Rocking an old wooden crib in front of a peat fire

Listening to oral histories from Shetland I was struck by one woman's account of how it had been her job as a young girl to rock her siblings in the crib when they were babies, and how she had made this boring task more interesting by knitting socks at the same time. I was interested in hearing for myself the domestic sound of the rhythms of such a crib, because its rhythm would have been part of the sonic world which this knitter inhabited while she knitted. Staff at the Shetland Museum told me the best place to record the crib would be at the Croft House Museum, as this low building with lack of electricity and open peat fire would most closely resemble the type of dwelling to which the woman speaking about the past was probably referring. In The Croft House Museum I also discovered the sound of a large clock on the mantelshelf; apparently this type of clock was very fashionable in Shetland at one time. This was lovely, because I have heard many similar clocks in oral histories held on the Tobar an Dualchais archives. You can also hear the open peat fire purring away in this recording, however there is no crying baby, no busy parents, and no knitting... also, as I've never rocked a baby in a crib before, I am not sure if the rhythm is about right or not! Still, hopefully there is enough in the recording to give a minimal impression of the sounds which surrounded the Shetland knitter of the past in a domestic situation, multitasking childcare and the production of socks to sell.