Showing posts with label Shopping. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Shopping. Show all posts

Tuesday, 18 August 2020

Cushions and Country Shopping

One of my concerns about moving to the country was shopping. I'm not really a big shopper, but in town I was very lucky being within walking distance of a big shopping centre on the edge of London. But even there, sometimes it was hard to find what I needed, and I have recently been buying wool online. 

But I have found that the small town that we live near in the country, Launceston, has more than one really good wool shop. The Cosy Little Wool Shop, runs knit and natter coffee mornings, and I am going to try and be brave and go when they start again. There is also somewhere out of town called Cowslip Workshops, which runs craft classes and has a cafe, but is only open by appointment at the moment.  

One of the other shops in town, Threads Designs, not only has wool, but a whole range of fabrics for dressmaking and furnishing, and everything else that a sewer might need. Nice ladies who can advise and cut whatever you need.

I have made these cushions, with everything needed bought from Threads Designs. I am going to take them with me to the flat. Less than two weeks now, and me and my daughter will be heading back to town for school. Her final school year. Perhaps then I may get back to a bit more crafting, as there seem so many outdoor distractions here.

What is nice in the country is shops tend not to be chains.  I have not even mentioned Cornwall Smallholder Supplies, where you can look at the large range of brewing and jam-making equipment. Or Maunders, more geared to agriculture, so among the gardening supplies, you can also find tags for your livestock and other more mysterious equipment.

https://ginxcraft.blogspot.com/2020/07/ginx-woolly-linx-party-august.html

Just a reminder that there is still loads of time left to join in my Ginx Woolly Linx party for August. Click on the photo above or at the top of the page to find the party. I would love to see what you have been working on this month.



Sunday, 5 October 2014

The Village Shop



I knitted several houses from my Little Woollie House pattern in the spring, with the plan to make them into shops rather than just houses. As usual other projects got in the way, but I have been thinking I should try and stock up my Etsy Shop a bit for Christmas, and have managed to finish the first shop.


This shop is the village greengrocers. Can you see the bunches of bananas hung up, as well as strings of onions? At the back of the shop is a little cart, piled up with a delivery of potatoes.


It was great fun to stitch. I love hand-stitching on my knitting, and although it may look complicated it is just made from a few basic stitches. There are some tutorials in Embroidery Corner in my sidebar if you fancied making your own shop.


So this shop is off to my own little shop. I am now working on a village post office, so if you keep watching my blog that will appear quite soon.

Wednesday, 3 October 2012

Little Pumpkins


I've been knitting some Jack Be Little Pumpkins from a lovely pattern at The Sitting Tree. Very simple to knit. For the first one I followed the pattern exactly, and used some wool I bought specially. I didn't have a single piece of orange wool in my stash, so bought this rather nice Mist by Twilleys of Stanford. I thought it was a rather subtle orange, although I guess pumpkins can be brighter.


Then I was in Tiger (me and Frankie's new favourite shop). I don't know which countries it has got to, or even if it has branches far from London. I see it is a Danish company, and the shop is a little like the non-furniture part of Ikea. Everything has a Scandinavian sort of name. I won't say it is cheap, but just very good value. I bought these lovely coloured wools, at £1 a ball. They have quite a low percentage of wool, but I thought they would be ideal for my little creatures, or I might even knit some socks. They also had wooden knitting needles, bead sets, and lots of other things. Very tempting


So I decided to try a variegated mini pumpkins. I slightly increased the number of stitches. Family say it looks a bit more like a russet apple, but I still like it.


I have photographed them with my ornamental gourds, which I grew last year. They are now even past their best as ornaments, but I thought they might look interesting. My best friend laughed at me, as she had grown lots of lovely useful vegetables, and all I had to show for my gardening efforts were ornamental gourds.