Since I began blogging nearly a year ago I have averaged between 20 and 30 readers a day. Obviously it's not the most read blog out there, but I am always amazed that anyone reads it at all. The blog was originally meant as a way for me to express how I felt living with depression although right from the start I said that it would also contain my thoughts on many subjects; and it has.
I knew that I didn't want to harp on about how I was feeling; that would have been rather boring and also self-centred. I wanted it to be more of an educational tool so that non-sufferers would perhaps get a better understanding of what it is like to have to live with mental illness.
I have regular readers, and some who dip in from time to time. Fortunately, readers will often drop me a comment, which as every blogger knows is a great comfort as it lets us know that someone has really read what we have written and not just pulled up the page and then passed on to another blog. I have even been fortunate enough to have met one of my fellow bloggers and we have become friends and correspond regularly.
As a blogger you wonder what attracts readers to your blog in the first place and the array of add-ons that are available for no cost that enable you to track your readership and how they have found your blog make this easy to do. One thing that I found out about these add-ons fairly early on is that they don't all register readers in the same way, and more importantly that they don't register all those who come to your blog. That is why I have four different examples of these widgets on my blog.
Over the last couple of months I have been taking a note of Google searches that have brought people to this blog and I have found that I am getting two or three visitors a day because of one particular post. I don't know how many of those visitors become regular readers, very few I would think, but I find it truly amazing that I have written a post that brings so many people here in their quest for information on a particular subject.
That particular post is What is a Shetland Hap Shawl? It was written in response to several of my regular readers who were interested in my knitting projects and when I started writing about the hap shawl that I was knitting at the time, asked me what a hap shawl was. This morning I thought that I would carry out a Google search for 'hap shawl' myself and I was amazed to find that my blog was the second result to come up, the one ahead of me being Heirloom Knitting, the company who got me interested in knitting Shetland lace in the first place.
I haven't knitted any Shetland lace for a while now, I've been too busy on other projects, but I am planning to design a Shetland lace shawl of my own from scratch in the next few months and it is as a result of the wonderful designs that are available from Heirloom Knitting and an incredible book of that name written by the company's owner, Sharon Miller. So, in the not to distant future I will be buying a huge sheaf of graph paper, arming myself with some pencils and a very large rubber, some suitable knitting needles, some yarn, and hoping that don't get too frustrated and despondent when things don't turn out quite how I expect.
Showing posts with label Heirloom Knitting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Heirloom Knitting. Show all posts
Wednesday, 27 May 2009
Thursday, 12 February 2009
A Busy Week
It's been a busy week this week, and it hasn't finished yet. After my successful meeting with 'S' on Monday and the lovely lunch, Tuesday was a rather quieter day. I sat at home trying to decide what I was going to include in the lecture and making some notes and gathering material for it. Actually, I was procrastinating a bit because I could have started writing it but I just couldn't face doing that.
Yesterday I was out to lunch again. Yes, I know, I'm getting to be a lady who lunches. I met one of my friends from Corfu. She is English and married a Corfiot and has now lived in Corfu for more than 20 years. My husband and I met her the first time that we went to Corfu and over the years a lovely friendship grew. She was one of the people who helped me during the first dark days after my husband died. Anyway, she comes home for a couple of weeks every February to spend some time with her Mum and when she is over we always go out for lunch one day. We found a lovely little restaurant not far from Westminster Bridge a couple of years ago and we always go there for our meal, sitting at the same table each time.
We had a lovely meal, a bottle of wine, and sat and talked for about two and a half hours. Although we talk on the phone occasionally, there was a lot to talk about this time because I have not seen her for a year. This is because for the first time in 20 years I didn't make a visit to Corfu last year. Up until then I had been every year since 1988, once a year when my husband was alive, but two or three times a year since his death. Anyway we caught up on all the news, and had a lovely time. On leaving the restaurant, we told the waiter that we would be back the same time next year. I'm not sure that he believed us, but it is true, when she is over this time next year, my friend and I will be back there for another meal.
Today I have actually managed to do some real work on the lecture. I also have to dream up some practical work for the students to do, and I think that I have found the perfect exercise so now all I have to do is write to 'S' and see that it meets the course requirements. As far as the lecture itself is concerned, I have started to create the PowerPoint slides that will go with the lecture and done some work on the script itself. I've come to a bit that is going to cause me a certain amount of angst to write, so I have decided to call a halt for the day. I'm quite pleased with what I have done so far, but need to really buckle down to it tomorrow.
However, before I do that I have to go for my Friday morning psychotherapy session. I never know what direction that the therapy is going to take before we get started, but one of the things that I might see if we can discuss is the thing that is causing me the angst in writing this lecture. We have touched on it a couple of times in recent weeks but perhaps now is the time to really thrash it out. Maybe once that is done I can view it a little more dispassionately and it not cause me so much of a problem. It is something that I have to come to terms with if it is not going to cause me problems when I actually deliver this lecture. It's not going to look too good if I end up in tears talking about something that is the real focus of the lecture, especially as I have been asked to make this a regular part of the course module and I will be delivering it several times a year.
Anyway, this evening I am going to do some knitting and not worry about the lecture. The Shetland lace shawl is growing slowly, but at the risk of regretting my words, I have not made any mistakes on the lacy borders and I am now half way to completing them. I have a few complicated rows coming up, but nothing that I can't handle, so with a bit of luck by this time next week I should have finished the borders and be working on the lacy edging. I need to get a move on with it because the baby who it is for was born last week. Still, it is an heirloom piece, so a few weeks late shouldn't matter too much.
Yesterday I was out to lunch again. Yes, I know, I'm getting to be a lady who lunches. I met one of my friends from Corfu. She is English and married a Corfiot and has now lived in Corfu for more than 20 years. My husband and I met her the first time that we went to Corfu and over the years a lovely friendship grew. She was one of the people who helped me during the first dark days after my husband died. Anyway, she comes home for a couple of weeks every February to spend some time with her Mum and when she is over we always go out for lunch one day. We found a lovely little restaurant not far from Westminster Bridge a couple of years ago and we always go there for our meal, sitting at the same table each time.
We had a lovely meal, a bottle of wine, and sat and talked for about two and a half hours. Although we talk on the phone occasionally, there was a lot to talk about this time because I have not seen her for a year. This is because for the first time in 20 years I didn't make a visit to Corfu last year. Up until then I had been every year since 1988, once a year when my husband was alive, but two or three times a year since his death. Anyway we caught up on all the news, and had a lovely time. On leaving the restaurant, we told the waiter that we would be back the same time next year. I'm not sure that he believed us, but it is true, when she is over this time next year, my friend and I will be back there for another meal.
Today I have actually managed to do some real work on the lecture. I also have to dream up some practical work for the students to do, and I think that I have found the perfect exercise so now all I have to do is write to 'S' and see that it meets the course requirements. As far as the lecture itself is concerned, I have started to create the PowerPoint slides that will go with the lecture and done some work on the script itself. I've come to a bit that is going to cause me a certain amount of angst to write, so I have decided to call a halt for the day. I'm quite pleased with what I have done so far, but need to really buckle down to it tomorrow.
However, before I do that I have to go for my Friday morning psychotherapy session. I never know what direction that the therapy is going to take before we get started, but one of the things that I might see if we can discuss is the thing that is causing me the angst in writing this lecture. We have touched on it a couple of times in recent weeks but perhaps now is the time to really thrash it out. Maybe once that is done I can view it a little more dispassionately and it not cause me so much of a problem. It is something that I have to come to terms with if it is not going to cause me problems when I actually deliver this lecture. It's not going to look too good if I end up in tears talking about something that is the real focus of the lecture, especially as I have been asked to make this a regular part of the course module and I will be delivering it several times a year.
Anyway, this evening I am going to do some knitting and not worry about the lecture. The Shetland lace shawl is growing slowly, but at the risk of regretting my words, I have not made any mistakes on the lacy borders and I am now half way to completing them. I have a few complicated rows coming up, but nothing that I can't handle, so with a bit of luck by this time next week I should have finished the borders and be working on the lacy edging. I need to get a move on with it because the baby who it is for was born last week. Still, it is an heirloom piece, so a few weeks late shouldn't matter too much.
Monday, 15 December 2008
What Is A Shetland Hap Shawl?
I have written several times over the last few weeks about the Shetland hap shawl that I am making, and it has brought about several comments asking what a Shetland hap shawl is. So I thought the best way to answer this was to write a post about it. I have been knitting lace shawls for some months now and the owner of the website that I had been buying my wool from told me of another site that specialized in Shetland lace shawls. This site is Heirloom Knitting and is a source of lots of information about Shetland lace knitting as well as being a source of supplies and patterns for some truly delightful shawls.
Shetland lace knitted shawls are justifiably famous for their intricate designs and fineness. Perhaps the best known are the Shetland lace ring shawls which are so fine that they will pass through a wedding ring. The production of these incredible shawls was a cottage industry during Victorian times and the finest London stores were supplied with these hand-made shawls for sale to the high and the mighty.
But these shawls were not suitable for everyday use by the Shetland women themselves so they produced shawls made of thicker wool and in dark colours for their own use. These were known as hap shawls and in addition to being thicker and darker then the fine shawls that went for sale, the patterns in them were far less intricate. Hap is a medieval word meaning a cover or to wrap up, and that is what these shawls were for. They were used by the Shetland women to wrap themselves in for warmth. I've included a picture below of the shawl that I am knitting.
I hope that this answers the questions that you have been asking. A trip to the Heirloom Knitting website will give you far more information.
Shetland lace knitted shawls are justifiably famous for their intricate designs and fineness. Perhaps the best known are the Shetland lace ring shawls which are so fine that they will pass through a wedding ring. The production of these incredible shawls was a cottage industry during Victorian times and the finest London stores were supplied with these hand-made shawls for sale to the high and the mighty.
But these shawls were not suitable for everyday use by the Shetland women themselves so they produced shawls made of thicker wool and in dark colours for their own use. These were known as hap shawls and in addition to being thicker and darker then the fine shawls that went for sale, the patterns in them were far less intricate. Hap is a medieval word meaning a cover or to wrap up, and that is what these shawls were for. They were used by the Shetland women to wrap themselves in for warmth. I've included a picture below of the shawl that I am knitting.
I hope that this answers the questions that you have been asking. A trip to the Heirloom Knitting website will give you far more information.
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