throw pots so should be busy!

Emma

Friday 14 August 2009

Wool Glorious Wool!!!


Sherry has dropped us off some more lovely Ba T'at yarns. She has been busy! Some new colours and some of the existing colours. Photo doesn't show them all but gives you an idea!
Miranda has put her name down for the Liquiorice for the shawl knitting course Sherry is taking in October. I am undecided - there is just too many to choose from!
Supposebly our Gedifra yarn order arrived this afternoon at Create, I haven't seen it yet but it contains some metallic yarn. Very whacky and suppose to be all the rage this season! Anyway I will be in tomorrow to check it out.

Emma

Wednesday 12 August 2009

My Latest Finished Project



My latest finished project - I have about ten unfinished! This is one of the items I knitted on holiday! A cup warmer knitted in our own Ba T'at yarn - the mugs on display were beautifully painted by our talented girls (Emily and Charlotte) at Create! These pictures are taken in our garden next to our vegetable patch which I am equally as proud of!! It's turning into a bit of the 'Good Life' here at home with our first year of vegetable growing. We have had tomatoes, lettuce, runner beans, peas, carrots and the season isn't over. Not sure people would recognise me from my wild days living and working in London - knitting and vegetable growing all in the same blog!! They all wondered what would happen to me when I moved further north than the Watford Gap - well here you are! Anyway really enjoyed knitting with the Ba T'at yarn (this colour is called Daffodil) which is hand dyed by Sherry on the farm very close to Create. I am also known for letting my coffee's go cold so this cup warmer may just help!
Further news from Create is we have had our enamelling kiln working today. Will post a picture of some of the items that were produced so you can get a better idea of what enamelling is. Sure the tease of seeing our enamelling items will get you back to view our next blog!??

Emma

Friday 7 August 2009

Wool Arrivals


Can't believe I am writing another blog so soon after my last one but there is so much going on at Create and I just had to put this photo on. This show our enormous delivery of the Autumn/Winter range from Rowan. The different yarns and patterns that have come from Rowan this season really are great hence the big order! It made a very comfortable bed for our youngsters for a very short time before the team at Create cracked on with getting it onto the shelves today. We are pretty much there! Well done to Lyndy and Emily! I luckily escaped for the afternoon and went with friends, the dogs and the children for a walk along part of the Dales Way, ending up in Grassington. It was a beautiful walk and really made me appreciate how lucky we are to live in this part of the country. Miranda is off camping at the coast, I'm hoping that they are getting the good weather that we have here at the moment.

Emma

Thursday 6 August 2009

Having fun making pots!




Well I have now arrived back from a lovely holiday in Northumberland. We seemed to have had all the good weather! Managed to get quite a bit of knitting done - more about that when I have the photos to show what I have made.
Miranda was certainly busy - not only writing blogs and posting more in 2 weeks than we have done in a whole year but also in Create with all the summer courses. Anyway I am straight back to it and we have had a great day today with the pottery wheel out and 8 children (and 1 adult) having a go at throwing a pot! Pictures shows some of the items made today and the pottery wheel in action. Michele, a qualified teacher and expert potter takes the courses for us and they have been a great success. We still have another two sessions scheduled in the summer holidays so please check the courses page on our web site www.createcafe.co.uk if you fancy having a go!!
Also all our autumn Rowan stock arrived today and boy have we ordered a lot but will update you on all the details in the next blog. Have had to bring it all home to sort out and then hopefully it will go back to Create tomorrow for us to start loading the shelves!
Until next time .......

Emma

Saturday 1 August 2009

New Wool

We are now getting our deliveries of all the Autumn/Winter wool stock and books, I love it when these huge boxes arrive we unpack piles and piles of scrummy new yarns, new colours and new books full of things I NEED to knit right now!!! This week we got our delivery of new Debbie Bliss yarns and books, we have also added new colours to our existing ranges of Aran yarns and the ever popular Baby Cashmerino. We have 3 new books in, 9 To 5 which is a great book full of patterns for children up to age 10, Fez which has some great chunky knits in and The Big Easy which is full of lovely things to make using Aran weight yarn. We also got some new Noro yarns in, I particularly love the new Silk Garden Sock colours (guess what my Dad is getting for Christmas!!). Other new things have been the new range of Amy Butler Knitting Bags which are fab (I have my eye on a large rusty coloured one!), gorgeous fabrics and in a range of sizes, these are not going to be in stock for very long. Monday should see our delivery from Rowan arriving, I can't wait to see the new British Breeds DK range - the Chunky range last year was very popular and the designs were great, I think the new range should be even more successful. It is ages ago since Emma and I placed our order so it will be exciting to remind ourselves what we actually purchased!! It is just like Christmas!

Emma has been away for the last 2 weeks in Northumberland, but I did receive a text this week with a picture attached of her knitting on the beach!! Crazy! I am off to Scarborough with friends and family this week for a bit of camping, I hope the rain clouds have dispersed by the time we go, I don't fancy being like those unlucky campers in the Lake District who ended up with Swans and Ducks swimming round their tents!!

Not much other news, my husband has been in the wars yet again, this time a car crash!!! He was in a friends car and they ended up spinning on a wet road and hitting a tree! Luckily no major injuries or hospitalisation this time just cuts, bruises and a very sore leg for Simon where it got squashed in the foot well of the car. Everyone is joking that Simon must be a cat, he is rapidly running out of lives though!! He is very fed up though because it means more time off his bike whilst his injuries heal.