Miaou

Look look look - I was just minding my own business taking a picture of my (messy) front room, and look who popped up!

After having a good look around he introduced himself to Calum’s animal collection and hung out there for a while …

But he seems to have made good friends with Gerald, who is showing him the ropes.

After all that he was a bit peckish and spotted a snack - hands off my mushroom monkee, Nita made that for me!!

Thank you very much Kerry at monkeemaker who sent me this troublemaker delightful bundle of fun!

My poor neglected blog. My computer died then I went away on holiday, and between the two I have simply not had the opportunity to post anything! Sorry to all those who have been checking and finding me sadly stalled in September. Computer still dead, so I’m posting on Nick’s laptop, which is not ideal but I just had to do something!

Anyway, given the day, I thought I would post some pics of our Halloween outfits. Calum unilaterally decided that he and Euan would be going as dinosaurs. The flash makes the material look a lot more shiny than it really is! The sharp-eyed amongst you might notice that it’s the same material that I used for my wedding outfit earlier on in the year. Naturally they wouldn’t both pose at the same time so there are two pictures:

Calum showing off his spikes

Euan displaying his tail

Eilish has been asking for years to go as a Native American and this year I finally got round to doing it! Caitlin is dressed as a Victorian Match Girl and is going to paint her face grey so she looks like a ghost (she made up a story to go with it, apparently she met a grisly end under the wheels of a cart, lol)

Victorian Match Girl and American Indian

Edit: Calum won Best Dressed at Nursery this afternoon, he was most pleased!

Ah, a lot of things to share!

Firstly, a big thank you to Margy at Hmm Designs who sent me this fab turtle! I won the giveaway on her 150th post and she very kindly made me this lovely little stuffie.

Thank you Margy! The kids are very keen to have it but I’m keeping this for my very own

Next up, I have finished my stole! I hope the recipient likes it. I’m pleased with the way it has come out, and I have commissions for two more. I really enjoyed doing it - embroidery and applique are mediums I feel very comfortable with - so am looking forward to doing the next two.

And finally, my cork army has been growing … I went to my local wine bar and they very kindly gave me a bag full of corks with the promise of more in a couple of weeks! So I have been busy, look!

And finally - a confession. I was going to have a giveaway for my 100th post. Only I’ve just checked and um, I’m on post 101 now. Oops. Hopefully a giveaway will follow soon - I have an idea of what I am going to offer, just need to find the time to make it now!!

Start more, obviously … ;-D

My applique stole is coming on nicely; in fact, I’m not far off completion. But there are times when it is not practical to get sharp needles out (mainly when there are very small children around!). So between times I needed something else to do (but obviously not any of the other non-sharp-needle-type projects I have on the go. That would be boring.)

Anyhoo, a friend of mine came to the rescue on that front - she is having a craft stall at a cancer charity event at the beginning of October and was panicking a wee bit about what to sell (she makes beautiful ceramics but is a bit short on time!). I gamely offered her a box of stuff I made for a stall last year, most of which went unsold (not because it wasn’t nice. Everyone stopped and said, “ooh, how lovely!” then walked off to the car boot stalls and got a plant pot for 50p. It was that kind of fair. Nuff said). But I can’t find the dratted box. I think it is still packed up somewhere from when we moved house. So I decided I’d better make some stuff, and quick.

So - first up - if anyone subscribes to LionBrand you will have seen these in your mailbox this week - a free pattern for Gecko bookmarks. Aren’t they fab?

Gecko Bookmarks

Fortunately I have a ready supply of red pipe cleaners and googly eyes. Enough to make a dozen or more anyway! I think I might branch out into some other colours though. My girls are already begging me for one each (”of course,” I said, “buy them from the stall!”)

Secondly, how about these wee cork folk?

Cork Folk

Very cute and irresistable to small children with money to burn pocket money to spend!

I must point out though, these are stunt corks. Nick very kindly drank a couple of bottles of wine so that I could use them for my cork people. Sadly though, they are plastic corks and covered with the names of the wine makers, so they lose a little charm in my eyes. I really need some proper corks. I tried everywhere in town to get some but apparently no-one sells them here any more! Someone suggested asking the restaurants if I could have some of their used ones (apparently they keep them and a little man comes along and collects them for recycling every so often), but I haven’t plucked up the courage yet. I would feel a bit daft explaining what I am doing. “Well, I knit them little jumpers and hats.” Hmm. Perhaps you could send me some …

Ok, so - number of projects underway in my last post: four

Number of projects underway not in my last post: a further four

Number of projects completed since last post: none

Number of new projects started since my last post: erm …

But - I did complete one!

Look - I made a messenger bag for Eilish’s best friend for her birthday:

Bag for Erin

I made it really quickly last night, and finished it off this afternoon. I used the first messenger bag tute I came across, which happened to be this one , which was incredibly easy to follow and the bag was a great size when finished. I had just enough purple material for the outside of the bag, and used a light denim fabric to line it and make the straps.

There was a wee bit of the purple left to make a pocket inside too:

Close up of the pocket

Eilish is thrilled with it, hopefully Erin will like it too! She happened to mention that purple was her favourite colour, but I didn’t have any purple fabric. Then the following day I was walking along the promenade when I came across a garage sale at one of the houses on the seafront. Hey presto, vintage purple fabric for a small charity donation. Serendipity, aye!

I have been doing lots of “bits” recently, and consequently have loads of half-finished projects on the go and nothing complete. I think I need to stop being a butterfly and concentrate on getting something done. Now the older ones are back at school and one of the littles is now at nursery each afternoon, in theory I should be a bit more productive! Hah - we’ll see.

Anyhoo, this is some of what I have been doing:

My mum very kindly offered to buy me some wool for my birthday to make myself a cardigan. After a lot of prevarication, I finally settled on grey as a “goes with everything” colour (I don’t do black!). The yarn is gorgeous and lovely to work with, so I started very enthusiastically, but have now slowed to a halt. The great thing about top-down construction is you don’t have to wait until it’s done until you try it on! I finished the top and did about six inches of the first sleeve - only to find that I had indeed done the wrong size (I thought I would need the smallest size but in fact it will be a little tight on the arms). Ah well, I shall pull it back and try again. But for now it is nestling in the bottom of my project bag.

So, whilst deciding what to do about my cardigan, my itchy fingers pulled out a skein of Lorna’s Lace Shepherd Sock yarn that I had been given as a present a couple of years ago. I have made socks before (well, one pair) and just love them! I’m not great with four needles so I stick to the very simple pattern that came with my first pair. I have made one so far. See, I’m just not good at finishing stuff at the moment!

Then I got very excited about some new yarn I have got from Scandanavian Knitting Designs . This is where my grey yarn comes from and I strongly recommend them if you are in Europe. They have a great selection of unusual and difficult-to-find yarns, their prices are reasonable and their delivery times are fast!

So, the yarn I bought is Kauni Effektgarn in Rainbow. I have coveted this yarn for months, and finally managed to track it down in Britain - previously I have only found it available abroad! So that made me a very happy bunny.  This is what I have been doing with it:

My love affair with yo yos continues! These are destined to be Made Into Something. I Have Plans. I will not abandon them and start something else … oh, except to finish this …

Remember the silk from my last post? Well here it is in action. Not anywhere near finished, but certainly in progress … watch this space!

And finally, for those of you who have impatiently scanned through this post to find out what on earth “footerin’” is, here is the description from a site that boasts Scots Word of the Week :

“Footer (also fouter) - Meaning to fiddle/tinker, a person who does this, or a fiddly task. This weeks Scots word of the week is a perfect word to describe that slightly aimless state of fiddling around with something in a totally unhurried way. Similar words are pottering and pootling.”

All clear now?

I can’t wait to get going with this!

Yummy …

These colours are going to make up a stole (as in church vestment) - I think it will look stunning!

And this I picked up as a remnant for a song from my fabby fabric shop - I am going to make a beeeyoootiful bag from it I think!

I spend a lot of time on Google images looking for inspiration when it comes to designing things. I might have an idea, but I’m not good at just drawing from my imagination. It’s a technique my dad taught me when I was a child - he told me that it was perfectly acceptable to copy a head from one source and a body from another, to make a third - and unique - picture of my own. It’s a philosophy I have followed religiously since then

Anyhoo, I have an idea for a bag and I am researching colours and shapes prior to doing some sketching … and I came across this site , full of the most wonderful finds! I especially like this:

And these:

And this is just fabulous!

When I have lots of money to burn spend, I am going to get one of those! (Still at the drawing stage with the design though so I’m not giving any clues away just yet!)

In other news, for those of you who are fans of MonkeeMaker - she is back, after a sabbatical! With a new website and a great giveaway - see here . Take a look!

I finally went off to Wick this afternoon with seven (yes, seven!) handmade bags for the Made In Caithness shop. They were very well received so fingers crossed they sell well! Here they are, some being ably modelled by Eilish because they looked a bit sad and floppy on my table.

This is my crochet shoulder bag (remember all those little yo-yo’s?)

And here is a close-up (I lined it with a light denim):

This one is a lovely (if a little floppy) shoulder bag made from curtains (as if you couldn’t guess, but I rather like the colour!)

I put a matching pocket inside:

I’ve made this bag three times now! I like this version though - these handles remind me of maltesers … yum …

And a sneaky peek inside …

And another pair-of-jeans-made-into-a-bag (I’ve had lots of compliments about my own one!)

And another close-up for good luck:

Now the sharp-eyed amongst you will note that the two bags I put in my last post, plus the four in this one, do not make seven. No, sirree. However, the seventh one is a knitted one, exactly the same as this one, so there seemed little point in taking a picture!

I’ve got lots more ideas, so more bags on their way soon I think.

Not one, but two bags! This first one I made following Lisa’s wonderfully clear tutorial at U-handblog , from some leftover curtaining material that I managed to blag from my local material shop. It’s so pretty I felt it was crying out to be made into this bag! The handles go so well with it, don’t they?

Funnily enough, the fabric looks like I cut it all wonky in this shot, but I really didn’t! I must take better picture of it I think!

Here’s the interior:

Then here is another bag of my own design. I quite like it but if I made it again I would not make it quite as deep I think.

And another interior shot (wonky blurry pics are us!)