Last night we held the last Tak Your Sock night for this Winter and the last one to be held in this building.   We had another lovely evening with good company and plenty of interesting knitting projects on the go.  Violet was demonstrating her crochet skills and Mrs Hunter took in her spinning wheel to show us her latest, newly acquired skill.   True to form she is an absolute natural and provided a relaxing background sound.  As usual there were plenty of tea and homebakes to go around.

At this time of year there is a beautiful array of Fair Isle on display everyday at Anderson High School.  This is testament to the many talented grannies, aunts, mams out there who are busy knitting up these beautiful and sometimes unusual garments.

In celebration of our rich heritage and local knitting talent we decided to hold Fair Isle Friday, a day where everybody was asked to wear something Fair Isle to school.  The response was great with all ages digging out their ganzies and yokes for the occasion.

At lunchtime members of the local Knit and Chat group, run by Alzheimer’s Scotland, were invited along to see the Fair Isle.  The Home Economics Department had made some scones and fancies for the occasion and some S5 pupils served tea/coffee and homebakes to the ladies.  At 1pm, pupils and staff began to arrive at the staff room and this created quite a spectacle in Fair Isle.

Some of the visitors judged the competition for most beautiful Fair Isle and also the most unusual garment.   Eleanor Hutcheon won the most unusual garment with her Fair Isle boot cosies, made by her Whalsay granny.  Although there was much debate about most beautiful Fair Isle, the prize eventually went to Mr Redman/Mr Robertson for their rather…ahem… “striking” ganziesJ.

Knitting is a great pastime, not least because it has a way of bringing the generations together with a common interest.  Every garment in that room seemed to have an interesting story of how the wearer had inherited it or had got it as a present when they first arrived in Shetland.  Some of the Burra boys, too shy to attend themselves, had loaned their ganzies to friends who were modelling these on their behalf.  There was a great atmosphere in staff room and all ages enjoyed themselves.  Some of the AHS Maakers and Yakkers were in attendance with their knitting and said they were inspired by what they had seen.

John Coutts attended, also wearing a beautiful allover, and took a group photo of everybody.  There was a silver collection on the door and £50 was raised for Alzheimer’s Scotland.   This is something we may well organise again in the future but next time we’ll try to do so when the weather is not so mild as everybody was roasting in their outfits.

Alyssa Gair has produced another beautiful FO.  This time it is her interpretation of the Wool Brokers Socks – designed by Lesley Smith.  Alyssa’s outstanding eye for colour is obvious here as she has used a subtle blend of earth colours to produce these wonderful socks.  She has now started another pair, using the same colours but in a different combination… watch this space for her next installment.