My Month in Makes...June

I must confess that it's been a somewhat disjointed month of making - I've finished a pair of socks, and for my stall some rosebud brooches and button earrings, but otherwise I have either started new projects - Frankensocks and large granny squares - or plodded along with projects that were already in the making - my 2015 blanket and my grey and pink socks. 

I have been working on some more squares for the "Square Enough" course that I'm running with my knitty friend, it's less than a week away now and I'm a healthy mixture of excited and very nervous! 

2015 so far...

Here we are, halfway through a crispy January, and only now am I finding myself back into my daily routines. It was a delightful festive season, and I fully immersed myself into the holiday spirit, with plenty of crochet, reading and good food. I finished my granny-a-day blanket at a nicely cosy ninety squares, which is plenty big enough for my sofa, and began a new daily square blanket on 1st January. I took the plunge with rather large ambitions to make a Sunburst square for every day of 2015, the plan being a blanket that will be 16 squares by 23 squares, hopefully finishing up with a somewhat impressive 368 squares. I am holding out high hopes for this one, I really do want so much to complete a year long project. 

As is always the way, I was completely unable to get through a holiday without starting a new project, and I am very pleased to say that I finished it yesterday - a sunburst square cushion. It was a low-concentration stash-buster project, and I am rather pleased with it. 

Some of the other adventures from my holidays were passing my driving test on New Years Eve (a rather lovely way to end 2014), turning 30 on 8th January and the mountains of tea and cake that followed it, and being enlisted as Bridesmaid for one of my most wonderful friends - I am so terribly excited, I have never had the honour of being asked before, and I hope to do her proud.

I also had a splendid trip to London with my dear husband! We visited the British Museum for the Germany and Ming exhibitions, as well as the National Portrait Gallery for the Grayson Perry exhibition, which was fabulously inspiring. 

So I suppose that after all of those adventures, my plan to hibernate for the rest of January seems completely reasonable. 

Happy New Year lovely friends, I hope 2015 is a wonderful year for you!

My Week...

A little bit late with my highlights from last week, as my work-adventures get in the way of my regular-adventures in the last weeks of festive shenanigans. Luckily I have found time for some crafty-makings - finished a pair of Frankensocks, and some cheery festive baubles for family, as well as working away on my mood-blanket squares. My big adventure this week was a little trip to Manchester to see the Manic Street Preachers playing "The Holy Bible" and it was one of the highlights of the year, not just the week. I owed it to my fifteen year old self  to be there and it didn't disappoint.

So now the decorations are up, my shopping is finished, and the craft fairs are done so I'm planning a quiet run up to the Big Day. 

My Week

The days are passing so quickly and it's suddenly December. I am finally allowing myself to feel festive, and this week has been about buying gifts, spending time with family and being cosy. There has been plenty of crafting - my latest pair of Frankensocks is cast off and all of the pesky ends woven in, and my mood blanket reached the sixty-square milestone.

There are lots of lovely things happening over the next few weeks as we get ready for Christmas, and although I am ever so busy in my little shop I will be making efforts to enjoy festive jumpers and lots of chocolate and good cheer. 

My Week

What a delightful week it has been! It started rather well with the Wonderful Wool day, but I have spent the rest of the week battling the dreaded lurgy. Despite that, I have tried my best to have a jolly time, having an appropriate amount of sofa/cat/tea/cake time, as well as a bit of crochet time, working on my Mood Blanket and a shiny-new "make myself feel better" project - a granny square cushion cover in warm autumnal colours. 

I had adventure-tickets this week too - another evening with Mr Mark Thomas, this time in the thoroughly grand Chester Town Hall, and a trip to Manchester for dinner at The Cornerhouse and a visit with my current most favourite band Allo Darlin'. That was at the Deaf Institute, which is worth a look if only for the glorious wallpaper that adorns the place. Allo Darlin' are absolute happiness and anyone that has crept up to me quietly since Thursday will have found me humming songs from their new album "We Come From the Same Place" which has some delightfully catchy little numbers. They were supported by the equally sweet Making Marks, they have sweet little tunes in English and Norwegian, and they are splendid. 

So despite the lurgy, all things considered, it has been a really rather lovely week. 

Makings...

This week has been less about adventures and more about hibernation. I have been quietly crafting at home, watching the world go by through my window, mostly the chickens mooching around the garden, and enjoying the leaves changing colour.

My crafty projects are all growing, I have finished my first thirty squares for my mood blanket, each representing the day it was made. 

Making a square every evening gives me an opportunity to think about the day, the things that have been interesting or colour combinations that have caught my eye. Each square is different and yet they all sit so nicely together, complimenting each other. I'm joining as I go along, so I can see a blanket emerging, and I look forward to adding a new square and seeing it grow. 

 My other blankety project is knitted and is going to be cosy. I think that I may have an addiction to making blankets, but I like to have a cosy home.

 My toes will be cosy too in no time, my Frankensocks will soon be done. I think they are rather splendidly jazzy, so many colours and stripes.

My Week...

This week has mostly been about hibernation and hiding from gales and stormy weather. We ventured out to Wolverhampton on Sunday for an evening of entertainment in the shape of Mr Robert Newman, who is always a delight. Other than that little trip to the outside world the week has been spent mostly at home and there has been an abundance of tea and craftiness - I made a string of bunting with vintage embroidered doilies, as well as my daily granny squares (the first 18 are done and joined!) and the start of a brand new pair of Frankensocks. I also gave a little bit of love to my latest fabulous thrifty-find - a pretty polka-dot Cath Kidston bag, which needed a jolly good wash and a wee bit of stitching before it had it's first outing! 

I am pleased (and admittedly a little bit shocked) to see that my dear little Windowsill Garden has produced more pretty flowers, some delicate and utterly delightful pink Delphiniums. Although I am sure to be tempting fate to say it, it would appear that I may have finally  broken my run of terrible plant-growing luck. I am also successfully growing succulents, after a bit of very helpful advice from my favourite gardening enthusiast. 

After a splendidly busy day in my little stall, the week was rounded off nicely this afternoon with tea and a generous slice of Cherry Bakewell at one of my favourite establishments, Fine&Dandy, with my lovely husband and dear friends. 

My Makings...

I am making splendid progress with my mood blanket and I have chosen to look upon my "late to the party-ness" as being fashionably late as opposed to a negative and rubbishy late and I am embracing the routine of making a square-a-day. October is most definitely a month for making blankets, not that the time of year ever limits my dedication to blanket-making. I am utterly and unashamedly addicted.

 October is also a month made for my other addiction - cosy hand-knit socks, and my delightful Frankensocks are certainly rather cosy. I kept to my super-strict palette of pinks and greens and cream, and I think they are more than just a little bit spiffing, if I do say so myself.  

The chilly winter weather is perfect for cups of tea, crafting and devouring books. I love the warm and cosy hibernation months.

My Week...

As the autumnal air seems to be here to stay I am choosing to embrace it wholeheartedly and make the very best of it. This week has been chilly but mostly sunshiny, and full of opportunities for tea and craftiness. 

I had a nice little surprise on Sunday, in the chiller cabinet of a supermarket where I found my very own little face looking back at me from the side of an Innocent Smoothie carton. I have been organising knit-alongs and Big Knit hat collections for the last couple of years, and in May a very nice lady came to visit to take my picture, and now I am gracing the packaging - these ones were Blackcurrent, Strawberry and Blackberry, but I am told that I also smile out from other flavours too. It's exciting and a little bit strange it has to be said. 

Monday was a "work in a cafe" day, a pleasant little day of sewing and drinking lots of tea and enjoying a rather lovely lunch. Being self employed has several pretty splendid perks, and this is most definitely one of them. 

I discovered on Tuesday that not only is my Gypsophelia growing nicely, but my Delphiniums are flowering! They are a beautiful and rather regal purple, and I am, as always, amazed to find that I made something grow. Their lovely colours inspired a new project, I am a wee bit late to the party for this one, but I am embarking on a crochet "mood blanket", as seen in the deligtful photographs of many and varied instagramers. I am four squares/days into the project and rather enjoying it. As well as my delphiniums, my squares have been inspired by a grey and rainy day, the colours that I loved most this summer and the new autumn colours outside. I am stitching them together as I go along and hope that I will eventually have a cosy and autobiographical blanket. My other crafty time has been taken up making pompoms for little hats, and my assistant was of my all-time favourite little chaps - my parent's little dog Jock, who kept me company and tried to help by attempting to dispose of the scraps of yarn.