Thursday 30 May 2013

Small Skein Society - No 5

Here is my lovely fifth installment of yarn from the Yarn Yard's Small Skein Society:


This one is one of my favorites. Its inspired by summer berries mixed with black pepper. Like Natalie at the Yarn Yard I've never tried this although I have heard it is supposed to be an interesting combination. I have tried strawberries and balsamic vinegar though, which is lovely, but I have to admit for me there is nothing to beat the taste of a strawberry freshly picked from the plant, in the sunshine, and eaten straight away.

Its nearly time for the PYO farms to be open again, and I am looking forward to going. The Husbeast and I will go three or four times during the summer to a local one and buy mountains of strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, black currants, redcurrant.... Some we eat straight away, some we freeze, some I make into jam, and some I make flavored alcohol with.

I'm hoping all the wet cold weather this year hasn't affected the crops too much and that we get some nice sunshine to go fruit picking in. Somehow picking strawberries in the rain just doesn't seem as much fun!

By the way, for those of you who like your yarn on the thin side, Natalie has just opened up the Luxurious lace lovers society, which will have a luxury skein of lace each month. I am so tempted, but I am never going to be a lace knitter, so I am really trying to be good!

Saturday 25 May 2013

Some swap parcels


 

I've been inundated with swap parcels recently and its been lovely, I feel really spoilt, I think my favourite colour is about to become obvious in a minute when I start posting pictures of them as well!

Firstly I had a kit to make an Acanthus shawlette:




The yarn is Posh Yarn isn't it gorgeous?

Then I've had a trio of vampire related parcels from some people who kindly stepped in when my partner flaked out:



There's too much to list but I've had yarn, yarn and more yarn, tea, sweet things, some lovely handmade things, lots of goodies.

Now all I need to do is work out what to make with all this red!

Monday 20 May 2013

Photoshoot

My sister and brother in law came over at the weekend, I mainly invited them so that my brother in law could show me how to use my camera, but he also fixed my computer so he can come again! My sister provided the light relief by posing for me:



Isn't she beautiful!

My brother in law is the very talented photographer at Dark Soul Photography. Please don't judge him for the quality of my photos, before he came over I couldn't even take a photo in focus with this camera so he's pretty much worked miracles.






Friday 17 May 2013

Crafy Creatives - May Box

The theme this month is Glamour which I love. Although the kit isn't entirely my colours, I tend towards silvers rather than browns and bronzes, this is a fabulous box and I'm itching to get started on some of the contents already.

First there is the art card:
 

I love this one!

Then there is the kit to make a beaded hair piece:




There's some gorgeously tactile black velvet and beaded trim which would probably work well together to make an opulent evening bag:



Beads beads and more beads:



(There's some swarovski crystals in a pretty black pouch, some starbust beads, some metallic starburst, a rose pendant and a couple of silver tear drop rhinestones)

And some practical stuff, picture glue, some earring findings and a pretty lace stamp and ink set:




Here is is all together:




I already know that those teardrop beads are going to become earrings, and I think those and the hairpiece might be my task for this evening.

Monday 6 May 2013

FO - Monochrome squares blanket

I had a friend come over on Saturday and we sat and crocheted. Well she crocheted, I sewed in some of the millions of ends on my blanket. I got loads done, its amazing how much easier it is to do something like that when you have some company.

With a little encouragement I decided that the blanket was going to be finished this weekend. Once I'd finished the seaming and the sewing doing the actual border took no time at all. It all got finished yesterday in time for the Husbeast coming home from the allotment.

Here it is:


The cage in the corner of the photo is where Speedbump my grumpy tortoise lives, when she's not hiding under furniture in the living room or trying to singlehandedly eat my lawn.

I'm also half way through a coloured version of this blanket but I've run out of wool. I'm quite impressed with the Stylecraft Special DK, it cost about £30 to do a blanket and a half, so each blanket works out to about £20. Its soft, washable and easy to work with.Best of all, when I am using it in these quantities, its cheap!

I'm taking a break from these now and going back to my 15 stitch blanket. I had a bit of help over the weekend deciding which yarn to finish it off with and if I don't do it now I'm worried its going to languish in my WIP pile forever. I wonder if I can get three blankets finished this month.... (I doubt it but it'll be fun to try)

Sunday 5 May 2013

April Round Up

I think I'm going to give up trying to blog about recipes and just be glad the Husbeast likes to cook!

Projects started:

Intrepid spirit

Diva Tunic

Projects finished:

Bird Mobile













Steampunk box










Projects in  the WIP pile:

Crochet Squares Blanket







Colourful Crochet Squares Blanket











High Speed knitting number two - no post on this yet but it is the same pattern as the one here


15 stitch blanket: this is still in the WIP pile I will finish it eventually honest....








Yarn in this year:

8450g

This converts into 27309 meters or 16.9 miles

Yarn knitted or crocheted this year:

2875g

9124 meters or 5.67 miles


Books reviewed:

Week 14: The Grand Sophy

Week 15: Frederica

Week 16: Persuader


Week 17: One shot

This feels like quite an unproductive month, but its been busy in other ways which has distracted my crafts. Its not as bad as it seems, I've 95% finished my grey blanket and 50% finished my coloured blanket. So there should be a couple of bigger FO's next month to show.

I have knit more than the total shown, but I only add it on once a project is finished, so it is looking a little glum. I have also bought a fair bit this month, and as I've run out of stylecraft coloured yarn that figure is going to keep going up. I think I need to work out a plan of what to do with some of the stuff I've bought and not yet used this year. Maybe some socks are on my horizon.

Its been a bit quiet around here in April, there's been a lot going on and I've been pretty tired. Too tired even to crochet for quite a few nights this month. I'm feeling better today though so hopefully things are on the way up again.

Thursday 2 May 2013

52 books - some catch ups

Here's a catch up on the reading I have been doing. Life has been busy recently so I wouldn't necessarily class these as classics, but both authors have a wide appeal and are well worth reading.

Week 15 

Book Title: Frederica

Author: Georgette Heyer

Enjoyment: 10/10

Would read again: 10/10


Comments: My other favourite Georgette Heyer book, this one has a more serious heroine I think than The Grand Sophy but still a good read. The end might be a bit predictable (once you've read one Georgette Heyer book you can work out the rest of them) but as usual the book takes a few turns and twists along the way and is full of humour and fun. It is refreshing to read a book with no bad language, sex or much violence in them.

Which makes a complete contrast with my next books. These are not necessarily my favorite Jack Reacher books, lets face it I love them all, but they were the nearest ones on my bookshelves when I needed a Reacher fix over the last couple of weeks.

(My reading is currently being hampered by about 60% of my books being unaccessible, I will be so glad once we've finished doing stuff to this house).

Week 16
 
Book Title: Persuader

Author: Lee Child

Enjoyment: 10/10

Would read again: 10/10

Comments: I like this one because at the start it sets it up to seem like Reacher is the bad guy which makes for an interesting twist. The book itself contains some more information about Reachers past and is enjoyable. It seemed a little slower paced than some of the Reacher books, possibly because he is stuck inside the one house for a large proportion of the book, but that didn't detract from the story.

Week 17

Book Title: One Shot

Author: Lee Child

Enjoyment: 10/10

Would read again: 10/10

Comments: Another one which harks back to Reachers past. Also has some interesting insights into the Soviet and a bad guy I could almost sympathise with if only because of his past.

So there's my last few weeks reading. Not classics exactly, fairly easy reading but just what I needed at the moment. Hopefully I'll get back on track with some more serious reading over the next few weeks. Hopefully... I keep waiting for life to calm down and for some reason it never does.