Colour therapy

I was the lucky recipient of some vouchers for our local quilting shop, Country Threads (no proper website sadly) last year as a leaving gift from my work (thank you everyone!) and I only just got around to spending them yesterday - spectacularly tardy of me, I know. I wanted to be sure that I made just the right selection of things for something special. I never make anything too posh for the house because I don't want to see it destined for the sole appreciation of arses, spilt beverages, melted chocolate and mucky paws! So...this time I'm going to make a wallhanging so none of the above can reach it (unless...oh no, don't go there!)

They're batik fabrics, mostly by Hoffman, I think. I'm such a hippy at heart. When I was 14 I did my first tie-dye experiment and never looked back. Nothing in my wardrobe escaped. I even wore tie-dyed socks to school...(can you get ASBOs for fashion crimes?). The lust for tie-dye and batik has to be fulfilled somehow though, so this is the socially acceptable way of getting my fix.

Love or loathe them, they certainly add a bit of colour to a grey day. I have a little pile of my own hand-dyed fabric (not tie-dyed, mercifully) which seems to fit the bill too.
 

oh..., plus the *cough* considerable stockpile of other batik fat quarters I've had squirrelled away for a rainy day. I'm so glad I don't pass the quilt shop on my way for a sandwich at lunchtime any more (actually, it was more like: obtain sandwich, then wander round the corner, away from the direction of work, up the cobbled street and - oops! - I appear to have stumbled into Country Threads, as if in a tuna-and-sweetcorn-induced daze! Well, now that I'm here..., etc)...or this pile would be even bigger.

Like all things I start, it will end up in the huge 'wip' pile of course, along with the eleventy billion other projects I have 'on the go' as it's euphemistically termed...!

Bodice-ripping

I have unpicked, re-sewn, unpicked, gathered, sworn at, hacked at, and re-sewn the bodice of this so many times this weekend.  I couldn't get the gathers right at first, so had to undo it. And undo the wretched thing again when I found that, after gathering it, it still didn't fit my non-existent bust. (Summed up by my experience of first buying a bra in Littlewoods in Barnsley, at the age of 11. The shop assistant laughed: "You what, love? What size???! you might as well wear a piece of elastic!!" Oh how I miss Northern candour) After all this ripping, the poor bodice is beginning to look like the dog chewed it.

 

I also had to undo the interfacing I'd lovingly sewn at the top of the dress too, because it gave the neckline all the softness of an Elizabethan ruff. So as I'd figured out how to gather things, I added some more round the neckline.

 

Now I'm just sewing the sleeves - with more gathered bits! This dress has more puff than all the pastries at Betty's Tea Rooms put together!

 

That took most of my energy (cold still apparent) so the rest of the time I've been sitting on the sofa finishing off my crochet blanket. That's right - something has actually been finished in this house!

 

I had to take it outside to photograph so the dog wouldn't sit on it. He is rather fond of the blanket, possibly more keen on it than I am...(it's primarily a leftovers blanket, and like most leftovers, it tasted much better the night before.) Right - after that Herculean effort I think I shall slump onto the sofa with the heavy crocheted monster and not move for a few hours...!

House of Idiot fashions

I've prescribed myself a short course of dressmaking to beat the post-viral blues and encourage me out of my tissue-strewn hovel. I've been inspired by watching repeats of fashion-house costume drama House of Eliott (on UKTV History every Monday if you want to join in) although my attempts at dressmaking are rather more like the French and Saunders version, House of Idiot and there's nary a bugle bead in sight, sadly :-)

Profuse apologies for the dark pictures. I don't believe the sun has risen today. If it has, someone show it the way to Somerset?

It's Simplicity 3807 dress pattern, a short dress with cute puffed sleeves. The fabric is two metres of Kaffe Fassett stuff. It's just too good for cutting into patchwork pieces so it's going to be a crazy dress instead. It's become the 'broccoli dress' in my head as they look like stems of broccoli to me. And that was before I was taking the decongestant tablets. Let's take a closer look.

Definitely broccoli. Hmm, with a hint of puppy-dog tail, I think?

Inevitable, I suppose.

The pretty tin of pins I'm using is inherited from my late mum and gran. They made all their own clothes (and mine) and passed their skills onto me, so there's always the pair of them at the back of my mind (and in this case they're shouting "£9 a metre? Bloomin 'eck! what's wrong wi' stuff from th'market?") when I'm sewing. I blame them for my sense of fashion being a bit wacky too.

 

Right, better go and do the boring bit of ironing, pinning, cutting...and see if I can get round to any actual sewing today...

Notes from the dusty archives

Forgive me! Another non-yarn-related blog posting. I've not had any creative energy since the Man Cold arrived, so I've been pootling around with another hobby: family tree research. I don't do it much, as it can work out expensive if you haven't any firm leads and your family name is really common! However, the 1911 census went online yesterday and I was able to find a bit more about my maternal great grandparents...

(click to embiggen!) There they are. Harriet and George, with a baby called Harry (I think he may have been cast out into the unknown as I can't remember him. Mind you we never spoke about that kind of thing), and four lodgers, all crammed into 4 rooms (eeh, that were luxury when I were a lass, I lived in an armpit, etc, etc). They've yet to have my gran, Nellie. Here are some faces for the names.

That's Harriet and George, my great-grandparents.

And there's my great-gran and my gran, Nellie (marvellous boots. I wear Doc Martens to this day, with everything. Wonder where I got that from?) Funny how Harriet, George and Harry as names, have come back into fashion, but 'Nellie' has yet to resurface.

My family were all employed in the cotton industry in Oldham, Lancashire and since we were the kind of family that never spoke about anything, and everyone's dead now (careless as well as tight-lipped!), I have to do my own sleuthing! I only wish I had the researchers they get to do the work on Who do you Think you Are, because I think this is all I'm going to have time to find out for now...possibly a good thing for you though, else I'd be raking through the archives for hours and this would be a family history blog. Hmm. Where's that yarn gone?

 ah, that's better!

This post is brought to you by...

...the healing power of Olbas Oil, Savlon and Andrex tissues. Sound familiar? Yep, I finally succumbed to the hideous cold that's going round. Try as I might to hide away from people, germs, civilisation etc somehow it managed to track me down and stick me in bed for 48 hours. My husband says I'm the only woman he knows who gets Man Colds. The cheek! 

Since I've not been up to anything creative (other than finding new places to hide soggy tissues) in the past few days, and I didn't think that an entire post about my symptoms would be very interesting (but a full list is available on request, for the mere price of a stamped addressed envelope), here's a random selection of stuff from around my room...

I've been designing and making some cute pouches for double-pointed needles. They'll be available in the shop (it's on its way - honest - we are having a few teething problems!) soon when I've made enough to sell! They're made with Heather Bailey fabric, and are fully lined, and they close with a cute button. DPNs, jug of threads and basket not included :-)

I made this chap a while ago now, but I haven't blogged about him yet. He's from a pattern by Ysolda and her elephant is called Elijah. I knitted him in some Regia cotton sock yarn (colour 4184, knit on 3mm) and I love how his stripes turned out! It is a genius pattern - I heartily recommend it as a fun knit. You won't want to give him away once you've knitted him though...I didn't!

 

Since I couldn't figure out how to do his eyes properly, he's got a bit of a wonky right eye, but I think it gives him a bit of character. (mistakes in my knitting = giving something character. Try it for yourself! "what's that weird flappy bit at the back of your cardigan?" "oh, it's character! I did it on purpose!")

This view is right in front of the computer where I type. (and just look at the dust, eek, at least it proves I didn't stage the shot...) It's part of a ridiculously large collection of useless useful tins and retro pottery, hailing from places as far away as Barnsley, Keynsham and the metropolitan borough of E-bay! When does a passion for collecting turn into a sickness, anyone?

And no post would be complete without gratuitous dog pic.

 

He wants to play ball. Or eat. Or go for a walk. Or eat. Or play ball. Or go for a walk. So he's sulking in this picture. I suppose I ought to go and play ball with him...in between sneezes and tissues!

Cardigan infidelity

I don't know. You're busy knitting one purple cardigan...

...and desperately trying to stay awake whilst knitting stitch after boring stitch of dull, purple monotony...when out of the blue, there arrives this, from Knitty.

A much nicer, more exciting purple cardigan! Look! it has Other Stitches in it, like garter stitch and - oh my! - twisted rib. So there was only one thing to do.

Ahem. I cast it on, and cast the other one into the big fiery pit of unfinished objects. I can't help it if a prettier cardigan comes along and turns my head! It's Knitty's fault, anyway!!

I'm back!

What a neglectful blogger I've been...in my defence, I have been busy banging my head against all kinds of virtual brick walls in an attempt to get the shop up and running online. Payment gateways, SSL certificates...merchant accounts, FTP sites...but hopefully soon you'll be able to buy some of this lovely stuff:

Hmm. Sock yarn. Lovely. Doesn't try to confound me with gibberish. Hasn't got a payment gateway to get up and running. Doesn't understand HTML. Lovely, lovely yarn! Yarn is my friend!

Of course in the interim, Christmas has been and gone, and I hope yours was a lovely one. Mr Yaffle and I spent some of ours in Glossop, just outside the Peak District National Park.

This amazing view was just outside the flat we stayed in. It would've been positively churlish not to go and see what was at the top, so we did. Now, my idea of walking is as follows. 1. get into the car with dog and wellies. 2. drive somewhere pretty, and flat. 3. get out of car with dog and wellies, and walk for a bit. 4. drive home, unexhausted, dry, and not aching. So this was a departure. We climbed a bit, and found a 'clough' (no, not that kind of clough) which I think is a kind of ravine:

and right at the top we found lots of these!

We told him about the sock yarn and everything, but he didn't look too impressed.

Main surprise of the festive season was that I did. NO. KNITTING. whatsoever! Unprecedented. I spent Christmas watching this, this and a bit of this. And then I got incredibly twitchy and yesterday couldn't resist casting on a new hat, and trying to start the sleeves of the Big Purple Endless Cardigan of Dullness. So that'll see me to the New Year and beyond...!