Craft Books and Sunshine in the Garden.

A beautiful burst of late afternoon sunshine had me touring the garden yesterday, camera in hand.

Green man.

Rose. Earlier this year I dug out all the roses in the front garden as they were loosing the battle with the grass in the "flower bed". I later bought another one for a pot and it's thriving, so far...

Aster. Bought as an unknown thing in the sale section at B&Q. So glad I did give it a home as it provides a reliable and welcome show of late colour.


I varnished the gate, woohoo! I did this last week during the "heatwave". Although we didn't share in the very hot and sunny weather experienced further south in the UK, the week was generally dry and mild - most pleasant. A painter dealt with the eaves and downpipes of the house, a roofer sorted out the damaged flashings and loose slates, and I got some varnishing done. I'm starting to feel a little more prepared for winter.


Back inside...
The brambles have all been turned into jelly. The harvest was pretty poor this year, a lot of the berries never seemed to ripen and those that did were small.

I made seven full jars and two half jars in total. Some have already been gifted or eaten but I have five full jars safely tucked away.

Continuing with the red, white and blue colour scheme, I finally won a dala horse on ebay. I've had my eye on one of these for a while and found a pair in deep red (as opposed to the more common orange), one is living upstairs and this one is downstairs (shown here next to a print by Julia Crossland).

More artwork: A's latest - a rather exuberant mountain goat, made me laugh.

I picked the last of the rhubarb from the garden and made a rhubarb, apple, plum and blueberry crumble. It was unexpectedly delicious. I'd overstewed the rhubarb and apples, and when I added them to the plums and blueberries it looked like a cat had puked in the dish (sorry!), but it made a lovely thick fruit sauce. I then didn't have any rolled oats so added oatmeal to the topping instead, it turned out beautifully crunchy so I will continue to use oatmeal in future.

My current favourite type of chocolate. I can't keep any in the cupboard as I just end up eating it all. Available in handy 40g bars from your local Co-op for 60p.

Muffins! They're all the same recipe, the darker ones are just the 2nd batch which I burnt - too busy chatting. I managed to catch them before they were ruined though, the children don't like them but I do.

The Book People currently have some lovely craft books for sale at excellent prices. I recently bought two by Jane Brocket - The Gentle Art of Knitting and The Gentle Art of Quilting, both for just £6.99 each.

Of the two, the knitting one is the one I'm most likely to actually make something from, but both are lovely to read and look at. "There is nothing nicer on a cold, rainy, blustery winter evening than snuggling down on a comfy sofa, a fire to one side, a glass of red wine to the other, ... [with] a good book, [and] some knitting that can be picked up and put down." Well if that quote and the lovely patterns (I've shown below the ones I'd like to try first) don't get me to have another go at learning to knit then nothing will!

Hot water bottle cover.

Plain sock pattern.
Gloves.

Slouchy hat.

I've just had a quick look at the craft section on the Book People site and they also have "Cute and Easy Crochet" by Nicki Trench (see Attic 24 review here) for a mere £3.99.

The Knitter's Year by Debbie Bliss (£4.99) and Christmas Crafting in No Time (£3.99) are also catching my eye, uh oh, perhaps it's just as well I have to step away from the computer right now as I need to collect A & N from school & nursery!

Snippets

Here we have...

...snippets...

...in a jar...

...from The Blanket. As you can see from this view of the back I've completed sewing in the ends on the little section on the right but there's still a long, long way to go.

I did weave quite a few of the ends in as I was crocheting the African Flowers. At first I still went back and sewed in what was left of them, but now I've started just cutting them (I hope they'll be secure enough?). At times I got carried away and started crocheting without weaving in the ends so there are still a lot which will need sewn anyway.

I've finished the border too, I did modify it slightly after my last blanket post but I'm keeping it hidden till the thing is completely and utterly finished and then I can finally do my Ta Da!

I couldn't resist taking a few more photos of the blanket while it was out in the sunny garden this afternoon.

Also while in the garden, three photos from different angles of the same flower head (and no, I don't know the name of the plant, it was here already when we moved in). The colours seem to echo those of the blanket very well.

A few days ago I received this book from The Book People. I have already used it to make Sarah Raven's version of Rosehip syrup (she adds cinamon, cloves & star anise).

Rosehip syrup (in baby jars as I didn't have any bottles)

Sarah Raven's Complete Christmas is a nice book though for me it would have benefitted from having more photos and from the inclusion of some Christmas crafts (it's almost exclusively flowers & food) but as it cost a mere £4 I'm not complaining.

The Book People are great for selling books at incredibly low prices, they're much cheaper than Amazon but carry a very limited range. They often have the latest Usborne titles, I like Usborne books very much.

You've probably already seen the Drawing & Doodling one on other blogs. The 365 Things to Draw and Paint is also full of lovely ideas, I think I'll be sharing this one with A. Here are a few images from it of subjects popular in Blogland at the moment...

I thought they'd be particularly nice for making cards, just need to find some more free time somehow.

Just before putting the children to bed tonight I happened to look out the window and saw the beautiful evening sky, I popped to the back door to take a photo and was rewarded with a view of the large waxing moon too. An useful way to remember whether the moon is waxing or waning is to use a French mnemonic - if the curve is like the p in premier (for first quarter) then it's waxing, if it's like the d in dernier (for last quarter) then it's waning.

Right, best go and get started on the dishes and tidying up...

whoom whoom whum

Grrrrr! Just had a few rather frustrating days though not for any particular reason other than the general inability to "get things done" that comes with having a 1 year old and a 4 year old around.

Above are flowers from the garden that A picked so that we could press them in the flowerpress she unearthed while untidying her room earlier. Sounds like a pleasant task but I'm afraid I was rather grumpy about it all. Anyway, the flowers are now being well squished so we'll see how they end up.

I managed to grab some flowers from the garden too for my little jug. It was indeed a grab, I had to remove a little boy from round my leg and run out then back in before he got too upset. They're just plonked in the jug (recent boot sale buy!) and put on my new shelves which are the only part of the house I seem to be able to keep tidy.

I did get out to play last night though. Orchestra practise has resumed. A friend at orchestra gave N a belated first birthday present which was this book

N's not really too interested yet, but A and I enjoyed it, it's great fun. I particularly liked it because...


... page turn here!...

... it has a double bass playing bear, yeah!

I actually took my bass out its case today though have yet to practise but did take some photos of its bits:


Nice to be back playing. We bass players are a fairly rare breed. I do recomend it as an instrument; it's rare that we get the tune (very!) and we're often taken for granted but there's just something about being able to produce those lovely low notes, mmm!

Just finished reading this:
Urban Gardener by Elspeth Thomson. It was a charity shop buy. I enjoyed it so much I bought this:
from Amazon marketplace, which is the sequel, A Tale Of Two Gardens. Looking forward to some more pleasant bedtime reading.

I lost my camera at the weekend. I was going potty trying to find it - I had the case and the memory card so knew the camera itself couldn't be too far away. Turns out a little person had stashed it away at the bottom of one of the toy boxes.

Went for a walk with said little person shortly afterwards, the weather was pretty dismal so just this berry photo to show for it.