WATERLOO SUNSET AND OLYMPIC DREAMS

Golly, I cannot believe how long it has been since I last posted on my blog and I have missed it so much!  Not only have I neglected my own blog, I haven't been visiting all my favourite blogs.   I have so much catching up to do!

We didn't go on holiday this summer, so I can't blame it on the usual weeks of holiday preparation and  the two weeks of lovely relaxation that follows.  It has, nevertheless, been a very busy summer indeed don't you think?  Looking back, we seem to have had one event after the other such as the Queen's Jubilee, the Olympic torch relay, the Olympics and the Paralympics.  And I think to myself "there is nothing like having non-stop Olympic games coverage, to ensure that you become a 'couch potato' yourself."  But I think that the majority of the nation of Great Britain feel very proud of what has been achieved and of the fantastic courage, ability and determination displayed by all, especially our paralympians.  It has been brilliant to watch.  I would like to say a personal "thank you" to them all for keeping me entertained this summer.

I didn't have to think very hard for the song related title of this post.  It was so lovely to see Ray Davies singing this in the closing ceremony.  When I heard his dulcet voice I was immediately transported back to the days when I was a child, it was lovely.  And you could hear the "sha la las" ringing out all around the stadium.  I know that many felt the closing ceremony was very strange, but I totally enjoyed it with a glass or two of wine.  I like to think of it as 'unique' like most art, fashion and design usually is in this country.

We did manage to get out for the day in Wales for a walk, which was lovely.  Thankfully, the end of the summer has produced some dry and sometimes hot weather (at last), so it hasn't been a total wash out.

I have managed to clear most of stash mountain (and the unorganised chaos) and have sorted and organized some of the stuff, which is great because it means I can now find things!  And DH is delighted as he doesn't have to break his neck every time he tries to get to the computer printer!  There is now a 1ft x 1ft piece of clear floor space to stand in.

Also, remember this .........

it has become this ...........

and I am very pleased with it indeed.  There has been a positive outcome to being a couch potato all summer.  I have finally finished the crochet granny throw yay!  I do love the way it turned out, but oh boy..... did I find the sewing in of all those ends so tedious.  All I can say is that I am very glad that I decided to make a throw and not a king size blanket. 

And it looks very at home on the couch (just like me ha, ha).

Have fun until next time!

Daisy x 

Those Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer

Ha Ha Ha........ if only!


Sorry about that, its just that this song popped into my head yesterday and it got me thinking about long hot summers in my childhood, when we would spend endless hours out at the park and the only thing that interrupted our games was tea time (or dinner to some people).  Sometimes you would get so hot playing in the sun it would make you crazily thirsty and then you had to join the queue of what seemed like hundreds of other children, to wait your turn at the water fountain.  Every summer we had games and activities organized at our local park - it was bliss!


We also went camping every year on holiday, usually to Cornwall and again, we spent the whole time outside!  I can remember only the odd downpour or thunderstorm, usually at night time - nothing much to dampen holiday spirits.  Maybe we just didn't notice it as kids?  


I hope that the weather will make a change for the better during the coming summer holidays, so that we can all enjoy a bit of sunshine and warmth!

I have been trying to keep going with the granny squares and the stacks are growing bit by bit, slowly!  At first I could not make my mind up on how many of each to do.  Would there be a uniform pattern?  Or would I place them randomly?  I decided in the end, that I should have a set sequence, so I have settled for two rows of twelve different colour combo's and when I join them all together I will move each two rows down by one line at a time.  These two rows above are the colours that I have set, so I am now making another five of each square.  (Hope this is all making sense, if you are still reading)!

In an attempt to try and keep organized in all of this, I have been putting the completed stacks into Zip-Seal food and freezer bags.  I am so glad that I did this as I can clearly see what is in each bag and also whether or not I have sewn all the ends in (a job I am trying to do regularly as I don't fancy doing it all at the end).  Also once done, I can put them away until I need to join them together.

I have also been doing this with my patchwork hexagons.  I have a bag containing cut up papers and a bag containing cut up squares of fabric.  

I just wish I could work faster as both projects seem to be taking sooooooooooooooooooo long!  I will make sure that I do a few smaller projects after these to keep my mojo going.  :o)

Hopefully the sun will shine on us all during the school holidays. X

With a Little Help From My (Blog) Friends

Well I have been blogging for 6 months now and I have enjoyed it so much!  All I can say is 'Why on earth didn't I start it before?'  I had been thinking about it for at least a year or more beforehand, but I was worried that I would not have enough to say!  I had used my computer many times in the past for reasearch and to look up websites etc but I had not looked at many blogs ..... until the end of last year..... and to put it mildly - I am completely 'bowled over' by the amount of fantastic talent out there in blog land.  I didn't know there were so many craft blogs! So many people that might otherwise be crafting at home and all their lovely work being hidden away unseen.

The funny thing is though, I have spent so much time admiring all these lovely blogs ..... I have not done so much crafting myself  :o) lol.  I get lost in a world of crafting every time I switch on the computer!!

So therefore, I have to say a very big THANK YOU to all the bloggy people out there, especially on the blogs that I follow, for brightening my days.  I feel like I am part of one big crafting group and although I don't know you all personally, it makes me very happy to read about your lives, to share projects and to learn new skills and techniques.  All this inspiration is giving me so much motivation to get cracking on with my own projects.  Thank you so much. X

Hopefully I will have some work of my own to show you next time, but until then, I thought I would leave you with a picture of some mushrooms because I think I may soon have some growing out of my ears if it doesn't stop raining here!  lol have fun until next time x

MATERIAL GIRL

Hello, its me again after such a long time - I have been trying to do this post since last week, and now I am a week behind myself!   It has mostly been about my mum being in hospital (who is now recovering at home) and DH's dad who is still in hospital, but slowly getting better (we hope!).  And we have also been quite busy with DD who has had so many things going on at school  such as D of E (involving overnight camping) and days out with school and other activities, which although she is very good at planning and doing things herself, it still requires a large input from us as parents and needless to say, lots of 'picking up' and 'dropping off'.  Phew!!!  (note to parents who have small children and who think they will have loads more time when their children are teenagers one day, I thought that I would have more time by now, but for some reason I seem to have less time?).


Anyway, I have managed to snatch a bit of time to sign in and say hello.  I took the above pictures about two weeks ago, when the sun made a rare appearance.  The bees seemed to be really enjoying the patch of chives in our garden.  I wanted to get a close up of a bee but it was nearly impossible - they never keep still for long enough.  So I decided to do a little montage of the shots I managed to get.  No wonder they are known as 'busy' as they truly do not stay still for more than a second or two.  I think that I have been like a bee this week.

(1,3, 5 & 7) home dyed cotton fabric  (2) recycled fabric from an old Laura Ashley dress 
(4 & 6) vintage fabric given to me by an elderly neighbour (8) lovely crisp cotton sheeting (which has previously been an Ancient Greek costume for DS's Greek day in Primary School 
(9) yellow cotton fabric which I can't remember why on earth I bought it.


As previously mentioned on this blog, I seem to have formed a small mountain of haberdashery in our spare room (aka as my work room lol).  It has reached critical proportions now, so much so that even DH has offered to help organise things for me (although his way to manage the problem would probably involve a skip). 


I had a look through my fabric cupboard the other day (the place where I keep my very best fabric, there are several other fabric storage areas around the house, shhh don't tell DH) and I was pretty impressed with the collection I have amassed in there.  There are fabrics for several Amy Butler projects that I have in mind and I keep thinking that one day I will also make a beautiful quilt.  There are also some Tilda fabrics which again, have been bought with several projects in mind from Tilda's books.  I have therefore given myself a thorough good talking to.  What is the use of all these beautiful fabrics in a cupboard where nobody gets to see them except me when I open the doors?  I need to get busy and produce some of the lovely projects that I have in mind.  And another thing, because of this recession and economic downturn it has certainly made me distinguish between what I want and what I need.  We have had to restrict our spending so much this year in our household and I have not been able to go out and spend money on things 'just because I like them'.  So I need to put all the lovely things I have to good use, and hopefully when things pick up again, I will be able to restock my stash.  Out of all my crafty pursuits I am definitely a 'Material Girl' at heart.


I have started with the fabric in the above picture.  For some time I have been thinking about making a patchwork table cloth for our kitchen table and I thought the above fabrics would be suitable.  The home dyed fabrics above have not been put to good use as they came out quite patchy (others were more successful and have since been used).  I thought that by using them in patchwork, it would be a good way to work around the less successful parts (I hate to waste anything).  The vintage fabrics were given to me some time ago by an elderly neighbour who no longer had any use for them.  She gave me  a whole great big bag of fabrics and I felt like I had won the lottery!  I have made a start on the tablecloth, but I have not taken any photo's yet. I will let you know how I get on.  I am intending on sewing it by hand using the paper piecing method, so I think it will take quite a while.  I have tried this method before, but I was in primary school at the time and I can't even remember what I actually made in the end - all I remember was cutting out the shapes and sewing around the papers.  My recent inspiration has come from this lovely blog and I will let you know how I get on.  Also in progress is my crochet granny square blanket which is slowly growing.


I also have a few ideas for updating the look of my blog, but I never seem to have enough time to do it (i'm still looking out for Dr Who's Tardis on ebay so that I can buy it and use it to 'meet myself coming backwards' lol.  Until next time X

Under Pressure - For Blog Titles

Not much work done this week due to the school holidays and jubilee celebrations

and the weather, well i'm not even going there or anywhere in fact!  Poor DS is at the Download Festival in Donnington Park this weekend.  I'm not looking forward to his muddy washing!

No, instead I thought I would take this opportunity to explain my blog titles, as I am sure that by now, if you have been kind enough to follow my blog, you will perhaps have noticed my continual use of song titles.  I will try to explain myself, as some of you may, by now, be finding this quite tedious and irritating, but I hope that you will bear with me and that you will understand my explanation.

I have given myself a challenge.  Yes indeed!  It is a therapy of sorts.  I have to keep this song title thing up for one whole year and then I will not be Under Pressure (you see, there we go, I had one title lined up for this post and I have just had to change it as this song title is now in my head!).

This has come about because of my life-long association with music and the sudden urge to associate a song with a situation.  Now I know at this point, you may be assuming that I am copying Miranda Hart who seems to suffer from the same affliction of suddenly bursting into song and dance at the mention of a word.  I absolutely love watching Miranda, because she is so funny, but I can absolutely promise you, with hand on heart, and 100% that I have had this song association problem for most of my life .  My mother has done exactly the same thing for as far back as I can remember (about 42 years).  Just the mention of a word can bring out favourites like Elvis, Bill Hayley, Abba and a particular favourite in the 80s Shaking Stevens,  'This Old House'.  So if somebody said 'house' off mum would go singing and dancing around the kitchen (she still does it now).

My own daughter (DD) has put up with me singing 'I Don't Like Monday's', 'I Don't Like Bread and Butter', and Dancing Queen etc first thing in the morning (and she's not always such a happy bunny in the morning).  She finds my so called 'bum wiggle' dance that accompanies so much of my singing, particularly distressing.  But guess what?  The other day I said something to DD in the kitchen and she burst into song (see it is in the genes!).  So the only way to overcome this habit of mine may be to have total saturation of song titles, until I can no longer think of any more by regularly having to produce them as blog titles for a whole year.  They may not always be songs that I like, but as long as they fit the theme that's fine and I will only use them in the title (trying not to upset the copyright police here).

If anybody else out there suffers from this same condition, I would love to hear from you.  Perhaps you would like to take up the challenge too (but it is for one whole year, its going to be tough).  It may be quite comforting when 'you are not alone' Oops, sorry couldn't resist that one.

Until next time X

Manic Monday or Week to be Precise

What a week I have had!  Honestly, I have been hopping about all over the place and this week has just disappeared yet again.  I would love to borrow Dr Who's tardis now and again to add some extra time dimensions to my life!  Well at least I have been busy in a nice way.


Last Friday my sister whisked me off to Chester to spend the night there in a hotel right in the City Centre.   It was a birthday treat  (yes I know, this birthday has been going on and on).  But we don't get to see each other often, we live miles apart and we both have families, so it was lovely to catch up with each other.  We had a lovely meal in an Italian restaurant and then we had a few drinks in a pub, and then ...... we went DANCING UNTIL 3am.  We found a place where the people were of our own age group and they played 70's and 80's music and we danced our socks off! It was the best night I have had for such a long time.  In fact, we have not been out dancing like that since before we both had children.  It was fab!  But I paid for it the next morning with my creaky joints.

Then at the beginning of last week, a good friend of mine asked if I would make a dress for her 10 year old daughter.  She was having a Jubilee party at school this week (today in fact) and she needed a 60's style dress, as they were all dressing up in clothes from different eras of the reign of Queen Elizabeth II.  Of course I couldn't resist the challenge and I really enjoyed doing this and working to a very particular brief,  but it just totally zapped my time - completely!  They didn't want flowery material or a colour block design.  Geometric would be OK.  It had to be a shift dress, with no sleeves and it had to be straight at the sides, no swinging out.  It had to be short (nearly a mini) and it had to have pockets at the front at the top, not the bottom.  Phew....

I can do pattern drafting, but I have only ever done that for adult sizes, never for children.  This was new territory for me.  Anything I had ever made for DD and DS in the past had always been from a shop bought pattern.  Anyway, I went out and chose some material (the material is Sugar Hill by Tanya Whelan) and lining with mum.  Then I drew up a pattern and got to work with the measurements I had taken.  I was so nervous about the first time she saw it and the fitting.  But when she saw it and her face lit up, it really did make my day!  I did have to take it in slightly on both sides - which involved unpicking and re-sewing the sides and hem but there was no further adjustments after that.  And it looked beautiful on her!  I also made a lovely thick headband to go with it.  And mum bought her some pink tights and large white round sunglasses.  I can't wait to see the photograph that mum promised to show me, of how she looked this morning!

And after all the complaining I had done about how awful the weather had been recently, I spent three whole days of this lovely glorious recently hot sunny week of weather inside sewing!  But that's life isn't it!

This weekend I intend to relax with my family and get on with my crochet granny squares (which have been very neglected).

Hopefully we will be able to enjoy the garden that DH has been working so very hard on .......

and join in with the Jubilee celebrations that will be going on.  


And if you are planning to have jubilations yourself this weekend I hope you have a lovely time.


Have fun until next time!


Daisy X

Sunshine of MY Smile

 
O.M.G. it's official, the sun has been shining, not just a little peep of sunshine ohh nooo, a whole two days of sunshine and it is beautiful.  And it has been warm, yes warm enough to open the doors and windows and listen to the birds making their sweet cheerful chirps and whistles.  I imagined that they were telling each other how lovely it was, and not before time!

I sat outside for a whole hour, while the sun spread its warm golden glow over my body.  I snored snoozed ZZZZZzzzzzz my head empty of the all the things that needed doing, housework, dinner, ironing, bills .......... and then the phone rang, which brought me back to reality, but I enjoyed that snooze in the sun so much.  Let's just call it my lunch hour.  ; )

I wanted to decorate the house a little bit in prep for this years main events such as the Queen's Jubilee, the Olympics and DD's birthday (she is thinking of having a birthday party at home with some school friends with an olympic theme).  I have bought some bits and pieces such as cups, cake cases, napkins but I also wanted something a little bit homemade.  I found a free pattern for some knitted bunting by Amelia Dellow on the internet and  thought it would be perfect.

The pattern can be found on this website Here I found the Union Jack part of the bunting quite fiddley as it needs to be done as intarsia (I didn't think it would be practical to use a fairisle method) and at one point I had about 10 little butterflys hanging from the back.  Once done however, I was quite pleased with the result.  What I did like about the pattern was the shape of the flags and that they started off with 41 stitches and reduced down to a point. The flags could also be knitted in pastel colours to decorate a child's bedroom.  The Yarn I used for this project was left over from the stash that I used for the Boogie Knits blanket and I don't think you can get it anymore, but rowan have a union jack cushion project on their website knitrowan.  Also, there is a Union Jack placemat with suggested yarn, in this month's (issue 45) of The Knitter . Apart from the Union Jack, the pattern is fairly easy, perhaps suitable for a beginner.  I had more problems trying to sort out where to hang it and trying to get a decent photograph of it!  Hopefully you will be able to see.

Hope you are enjoying sunshine wherever you are!  Have fun 'till next time.