People Tree dress

Ooh... I have a new dress...




















Hand woven cloth delicately embroidered, it's really beautiful.

A year and a day..

Since my last post. Oh. Dear. That’s rather a long time! However I’ve been busy, promise. Just not on anything terribly crafty, or at least not very much. The little boy is now a big boy and has just celebrated his very first birthday. He is a wonder and a delight.

Here he is enjoying his first train ride on the Bluebell Railway in East Sussex last weekend. So he’s pretty much been keeping me on my toes and the only bit of weaving I have to show for my year is a little bit of inkle weaving. Yes, dear husband gave me an inkle loom for my birthday (I rather like the pattern of birthday looms, feel free to keep it up darling..) and here is the result of my tinkering:

Rather nice and so easy to start with. If I was learning to weave again I would start with one of these – it really is stripped back weaving and you get results in no time at all. Albeit narrow results.

BTW the spots on that surface have now gone – hurrah! Replaced with slick mosaics in a lovely grey. I managed to reign in my plans for a wild worktop based on it not being everyone’s cup of tea, including mine.

Same time next year?…

Vigo

Vigo was born on April 20th weighing 8lb 8oz. He's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen and we are over the moon! Here he is at 2 days old with his cat.

Cafeteria la Biennale

Wow. This amazing place is the interior of Cafeteria la Biennale in Venice designed by Tobias Rehbeger. I think I may have hit on inspiration for our kitchen island mosaic design.

New yarns, please

So I never realised how tricky cotton is to knit with… it ain’t got no stretch!

This is not a welcome characteristic for my level of knitting ability, plus the colour is looking more and more pink everyday.

So, a necessary step has been taken. The cotton will be used to weave with instead, and new yarn – wool – has been ordered. In green.

Fun on a Wednesday

This morning has not gone entirely to plan. Firstly my computer decided to disable the USB ports so neither the mouse or keyboard would work, meaning that interacting with it was largely impossible. Then the electricity company rocked up to change the meter which meant no power for a time, while I was trying to fix the computer. Plus the joiners are making a racket and lots of dust and generally driving me up the wall.

Urgh. I felt like going back to bed frankly!

So with all my plans (temporarily) sabotaged I got out the yarn for the blanket. The coral (which has morphed into pink in between the shop and home!) is the main colour and then ecru stripes, if I can work out how to change colour every few rows. I’m not trying to feminise my baby boy, it was coral, honest!

Anyway, the power is back on and I’ve fixed the computer so I’ve got no excuse not to work again now. Boring!

Pregnancy stops play

I’ve recently discovered that I can’t weave any more – boo! My baby is due in 6 weeks and I’ve become too large to grapple with the loom, especially the treadles which is a real shame because I am full of plans for weaving nice baby things which I never managed to do earlier.

So with weaving forfeited, I have dusted off the old knitting needles and am embarking on a baby blanket. I don’t really like a lot of the blankets in the shops – the fabrics are either nasty static man-made ‘fleece’ fabrics which I wouldn’t want to sleep under so why would I inflict that on my little baby? Or they come in the standard blue, pink, yellow or white. A bit bland to say the least.

It would be a gross understatement to say I’m a novice knitter but as I find myself loafing about with my feet up on the sofa more and more these days, it seems the appropriate thing to do.

Half the fun so far has been browsing the internet and Chichester’s (I believe one and only) knitting shop for patterns, yarn and general inspiration. I must actually do some work now!

Loving these Art Viva needles!