Garden

It is sunny again today, yippee! It means I can keep up with my washing which, though sadly domestic, is something that keeps me happy!

I also realised that a lot of the flowers that have been blooming in my garden have sadly bloomed their last, so I thought I would take some photos of some of the flowers that remain.

The majority of the flowers have been grown from seed by Master M. and Master A. It seems like such a long time since we bought the seeds, dug the compost out the compost bin, and planted, and watered, and waited, and watered and waited...and then we had little seedlings which we planted out and how they grew! The boys have been so pleased with the results :)





These were all grown from seeds except the Fuschia which is a really old bush that has lived in this garden forever.

Oh and I have to mention out teeny apples growing on our (very modest) apple tree. It won't be long before they are full size apples - can't wait!


x

The Art Of Crochet So Far ..

Wow I knew I hadn't blogged for ages but hadn't realised it had been this long!

Just thought I would share with you some photos of my blanket so far that I have been making with 'The Art Of Crochet' partworks magazine. If you are not aware of the magazine, every week you get a ball of yarn and instructions to crochet a square, eventually each square is sewn together into a large vintage style blanket. There are also loads of other patterns in the magazine as well.

I have really been enjoying the magazine because not only did it teach me to crochet in the first place, it has taught me stitches and techniques that I would probably never have attempted ( and a couple I never want to attempt again!!) because I am determined to get my blanket finished.

This is only the second time that the magazine has published the making up instructions, it does get a bit frustrationing waiting on the instructions when I have had a huge pile of squares waiting patiently, but now I have a whole half blanket!

I am pleased with my progress so far :)










I will try and not leave it so long until I blog again!!

X

Flower Garland

Thought I would share a wee flower garland that I crocheted for my hall.

Our hall is a rather boring apricot colour, apart from laying laminate flooring we haven't touched the hall since moving in seven years ago. I really want to do something with it just not sure what.

We added a huge mirror a couple of years ago to enlarge the space and I though a crocheted garland would be just the thing to give it a lift. I was able to use some vintage buttons that my mum had given to me a long time ago.

Oh and please excuse the blank canvases on the walls. hubby hung them there a while ago as a minimilist joke and we have never got round to taking them down! I sometimes think people that come to the door must think we are mad (they would be right, of course ;) )

I am quite pleased how it turned out.

Hope you like it :) x

Chair Update

Thought it was time for a little chair update.

I stripped the chair down to the frame (the grey square on the front was me testing the paint for the legs!) please also excuse the lego pile in the background :)



I sanded it, and painted the legs a dark grey/barely black colour. Still not sure which fabric I am using but I wanted the legs to be dark.

Before:



After:



I have just finished attaching hessian and webbing to the back and webbing to the base.

Before:



After:



As you can see the chair originally had rubber 'pirelli' webbing but it had long since perished and gone hard. I decided to just use jute webbing instead, I hope it will last longer. I have also glued and screwed a couple of joints that were still together but were becoming a bit wobbly. I am really impressed by the harness of the wood. Makes me sad that a lot of furniture these days is made form cheap pine and composite board. They wont last for the tens of years this chair has. Buy cheap buy twice, I suppose.

I am now waiting to purchase some spray adhesive so I can join some hessian to the underside of the base cushion to stop the webbing cutting into it.

This project is taking longer than I thought mainly due to the number of bits and bobs that I seem to need and I am trying to do it right and never having done anything like this before it is a huge, slow, learning curve. I am enjoying it and happy so far with my progress.

On a side note, the other week I was in town (I rarely go into the City centre) and I popped into a brand new Cath Kidston shop (just for a nosey - never bought anything) and imagine my surprise when I saw they had a re upholstered chair, exactly the same 'nursing' style chair. Their one was covered in a 'vintage' picnic blanket and they were asking £265!! This has spurred me on a bit as I am sure you can imagine :) and to think my wee chair was destined for landfil :(

Take care x

New Product! New Photos!

Today I have listed a new product - Elf Doors! I have made quite a few Elf doors in the past as special orders but I have decided to start selling them as a main line now. Lots of people prefer elves to fairies. Some people have sons (like me!) and want a wee door that is less 'girlie' so the answer is a wee blue Elf door!



Of course, no elf door would be complete without an elf doormat, so I made some of them too!



x

New Photos!

Today it is raining much rain, but that is ok because the garden needs some rain some of my plants were starting to wilt!

The other day I took my fairy doors on a wee trip to my local park and took some photos. I was trying to get some good shots in different locations but my photography isn't that hot. I think I rely too much on the Auto setting and should spend more time getting to know the other functions it has to offer.

It was a beautiful day but it turned out to be too sunny (I know!). I took several photos but hardly any of them were successful, the sun was so bright it glinted off the glittery paint. I hadn't realised it had done this until I got them home so most of the shots that are useable are of my brown 'wood' doors.

Here are a couple photos of the park:





It was such a beautiful day it makes me feel guilty I don't visit this park more often.

Here is a glinty picture of one of my doors :(



And here is the non glinty version!



With added 50p windmill!

Hope you are enjoying the weather (whatever it brings!)

x

Before But No After

You know when you share something and then think I need to finish that because people will wonder how I am getting on well, this is kinda the reason for this post. I am sharing the 'before' of a project which is currently a work in progress and hopefully will one day become an 'after' I was going to keep it to myself and just do a ta da 'before and after' post but I thought by sharing it I might be insentivised (is that a word?) to actually finish it!!

You see the other day we were driving to the supermarket and it was bin day. Now when it is bin day I often have to avert my eyes as I get really stressed at the things people throw out things that are perfectly good but destined to be crushed and buried in the ground because it has served its useful life with that person. Well this day and I spied a wee chair. I thought it looked 'useful' not too big not too small. We could do with and extra chair. One that is not to big and not too small. So later that night (it had actually gone dark!) I asked my hubby to drive back to see if the chair was still there. You see the bin lorry should already have been, but it was still there! It was fate. So I picked it up and brought it home to keep warm :)

Here it is!





And so begins my first upholstery project! I mean, how difficult can it be?

x

Spring!

Well how nice it is to see some sunshine around. My garden has burst into life over the past couple of weeks. I feel as if winter had just gone on and on, this year.

The sunshine meant the host of daffodils I have in my front garden burst into life. I do love daffodils, the way they always open with their fantastic yellow blooms just when you think there will never be any more colour outside. Unfortunately for my daffodils just when they had revealed all their lovely colour we had strong winds and heavy rain and oh dear he daffs did not like that weather one bit! So I had to go out and save lots of my poor battered blooms, so many were broken (but lots survived - yay!) . I put them in an old jam jar and then set about making the jar a wee jacket! And lo and behold this is what they became.





So simple, yet so pleasing :)

If you want to make your own the pattern is from Lucy at the fantastic Attic 24 blog.

Hope you are out and enjoying the spring sunshine.

x

George

Every time I start to write a blog post I never know what to call it. Sometimes I think I should just number my posts, other times I think I will just call them George.



In an attempt to fill out my shop I have added a new pink fairy doormat listing to my Folksy shop the perfect accessory for your pink fairy door!

I met with a crafty friend of mine the other day. They lovely Suzanne of Fieldy Tweed fame. We were both discussing the difficulties of staying motivated when you work from home and trying to stay inspired in order to pursue our chosen handmade career paths, when the urge to wrap up in a blanket, drink coffee and watch Homes Under The Hammer is very strong. It is something I have struggled with for a long time, motivation.

To this end we have set ourselves a goal - to sell X number of items and to write X blog posts and to meet up once a month to make sure it happens! As the sun is gracing us with its presence occasionally now, we are going to meet up in a local park armed with products and cameras to take some product shots, just trying to think outside the box a bit. Having product shots is something that really holds me back more than it should, so hopefully this will help.

I will let you know how we get on!

Take care.

x

Babette Update

I thought it was time for a babette update. Sadly I am about as rubbish as getting on with the babette as I am at remembering to blog, so a bit of an advancement but not much.

I haven't actually been able to do any work on this blanket for a few weeks due to life stuff. I find it takes a lot of concentration, working out the size of square, the colourways and the tedious (for me) colour changes! So I am hoping this little update will spur me along a bit :)

A gratuitous yarn photo

In other news, yesterday I made another batch of fairy doors. Here are some of them drying out

Not as colourful as the last three pictures!

Finished Fairy doors always available in my Folksy shop here (well, you can't blame a girl for a little self promotion ;) )

Take care

x

So far, So Good

Thought I would pop in and update you on my Babette progress! I have been trying hard to finish my pile of WIP that I seem to have accumulated. I thought I actually had a huge pile of crochet projects to finish off but it turned out that some of them were just 'to dos' written on a list so I was able to ignore them for the time being. :)

So far I have made just two squares. They are turning out ok. I have changed the way I join in the yarn however. The instructions call for you to join the yarn on the side of the squares this however seems to leave an unsightly gappy bit all the way through, maybe better crocheters won't have this or maybe if I was using a more fuzzy yarn it wouldn't be so obvious but I think I have to change the way I make the squares. I made the big square as per instructions and made the smaller square by joining the yarn at the corners instead (and using a 'magic circle' to start to eliminate the centre hole) I am much happier with the result so will continue to do this. I might redo the larger square at some point but I will see. It probably looks worse to me than anyone else!

Hello!

Well I didn't expect to be missing from blogland for so long. Sorry about that. My absence has been mainly due to working in my 'proper' job (Stage Management) Christmas - yay! illness - boo! and a complete lack of anything to blog about!!

I want to look forward now, not backward.

I got some money for Christmas, so decided to splurge on some yarn! Buying loads of yarn is something I have resisted because I hate the way it takes over my life! We have no storage so I end up putting piles of yarn and magazines and books and all other crochet related paraphernalia in different piles in different rooms so it looks less. Part of the problem is I have dabbled in so many crafts in my life I have loads of piles of unused things that I really need to rationalise, but hey, that is another day.

Here is my pile of new yarn,


it is just acrylic as I don't have that much money. I am going to make a babette blanket with it. I have wanted to make this blanket for ages and if all goes well and in the future I have more cash i will make a 'proper' blanket in lovely real wool, at the moment I am making a washable everyday version. :)

Hopefully I will be able to keep you updated on my progress.

Take care x