Evenin'. I've been busy in the garden. Not the real garden, you understand, where overgrown shrubs fight vicious battles for legroom, and where convolvulus sneaks across the lawn when it thinks nobody's looking, although if we're talking about the real garden, I'm quite partial to this quiet corner:- No, I'm talking about the garden of the crochet house-related project. It's going to be detailed, with paths and a pond, and lots of flowers and general garden stuff, but you have to begin Continue Reading
Looking For Mud
It's good to be out of quarantine at last. The Tyrannical Twinnage and I have been bimbling around south Oxfordshire's various towns running errands today. One of those errands involved yarn, so I can't complain. More on that, later. We took the winding back roads through thatched, rose*-covered villages, and over ancient stone hump-backed bridges that bounced the twinnage in their carseats and made them giggle. Those bridges criss-crossed the Thames, the river narrow and enthusiastic in its Continue Reading
254 Roses.
Well if I can ever persuade our wibbly-wobbly internet connection to upload the photo, I'll show you the 254 red roses (yes, I counted them, which was an awful lot quicker than embroidering them was) that I made on the front of the big-house-crochet-secret-project. I'm sorry, I assume you're sick of me being coy about what this project is, but I really do want the finished, installed thing to be a surprise, even if you've seen elements of it along the way. Ah, here we are. The little hamsters Continue Reading
Bricks. Mortar. Grass.
Goodness, I'll never be a bricklayer. I'm getting towards the top of the wall of my big furniture-related housey secret project, and I am very nearly over this whole brick-mortar-brick-mortar-brick-mortar monotony. I'm looking forward to embroidering roses scrambling all over it. Mad, monstrous roses with no inhibitions. Also I'm looking forward to starting the garden. Some of your comments on previous posts have given me ideas.... (Thank you.) I'm also wondering about possibly a Continue Reading
In Which Life Imitates Art. Or Vice Versa. Or Summat.
Well, I'm back. Properly back, but more on that later. The ridiculous thing was that in my IVF-befuddled state, I clean forgot to mention that my column is in this month's Simply Knitting. Here's a sneaky peek. I really must get on with writing the next one. Anyway, to the point of today's post... There comes a point in many big projects where the novelty of the early stages has well and truly worn off, but the end isn't yet sufficiently in view to draw you closer. You just have to keep on Continue Reading
The Bag Lady
The crochet house-bag-thingummy is done! Want to see it? (Please say 'yes'. Or at least, 'Oh all right then, if I absolutely must.') I began construction of the crochet house around the same time that men in big boots and hard hats arrived round here to build far too many new houses on the periphery of our previously lovely village and buy up all the best sandwiches from the village shop for their lunch each day. And I can now report that building a house takes a couple of months, regardless of Continue Reading
Notes From A Crime Scene
Woe, 'tis a dark day, here at the 'Yarn. A heinous crime has been committed. I've been working on the crochet house-bag (doing the boring stuff; weaving in dozens of ends - an ideal job for when you've got a stinking head-cold.) I have to say, it's going extremely well and I'm rather excited about the finished product. It's gone from this:- ...to a proper 3-d house-bag with shoulder strap, but I'm hanging back from showing you until I can ta-da it properly. Thank you to commenters who Continue Reading
Crochet Therapy
...And then there are days that don't quite work. Do you know the feeling? I think I'm still raw from intense hours with patients' harrowing stories at work this week. And the Toddler Twinnage were a leeeeetle bit relentless in their Mummy-Mummy-Mummy-Mummy-Mummy all day today. And I possibly ate too many of the choc chip cookies that I baked this morning. And my first attempt at crocheting my bag strap in the round went all Mobius on me and had to be ripped out. Yes, yes, I've got these Continue Reading
House!
T'was a beautiful clear night last night. The sort of night where you amble along in the peaceful blackness gazing up at the starry heavens... and then walk slap bang into a wall. Who put that stupid wall there, anyway? It's a ridiculous place for a wall. Only an idiot would build a wall right there. Given the rate at which they're building too many new houses in this village, you do have to watch out for sneaky new walls when you're out and about. Anyway, back to last night. I was on my way Continue Reading
The House Of Crochet.
Hmm, it seems that the house-bag I'm crocheting and the real houses being too numerously built in our village are neck-and-neck in terms of progress. That said, I'm tempted to just whack a roof on what I've hooked so far and call it a bungalow. Would you like to see some progress? (Thank you for your lovely comments on my previous post about it, by the way. :-) ) There's a long way to go. Upstairs, for starters, and that door needs a handle. And those little balls of red/green Rowan Fine Continue Reading