27/52

Hello, how are you? I am loving the warm weather we are having on the South East coast today. It's supposed to stay for the weekend I think, so hopefully we can pack a picnic and head down to the beach for some chilling and a bbq.

lots has happened this week, its been a good and not so good one in some ways, but I'm here to focus on the good, sweet moments of my life....so here goes

I found a whole bunch of keys in a junk shop in Eastbourne and this sweet card from a vintage shop and they made me smile. I am an avid key collector, I adore old keys and have a lot few in my collection! I want to make some jewelry and have keys as a feature, we'll see.

Pretty shadows and flowers from the garden of one of our favourite pubs to eat at on a Sunday. I had a crayfish and avocado salad which was delish. 

Knitting in the sunshine with my new yarn I bought on Saturday and attempting to make the Oaklet Shawl. I took it to knit and natter last night and realised I was going horribly wrong on the lacey bit, but thanks to the help of Jo and Lesley I managed to pull it back and hope and pray I can count my stitches correctly now. I need to CONCENTRATE on this and it's making me nervous. Ha ha, I am sure mine will look nothing like what it's supposed to! Nevermind, it's all practice. 

I also took these 3 photo's of Lesley's blankets. This one is a WIP 

Gorgeous or what? And just look at this one she made for her daughter from Noro yarn which took her 500 hours to make and quite a few pounds too!

Lesley was happy for me to photograph these and pop on my blog. How beautiful are they? One day I will make one of these fabulous blankets.I will, I will ....

Putting some fresh flowers in my beautiful Alice's room, there have been some tears this week. Not fun being an almost 13 year old girl at times. Why are girls so nasty to each other at times?

Having some serious fun with tie dying which I haven't done for what feels like many years (over 20 at least when I was going through a bit of a hippie stage). This is Dylon dye and I was shocked that you no longer have to boil your tee-shirts and pillow cases for hours in a big pot on the stove. It just involves a bucket, salt, the dye and some warm water and a few minutes and hey presto, we are hippies again :o)

Oh, the joy of 2 x £1 pressies for Carol and John who's housewarming we are going to tomorrow eve. I love those jelly moulds and have a couple myself and just like to make colourful jelly to watch it wobble once it has set. Weird, but true!

Alipops brought home her wood tech project home this week and promptly told me she got top marks for it...worthy of an appearance on my blog indeed :o)

Last, but not least I loved picking some elder flowers which are everywhere at the moment from our local hedgerows and making elder flower cordial from this gorgeous book I found yet again in my library.

I hope to make a little of this too...(fabulously easy recipe, you can actually see these if you follow the link above and click on the "look inside" on the book cover)

Hooray for the English hedgerows! I plan to renew this book and write down some of the seasonal hedgerow recipes with the flora and fruits I know I can pick locally.

I hope you have found some sweet moments in your week too

Wishing you a marvelous weekend 

xox

See you soon

Penny

26/52

Hello again! Oops I forgot to log my happies and sweet little free moments from last week. Was it really the mid year last week? My goodness where has all the time gone?

Here goes...

Some nature bits and bobs from my sweet potted garden. I get very excited when poppies self seed into the cracks of our courtyard garden.

A new little face knitted from this sweet pattern. I have always adored Julie's beautiful creature creations, she is Julie of Little Cotton Rabbit blog fame. It's my first attempt at her face and I am not sure if I am 100% happy with her nose/mouth area and might give it another go.

Some window admiring and pootling around Hastings old town. This is the lovely Hendy's Home Store in the old town high street. 

 

Loving delicious summer food, avocado, mozzarella, sun dried tomato and olive salad. Yum.

Admiring, but not buying this ashtray in a charity shop. I would have snapped it up if it was a plate or dish , but I simply couldn't bring myself to buy it being an ashtray despite loving the design.

Wishing you all a sweetly simple and happy week.

Thanks so much for all your great comments on my last post. 

See you soon

xox

The smell of the sea

This morning after doing some boring domestic chores, I decided to cycle to Hastings to the Summertime curiosity bazaar in the glorious sunshine and summer coastal breeze.

It was low tide and despite the day starting with some clouds, it was warm and I could smell that sea salt smell in the humid air. A smell that is so familiar to me, a childhood and summer holiday smell. A comforting family camping and my Dad fishing in the sea smell. It only conjures up images and happy memories for me. I love it so.

There were people dotted about the beach and along the cycle walk way from Bexhill-on-Sea to St.Leonards -on-sea and Hastings. Dog walkers and pushchairs with summer time umbrellas, people with cooler clothing on, all looking lighter and less heavy from the grey winter we had.

Stopping to admire all the beach huts and seaside plants and fishermen's rope. All a sensory delight.

Stopping and admiring some iconic buildings like Marine Court built in the mid 1930's and the poor Hastings Pier which burnt down some years ago now and is trying to be restored by Hastings Pier Charity

I eventually got to the Bazaar which was good fun, unfortunately I was not allowed to take any photos to show you, but you will have to believe me when I say it was full of remade, vintage and beautiful crafty goodies.

I was rather pleased to meet Jo from Lime green jelly yarn. I have purchased some of her yarn in the past from another Christmas fair, but have never met her. It was so lovely perusing her beautiful hand dyed yarns which she makes with Elaine, another knitter friend whom I met and chatted away to. Their little display of yarn is called Insane jelly, a collaboration of their talents and of course I had to purchase some from them.

Jo spins her own yarn which is divine and Elaine (aka Insane Elaine) was telling me all about her gorgeous 5 week(!) knitting holiday to Shetland where she learnt to shear a sheep, spin and dye yarn as well as make lace amongst hundreds of other divine woolly things. Oh, my it sounds like my kind of holiday heaven.

After a delicious felalel, salad and frites meal I cycled my way back home. Happy and satisfied with my purchases and once again that comforting smell of sea air...a little interjected with bbq fish which smelt delicious too.

Always stopping to admire the flora and colours on the way home and then I had an idea...why not show you my yarn "on seaside location"!

Is it not just gorgeous, I think I know where I got my inspiration from for choosing these delicious colours!

Nothing better than smelling the sea air and seeing the sea side colours to inspire me. I'm planning to knit myself a shawl with this 4 ply sock yarn and can't wait to get knitting. I am hoping to find a shawl pattern on Ravelry with a little lace in it to step up my confidence and skills and challenge myself again xox Happy weekend to you all, I hope you are enjoying the fresh air wherever you are x







A treat

 

 

When I got home today a treat was waiting for me, a treat that I purchased on payday from Amazon. A book I have had my eye on for a while, one I forgot about, then remembered, then forgot about again until the other night when it appeared via one website leading to another, then another and another and voila, it was ordered!

 

This story by Hans Christian Anderson, has been stunningly illustrated by the very clever Sanna Annukka (I adore all the triangles and soul birds she uses). She also designs for the beautiful Finnish Marimekko.

 

I am just sharing a few of the delicious pages from this hard covered beauty. It's a real gem and definite keeper. I feel so inspired by the colour combinations, inspired enough to be thinking about yarn in these combinations for some up and coming projects.

 

What is inspiring you at the moment?

I'd love to hear.

Thanks for stopping

and for your comments

xox

 



Pixies

Last week I finished these very sweet baby pixie hats. It was a free pattern I found on Ravelry and although I was tempted to splash out on some Noro kochoran at just under £15 a pop to knit these two hats up with, one of my knit and natter friends suggested I used any Aran weighted wool and because this was going at a reduced price from Fran's shop I bought a couple of 50g balls. She sells them on ebay too if you are interested.

Anyway, here they are back and front without the pom poms I was planning to put on the ends. I did attempt to make a couple of pom poms for the red one but they just fell apart!! I guess I should buy myself one of those pom pom makers if I want success in the future. You will notice that I left a few of the tightly attached threads at the ends to create a bit of an effect. The green one just got knots which is good enough I think.

I do love this tweedy yarn and the subtle strands of other colours dotted throughout it. I think these colours will be good for a sweet baby boy or girl, uni-sex colours I hope.

These sweet little Pixie hats are for two of my colleagues who are expecting their babies in the Autumn. New life, new joy!

See you soon

xox

Penny

ps. I am here on bloglovin if you want to see any new posts, I haven't really got my head around this yet,but I managed to register myself and that's it so far :o)I will of course endeavour to find your lovely blogs to keep up with my reading x