Yarn Along

What am I knitting and reading at the moment? Well I am still crocheting in pink.  I gave up on the zigzags due to my inability to follow a pattern at the moment so it's back to granny squares.  I can pick them up and down whilst seeing to the children in the evenings without having to think!

 

As for reading, I am listening to 'The Casual Vacancy' by J.K.Rowling.  I put this off for a while as I was worried I may be disappointed after loving Harry Potter so much.  This was stupid! It's an excellent book and I'm really enjoying it.  The characters are great and I'm really interested to see where it goes plot-wise.  It's the second book I've listened to as a result of reading other reviews from the Artful Readers Club.  I listened to 'Around The World In 80 Days' last month. 

 Hopefully, I will have my May book review for the ARC posted up by the end of the week after a total art fail at the weekend. 





Owl Hat ~ Sophie

 

A present for a friend's baby, due any day.  The pattern is from Repeat Crafter Me.

It was really quick to make and I'm pleased with it.  I may do more......



Pink Peace Crochet ~ Sophie

First piece for Wool Against Weapons finished....

....second piece underway....

I have plans for a 3rd one which will be knitted.  My pink wool supply is increasing thanks to some donations from my mum :)

 

http://www.woolagainstweapons.co.uk/

Lavender Sachets ~ Sophie

Today I've been hiding from the rain. It's been constant and there are floods everywhere so I thought I'd stay home and start to make a few things for the fund raising event that my mum is organising for the Harriet Davis Trust.  We holiday in their house in Pembrokeshire with our boys and it's great :)

 

So in between allowing a lot of time for the school runs today, I've made lavender sachets and a scrappy bookmark.

 

 

 



A Little Different ~ Sophie

 

I'm knitting and reading things that are not my usual choices this week.

 

The knitting is a mesh triangular scarf which I'm doing with a yarn which my mum bought back from one of her crafty outings.  The colours in it range from browns, yellows and greens into turquoise and lavender.  I like it but I would have never picked it up myself as it's not a combination I would usually be drawn to.  This is excellent as my collection of greeny/purple scarfs is probably in danger of getting out of hand!  When I am knitting it up against my turquoise cardigan it looks great. 

 

I am also reading books which are a little away from my usual choices.  I tried a Terry Pratchett book years ago and couldn't get into it.  Someone recently suggested I try, 'The Wee Free Men' so after having it sitting around for ages, I'm giving it a go.  I'm still not sure to be honest!

 

The audio book I have on the go is called 'The Garden of Evening Mists' by Tan Twan Eng.  I am very excited to say that I chose this from my library's free audio book service which has been going for a while but I have been unable to access.  They have updated their system and it's now easy to use.  I am really enjoying this so far, it is incredibly atmospheric.

 

I also just finished listening to 'The Woman Who Went to Bed For a Year' by Sue Townsend.  'Nuff said!!

 

Gaby and I started listening to this at the weekend......

 

 

 

.....I love Jacqueline Wilson's books.  We found this and more whist having a mooch around the charity shops the other day.

 

 

I was really pleased with myself until I got home and realised that I got rid of the cassette player in the kitchen!  We do have one in the house, just not where I'm usually listening to books, but they were a bargain!

 

I'm linking this post to Ginny's Yarn Along

 

School projects ~ Gaby

Long time no see! I have had hardly any time to write a post in ages because of a school project I have been doing recently. My topic, dyeing materials. I wrote and tried different techniques with the help of my granny and created a project with instructions and details of what I did. I also included different products I made with the textiles that I dyed. After this we had a celebration evening where we presented our projects to our parents. A couple of weeks after this we had a celebration day at Kilve Court. It was really fun and I can't wait till next year!

Here's some pictures of my project.....

Decorative Name Board ~ Gaby

 As part of my New Years Resolution, I said to myself that I would decorate my room again for more of an 'older girl' look. My first idea was to use the letters in my name (G, A, B and Y) and make a decorative pattern on them. Lucky for me at a craft centre I found some 3D letters which Mum later bought for me.

To make the board I used,

• Wooden board
• Paint
• Gel medium (Cool craft glue)
• Card letters
• Tissue paper

  First I painted the board a nude, salmon colour and let it dry. Then I stuck the tissue paper to the letters with the gel medium. After everything is dried stick the letters onto the card et voila!

iPad Stand ~ Sophie

Finally we have a working laptop again!  Hopefully our posting will be a bit more regular again now.

Over this weekend, I decided to make an iPad stand.

I saw some like this on Pinterest a while ago, and with a little Internet searching, I found a pattern for one at

 http://www.bettycrockerass.com/2011/10/updated-ipad-rest-tutorial.html

Now when I say I found a pattern, that doesn't mean I followed it very well.  I am a bit of a nightmare when it comes to making these kind of things using my sewing machine.  I tend to do it all by eye, no pins, little measuring and just go for it!  This doesn't always work out for me, but this time it did :)

I'm really pleased with the results and I'm finding it very useful. I spend a lot of time bent over the iPad either when following recipes online or watching TV shows on iPlayer whilst getting on with other stuff in the kitchen.  It was only a matter of time before an accident occurred with me propping it up on tea towels etc. and this has made things a lot easier.

Reusable Gift Wrapping - Sophie

Having children has really opened my eyes to unnecessary packaging. As the years have gone by I've become more and more unhappy by the amount of rubbish we generate around birthdays and especially at Christmas, when it's not unusual for us to have 2 extra bags of rubbish just from wrapping paper and packaging. Over the past few years I've been trying really hard to find ways to decrease this.  Obviously you can limit unnecessary packaging by choosing your gifts carefully but wrapping needs a bit more thought. My favourite and easiest way of doing this is just to hold onto gift bags and recycle them.  They seem to get passed all around the family and come back again - I'm sure lots of people do this!  I have also started wrapping family gifts with fabric and ribbons. At Christmas we halved our usual rubbish by doing this. This week it was Gaby's birthday and it will be the second year I've used this cupcake fabric and although it did cost more to begin with, it was a nice feeling to get it out again and have nothing to throw away. I'm getting better at the wrapping now I think.....!

 It's a bit harder when it comes to gifts for friends. I think most people would find it a bit strange to be asked for their gift wrap back! I found a way to make the wrapping part of the present with this knitted face cloth pattern last year, so a couple of people ended up with these filled with soaps or bath bombs...

Here's the cloth 'unwrapped'...

....I really like this pattern.  It's enjoyable and easy to follow.  I've knitted 6 of these now and given them all away, I think it's about time I kept one, maybe it's a stash buster project for the future!

My Birthday ~ Gaby

  Recently it was my birthday! We had loads of fun at Pizza express for my birthday party. Pizza, Chocolate sundaes and Twilight birthday cake, YUM!!!

  On my actual birthday my granny came round for tea and we had another twilight cake! (Next year I think we might change the themes...)

 I got loads of awesome prezzies, including LUSH  bath goodies, a bowl hand painted by mum, books, make up, vouchers and a notebook. Wow I was spoilt this year! Not that I never am or anything....

  Overall I had a good birthday and whenever your birthday is Happy Birthday!!!!