Bit O'Knitting

Shockingly, I've finished a pair of socks. These are for Husband and are knitted from plain Trekking yarn that I dyed over at Lovely Jan's. I'd seen this yarn in the Mint Julip colourway and I thought I'd quite like to recreate something similar myself. I christened it "Spearmint Rhino", not because I think strippers would look good in it (although I'm sure they would!), but because of the grey and green. Geddit? (Groantastic, I know!)

Boat-Floating Stitchery

Aren't these beautiful? They're all the work of the uber-talented Corinne, aka septemberhouse. Check out her AMAZING work on her blog here, or through her Flickr photostream (where all these pictures are from) here. Gawjus stuff.

How I Did LOL

(Taken outside Blatchington Road post office this morning.)

 The woman on the end doesn't look anywhere near laughter, though. Maybe because she is trapped in the nightmare!!! herself?

A Quick Warm Up

It's been a bit strange getting back in to the old illustration groove this week. As a bit of a warm up, I scribbled a quick portrait of Husband. "Umah" is his favourite grumpy noise. I have no idea if that is how it should be spelled, but that's how it sounds when it comes out. Just make the "M" nice and long.

A Bit of Christmas Craftiness

Now everyone has received their gifts, it's safe for me to blog about them. But first, I must make an announcement. Hold on to your hats here; it's a big one. Yes....I took pictures of things I made before wrapping them up and giving them away. Shocking, huh? I think I'll split this into two or more posts, as I really did make pretty much everything I gave this year and you don't want to be sitting here for hours and hours reading about every last detail, do you? No, I'll save that as a treat for later ;)

First up, lipbalms:

These were something I'd been wanting to have a go at for some time, and I thought Crimbo was perfect for it. I bought all my supplies from bathbombbiz. I was going to just get a kit and make them that way, but once I'd seen how easy they were to make to your own design from various recipes on various websites, plus the fact that all the kits seemed to contain almond oil which is no good for my nut-allergic chums, I just bought the separate elements, plus tubes, and made it all up myself.

They're really easy to make; you just weigh/measure out your ingredients, melt them all down over a double boiler as if you were melting chocolate, and pour into your desired receptacle. You can add more or less of each ingredient to make it softer (for pots) or harder (for tubes). I added peppermint oil to one batch of ten, and lemon & orange oils to another.

The labels I whipped up in Photoshop in a Victorian poster stylee and printed out on to Avery labels (nightmare afternoon that was). Quite a few people didn't realise I'd made them myself, so they must look quite professional!

I didn't take photos of the making process, though (surprise, surprise), but as I have loads of the gubbins left, not to mention other flavoured oils, I think another go at these is definitely on the horizon - with added step by step photos this time. I might get hold of some vintage pill boxes and use those as interesting tins.

Secondly, PJs:

I made PJ pants for my sisters and Ma and for Husband. This awesome tartan fabric is "Suiting", apparently, which I'd never used before but is very nice, plus soft on the skin, even if it did turn my iron a bit black and gooey. I must lower the temperature next time! I might make a skirt out of it in the future. I have plenty of each colour left, but I could make a sort of patchwork/panelled affair...hmmm....

Anyhoo, here I am modelling Youngest Sister's pair, as we are the only two who are the same size these days:

There's elastic in the waistband for comfort, plus a drawstring in a contrasting colour for adaptability. I also put in pockets in the same colour as the drawstring. You've got to have somewhere to put your tissue, right? Husband's pair were made from an old yellow striped duvet cover. He's so chuffed with them; apparently they're his favourite Xmas present! I'll make him some more soon.

I have more to chat on about, but I'll save it for another time. A treat, definitely.

Wine Gums

A Christmas pressie from Sam again. This collection of lushious, transparent buttons really is called "Wine Gums". Genius. This is what you get when one of your bezzers works in maybe the nicest sewing shop in the city. Awesome stuff. The bottom photo is currently my desktop wallpaper and it really is brightening up my desk no end.

Crafty Work in Progess

The fab Little Red cross stitch pattern was a gift from lovely Sam and is designed by Heidi Kenney of My Paper Crane, who, coincidentally, also designed that lovely mushroom fabric I ordered from Spoonflower late last year. Heidi also has a Snow White pattern for sale, so I might have to get that one soon, too!

As you can see, I sorted all my cotton embroidery threads in one of my (many, many) biscuit tins, but I think I might have to move them in to a bigger one, there's just not enough room in this one. Good thing I have a ready stash!

The Green Man

Lob himself as a stained glass masterpiece in the window of the Blue Dog Gallery, Gardener Street, Brighton.

Sunset From the Bus, 4.27pm Today

End of Week 53

And the whole shebang:




I've really enjoyed posting a page a week. I'm not sure I could commit to a post everyday, so this was a nice way of having something constant and regular to post about without it being too rigid. I'd like to try posting everyday through January - as I inexplicably managed to do in 2010 - although being chained to the desk as I will, I'm not sure how exciting the posts will be!

I've been looking over the "resolutions" I made this time last year. I don't really go in for resolutions as such as I think that if you want to do something you should just get your arse in gear and do it, but there are definitely things I'd like to achieve in the coming months. (I totally failed on "going to the dentist",  by the way. Should really do that one this year!) I want to do well in my new illo job, I want to treat the Husbando to a few meals out etc as he's basically been keeping me for the past few months, I'd like to buy a bike, I'd like to move to a slightly bigger flat without crazy drunken next door neighbours, I'd like to have another nice holiday, I'd like to have a go at knitting cables and working from a chart (eek!), I'd like to continue making my own clothes and maybe even make an attempt at button holes and zips! I suppose that's enough to be getting on with already. It's nice to have a general plan, but, like I said, I'd have a go at these things anyway, regardless of any promises I may make on New Year's Day.

Right, I suppose it's time to go and take advantage of the last few days off. We're off out for a lovely long walk and maybe even a pub lunch tomorrow. Husband goes back to work on Monday when I'm going to take down all the Crimbo decs and scrub the flat in readiness for actually doing some work on Tuesday!

This Year....

I have liked:

*The weather (almost properly seasonal all year round, bar the wet July)
*Getting married
*Getting a fab new job
*Growing loads of herbs and veg on my balcony
*Going on a nice, long holiday
*Winning two Spoonflower competitions
*New audiobooks
*New books generally
*Taking lots of photos (over 1000 of the buggers)
*Going to the cinema
*Losing weight
*Learning to sew my own clothes
*Learning to sew lots of stuff generally
*Making Husband nearly as Harry Potter obsessed as I am
*Blogging 261 times, my highest record yet
*Collecting "granny china", as my sisters call it
*Discovering Pinterest
*Getting a Wacom
*Blogging calendar pages every week


I have not liked:

*Clients who do not pay on time
*Having to juggle money around - see above
*Noisy, drunken neighbours
*Husband being ill for past 6 months
*Bloody selfish people

I am happy that:

*My "Liked" list is much longer than my "Not Liked". Generally, life is pretty good and I am very grateful for that.




Happy New Year, everyone!

End of Week 52

A bit late with this one. But, surprisingly, there's another one to go. Who knew a year could have 53 weeks?

Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

In a quiet half hour before the monster turkey needs to come out of the oven and everything else needs to go in; when the table has been set, the candles have been lit and the Xmas playlist is getting its last airing, I thought I just pop in here and wish everyone a very Merry Christmas. And also to thank you for coming along here and listening to me ramble on about any number of things. Cheers!

Burning of the Clocks

Last night was The Burning of the Clocks, an annual parade held in Brighton to celebrate the winter solstice. I was so glad it was on, as they had to cancel last year's parade due to the snow and ice. Husband has never seen it and I'm always going on about it, so we made our way down to the pier and waited for the lanterns to pass us:











I loved this Day of the Dead themed section, although this awesome skull was an inflatable rather than a paper lantern like the others. I'll let it off, it was HUGE! We didn't hang around for the bonfire, but had a walk past the Pavilion and the lit-up ice rink outside it before heading to GBK for a festive venison burger.



I posted about the 2008 Burning of the Clocks parade here. Although I went in 2006, I didn't blog about it, 2005 was before I had this blog, and I didn't go in 2007 as it was too foggy to drive down!

Edit: You can see more photos from The Argus here and a view from the inside here.

Lovely, Lovely Spoonflower

For 24 hours late last month, Spoonflower were offering free postage - even for international orders. I couldn't pass that up, could I? I used the Spoondollars I won back in the spring, and ordered me a whole load of FREE loveliness:




This mushroom fabric is by Heidikenney. It's made from cut-out paper mushers. Awesome.


Green Button fabric by Jesseesuem.


Cute as a Button fabric by Craftylittlemia.

These four pink and orange lovelies are by the uber-talented Bora.



And this one is my winning 50s design. So nice to see it in the flesh, so to speak. I got a yard of that one, but, as with the others, I've no idea what I'm going to make with them yet! Many purses, I expect, and maybe even a proper go at patchwork and quilting. I do need some plain colours, though. Quite possibly all those patterns would knock you for six if they were all put together without something inbetween!

End of Week 51

Sunset, 3.55pm Today

Sunset, 3.28pm Today

Repurposing

At the moment I am very much into making/repurposing things from items I already have (watch out those to whom I have given Xmas pressies, this includes you). So, in the spirit of recycling and saving much needed moolah, I've been hacking away at some of my clothes from last winter.

I bought two knitted dresses last year, one in grey, one in purple. They are both now waaayy too big (hurrah!) so something really needed to be done with them. The purple dress I simply cut in half and have been left with a skirt and a shrug. The shrug I haven't finished faffing about with yet, but the skirt is here:





I just gathered the top edge and stitched it on to an elastic waistband. I may reconsider this, as it means I pretty much always have to wear a belt with it to hide the elastic (which is white), so I may take it off and make a casing for it instead. I'll see how it works for a while yet.

The grey dress I loved, so I decided to keep it as is but take it in to fit better:

Before:


In progress:


After:

(Apologies for the quality of the photos; half were taken by night and the others were taken in appalling winter light.)

Cool, huh? I do like getting something for nothing and clothes for free is always doubly good.

I also have my Celebratory Party Dress to share, but, again, I need daylight to take some decent pictures so I'll keep you posted.