Another Face Cloth

Hi there

I've made another face cloth:



I've added a few more stripes to my ripple blanket and now need another ball of Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino before I can continue:



I'm very much enjoying working on this but it is going to be a very long process. I'm estimating by summer next year it might be finished. The last blanket I made took me about three years. It was a baby blanket for my daughter. It helped to work on it while she was in hospital and we would wait for her to come out of theatre. When it was finished she was a bit too old for a baby blanket and it stayed hidden away for a long time. Since starting to read the Attic 24 blog though I've developed an appreciation of blankets and it now lives in the living room where we use it to keep us warm. It could do with being a bit bigger but it does the job for my daughter for now.

I've started working on an Attic 24 summer garden granny square wash cloth using up my Rowan Cotton Glacé. This is it so far:



I'm scared to go upstairs. It's very noisy and I was just asked to inspect the tidying that my son and daughter are doing. The sight that met me was an interesting definition of tidying. They had taken all the stuff out from under my son's bed and put it on the floor in the middle of his room. Apparently they are sorting things out!

We are at the start of a week off school and it's going well so far. My son has quite a bit of homework to do. My daughter has to learn her spellings, read and practice her touch typing. We managed to get it all done before lunch today then sat to watch a film. There was then housework for me to do with some help from them. My daughter is having swimming lessons each day this week. I thought it would be good to give her a bit of a boost with her swimming since she hasn't had private lessons before. She was very excited.

Dinner is nearly ready and I'm still not keen to go upstairs. I think I'll remain in blissful ignorance of the state of things for a bit longer.

I got out to my shed last week and tried to make a field of poppies bead. It didn't go as well as I had hoped. Haven't managed to take any photos yet but will post them on here when I manage it. I worked from a photo that I really liked and would love to show you that but will have to see if I can work out how to link to it since I probably shouldn't post it directly because it's not my photo.

I hope your week is going well.

Sally
Xxx

Happy Valentine's Day

This is what I made for my family to wish them a Happy Valentine's Day:



I made one each. My daughter's current favourite colour is turquoise, my son's is orange and my stepson's is yellow. I was disappointed that I couldn't find a nice bright yellow cotton yarn. I used Rowan Cotton Glacé. I really like this yarn and it comes in some great colours. I popped into John Lewis today and saw that they've had a lovely restock and must have all the colours now I think.


To make these little pouches I used 3.25mm hook. I used the pattern Lucy of Attic 24 has for the base of her yarn bag. I only realised when I put them all together that the first one I made (top right) I put an extra round in as if starting to increase the side of the bag - same number of stitches as the previous round - I think it makes it look better and would have done all of them this way if I'd remembered I'd done that!


Once I'd made two circles I double crocheted them together leaving a gap then turned the whole thing inside out. The heart is again a Lucy pattern and happens (as my son told me this evening) to be the exact same size as the pink chocolate hearts I bought to go inside.

I'm so pleased with how these turned out. It felt good to use my crochet skills to do something nice for my family.

I finished this wash cloth yesterday:




It's Rowan Cotton Glacé on a 3.25mm hook and edged with DMC Petra Number 5. I put two double crochet stitches in each stitch which has made it go a bit higgledy piggledy.

I was in John Lewis today to treat myself to a ball of Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino. I was picking a colour to start my ripple blanket. I can't justify buying a load of yarn at the same time so my plan is to buy a ball each time I go into town and work on my blanket gradually as I pick up new yarn. I'll have other bits on the go in the background. I like having something to do instead of snacking in the evenings. I am still making flowers to add to my scarf and still working on granny squares of Noro for another scarf I'm making. I like scarves!

When I got home with my new ball I had a look at the other colours I have bits of and realised I have enough to get cracking on a blanket. This is very exciting for me. It's very chilly at the moment and the thought of getting started on a blanket makes me feel snuggly.




I've also started on another wash cloth. I want to have a nice collection of them.


My daughter came home with this today:



They have been learning about drawing people and I'm really impressed by this. She is a very talented drawer. I love the pictures she does.

This week I made a blueberry and lime cake in my slow cooker. It looks rubbish but was very moist and tasty. D and I really liked it. My son accused me of trying to poison him and my daughter refused to even try it!








I hope that if you are reading this you are safe and dry.

Sally
X

Yesterday

Hi

Yesterday D and I got to go for a walk together. This is a real treat for us. We love walking. The children were dropped off at my daughter's best friend's house and off we went for a couple of hours of alone, awake time.

The weather was amazing - not in a good way! We had wind - very strong, hail - it hurt and sideways rain. Despite this we still very much enjoyed our time walking together and I would do it again even with the weather. D picked a section of The Ridgeway for us. I think the fact that it was a ridge between bits of farming land added to the impact of the weather. There were trees but without their leaves they didn't offer a great deal of protection.

Here's me at the start of our walk:



My mum bought me that fluffy cowl for Christmas and it's very snuggly.

Here are some photos I took when I wasn't being battered by rain or hail:






This one is my favourite. I love trees.


We actually got to see both ends of a rainbow which I thought was pretty great.


The other end though we could actually see hitting the grass/crops in the farmer's field. It was amazing. I've never seen this before and I only had my phone camera so you can't really appreciate how good it looked to see the end of a rainbow.


Our walk was lovely and we hope to do it again with the children when the weather is nicer. I think there would have been tears and carrying if they had come.

The children had a lovely time. They made a great den that even had a bed in it.

I made pizzas for dinner while D went off on a work call.

I felt very smug because I had the bread maker on a timer to do the pizza dough while we were out.

These are our pizzas before cooking.
This is mine:


D's:


My son's


My daughter's


I used the leftover dough to make garlic bread but it was a fail.
I used dried garlic and parsley which just didn't have the flavour. I think if I had soaked the garlic it might have been better but I just threw it on top to see if it would work. It didn't get eaten. The pizzas were delicious.



I am writing this in bed which is lovely. It feels chilly out of bed and I'm also hiding a bit because my son has homework and he can often get a bit cross when he has to do work. Totally understandable but not nice for me.

Sally
Xxx

Note for A: the other day I made a big bloomer loaf of bread. Daddy told me a few times how delicious it was. I made you and P sandwiches for your lunch boxes. That evening you told me "the reason I don't like the bread is that I can taste the dough". This was followed by P saying "yeah. I don't like it because it tastes wet". Daddy says that you are my harshest critic and that I must ask you before I ask anyone else. The tree bead I made that I'm so proud of was met with "where's the bird?" And "can you add a bird?". Sometimes you very kindly will precede your feedback with "I don't want to hurt your feelings but...". At least if I ever impress you with anything I will know its genuine.

Making things

Hello there. How are you?

I asked to be woken up this morning by my daughter when she for up. It was just after six. I wanted to finish something and needed her neck and wanted to try out a method for poaching eggs that's on the Attic 24 blog.

The eggs were delicious.

Remember I showed you a work in progress with the Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino that was destined for a hexagon cushion? I decided that my daughter's chilly neck was a more worthwhile cause and made her a Neckwarmer. I crocheted it in the round joining each row and stepping up, as we say in beaweaving, for the start of the next row. It was very enjoyable and quick to make. I added my favourite Attic 24 triple layer flower and was very pleased with the result...





...until my daughter put it on and I realised that, although it went over her head and looked very nice it didn't keep her neck warm. It was too far away from her neck. So I had another go:







I used the Attic 24 ripple pattern (can you tell I'm an Attic 24 fan!). This pattern is lovely and the resulting - insert what you are making (I wanted to say "fabric" but that's not the right word) - is lovely.

I wanted to get up early this morning with my daughter so I could finish it. I needed to make sure it was a good, snug fit for it to keep her warm. It looks like this flat:






And fits her very well. It took me a little while to get the button hole size and stitches around it right but I did it and am so pleased with the result.

I have a big tub of buttons and had never noticed this one before. Isn't it lovely.

I'm still working on my Valentine's Day things which I've not photographed yet. I have a few finished and some left to do. I have to do it sneakily because I want it to be a surprise.

In other news I visited a lovely little charity shop by school yesterday to get some pots to put my boring black pots into. I planted some seeds yesterday for my windowsill in front of the sink and liked the idea that I might gradually see little plants emerging over the next few months. I planted poppies, cornflower, tomatoes and something else I can't remember. Unfortunately, I was so pleased with myself I forgot to label the pots so it will be a surprise to see what comes out.

Want to see the pots I bought? Here you go:

I thought this one was very sweet and old fashioned.





I liked the colour and style of this one. Unfortunately it is an actual pot with a hole in the bottom but that should be ok I think.





I loved this mug. I think it's my favourite. My daughter loves learning French and D will often say "Bonjour" to us so it felt very special to find this.





I liked the colour of this one. It's actually a kind of blue colour which it doesn't look in this photo - weird.





This cup is also on the windowsill. I've had it a very long time and love the boldness and brightness of the decoration.











This is the windowsill:






Bit dark but you can vaguely see what's there. That lovely blue shed in the distance is where I make my beads. I love being out there attempting to create lovely works of art. It's a right state in there and I am not exaggerating. It's got into an embarrassing mess. This is a tricky one for me because a while ago someone broke into it which upset me very much. Nothing was taken but this shed was my sanctuary where I would hide from the housework and demands of children. It was my haven. To one day see the door swinging about and discover it had been broken into was very upsetting. The advantage of it being such a state is that you would now open the door and fear for your life if you were to try entering. There's a massive bottle of propane, glass rods all over the place some of them very lethal looking because they have been made into tall, sharp stringers, and just general stuff to fall over. If anyone but me tried to get in there they would definately be leaving some DNA behind this time.

Anyway, sorry for that bit of a sidetrack.

Have you seen this before?







I've never ever seen this before. Two flowers from one stem. I thought it quite unique until the mum of my daughter's best friend told me her's had done the same thing.

Sally
X


I've just posted a photo on my Flickr account and belated realised that my brilliant button is a ripple button! How could I not have realised how brilliant that is. I've sewn the button on the wrong way round. I might resew it. I'll try to work out if it's worth it. Can't believe my ripple neck warmer has a ripple button!