A bunting we will go...

At long last I have completed one of my many WIP's and consequently completed my bunting. I decided to do something a little different though and instead of crocheting the triangles together decided to thread some vintage braid through the natural spaces made by the "granny clusters". Alice asked if I was being lazy and I soon corrected her by saying mummy is being very resourceful ! So have a peek and see what you think.

Have a closer look at the braid

Surprise, Surprise it's that old favourite of mine pink and green again

The light is not brilliant in these photo's (blustery august greyness!) and I always seem to be attracted to using the floor as a "photo studio"

I might be tempted to put a vintage button or crochet a flower for the centre's , what do you think ?

I also wanted to share this delicious book that I have loaned from my LYS called Wa wa wool which is owned by the lovely, ever so helpful Fran (I think her website needs a wee bit more work). Her library of books is incredible and she will happily loan her books out 1 at a time for a £5.00 annual fee, brilliant idea for those of us who own too many books anyway.

Ooooooh it's delicious and caters for beginners, intermediate and advanced ... one  can only hope xox

And last but not least a pic of my lovely 1970's hen that I needed to complete from over a year ago. Her very simple pattern was found in a Charity shop 70's embroider / sewing book. I like her and have added my own touch of vintage to her eye and beak. Any name suggestions? ( I must ask Alice too...)

Have a wonderful week of wooli-ness

Edit: Thank you to http://crochethealingandraymond.wordpress.com/  for naming Mrs. Hen, Dolores. My little Alice (age 9 and 7/ 8ths !) has agreed with her, hooray another win win xox

Aardvark happiness

I love these prints by Aardvark  who are based just a 20 minute cycle down the coast from me and the idea of creating your own "life manifesto" like this first print

 what do you think?

Yes please...

Thank you Samuel Beckett...

,

I also want my boat of life to be light...

I am not sure what your manifesto would be, I think mine might change from time to time but today it's something like:

Where there's hope there's TEA

Star gaze at night

Wherever you are there you are

Make sand castles

Climb trees

Eat cucumber,mint and cream cheese sandwiches

Give flower posies

Get hooky happy

Celebrate your children at all moments in their life

Create romance

Have vintage parties

Blow raspberries ;o)

A few of my favourite things ...

WOW I was pleasantly surprised to see some new comments and followers of my blog , this is such fun, Thank you to all of you for visiting, it feels like another win win situation whereby you get to see what I am up to and then I get to go into your creative worlds. The internet never ceases to amaze me, can anyone remember life without it? 

Thinking about it now I am kind of glad I grew up without technology in the beauty of South Africa and where imagination was as high tech as it got in my little world. Alice loves stories from my childhood, climbing trees, reading Enid Blyton, sticking, painting and glueing allsorts and of course getting up to mischief!

Anyway, I digress today is about a few of my favourite things in amongst :

"Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens;

Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens;
Brown paper packages tied up with strings;

These are a few of my favourite things".

Let's start with some of my bunting which I made out of old tea towels and took camping a week ago, it looked pretty flapping away in the breeze, especially when the sun went behind the clouds and we needed something to cheer us up!

Now, progress with my large granny cotton blankie which is eventually getting a border to complete her. First a row of dc and tr (UK) or sc followed by dc (USA) , I did a half treble in the chain space of the corners. I have ended the blankie with one of my favourite colour combinations pink and green. I plan to do some sort of bobble / shell after this tr/dc row for the finale. I love the feel of the organic cottons ...yummmm

I have just noticed from this pic that I started off bright then went mute almost dull ? I blame it on the weather we are having in august :(

Here is a pretty doillie that I attempted to crochet some time ago and have decided to include in one of my pillowslip projects and thought I would share with you. As you can see the pink and green theme continues!

  

I have also put some of my charity shop button finds to good use and started making a necklace for a friend who likes nautical themed goodies, can you spot the little purply red flowers I crocheted and popped a red button in the middle ? My plan is to knit the rest of the necklace and make it into a choker type of necklace. I'll pop a pic on when it's completed.

 

And then there were more bunting triangles...thank you to the lovely Alice for inspiration

Then a temptation to teach myself to knit cables came my way from this website Lionbrand which is an american website and patterns are free when you join xox This is the left hand of fingerless gloves which I am knitting with 25% wool and 75% acrylic...EEEKKKKK is usually what I say when I touch, hear, or see acrylic but I have to eat humble pie and say this very cheap ball (£1.25) from my LYS did the owner proud and I have become less of a snob about man-made yarn.

Last but not least here a couple of pretty authentic british pics from last sunday on my cycle ride that have made me smile this summer :o)

Happy hooky heart skippy moments to you all xox

Sunday, fun day

Yesterday afternoon it was a little breezy but sunny too so I cycled down to the seaside on my bike to visit my favourite art deco heavenly building in Bexhill-on-Sea where I live to see the latest art exhibition and the annual august free sunday afternoon concerts and here are a few pictures of what I found...

Firstly a peak at my art deco delight, The De La Warr Pavilion

and now a postcard from the shop which is far better photography than mine !

and one of the stunning staircase and it's famous chairs

I saw the famous Anthony Gormley ( he made the Angel of the North) "Critical Mass" exhibiltion on the roof terrace, it was eery and beautiful

What do you think ? I feel very privledged to have this art gallery and theatre on my doorstep. They have recently been focussing on installations and I found a few interesting bits downstairs

 like this Tomoko Takahashi installation inside a shed

I like it a lot, especially with Tchaikovsky playing when you poked your head inside the shed door

here's her explanation ...

then I pootled downstairs to find this beautiful ensemble from Ghana whilst having a little beer in the sunshine in a deckchair ;o)

and of course a bit of this ...

Got to go it's bed and story time for my Alice xox next time more crochet / knitting to share x

Feast for my eyes

I found this website last night Cloth kits and just couldn't get enough of it , all those liberty fabrics, yarns and printed skirts to sew , mmm yummy. Enjoy a bit of eye candy for yourself on their website

an apple a day keeps the Dietitian away  xox

1am in the morning

Last night I fell into big temptation and found myself doing another (slightly tedious row) of my cotton blanket

but boredom set in too quickly...so I folded it up despite enjoying all the zinging colours and got the laptop downstairs ...

and made one of these...

thank you to  Alice xox

and then I made this lovey african flower (pattern found on ravelry by Saartje a fellow south african hooky happy chick) which I plan to make a few of and assemble as bunting for my stall at a local vintage market in October, I am pleased witht he result and love the hexagon shape.

It took me a few goes to get it right and a little moaning and a couple of pots of tea but by 1am I had made it and went to bed full of hooky thoughts of african flowers and my childhood. So here it is, what do you think ? It's not perfect and the colours could be better but I am pleased with my first attempt xox

and then on my way out of the living room I found Alice's cyclops she had made earlier this year in my country living magazine rack , this added an interesting dimension to my childhood dreams ...

Have a wonderful weekend xox

Sweet charity (shops)

Happy Friday everyone, it is indeed a happy one for me having come back from camping on Wednesday and only worked 2 days and now I have the weekend of family time, knitting, hooking and gardening and maybe a little sewing !!   I desperately need more hours in the day... work just interferes with the university of life , I just get so inspired so easily that I just want to stop and dooooooo all the lovely projects I encounter on the blogs I follow and books I read etc etc.

Anyway, I am just whinging and need to press on and try so very hard not to be tempted to start another project and simply FORCE myself to set goals which are achievable and of course timely to finish those projects I have already on the go (counting 1,2,3,4..maybe more!).
A mixture of happy frustration in amongst the enthusiasm is exhausting me.

My post today is a little find I want to share with you, its about a lot of things really. Firstly I have to thank God for UK charity shops and recycling material possessions, secondly it's about supporting a charity you believe in, in this case my find was in a MIND charity shop (for mental health sufferers) and then it's the joy of thrifty little treasures and the thinking of which lovely lady owned what you've found and the tapestry of her life and then thinking about what you can do with your simple treasures.  

So here it is a simple sweet charity shop find this afternoon:

a little flower tin with...

buttons in ...let's have a closer look

Ok those are fun, I am sure I can find a use for them, maybe I could sew a vintage bag and use these ?

some black beauties , mmmmm..loverly (I am liking the sailor one ;o)

some blue shiny one's.. .I feel a necklace coming on

and one sweet red lonesome button xox and of course the rest of the tin to rummage through

And then in the corner of my eye I spotted these beauties for 10 pence each, I just had to buy them because I love the 50's, 60's, and 70's images and I am sure I will be tempted to knit a pattern or two, have a look...

a practical guide to knitting and crochet, ah what bliss, I have tried desperately to see when this ed. was published but no joy, my guess is around 1940's and the reason why I thought 1940's is that I had to smile when I was this pattern

possibly a war time make do and mend ? maybe you can help me on this one, i am sure Alice will giggle when I show her this

I am loving this hairstyle xox

and these are such fun, what crazy colours... this was published in 1976

Sorry about the red backround I ended up looking for some light on this grey afternoon and it was on the step to our victorian outhouse loo ! I think I like the funky black,blue and white one on the left and will be a very good girl and resist  temptation and put in on  my "desperate to do" list , have a fabulous weekend everyone.