glorious at last

Hope you are all enjoying the wonderful sunshine- just in time for the school holidays. We certainly are.

We're off to the beach on Friday, but I've got a horrible feeling the rain may be back by then. Fingers crossed I'm wrong!

if i had a hama

The last few days of the school holidays have been spent getting up late, snuggling, drinking hot chocolate, a trip to the cinema and lots of fun making and doing. 

Having now taken down the Christmas decorations, Flora and I decided to make some pretty dangly things from the bumper tub of Hama beads that Father Christmas had brought her. Partly inspired by Lou's lovely Hama window decorations, and partly inspired by Tiff's tremendous Happy Hangers of Joyfulness, we made some cheerful little mobiles to brighten up this dull, dismal January.

I started off by making this little woodland-style mobile to hang in the girls' window. I'm hoping it will shine chirpiness into their room, even when it's wet and windy outside, as it is today.

Meanwhile, Flora set about creating hers, which features a random assortment of brightly coloured bits and bobs to hang over her bed.

I especially like this  cute little face (me apparently!) because she patiently sat designing and making it entirely independently.

I found myself feeling a little envious of the sunny little dangly things and promptly decided to create a few of my own in the shape of some of my favourite things- can you tell what they're meant to be?

This one is my personal favourite....

OK, so you know you must be ready to go back to work when you start making Pyrex dishes out of children's craft materials!

What are you doing to keep the January blues away?

a space of my own

It's hard to believe we've lived in our cosy little home for a year now. In many ways it's flown by, but in others it feels like we've been here forever. The one room I'd not got round to properly sorting out since we moved in was the dining room and it had turned into a bit of a dumping ground for things that didn't belong anywhere else. So this weekend, after a trip to Ikea to buy additional shelving, I set about organising this space once and for all.

You will notice that I have finally got a crafting space, all of my very own, with a shelf high enough to keep small fingers away from my best scissors! It's been a really good excuse to rummage through my fabric scraps and oddments of yarn- just the kick I needed to get my creative juices flowing again.

Having seen my greatly under-used sewing machine looking all happy and shiny in its new space, I felt the need to try it out immediately. Luckily I had a star-puncher and some newspaper to hand and whipped up a thrifty Christmas decoration for  the mantelpiece...

Happy days!

hurray, i'm back

Hello everyone, what have I missed?

Our broadband is finally connected and we have re-joined the modern world. Meanwhile, we have been busy settling into our fantastic new home and I will now happily concede that having to leave Purl Cottage was the luckiest thing that has happened all year!

Would you like to take a little peek through the door of number 52?

Due to a combination of the rubbish light in recent days and my ancient old compact camera, it's been a challenge to take photographs that do the place justice, but these will give you a bit of a taster.

This is my favourite room in the house- the living room. I'm really pleased how our furniture has fitted in so well...

 

The woodburning stove has been so cosy in all the really cold weather we had in the week that we moved in.

The kitchen is a galley-style extension on the back of the house...

It's not your typical country cottage kitchen with an Aga etc, but it is the nicest kitchen we've ever had and I think the dark units go well with all my 60s and 70s bits and bobs. The appliances are all cunningly hidden away behind cupboard doors and we are especially excited about having our very first dishwasher- I don't know how we ever managed without one!

Another bonus is that there is a separate dining room, which we didn't have in the other place. I have reserved a corner for setting up as a crafting area, where I'm going to put up some shelves to store my stash of yarn and fabric.

In the fireplace, there is a funny old iron bread oven that I've been too scared to try out so far...

The bathroom is so shiny and posh- it still feels like we're living in a hotel suite at the moment...

I need to keep an eye out for bathrooms nick-nacks during my next charity shop trawl, to go on top of the fireplace, as it's looking a bit bare at the moment (although in an ideal world I'd have a long row of multicoloured bottles of Molton Brown bubble baths!)

but I have allowed myself one little extravagance (thanks mum!)....

There are some shelves above the staircase- I'm not sure what to put on them at the moment, so I have made a 1950s toy cowboy display while I think about it a bit more...

and last but not least is the girls' room.

My brief from Flora for this room was a Nanny McPhee-style nursery (crikey was I glad that she didn't want Hannah Montana or something pink and horrid!)...

Their room in our last house was smaller than a shoe-box and it was a squeeze just to fit in the cot and toddler-bed, so it is lovely that they now have proper beds and plenty of space to get to all their toys.

How fab is the vinyl atlas frieze I picked up in habitat?
 

I haven't bothered taking any pictures of our room yet, as it is looking very plain and boring at the moment. I need some inspiration for what to do with it as it's an attic room with sloping walls and not suitable for conventional bedroom furniture. The sloping walls also mean that we can't hang pictures up, so I'm keeping my eye out for some grown-up vinyl decals to brighten it up a bit.

Unfortunately, there is no garden, but there is a back yard which I'm also still thinking about what to do with- pictures to follow in the Spring.

I'm off to try and catch up with a snippet of what I've been missing in your blogs- oh how I've missed you all xx

outside there's a box car waiting...

So this is our last proper day in Purl Cottage. 

Tomorrow we pick up the keys to the new house and commence the exhausting process of humping bags and boxes back and forth. I am not sure I have the energy for all this- work has been so tiring over the last month and I am sick to death of being surrounded by boxes and not being able to find anything. The only thing keeping me going is thought if snuggling up in front of my new wood burner with my pussy-cat and a glass of mulled wine, after our community Christmas lights are switched on on Saturday evening. 

image credit

I won't be back for a little while as, despite giving BT a month's notice of our move, they aren't going to get our broadband sorted out for a fortnight grrrr. So when we're eventually reconnected to the modern world, the house should be looking like a cosy home, fingers crossed!

TTFN x

four and twenty blackbirds

Recently, I was lucky enough to win a fabulous giveaway, over at Scented Sweetpeas. I was really excited because I never win anything, let alone such lovely, sweet little goodies. 

In amongst my many prizes was this fabulous ceramic blackbird pie funnel, which not only is a handy kitchen item, but coincidentally, also has some significance to our new street.

It is said that the nursery rhyme Sing a Song of Sixpence is a reference to the poet Henry James Pye, Poet Laureate and one-time local resident. Apparently, he wrote an awful lot of dreary poems about birds and was a bit of a laughing stock. 

It is dubious as to whether the poem was actually written about him, as its origins appear to be disputed, but it was certainly recited frequently by his contemporaries in order to mock him... "four and twenty blackbirds baked in a Pye".

image credit

Now, how is all this random, not particularly interesting trivia related to my new home?

Well, when I was small (about 6 or 7), I had a friend who lived in a house on the same street as the house we will be moving to next week. Her mother was a potter / general artisan- she had an  enormous, beautiful studio in the attic of their rambling, frightfully bohemian house. 

The family have long since moved away, but a little part of them remains. At the time they were living there, they named the property 'Rye House' and her mother crafted a ceramic pie to put over the door, as well as making exactly 24 blackbirds to roost on the many windowsills. I remember seeing some of these very birds sitting on the bench my friend's mother's studio, awaiting their finishing touches.

When we moved back to the area last year, I was surprised and delighted to see the pie and blackbirds still adorning the house. I had such great times playing here and have all sorts of happy memories, including us haring round the house in bizarre fancy dress and running down to be fed when her mother banged the gigantic golden dinner gong. 

It's so strange to think we are now going to be living opposite this place!

Thank you again to Scented Sweetpeas for my lovely prizes and for prompting me to post about my new street.

farewell purl cottage garden

Today Pearl and I made the most of the break in the storms and got stuck into a spot of gardening.

The first thing I did was pot up this beautiful Acer Atropurpureum that I sent off for on a free Gardener's World Magazine offer. I had been planning to buy one anyway for our new garden, as I just adore acers- they must be my very favourite plant. Something about the delicate structure bobbing about in the breeze and the way the leaves turn the most breathtaking crimson really gets me excited.

I do hope this one goes on to flourish into a superb potted tree that we can keep forever, wherever we're living...

I could tell you that the rest of the garden was looking stunning in all its Autumnal glory...

 but really, that would be a big fat lie.

It actually looks like this...

As you can see, the grim reality has kicked in. We are going to be leaving our beloved garden behind- the shed has been emptied, the strawberry plants lifted and, most painful of all, the faithful veg box has been cleared. 

I've had to harvest my Brussels sprouts rather prematurely- these emerald beauties were ear-marked for Christmas, but I don't really fancy frozen sprouts with my Christmas dinner, so I think they're now crying out to be pan-fried with pancetta... mmmmmm.

So, tonight I'm drowning my sorrows with some margaritas and a little extra help from some of my dad's finest...

Farewell Purl Cottage garden. 

You will be sorely missed.

a new home

Just a week ago I was in the depths of despair because we were being made homeless.

This week, I am brimming with excitement having found the most perfect new home, just round the corner from where we are now. Not only is our new home even prettier than this one, it is much more spacious and is full of quirky character.

But the most exciting bit of all for me is the lovely wood burning stove in the lounge- something I've bored everyone I know to tears about wanting one, ever since we went on a Featherdown Farm holiday a couple of years ago. I absolutely can't wait to pull up a chair and toast my chilly toes in front of the fire- what a Christmas present!

And, of course, more space means new excuses to collect even more brightly-coloured tat to fill it up- hurrah! So I've become slightly obsessed with planning all my new rooms in my head, with the aid of my new-found addiction Pinterest boards.

It looks like we'll be moving in four weeks tomorrow- I just can't wait!

mitten im leben

I haven't had time for too much crafting over the last couple of weeks, but I did just finish these little mitts for my sister-in-law's birthday.

The pattern was very easy-to-follow and it should have been a straightforward project. However just as I was finishing the second, I noticed a small anomaly in the pattern, halfway down the mitt and although it was a small error that I doubt Ruby would have noticed, the perfectionist in me was compelled to rip it down and do it again!

 

I used about 40g of Palette Vintage yarn in Otter. The yarn was interesting to knit with- at first I was struggling to believe that it was worsted weight, because it felt quite fine, but, to my surprise, it did knit up to the required gauge. It's a 70% wool / 30% soya bean mix (I must say 'Vintage' is a strange choice of name for such a modern fibre) and I think the soya gave the fibre strength, as it was quite a fluffy yarn that would have kept splitting without the soya. My main criticism of it would be that it is very unevenly spun and quite lumpy, making the stitches look a little scruffy in places. I really love the colourway  but I think the lumpiness was just too much of an irritation for me to use it again (although it appears to have been significantly reduced since I bought it, so I may just have to stash a few more balls- you know me and a bargain...)

Despite those few minor whinges, I do really love how these mitts turned out and I will be using the pattern again to make some for myself, as I seem to only be able to find one of my mittens from last winter and my hands are getting chilly!

Oh, and things are looking up on the home-front. More about that another day, but I may be a little absent for a few weeks while we start the daunting task of packing up!