Tea Tuesday: Lady Grey

When Bran started drinking tea he was all about Earl Grey. Why is that you might ask? Well we are nerds and he in particular is a star trek nerd. On the show Captain Jean Luc Picard is well known for ordering “Tea: Earl Grey, hot”. Personally while I might occasionally take a cup of Earl Grey the trademark bergamot is often a bit much for me and I’ll generally go for something mellower.

Enter the Lady Grey tea. This variation on the old classic was created by Twinnings in the 1990’s to appeal to a market who, like me, found bergamot to be stronger than they cared for. Like the classic Earl Grey, Lady Grey still features oil of bergamot but in lower concentrations. Plus it adds in the oil of lemon and orange.

I had gone through my own box of Lady Grey tea bags earlier this year. So when we were in Epcot and able to visit the delightful Twinnings Tea store.

The tea has an excellent strong smell. You get the distinct bergamot notes with their spicy scent plus the more familiar sharp invigorating citrus. From the smell it nearly seems that it could be overwhelming. The taste however isn’t too much at all. The bergamot, lemon and orange are certainly present but blended together with the tea it gives an overall strong pleasant taste. It’s also the type of tea that will stay with you and keep you going for a bit.

Lady Grey is a good tea. I wouldn’t go so far as to rank it among my favorites, but it does make an excellent morning cuppa.

Goodbye Summer

Today is the first day of Autumn. And before I look forward at all of the Autumnal crafting that I need or want to do I thought it would be fun to look back and see what I accomplished this summer. Particularly since I have fallen so far out of the habit of posting here. Prepare for MANY pictures.

Way back just after the Summer Equinox I kicked things off by whipping up a little Old Snake. He is a character from one of Bran's favorite video games. Quickly gifted to said boyfriend it was the best most awesome reaction I've ever gotten to something I made for him. It may have something to do with the fact he had been hinting about said item for at least three years now.



I attempted to make a Groundhog to be sold to all the Grundsau Lodge members at the Schwenkfelder Library and Heritage center. Alas when I surveyed my family over a holiday weekend the consensus was that he did not look so much like a Groundhog.



In July I spun up a storm during the TDF.



After the tour was over I felt a bit lost and started working on random small projects......

Everyone needs a knitted snail teapot cosy, right?



I tested out a random star ornament pattern.



Whipped up some little owl keychains.



I also became mildly obsessed with the adorable sheep ball knitted ornaments.



The knitted sheep ornaments led to some experimental knitted ornament testing.



I built a fully functional ridgid heddle loom using cardboard plus a few tools, yarn, and tape.



I did some testing on my new loom. It is indeed fully functional but I must confess not exactly the best performing.



The most excellent discovery of the summer was probably dying. I went all out playing with food coloring to dye up 60 samples. and then wove up some of the samples.



 

I've probably missed some things but all in all I'd say it was a good summer.

Sunday Status Report

I feel like I was starting and working on a ton of things this week. But putting this post together it all seems quite reasonable. Yay.

First up I finished this simple scarf. It is knit from a skein of my own handspun. I loved the colors and was at a loss for what to do with it since it wasn't much yardage. But this pattern worked well to stretch it out into a decent sized scarf.



Also on the finished items list was this Knitted Christmas Sheep Ball. The original pattern is named "Sheep Balls" which still amuses me. I've been adjusting some of the construction elements of this pattern however to make it extra awesome. Next week hopefully I'll have my own pattern.



In the land of works-in-progress I made lots of progress on this pair of socks. They were my go-to work lunch project. As this afternoon was taken up by family visiting a few inches have been added since this picture.



I didn't make a ton of progress on the simple alpaca scarf for Carolyn. But I suspect the way things are going it will be getting more attention this coming week. (Sidenote: my knitting, even with handspun, is really not that uneven but I was working with yarn that I knit up once before and didn't block straight again before re-knitting. It should tidy up with the final blocking.)



My brown lace shawl did not see much love at all this week. It still requires sitting and diligently knitting while following the pattern which just wasn't in the cards. I'm may also restart and use a different method of working the edges.



For quite a while now I've been meaning to dye up these last six bits of roving. In fact I think they've been "pre-soaking" in a water/vinegar bath for a few weeks now. I hope the fiber wasn't damaged in doing that. But anyways they are dyed now and will be spun up soonish to join the other bits from my summer spinning. Eventually they will all become something awesome.



And lastly I've been absolutely itching to knit up another sweater from bulky yarn lately. I had a few different stash options but eventually settled upon using this super weird Ramboullet-X woolen handspun by yours truly yarn with a pattern that I think should be perfect. The finished sweater is almost more jacket like and along with the rustic look it just seems like it is perfect for the upcoming season. Now I just need to knit faster.