I once threw beer at a swan, and then it attacked my niece Rebecca

Two posts in two days? Inconceivable.

Anyway, we went to Kew yesterday, and I took the amazing DSLR and had a go at taking some photos without anyone holding my hand and reminding me that I can do this.

MORE COLLAGES.  I've made a page on the blog - it's over there on the side now, not on the top, after the radical redesign.

I will try not to be so self-indulgent in future.  The operative word here is "try". 

Highly unlikely, but not outside the realms of possibility?

Last night was all about the hand-sewing, tonight is all about the knitting.  Yonks ago, I actually can't remember when, I decided I wanted a close fitting grey jumper with rainbow stripes, so bought some Faroese wool in grey and some rainbow Kauni wool from eBay, which I promptly lost in a pub somewhere.  I swore a lot, and sulked a lot, and then bought some cream wool and some more Kauni, and just got on with it.

Of course, very thin wool on titchy little needles takes a while to knit, so I left it in my knitting bag, and ignored it, and occasionally knit it, and eventually finished the body.

You can't really tell from this photo, but there is a weird "side boob" thing going on under the armpits, and I thought long and hard about it but decided I really, really couldn't live with it, so ripped back all that knitting that had taken months and months, and started again.

I eventually finished it the other day.

It still needs a good block, and the right cuff is considerably bigger than the left, but I can live with that, as no one else will notice, and a bit of sewing will hide it as well.  

I wore it today as it was cold.  FFS April, sort it out, it hailed earlier.  The jumper still needs a block, and I will do that later on, but for now I am running around the house, cackling with laughter as my jumper looks ace and I love it, and also my denim skirt is too big and I will wash it and then send it to the charity shop to seek its fortune.  Hurrah. 

I'm sure I'll have something more to say tomorrow evening.  We're going shopping on the Goldhawk Road tomorrow.  Brace yourselves. 

Uh, Shakespeare in the park? Doth mother know you weareth her drapes?

Good morning comrades.  Well, I'm not in such a terrible mood as I was, so I can face trying to be light-hearted about sewing again.  Me Made May is in full swing, and I've been enjoying wearing all my handmade clothes and smiling modestly when people ask me if I made my outfits.  It's all about the kudos.

Day 1

Miette skirt.  

Day 2

Miette skirt, Aiken jumper

Day 3

Spotty Francoise dress, Luxulite brooch

Day 4

Miss Scarlett top

Day 5

Pink fleece Coco, Miette skirt

Day 6

Garter yoke cardigan, striped Coco dress

Day 7

Grey Coco dress

Day 8

Bird Coco, definitely red scarf

Day 9

Spotty skirt, Miss Scarlett top (all the filters)

Day 10

Raccoon Anna dress, Myrna cardigan (from the outfit along challenge last year)

So there you go.  All the outfits, all the time.  

Oh, I don't think I'm a lot dumber than you think that I thought that I thought I was once

What a terribly busy weekend and couple of days that.  My nephew turned one, I went to Bristol for a day trip to see a friend and spend money at the Outlaw Craft Fair (great), and we spent Monday walking around London, looking for more Shaun the Sheep statues.  So a fine time has been had by all.  There's even been knitting happening.  

• Nicholas' POP blanket - Finished and done and given to the birthday boy, who was predictably unimpressed by it, but my sister in law loves it, which is the main thing really.   30 circles, 30 squares, the blue border made from the remains of my Elsa jumper.  I've only had the kit for 18 months, so that's a pretty good rate of progress for me.  

• Hexipuff Quilt - It's something like 180 out of 250.  Which is great. STILL.  

• Lucy Attic24 Ripple Blanket - Nearly done.  I need to finish this now, although I honestly need more wool for it; some more orange is needed as it's her favourite colour. 

• Wisteria jumper -  Still the same.  It's too warm to work on this.

• Burton Bear Cowl for Hattie. I'm going to move this to next year I think; it's really too warm for this too.

• The Weather in the Streets 

Still 98 to go, so no photo.  I'm still pretty happy about it, although I'm thinking that I should really just get on and finish it.

• Yellow squares - 109/143 done - 34 to go
• Blue squares - 56/72 done - 16 to go
• Grey squares - 69/102 - 33 to go
• Turquoise squares - 2/11 done
• Orange squares - ALL DONE
• Pink square - DONE
• Purple squares - DONE
• Red squares - 7/10 done
• Dark Green squares - DONE
• Pale Blue square - DONE
• Pale Yellow square - DONE
• Dark Blue square - DONE
• Pinky-Red squares - 7/10 done

• Hattie's 4th birthday blanket.  This is going really well.  I've made and sewn together 20, and there are another 3 to sew on at some point.  I can finish 4 more of them, but then I have to wait for the wool fairy to bring me some more wool to finish it. I've been putting empty ball bands under my pillow every night, but nothing. 

• NEW: A Miette cardigan.   I've seen lots of these on the internet, and thought it would be just the thing to make myself to go with my soon to be finished skirt.  The skirt is gorgeous; red roses, Liberty print, salvaged from something my mum was getting rid of, which makes it super amazing: vintage, upcycling and handmade.

• Owl Obsession for one of my godsons - it's for his second birthday.  Next up. 
• Peacock Mitten - I'm almost a quarter of the way through the second mitten.  Still.
• Coraline cardigan - I've wound the wool for this, but I need to finish the Wisteria jumper first.
• Petrie top - I should probably start this one soon.    
• Knitted Coco -see above.
• Socks for me - I have no suitable sock wool that I like.
• Rainbow jumper - still depressed about losing jumper 1, and in mourning.  
• A Little Birds jumper with no steeks - still planning.  I need to sort the stash to see what I've got of this.  I might even need to sort out whether I've got the wool.  I think I bought some, but I don't remember.  How awful.    
• Reknit an unwearably large jumper for Simon - Oh Lord, I keep putting this off.

Done:

Myrna Cardigan

Hattie's cardigan.

A pair of simple socks for the children

Garter Yoke Cardigan

An Owlet for Lucy

Lucy's Cowl

Hattie's Cowl

A Burton Bear Cowl for Lucy

Simon's socks

Boreal

A tiny jumper for Nicholas

Sparkly Owlet for Hattie

Ringo mittens

Aiken

Striped jumper for Lucy

So that's your lot.  There's been sewing happening, but no photos.  Too busy and important these days.  

It is more fun to talk with someone who doesn't use long, difficult words but rather short, easy words like "What about lunch?”

It's somehow still the Easter holidays, and I'm desperately hunting around for things to fill the girls' days given that we only booked one week of tennis for Lucy, and there's only so much CBeebies I can stand.  We've still got swimming in the afternoons; Lucy's now in Stage 3, but won't be for long, and my little baby seal Hattie loves sploshing around chasing monsters in the baby pool; she needs lessons because she won't listen to me, and I don't want to have the swimming argument with her.

So today we went into Central London to look at Shaun the Sheep statues.  The film came out a while ago; we haven't seen it yet, but it looks pretty good; the statues are pretty fabulous too, and we have now found 12.  It's the usual thing -  statues decorated by artists and celebrities and sponsored by companies; there was a Paddington one a few months back; what a rubbish idea having a trail walking around London outside, in the middle of winter.  

Anyway, we did the 12 from one of the trails on the app map, and took a daft picture at each stop.  The girls walked over 7km today, and then swam, and then went on their bikes, so it's little wonder that there were lots of tears before bedtime.  We're trying to get Lucy to ride a bike by herself; this is not working very well.  Hattie, with a lot of stick-with-it-ness, is happily pedalling away on her bike with stabilisers; we had a few shouts of resistance to begin with and a lot of frantic pedalling backwards with super steering into the grass.  

Happy days.

I ate a whole bunch of fiberglass insulation. It wasn't cotton candy like that guy said. My stomach's itchy.

Bank Holiday Monday night.  We've been busy today; Simon is training for the London to Brighton bike ride in June (Fathers' Day, we each do our own thing on our respective thing) so he rode out to Princes Risborough, and because I am kind and do not think he has to cycle 70 miles in one day, I took the girls out to pick him up in the car.  One of my ex-colleagues moved out that way with her family; I miss her at school a lot, so it was nice to see her and catch up.  Her son is the same age as Hattie, and her daughter is 18 months, which meant that Lucy was a bit at loose end, but she coped with it all remarkably well, and it makes a change; normally it's Hat who's the third wheel.  We drove back the way Simon came, through Little Missenden, which has a lovely playground next to a cheapish pub, somewhere to come back to, especially when the girls are a bit older and ready for the Roald Dahl Museum.

Anyway, all that driving meant I made 3 hexipuffs on the way back, which makes a good segue into the next bit.  Smashing that fourth wall.    Or something.

• Hexipuff Quilt - It's something like 180 out of 250.  Which is great.  

• Nicholas' POP blanket - No change here.  I've blocked the two sets of six, but I need to make more circles that aren't purple.  So it's still 16 out of 30. 

• Lucy Attic24 Ripple Blanket - 40/57 rows done.  Lucy loves this and doesn't think it needs to be longer.  I think it does.  She wants to keep it upstairs in her bed all the time.  I want to work on it.  

• Wisteria jumper -  Still the same.  I am not going to start anything new until this is DONE.  Hnnnggggghhhhhh.

• Burton Bear Cowl for Hattie. It really is Spring now.  The need for this is lessening.

• The Weather in the Streets 

Still 98 to go.  Same photo as last week; I'm still pretty happy about it.

• Yellow squares - 109/143 done - 34 to go
• Blue squares - 56/72 done - 16 to go
• Grey squares - 69/102 - 33 to go
• Turquoise squares - 2/11 done
• Orange squares - ALL DONE
• Pink square - DONE
• Purple squares - DONE
• Red squares - 7/10 done
• Dark Green squares - DONE
• Pale Blue square - DONE
• Pale Yellow square - DONE
• Dark Blue square - DONE
• Pinky-Red squares - 7/10 done

• Hattie's 4th birthday blanket.  12/36 Rainbow Granny Squares done.

• Owl Obsession for one of my godsons - it's for his second birthday.  Not being done.  Being thought about but not done.
• Peacock Mitten - I'm almost a quarter of the way through the second mitten.  Still.
• Coraline cardigan - I've wound the wool for this, but I need to finish the Wisteria jumper first.
• Petrie top - I should probably start this one soon.   
• Knitted Coco -see above.
• Socks for me - I have no suitable sock wool that I like.
• Rainbow jumper - still depressed about losing jumper 1, and in mourning.  
• A Little Birds jumper with no steeks - still planning.  I need to sort the stash to see what I've got of this.  I might even need to sort out whether I've got the wool.  I think I bought some, but I don't remember.  How awful.  
• Reknit an unwearably large jumper for Simon - Oh Lord, I keep putting this off.

Done:

Myrna Cardigan
Hattie's cardigan.
A pair of simple socks for the children
Garter Yoke Cardigan
An Owlet for Lucy
Lucy's Cowl
Hattie's Cowl
A Burton Bear Cowl for Lucy
Simon's socks
Boreal
A tiny jumper for Nicholas
Sparkly Owlet for Hattie
Ringo mittens
Aiken
Striped jumper for Lucy

ALL THE KNITTING ALL THE TIME WITH ALL THE CAPS LOCK STUCK ON.

Once I accidentally drank an entire bottle of vinegar. I thought it was terrible wine.

More sewing, this time for the children.  I only make very simple dresses for the girls, they grow so very fast, and I don't like fussy things on little girls.  The pattern I use is a Simplicity one, and it is about as simple as you can get.  Two dress shapes, front and back, bias bounding on the armholes and the neck and a hem.  The girls get to choose their own fabric, and the dresses take me all of an hour to cut out and sew up.

Lucy hasn't worn hers yet, so no modelled shots yet. You can see how simple it is, although I should probably retrace it, so that it's longer.  The dress is very pretty, but it's definitely one to go over a top and leggings.

Hattie has not only worn hers twice, she has also got chocolate on it and probably pen.  Here she is, about to go on an adventure.  She has her minion backpack and shoes on; we bought them from the boys section of Bratano near Hobbycraft; for goodness sake, minions are for everyone, especially bonkers 4 year old girls.  

We are making preparations for her 5th birthday party and her minion cake.  Her birthday is in December.  It's going to be a long 9 months. 

This online slang dictionary says it's short for "amazing." Or it's a club drug made from a tooth whitener. Either way you win.

I've been on my own all day, well ever since last night really, and I've started to go a bit feral.  I've been writing my SENCO course essay all day, and obsessively eating brie and listening to the frightfully posh Paul Temple on YouTube.  Did you know you could listen to recordings from the radio on YouTube?  Well, now you do.

Anyway, the essay is done, all 5002 words of it, not including references, and I'm very pleased with myself.  The house is an absolute state; paper everywhere, all my articles and notes and bits and bobs are strewn around the kitchen, the sewing machine is still out from yesterday and the washing up is waiting on the side for tomorrow.  I need to do a wash, and go for a run, and maybe leave the house for a while, and have a shower and all the other civilizing things that I've completely forgotten to do today.  I don't have much time to write normally, that old refrain, so I've just submerged myself totally.  And it is done.  Done. DONE.

Last night, as well as sewing up the Mortmain, I had a bash at the wraparound dress from the second Great British Sewing Bee book,  It's a bit of a wearable toile, as the jersey is  a bit flimsy, flippy floppy, and I turned over the edges instead of bias binding it.  I tried it on last night, and it fits pretty well, but I'll need a vest top underneath if I'm going to wear it to school.

I've got a much nicer stretch fabric to make a "real" one with, and I will properly bind it this time.  The pattern is a bit of a pain frankly; not terribly well written, keeps on referring me to pages further back in the book, not very well drafted - the sleeves don't fit in properly, and so on.  User error means that I cut the front skirt on the wrong way so it stretches wrong, and then I sewed the right front to the left back, and the left front to the right back; neither of these things were the fault of the pattern, but have irritated me and left me much less keen on the whole thing.  Plus I had to trace the pattern from the book, which was  a massive pain in the bum.  Ah well.

The family are due back tomorrow; I will try to post some modelled photos of all the dresses in the next couple of days, and I might even have made another one by Sunday.  I might make another Coco, it's been a while since I did that, and I've got some spotty fabric for a Francoise burning a hole in my stash.  I'd really like to make another Cambie dress, but that requires a lot of thought, as the bodice is not made for my shape, and I need to do some faffing about with it.  

But first, first I need to either tidy up or set fire to the downstairs.

I like my money where I can see it - hanging in my closet

I've been sewing up a storm recently.  As I may have mentioned, Simon bought me a lovely Mother's Day present, a two day Mortmain sewing course at Badger and Earl.  Well, day 2 sort of ran away from me, and I didn't manage to actually finish the dress until just today.  The exposed zip just about killed me, and I had to have 4 or 5 goes to get it in properly.  It still doesn't quite look right, and I might still have another go, but later when the pain is just a happy memory.

Here's what it looked like on Sunday last week.

The zip's tacked in place with red thread.  In the end, the best way I found to secure it was to hand sew over the teeth and force it into place before sewing it twice.  Anyway, it worked in the end; have a  sort of close up.

I finished the hem as well; I'm taking advantage of the children being away with Simon.

I'm going to have to wait until they get back to take some modelled photographs, and I'll even brush my hair this time.  I should probably iron the dress too; for some reason it doesn't take kindly to being kept in a bag and then sulkily dumped on the sofa.

The pattern is an absolute dream to make, and I loved every minute of my classes with lovely, lovely Jane; and I'm definitely going to make it again, with sleeves and without sleeves, but with an invisible zip.  Just got to get the fabric together.  I might make it with contrasting facings too, now I've beaten facings into shape.  

The classes were at Badger and Earl, which is the most delightful sewing cafe/haberdashery/fabric/yarn shop a bus ride from my door.  We are going there for a fabric printing class next week, which will be great fun for all of us.  Jane wrote about the class here, and there's even a couple of photos of me with my tongue stuck out in concentration.  Look carefully and there's a modelled shot of me in the dress, in its previous length, where it makes me look slightly like Kimmy Schmidt coming out of the bunker.

Dammit.

When I was your age, television was called books.

Everything keeps getting in the WAY of blogging.  Whether it's cooking, or looking after the children, or working, or not writing my essay, the blog has taken a bit of a back seat recently.  Which doesn't mean that I don't want to write anything, just no TIME to do it, and when I have time, I don't have the energy.  

Anyway, there's quite a lot of knitting going on, and sewing, and even running.  Not much running, and not very fast, but at least it's happening.  

• Nicholas' POP blanket - lots of change here, I've made 2/5 red circles, 2/5 orange circles, 2/5 yellow circles, 3/5 green circles, 2/5 blue circles and 5/5 purple circles.  AND I've SEWN 12 of them together, which is brilliant.  It properly needs a good block though, but here is a poor quality in progress photo.  I've got another month to finish the knitting, sew it together, reblock it, line it and give it a border.  Hurrah.  16 out of 30 isn't bad, but it's not great.

• Lucy Attic24 Ripple Blanket - 38/57 rows done.  Lucy loves this.  I'm tempted to call it done, but I don't think it's quite long enough, and it does need a border.  It's quite wide and not very long; she says it covers her, but I'm not so sure.

• Hexipuff Quilt - It's still 172/250; I'm going to put it in the car for our next long trip.

• Wisteria jumper -  Still the same.  I am not going to start anything new until this is DONE.

• Burton Bear Cowl for Hattie. Brown wool found again.  Hattie isn't showing any particular desire for a cowl, so I will put this on the back burner.  Plus, it's technically SPRING now.

• The Weather in the Streets 

Woohoo!  There is progress with the blanket.  There are now 98 squares to finish.  ONLY 98 LEFT TO GO.  It still looks the same, but it is bloody MASSIVE.

• Yellow squares - 109/143 done - 34 to go
• Blue squares - 56/72 done - 16 to go
• Grey squares - 69/102 - 33 to go
• Turquoise squares - 2/11 done
• Orange squares - ALL DONE
• Pink square - DONE
• Purple squares - DONE
• Red squares - 7/10 done
• Dark Green squares - DONE
• Pale Blue square - DONE
• Pale Yellow square - DONE
• Dark Blue square - DONE
• Pinky-Red squares - 7/10 done

• Hattie's 4th birthday blanket.  6/36 Rainbow Granny Squares done.

• Owl Obsession for one of my godsons - it's for his second birthday.  His birthday is in SEPTEMBER PEOPLE.  I started this.  I used the wrong yarn, but the pattern is pretty clear, until you get to the ears, at which point it becomes obtuse, so more thinking needed.  
• Peacock Mitten - I'm almost a quarter of the way through the second mitten.  
• Coraline cardigan - I've wound the wool for this, but I need to finish the Wisteria jumper first.
• Petrie top - too cold to think about spring weight tops.  
• Knitted Coco -see above.
• Socks for me - I have no suitable sock wool that I like.
• Rainbow jumper - still depressed about losing jumper 1, and in mourning.  
• A Little Birds jumper with no steeks - still planning.  I need to sort the stash to see what I've got of this.  I might even need to sort out whether I've got the wool.  I think I bought some, but I don't remember.  How awful.  
• Reknit an unwearably large jumper for Simon - Oh Lord, I keep putting this off.

Done:

Myrna Cardigan
Hattie's cardigan.
A pair of simple socks for the children
Garter Yoke Cardigan
An Owlet for Lucy
Lucy's Cowl
Hattie's Cowl
A Burton Bear Cowl for Lucy
Simon's socks
Boreal
A tiny jumper for Nicholas
Sparkly Owlet for Hattie
Ringo mittens
Aiken
Striped jumper for Lucy

ALL THE KNITTING ALL THE TIME WITH ALL THE CAPS LOCK STUCK ON.

You should never, never doubt something that no one is sure of.

It's been a while.  Life keeps on happening, in its boring and inevitable way.  Module 1 of my course is now over, and I still have 2500 words of my essay to write. The title has changed, along with the focus, but nothing else.  Module 2 has started, what terrific fun it all is.  There have been a few minor health niggles, nothing serious, so no running at the moment.  I've got either the start of a terrific cold, or something I can shake off easily, so I'll have to get shot of that before I go out again; I dislike being unable to breathe when I'm running.  

Anyway, enough about that.  There's been some knitting going on.

• Lucy's stripey jumper.  Finished and done.

• Wisteria jumper - I've just finished the body of the jumper, "just" the sleeves to go.  I need to try it on and make sure that everything is OK, and also see how much more going round and round on the sleeves I need to do before the tricky cable bits.

• Nicholas' POP blanket - Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.  

• Lucy Attic24 Ripple Blanket - 38/57 rows done.  Lucy is using this, so I am going to do 2 more rows and a border, and call it done.  

• Hexipuff Quilt - I've managed to do about another 10, which is fantastic, and I'm very pleased with myself.  172/250, which is my target for this year.

• Burton Bear Cowl for Hattie. Brown wool found again.  Hattie isn't showing any particular desire for a cowl, so I will put this on the back burner.

• The Weather in the Streets 

The numbers are depressingly the same.  Ho hum.  We're on a break.  Still on a break. 

• Yellow squares - 107/143 done
• Blue squares - 52/72 done
• Grey squares - 64/102 done
• Turquoise squares - 1/11 done
• Orange squares - ALL DONE
• Pink square - DONE
• Purple squares - DONE
• Red squares - 6/10 done
• Dark Green squares - 5/7 done
• Pale Blue square - DONE
• Pale Yellow square - DONE
• Dark Blue square - to do
• Pinky-Red squares - 6/10 done

• Hattie's 4th birthday blanket.  6/36 Rainbow Granny Squares done.

• Owl Obsession for one of my godsons - it's for his second birthday.  His birthday is in SEPTEMBER PEOPLE.
• Peacock Mitten - oh God, this is too depressing.
• Coraline cardigan - moved to be finished by April; this is Britain, it will still be cold then
• Petrie top - too cold to think about spring weight tops.  
• Knitted Coco -see above.
• Socks for me - I have no suitable sock wool that I like.
• Rainbow jumper - still depressed about losing jumper 1, and in mourning.  
• A Little Birds jumper with no steeks - still planning
• Reknit an unwearably large jumper for Simon - March project

Done:

Myrna Cardigan
Hattie's cardigan.
A pair of simple socks for the children
Garter Yoke Cardigan
An Owlet for Lucy
Lucy's Cowl
Hattie's Cowl
A Burton Bear Cowl for Lucy
Simon's socks
Boreal
A tiny jumper for Nicholas
Sparkly Owlet for Hattie
Ringo mittens
Aiken
Striped jumper for Lucy

You win some, you keep some the same.  Again.

There's also been some rather exciting sewing happening too; my Mothers' Day present was a two week, two Sundays, sewing course, making a lovely Mortmain dress with Jane of Handmade Jane fame, at Badger and Earl in Chiswick, so I've been doing that.  The dress is beautiful, so far, and I'll have it finished and ready to photograph next week.  I'm going to need some new shoes to go with it too.

What's new with you?

Whoever said orange is the new pink is seriously deluded

Hnnngh.  A couple of weeks of the 52 project.

Week 24:

Hattie's first ballet lesson.  She is a natural.  Do not think of this:

Lucy part way through another mammoth bike ride.  We cycled from West Ealing to Syon Park and back again.  That is 15 kilometres.  She did very well.  

Week 25:

Hattie at the Henley adventure playground. Faster mummy, make it spin more.  She wasn't sick, despite the enormous ice cream immediately before this.

Lucy learning to row.  Surprisingly, she wasn't very good at it.  I had to crop this photo, after my friends on Facebook pointed out the unflattering angle of Simon's legs.  The world is not yet ready for that picture.

Portraits of my children once a week, every week, in 2014.

Wait, you want to make the cheerleading squad to prove to a girl that you are not a loser?

It's been a few weeks....

It's not that I haven't been taking thousands of photographs, it's more that I've run out of the energy to put them up on the blog.  I dare say you are all devastated.

The last few weeks have been a blur of ice cream, half term, face-painting, new hair cuts, bowling, Norwich, lost teeth, swings and rainy days.

Weeks 21, 22 and 23.  Collage courtesy of picmonkey - I love that site so much.

Portraits of my children once a week, every week, in 2014.

There were horses, and a man on fire, and I killed a guy with a trident

Some children can read, write and count at 3; other children can build a very stack of chairs and climb up to the top.

Lucy's friend had a Flower Power party, and we dressed up. Lucy originally wanted to wear the flower at the front.

Photos of my children once a week, every week, in 2014.  Week 20.  Where has this year gone?

Well, you have a sweet bike, and you're really good at hooking up with chicks. Plus you're, like, the only guy at school who has a mustache.

Handmade May is nearly halfway through now, and I've really had a good look at my wardrobe and the clothes in it.  It turns out that I really wear the same two pairs of jeggings with various tops on rotation, and while I do wear skirts and dresses occasionally, what I really need (NEED) are a variety of basic tops that will work with various garments, and a way to make trousers without horrible flashbacks to Upper Three, and the terrible Textiles lessons. 

I've ordered Tilly and the Buttons' book, and I know she has a pattern for pyjama trousers, so that will be a good start, and I've got a pattern for a "zippy" top, that apparently takes minutes to make, but requires cutting out and taping together, and that worries me.  Learning new skills is hard, especially when you actually don't have very much time to do them.

Old skills: I finally finished Lucy's cardigan.  Hattie is now clamoring for one of her own, but she must wait until I've finished at least one of the jumpers I'm making myself.  That sodding Wisteria is still only half way through, and the Idlewild is missing a sleeve.  The WIPs are beginning to overwhelm me.  I have the Weather blanket to do (12 out of 36 done for April, none for May), the Hexipuff blanket has been put on hold, the Elephant Blanket needs 4 more stripes, I've only got one Peacock mitten and one blue and grey sock, and the blanket for my nephew's Christmas present is currently one square.  Plus Lucy wants a 6th birthday party blanket, and Simon brought me the yarn for our new godson's birthday blanket, so there's that to do too.  

WIP Wednesday.  Moan moan moan.

Quick Dad, we're missing the giant capybaras of Uruguay!

Photographs from a sunny Bank Holiday in Rottingdean.

Hattie likes to explore the beach.  She generally comes back, pockets through of stones, which she hands to us to carry, as stones are too heavy Mummy.

Lucy catching bubbles.  I don't know what it is about bubbles; all children under the age of about 40 absolutely adore them.  Grandad bought us a bubble machine, it is all kinds of brilliant.  

Portraits of my children once a week, every week, in 2014.