Hello blog. Just a short one today. Thank you for all the kind comments that you've left lately, you lovely yarny lot. On Sunday, this blog will be three years old. Three! I can scarcely believe it. In my experience, three-year-olds are obstreperous and independent little spirits, prone to embarking on unhinged adventures and removing all of their clothes on a whim. So read here at your peril. Talking of the blog, I discovered by chance the other day that I've been shortlisted for the British Continue Reading
Blogstars
Last weekend I was in West Yorkshire at the invitation of Stylecraft. The occasion was the inaugural meeting of their 'Blogstars' programme, in which a dozen of us yarny bloggers/designers get the chance to work closely with Stylecraft and hear whispers about new yarns that are on their way. (Clue: there are some very interesting and unexpected developments afoot.) They kindly asked me to take part. 'Would you like to come up to the picturesque valleys of West Yorkshire, tour our old woollen Continue Reading
Wobbly Blog Is No Longer Wobbly
Never work with children or animals, they say. I'd add technology: never work with technology... except for the fact that you can't avoid the stuff. It's great when it's doing what it should: I have a gadget strapped to my wrist that buzzes and shouts MOVE! if I've been sitting still for longer than is healthy - this thing is a little like my husband, reproduced in electronic form. But I'm sorry to report that we've had a wobble here at TTY that made it impossible for people to comment/like Continue Reading
So That Was 2015
Oh all right then, I submit. Every other blogger in the world has produced lovely collages of their stuff for an end-of-2015 post, so I suppose I should follow suit. Here are six images of 2015-y goodness from TheTwistedYarn. I hope you enjoy them. (And for those of you kind enough to have followed this blog a'while, I hope you don't expire through boredom from the repetition of these pictures.) So let's begin with some of the things that I designed from scratch in 2015. As you'll see, there's Continue Reading
The (Very Very) Alternative How To Blog
No! Don't run away, non-bloggers! Because this is the alternative how-to-blog guide that's just as relevant to readers as it is to writers. That weird lump you can see on my face is my tongue, firmly inserted into my cheek whilst I write. This is the blogging guide that you'll never ever read on more serious how-to-blog sites, I promise. Also, I guarantee not to be able to tell you how to make millions from your blog. Sorry. Here, my fine fibrous friends, are the unexpected things that they Continue Reading
Christmas? Also Mega-Yachts
Christmas is ages away, right? There's still l-o-a-d-s of time? Yes? What's that you say? No, no, I'm not speaking in a high-pitched, hysterical voice: I've just... got a bit of a cold, that's all. But everything's under control round here. Absolutely everything. Far be it for me to play chicken with the last posting date before Christmas... again... More seriously, thank you for all of your kind words after the shock and sadness of last week's fatal fire. Everyone at the hospital (patients Continue Reading
Blogging
It’s a rum ol’ game, this blogging. Putting yourself out there, (selected) warts and all, but also holding back a little. Every blogger has their own limits regarding what they’re prepared to share and what they keep private, and unless I missed the memo (entirely possible – I miss a lot of memos, including the one that says your sentences shouldn’t be nine clauses long), nobody has yet figured out the definitive answer about exactly how open a blogger should be. (Disclaimer: the photos in Continue Reading
The New Gaff
Oops! Mind those boxes, there. Unpacking is a work in progress. It's strange, moving into a new place. Even though you know that soon its every detail will be as familiar as your own hands, there's a period of adjustment whilst you're learning its smells, its proportions, its light, and the fact that you have to yank the bathroom window handle slightly to the left in order to open it. No, I haven't physically moved house. I still live in the oldest, coldest, quirkiest, roof-leakiest, converted Continue Reading
Lost In The Ether
OK, this is a quick one, because I know you're busy. And it's sort of an admin post, just like when you go to a training event and they tell you at the beginning where the fire exits are, and ask how long a lunch break you'd like, at which point everyone opts for a short lunch so that they can go home early. I'm trying to knit whilst typing, so please do excuse any errors. So, tomorrow-ish, some serious backstage shenanigans will be happening on this site. (For those with an Continue Reading
The Icing On The Cake
A year ago today I moved into this blog, opened the blinds, looked around at its bare walls and set about putting up some pictures. Then I unpacked a couple of boxes and began to write my first post. Fast forward to today. Well, the place is a little more cluttered, and some of the original boxes I moved in with still haven't been unpacked. Oops. But TheTwistedYarn has become a colourful, happy, lived-in place where I get to talk about knitting, and crochet, and colour, and nature, and Continue Reading