Catching Up On Craft

I couldn't help but notice that in my last post, there was a distinct lack of craft - sorry about that! In my defence, I feel I should say that I was pretty busy and that I did manage at least to bake a batch of muffins to say thank you to my friends at work for all of their lovely gifts and I have finally mastered the art of pain perdu. Mmmmmm.

And it isn't as if I've been a craft-free zone. My quilt is still coming along nicely and I've just spent a really lovely afternoon quilting away while watching the very wonderful "You've Got Mail" by the talented Nora Ephron, who will be sadly missed.

I've also done a little bit of knitting, not much (especially as I decided to unknit a certain amount of my mustard shrug because it had some pretty shonky yarn overs in it!) but enough to still say that I am still a knitter. Just. Oh, and I made a pretty necklace for a friend at work, too.
I started writing this post in the middle of the night, in bed, during an almighty rain storm. It is both welcome and necessary (not to mention loud) but I can't help worrying that my poor tender veggies will be battered by this much water...

I can't tell you how much I love the new garden. I love watching everything grow and take shape - even weeding is a pleasure! And I've started a sort of garden journal to celebrate it all. Today I popped on my bike, cycled to Wilton and spent the last of my birthday tokens on a Temperley rhubarb, some basil and some garlic chives to fill the very last few spaces in the beds. I can't wait to start eating our own veggies. Mmmmm!

It's a bit brighter now and although not fully summery, D and I have made the best of our weekends with trips to the beach at Bournemouth and a glorious picnic at Henley-on-Thames. Here's hoping for a bit more sunshine and a lot more picnics to come!

What a Wonderful Weekend

 

 

Best in Show

Alllium

 

Foxgloves Galore

 The last three days have been an absolute whirlwind of delights, with trips to the Chelsea Flower Show and Malmaison in Oxford all rounded off with a bit of knitting, quilting, running, and some quality time in the garden. 

Kaffe Fassett's Emporium
of Fabrlc Delights

Roses, Roses, Roses

Having narrowly missed out on tickets to Chelsea last year, my sister and I were determined to make it and she booked our tickets in January. I can tell you that it was definitely worth the wait and lived up to all of the hype and way beyond my expectations. It was all so beautiful that I ended up feeling rather overwhelmed by it as we strolled the pathways soaking up garden after garden after garden. The Brewin Dolphin Garden deisgned by Cleve West which won best of the show gardens was a worthy winner and my sister and I were both really taken by the Laurent-Perrier Garden designed by Arne Maynard. 

We had an absolutely smashing picnic and I went completely belly up for the whole Artisans' Retreats area. The Kaffe Fassett exhibition was probably my favourite thing of the entire day, though I'd be hard pushed to say that there was anything about the entire day that I didn't like!   

 












Oxford was almost equally lovely and D and I had the most delicious meal followed by an afternoon of browsing bookshops and a picnic supper in the Oxford University Parks before retiring to our rather lovely accommodation that D had booked through the university. What a wonderful weekend!

Going Green

The last couple of weeks have been pretty exciting in our little household as we've watched out garden being transformed from a wilderness into a beautiful garden. Last year, we got in touch with a lovely fellow called James Taylor who shared with us a vision for a natural, usable, easily-maintained outdoor space. An area that would work with and make the most of what we had and make our garden feel like another room in the house. And, boy, has he ever managed to fulfill every part of the brief.

We have a garden that is better than I could ever have imagined - and it's not even finished yet! Today is hopefully the last day and I can hardly wait to get home tonight to admire the final art. We've been out over the last two weekends, enjoying it as a work in progress with our first ever barbecue (sausage sandwiches - mmmm) and I spent an incredibly happy day planting out two vegetable patches with petit pois, sugar snap peas, courgettes, tomatoes, spinach, rocket, chard, butternut squash, potatoes, onions, leeks and garlic. If even a fraction of it comes up, I shall be absolutely delighted and thrilled to be able to eat produce from our very own garden. I can hardly wait and I'm sure I'll be out checking their progress at every possible opportunity!

I've also had a little bit of time to spend working on my new quilt, which now has 40 pieces all joined together. It's waiting for a border and some actual quilting, so I doubt I'll get it finished in time for birthday picnics, but here's hoping...

The Joys of Spring

I don't know if it's because spring is in the air, but I've been feeling really creative lately and I can't seem to get enough of crafting. The week before last, it was my mum's birthday and I'd started a quilted cushion cover for her sometime in February. As is all too often the case with me, I'd started with enthusiasm and completed quite a lot of it, but then I'd totally run out of steam and the poor cushion cover lay in a heap on the back of the sofa until I was quilting against the clock. Now, I know that necessity is a great motivator, so I got up early on the Saturday before the actual birthday, edges the necessary bits of the quilt and sewed the sides together to create a rather lovely (if I say so myself) present for my very lovely mum.

I made the post and Mum loved her present and the crafting bug seems to have bitten. Since finishing the cushion cover, I've started another quilt, from a Hometown jelly roll by Sweetwater for Moda. I've never tried anything with a jelly roll before and wasn't quite sure where to start, but Emma from my new knitting group came to the rescue and kindly loaned me a copy of Jelly Roll Quilts by Pam and Nicky Lintott. It's a great book and shows clearly how to make the most of a jelly roll. I was really sceptical that you would get an entire quilt out of so little material, but having cut and pieced it's going to be a full sized quilt. I've really enjoyed having a day of cutting and sewing and I'm hoping that I should be able to get the whole thing finished in a matter of weeks, rather than the months and months and months that it took to make my first one!

On the needles, Olive is coming along really well and I'm already well past the bustline. I've also cast on a shrug from Ravelry by Katya Gorbacheva which is giving me the opportunity to use some beautiful vintage needles that have been languishing in a pen-pot on my desk. I've also started up the sock monster manufacturing again and have half a dozen sock-skins ready for sewing and stuffing. Busy, busy, busy!

Off the needles, D and I celebrated the birthday of a very special two-year-old with a delicious lunch at the True Lovers Knot pub near Blandford. We've also helped our local landlord and friend celebrate the opening of his new pub The Haunch of Venison. (He's still working on the website, so I'll post a link when it's up and running.)

Speaking of running, I've started that up again as well and am following a nice, gentle training programme, which I hope will help me feel fitter and more energetic - and full of the joys of spring!

Taking it Easy...

After a good few weeks of being busy, busy, busy, this weekend has seen an incredibly welcome return to laziness! The last two days has been the longest time that D and I have both been at home without any visitors since we returned from our holiday in Italy in June!

Friday night started with a little tour around the Cathedral Close to admire Sean Henry's sculpture exhibition: Conflux: A Union of the Sacred and the Anonymous, a series of amazingly lifelike sculptures that are both around the close and in the cathedral itself. I could only see the outside figures as I had a date with D to try out a new pub that has recently opened just outside St Ann's Gate, The Lazy Cow. The bar itself was nice and lively, with a great atmosphere. I think it's probably the kind of place that would be nice for a long Sunday brunch. We didn't get much of a look at the menu, but I'm sure that we'll be back to try it out before too long.   

Saturday started with a quick trip on the train to Southampton. We needed to check out some wallpaper for our bedroom and after very thoughtful debate, we decided on a steel blue botanic rose print. It's quite big and bold and somewhat modern, whilst still feeling appropriate for our ramshackle old house. We just have to find the appropriate colour for the remaining three walls, but I'm hoping that it'll be one of those colours that you know is right, just as soon as you see it. At least that's the theory...

I also took the opportunity to spend the "towards crafty projects" birthday money that my parents sent me in June. Browsing through the selection in the haberdashers was a real treat and I finally settled on teh following prints from Joel Dewberry's Modern Meadow collection. I'm planning on using the fabric to make the Sample Book quilt from Jane Brocket's The Gentle Art of Quilt-Making. It's going to be another long-term project, but I enjoyed making my first quilt so much that I'm itching to get started on a second.

The short journey home from Southampton was broken up with a very welcome stop at Mottisfont and Dunbridge for a tasty pint of cloudy cider at the Mill Arms and this afternoon has seen a trip out into the country to visit the newly re-opened Beckford Arms at Fonthill Gifford, near Tisbury. On the drive home D and I decided on our top five country pubs, all within 30 miles of Salisbury and here they are:

1. The Beckford Arms, Fonthill Gifford, Tisbury (great food, drink, accommodation and a lovely atmosphere)
2. The Mill Arms, Barley Hill, Dunbridge (great location close to Mottisfont Abbey, gorgeous beer garden) 
3. The Ship Inn, Burcombe (this is a regular go-to for delicious dinners and Sunday lunches)
4. The Spread Eagle, Stourton (just outside the grounds of Stourhead, the Spread Eagle does a wonderful line in afternoon teas in the summer and toasty fires on a cold day with Winter Pimms)
5. The Compasses Inn, Lower Chicksgrove (award-winningly good grub)

All five of them are absolutely wonderful and if you are ever at a loose end in Wiltshire (or Hampshire in the case of The Mill Arms) then you would be hard-pushed to find a nicer way of spending a couple of hours than visiting any of them. 

I'm rounding off the weekend with some homemade ginger biscuits and tea, listening to the new album from Bon Iver and reading Meg Rosoff's new book, There Is No Dog, which is as brilliant as it is funny.

And finally, on the needles, Bunting is growing before my very eyes. I need to get a move on to get him finished by my end of summer deadline, but with a good wind and a few more weekends at home, all will be fine!

Here comes the summer

What a lovely couple of weeks I've had. Work is great and I'm embarking on some wonderful projects and home is lovely. Last weekend was pretty cultural, and I got out and about with visits to the beautiful walled rose garden at Mottisfont Abbey, the brand new Constable & Salisbury exhibition at Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum and to the Made to Last exhibition which is being hosted in the cloisters of Salisbury Cathedral  as part of Salisbury International Arts Festival.

I took literally hundreds of flower photographs at Mottisfont, both on the Olympus PEN and the new Diana F+. The colours of the roses, and the foxgloves, and the clematis were all staggering, and in the warm sunlight, the flowers seemed to glow. This time of year is so precious, I want to try and capture every second, every glint of light and every shade of colour. If any of the film picture come out okay, I'll upload them when I next post here. Watch this space...

The festival is wonderful for the city of Salisbury with events and activities taking place at dozens of venues for a jam-packed fortnight. Sadly, I missed one of the opening events which was an aerial ballet by the Argentinian dance company, Voalà. It would have been great to see, but I had a prior engagement for some baby cuddles with the adorable Flora, which could not be missed for all the dancing in South America! The Made to Last exhibition was well worth the visit, with some really unusual modern sculptures in the quiet and contemplative setting of the cathedral cloisters. I posted a handful of pictures on instagram (which, yes, I am still smitten with) and here's one of my favourites. 

This weekend has been all about family and friends and, very importantly, music. D has always been an amazing musician, but a non-practising one until this weekend, when he re-emerged onto the scene with not one, but two, amazing acoustic sets at the local. He totally rocked and I am very proud of him! Special thanks to George and Sarah and to my mum and dad, who came along to support him on Friday and Sunday respectively.


Here are a couple more instagram pictures that I've taken in the last fortnight of the bunting celebrating the anniversary of the Festival of Britain at the Southbank Centre and the stunning alliums from outside Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum.

 

On the craft front, I am delighted to report that I have finally found just the right colour orange for Bunting. It was pretty tricky and I needed the help of the lovely knitting departments of both Liberty and John Lewis (frankly, visiting any knitting department is no hardship) but I am there. I've also started Bunting in earnest and have rediscovered the lost art of french knitting thanks to this superb tutorial from Donna Vokes. My parents moved house two weeks ago and my mum discovered an old french knitting dolly, made from a wooden cotton reel with four teeny tiny nails hammered into the top. It turns out that I had completely forgotten how to create icord with a dolly, but now I've started again, there's no holding me back!

Coraline is still growing. I did get to the yoke, but then decided that I would actually prefer a longer line cardigan, so I'm adding an additional
couple of inches, which means fourteen more (very long) rows of stocking stitch. Gah!

The good news, though, is that my quilt is almost, almost finished. The pieces have been pieced, the sandwich quilted and all I need now is some dark brown cotton to match the ribbon that I am planning to use as a border. I can hardly wait to be snuggled up on the sofa, on a chilly autumn afternoon with a good book and a cup of tea, all wrapped up in my own hand-made quilt. I just have to resist the urge to make a matching blanket from Jane Brocket's The Gentle Art of Knitting, which I finally received this week. No new projects until I've finished something! (Let's see how long that lasts...)

It's been a while...

The last four weeks have just flown by - I've been so busy at work and at home that I've found it hard to find the time to sit quietly with my laptop and get a few words down. However, I have had time to keep crafting. (Phew!) Coraline is coming on steadily and I hope to hit the complicated yoke smocking in a couple of weeks time. It's slow-going, and repetitive, just now, but it is about to get interesting and when it's all blocked and I can wear it, I know it will all be worth it!

Aside from knitting, I've been spending a fair amount of time beavering away on my big quilting project. Over the last four weeks, I've cut out all of the pieces (all 252 of them!) and I've started to put them together together. It was great fun playing with the different coloured pieces, spreading them all out on the floor in my den to see what went well where and to check that nothing looked out of place. That there weren't too many repeats or blocks of similar colours too close to each other.

Following the instructions from Jane Brocket's Gentle Art of Quilting I labelled each square-to-be before machine-sewing the four strips of each square together, then patiently ironing every single seam flat. I swear, I did more ironing in the last four days than I've done in the last four years! I've now sewn the squares into rows, and once I have sewn those rows into one giant piece, I shall begin hand-quilting in earnest. I've just run out of cotton (and bank holidays) so I shall have to wait until next weekend before I can finish off the front. 

It's lovely to see something come from nothing; to create something so large from scraps of material. Although I'm a long way from finishing this particular project, I'm enjoying it so much that I'm already imagining what my next quilt will look like! Since my last post, I visited The American Museum in Claverton, near Bath, which has the most inspirational collections of handmade quilts. They had them all in one room in gigantic poster sleeves and I only wish that I could have had the place to myself so that I could really have studied them in detail. I did buy some beautiful fat quarters, none of which are actually in this quilt, but they will be in something lovely before too long, I'm sure!

I've also treated myself to a very exciting new camera. The Diana+ is a lomographic camera - and isn't she the most beautiful camera you've ever seen? I've only had one roll of film developed so far and I wouldn't say that I was particularly proud of any of the pictures (especially as I'd bought the wrong speed film!) but it's a start and I'm going to have lots of fun with analogue photos. I love the unpredictability of shooting with a film camera and I love the nostalgic warmth of the end results. Here's a link to the Ten Golden Rules of Lomography - whatever you take your photos with - these are all lessons well-learned!

This move to lo-fi has done absolutely nothing to dampen my enthusiasm for Instagram! I've made the bold move of having some of my snaps printed out on 5" x 5" matt paper by the lovely folk at Photo.com. Some of the images aren't quite hi-res enough to be blown up to that size, but somehow, when you're looking at them in the pages of a gorgeous album it doesn't matter in the slightest.

A Stitch in Time

The last three weeks have been pretty hectic, both at home and at work. We've had guests to stay, had a wonderful bit of decorating done (thank you RJ for our beautiful new staircase), and been out and about a fair bit too. I feel like I haven't had much time for knitting and stitching so this weekend has been a very welcome craft-fest!

The weekend kicked off on a high note when the door knocker heralded the post man who was carrying a divine parcel of happiness from the fabulous folk at Fabric Rehab. The photo on the left shows the material which I'm hoping will turn into a Beach Hut pattern quilt from Jane Brocket's Gentle Art of Quilt-Making. I bought a super-duper quilt ruler on Saturday morning (and the most gorgeous muffin cases ever seen - thank you Dinghams!) and I'm really looking forward to getting stuck in, cutting out a trillion 2" x 8" strips! 

In the meantime, my first patchwork project is coming along quite nicely. I've machine-stitched all of the pieces into strips and pressed them all nicely, so I just need to sew the strips together, buy some wadding and backing fabric and put it all together. I think that the part I'm most looking forward to is the actual quilting part - hand stitching each of the squares through all of the various layers. I'll report back when it's progressed a little further. 

On the needles, the navy aran from my mum is now in its third incarnation! It started off as an asymmetric cardigan, then it was going to be a capelet, but now I'm rather hoping it will be comfortable as a Danica. Fingers crossed that third time will be a charm. (Didn't I say something like that about the my afghan blanket? Hope I'm not spotting a pattern...)

I've not fallen out of love with Instagram yet and have been snapping away at every opportunity! Here are some edited highlights from February:

 

I've read a couple of pretty good, albeit completely different, books in the last couple of weeks, Trespass by Rose Tremain and The Radleys by Matt Haig. I've just started Even the Dogs by Jon McGregor which has a slightly odd start, but I have high hopes that it'll be every bit as good as If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things and So Many Ways to Begin. I've also watched a couple of movies, The Social Network, which was really good and surprisingly moving and Black Swan which I enjoyed less, but mostly because I was expecting something beautiful and art-house not the horror movie it really is. (The costumes and the dancing were incredible, though!) To end this post on a hight point, I heartily recommend the new album, 21 by Adele. I've had it pretty much on repeat since I bought it - hope you'll like it too.

Keeping Busy

I've had a pretty busy month, so sorry for the lack of posts. Knitting has taken up a fair amount of my free time, especially as my dear friend Jenny is getting ready to have a baby (the bump is affectionately known as Bobbin) and I've been crafting away to make something ready for when she arrives. The knitters from work joined together to make this really lovely blanket for her. The pattern is from Stephany Lein's YARRRRN! blog and Jenny E, Suzie, Claire, Maya, Chiara, Alyssa and Gemma all chipped in to make an incredibly personal gift for Bobbin. Jenny E, Gemma and I had great fun choosing particularly Jenny-esque colours. Wool was handed out just before Christmas and the knitting started in earnest. Squares started coming in a couple of weeks ago and with a bit of patience, a lot of needlework, a long, long chain of double crochet and the magic of blocking, a baby blanket was born.

Bobbin is going to be a very well dressed little girl as she already has a beautiful nautical jumper and gorgeous baby jeans knitted by her mum, a stunning pinafore dress knitted by Jenny E and a little red asymmetrical cardigan from me! I think that the dress, the jumper and the cardigan will form Bobbin's going home outfit. She'll be the best-dressed baby that day, and pretty toasty too! I can't wait to see the photos and I can't wait to meet her even more! We gave her a pretty good send off from work last week and I'll really miss her over the coming months. Big hugs go out to Jenny and good luck for the big day.

My Kaffe Fassett Patchwork book that Mum and Dad bought me for Christmas finally arrived and I have at last been able to start on my first quilting project. I'm using the fat quarters that I received and a pair of jeans that David has kindly donated to craft to make a quilted cushion cover. It's early days yet, but I'm rather looking forward to having something to show you as the project to share...

Off the needles, I've had a trip up to Scotland to stay with Angie, Robin and Joe and we had a wonderful time. Angie and I even managed a girls' night out at the movies to see The King's English at Dundee Contemporary Arts. I had just discovered the Instagram app for the iPhone so spent a fair amount of time snapping away and posting my pics!

Edinburgh Castle in the Dusk

Woodpile at the Pillars of Hercules

Flowers in the Guest Room

Up In the Clouds

I've been reading some absolutely cracking books this month, including You Against Me by Jenny Downham, Mrs Miniver by Jan Struthers, Life: an Exploded Diagram by Mal Peet and Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins. 


My favourite book by a very long way, however, has been Being Billy by Phil Earle. Being Billy is an incredible book. It is a work of honesty and sensitivity. Rarely have I cared quite so much about a protagonist as he struggles to come to terms with the life that he must lead. Being Billy has integrity, it is moving and heartfelt and above all, it's a brilliant read. I was lucky enough to be invited to Phil's book launch at Waterstone's Piccadilly in January and it was wonderful to help him celebrate and catch up with so very many old friends. Phil's working on his next book; please do visit his website for more news, reviews and more.