Our new Friends have moved in......

During the last three weeks, hubby has been working hard on building a chicken coop. We're not sure what made us decide that we wanted to keep chickens, maybe its because we're making an effort to grow our own fruit and veg and be a bit more self sufficient...who knows!

Hubby has worked for the last three weeks on designing and creating the perfect coop so that we would have very happy hens, he based his design on a triangular coop that he saw online and sized it up so that our girls would have plenty of room to roam.

Heres a look at the finished coop before our friends moved in....



We went out today after our next door neighbour who keeps an Aviary in his back garden advised us that he had been to a local pet centre where he was getting canaries saw chickens and thought of us. We were going to go to Mr Welshegg in Caerphilly but we decided to check out this pet centre in Glynneath first, without any real intention of getting chickens, just having a look....

Well it was love at first sight when I saw them, hubby knew there was no way of us leaving without chickens. The salesperson who sold the chickens was actually the farmer that raised them on his parents farm and then brought them into the centre, he advised us about lots of various things and advised if we didn't want too many eggs at once Calder Rangers are good because they spread out their laying, and also light Sussex's were good for this also.

So I had to choose the chickens, there were two brown and one white nestled together, how could I separate them? so decision made, we bought some sawdust, layers pellets and mixed corn and we were on our way.

We seat-belted up the birdie boxes and carefully drove home, there were lots of clucks and cackles on the way. I think hubby should drive with chickens in the car at all times as it was a much calmer, smoother ride :D

When we got home we put in the feeder and drinker and then let our babies loose, however Dotty and Betty our calder rangers were happy to be picked up and put in, Mildred our Light Sussex made a bid for freedom and jumped out of the box into hubby's hands....the bigger of the birds she was very nervous, so we then let them get used to their surroundings and settle in, watching from afar.


Heres a few photos of the Girls that I have taken.....their soo cute!!

Heres Dotty, If you look at her lower beak its longer than the top, so this is how I can distinguish her from Betty.




Heres Betty, she's the other Calder Ranger like Dotty.



And lastly but by no means least, here's Mildred our Light Sussex



Oh and what sort of person would I be if I didn't show me having a Dotty snuggle?



I hope our new friends settle in and enjoy being part of the family, I think its safe to say that their definitely NOT going to end up on the dinner table, but they are going to be the most spoilt chickens in South Wales, If I have my way :D

Wonderwool 2011....another success!

Yesterday I ventured out to Wonderwool Wales which is held at the Royal Welsh Show ground. Me and my travel buddy Snowberrylime, took off at 9am to get there in time for it to open at 10am.

I had a plan...well sort of! I decided that I wanted to try my hand at scouring a fleece, but in order to do this I needed to get there asap before all the good fleeces went.

Unfortunately Veronika was on a fleece ban, and previously I had promised to an "Intervention" if it looked like she was going to give in.....The only problem was I was practically rolling in the fleeces at this point so I totally left her unattended, and eventually she bought fleece....heck! I even went halves with her on a particularly lovely grey Shetland fleece. I also bought a 2nd prize white ultra fine shetland fleece, to spoil myself and my Elizabeth wheel, I plan to wash it and spin it super fine and see how much yardage I get and possibly knit a lace wrap with it.

Heres a Picture of my fleece's in the bags, their not the best pictures but when the fleeces are washed I'll take better pictures then.

the Grey Shetland Fleece;


The white Shetland fleece;



The other reason for me to go to Wonderwool this year was to visit my good friend Gypsydancer
as she had a stall there with her fabulous Yarn Bowls and other notions and she kindly offered to display some of my Yarn on her stall.....I kinda felt like a woolly Celebrity, ok well not quite but I was really chuffed to be part of her beautiful stall.

Heres a picture of an unsuspecting Tora with her stall :D



and here's a close up of some of my Yarn that was on sale that day, some mixed in with Snowberrylime's yarns too.



And a close up of my Sheepy sign and my favourite Art-yarn...Goldfish Bowl, with two of Snowberrylime's yarns in the background.



and one with a few of my yarns in the foreground,



So this years Wonderwool was that little more special to me this time because my yarn was being displayed and sold, onwards and upwards I always say :D

Creative Spinnig Workshop with Andrew Johnson.

I've been looking forward to attending this workshop since my friend Kirsten told me about it. I've been attending some of the meetings of the Glamorgan Spinners, Weavers and Dyers Guild, and when I was told about this workshop I put my name down Immediately.

Art Yarn is a personal favourite of mine so the idea of spinning crazy yarns from 10-4 was pure bliss. Tora, a friend and also a relatively new spinner also attended, hoping to improve her 3 week old spinning technique and also get some intensive spinning experience.

We started off spinning huge yarn from raw fleece, the idea was just to get it as big as you could and try to resist the urge to draft the fibre too much!! not a problem for me as I adore super bulky yarns. I can't remember the fibre that was used, all I could remember was its rough texture and adoring its lovely mixed brown colour, it was rough, scratchy and dirty.....awesome!!!

The second yarn we had to spin was with raw Wensleydale fleece, still damp and a little sticky, but Both me Tora and Kirsten were ready to get in there!! Sticky fleece was slightly gross, but considering some of my immediate family are from down south...I couldn't let the side down!!

The plan was to ply said scratchy brown yarn with said sticky Wensleydale....job done!!
Although, bummer as I forgot to take a photo...bad Bekka!

Next on the Agenda was Bouclé... now I can't really say that I am a fan of it, however its one yarn I had yet to spin so I was open to suggestions. I used some of the single that I had left over from spinning Buddy the Christmas Elf and used that as the pretty part of the bouclé. The other singles that were used were a mixture of organic merino and milk protein that were spun in advance of Andy's workshop.

We consumed copious amounts of tea and in the afternoon Andy decided to let us loose on some crazy carding, in order to spin up some luuurvely singles which will then be super-coiled into a cute necklace.

Here's a photo of my newly spun single


and here's another look, check out those lovely shreds of fabric, yummy yummy!



All in all, it was a fantastic day, I thoroughly enjoyed meeting the ladies at the Guild and getting to know them a little better, at the end Andy graciously agreed to pose for a picture for me.

p.s I'm wearing my pretty super-coiled necklace :D

A new year and a new wheel!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year everyone.

Well as Christmas's come and go I have to say that this Christmas I think that due to the horrific weather everyone who wasn't able to go out and shop as learned a valuable lesson (no, not go and do it earlier) but that Christmas is NOT about presents. I like to think that for this reason this Christmas was more about the things that are more important...family time :D

Hubby however decided to get me a new spinning wheel for Christmas which was awesome, however due to the crappy weather my new baby didnt turn up until December the 30th which was a lovely post-Christmas surprise.

My new wheel is a .....(drumroll)......an Ashford Country Spinner..WOOOOOOOP!!

So far I've spun up 4 lovely skeins of yarn and am seriously in love with the double treadle, I think a trip to Fiddies in Cardiff is in order soon as I really want to get a wax to finish the wheel (even though I should really have done this before I put it together..oops!)

Also, Hubby was only saying that Christmas isnt the same without having to put something together while someone bounces around over excited...wrong!! that was me when he was doing my wheel :D. Poor hubby was so serious because he didn't want to mess anything up and he had me bouncing around like Tigger in the background asking "Is it done yet?"

Aaaaaanyhow enough of my ramblings heres a photo of my new baby..



I'snt he puuurdy? the two marks on the pedal to the left are where I oiled the hinges, because the wood is so dry its kinda sucked up the moisture...do'h. Thats why I need to get wax and finish him :D

And lastly but not least here are a few shots of my new "yarn babies" that I spun using my new wheel.


Blank Canvas, a bulky spun merino yarn 162yds




Souk Market, Merino and Angelina - Chunky spun yarn 228yds



Caramel - Chunky spun Merino and Firestar - 145yds



And lastly, Zombie - chunky spun Merino with Angelina - 158yds



Stay tuned for more yarny adventures :D

Busy Bee!

Wow! how much does my blogging suck right now? I can't believe that its been nearly two months since I last blogged. So in my defense I have been majorly busy, what with spinning, going on holiday, more spinning, starting my second year at college, getting my etsy-shop and branding for my yarn sorted. But I'm back now so those of you who thought I was laying somewhere being eaten by a pack of wild dogs can worry not!

So the holiday to Cornwall was fab-tastic, I took my spindle and done some lace-weight Tussah silk spindling. Also went body-boarding, NOT to be advised in September weather because both me and Liz (my sister-in-law) froze!! Hubby and Big Bro chose the holiday solely to kite buggy so in the meantime me and Liz rock-pooled. We survived a crab attack and managed to catch some white-bait, slippery little suckers!

Am now in my second year at college so am contemplating my future, mainly deciding what degree to do at Uni, I had a looooooooong think about it and finally decided to go for a teaching degree for early years. I know its going to be hard to get into job-wise but i figure Ive gotta do what I gotta do!

I haven't been blogging for you to know that I 've been through an anti-spinning wheel protest. I decided to improve my skills using a drop spindle and then go back to my wheel. I'm completely addicted to my drop spindle, and now that I'm back on my wheel I can see a massive improvement on my spinning technique :D there's always room for improvement in my case I've broken into the world of laceweight...yeeeeehaaa!

Anyhow stay tuned to see how my Rebekkaleigh Brand and my yarns are developing.......(so exciting!!!).

A Year Ago Today!

It was a year ago today that me and Hubby took "the Vows" and got married. Its come around so fast it only feels like a few months ago. Traditionally it is our 1st anniversary which means its a paper one. Hubby presented me with a handmade card, complete with hearts in the colour of our wedding theme (which was red and white). He also got me a years subscription to my favourite knitting magazine to "extend" the paper gift. I on the other hand stashed his card in the cupboard with the loo rolls in the hope that he would find it, as I kept joking that I was going to give him a toilet roll and only the night before had I gave him a complete sob story that I hadn't got him a card. Our Anniversary came and I strategically placed his card in the morning, however, 5pm came and still he hadn't discovered it but managed to tell my nan and his parents that I had forgotten his card so after enlisting his mum and dads help and completely making up a story which was aimed at him looking in the loo roll cupboard asap the card was eventually found :-)

The best thing about having an anniversary, (other than a lovely hubby of course) was that I also still have my wedding flowers. This was due to the fact that I decided to knit them. I wanted tulips but unfortunately tulips aren't available in August, so after much debating and internet searching I found the perfect tulip patter which was designed by Nora Bellows of Noni.

Here's a Photo of my flowers..





And heres a photo of us as the happy couple...


I also knitted the flowers for my two bridesmaids and the buttonholes for immediate family etc.
I decided to knit multi-coloured flowers for my bouquet as lots of bright happy colours were the theme of the day. I also knitted each buttonhole to co-ordinate with each family members outfit. Hubby however had a cream buttonhole and my two uncles , ushers and best man had red buttonholes to tie in with the bridesmaids red and white knitted roses.

I asked my two uncles to give me away as I would never have been able to pick between them both. I would have in this instance asked my big bro to give me away, but hubby had already snaffled him as his best man due to them being school friends.

Here's a photo of my bridesmaids :-)



The lady on the left is my mate Diane and the flower-hog on the right is my chief bridesmaid Liz. Its really funny because after all the effort I took to knit the flowers i think theres more photos of Liz with them than me, well I did tell her to make sure they were looked after and in all the excitement I forgot to hold onto them for photo opportunities.......Do'h!!

Last but not lease I think my fabulous shoes deserve a mention, In homage to all things romantic I chose a pair of shoes with red love hearts on them. They were by Irregular choice and I bought them at Schuh in Cardiff about 6 months before the wedding. I also bought ribbon off Ebay to bind the bouquets together to go with the heart theme. Hubby also sent me a lovespoon as a present before I left the house for the church, which was quite funny because I unbeknown to him sent him one too!

Here's a piccy of my shoes



At least the shoes also go with the cake, Hubby's mum made all the cupcakes and top tier for the wedding


Anyway in homage to our anniversary I'm also in the middle of spinning up an anniversary yarn, which consists of left over heart ribbon, sequins from my flat wedding shoes which I wore during the evening. red felt hears and sparkly beads which came as extras incase any fell off my wedding dress... stay tuned as when it's finished I'll post piccys.

Just one last message....Happy Anniversary Hubby x x x x

Laminaria progress

I'm happy to report that my lace wrap is really coming along nicely, I say this as I'm really quite surprised that I've managed to make it this far considering I've always hidden away from anything lace related. I picked this pattern as a first go as I was drawn to the colour and the pattern, although I was worried that it would end up as a UFO due to sheer frustration, I'm happy to say that it is progressing very nicely.

The photo below was taken just before I finished the last repeat of the star chart.



The yarn is Knitwitches 3ply Heavyweight 100% cashmere and the colour is called "Jungles" It followed me home from Wonderwool in April and as soon as I saw It I knew I had to knit a wrap with it so the hunt began and there, on Knitty was the Laminaria pattern.

At the moment I'm now currently working on the Transition chart so to prepare me for any whoopsies I may make whilst working the chart I have put a lifeline into place so if I do make a boo-boo I can just simply frog it back to a row which I know is o.k.

So to sum up, for someone who doesn't knit lace, rarely uses circular needles or uses any yarn below a chunky grade I'd like to say whoooyaaa!!!!!

Stay tuned for the next update........