Little by little

Baby steps. Progress towards a homey home.

I made a cushion  (fabric from The Cambridge Fabric Company ,  I paid £6.50 for an offcut large enough to make a 45cm square cushion and have some left over. It's looking slightly crumpled at the moment because one of the kids was giving it some serious cuddle testing immediately prior to this photo. 

Picture by the lovely Charlie Meyer. Adds a bit of much needed colour to my as yet undecorated, miserable-in-the-January-sun bedroom. 

Colour swatching for the bathroom  (I'm going for the third one, but as it's snowing I've put off the actual paint buying for another day).

Lovely little touches from crafty friends :)

And I  may possibly have started another blanket ... (this one is the wooleater blanket.  It is going to be so cosy!)

Happiness is ...

... found in the little things.

The touches that make a house into a home ...

A new light for my bedroom ...

A sign for the bathroom ...

A really good run (5k in a smidgen over 30 minutes, whoop whoop!)

A finished sweater ...

And fluffy pyjamas. 

I'm feeling accomplished today

My life has changed so much in the last couple of months. My whole routine, my way of living,  has been shaken up and dropped where it landed,  and much of the time these days I feel like I'm scrabbling around trying to make sense of the jumbled pieces in front of me.

About half of the time, I feel like I'm metaphorically holding those pieces in my hands whilst staring off into space and wondering how to move forward.  The other half,  they seem to be stacking up pretty neatly and I'm even managing to make some pretty shapes with them :)

Today was one of the good days, and I managed to get out for a run. This was my first run since the beginning of November, and I was astonished to find that I  can still do it.  I only went about 3k,  just to ease myself in, but it was easy and enjoyable. It's given me back a lot of confidence that I can get back into it relatively quickly.  Good job really as my friend Helen has encouraged me to sign up for the Cancer Research UK Race for Life in May, so I need to get the practice in!

Another piece I've picked up recently is my daily walk. The first picture in this post is St John's College, the second is an Anthony Gormley sculpture at Trinity College.  I'm so lucky to have all these beautiful surroundings; there's always something wonderful to look at even if the weather is grey and miserable. 

And the yarnie stuff? 

Coming along nicely, thank you. 

Yarn fort

Any knitter or crocheted knows that when the going gets tough, you build a yarn fort. Retreating into the calm oasis of yarn and working on creating something lovely really does soothe the soul. Whilst today has been a good day, I'm thinking ahead to the times when a yarn fort may be a required, and I have come up with a plan. More on that later.

In the meantime, here's what I'm working on:

A lovely commission piece, a vintage sweater from the sixties, in the fabulous Mrs Moon plump dk . The yarn is 80% merino and 20% baby alpaca, and it is so soft!! I find I do need to concentrate when knitting with it though, as it's very loosely spun, so I have to watch that I don't put the needle through the yarn.  I am knitting this in the angelica colourway, which is a very pleasing shade of apple green. I have been making it for aaaaages, and am now on the final sleeve, so not long to go until it's done!

Another commission, this time a crochet blanket, the Cottage Ripple blanket by Attic 24, which you can buy as a kit from wool warehouse. I'm about two thirds of the way through this and the colours are just fabulous.

And finally, my yarn fort project. I have two boxes full of random bits of stash yarn, and this year I want to knit and crochet this down to a more manageable level (I have lots of other boxes too, I'm only talking about the little bits!). So this year I intend to make a stashbuster blanket and use up all these little bits. There's a lot more colours under those top ones!  you have any patterns to suggest, I'm all ears ...

New beginnings

The end of last year has seen a huge change in my life.  Fortunately this is for the better, though I expect there will still be some tough times ahead.

Although I didn't make any new year's resolutions as the bells rang in 2018, I have set myself a number of goals for this year, and one of those goals was to resurrect this blog.  So here I go! I suspect it will take a similar form - a lot of knitting  (and crochet), and maybe a bit of running thrown in for good measure.  I hope you will join me on my journey.

Finished ... and started

The socks are finished ...

I am so pleased with them. I love the way the district and circle lines spiral up the foot. They are ever so warm too. 

Another pair has been started  ...

(No,  I still haven't finished the Down the Rabbit Hole socks.  Yes, I will finish them at some point).

This is Rico Superba Poems in Tropic colourway and it's quite hard to put down. Since I took this picture a couple of hours ago I have turned the heel and knitted up a fabulous shade of blue.  Yum.

The sweater is finished  ...

I am very happy with this - the colours work well together and it looks very smart.  It will go in the post to Caitlin after the weekend,  at which point I will metaphorically hold my breath until I know it has arrived safely.  Euan liked it so much he asked for a mini version.

And this project has been started ...

The boys' room.  They chose the colourscheme  (you haven't seen the best of it yet),  and are helping with the painting.  Eilish is also painting her room this weekend so there's a lot of paint being splashed about!

Changes afoot

As I expected, my enthusiasm for this sock yarn knows few boundaries. At lunchtimes once a week I teach crochet to some fellow work colleagues, and I couldn't resist shoving my yarn in their faces sharing my lovely yarn with those who appreciate it. They were very kind and didn't back away nervously. I actually managed to stop myself from showing it to my boss and every passing visitor, but it was a close-run thing.


At the weekend, house things were accomplished. Together with Eilish and Euan, I painted two walls of the living room. First coat, which is a bit patchy, but I'm pretty pleased with the colour. It looks a bit insipid on the photo, but it's very nice in real life and,coincidentally, matches the sofa almost perfectly. (We didn't plan that). The third wall with the window will be the same colour, and the fourth wall will be a brighter green. (there won't be an odd white stripe next to the door either).

Meanwhile, the socks continue to grow. I'm hoping to finish them before the yarn arrives to finish Caitlin's sweater (I think the socks might win), which should arrive in the next couple of days.



You may notice I have managed to make it to a real computer this time, as I've now added a better banner. Hooray!