70's Heaven

After decorating the living room, my enthusiasm for getting the rest of the house updated is high!    We finally got new carpet to replace the stairs and landing (which the dog had chewed one manic week when he was accidentally on working dog food), as well as two of the bedrooms (mostly ruined by the cats), and we got laminate laid in the living room to finish it off (I've added a photo to the Purple Haze blog entry).   The new carpet in the spare bedroom was a pre-cursor to getting wardrobes in there.   I've been coping with my clothes being stored on flimsy rails for nearly 3 years, and it is especially awful when we have visitors who have to look at my clothes when they stay with us. 


Seeing as Greg's purple walls were such a success, we decided to go with a similar technique.  He chose a main colour and left me to work out how to coordinate it.   His chosen colour this time was orange, as this room gets the sunrise in the morning and he wanted the wall to reflect it.     I then used the Dulux Colour Concept app for the iPad again, to chose coordinating colours.  I decided on what I thought was a grey, but actually, is a very pale grey-purple, but having found the Orla Kiely bedding fabric (bought from Dotmaison.com), I could see how it would all come together.

Previously, the room was painted the same cold green that the living room was. In addition, there was some mould (not damp though) in a corner of the room, and some of the paint was flaking in the other corners.   I scraped the flaking paint off and sanded it, filled a few holes and filled the gap between the wall and the skirting boards, and then used Mould Killer to clean as much of the mould off as I could.     I then painted the most mouldy parts - the corner by the skirting and all the way up the corner to the ceiling - with Ronseal Anti Mould paint in the hope that this will keep it at bay.


I painted the grey walls first, then the orange wall.  I have to admit, you don't want to be looking too closely at my cutting in, especially at the ceiling edge, but hey, it'll mostly be behind wardrobes and doors....





There are more things I need to do: paint the skirting boards (I used an old roller for the orange, not the new microfibre one, and it splattered quite a lot), get a new lampshade, and make some curtains and a pelmet to cover the broken bit of plaster by the window... but the wardrobes (Shoreditch, from Next, x 2) arrive towards the end of October, and I cannot wait to get them, and be able to organise my clothes properly!

I'll update when the room is finished.

Winter is here - time for a new hat

Well, it feels like winter this weekend.  A cold arctic wind has been blowing over Britain and brought the soggy weather with it.   So, to celebrate this, I decided it was time for a new hat.

My old grey one was looking ... well, old and grey.  It is a snug hat that keeps my ears warm, and was bought for me when I was having chemotherapy to keep my bald head warm through the winter.   I felt it was time to have something new.

I bought two balls of  Rowan Felted Tweed from John Lewis and, using the same pattern I used when I made hats for friends and family for Christmas (the Boyfriend hat).

I used an entire ball of wool on the main part of the hat before starting the decreases. As I found that the pattern's recommendation of  a length of 5.5in was far too short, I knew to make it longer.

The next day, I had to decide whether to make a pom-pom to put on top of the hat, or to crochet a flower. As I am still quite new to crochet, I did want to at least try, and had found a nice pattern via Pinterest that would look good. My old hat has a flower, and I always liked it.  The Wagon Wheel Flower pattern was reasonably easy to follow... although it appears to lead you to make the inner petals first and then the outer ones, and having made the first set I was worried the flower would be too big, so I adjusted it slightly so I added the second, smaller set of petals at the front with chains of 4 and 9 double crochet, but otherwise following the instructions.

I was pleased with the outcome and sewed it onto the hat, but when I tried it on, it was a little itchy against my forehead.  So, I decided to add a lining.    Luckily, I had bought a couple of fleece blankets from Ikea not long ago, intending to use them for camping. We did use them for camping, and they were great.  And they were purple... and exact match for my new hat.   So, after having found a website with great instructions on both how to make a full lining for a knitted hat or a headband lining, I cut a strip of fleece and set to.  

The only mistake I made here was that I cut my strip the wrong way, so the stretch was on the short edge, not the long edge.  But seeing as it is only me that will wear the hat, I don't think it will matter too much.

I'm really pleased with the finished hat.  It is warm, but not too warm (I think a full lining would have been), fits perfectly, and doesn't make my forehead itch!

And not only practical, but it looks nice too.     So, at £13.50 for the wool (2 balls bought, 1.5 used), £3 for the Ikea blanket (albeit I only used a tiny strip) and say, 6 hours of my time, that hat is probably a lot more pricey than any you'll buy in the shops - but its mine, and unique.

Purple Haze

I'm going to skip some of my past projects - I'll come back to them later - and instead move on to things I've been doing over the past 2 weeks.  I've been learning a lot about soft furnishings and have transformed our living room from a hotch potch of different colours and patterns, to a coordinated, homely and warm room.

 

Before

The room had been depressing me.  It was painted a cold green colour at two ends, and had dark brown and green curtains and cushions which were left behind by the previous inhabitants.   Over the time we have been here, the walls have become dirty - just general wear and tear, plus a puppy who occasionally chases flies and moths up the walls with muddy paws - and the carpet has been ruined.   This is a combination of  the type of carpet - a light coloured loop pile - plus cats who like to scratch anything and everything.  Locking the cats in the room by accident doesn't help. And when we first moved in, the cats were anxious and decided to christen one particular corner which has never fully recovered. The puppy added to that with a few accidents, and lets be realistic, we live in the country, so muddy paws and boots are a way of life.  Not conducive to keeping a carpet clean.

 

What to do?

We have just had two weeks off work, and I knew I wanted to work on the living room during this time, so I had been chatting to Greg and others about what to do.  He had said he didn't want the room too modern, and wanted to keep the cottage feel to it.  And he wanted bookshelves either side of the fireplace.

So, I'd seen some nice striped fabric in blue, red, cream and brown and wondered if I could do something with those colours - but stripes would be too modern.   I also saw some wallpaper that I liked, which was a bit pricey, but maybe that could be used.   But before I got a chance to do anything with these thoughts, Greg decided to take my vague "red, blue" ideas and turn it into purple.  While I was away at a conference, he painted the walls by the fireplace a deep purple.

 

Dealing with purple walls

He loved it, and hey, he lives here too, so I had to work with it.   I used Pinterest and the internet to search for colour schemes and ideas that might work with purple, and felt that shades of grey would tone, with perhaps a damask pattern for the curtains in a darker shade of grey.     But would grey be too dull, dark and cold? Hmmm.

During my search, I kept coming across schemes with green in them. I'd wanted to avoid this colour, because the room was already green and I wanted a change.  But, this scheme from design-seeds.com, showing how the natural green and purple colours in asparagus look so good, totally changed my mind.

Before I finalised it, I needed to find a fabric for curtains and cushions that would complement the theme. After a trip to Dunelm and Fabric Warehouse I found Fryetts Trentino in Sorbet, amongst the custom-make curtain samples.  They didn't have it in stock for me to buy, so I found a source online and bought direct from curtains-fabrics.co.uk.

Greg then introduced me to the Dulux Colour Concept app for the iPad, and this was so helpful in pulling all of the elements together and choosing the paint that should go on the other 3 walls in the room.  You can pick a colour from a photo and it will tell you which Dulux colour it is, or you can look at contrasting or harmonising colours. It's so flexible and easy to use.  My final plan was decided.

 

Starting work and swearing at shelves

I started by re-doing the purple walls again, as Greg had painted them in the evening and in daylight you could see a few weaker patches.   Then I made a start on the other walls, in my light green.   It was a bit fiddly around the windows, but I got there!  2 coats of flat matt were enough over the magnolia and cold green.  I was done in 2 days.

As the room was coming together, Greg was itching to get his bookshelves built, so he spent 3 days putting them up. They're made of raw timber, and because we don't want to attempt drilling into the stone chimney breast, they only have support on two sides.  But he used 100mm fixings into the wall for the 2in x 2in battens, and then  screwed the shelf onto the batten, so they're not going anywhere!  A 2in x 1in batten on the front hides the supports at the back.

While he was shouting and cussing at his shelves (walking to and from his workshop, at the far end of the garden, to get to his tools and chopsaw and make each piece the exact right length was getting wearing over the course of 12 shelves!), I went to John Lewis and found some purple and green chenille to make some cushion covers. I already had a lot of cushions, some of which matched the old curtains, plus a few others I had bought in an attempt to try out other colour schemes (orange and teal. No.) so I was planning on making some new covers and using the fillings of the ones I already had.  I debated just buying new cushions, as places like Tesco sell them so cheaply at £5 or £6 each, but the colours they had weren't quite right.    In the end, I am glad I bought the fabric and zips and made my own. From £30 of fabric (1 metre of each colour at £15 a metre) I made 4 square removable covers and 2 rectangular cushions and re-used all the small cushions I already had, including the fillings from two where the cushion lining had split open.   I actually put two cushions inside each cover, as they were all a bit flat looking!  I'll write a separate post on making the cushion covers.

Cut once. ONCE!

Once Greg was done with the shelves and we could clean the room of sawdust and tools, I could then get my curtain fabric out.     Curtain one started ominously, with me gaily thinking I could use the 150cm width of the fabric as the 150cm drop I needed for my curtain length. But of course, I hadn't looked at the pattern properly, and the flowers would be growing sideways if I did that.   So I didn't follow the 'check, measure, check, measure and check and measure again, then cut once' rule.  I checked, measured, cut. Fail.   But I only made one cut, so quickly saw my mistake.  And realised that I wouldn't have any spare for cushion covers (yes, I still had 4 large cushions that needed new covers) so I would need to buy some more anyway. Phew. Continue.

I will write a separate post about making the curtains, but suffice to say it took me all day to just make one. Just one. Not a pair, just one.    OK, so I did walk the dog, stop for tea, lunch and dinner breaks too, but I was still sewing at 8pm after beginning around 11am.   I re-used the lining and the header tape from the old curtains, so part of the day was spent unpicking them, washing them and straightening them out.     Otherwise, they were fairly straightforward, if a bit unwieldy at 3 metres in length. That fabric width of 150cm? It is easier to just join two pieces together and have them slightly longer than you need than it would be to try and cut a piece to size against the grain.

So, the room is nearly done.   I still need to do the other 3 curtains (we have two bays), and the new flooring (laminate in Liberty Oak to match the hallway, plus a rug - yet to be bought) will be ordered on Monday, but the room now looks like OUR room, warm and inviting.

UPDATE: October 2013 - Finished room (except for two curtains still to do...)

New machine, new make up bag

I was lucky enough to have been given a new sewing machine for my 40th birthday (Dec 2012), so I just had to give it a go straight away.

I had asked for a Brother MS-5 (which, already seems to have been superseded!), nothing complicated or fancy. Until I know that I'm going to make some serious use of a machine, a bog standard one will do just fine.

So, what should I make? It was Christmas and snowy (and remember, we live up a hill) so going out to get supplies wasn't going to happen.







I already had some nice fabric - probably leftover from the previous Christmas, where I had made lots of gifts but been frustrated by the fact I could never get the tension right on my old machine.  And I found a zip in my sewing box.  My old make up bag was dirty and boring, so it seemed right to make a new one!








I don't quite know how, but I managed to make it so that it had a full lining and a French seam (at the time, I didn't even know what a French seam was - I learnt that a few months later from the TV programme, The Great British Sewing Bee).

The zip wasn't quite long enough, so I filled the gap with a fold of black ribbon, and because I wanted to test out the pattern stitches on the machine, I added a little pattern to it.

The only modification  I would make if I made another, would be to add some interfacing or quilting to make it slightly more sturdy.  It's a little floppy in general, but otherwise it is a really pretty addition to my dressing table.

A Popular Jacket

Knitting and crafts took a big back seat after the dog arrived.   I don't think I picked up a needle of any kind until at least September of 2012.  And then it was to finish that jumper.

While doing that, I also started a project to make a friend's child a knitted jacket.  She saw one of my Facebook updates about knitting, and commented that she wished she had something hand-knitted for her new baby, but she didn't know anyone who knitted.  Who could refuse such a plea??

So, I found the lovely Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino yarn in a nice dark blue - my local shop doesn't stock the full range, so this was the nicest shade they had right there, right then (have I mentioned I'm impatient?) and the accompanying book, and set to, making the super cute Cabled Coat with Hood.

I had been dying to make something with cabling, as it was something I hadn't done for years, but I remember as not being that difficult.


And it wasn't.

Remembering which row you were on was the trickiest part, so I took it slow to begin with and it all came back to me!

I was really pleased with how it was looking as I began, and very, very happy with the end result. 

I tried mattress stitch for the seams, and I think it worked. It was better than the green jumper, anyway.

When I posted the finished picture on Facebook, I got many requests from friends to make one for them! Sadly, with it having taken 2 months to make and only being a baby size, I really couldn't face making another or enlarging it to be suitable for an adult!  Lots of disappointed friends!!

But baby and his parents were very happy with it, which was the most important thing, even if it will only fit him for such a short time.  They are the kind of people that I expect will keep it for baby number 2, when and if he or she ever comes along...

 
(Ps. That's me with baby. Such a cheerful chap!)

A canine addition to the family

After my epic Christmas preparations (I didn't even mention that we hosted that year, with 10 of us staying for 3 nights), I was a bit tired from all that crafting, and then we decided to  'gift' ourselves a puppy that following January. Sydney arrived in our family at the end of January 2012 and I thought I knew what we were in for. I had definitely underestimated the impact on our life!

Who would have thought such a small animal - one that fitted in a cat basket for his first set of innoculations - would cause such trouble!

Looking back, I can actually barely remember what my problem was. Yes, he peed on the floor - he was a puppy in toilet training.  Yes, he whined at night when he was locked in the kitchen alone. And then bashed the kitchen door when he woke in the morning at 5am - not necessarily needing the toilet, but feeling lonely, awake and wanting company. We resolved that by letting him sleep with us instead and finally we got a full nights sleep again.   Yes, he wanted to play tug endlessly and the evenings were exhausting with all the attention he wanted. It took us a while to get the balance and timing of his walks right to counter the excess evening energy.

We were afraid of letting him off lead in case he never came back, and confused with the various advice about how to get his recall right or walk to heel or not jump up at people, so lack of consistency has probably meant he hasn't learnt these things as quickly or as well as he would have if we'd got it right from the start.

He still pulls on the lead a bit, although not as badly as he used to.  He still jumps up at anyone he meets who will let him (i.e. almost everyone, as they all want to say hello too and catch his paws and he comes to meet them).  His recall when there is nothing else around is great, but rubbish if there is another dog that wants to play.   He doesn't have a bad bone in his body, but he doesn't have enough fear - he just charges on in - and he is a big boy.

He is a pedigree English Pointer, a breed we chose because they are friendly, large and energetic - but in theory, more trainable than a Boxer dog which is Greg's favourite breed.   And he is adorable.  We're still going to dog training every week, but we're getting there and he is a much better behaved dog now, at nearly 2 years old, and we have a routine that works for us.

But that's why crafts took a back seat for a few months.

Christmas motivation

The things that really got me motivated to get on with my crafts was feeling that I couldn't afford to do the amount of shopping and consumery that goes into a normal Christmas. It usually costs me around £1000 to buy presents for the numerous family and friends at Christmas, as I don't think I go overboard with them or that I buy for many people that I could cut out.  It's just expensive. Oh, and have I mentioned that I hate shopping. I really wasn't in the mood to trawl around the same old same old high street feeling utterly uninspired about what to buy for people.

So in September 2011, I began making presents for them instead.  These included  knitted hats and toys, sewn iPad and Kindle cases and jewellery rolls, homemade Dundee cake, shortbread biscuits and flavoured vodka.

Knitted hats were mainly from the Boyfriend Hat pattern on Ravelry, although I advise that you add another inch or so in length as the pattern comes up a bit short in my view.

I had to teach myself to knit in the round for these and the for the toys, and discovered it wasn't anywhere near as hard as I thought it would be. I'm quite handy with DPN's or a circular needle these days!

I made hats for my brother, sister in law, nephew and friend's daughter, in various colours and types of wool. My favourite was the red one which was made with a felting wool, but I really should have noted how I had adjusted the pattern as it was a thick wool and would have come out too big to wear if I hadn't made some changes along the way.

Toys were from Rebecca Danger monster patterns and are super cute.   I really enjoyed making these, so much so that I've gone on to make more for the children who got a hat that Christmas, so now they have all had a toy as well. And an elephant for my dad, who has a love of all things elephantine.








Sammie the sock monster was made twice for two little boys, and the parents confirmed that they were both loved immediately on opening on Christmas day, especially as they could remove their socks and put them back on again.










I love Jerry the monkey and his super long limbs, and Esther the elephant was for a friend's daughter.  I always feel that children - especially those of my friends and family who are all 'comfortably well off' families - get plenty of commercial toys, so getting something a little different from me would be a break from the norm and not a massive disappointment. I loved the toys my gran made for me as a child, and still have one of them. I wish I had more, but just don't know what happened to them all.


On the food side, we had had a crop of green tomatoes so I made some tasty chutney and put this together with Dundee cake, honey from my neighbour's bees and vodka flavoured with fruit from our garden.

The Dundee cake was Delia's recipe, but cut down by a third as I made small ones (and missing out the candied peel, as I don't like it!).  I knew my parents liked Dundee cake, so it was made especially for them, but each of the adults got a food pack, with varying amounts of biscuits to go around the relevant children!

Biscuits were a BBC Good Food recipe but made with my own shape and decorations,  and the vodka, well, that's just trial and error too. Hic!

In fact, we have a second batch still brewing in the cupboard. Raspberry or Blackcurrant vodka in iced lemonade is just lush on a hot summers day.






I made a number of sewn items too. iPad and Kindle cases for my dad, friend's dad and my neice, and jewellery rolls for my mum and mother in law, both who travel quite a lot.


I didn't follow any specific pattern for these, but browsed a number of different blogs to get ideas about how to make them.  The Kindle and iPad cases have batting which was actually the lining of an old sleeping bag, but provided enough quilting to make them a secure housing for precious devices.



You may have noticed that I also tried to package the items nicely.  Greg knew what I was doing and he bought me a fancy label printer for my birthday (which is just before Christmas) so that I could make some really nice labels to attach to the toys and gifts, and I bought nice jars and bottles from a catering shop, tissue paper and ribbon, and smart cake boxes to make sure the Dundee cakes didn't get squashed.   I hope this made the gifts that little bit extra special when they were received.

I never did price up whether doing things this way was any cheaper than if I had spent my usual budget in the shops, but I had a lot more fun doing it, that's for sure.   But I maybe won't be doing it every year...

2 years to make a jumper?

For readers in the US, a jumper in the UK is the equivalent of a pullover/sweater.

One of the first projects that I bought the materials for was a jumper, way back in spring 2011.  I was limited in choice as the day I wanted to start, I had to find a knitting shop in one of the local small towns. I wanted to make it NOW! And I didn't want to drive very far to get my yarn! Ledbury is a lovely quaint town nearby, and I found it had a part-craft, part-old lady clothes shop with a limited selection of patterns and yarn.  The photo on the pattern made the style look young and smart, so I thought I would try it, although they didn't have the right shade of green in stock, so I took a similar one.

Well, it was ever so slightly more complicated that I thought, but when I finally got used to the repeat pattern, I was on a roll and was looking forward to the finished product.

But it took me over 2 years to finish as first of all, I went off knitting in the summer months, and when winter 2011 arrived I decided to make Christmas presents for everyone instead of going shopping! I hate shopping. And I had no money left after moving house.  After that, we got a puppy - and if you've ever had a puppy you'll know that for the first 6 months, you don't have any hobbies apart from cleaning up, worrying about, playing with and training that dog. And he would have stolen the wool anyway. 

Enough of the excuses.  I picked it up again in winter 2012 and finally finished it in February 2013 only to find it was too small - and looked better inside out than the right way.

So, if it had fitted me (or, to be honest anyone I know), I think it would be OK - but it doesn't, so it is in my charity bag now, waiting for the next trip to the charity shop. 

But I console myself that I learn some valuable lessons along the way.  (1) measure myself before making clothing and (2) test my tension.  I had done neither for this project.   I've also learnt to make up the seams in a different way since doing this - now using mattress stitch - so in future my seams won't be quite so bulky!

(and secretly, I didn't like the colour in the end - the green was a bit insipid).

You win some, you lose some.

Where it all began

I've decided to start a blog after a good few years of making things as recently it has become more of an obsession, and I am craving the opportunity to do more and more.  So, I felt that talking about it and sharing it with others might help me express this side of me.

I learnt to knit and sew as a teenager, taught by my mum and making a few dubious jumpers and slightly badly fitting dresses and skirts. I may not have been fast or accurate, but I enjoyed it a lot.   That all seemed to go by the wayside in my 20's and most of my 30's - University, marriage, divorce, career - they all got in the way.

But about 5 years ago a friend at work was looking for someone to teach her to knit, so we started a mini-knitting club during our lunchtimes and I re-learnt, and she and another colleague got started.     This re-ignited my craftiness just a touch - but I never did finish the scarf that I started.  I think the cat may have got hold of the wool and I had to throw it out!

The same friend then had a hen night that involved dressing as Jane Austen.  We could either make our own dress, or get a dressmaker to do it. Well, I wasn't going to pay someone else to do what I was capable of, so I dusted off my machine and made an ill fitting dress. I got away with it, I think.







But it was moving to Grand View in 2010 that seemed to really get me back in the swing.  So, my first few blog entries will re-cap what I've done since my fiancée and I moved here.

PS. I was post-chemo with hair just starting to grow back there. Rocking the skinhead look!

PPS. I meant to add, the Jane Austen dress pattern was from http://sensibility.com/. I'll share details of where I get patterns, ideas and recipes throughout this blog to give credit where it is due and share sources.