Vain

I'm not very good at being vain.   I'm too self conscious.   I only ever wear make up for work or if I've got a night out.  I only brush my hair when I wash it - and that's only every four days or so.   The hairdryer is used more on Finn than on me!   The first thing I do when I get home from work is take my make up off and tie my hair up.

But, a few weeks ago, I had a haircut.  A proper girlie haircut.   Ginny at work was so fed up of looking at the state of my hair across the office that she persuaded her son to cut my hair - he is a top stylist in one of the more exclusive salons in Norwich - their regular clientele includes the wives and girlfriends of all the Norwich City footballers.  I felt very pampered and a tad nervous.

There really was no need.

Of course it only stayed like this until I washed it later that week!  But I'm glad I've got the photos as proof that I can look a wee bit glamorous very very occasionally.

Tada! "Pull Up A Seat, Take The Weight Off Your Feet" Bench Cushion

Up to now, my hexipuff experiments have all been rather small scale, but I've been desperate to make something a bit bigger and so came up with a plan to make garden bench seats for us all.  And that's about as far as I got - a plan!  

To be fair, I made two large bags' worth of hexipuffs and used a 1kg bag of stuffing to fill them.

I love making them, I just get a bit grumpy when I have to sew them together!  

So, out of the four projects I had decided on - garden bench seats for me and Pam, a window seat cushion for me and summer house benching cushions for Mum - it was only Pam that has something cushiony to sit on!

It does look beautiful - it's a real hotchpotch of colours and will look beautiful when the sun's shining on it.

In the meantime ..... 4/10, must try harder!

Caravan of Love!

Every woman every man, join the caravan of love (Stand up) stand up Stand up 
Everybody take a stand, join the caravan of love (Stand up) stand up Stand up 

Back in 1986 - yes really! - these were words that everyone sang along to with the Housemartins.  I just googled the year of release - 1986 seems a scarily long time ago now!  When I first met Andy in November 1998, he was sharing a caravan with Trevor and Martin - the "caravan of love" as it was referred to for reasons which I won't go into here!   

About a year after we met, we got together and got our own caravan - and we lived in an orchard in Wickham, just outside Portsmouth.   We lived there for nearly three years and, on the whole, I loved it - the only times I didn't love it was when it was cold and muddy and I had to park my car at the top of the field and run down the length of the orchard to the caravan wearing wellies and headtorch. Or the memorable occasion I realised I had a major phobia - I'd found a slug in the caravan and Andy found me throwing up outside because of it. Or when it was so cold that our water froze and I had to run up to Martin's caravan (he'd also moved down with us but to his own caravan) in my dressing gown and wellies just to have a shower.   

On the whole, though, I absolutely loved it - we were in a very rural location surrounded by lovely walks and good pubs.  Good times.  I remember that our landlord had forgotten to lock the electric meter, so that we could recycle our pound coins by taking them out and just putting them back in again!   Or the badger that got drunk every night on the windfalls underneath the apple tree.   Or the horse that escaped from the field behind us and Andy had to chase it through the field to catch it and put it back.   Or the morning I woke up early to hear voices outside the window and when I got up, the boys had built me a staging system for all my plant pots.   Friday nights when we went to the pub in the village and bought a couple of bottles of fruit wine before heading back to the caravan with a Chinese.   Kim staying over and me making coffee one morning, only to come back to bed to find Kim and Andy in bed together, looking for all the world like Morecambe and Wise!   The morning that I was trying to get ready for work when Andy decided to chase me around the field, stark naked, singing the theme tune of the Benny Hill Show!   Such lovely funny memories.   

In 2004, Andy moved to Iraq - by this time we had a very nice flat in West Drayton near Heathrow - but, with Andy gone, I felt very vulnerable and isolated and lonely.  So I packed in my job and the flat and went off for six months in my own portable caravan - Dizzy, my fab Bedford Rascal Eldiss converted camper van, before coming back to real life and a rented cottage.

Fast forward to 2009 and Andy came back from Iraq, got work with Balfours and started on a new contract in Bedford in the middle of nowhere. And bought another caravan!  This caravan had lasted us six years before Andy finally made the decision to upgrade.   I know he was really sad about letting it go, but too many things had started to go wrong with it - he rang one evening to say all the electrics had gone and he was sitting in the caravan in the dark wearing a headtorch with no kettle, TV, anything.   I must admit I hated the thought of him being so miserable, although he did point out he could always go to the pub and he was much more miserable and lonely in Iraq when they lost power!   

So, in early January this year, Andy took possession of a new caravan and it's brilliant.  I love that there is a fixed bed in a separate bedroom so that we don't have to put the bed down each night and take it up each morning.   I love that there is a proper freezer so we don't have to run outside to the spare freezer standing outside.   I love that there is enough room for Finn.  That there's cupboard space to put everything away which means I don't have to leave my bag in the car every weekend that I'm down.   And that there isn't dog hair over everything I can't put away.   And there's a loo and shower!   It just is brilliant.   I'm looking forward to making lots more lovely memories in this caravan.  

This photo of the fridge contents really makes me laugh - apart from condiments all we've got is wine, champagne, strawberries and Stilton.  How very very civilised!

Even Finn is making himself at home!

Tada! "When The Boat Comes In" Cushions

I love Seasalt clothes, but am too poor to buy them straight from Seasalt.  Which means I spend quite a bit of time on ebay looking at Seasalt clothes which have been purchased from the shop, but which haven't been worn and have been hanging up in people's wardrobes.   This goes some way to explaining why I'm always at least a season behind!

One day while doing my usual ebay search, the strangest photo came up of a stuffed fish cushion.   When you do an ebay search, some of the results are fairly tenuous. But the woman selling the fish cushion was good enough to give an explanation in her sales description.  Apparently she had walked past a Seasalt store and seen their stuffed fish hanging in the window, made up of typical Seasalt fabric, and had loved them so much she'd gone in and asked if they were for sale.  They weren't.   So she had simply made up her own pattern and started making them herself.  

What else was there left for me to do, but purchase the PDF pattern and start making them myself too?   The beauty of these is that I can use all my scraps on them - when I haven't quite got enough fabric to make a substantial difference to a patchwork quilt, then a fish cushion is the ideal solution.

My first attempt - for Shiriin - was terrible - I just couldn't work out what to do with it.   So the finished article which was sent to Nepal wasn't the best - and I have it on my list to make a much more proficient version to send.   Mortifying.  In fact, so mortifying, that I didn't even take a photo.  I'm very glad to say that they have been improving since though.  What's lovely is the fab comments I've had from the recipients and what's really funny is that some of them have been given names too!

This is Billy, who took up station under Bev's neck while she was poorly and laying on the sofa over Christmas.

 And this little chap now lives with Caroline.  

And here they are together!   I tried to match the fabric to the person as much as I could - so Bev gets greens and Caroline gets browns.  The fins on all of them are made from the blue fabric which I used for Shiriin's scrubs back in the summer, and the peach faces were made from fabric kindly donated by Judith at work.

This is Fsh who now lives with Mary and Jim. (Fsh because he has no eyes!)

And this is his twin, Mac, who lives with Amanda.  (Mac, apparently because he is very obviously Scottish and looks like a mackerel!)

I know I'm not supposed to have favourites, but this is pretty much up there.   This beautiful creature is living with Rachel now and apparently has spent some time in each room in her house to make sure he finds the most comfortable!   I chose this fabric for Rachel as it was the nearest I could find in my stash to Cath Kidston.  Sort of.

This bruiser lives in the Caravan of Love with Andy and matches his pillow case and pyjamas!

I love these fish and am planning on making lots to put on our Folksy site.   They've been so well received - and I know that my lovely friends and family are biased in my favour - but I'm going to try them on the general public soon!

Ice

I should have known that our walk was going to be full of incident, when Finn jumped out of the car onto the icy road and flew spreadeagled down the lane, looking like Bambi!   He seemed to really enjoy it though and did lots of running and sliding along on his bum - he's such a boy!   I took the sensible route and marched straight down the middle of the road where there were no grass verges, and I stuck to the grass when I could.  I hate ice!   I am so nervous of it.   But, in truth, we have been very lucky in East Anglia with the lack of snow and ice so far and I really feel for those around the country who have not been so lucky.

It's very very cold though, despite the scarcity of ice, and we marched as briskly as we could to get a good walk, before heading to Mum and Dad's for a cuppa!

These lanes that we walk on - in Worthing and Hoe - are about a mile from Mum and Dad's - it's so beautiful around here.   This photo is a view of Billingford Lakes taken through a gap in the hedgerow.

Finn of course wanted a swim - bbbbrrrrrrr.   It was at this point that I thought we really ought to get to Mum and Dad so I could get him properly dry and warm.   Bloody dog!

Tada! "Twins!" Cardigans

This cardigan was made for Jessica's fifth birthday.

And this was made for Shannon's Christmas present.   Shannon is twenty-six!

It's very rare that pattern writers manage to get a pattern right with such differing measurements, but this pattern is fab.  It's a Sirdar pattern - I think for Sirdar Crofter wool - the pattern is up in the loft and it's too cold this evening to run up there to confirm!   It's definitely Sirdar.   Instead of the Crofter wool, I had some Sirdar Montana which I was keen to use - this colourway is Big Sky.   The cardigan has three quarter length sleeves and is a really pretty cover up with a very striking diagonal ridge pattern.  I can't wait to make one for me!  This wool goes ever such a long way - I managed to make both cardigans from just one 500 gramme pack and I still had a bit left over to make some hexipuffs when I get round to it.

I found these lovely buttons in Hobbycraft and wish I'd bought more now as I'm sure I could find hundreds of fabrics or wools that would be beautifully matched to these.

Shannon sent me these selfies of the cardigan.  I did comment that it was a beautiful fit, but she did confess that she'd put a couple of stitches in to make it more snug!   Sneaky!

Blog update:   after I sent the link to this post to Ruth, I received an email with a photo of Jessica wearing her version of the cardigan.

And what's pretty amazing is that the colours in Jessica's cardigan have fallen in almost the same colour stripes as Shannon's.  Magic!

And I couldn't have a photo of Jessica without a photo of Katherine in another of my creations - I love this cardigan - the colours are beautiful and this one is 100 per cent wool so really soft too.   

Such beautiful girls, but growing up way too quickly for my liking!

Seeds and Stuff - January 2015

Last year, I totally failed in my garden when it came to veggies.   It was such a beautifully hot summer which went on for ages with not much rain, and I tend to forget about watering.   I always assume that if I haven't watered for a couple of days, it's not the end of the world as we're bound to get some rain very soon.  But not last year.   The only thing I managed to grow was five solitary peppers!   Oh, and lots of fruit - but fruit pretty much looks after itself - I had over ten pounds of plums, I lost count of the amount of pears, and I also had six or seven pounds of apples and pounds and pounds of blackberries.  So I wasn't a total failure.   (But I didn't water a single one of these trees or bushes either!)

So this year, I have resolved to be more organised, more kind to my seedlings, be more generous with feed and water, and this will hopefully lead to a much healthier diet for me, and also I shouldn't be quite so poor as I won't be buying pre-packed salad leaves or tomatoes.  I can't believe I didn't manage to grow a single tomato either - normally I have hundreds of them and have to make my own passata for the freezer just to use them all up.  Not to mention chutneys.  I was very lazy indeed last year!

So, to help me with this endeavour, I am going to post a blog each month with progress updates to try and spur me on.   At the end of the month, if I have nothing to post, it means I've failed again!   This monthly post will be all about my seed sowing, how the garden is doing generally, what I've managed to harvest and possibly even the odd recipe in case of glut.   

This is my potting bench cupboard - it's an old free standing double kitchen unit that Mum and Dad didn't need in North Walsham after they had their new kitchen fitted.   So Andy and I chucked it in the back of the van and brought it home where it has stood in the outhouse for ages while I decided what to use it for.  At one stage, it was full of old jam jars and jars of chutney that I made.  And that was fine for a while. Then one of the doors fell off and I couldn't get it back on again without proper tools - I don't have any.   I know I'm rubbish.   So when Andy came up at Christmas, he did a proper repair job which means the door shuts and I can put my chitting potatoes in, without fear that Finn will get to them and eat them all while I'm at work.

Talking of potatoes, I bought two seed potato varieties - Charlotte and Pink Fir Apple.   I have never grown Charlottes before, but have grown Pink Fir Apples many times - they are brilliant in salads and have a lovely nutty flavour.  I haven't been able to find any Anyas yet - another of my favourites - but am still on the lookout for those.   My work colleagues have donated all the egg boxes!

I have a book which I use to record what I should be sowing and when.   I'm going to concentrate on flowers too this year - my pergola is looking very bare and Mum has given me some flower pots that clip onto the top of the pergola so I can have hanging down flowers - hence the lobelia seeds.   Mary and Jim have also donated some seeds from their passion flower so hopefully they will grow up, to meet the lobelia coming down.   We will see.  The carrots this month are all for Finn - he loves them!   So I have to keep them elevated (which discourages carrot fly anyway which likes to stay close to the ground) to make sure Finn can't get to them to eat them before they're ready!

I have no idea where this green box came from - I'm assuming Mum.   But I have so many seed packets that I've had to fill up a tin as well.  I need to stop buying more seeds and start sowing what I've got!

So, this is what I've sown for January .....

And this is my list for February.   

Watch this space for more updates!