Tag Archives: Christmas Angels

Angels and Light – Part 2

A brief pictorial post to bring you up to date with the angels from this post.  I’d like to share the beauty of our local church, St Michael and All Angels,  and the talents of people in the surrounding area who have made it look even more beautiful for this festival.

Wooden Angel

Dolly peg angels

You can see Knit and Stitch have quite a selection of angels, apart from the dollypeg ones!

wheat sheaf Angel

Angels on the font

Hessian Angel

The one I found most moving was the British Legion Angel, an amazing labour of love made as a tribute to all the lives lost to date in Afghanistan.  Four hundred and thirty five men, three women and one dog…

British Legion Angel - Angels and Light

British Legion Angel  Angels and Light Festival

Each poppy an individual tribute to a lost life… Such a waste…

flying Angels

Angel Banners - Angels and Light Festival

If you live in the Norwich/Broadland area this is well worth a visit.  The church is open until next weekend from 10 -4 and you will also find some lovely ladies serving delicious soup, cakes and tea and coffee!

And if you are too far away, I hope you enjoyed this virtual visit!

See you soon…x

Angels and Light – Part One

Do you remember me mentioning our forthcoming  Angels and Light Festival and my date with dolly pegs?  Well, I spent a dolly peg day or two last week and have created a dozen assorted angels, all ready for setting up the display in the church at the end of the week.

I don’t know whether spending a few hours in the company of angels went to my head or not but having spent a few hours with white lace, white yarn and white parchment  coming out of the studio blinking into the bright Autumn light for a walk with Higgins gave me some magical moments which I tried hard to capture in the next few photos.

A beautiful Autumn day is a treat, coming in the midst of rain and wind, mist and fog and needs to be savoured.  I set off with Higgins and took our usual route across the footpath through the stubble and was amazed by a sight I never noticed before, and yet I must have past it time and time again looking up, looking down, thinking of to do lists and never actually seeing.

The low sun was shining across the stubble creating a shimmering pathway, like the moon on the sea…

Autumn sun on stubble

…which when I looked closer was caused by thousands, millions of spiders webs spun across the tops of the stubble and reflecting the golden light of the sun…

light on cobwebs

Shooting into the sun with a compact digital camera without specialised lenses or setting was never going to give me the best of shots, but I hope this will give you an impression at least.

It was mesmerising.

After Higgins had charged across it hot on the scent of a rabbit and returned I found he is just the right height to be a cobweb brush!

Mini dachshund with cobwebs

At  far side of the field, where the footpath continues in the shade of the hedge the previous nights mist was still lying on the grass…

mist on grass

..and the cobwebs here were beautiful in quite a different way…

mist on spiders webs

mist on cobwebs

(It was only later that evening I realised that as an arachnophobe I must have been in the company of thousands of the little beasts!)

The golden light continued…

Autumn Light

Autumn light

Autumn light

Everywhere I turned was another photo opportunity…

Autumn bracken

Holly

Golden Oak leaves

umbellifers

It was quite hard to return to work and the angels but they are all done and dusted now and ready for next weekend.  I’m sure you’ve been wondering whether I would ever get round to showing you!  These have auburn locks, made from Wensleydale fleece…

Dolly peg angels for Angels and Light Festival

…and these have blonde hair, made from dyed Merino fleece.

dolly peg Angels for Angels and Light Festival

They are made in the same way as in this tutorial using oddments of Broiderie Anglaise edging, white felt and cotton yarn.  the wings are cut from parchment printed with sparkling flowers.  Next week I hope to share the pictures of them as part of our display at the Church.

Talking of next week, I’m off to London again with an invitation to spend an evening with Debbie Bliss as part of the promotion of the Save the Children Christmas Jumper Day  As yet I don’t have any details to share, we are knitting a ‘Christmas Surprise’ but I’ll be back next weekend to tell you all about it!

Finally, do you remember Higgins being an artists model?

drawing of miniature dachshund

You can now find out a little more and see some other little sketches by visiting the Thomas Taylor – Author website.  I’m struggling to keep up with his fan club by the way, he now has over 200 ‘likes’ (or should that be licks) on Facebook!

I’ll leave you now with the usual link to Handmade Monday.  Thank you to all the lovely people who turn up each week to comment on the blog.  I do try to return the compliment as far as possible  and wish I had time to visit everyone,  but I do read all the comments and really appreciate them.

I’ll be back soon …x

Dolly Peg Angels for Handmade Monday

Hello, and welcome to another Handmade Monday. I hope you’ve  had a lovely weekend as we all rev up towards the Christmas festivities.  I was very excited to find that I was able to control the weather on Planet Penny and arrange for some seasonal snow to fall!

I’ve just about reached the point of RSI on the needlefelting front now, and I’m longing to spend an evening with the hexipuffs or some crochet.  I can’t believe how popular the needlefelted robin baubles have been, I think it’s the Kirsty effect!  I’ve just posted the very last ones for this year on Folksy, the result of an experiment, but I really like it.

One of my fellow stall holders at the Pick’n’Mix Makers Market is Fiona Henderson of High Fibre yarns and she makes the most unusual yarns, a bit like french knitting, from lambswool, and I bought a few skeins to try out.  So this is what I’ve used to make a little creamy wreath on which two teeny tiny robins can perch….

…they’ve still got the little feet that make everyone go ‘aaaah!’…


Looking at then here they look huge and a bit hairy, but in fact they’re only 2″/5cm long from beak to tail.

I also  have a rather gorgeous raspberry pink yarn from High Fibre destined to be a mug hug soon, another reason to get at the knitting needles!

By way of a change, I’ve revisited the Dolly Pegs, and made a little Choir of Angels who are also listed on Folksy


…and then decided the Dolly Peg Dolls would make a great tutorial to share, and you can find it here!  I hope you enjoy it, I’d love to see your versions.

I’m off to do some baking now.  We have the Christmas meeting of our Knit and Stitch group this week, and I’m using that as an excuse to get out the Frangipane Mince Pie recipe.  I’ll have to get them into the freezer the minute they’ve cooled down though, they are SO more-ish I doubt there would be any left if I don’t!

Finally, thank you so much for the congratulations and nice comments about Planet Penny being on the Ch4 Favourite Craft Blogs list.  I hadn’t realised before how many links there on the 4Homes website for makers and crafters, well worth a look.  And of course the other place to visit today for handmade inspiration  is Wendy’s Handmade Monday Linky over on 1st Unique Gifts.

I’ll leave you browse…

Have a lovely week! x

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