Knits and stitches 2011

I still make things, just not half as much as I used to. Looking back on 2011, though, there was a bit more making than I realised, in between the house-hunting and house-selling, as well as all the stresses and strains of a relocation with 3 small children in tow.

In costume, there was 1 don't-look-too-closely felt Paddington hat, 1 Mildred Hubble school tie and sash, 1 Victorian smock, 1 WW2 evacuee's cap and gas mask, and a Bethlehem villager's get up. You'll have to trust me on this one, though the costumes were pretty shoddily thrown together at top speed, I may be biased but I think the cuteness of my children more than compensated for it!

For my little family, there was an attempt to be less of a slummy mummy by making an apple print pram liner, and a couple of outfits for my daughter's Corolle Les Cheries doll.

There were even two handmade baby quilts as gifts for my friend's new baby and my new nephew. I loved making the orange and pink zig-zag quilt, acquiring a new love of orange fabrics in the process.

The nephew quilt was finished and belatedly gifted to its recipient just before Christmas when at long last I managed to unpack my sewing machine and clear a space amidst the boxes in the study to sew! I used some of the same fabrics as I used in my own boy's quilt, adding some new ones into the mix, and backing it with some lovely soft brushed cotton fabric from Cath Kidston.

And my first project of 2012 is already underway as I'm getting another new nephew in the Spring when my sister's first baby is due. Today the fabrics were ordered and I can't wait to get started.

And in the hall of unfinished shame, we have one baby quilt top and the scrap vomit quilt I started back in May. I'm so nearly there with the scrap vomit now, well, with piecing the top anyway, just waiting for a spool of cotton thread sent to my old address and I'm away! But in the meantime, here's evidence that the B blocks are in progress, though I've departed from the pattern here and gone for what will hopefully be a pattern of diamonds interlinking across the quilt in dark grey solid cotton ... which may or may not turn out to be a terrible mistake.

There was also a sole knitted project, but as it was start to finish in moss stitch I'm counting it as three (let's overlook its miniature size!).

Pattern: Lucky by Kim Hargreaves
full details on Ravelry

I got over the pain of the moss stitch by knitting continental style, which I heartily recommend, as otherwise I think my hands would have ended up as gnarled claws in the process (knitting British-style does not favour moss stitch as it's about as inefficient a movement as you could get switching from knit to purl). I finished this one whilst watching Prof Brian Cox's A Night with the Stars before Christmas. Ok, so the maths bit was a bit of a stretch for me (and I have a gloaty mathematician of a husband to make this abundantly clear) but as far as I'm concerned, lining a handknit jacket with quilting cotton is as near as damnit to quantum physics. Stretchy knitting versus tightly woven cotton, the whole inside out/right side in thing. I'm so pleased with the end result, and my little nephew looks gorgeous in it!

And as for 2012? My stitching resolve is firm, and I intend to have a much more productive year.

Winter jaunts

I genuinely can't believe that I had comments on my last post - I really thought I'd be posting into an echoey void! It's a lovely reminder of why the internet is such a great place; I have so many friends through blogging that I might never otherwise have met.

So it's the week before Christmas, and we've just had a 6th birthday for a small boy. A small boy who, with a week's notice, decided it was imperative he had a party rather than a family outing to Big Pit as he'd planned. I must admit, I was a little relieved about big pit. I'm fine with heights, but give me an enclosed space, or maybe a coal face 90 metres down a mine shaft, and I'm not at my happiest. And anyway, I've been before, on a lovely school trip and feel one 'real underground experience' in a lifetime is probably enough. Ask Joanne, I couldn't even go in the giant badger sett in Kew Gardens, I'm really a total wimp.

I prefer to do my sightseeing strictly above ground, and goodness knows there are some lovely places right on our doorstep in Monmouthshire. You can't walk a few feet without tripping over an ancient monument or recognising a backdrop from Merlin, hence Monmouthshire's boast of having more castles per square mile than anywhere else in Britain.

Tintern Abbey

Raglan Castle

And the children are partial to a bit of history and a rampage around a ruin too, hence their hilarious comments in the visitors' book at Raglan Castle on our latest visit:

The girl, 8, writes: 'Beautiful views and outstanding history'
The boy, 5, writes: '2000 times better than an ordinary human house'.

Now that's what I call value for money.

Bloggled

My new sewing space; welcoming, huh?
I see this as symbolic of my mental state after the fun of moving house.

Goodness this blog has been neglected lately! And it feels a bit now or never coming back to it. To be honest, the more time has passed, the more I've felt like letting it die a quiet death. I'd been feeling a bit boggled and blah about the whole thing, and then a few days ago happened upon a lovely email in my inbox which really touched me and made me miss all the things I love about blogging.

It's been a long-haul few months. Around a week after my last post we sold our house to a buyer who wanted us out just over three weeks later, which didn't leave much time for blogging, taking stock, or even packing. I did briefly consider just taping myself up into a box marked 'fragile' and hiding when faced with the task of packing up an entire house with just a 13-month old to help. But somehow it happened, our stuff went into storage and after a short spell camping at my parents' house (whose patience must be limitless to have put up with us and our three children as well as a good deal of our clobber for several weeks), we moved in to our new home. Some headaches along the way, not least finding our children had been allocated two different schools, around 1 mile to the first, then 2.5 miles on to drop off the next in 10 minutes time with some crippling hills in between ... I mean, I like walking, but I can't fly. Thankfully we've finally sorted that one, and after a busy couple of months unpacking and decorating, along with parenting (which has slowed down the first two), I'm finally turning around, taking stock and thinking about blogging again.

We're loving our new life in Monmouthshire, although missing the friends we've left behind. The countryside around here is beautiful, our new home town has its very own castle, and we have a fabulous view of the Severn bridge as we walk to school. Oh yes, we've gone over to the other side (that's to say the Welsh side, and back to the homeland for me). The house is great, with so much more scope for swinging cats. And guess what, there's even a sewing room for me. My husband is intent on calling it a 'study' for some reason, but he'll soon learn that I don't really intend this to be shared space.

This week marks me finally unpacking the sewing machine, and some actual stitches sewn. I feel 100 times better about most things when I'm making stuff, and I've felt positively joyous this week stitching in the ditch and handsewing the binding onto a baby quilt for my new nephew. Now to try and keep up the momentum.

See you on the ice.

Multi-coloured block shop

My workspace (because it sounds grander than 'the desk in my bedroom') is being overtaken by glorious colour. I now have 8 scrap vomit blocks completed and another 4 blocks' worth of string-pieced strips for the remaining 'A' blocks. Then there's the little baby boy quilt which started making itself last week on a whim.



As much as I'm trying to pare everything down and keep the house as tidy as possible for viewings, I'm not hiding these completed blocks out of sight because they make me happy when I see them. Partly because it's satisfying to see the 'completed' pile grow, but also because we're living in a completely abnormal way at the moment, with all our clutter hidden from view, so it's nice to have a bit of chaos creeping in!





I have, however, stopped short of leaving them laid out on the dining table for the delight of potential viewers -- yes, I'll buy the house immediately, but only if you throw in that beautiful patchwork! --
... no, probably not going to happen.

Oh, and thanks to all you enablers who commented on my last post, and a twitter exchange with Kate from M is for Make, I've taken my Japanese 'Dress and Camisole' book down from the shelf and traced out a pattern for a pretty - but, crucially, simple - top.

Delusions of being a dressmaker

Will someone please remind me that I am a rubbish dressmaker? I lay before you the evidence (well, the remaining evidence that I haven't disposed of under cover of darkness):

Exhibit 1
The gauzey, wear-with-everything, it's-going-to-be-the-best-top-I've-ever-owned top.



Verdict: Never worn. Looks great on the hanger, but the fabric was itchy, the neck was too wide, and the cap sleeves were voluminous. Attempted remedial work, but banished to the scrap bin as a lost cause.


Exhibit 2
The shoplifting dress.



Verdict: Really, need I say more??? Wrong fabric, wrong size, unsalvageable.



Exhibit 3
A stash of fabrics and patterns bought specifically for dressmaking, languishing unused in an underbed storage box.

Verdict: Quit while you're ahead and still solvent.


So why is it that I am yearning to make a Beignet Skirt (Colette patterns)? I've been haunting the flickr pool for Colette patterns and have found some lovely examples there. I've even chosen my fabric - this organic crossweave cotton from Raystitch (there isn't a colour I don't like).

I just need to remind myself that the finished skirt, knowing me, will be unwearable. So if you see me hovering over that 'add to cart' button, please save me from myself.

The small stuff

We've had a busy week of house-hunting this half term, with a trip across the border to the Wye valley to begin our search for a new home. Daunting is not the word - co-ordinating house sale and purchase, new schools for children and the husband's new job is going to be no joke. Then there's the packing. I'm trying not to think about all that for the moment, but gradually plugging away at all those little sorting jobs that will make the whole thing less painful.

I'm counting as one of those little jobs going through my fabric scraps at long last. There doesn't seem to be much sense in transporting huge carrier bags of tiny offcuts and fabric strips when we have a whole 5-people's-worth of stuff to think about. Of course, cutting and sewing means making a mess, but it's a pleasant diversion tactic. In a flurry of activity after returning home from Wales, I finally cut my 965th 2.5 inch square ready to start on scrap vomit. I'm thinking of changing the pattern slightly, and using a dark charcoal grey or even a navy for my B blocks, with the outer ring in grey, the next ring in scraps, then the inner ring in grey again, taking inspiration from this lovely quilt I found over on flickr.

The process of cutting up those little squares has put a considerable dent in my scraps collection, and now I've got the momentum going, I've been grabbing handfuls of fabric strips to finally get going on some projects I've been thinking about for ages. It's so satisfying string-piecing little blocks and odd shaped patchworky pieces. Once I've zipped through a few more, I'll post some pictures of what I'm making; I have lots of different scrappy plans!

Good things come in 2 ounce packages

This last couple of weeks I've been driven by a new obsession - to reduce the two carrier bags full of fabric scraps I've been hoarding into 2.5" squares. Oh yes, bring on the scrap vomit. I loved the idea of this quilt ever since I saw Katy's post and mock up over at I'm a Ginger Monkey, and the finished quilt is beautiful. Then there's the name, of course, which seems to have inspired admiration and revulsion in equal measure, for me it's a complete winner; how could anyone not want to make a quilt called 'scrap vomit'?

There is something immensely satisfying about trimming down all those offcuts of fabric and being left with a towering, multi-coloured, pile of fabric squares. That's the beauty of scrap vomit, all those mismatched squares come together in a glorious riot of colour. If there's pleasure to be found in lining up those edges on the grid of my cutting mat and ruler edge and neatly cutting them to size, I'm even more delighted by the 100-square stacks I've been making. And, I discovered a stash of little ziplock bags, the perfect size to accommodate them, each package weighing in at around 2 ounces; the husband has been wildly amused by my bagging them and weighing them at the dining table!

At 623 squares (and a full 342 - or 7 ounces - short of the 965 I'll be needing to complete even the lap-sized quilt, there's a danger I'll be compelled to reduce all my yardage to 2.5 inch squares, which is really defeating the scrap-busting point of this quilt.

Any one else scrap vomiting? There's a scrap vomit appreciation society group over on flickr, and the finished quilts are all looking gorgeous. I can't wait to get sewing now, once I've carved up the remaining squares.