Tag: Roscommon

Explorer Beastie in Autumn

Posted on by crawcraftsbeasties in Explorer Beastie

On the road again...

A couple of weeks ago, Explorer Beastie and I had a chance to head out West and enjoy a little quiet time. Autumn is far and away my favourite season, and I’d argue that the Irish countryside looks its best at this time of year. We definitely got more than our fair share of “mists and mellow fruitfulness”, as you will see! Our first discovery was a toadstool among the fallen leaves in the garden…
Explorer Beastie with Toadstool

Then we headed out into the fields to see what natural goodies we could harvest!
Exploring the Fields

I was particularly keeping an eye out for sloes on this expedition, but I needn’t have worried. The blackthorn trees were weighed down with these super-bitter berries, which, like a lot of us, become a lot mellower and nicer to be around with the addition of a little gin. My sloe gin stocks have been sorely depleted after two consecutive bad years, so I was pleased (or relieved) to see such a bumper crop! Picking the sloes is usually an arduous task, involving multiple scrapes and jabs from the vicious thorns that give the trees their name, so it was good to have a little extra help this time around.
Explorer Beastie Picking Sloes

We were also on the lookout for more immediately edible treats – blackberries! We took these home and used them to make miniature apple and blackberry pies…
Explorer Beastie finds Blackberries
… Once Explorer Beastie had finished gadding about in the brambles.
Explorer Beastie's Bramble Trapeze

There were plenty of other natural treats to be found along the way… unfortunately, I lack the equipment and expertise to make these beautiful hedgerow fruits into something tasty! Maybe next year…
HawsRosehipsElderberries

After that, we had just enough time to say hello to the cows…
Explorer Beastie with Cows
… And take a few artsy shots of glistening mist-spangled spiderwebs…Spiderwebs in the Mist

…Before heading home to toast our toes by the fire!

How do you spend a perfect autumn day? Let me know in the comments!

Oooh! New Beasties!

Posted on by crawcraftsbeasties in Ideas, Knitted Beasties

All-Irish Beastie

For some time now, I’ve been wanting to make a range of Irish Beasties. Of course, my Beasties are already pretty Irish – they are born here, after all. But it always surprises me how little of the yarn we get in this country actually comes from here. And when you have a whole world of beautiful fibres to choose from – South American alpaca, merino wool from Down Under – it’s very easy to take what you have at home for granted.

Fortunately, I recently got a couple of timely wake-up calls. A while ago, some of my knitting friends and I started taking “Knit Days” – we’d hop on a train, or form a convoy of cars, and travel to another town or city to enjoy a crafty day out, usually fuelled by copious quantities of tea and cake. One of these Knit Days took us to the village of Graignamanagh in Co. Kilkenny, which is the home of Cushendale Woollen Mills. This family-owned mill has been producing yarn and finished woollen goods since the mid-1800s, and we were lucky enough to get a full tour during our visit. Since then, I’ve been looking out for a project that would allow me to use some of their products… even more so after I helped my friend with the annual stocktake at her wool shop, and I couldn’t stop admiring the beautiful colours of the Cushendale yarns. I realised that they reminded me of the countryside out in Roscommon, which is where my boyfriend comes from, and somewhere I never get tired of visiting…

Lake, RoscommonRoad, RoscommonForest, RoscommonAbandoned Car, RoscommonPeat Bog, Roscommon

Gate, RoscommonBlackthorn Blossom, RoscommonMoss, RoscommonPeat Bog on a Cloudy Day

So, I picked out the four colours which I thought best summed up the peat-bog palette, and got knitting! Having completed my first full All-Irish Beastie, I had to give him an accessory… something really IRISH. I could have gone the obvious route – shamrock, leprechaun outfit – but I wanted something a little different, that still reflected everyday life in this part of the world. So he got…
Irish Beastie full lengthIrish Beastie Tea Mug

A BIG MUG OF TEA!

Bet you didn’t see that coming… but, no matter who you consult, we Irish always make the top 3  in the world tea-drinking charts.

Our only challengers for the title are Morocco and Turkey, where people must be making cuppas 24-7 to hold us off the top spot. Truly “Irish” tea is made in a teapot, then put back on the range to stew into a viscous tar-like substance, before being thinned out with liberal doses of milk and sugar. But most of us settle for throwing a bag of Lyons or Barrys into a mug and just stirring it around a bit!

More All-Irish Beasties will be landing soon! Let me know in the comments if there are any you’d particularly like to see!

He’s Back!

Posted on by crawcraftsbeasties in Explorer Beastie

Explorer Beastie in Glasnevin

Ta-daaaaah! Explorer Beastie is back in Dublin. Well, for the moment, anyway. While I was away sunning myself in the West of Ireland (yes, that CAN happen) over Easter, he took a trip to the northern suburbs of the city to have a look around Glasnevin Cemetery.
Explorer Beastie with Knotwork Headstone

Not everyone’s idea of a good time, perhaps, but Glasnevin Cemetery is actually a fascinating place. For starters, some of the monuments are beautiful – check out the knotwork design on this one!
Explorer Beastie with Graves

There are over 1.5 million people buried in Glasnevin Cemetery. That’s more than currently live in the County Dublin region! Among them are significant figures from Ireland’s past – Daniel O’Connell, Charles Stewart Parnell and Michael Collins, to name a few – as well as many of our most famous writers, artists and musicians. Glasnevin also makes an appearance in James Joyce’s Ulysses, and Explorer Beastie appears to have caught up with Mr Joyce himself in the gift shop…
Explorer Beastie with James Joyce

Meanwhile, I have enjoyed a relaxing week away! I’ve been flexing my farming muscles, babysitting these little sweethearts…
Calves

…being inspired by the scenery…
Lake at Dusk

…And most importantly, knitting like a fiend! I have a bunch of new Beastie bodies ready to be decorated – I wonder what they’ll be?

Exploring Out West

Posted on by crawcraftsbeasties in Explorer Beastie

Explorer Beastie with Mountain

This weekend, Explorer Beastie took his first trip westwards, to Co. Roscommon.
Um, where?
Don’t worry, I didn’t know it existed myself until I met someone from there during my first week in college. Roscommon sits in the western midlands of Ireland, which means that it’s pretty far removed from any of the main tourist trails. It has no coastline, and is distant enough from Dublin that it was left relatively untroubled by the embarrassing “build just about anything just about anywhere” phase this country went through a few years back. It boasts the second lowest population density in Ireland, and 74% of the people live in rural areas (factoids courtesy of the 2011 Census report). It also happens to be where my boyfriend is from, and I consider myself pretty lucky to have an excuse to visit somewhere as beautiful as this!

Anyway, we got a brief spell of sunny weather on Sunday, so I made a beeline for the bog with Explorer Beastie, Boyfriend and Cooper the dog in tow. The main picture shows Explorer Beastie enjoying his first visit to a genuine Irish peat bog! It looks empty, but this bog has a lot going on. Local people still cut peat here on a small scale and use it to heat their homes, and in the late 1940’s a man discovered a hoard of Bronze Age gold jewellery while cutting turf! The pieces – a gold lunula (a crescent-shaped collar) and two gold discs – are now on display in the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin.

Unfortunately, we didn’t come across any gold. But Explorer Beastie did find some vibrant neon-orange lichen:
Explorer Beastie with Lichen

In fact, the bog is surprisingly colourful at this time of year. We also found some deep crimson moss…
Beastie with Moss

…And some fresh new gorse growing up between the charred stumps left by a fire last year.
New Gorse For Old

We also found some cool bracket fungus on a fallen tree stump:
Explorer Beastie with Fungus

And there were opportunities to climb trees…
Beastie in a Tree

… Hack through the undergrowth…
Beastie in the Bracken

…And stop for a sandwich in a soft mossy hollow.
Sandwich Break

But let’s not forget that this is Ireland, and it wasn’t long before the weather took a turn for the worse!
Raincloud

We had to dash for home and spend the rest of the afternoon toasting our toes by the range. Life’s tough…
Have a great week!