This was 2011...

Happy New Year!!!

But let's not rush into the new year wothout thinking about all the awesome things that happened in 2011. There were ups and downs but I'm all about the positives! So here are my 2011 highlights!

YSP trips
Trip to Roller Derby tournament where I fell in love with New Skids on the block
Met and got tattooed by the lovely and awesomely talented Sunny Buick
Visited portmeirion and had an all round awesome adventure in Wales
Public Roller Derby debut
Harry Potter premiere with Holly Horcrux
Knitted Nancies
Wrote a knitting pattern for a book
Roller Skated a Marathon
Sugar papers 7 & 8
Filey seaside and rock factory trip
Belgium - waffles, chocolate and my first festival experience

I'm sure there are lots of things I'm missing off, but looking back at this, there were some pretty good parts to 2011, bring on 2012!!!

Work, Wheels and Wool!

Hello there, what was that? Where have I been hiding all these months?!

Well, there has been work which has been greedily taking up my monday-friday,

One wall of my office there, with some ace 70s knitted fabrics we found when clearing out in the Summer, that place is full of old treasures!!!

Then roller derby, that's the wheels which I just can't get enough of....this is me jamming at the Sheffield Steel Rollergirls' Crucibelles bout against Rainy City's B team, tough but FUN!!!

....and of course in amongst that, whenever I get a chance, there is Knit and Destroy, which of course is the wool!!! On this front I have mostly been fulfilling customer orders, and this fella is always popular in the winter months...
That was possibly the briefest round up of 3 months in the history of ever!!! And that's all from me for now,

See you next year! KD x x x

French knitters...

I like france and knitting, and you know what I really like...French knitters!!! Also known as knitting nancies, spool knitters, tricotins and many more names worldwide. These simple wooden dolls that allow you to knit a continuous tube strike a chord in many people's childhood memories. I really like them and when an exhibition opportunity came up with the brief of 'tradition and technology' I knew I wanted to do something with these knitting nancies.


Armed with lots of images of various knitting nancies, a knitting machine, some wool and some (techno) thermoform yarn I began on my 'knitted nancies', there was a lot of trial and error but I finally got the art of machine knitting with wool along with and very springy plasticy yarn down to a T. Heat setting the yarns around objects to give them the shape you see below was also a challenge, and I am happy with the end result!


Another knitting nancy related project that I am super-happy with is the tattoo I got from the lovely Sunny Buick. Here I am post tattoo in Sunny's studio in Paris!

This is my only knitting related tattoo (so far, he hee) and I am really happy with it. The word underneath is 'tricote' french for knit.

If you like knitting nancies and could look at pictures of them all day, check out this blog, dedicated too spool knitting, it's great!

State of Craft

Hello there,

It has been a while, but I have some exciting news...Knit and Destroy is going to be featured in an awesome new craft book! At the beginning of the year, the lovely Victoria Woodcock (the lady behind Making Stuff and the UK BUST craftaculars) contacted me about contributing to a new craft book her and her friend Ziggy were putting together. This would involve me creating a hand-knit pattern for them..only the exact thing that I had at the top of my to-do list this year, and this gave me the kick up the bum I needed to do it. Lots of maths, lots of knitting and a bit of writing later I had the pattern finished! You can see the paintbrush scarf on the front of the book here...

This book is full of lots of great projects from today's hottest crafters, not least Seleena Laverne Daye, artist and co-writer of Sugar Paper Zine, this lady can do some amazing things with felt...watch this space!!!

The book is out in October, you can pre-order it here. The perfect christmas gift for any crafter!

Yorkshire Sculpture Park...

The Yorkshire Sculpture Park is a lovely place for a day out, there's so much to see and beautiful grounds to just have a walk around in if you've looked at art for a bit too long! I went last week and despite the pouring rain and gale force winds had a lovely time as always...

There were some good exhibitions on but the things that caught my eye were in the gift shop, typical I know but it just re-inforces my theory that 'the gift shop is a major highlight of any day-trip' .

The first things that I gravitated towards were these lovely framed heads by Victoria Whincup, a mixture of cute girl and deer... drwaing and textiles...I'm instantly in love!

Click the photo to see more of Victoria's work in her shop!

Wandering aimlessly round the shop, past the mounds of Rob Ryan stuff, some yellow and pink caught my eye...upon closer inspection it's a beautifully detailed image with mushrooms, woodland and a fantastic creature. I instantly thought 'wonderland' and picked it up, the image is by NY based illustrator and artist Aya Kakeda. She not only draws but also does some really sweet work with a needle and thread, click the picture to check out her website.

Hope you like these ladies' work as much as I do, if you get a chance to go to YSP I highly recoomend it...but you might want to wait 'til October as there will be an exhibiton by Manchester based artist Rachel Goodyear whose work is amazing and like nothing else out there!

Kitten...Karavaning...Krafting...not so much Knitting!!!

Things I've been up to while I've not been doing any blogging..

KRAFTING...we finished another amaazing (I know, I would say that, but it is a particularly excellent issue) issue of the craftastic Sugar Paper Zine. There's lots of summery-type things to make and do including making cordial, sewing yourself a pair of shorts and 'fun with trees'...

Click the cover (pained by our artist pal Alison Forde) to go to the Sugar Paper shop where you can buy it!!!

KARAVANING...it was my best pal's birthday at the beginning of May and we thought it would be good to get all our best pals together and go away somewhere to celebrate! We settled on Wales and after much searching and failing to find a holiday cottage that would take a group...I stumbled upon a caravan park which turned out to be a real gem. From this idyllic woodland setting we ventured on a steam train to the Beautiful Portmeirion.

KITTEN...on my return from this weekend away, our friends brought round a beautiful 8 week old black kitten, now known as Sirius Black. Anyone who has ever had a kitten can appreciate how very difficult it is to do anything with such a cute, cheeky new friend in the house!

He is now curled up asleep on my lap allowing me to write this fantastically delayed blog post!

Saturday..what a day...

Saturday saw another excellent Craft Candy fair in Sheffield, and for those of you who couldn't make it, here's what it was like... This was the first time I had done one of their spring fairs and I wasn't sure what to expect....but as always, the Craft Candy team had done a great job of promoting the fair, there was a great turnout and it was a lovely day. After being lightly told off by Sarah for 'panicing her' by getting there about 20 minutes before the fair was due to start (sorry Sarah!)...we set up in a flash like the seasoned craft fair pros that we are; me with my stall...

And Seleena representing Sugar Paper Zine as well as her awesome crafy wares.

As we were snapping away at each others stall's with Seleena's little blue camera, the lovely Elodie appeared as if by magic! Elodie is a lovely and very talented lady, not only is she 50% of the band Plouf! she also makes lovely crafty stuff that is right up our street.

If you like what you see click on the picture to go to Elodie's little online shop!

And if you like what you saw in general...the next Craft Candy will be on 16th July, we might be there again (fingers crossed), but I will warn you now, I may be in a Harry Potter film enduced trance!

KD x