The season of tea and cakes is getting nearer!

Wool first, or tea and cake first?

Wool first!

Hello, you have a good weekend? It flew by for us, flew, flew, flew, and now here we are again, back to Monday.

On Saturday, we packed in quite a few different activities. First, I went to visit a gallery, called Number Four Gallery, which has a website here. I took along my folder of still lives and abstracts, wondering if they would be interested in taking some on.

They were! Jenni, who I spoke to, liked my abstracts, and would like to have some to sell, in time for Easter.

I went into the gallery feeling tense and unsure of myself, and came out feeling absolutely elated.

Next stop, a visit to the wool festival down the road from the gallery.

I'm a bit like a child in a sweet shop when it comes to a place selling yarn. I feel frienziedly excited at the mere whiff of a place selling yarn, not that you'd know I was excited, it's all going on inside, noone talking to me would know I'm feeling like a bear hungry for yarn.

As I sold a painting last week, I allowed myself to spend a little on yarn.

I know I have a stash of yarn already, and I'm not meant to be spending money, but,well it's like this, for instance, if I had to make a choice between buying shoes or yarn, even if I only had one pair of shoes, and they had holes in the soles, I'd still choose to buy the yarn, rather than the shoes. Yep, that's how much I love buying yarn.

It's unhealthy, I know.

So when I came upon Jacqueline's table of hand dyed, hand spun yarn, I completely lost to the will power I had sort of built up, will power to not spend.

I did buy a skein for £10, a beautiful skein in blues and greens, that reminds me of the sea, and mermaids. (I haven't had time to photograph it for you today, sorry about that, I'll do that another time).

Jacqueline has a website, which you can see here. She sells her yarn, and has some nice free patterns as well. The stole pattern looks lovely, and the sock pattern too.

As I was chatting to Jacqueline, some freinds of hers approached the table and joined the conversation, it turned out they have just set up a business, selling naturally dyed yarns, using only natural products. I thought I'd show my support for them by putting a link to their business, called Natural Born Dyers, here.

Louise, who owns a fabulous wool shop called Woolfish, (link to her website here), and who organises the wool festival, was multi-tasking by not only taking the entry fee, but she also had a table laden with huge cones of this Aran wool. One cone is enough to knit a gorgeous jacket she had on display, (which I stupidly didn't photograph, I have no idea why), so this turned out to be my other yarn purchase.

I picked the Heathery purple colour you can just see on the far right of the photo above.

Apparently this pattern looks good on everyone, Louise has a link to the pattern on her website, though I'm not sure the photo of it, that comes with the pattern, does justice to the design.

At this point, Hugo and I were starting to worry we might be too late for a slice of the Victoria sponge that had been recommended, on sale in the tea room.

I know, I'm not meant to be spending money, and I'm not meant to be adding to my waistline, but could you visit a wool festival and not have a cuppa and a slice of cake? Could you?! Buying wool, and drinking tea and eating cake, well, these things go together very nicely.

I also found myself thinking that this tea and cake was quite symbolic. It signalled the start of the tea and cake and visiting open gardens and country fairs season, which feels like it last happened a long time ago.

I fancied reminding myself of some of the delights of this season by going through my photos from last year.

The season of tea and cake.

The season of embroidered table cloths, on which to place your fine bone china tea cups, saucers and cake plates.

The season of open gardens, open for charity, where you get to sit and sip your tea and eat your cake, in the grand setting of a beautiful garden.

The season of bunting and happiness, dainty floral china cups, and grab your attention geraniums.

 

The season of country fairs, with their agricultural tents displaying home grown flowers and produce and baking, homemade jams, knitting and miniature gardens, and potatoes disguised as animals or babies.

You thought I was joking about potatoes disguised as babies, didn't you?!

And lastly, it's going to be the season for our garden, in the not too distant future. Eating outside, gardening, tea and cake, the sun on my face, walking round the garden, Douglas, (our boy dog), cradled in my arms, examining how things are growing, home grown flowers.

Yes, so much to look forward to as we approach spring, then summer sun.

So much to get excited about, and get excited thinking about.

And just before I forget, in keeping with the theme of tea and cake, I came across a link to an amazing tea room in San Francisco, it's called Crown and Crumpet, and if I could spirit myself somewhere right now, it would be this tea room. Not just for the tea and cakes, but for the setting too, it looks incredible. Though I fancy I might need to get my hair done, paint my nails, don some heels and a skirt, before striding in, clutching my chic hand bag, which just happens to match my shoes.

I'm a little later than usual with this post tonight, seems to have taken ages to get together tonight, it's already nine pm.

I'm going to shoot off now, got some knitting to do, and some dishes to wash up. See you Wednesday. Love Vanessa xxx

Comments

[Heather]

Oh my! That yarn is absolutely scrumptious! Such Monday evening eye candy. I second you on the yarn/shoes debate. Yarn wins every single time!
xxxxxxxxx

[Kate Bruning]

Just an absolute and utter feast - I am permanently in my own tea season but am hiding the cakes at the moment. I did believe you about the potato baby - Archie's school had a potato festival and there were the most hilariously decorated potatoes including a devil that had sprouts growing for its horns. I am not surprised you had such a great success with the gallery - they are just wonderful!!!

[paintdropskeepfalling.wordpress.com]

Sounds like a lovely weekend and life's too short to not have tea and cakes!! Congrat's with the gallery too :)

[Siobhan]

Well done for going to the Gallery - it must have been very daunting and quite scary - it's not easy being a sales person, especially if you are very nice and modest. But of course they loved your paintings, and I'm sure they will all be sold v soon. Then they will be asking you for lots more!

Never-mind Spring, after all your sunny pictures I'm impatient for Summer now! I'm so glad you did all the things you think you shouldn't have - lots of yummy pictures for us! Besides you deserved that piece of cake. Lovely lovely skeins of wool - I picked my favourite; the blue/green to the fore of your last skeiny picture with all the lovely colours laid out. I could just eat it off the page (not literally obviously but I do like that colour so much). Mermaids are one of my very favourite things so your chosen colour sounds lovely. I love the heather colour too. We have no yarn shops nearby which is very sad. I have to either order on-line, go into London (expensive) or my lovely sister gets me some for pressies sometimes. Roll on the tea and cakes season definitely!

[annri]

I get that way about yarn for offer too! I usually need to walk around a bit and settle down my urge to have all of it. I think you did very well with your self-control! ;)

All the photos made me smile and look forward to a warmer season...!

[Yvonne]

Great news about the gallery...why do we doubt ourselves in the first place?? Thanks so much for the reminder about tea and cake, open gardens, flowers and sunshine... I can feel my body longing for those days again.... so much to look forward to and so many tea rooms to visit... where to start???
Love Yvonne xxx

[Charlene]

What very pretty photos of the yarn festival.. I would have had so much trouble controlling myself and only buying 2 things!!

I'm in the process of trying to improve my knitting by making the little princess a cardigan... lets hope she gets it before winter?(which is approx May here)

[Val Reaves]

I just have to jump in and enjoy all this fun! Tea, and yarn and gardens, and friends...does it get any better than that!
Congrats on the gallery connection. I will keep a good thought for you. Thank you for making me smile. :-)

[greenrabbitdesigns]

Yarn and cake, that sounds like a good weekend to me !! Well done on the gallery! :)
Vivienne x

[Ellouise]

Oh thank you for that lovely lovely post with all those gorgeous photos! Roll on summer and Pimms and buzzy bees and sun!

[Gerry]

Vanessa, we remember your garden visits and trips to county fairs. Wow, do you think Spring is really on it's way?

Love every inch of yarn.

Hugs,
Gerry

[Claire]

Lovely to meet you, Hugo and the dogs on Saturday (could you tell Dachshunds are my favourite!)
Lovely post full of colour - and thank you for the link.

[Nicola]

What a lot of wool! At first, I thought those first photos were your purchases, then I realised that you probably hadn't actually bought all those skeins!

[Amy]

FEAST for my COLOR starved eyes! I'm still in a semi-winter wonderland in my neck of the woods. Your pictures gave me many a happy thought! LOVELY! And those yarns! GORGEOUS!

[penny]

What a feast of colour and cakes! Well done on selling to the gallery, a great boost to the morale. Looking forward to checking out thse yarn websites too, love Penny x(Planet Penny)

[Mandy]

Congratulations about your paintings being accepted by the gallery! You must be so proud (and quite rightly so!) How very exciting!

A lovely, colourful, uplifting post. What a lovely start to my day! Thank you.

[Jacqui Walker - aka jammam]

Beautiful photographs Vanessa. It was lovely to meet you both on Saturday and thank you so much for the mention :) You didn't say you'd just had your pictures accepted at a gallery! How wonderful :) I look forward to seeing you both again in November at the next Woolfish Festival or maybe at Woolfest if you can make it there. I'll be a seller there for the first time this year and it would be lovely to see a familiar face.

[Hen]

Well done on the paintings, Vanessa, hope they go well at the gallery. Lots of lovely photos, thank you, I can't wait for the "tea and cake" season, yes I like that name! I have a couple of articles about the cafe in San Fran and it looks just fab, doesn't it? Not sure I'll ever get there though...
Love Hen xxx

[annies abode]

good on you for getting your paintings in the gallery.
your snaps are a feast of colour and certainly make me think of spring and summer.
lovely wools too
anniex

[lucylaine]

wow!!!!!beautiful! that's the real life! !! thank you for sharing!! have a nice day!

[Milla]

Any chance you could add RSS feed to your blog? I'd love to be able to follow your posts more easily... :)

[Nina - Tabiboo]

Mmmmmmmm.....tea and cake - such a tease, but 'oh so' yummy!

Nina x

[Baa-me Kniits]

Loved all that wool, I would be the same as you....like a kid in the lolly shop.

[Karoline]

Congratulations on getting your work into the Gallery.

All that wool is positively scrumptious, I don't think I would have been able to stop at one skein.

[frances]

Vanessa, it's grand that your beautiful abstracts connected with the gallery! I do know that anxious feeling. Glad the sunshine quickly broke through. Also congracts on having sold the painting.

That leads me to say that I also would always choose some gorgeous yarn/s over new shoes. The wool festival that you visited really looked great, as did the websites you've highlighted.

And then...there's all that tea and cake, and flowers, and other glimmers of the spring that we know will soon arrive.

Many thanks for all the cheery reports. xo

[Rachel]

Ahh, wool, tea and cake, some of my favourite things!
Beautiful images too!
Rachel x

[Jo]

I loved those pictures so much - they came on the first really fine, Spring-like day we've had and the combination has made me so happy!

Can I come to that fabulous tea shop with you? We could have tea and cake and chat about yarn...bliss!

Jo xx

[Lynne]

I feel the same way about fabrics, so I know exactly what you mean. I'm with you on the tea and cake though.
I think I was first attracted to you when I came across your blog last year and you had all your lovely photos on from the shows you went to, so it's nice to see some similiar photos now.
I think there would be no doubt that a gallery would take your paintings.
I enjoyed looking at all the links you left, which is why it's taken me so long to write this. All lovely sites.

[Amy]

Congrats on your paintings, what good news! I'm torn between wanting to knit all the yarn in sight in your photos, or eat some cake in celebration of Spring! All your photos are so gorgeous :D

[Michelle]

I visited the crown and crumpet last year and it is every bit as gorgeous as it looks. I can't wait to get myself back there. Thanks for bringing back a happy memory.

[ali.b]

A beautiful post - thank you x

[www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawneZhBm5qTqgawP0p6tlz62b14iIECbQ2I]

I just found your blog last night and I absolutely love it. Total eye candy. I'm captivated by the crocheted photos and the instructions are wonderful. Amazing!! Thanks for sharing!

[Janice]

What a wonderful, joyous collection of photos - I have been freezing all day and wondering about winter's end. It ended when I popped over here - thank you!

[Jennyff]

That was a very lovely post that made me feel really positive, even though none of that gorgeous yarn or cake is mine. You are right, it will soon be garden time, we are now getting sunshine even if the garden is frozen solid and under snow. It can't be long now can it.