Cardigan I finished ages ago

I planned to blog this ages ago but having little boy means I have to find a little spare moment to do it. The evening is best, but by that time I don't feel like thinking up what to write as my brain is a little turned to mush! But I've just been totally inspired by some Christadelphian friends on facebook who have started a craft collective and I realixed I shouldn't give up on my blog, even if I don't get to post all that often at the moment. I've been surprisingly productive lately, as it happens. I've been knitting Noah a cardigan, although I've nearly run out of yarn and I just have to collar left to do. Its actually the Baby Sophisticate Jacket, super easy to knit and very, well, sophisticated. I knitted a lovely lavender stuffed heart for a friend who had just moved into her new home, but our camera broke on holiday - it got sand in the lens - so we just upgraded it, but I wasn't able to photograph it. I'll have to sneak to her house and photograph it in situ. I'm knitting another heart at the moment and also thinking about what to do with these little fabric squares. Oh, and don't reming me about the pattern I'm writing. I will finish it, I just need daylight, and we've also ripped out our kitchen as we're getting a new one (good old Ikea) so our dining table/craft table (!) is cuurrently covered with pots and pans and foodstuffs. We are very blessed in that our oven was just plug in so we can keep it until the new one goes in, and we have a great camping hob with two gas rings. Marno has set up a makeshift kitchen in the dining room and we have a ittle breakfast bar to eat at. Perfect!

Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, knitting. Here is the cardigan I finished. Kim Hargreaves "Thea". 

Sorry there aren't any good front pics - I was (and still am) breastfeeding, and in these photos it could, shall I say, fit a little better round the bust! haha! Its a lovely cardigan, knitted in gorgeous Rowan Kid Classic, but hence so warm that I can only really wear it when its really cold. Also it is a little shorter than I would have liked, which seems to be the general consensus on Rav, in the KH group. But overall, very nice, but pretty dull to knit.

Here is a picture I drew of Noah in a quick half hour when he was asleep in his bouncy chair. This is a couple of months old now, but a I said, I haven't posted in an age.

His lip looks a itte odd, but it is quite accurate. It tends to droop a little when he's asleep in his chair. Utterly gorgeous :)

Hopefully I'll have a finished cardigan to report on soon xxx

Passing the time and a possible pattern

Well today I am officially one day overdue. I can't imagine what it will be like to begin labour - I mean, I suppose it just starts pretty suddenly and you have to wait and count the time between contractions etc to work out if it is actual labour or not, but I haven't had any Braxton Hicks, or if I have, I haven't felt them, so I reckon when it does start it'll be the real thing. Its funny, before yesterday I had no problem with waiting up to the due date, but now its gone over I suddenly feel like I don't know what I should do with myself. I even did a little sketching today, which convinced me that I have gone over to textiles in a big way. I was never one to be able to sketch something very quickly and it turn out amazingly, and I always seemed to have a rubber to hand. Long, closely observed drawings were usually what I produced, with probably too much detail or too much time spent on small aspects. Perhaps I feel with knitting and working with fabric that the mistakes which can be made are of a different sort, and somehow cleaner; and I'm a very precise, clean person, so that figures!

Anyway, a few weeks ago now, I decided to design and make a baby changing bag as most of the ones I'd seen were not at all appealing and really rather ugly. I thoroughly planned the project and was very pleased that as I went through I had thought of pretty much every eventuality and barely had to make any amendments to my original design.

Here is the bag:



The fabrics I used are some that Ma gave to me ages ago which have been sitting in my fabric chest waiting for a suitable project, and this one was ideal. The nursery rhyme fabric is sweet without being childish, so suitable for something a parent will be using, but still very much with a childhood theme. The other two fabrics are a light and a dark brown checked brushed cotton which perfectly harmonise with the nursery rhyme fabric but also make it not too feminine, so my husband won't mind using it!

To be honest, the reason this project is so exciting is that I've decided to make a pattern and try to sell it. My husband is all for the idea of selling the pattern rather than a finished product, because of the initial expense in purchasing the required amounts of fabric but also because of the amount of time it takes me to make stuff. Unfortunately, I didn't do a very good job of documenting my making process, so I have had to buy new fabrics to make a new bag for the pattern. You may also have noticed though, that my photos are rubbish and not anywhere near good enough quality to include in a pattern I wish to sell. So my plan is to make a new bag, taking beautiful photos with my husband's camera which is a big, posh one I haven't a clue how to use, and make a beautiful pattern, to be available as a PDF and also printed if people want. The question now is, do I wait until after the baby is born and I've settled into some kind of routine, or do I just start tomorrow; I mean, who knows how long the baby will take before it decides when to come out!

Along with this, I know, goes the need to publicise my blog and to get myself recognised online. I'm planning to sell the pattern on Etsy and also, hopefully, through the blog, though I haven't a clue how to go about that yet. Lots of research to be done! And I know I'll need to pay my poor blog more attention than I have been. Maybe that means it'll be a bit baby focused for a while. I have some more designs in the pipeline as well; some bags and some clothes, but they're still very much at the drawing board stage, though I'm quite excited about them.

In the mean time, I'm slaving away at my hand applique for my bird cushion and knitting another Kim Hargreaves cardigan, Thea from Precious. I actually started it ages ago to try and get back into knitting. Not that I got out of it, I just hadn't done any for a while. Its not the most exciting knit, but when I get down to it its fairly quick and it will look nice when its finished. I've definitely learnt though, that knitting is very much for the process and not just for the finished product. The knit has to be enjoyable and challenging. In fact, I think challenging somehow equals enjoyable because, however long it takes to rectify a mistake, the satisfaction gained is immense. Challenging, in my opinion, will also include the learning of new skills or methods, or methods used previously but in a different way, such as lace work.

Well, I hope to have something to report soon, I just don't kniw if will be baby related or project related!

Last few days

Well I've had a pretty busy weekend, but its not been particularly creative. We had some dear friends for tea on Friday evening and I baked a Clementine Pudding Cake and I used a lovely cut glass cake stand that I haven't used before which was a wedding present (we got married nearly two years ago!)


It seemed to go down well and was good with Creme Fraiche! Ohh I also meant to post a photo of these fantastic books a while ago - I remembered becuase one of the friends who came gave them to me. They are the Vogue Sewing Book from 1964 and Good Housekeeping Sewing Crafts from 1979. Very exciting, especially since not much seems to have changed, apart from sewing machine technology, since they came out. Sewing Crafts is all hand sewing anyway, but the Vogue book will be excellent for when I make a dress for which I've had fabric sitting around for a while now. Hopeing to get that done before a wedding in May but don't know if it'll happen. I was also hoping to knit a cardigan to go with it...


I've done another little drawing of a Female Chaffinch


And turned our dining "area" into a makeshift painting studio


Loads of great natural light from the bay window. So I've done a base coat for these little Robins and was planning to get on with them today but, being a Monday, I've had loads of "stuff" to do and haven't felt in the right mood to carry on with them, though I've been really inspired by reading some blogs, especially Pretty Ditty's. I love her little painted peg dolls, and I also love the way she talked about God in her last post. I'm a very strong believer in God and the Bible but for some reason it can be hard to talk about it openly here in Britain because so many people are opposed to God and religion. I guess America's a much more Christian country, but thanks Pretty Ditty. I should just look at it that this is my blog and should reflect my true personality, of which God is a huge part.
If you want to now more about what I believe, have a look here.
Well there's not that much of the afternoon left so I may crack on with my knitting needle roll or do another birdie drawing.
Have a most wonderful day xxx

Some Little Birdies

I've been sketching a little yesterday and today, some birds in preparation for starting to paint. Here's what I've produced so far.

Female Chaffinch with a sunflower seed in her beak

Robin


Male Chaffinch

I've made them a bit darker in photoshop so you can see them better. I'm really looking forward to getting into this project. I've also primed my boards for painting today. They're a mixture of sizes but all quite small, smaller than A4, which will be good for me as I usually paint on a large scale. Its reallt been interesting doing these drawings as its really made me look in detail at the, construction, if you like, of the bird, particularly the way the feathers are laid one on top of the other on the wings. You can see that in the Robin.

I went to the National Museum and Art Gallery in town today but it wasn't very impressive really. There were only two painting areas open and the rest was all being changed around so I'll have to go back another time. Going to a clothes swap tonight with some friends from church which should be fun. I'm hoping to find some nice stuff as being... ahem..."independent means" means I can't really buy any clothes.

Have a fun evening whatever you're doing, if anyone's there x

Really old, old, less old and new...

Since I'm not going to have much finished new work to show for a bit, I thought I'd post some old work to inspire myself. This drawing of a buzzard I did when I was 14 and I guess is a link to what I want to do now, though a very old link!


We're going to Cosmeston Lakes tomorrow and I'm planning on taking my sketchbook to draw some birdies. My husband has got really into birds which is great for me because I love walking but he's not so keen, but now he wants to watch birds he wants to go on walks all the time, which is great! So I've started to become really interested too and have always been more interested in figurative work than abstract, so birdies seem to be an ideal starting point for some new work.

The following two paintings I did in my second year of uni. I always painted people, I am so fascinated by people. I love just looking at them and studying their features. People are so interesting. This is a painting of my old housemate Ellie which is on our living room wall.

I reckon she'd be quite surprised to know that I've still got it up. I think its my favourite painting.
This one I did for a competition for marine painting. The first landscape I'd ever painted so again I was quite pleased with it.


And this one I actually did after uni, I think in December 2004. Its of my friend Ruth, painted from a photo I adapted in photoshop, hence the strange blue aura. I won't point out all the bad bits though!


And my latest finished bit of creativity. My cardigan which is Kim Hargreaves Cate cardigan. I haven't worked out how to link to web pages yet so sorry, no link to that, but heres a photo of my finished project and more photos on Ravelry.


I think if you're creative you can adapt to lots of different creative things and knitting has really fulfilled my need to be creative, has led me to the blogs of some amazingly talented people and has brought me back round to the idea of painting and drawing again which is so exciting.