This one's for you Jonathan!

I've just received a text from Jonathan saying "Wot no blog update?"

So, just for that, my dear, I'm going to show off your work today.

As I said previously the boys and I moved in with Jonathan and his kids last February.  The boys really got the short straw in the bedroom stakes and had a smallish room that they shared - they wanted to share as they had in our house before.

However they were keen for Jonathan to make them a themed bedroom.  Matthew's is a Viking theme and Katie has a Stable theme.  Well the boys were determined not to be left out and requested a Star Wars theme.....!

Well after hours and hours of work and daily comings of wood and more wood ... well to be honest I didn't really see Jonathan unless I took him up a cup of tea or he was hungry!

It was completed just before Christmas so when the boys came back from their dad's (where they'd had Christmas this year)_on 27 December we taped up the door ....

And waited for them to open the door to their new bedroom (at the other end of the house and in the room that used to be the dumping ground!) .....

May the Force be with you Luke and Adam ....

So .... how talented do you think my man is?! 

For me - he's the best!

xxxx

Wonky Christmas Trees

A few years ago I belonged to Parkhouse Quilters which met up regularly in Bude.  Sadly I was not able to continue attending due to childcare. 

However on one of their outings we all went over to see Jo Colwill at Cowslip Workshops (http://www.cowslipworkshops.co.uk/) where she taught us the above block - one triangular tree surrounded by wonky log-cabin. 

I loved the pattern so much I came home I thought I could make a hanging to go on the wall up the stairs.  Where we used to live it was a very high wall and I thought it make a great statement. 

I made a long wall-hanging using Christmas fabrics for all the log cabin strips.  The trees are a gorgeous graduated green that is covered in silver glitter.  The tree trunks are literally scraps of brown fabrics as it was such a tiny piece. 

To make it more of a statement I used all the scraps of the fabrics used in the log cabin and the trees and of course the calico background and made Prairie Points for the outside (have a look how to make them here - http://quilting.about.com/od/quiltpatternsprojects/ss/prairie_points.htm) and I think that they do finish it off nicely - along with the quirky star quilting.

So now the wall is bare. 

We could always put up Jonathan's Marvel poster which fits rather nicely .... or I could make another quilt..... 

... I have an idea for one using Japanese fabric....

Handmade ornaments

As I'm packing away the Christmas decorations I thought I'd share my little ornaments I made this year ....

They are made from air-drying clay, cut out with cookie cutters - I had to use hearts and stars as I just love them!  I then used rubber letter stamps to make words on them.  Finally I stuck a darning needle through them at the top to make the hole for threading.

When they were dry - which didn't take that long - I painted them with white acrylic paint all over.  The final coat was varnish with a tiny blob of blue acrylic paint that I didn't mix in properly as I wanted to achieve the streaky look.

 

I was really pleased with them and they did look lovely on my mini blue tree we had up in the dining room window.

Santa Claws

Why is it, that whenever you have a job to do - like - for instance - putting the Christmas decorations away - the cats feel the compulsive need to help?!

Theo decided that he'd quite like to play with the tinsel and then make a bed in it.  Did you know tinsel is so comfy to sleep on?

And Trixie - well she looks all innocent here but seconds before she was chewing the tree!

Sleep evades me ....

It is now 3.38 in the morning here and I have not been to sleep.  I have been to bed but lay there for about two hours just unable to fall asleep despite being soooo tired.

Jonathan is going to be up early (about 5ish) as he's travelling into London for work and will be staying up there for the week.  He's up there gently snoring! 

So, after turning this way, and that way, I decided the best thing would be to get up and have some herbal tea and see if I can get sleep to creep up on me.  Probably not the best thing to be on here really ...

Bells and Whistles and Granny Squares

Yay!  I am slowly managing to get to grips with adding buttons to link to my Esty shop and Pinterest etc.  Gosh!  Who would believe it would be so perplexing!  Luckily I have one super-geeky man in my lovely partner and he's been on hand when I've been tearing my hair out!  So thank you so much Jonathan.  It's partly my fault really as I am quite determined to figure this out by myself and I do have my own IT person right here and I really should use his talent today as he's off to work tomorrow and won't be back until Friday night.

I belong to Ravelry (http://www.ravelry.com). 

This is an absolutely fantastic site for knitters and crocheters.  There are literally pages and pages of patterns - some free and some not - but it is like having your own library on hand all the time.

There are forums on there too where I have met such lovely people who create like me.  It is a really great place to go and meet like-minded people.  A lot of the forums run swaps which vary from a monthly set theme and you gather together gifts relating to that theme and things that you think would suit your partner and then post it to wherever they are.  There are quite a few over in the USA.  Or there are swaps of the good old crochet Granny Square.  Usually swapping 6" squares to a set pattern or to your partner's colour tastes/requests. 

Honestly, if you haven't tried it, you really must!  However, be warned, there is a time lapse thingy that happens when you go on and somehow you can waste hours ....!

I'm on there as LucyMc96 if you do happen to visit.

So, last night I sat and made four 6" Granny Squares for two swaps.  Both my partners like purple so it was good to just get out three balls of yarn and crochet away.  These are made using the pattern http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/free-smoothfoxs-charity-square-nbr-2.  It really is a lovely pattern to make and makes up quite quickly too.  What do you think ....

 

 

And here they are all packaged up - I do like to make them look pretty.  Don't you think it's nice to receive a prettily wrapped parcel as it shows a little bit of thought has gone into it.

 

 

Hope they like them!

 

 



Please be patient with me ...

I spent yesterday with a huge headache trying to figure out how to make this page look good and have all the functions and tabs etc on it so that it's easy to negotiate.  Hmmm not sure it's as easy as I thought it would be!

So if anyone has any tips on how to get all the bells and whistles working please let me know!

And in the meantime .... please be patient with me!