Just a few words and a couple of photos

This will be a post of few words, as I have a boy on my lap who wants to do everything his mummy is doing! But I just wanted to to show some photos of my hat, which I finished the other day. I saw some on ravelry which looked like they hadn't been blocked, so I found a salad bowl the perfect size to block it over, and it's come out nice and slouchy.

Here it is...

I'm really pleased with how it's come out, but my one complaint is that the pattern didn't say to add an extra knit stitch at each end for stitching up, so I'd got quite far before I thought, hang on a minute, the pattern's working right to the edges so I'm going to need an extra row to sew it up nicely. Anyway, I couldn't be bothered to rip it out, and it was meant to be a quick knit, so I left it and it sewed up fine, and I guess I learnt a lesson. I suppose lots of people say I should have added an extra stitch as a matter of course, if its a pattern to be sewed up at the end, or I could have just knitted it in the round, but, unlike many knitters, I actually like seaming - I find it a really satisfying way of bringing a project to an end.

I just realized that I haven't written about my finished plied skein of yarn, so here are a few photos of it.

I'm really pleased with the consistency considering it's my first attempt at plying. I've just started spinning some new fibre to ply for, hopefully, some kind of project, but I'm not giving any details, as I have so many projects in my head that so few come to fruition. I have, however, very nearly finished my dining room curtains - just the heading tape to sew on, so photos of those to come soon.

Have a wonderful weekend, whoever's reading.

xxx Sam

Winter evenings

We've been blessed with an incredibly mild winter here in Britain; we haven't even had frost here in South Wales. We had a delivery of four tons of logs a few months ago, which I think I mentioned a while back, and we've barely used any of them. As January runs into February, I'm hoping that the mildness will remain, and give way to the new life of spring without any rude interjections of unseasonal weather, such as snow in April, as has been known here in recent years. So with that intro, you may be wondering why this post is entitled "Winter evenings". Well we have got the woodburner going some evenings, and over Christmas we decorated the shelves in the middle living room with fairy lights, which we've been reluctant to take down yet, as they aren't Christmassy particularly, but they do bring more cosiness to the room on these dark evenings.

Let me explain about our living rooms. We have a summer living room and a winter living room. This may sound very grand, but let me assure you that it isn't particularly. The front, or summer, living room is at the front of the house and has a large bay window. It is open to the hallway and is quite cool in winter, but it as also South facing therefore gets the sun all afternoon. It is painted in Little Greene's Normandy Grey, which is possibly the most relaxing colour known to man, and is perfect for sitting in in the summer months. The middle living room is entirely in contrast. It is heavily influenced by Marno's South African roots and is painted in Farrow and Ball's Babouche, a beautiful, deep and warm yellow, and furnished with dark wood pieces and a dark sofa, as well as housing the log burner. This room also has the original tiled floor, which enhances it's warmth, though the previous owners didn't take advantage of it - the room was magnolia before we got our hands on it! Its is an incredibly cosy room. Well, what seems to happen every year, quite spontaneously, is that we will have spent the winter being cosy in the middle room, then, all of a sudden, when the evenings are drawing out and warmth is returning to the air, one of us will comment that we've not been in the front living room for ages, and we will find ourselves almost immediately migrating to that room, not to sit in the middle living room for months on end. Then, when the evenings are drawing in and the chill returns, the same thing will happen but the other way round. I think its a great thing actually, as it helps us make good use of the space in the house and not to neglect one room permantly in favour of another. It also means we benefit from the advantages of each room in the seasons they are most pleasurable.

So, I took some photos of the middle room the other night, as I said in my previous post, and I have to show them before they become a little unseasonal. Just have a little break from whatever you're doing, and  feel the warmth and cosiness. I hope you can get a little pleasure from it too.

Mmmmm, lovely :)

We still have a couple of things we want to do in here. We are planning another shelf above the sofa, quite high up, and we want a couple of wall mounted oil lamps to go on the chimney breast, with something in between them. We were joking the other night about me painting an old fashioned portrait of Marno; very dark colours with significant objects strategically placed within the painting. Joking aside, I'd love to do something like that. It would certainly be original, in a slightly paradoxical way.

I've just (literally) finished my Moon hat and its currently blocking, so photos of that to come, and I'm also in the middle of making curtains for the dining room. There are the usual unfinished projects on the go as well, so plenty to be getting on with.

xxx Sam

Hearts and buttons

I wish I had more time to blog. I'm finding myself to be quite productive lately, although I do seem to be starting projects rather than getting them finished. I started Kim Hargreaves lovely hat, Moon, over Christmas, and thought I'd easily have it finished by now, as its a quick knit even for me. But before Christmas I'd bought curtain fabric for our dining room to replace the horrible vertical blinds that the previous owners left here, which we've just left up as we've had nothing to replace them with (and I must admit, as much as I dislike vertical blinds, they do actually keep rather a lot of heat in). Anyway, I decided they were more urgent than the hat, so I've been getting them cut down to size and all the hems ironed down, ready for hand stitching, which will take a little while as they are large curtains. I could have knitted later on in the evenings, but we've been totally absorbed in Downton Abbey (we had much hilarity on Christmas day when Marno and I discovered we'd both bought each other both series on DVD!), and as I can't knit lace whilst watching TV, the hat has been put on the backburner. That is rather unfortunate, as it happens, because I left my last hat (at the bottom of the post) at a friends house yesterday, and the weather is pretty atrocious here at the moment. Ok, I do have other hats but that was my go to. I've also realized, going back to that post, that the one photo I took of that hat is pretty dreadful!

Aaaanyway... I made a few things just before Christmas which I'm going to write about today. Way back when I started my blog, my MIL sent me loads of patchwork squares, which she'd cut herself to make a quilt for herself. Unfortunately the quilt didn't work out and she decided to pass on the fabric. I knew she loved these fabrics, so I always had the intention to make her something out of them. Several years later, I finally became inspired to make her a patchwork apron. I'd wanted to make something which would incorporate the yarn her mother had spun which was on the bobbin of my wheel when she gave it to me. There isn't a lot of it, so I'd just wanted to knit a pretty lace border to attach to a larger item, which was when I designed the apron. When I came to knit the yarn however, it knit up very stuffly and was not at all delicate - it actually bent it was so stiff! So I decided to carry on with the apron anyway, and give it to MIL as a Christmas present, and come back to the yarn at a later date.

 The knitted lace was going to run along the join between the patchwork

squares and bottom pink panel.

 

 

I decided to attach the neck strap and waist ties with buttons rather than just sewing them on, to make thimgs more interesting. This one should be rotated 90 degrees to the left but blogger keeps uploading it the wrong way!!!

Modelled by me with the camera on timer.

I'm so happy to say MIL loves her apron, and I'm so pleased. She deserves a special gift. 

Still on the subject of Chrstmas, but of decorations this time, I was at a friend's house a couple of weeks before Christmas and she had up the most gorgeous decorations, mostly purchased from the lovely shop, Nest Vintage Living, in Cardiff. She had some stuffed fabric hearts, amongst other things, which set my mind working on what fabrics I had in my stash with which I could make my own. I had a little raid the same evening, and whipped up these sweet little hearts of my own, which I was very happy with.

You'll see where I put them in my next post, which is going to be a little feature on our "winter living room" which isn't as grand as it sounds, but is so cosy in the cold months.

Well, I wish whoever is reading a happy and blessed new year. 

xxx Sam

The Selfish Crafter

I can't deny it. I love making things for myself, or for my home. I know why it is; it's because I'm slow. I'm a slow knitter. Consistent but slow. I'm less slow at sewing, actually a reasonable pace, and I suppose if I was going to make something for someone, it would be better for them if it was sewn rather than knitted, if they ever hoped to get it. But the thing with this speed problem is that more and more things I want to knit, or design and sew, build up, and by the time I've finished (finally) the thing I'm working on, I have to choose out of that multitude of things. I do often run knitting and sewing projects alongside, but I never knit more than one item at a time. I think I need to change that actually.

So it may come as a surprise after reading the above, that I have actually made some things for other people! The other week I finished a beautiful pair of curtains I'd been making for some dear friends to go in their beautiful, Laura Ashley adorned, living room. The fabric was duck egg blue dupion silk. They were my second ever pair of curtains, and I must say, I am incredibly pleased with them. Unfortunately I'm less pleased with the photos I took of them so bear with me.

 

Ignore the cheeky chappies in the foreground.

I did take a couple with the curtains closed but becaue it was daytime, they didn't come out too well. I didn't interline the curtains as we didn't want them to look too grand. I love the more raw look of silk; so although they do look quite posh, they don't look over the top. They finished the room off really well, so I was really glad to have been able to use I skill that I have to help someone else.

This post started off being about how I never make things for anyone else. Well here's another thing I made for the same friend.

A lovely knitted heart from a sweet book called Vintage Hearts and Flowers by Kate Haxell.

This was actually the first "thing" I knitted. Not that one though, but this one...

... nestled in amongst our collection of ceramics, prints and cards on the living room mantelpiece.

The tall buildings on the far left we bought in Halkidiki in Greece many years ago. Marno loves ceramics and collects small pots with beautiful glazes. My mum writes the calligraphy Bible verses which we have a few of around the house.

I got these lovely prints from the makers gallery in Painswick. They're actually cards which I framed, but they look perfect (the hare print in the first and second photos of the mantelpiece is also one of them).

So, after that digression, my conclusion is that I need to speed up, with knitting at least. But I'm sure the reason for my lack of speed is my poor technique. My knitting is very neat but could be so much faster. The thing is, I don't want to spend time on knitting practise when I could be knitting an actual thing. Maybe if I knit something thats masses of stocking stitch I can practise as I go, but would that mess up my gauge? I'm just vocalising my thoughts here, so if anybody has any helpful advice, please let me know.

xxx Sam

Baking stuff

I've been doing some baking experimentation recently. I love cooking, and have no problem working from different recipies and am confident that they will work and be tasty. Baking however, is another story. Last year at my baby shower, my friend Ruth and I tried to bake. I made muffins which were supposed to to contain half fresh blueberries and half dried fruit. I thought how much nicer it would be to have fresh raspberries with the blueberries rather than the dried fruit. Being such an inexperienced baker (though perhaps common sense should have told me), I ended up with a batch of muffins that were so soggy they would not come out of the cases, and were co collapsed that they were inedible! As a joke, my friend bought me a book entitled Easy Muffins. Surely I could not go wrong... Well I didn't actually get round to baking anything from Easy Muffins until a couple of weeks ago, when I had a sudden desire to bake, and bake, and bake. I decided on muffins which contained apple (we have a huge Bramley apple tree in the garden, and a huge surplus of apples), and something else, I forget what. Anyway, I didn't have the right type of sugar, so I did a little substitution... and once again ended up with a batch of inedible muffins which would not come out of their cases and had to be binned. How ironic!

I have had a few successes though. I baked a Cinnamon Nutella cake for Noah's birthday...

... and an Apple and Walnut cake for Marno's birthday...

... making good use of those apples again! I have bags of them in the freezer, all chopped up and waiting to go in a crumble. Here is a fabulous crumble as it happens (I don't usually have a problem with puddings!) As you can see, I'm not one of those mums who can make a space rocket or a beautiful princess cake.

I also decided it was time to bake bread. I've wanted to for ages, and I have a loaf tin sitting folornly in the cupboard. I was excited to give the dough a good knead, like a buxom cook from a period drama, but with less of the buxomness! Goodness, does kneading give your arms a workout. I think I only gave it three minutes for the first knead, for the first loaf, but on the second (yes, I have baked bread twice now!), I followed what someone suggested in the comments from the brilliant BBCGoodFood website from which I got the recipe, and kneaded it once, left to rise for half an hour, then kneaded it again and left for another hour. I found the second loaf was slightly less thick, and rose a little higher.

 

Mmmm... freshly baked granary bread straight from the oven, buttered and served with slightly spicy butternut squash and chilli soup, the nicest soup I've ever made.

 

I think I should be some kind of agent for BBCGoodFood. I use the website nearly every evening and am constantly recommending it to people. 

I made these Mocha Muffins the other day...

...which did actually work, but they weren't the best muffins I've ever tasted. They included raisins, which I wasn't really sure about when I read the recipe, but added them anyway, and I don't think rainins and mocha are the best pairing. 

Anyway, I was going to write about curtains before I was overtaken by cakes, so that will be for next time. Now its time for the little boy to have his milk,

Byeee xxx

Pretty (random) things

I like to cut out and keep images from catalogues, postcards or anything in paper form that I find inspiring. The thing is, most of the images I like are from magazines which I like to keep intact in general so I can come back to them and flick though without having to hold them together or hold loose bits of paper in place as I read. So I only cut up a magazine if I know I don't want to keep the rest of it. I am a bit pernickerty about things being nicely presented, I must admit, even if its just an old magazine. Anyway, sometimes a lot of time will pass by since I last collected any inspiring images; to the extent that I think, "Oh, I'll keep that image", but then think, "Well what shall I do with it?" And then I remember that I do actually have a sketchbook into which I paste images, just so long a time has gone by that I've forgotten about it. That sounds quite ridiculous for a creative person but I can justify it by saying that so much I look at is online that I don't bother printing it out to stick in a book.

Well a couple of weeks ago I received the Anthropologie catalogue through the door. I have to say I'm not incredibly impressed with their stuff. I ordered it because so many people talk about it and I really expected it to be my kind of shop, but based on having seen the catalogue, it isn't. Its incredibly expensive and I have to say, I can't see the justification. But there were two pages I really loved, and as I didn't want to keep the whole catalogue, they were prime for ripping out! It was this that reminded me of the book, so I racked my brains as to where it was and found lots of other cut outs I hadn't yet stuck in.

 

I guess the thing of keeping things in this way is that everything in it is insiring to you personally, or appeals to you, for whatever reason.

 

I generally keep images of interiors and fashion...

... but I love that advertisement for Welbeck Tiles which is peeking out in the centre right.

I'm in the middle of so many projects at the moment, but have hardly any time for any of them. My hinderance is a lovely one though...

This is a few weeks old; my gorgeous little Noah was one last week. Happy birthday my sweetheart xxx

An Acquisition

Ugh, why is the weekend always such an anticlimax? We'd planned to go on a bird walk in the Forest of Dean on Saturday, but Marno had ordered a log store and logs from a company in West Wales, who ended up delivering it on Saturday morning . The guy told Marno the store would take one person two hours to fill with logs, so there went the morning. Then there wasn't time to go anywhere far beyond Cardiff, and it looked like it was going to rain anyway, so what an ideal opportunity to clear out the garage! And so a day had passed, and its been the same as a week day for me (aside from the log delivery and garage clear out!), but an ideal opportunity for Marno to get stuff done that he can't do in the week. It seems life is just like this at the moment; another phase which will pass in time.

In more exciting news, I have acquired a spinning wheel. Its a very traditional wheel, with no clue as to who made it,. Its double drive, which I found out on the internet -  thank you internet! We were searching for a groove or somewhere for the break band to run, and wondering how on earth Marno's grandmother had managed to spin with it (see below).

Ma's been telling me about it for ages; it belonged to her mother, who had sheep and spun their fibre. One of the bobbins still contains some yarn she spun, which isn't wool actually, I'm not sure what it is, but its a gorgeous pinky colour.

Well this was something that required a clear out to find, and I'm so glad it has been! Spindle spinning is a little slow for my liking; I do like to see more result for my effort, and I certainly am on this.

There's more on here from ten minutes here and there over the weekend, than on my spindle I got at Wonderwool this year. I pinched the fibre intended for the spindle too - sorry spindle.

I can't believe how my consistency has improved over such a short time, though it definitely helped that I knew how to draft already. I'm hoping to get to a spinning class at Calon Yarns at some point. Its a lovely craft studio run by lovely Lynne and her brother, Jon, and they hold loads of different craft workshops. They launched just after Wonderwool, which is where I met them.

Unfortunately, my Apres Surf Hoodie is languishing in a corner and I really want to wear it this winter. Thats one thing I really need to do; improve my knitting speed. I'm so slow (in comparison to people who are fast!).

Have a wonderful and productive week, whoever may be reading.

x Sam