What a week

This week I have mainly been trying to crochet. I have never done it before but I thought it would be a good idea to learn as I could then crochet the hats for the girls for Christmas. I have decided to give it up as a bad job though lol here are the more recognisable attempts at it.

 

 

As you can see not great, I am struggling to get the tension right. 

Don't get me wrong I won't give up trying to do it but I just don't think that I have time to master it and get everything done for Christmas. Maybe next year crochet gifts will feature heavily...but then maybe not lol.

In other news, I have been suffering this week with migraines and so haven't done much else.

In cross stitch I have finished Santa,

Day 2

 Day 3

 Before the magic of back stitch

 With the magic of back stitch

I have also had some help with my Christmas stitching from my other half, 

 However, I can't use it bless him as he has not kept the stitches in the right way :(

But I think you can agree, that he did a fantastic job for a beginner.

I have started a Boofle piece that I got with a copy of World of Cross Stitch magazine. Here he is,

Though I forgot to buy the ecru colour I need for the piece so will work around it until I need to buy some new threads. As I'm sure I have said before I refuse to but a single thread as it costs too much lol.

I have also completes Kerry's scarf for Christmas,

This looks great. but it took longer to do hers than the other two put together. It is a basic garter stitch scarf so I can't understand why. It also used up a full ball of yarn where the other two only used up half. How strange.

Anyway, off to try get some more bits made, speak soon.

Finally...The Wedding is Complete.

Well, as the title says it is done, finished, complete. Over a month of work, a few hiccups, running out of thread etc. But now it is done and ready to be sent off to the framers. He will be collecting it in a day or so and so I can move on now to other things.

What??? You want to see it?? Really?? 

OK here is the finished stitch

I don't think you can really judge the size of this properly so here I am holding it.

As you can see it covers me from neck to bum lol. Told you it was a big piece.

It would have to be to cover my bum lol.

So now what to do?? hmmm oh yeah, back to the Christmas stitches

I made a start on a new one here

But I made a mistake and had to do some frogging, here it is after the frogging

Gutted is not the word a good couple hours work down the pan.

I then started stitching again and got this far

Another night and this will be done. Fingers crossed.

Tomorrow is my 8th wedding anniversary, and so the hubby and I will be chilling out watching one of our fave programmes on DVD, kids in bed early we may even be able to watch 4 episodes. It''s a sad life isn't it lol.

We will go out to celebrate at the weekend no doubt too. I'm not that hard done to lol.

Anyway off to bed for me apparently I will be woken up early so I can have breakfast in bed. 

Speak soon xx

Knitting a scarf (with instructional videos)

For Christmas this year we are doing a handmade Christmas  This means that all gifts are handmade. The children are really looking forward to seeing what Santa will be bringing them and eagerly thinking of what they can make as gifts, so watch this space for all our makings.

Emily has been after a hand knitted scarf for ages now and so I have decided to give her one for Christmas, and of course once one wants something the rest follow and so now all three girls are wanting scarfs. So I thought about it and I have decided to make them all a hat glove and scarf set in the colours of their choice.

Emily wants purple, so please watch the video below to see how to do it.

Unfortunately the camera is on the wrong side so to watch you will have to tilt your head :( If anyone knows how I turn it please tell me

This one shows casting on and basic knit stitch

This shows casting off

This shows casting on, knit stitch and purl stitch

This shows how to cast off in purl stitch

And here is Emily's finished scarf.

And this is Jessica's

Handmade paper

I have been trying my hand at making paper. I can say I have learned a lot during the process and have decided to research and new projects I try before going ahead and doing them, instead of trying to remember how I did it in school when I was 10.

Anyway here is what I did and my recommendations for you to not make the same mistakes I made lol

You will need 

Frames, paper, water, Material, sponge, staples, bowl, blender (optional), cornflour/ cornstarch

First of all you need some frames, I got my hubby to make me some 

You then need some fabric to spread over them, I used an old pair of tights, but I would recommend something more stable like cheese cloth or muslin.

Staple it into place

You should end up with something like this 

OK next you need to take some old paper, this can be junk mail, or old bank letters etc, in fact this is a great way to use up all those documents you have shredded up.

 You then need to soak it in water

 At this point you can either blend it using 1 cup water to small handful of wet paper. If you are blending then I would recommend making sure the bottom of the bowl is fully secure (oops I didn't and made a right mess)

 Or you can do it by hand, This is great but time consuming, but if you are getting children to help then they will have much merriment doing it this way.

You want something that looks like this, from here on called pulp.

Add 2 inches of water in your bowl per handful of pulp and add in a few tablespoons of cornflour to your water too.

 dip your frame in, material side up 

carefully run a finger around the wooden edges, to remove the excess 

 place another frame material side down over the top

 press and squeeze as much water out as you can, use a sponge to really soak up as much as possible

 or use a towel but it will get very wet very quickly so have plenty to hand if using them. A sponge you can just squeeze as often as you need.

 Remove the top frame, and turn out the paper onto some where flat

 layer up as many as you want if you only have a small drying space and place something heavy on top to both keep it flat and squeeze it thinner 

Leave to dry overnight, best to be somewhere warm

then you can write away.

After I had done all this i found loads of instructional videos on YouTube where they made it look sooo much easier than I did it lol

Anyway off to learn a new craft.

Oh no so not fair

I could cry, I really could. I have been working on 'The Wedding' and guess what...with just 112 stitches to go I ran out of the thread I needed :(

I refuse to order just one thread and I don't know what colours I will need for other projects and so I will not be finishing this one for a little while now well until I reorder the thread I need.

So here is where I got to.

Day 33

Day 34

Day 35

There they are those pesky 112 stitches, taunting me.

Ah, well move on. I started another piece for the Xmas list.

This one is from The World of Cross Stitch magazine issue, 156

Day 1

 Day 2

Without the magic backstitch.

With the magic of backstitch, and some awful French knots. I am sooo bad at them.

I love the way a simple black line really brings the picture to life.

In other news, I have been quite ill recently and to my hubby's delight I lost my voice, I can tell you I wasn't very pleased as I couldn't stitch while I was so ill. There I was all tucked up in bed without the energy to lift my hoop.

I went to a council meeting last night too and as yet my voice is not fully recovered and so I couldn't really speak properly, but my Policeman had asked me to bring up several points and I couldn't let him down now could I? Anyway, after I had struggled to speak for 10 minutes, I covered all the points he wanted me to make and then guess what?? He turned up in his civvies and I must admit he was still quite hot in them but not as much as when in uniform. I thought it was poor form of him and had he turned up just 10 mins earlier he could have saved my abused voice. (* please note I conduct the business between him and the council with complete professionalism and would treat him exactly the same as any one else, this is just a bit of fun. It's always nice to have something pretty to look at. I just wanted to make that clear just in case)

I am looking forward to the weekend, as not only are the children all staying out over night Saturday, but I am also dog sitting for a friend. Her dog Pip and my dog, Benji love each other and can't leave each other alone so that will be fun, well until the tip tapping of paws on floor really starts to irritate.

OK I'm off to find something else to stitch. Speak soon x

Getting Prepared

Jessica has had an accident this weekend :( She was playing in her Grandmas garden when she fell down some steps and did this.

My poor baby, apparently she barely cried, my kids are hard as nails lol.

I also had the shock of my life the other night too, now my pets can not stand each other well Ceefer the cat hates the dog, Benji just wants to play. However in a first ever they spent 4 whole hours like this

I was happy they were so comfortable together.

I have been looking in to what gifts we will be making for the adults in the family. I have now decided what we will be making. I have also been looking up options to help etc. I have found a recipe for home made glue stuff, which I have made up a batch and will see how it works.

One of the gifts (2 people are getting the same gift) require 5 glass bottles and so I have been searching all over for glass bottles as I will need 10 altogether. I need a size 250ml one and so I have been looking on Amazon and Ebay and all blooming over I also went around all my local shops to see if anyone sold something like what I wanted. So after killing 3 hours in this fruitless task all the ones I found were too expensive for my tastes I struck upon an idea. Asda sell bottles of olive oil, in the size that I need. So I have decided to buy 10 from there. Not only does this work out cheaper than buying empty bottles but I also end up with loads of olive oil :D I have decided that this extra oil I will now have will be the perfect gift for some foodie friends, as I am going to infuse them with flavours and put them into bottles as gifts too. (I know I will have to get more bottles but I think I will use the Asda bottles again and use that oil in my cooking) OK OK long winded way of doing it decanting oil from here to there and back again but I know what I mean lol.

So, now in my head I know what is being made for whom and can now get a calendar organised for getting everything done. Woohoo, I'm much more prepared this year than any other year!!

Ok the meeting season has started once again and so many of my evenings have been taken up with council business, (tonight being a highlight for me as it was with a rather handsome police officer, yummy, no officer I don't mind at all that the meeting ran over, now what were you saying before I lost myself in your eyes??lol) but I have managed to get some stitching done too. Here is my day by day updates.

Day 29

Day 30

Day 31

Day 32

This is as far as I have gotten, as you can see it is almost finished now another week or so and it will be done yay me!

It is also TUSAL time again so here it is

Anyway time for bed for me speak soon x