Shetland – Page 2 – tracey doxey

Shetland, moss and Tove Jansson

My neighbour lent me a book. Because it was only on loan, it made me read it properly and within a time frame suitable for a kindly loan. The book is ‘Notes from an Island’ – Tove Jansson and Tuulikki Pietila. It is hard back, it is beautiful, it is illustrated both with washy paintings and words.

I have been in love with Tove Jansson ever since I read The Summer Book, which remains one of my most favourite ever reads. I have used her line on ‘moss’ with my apprenticeship students at the Uni when they built a pillow of moss and transported it to a wasteland on the edge of Sheffield. Their little film of moving the moss pillow book was gorgeous and reminded me of Tove – which, in turn, reminded me of the moss gardens in Kyoto – so revered and respected. You see, life does this, from one book to another, from a line in a book to a presentation from young women at Uni, to the Zen temples of Kyoto and it is when this juncture, almost collision of past moments happen, that I feel alive.

Here is Tove’s line on Moss – ‘Only farmers and summer guests walk on the moss. What they don’t know – and it cannot be repeated too often – is that moss is terribly frail. Step on it once and it rises the next time it rains. The second time, it doesn’t rise back up. And the third time you step on moss, it dies’

Kyoto

What I am trying to reflect on here, is that ‘Notes from an Island’ reminded me of my own brief island life on Shetland. And what the loan of the book did for me, is to read every word properly and enjoy how those words sink in.

I was interested to read that Tove and Tuulikki (Tooti) gave small island treasures away to other people on other small islands so that they could create their own island museums, and they wrote long lists for leaving the island. It reminded of when I was leaving and how I did the same. I sold stuff and gave away so many things – including my grandmothers Wilson Peck, Sheffield made, cabinet gramophone and the old 78’s to the Old folks home in Lerwick, where it was restored so that the people staying their could play 78’s and it would jog their own memories – I went to visit it in situ, just before leaving the Island, and they put on a Shetland jig 78 for me and I cried at the joy of where that gramophone was now homed. I see so many similarities in the life of Tove Jansson of that small island. The sea, the ever present sea and the changing sky. I noted that in the 200 year old house that I bought, that some things had never changed – the doors, the floors, the window framing the view and the sounds. Sounds of the winds howling, sounds of the birds, the deadening sound of fog – carried in the same was as 200 years ago.

I gave the woman who bought my house the most beautiful old Saltware jug with pewter lid belonging to Susan Halcrow, who had lived in the house from 1876 to 1960. Below is the last hour in the croft house, all packed up but the jug left in the kitchen where it had once belonged to Susan. I hoped that the new owner would love it as much as I had and that it would carry Susan into the house still but when I saw that she was selling Smola, and that she had ripped down the front wall to park her car and then ripped down the barn and byre, my heart broke. I had handed over a gem and it was altered beyond recognition. I felt that the jug had meant nothing and I should have treasured it myself.

In this reading of the borrowed book, I remembered how beautiful it was to live in Shetland, and how I was a different person when leaving – actually, a shell of myself. How I had moved through such joy and excitement to needing to leave was a quick shift. If you are interested in reading such a life on an island, or if you are a woman thinking of living on an island in isolation as I did, or, if you are interested in Shetland itself, then I have posted my Shetland life on Patreon in monthly posts which align with the month that we are in. I have just posted the May chapter. If you join now, you will also get all the previous months to read too. I loved my house in Shetland, I loved how freeing it was at the beginning and now, I can look back with love and respect of an island that shapes its people

Stormy weather. time for mitts again.

I don’t know where you live but here, in Sheffield, it has rained and rained and rained and recently, we’ve had winds over 40mh for prolonged periods of time. The weather is becoming like me experience of Shetland, except when we have 40mph winds, they have 60 or higher.

Today, I wore mitts on my bike to my yoga class at 6am – there wasn’t a frost but the cars were covered in a cold damp film. There was a small break, where the sky shone rose colours and a ball sun rose lulling us into a false sense of security that maybe spring will spring. The rains are back this afternoon.

On Friday, I teach my online knitting workshop for Rowan connect and I am preparing – rewriting my newly devised workshop plan, setting up prompts and examples of work, swatch books to look at and use to explain how I blend colours in my knitting. I knitted the Sea Urchin hat in Rowan yarns as well as a little mitt – then I made a little film of how to make its thumb. It took about 3 hours to make the little 3 minute video –

https://videopress.com/v/QCV0hgcy?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=true

All of my mitts patterns have a photo tutorial how to make thumbs. They are fun, easy little patterns, quick to knit and easy to use any stash that you have – they are great for presents and great to wear on the bike on the way to the gym. They are here, if you want to look

If you have booked onto the Rowan workshops, I will see you on Friday 😊

Keep dry 🙂 Happy knitting

https://www.ravelry.com/designers/tracey-doxey

Kimono

New Adult beanie hat pattern, just out, to match Kyoto Baby.

Are you a mum, nana, Aunty, Dad, brother, sister, mummy, granny, guardian, brother, or friend who would like to knit a matching hat for yourself and a little person?

Here you go, full of colour.

Inspired by a Crimson hemmed wedding kimono that I saw being made in Kyoto in December – this beanie can be as bright as you like. Use your stash to make it. You don’t need to use the colours I did.

Let me know what you think

Kyoto Baby is here and Kimono is here.

An accumulation of Impulses – Dear Susan

I had a dream, I achieved that dream but I had to leave it behind. My story is about finding joy / fear, love and loss, heart and soul – trapped and free over the duration of 14 months.

Capturing that year is too big a task. So, I am trying. Many people write about their dream to leave the city and to move to an island life – few write about the reality of that seismic change and the decision to leave the dream, of leaving behind hopes, love, dreams, can be read as failure – but only to those who have never tried.

I tried my hardest and here are the remains of that massive attempt. This is the story I created, then broke down with hardly a word to say for it.

THE HOUSE OF TWO WOMEN

Dear Susan.

Synopsis

‘I stand for a second to take in the moment, to look at the old plank-board door with a square wooden knob, which I finally turn sharply to the right. The simple mechanism lifts a wooden latch inside. Human touch has left tangible traces of every hand that has opened this door before me. The hollow sound of the sneck – a door latch hitting its casing – is what I will always remember of this place. I understand that it is a unique sound to this house, one that will forever embody a simple place of great beauty. In this exact moment, I am sold on the sound of a wooden latch and the view of the stone flag floor in the empty room in front of me. Before the agent has even arrived, I know that I will not pull out of this crazy unfinished deal to buy this house and change my life forever. I won’t admit to the agent that it is the sound of the sneck that sealed the deal, but it is.’

This book is my story: a single, 57-year-old Yorkshire woman who dared to follow a dream against all odds; to sell up and risk all to move lock, stock and two cats from a small city flat to a home facing the sea, in the northernmost reaches of Scotland, the islands of Shetland. It is a love letter to Shetland and its extreme elemental landscapes; to an old croft house and three generations of the same family who lived there for more than 140 years, knitting and landscapes. It is an accumulation of impulses. This is also the story of hope and desire and of demise and leaving.

Here, are the bones of my life of one year on an island and the letters I wrote to Susan Halcrow, a woman that once lived in the house, from 1876 to 1960. It unfolds in monthly instalments, beginning on the very first day I visited the house, and heard the sneck, in August 2020, to my last sunrise in October 2021, when I walked away, never to look back again. I dreamed of living on the island to be closer to nature, creativity and a life less ordinary, with my knitting practice at the heart of every day; of moving through slow travel across sea and natural beauty, to come to a personal understanding of both inner and outer landscapes. I never dreamed I would want to leave to return to the city.

I hope to share how emotionally challenging it is to make such a seismic life-change from city to island life and how my being an incomer, made it hard to find community both with some islanders and with some other local incomers.

The full book, written entirely from the islands of Shetland, ending abruptly in October 2021, offering an insight into island life and, finally explaining the reasons why I had to sell up and leave, to never look back again. Here, I draw out the bones of it in letters to Susan.

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? Mary Oliver.

Sea Urchin Hat pattern

January 2024

I thought that it was the Sea Urchin hat pattern’s third anniversary, but, because we slipped into 2024, when I was in Japan, I finally realised that this unassuming first design pattern of mine, is a big FOUR years.

I gave it the name of Sea Urchin Shetland pattern, after collecting Sea Urchin shells in Brindister on the West coast of Shetland in the December of 2019.

There were so many on the hills making the lunch tables for wild birds to crack open sea shells, that I began to call the place, ‘Sea Urchin Hill’.

So much has happened since the inception of this little beanie pattern, that I had already been making up in vintage tapestry yarn for some time. In January 2020, I formalised the pattern a released it. I didn’t know about test knitters or pricing or anything, and it flew. It was the colours, you see. I made the pattern beanie up in my very first use of Jamiesons of Shetland, Spindrift, after returning from 2 months of living on Fair Isle with Mati Ventrillon, as intern, at the age of 56. It was around that time, after many visits to Shetland, that I began to feel at home there, and think about moving to the islands.

I look back to the time of writing and designing this little pattern and now see that is it was the Kickstarter to my creative design process – the beginning of how I saw colour in knitting and how I began to blend those colours. The pattern became incorporated into my online colour blending workshops and was the possibility for a new me.

I designed the pattern on the doorstep, out back of my Sheffield flat using the yarn from Jamieson’s, posting little posts on Instagram, building what I didn’t realise then, was an interest in the pattern and in my colour ways. I began dreaming of living on an island 60degrees north. (the full story unfolds here and you can read Aug – January of the book I wrote, if you join us on Patreon now – then each month will drop on the 1^st of the month) and enjoyed how I mixed the colours to sing.

It makes me really happy to see this pattern interpreted by knitters in their own colours, some of which are included here. If you have knitted this pattern, please tag me in your posts so that I can see the results.

Here is the little pattern.

Just think, you never know where knitting can take you. It is all interconnected and all a journey .

Thank you to everyone who supported me in 2023.

Tracey 🙂

Fiberchat podcast

podcast with Fiberchats

On 4^th October, I met with Irina Shaar of Fiberchats, online, to have a little chat. It was pretty in depth because, I appear to be a talker. Stories of my journey in how I learnt to knit and my knitting journey were an initial soft entry into the chat. Topics such as ‘what constitutes an original design’, how do I teach colour blending workshops?, why did I move to Shetland? and did I fit in? talk about my book and other topics are all covered in the chat. I was totally honest, slightly guarded but honest.

There are things that I learned from my chat with Irina – to go for something new, to be out there – warts and all ( I look like my mother) to put my trust in a recording that was not at all edited, to find a joy in what I have achieved. To actually hear myself talk about what I have done in my life.

My life so far, has been a small but interesting journey. Of course, the 44 minute podcast only scrapes the surface but under that surface lies a challenging, sporadic, optimistic journey with many dents and bumps and breakages along the way – a bit like my knee at the moment, because I came off the bike – visible on the surface but such a lot going on underneath.

In the podcast, I talk about my knitting journey, my Masters at NTU in Knitting where I developed my skills in CAD fine lace knit which I took back to Shetland and placed in the abandoned derelict homes of the knitters long gone.

Unst – 2018

If you go back in this website, you will see all the Shetland visits to abandoned croft houses.

With Irina, I talked of writing to Sarah Burton at Alexander McQueen’s and working with them for a while whilst at Uni, and how that happened, and also, how I got on a train in Sheffield and got off in China.

Irina asked me about my online workshops, and about the book I wrote whilst living in Shetland for which I had an agent but no publisher. If you have ever wondered what it is like to move lock, stock and two cats to a remote Island, I am releasing the chapters in monthly instalments on Patreon. There are already 4 months posted – August to November, filled with the joy of buying the house, walking to the village beach, collecting flowers, shells, and sunrises, whale watching, soil digging, paint stripping. December’s will come out on 1^st December. There are also knitting posts, with downloadable Fair Isle motifs in colour and b/w – It is all there. Well, it is all here.

and here is a little note from Unst in 2018

So, if you want to listen to my chat with Irina, then, it is here. say hi to her for me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVQR4FMa1dA

Much love Tracey

https://patreon.com/tracey_doxey

Stash Buster Fair Isle Neck warmer

I designed and knitted a little thing – then a big thing. I made the neck warmer, initially because my face got cold while I was biking to the swimming pool at 6:30am every day in the Winter and spring and then, as I knitted, the whole thing developed into a swatch for a jumper that I began to want to knit – this is how my mind races. So, I spent hours and hours graphing out the charts, changing the joining sections of the motifs to fit 24 stitches, placing them in order and choosing colours, then, I just set off knitting without any real plan, though, alignment and the feel of the drape is crucial for me. I wanted a Persian carpet look using traditional Fair Isle motifs. And I got it

Finally, I put a little pattern out on Ravelry It has a lot of colours BUT, really, you can knit this pattern in just two colours because the gauge doesn’t matter, so you can use your own stash and to support that, I have added all the motif charts in 2 colour ways and in Black and White so that you can knit it in your own colour choices – so give it a go.

If you want to use the same colours as I have, you need one ball of Spindrift in each of the following colours – Peat, Burnt Ochre, Sunrise, Burnt Umber, Mustard, Maroon, Daffodil, Coffee, Midnight, Sea Grass, Twilight, Granny Smith, Port Wine, Old Rose, Mantilla, Pot Pourri, Peony, Pumpkin, Camel, Clover

But, really, use your stash – don’t leave it in your cupboard – it is a waste and share your projects with me on instagram here @traceydoxey

I am also thinking of doing a knit along on Ravelry, if enough people would like to join – I will knit the second neck warmer in much simpler colour work.

In total, there are 8 charts/motifs – each in knitted in 2 different colour ways, making 16 charts in total and 16 colours used and 4 additional colours used in the small band at the beginning and end. But, as I can’t stress enough, this is a pattern but it is also a worksheet for you to choose your own colours and use your stash of yarn – it is even called Stash Buster. For complete ease, you could knit the neck warmer, entirely in 2 colours only. For example, a light background and a darker colour motif. And if you only use two colours, you could knit it in the round – that would be easy peasy.

Take a little look – it is here and it took a very long time to write and chart this pattern out, it would be great to see it knitted by a community of stranded colour work knitters. 🙂

Ravelry: Stash Buster Neck Warmer pattern by Tracey Doxey

much love. Tracey

now I am going to share my behind the scenes knitting piece with Patreon supporters

Have you ever wondered…

Tonight, when I was out walking and knitting, through the allotments and the wood, I wondered, ‘Have you ever wanted to know what it is like to sell up your home in a city and move to an old croft house facing the Sea in Shetland?’

Well, I did that, as a single woman in my late 50’s and wrote the story. On Patreon, I will share my story of living in Shetland from the time I went to view the old, tiny, sea-facing croft house three weeks before signing the binding Scottish missives – from opening its original plank house door, to the day of walking away and closing it again behind me, 14 months later. Because, I had to leave it.

On Patreon, I will post the book’s chapters in chronological monthly instalments, aligning them with the month of the year that we are in currently in August 2023, with the same month in 2020. The story will start from the day I went to see the house for the first time. As time passes, the story will unfold about the previous tenants of the Levenwick croft house and my research into their lives in Shetland. I spent many hours in the archives at Shetland Museum, going back through records to the 1840’s. I was especially interested in Susan, who was born in the house in 1876 and died there, 83 years later, in 1960. In every chapter, as well as writing on my life in Shetland, I write her a letter, linking past and present. Some of the chapters are linked to knitting patterns that I designed, inspired by my croft house and Susan, at that time.

Additionally, I knit, teach online colour blending workshops for Fair Isle knitting and design small Fair Isle style knitting patterns. I only use Jamieson’s of Shetland, Spindrift yarn because of its many colours, hues and tones. Two of my Patreon tiers offer a bi monthly meet up to talk about knitting projects or my old Shetland croft house or life in Shetland for a ‘Sooth Moother’

Take a peek at the tiers and come and join me. If you do join, I will email a thank you but bear in mind, the time difference from the UK to your place and I work in between. 🙂

https://patreon.com/tracey_doxey

the little mitts are Fiona Blue and in the link below

https://www.ravelry.com/designers/tracey-doxey

One Day Colour Blending workshop in Sheffield – 16th September 10:30 – 16:30

_{200 colours to work with during the afternoon session}

I am really excited to share with you that I am finally runing a full day Colour Blending workshop for Fair Isle knitting, here in Sheffield on Saturday 16^th September 2023, 10:30 – 16:30 GMT

The Venue is the lovely Dorothy Fox Centre, Botanical Gardens, Thompson Road, S11 8RB, as pictured below.

On the day, I will provide:-

A morning of tuition on how to blend your colours in your knitting projectes. A collection of over 200 balls of Shetland yarn to choose from to knit with during the afternoon swatch knitting session. Print outs of tuition presentation from the morning colour blending lesson. A printed Sea Urchin Hat pattern to work with after the workshop, to practice your colour blending. Graph paper to practice your colours and coloured pencils. Plus print outs of the motif for you to experiment with colour to knit your swatch.

Experience Level of participants – Anyone who can knit a stitch and purl a stitch can join this session. Anyone who wants to experiment with and understand colours within motifs. This is a morning tuition workshop plus time to experiment using your new found confidence with colour by knitting a swatch such as the examples below, during the afternoon.

This is a skills based, creative, confidence-boosting, fun, experimental, workshop where you will learn the skills to enable you to successfully and confidently choose and blend your own colours for your own projects.

The workshop is based around the tree and star motive in my Sea Urchin Hat pattern., which you will receive on the day.

During the first two hours, I will teach you the principals of colour blending then show examples of different motifs. After lunch, you will be able to experiment with the 200 Shetland yarn colours available in the session to knit a small swatch in your own colour choices.

Afterwards, you will take away your colour blending skills to create your own swatches and choose your own colours for your future projects and you will be able to look at your own stash of yarn with a different eye. On the day, I will bring examples of Shetland and Fair Isle knitting and design pattern books as well as my own swatch books for you to look at.

the session will be £80. If you would like me to send you an overview and booking form, please contact me at traceydoxey@hotmail.com and I will get back to you asap.

Excited? I am.

email me at traceydoxey@hotmail.com if you would like to be sent an overview and booking form.

I also teach online workshops – information in workshop tab on this website – here

Link to Botanical Gardens – On Thompson Road, a turning off Ecclesall Road, Sheffield S11 8RB

https://www.sbg.org.uk/how-to-find-us

choose your colours

2pm, Wednesday afternoon – feeling free.

This, just this very moment after finishing work, is seriously my most blissful happy moment of the week. I’ve finished my admin job, biked home, picked 30 sweet pea flower stems and balanced them in Susan Halcrow’s tiny cut glass jug. Alfie sits beside me, Teep is on my knee, colours are coming together for my next set of motifs in my pullover project (that could end up being a jumper). There are two great passion flowers out in front of me and I’m surrounded by the scent of star jasmine, regular jasmine, and sweet peas. Honestly, these simple things (and a cuppa) signify Freedom. Freedom of mind, creativity and the senses. These simple things are utterly blissful.

Knitting is many things to and for me – today, it is freedom.

I’m looking at my yarn colours, choosing / feeling my way through them so that I sense what will work in the pattern changes so that they both balance as a whole and shine individually.

When I lived in Shetland, my inspiration was taken from my surrounding landscape and the stories of the woman that lived in the house that I had bought from 1876 to 1960. When I teach my colour blending workshops, I show how to feel colours with your heart.

Today, back in the city, this Wednesday afternoon, I feel the joy of the colours of the flowers that I have grown, from their vibrancy and scent. On my tiny slabbed area, in front of my small flat, I have grown an abundant, cascading mass of sweet peas, Star Jasmine, ordinary Jasmine, passion flowers, agapanthus and many other things. It is survival of the fittest in the tiny silly border. All the plants are growing across each other, elbowing with their leaves to reach higher. The sweet peas are so pretty, in shades of purple, fuchsia, pale pink, port, red, lilac, and white. The little jug of flowers sits on the table, the cats join me on cushions that are placed either side of mine on the bench, a cuppa, my swatch book and then the yarn begins to join the table top. The yarn comes alive and colours become inspired by the sensory pleasure of just feeling free, from not having to work again until Monday.

My knitting is not about just choosing colours from a pile of yarn, or shop but the colours come by feeling them through a sensory connection and today, it is a tiny jug of sweet peas that triggered the feeling of being free.

If you would like to join me in one of my colour blending workshops, the overview and information is here