Helping Hands

A big, much belated thank you to our champion work team, Caroline, Georgie and Paul, who last month came and gave us the final shove to get the terrace, from Gallery to Felt studio finished.

Their hard work has made such a difference - we're ready for Spring now!


I had the good fortune to be working upon the roof today (yes folks, it may even be completed this year!) and the birds eye view was stunning:

The terrace from above

The workers:

measuring, moving, laying

Charlie - helpful as ever!

making a pathway from Gallery to Studio

and to think one year ago - it was like this!

mounds of rubble and rubbish - from the house

like a post-blitz experience

Without their help, it would probably still be like that - rather than this:

the terrace today - imagined without the mobile home!

towards the Mournes

a glorious sunset tonight

tête à tête in the water tank

We are lucky, and grateful -  thank you!

The Felting Studio - Part 4: To Work!

We left the story with all the major 'structural' work complete, walls taken down, new ones built, windows and roof fitted and joining doorway complete.

After a spot of painting, it was time to tidy up the walls and put in the services.

T & G cladding for the walls

nice new shelving to gather all our yarns together

ceiling cladding - MDF whiteboard and weathered roof laths

cupboards and worktop - studding and insulation

studding out - with lath mainly

first fix electrics

look at all those lovely colours!

John on the roof making the hole for the flue

the first fire!

assembling work for Elaine's Show

you can see the lovely neatness of the stud wall and toungue & groove

Ladies from Moira are the first felters in the new studio

with fantastic results

this space is big enough to undertake big projects - like this full length coat

plenty of modern lighting, but we've kept as much of the lovely timber work as possible

you need plenty of flat surface, as pre-felting, everything is extra large

taking shape Kay!

So, after a long haul, and a great deal of 'mission creep', we have a beautiful space that enables us to create wonderful things, with our friends. All thanks to the gift of some windows. 

Thank you Tracy & Jimmy we hope you'll love what we've done when you come back from Florida!

Winter Scenes

We love it when the snows come - mainly!

This January we had the best of all worlds, snowy mountains, crystal clear blue skies, yet mostly snow free roads.

I've just put a gallery of pictures on our website, and thought that it was too good an opportunity to miss to put them here as well!

Charlie loves the snow

dramatic skies

through the backthorn

Elaine enjoys the snow!

willows and Slievenaboley

extremely sticky snow

not too deep

roads passable for the hardy travellers

our 'micro snowman' made by our our friend Conor at the weekend!

up towards Fofanny and Spelga

the shoulders of Donard and Commedagh

A beautiful end to a lovely weekend

vapor trails at sunset

the Turnip House courtyard

our dramatic Mournes skyline - fantastic!

Too Much Weather!

We have really active weather so far this year, with deep depressions bowling in from the Atlantic (to add to the usual post-Christmas depressions!)

Currently we're battling gale to hurricane force winds coupled with almost zero Celsius temperatures.

Met Éireann have issued a very rare red weather warning. 

This is the Atlantic this morning:

Also,the second highest wave ever was recorded at the Cork/Kerry Buoy M3 - some 16.9 metres!

Needless to say, there's no roofing happening.

At least what's up there is still staying on!

All this got me thinking about our weather data, and the enforced retreat indoors has enable me to upload our records up to December 2014:

Turnip House Weather Data

Meanwhile, we await the snow, as in this warning for tonight into the weekend!

met office website today

Christmas Sunday

Our lovely family Christmas got even more wonderful with a significant fall of snow last evening, and a freezing, crystal morning.

We're open as usual, but the Gallery has been dressed for Christmas:

a lovely Nordman tree - from up the hill at Legananny

the fireplace

we've moved the big table into the window

and the settee in front of the fire - very cosy for all!

The morning walk round the garden was a very sparkly affair!

charging around!

singing jingle bells

Ernie's first snow....

ice crystals on the cupboard

and from the puddles

across the lawn

and cuddles for Charlie

what a stunning day,

A quick trip to the local shop for milk and things was a great excuse for a walk to the Lighthouse Road viewpoint, about a mile away.

Slieve Garron - with famine fields picked out by the snow

looking South East to County Armagh

Slieve Gullion

a beautiful Mournes Panorama

 Back home - we baked some bread:

using antique 'Hovis' tins donated by Caroline

even turkey sandwiches taste great in this bread!