Attic24

Making the Seasons :: June

As you have no doubt gathered by now I absolutely love having fresh flowers in the house and always try to have a jug of something pretty and floral on my dining table. Mostly the flowers I have indoors are cheap and cheerful seasonal market flowers, but at this time of year I prefer to have small home-grown posies in a jug, or even just a few tiny stems in an old glass ink bottle. Being able to go into my back yard and snip blooms to bring to the table is one of my all time favourite pleasures, gosh it makes me almost delirious with happiness to be able to do this simple thing.

This past week I've been enjoying a beautiful bunch of flowers bought very cheaply from the supermarket, although these aren't your typical supermarket offerings. I was thrilled (like almost peeing my pants excited) when I spotted a bucket of flower bunches labelled "Summer Growers Choice", or something like that (I knew I should have written it down, I just can't remember if these were the exact words, but you get the drift I hope?!). Each bunch was slightly different and contained a mixture of single stems, a real English cottage-style mixture which made me giddy with delight. I mean, just LOOOK at that delicious stem of pink snapdragons, isn't it ravishing?!!! 

But it was the daisy-like stems of Feverfew which really captured my heart. My Mum used to grow these all over the place, in the garden and at her allotment plot and I loved that she would have them in her cottage, spilling out of jugs and vases. Some people think that Feverfew is a weed as it freely self seeds and grows in the most unlikely of places. But it's actually a herb and has medicinal properties, although neither of those things matter much to me to be honest. Weed or herb, I don't particularly mind, I just love the old fashioned simplicity of this flower and the fact that it reminds me of Dorset and childhood.

Last week I'd been pondering on what I might like to make for the June edition of Making the Seasons, and knew it had to be something floral. Summer months are just overwhelmingly flowery in my mind, they really are. Inspired by the flowers on my table, I thought I might like to try stitching some daisies. Not just any old stitching, but that irresistible placement of weeny little crosses that has me so in it's grips at the moment.

I wanted my cross stitch to be small and simple - 2 shades of green, plus white and yellow.

A little square of pale grey 14 count aida and a dinky little 3 inch embroidery hoop.

Creating a design for such a small hoop is harder than it seems, and it feels like every single cross has to be very carefully considered and placed. However, I happen to LOVE this kind of design challenge and it didn't take me all that long to create a daisy design on my laptop that pleased me.

So do you see my lovely printed cross stitch chart??? I made that chart All By Myself!!!!!!!! Yes, I did indeed!!!! Well, with  a little bit of help from my other half. 

You see, my very, very, very talented and clever husbundo can write computer programs to do pretty much anything that tickles your fancy. So a few months ago when I casually told him that I might like to have a go at designing some cross stitch patterns, he offered to whip me up an app for my laptop. See how casual I made that sound?! In truth it took us a couple weeks to work on it together, and through trial and error with me figuring out what I needed as we went along we came up with a really fantastic and very workable cross stitch design app for me to play with.

I can select my thread colours to create a colour palette on my screen, then I'm able to click away on the little grid to fill each square with colour. It's soooooooo good!! 

Once I had my chart printed out I couldn't wait to get started on the stitching. As you can see, this is cross stitch on a very small scale so it didn't take long at all to stitch the stem and leaves.....

....and then start work on the flowers. As I stitched, I realised that I wanted to change one of the flowers (the little one on the right in the above photo, as it has no yellow centre showing and looked a bit forlorn). So I took my very sharp little scissors and hacked out the flower stitches completely (far harder to remove crosses than it is to frog crochet let me tell you), then went back to my computer, altered the chart and re-stitched...

.....ahhhhh, that's better!! So so so sweet!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I can't tell you how proud I am of this dinky little design, it just pleases me so so much!

J's app also allows me to save these nifty stitch charts to my computer, so that I can then share them here on my blog if I want to.

I don't know if anyone is remotely interested in stitching themselves a tiny little daisy cross stitch, but if the idea grabs you then please feel free to use my chart :) If you want to print it out, you'll need to right click on the image, select copy image, then paste it into a word document to print.

You need 2 shades of green, plus white and a rich mustardy yellow. I used 3 strands of DMC embroidery thread when I made my cross stitches. And 14 count aida fabric, but I think I already said that.

The actual design (stitched on Aida 14) measures 5cm / 2 inches square. Find the centre of your fabric and start stitching from the centre of the design (which is marked on the chart). I think that's about it - cross stitch is pretty straight forward really.

This whole thing has been beyond exciting for me, and has opened up a delicious new part of my very greedy Creative Mind which is always on the look out for new things. Oh, the possibilities!!

Endless, exciting, thrilling possibilities for creating pretty seasonal designs to stitch with joy.

I can hardly contain myself.

The small scale of this 3 inch hoop is just delightful, and I really want to make more. More and more and more. For Summer, for Autumn, for every season throughout the year and everything nature inspired that makes me happy. I am thinking of little cross stitch strawberries now, or maybe some wispy summer grasses.........oh my heart!

I've popped my hoop on my mantel along with the feverfew daisies which found their way into my old glass ink bottle. I might eventually create a little bit of a display on the wall somewhere, if the stitched hoops start to grow and multiply and happen to become a collection.

So that's June for you, all joyful and stitchy and making my summer loving heart sing. I'm already wondering what July might be about, I never quite know what little seasonal thing will take a hold of my heart and bring forth a surge of creative inspiration. 

I hope you enjoy sharing in my seasonal inspirations and creative makes - you can find all previous months tagged in the {Making the Seasons} category. I love sharing my monthly making adventure with my bloggy friend Gillian - I've not seen her June project yet but I do know what it is and I am squeeeeeing with excitement waiting for her big reveal. We chat back and forth about our ideas and thoughts for each month, and it amazes me how different our individual styles are, but how similar our projects often turn out to be. This month we are especially in tune with each other......do go and see over on her blog Tales from a Happy House.

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Attic24 Crochet Banner :: Ta-dah!

Back in March I had an idea to crochet myself an Attic24 banner, partly for useful reasons (to hang up at Yarndale when I'm there in the knit n natter lounge), and partly to feed my creative urges (what's not to love about a pile of colourful squares?) At the time I started out with this project I could already see the finished thing very clearly inside my Creative Mind, so I was really excited to see if I could bring my idea to life.

I set out crocheting up a whole pile of 3-round solid granny squares using up oddments of scrap yarn left over from other projects. It only takes around 6g of yarn (I'm using Stylecraft Special DK) to make one square so it's a really fantastic stash buster if you fancy making a cushion, or maybe even a whole blanket.   

There is a tutorial for making/joining these squares already on my blog if you wish to give them a go....

♥ SOLID GRANNY SQUARE TUTORIAL ♥

As well as making squares in every single colour possible, I also made a collection of blue squares. I concentrated on the deeper, darker shades of blue as I needed them to act as a strong background for my white lettering. The banner was still very abstract at this stage, and I had to keep focused on the bigger picture as I sat and made square after square after square. 

By the end of April I had enough squares to begin stitching them together, turning all those little individual bits of crochet into something beautiful and colourful. I really, really loved seeing the banner begin to take shape, it made me happy to witness the essence of my creative idea gently become a reality.

Lots of people have asked me about my colour choices for this banner, and how I went about putting them all together. I can tell you that I put the border squares together very randomly indeed and gave very little thought as to what colours were going next to each other, or how it was all balancing out. As I was using up odd scraps of yarn, it really was a delightfully spontaneous process - I don't even know how many different colours are in this banner, but I do know that I love the outcome of all that randomness!

Around the middle of May I'd finished stitching all the squares together, but needed a little breather while I pondered on what sort of border to create. It's often a very good idea to take a step back from a project if you are pondering on a design decision, so I did just that. 

A couple of weeks later when I was ready to pick this project up again, I knew straight away what I wanted to do for the border. I decided to keep it simple and graphic, alternating shades of blue (rows of treble crochet) with shades of pink/purple (thinner rows of double crochet) to create a subtle striped effect. 

I know not everyone likes crocheting borders (the rows are pretty lengthy and time consuming) but I adore them. I love the gentle rhythm that unfolds as you work those long, even rows of little stitches, and I love the bubbling-up excitement as the Ta-dah moment slowly comes into view. It's quite addictive, and I know I will never be one of those people who has loads of WiPs on the go, as I get such a kick out of finishing things!

I thought at first that I would make the border quite wide, but when it came down to it the squares didn't need all that much holding together. The banner is quite long and thin, (or wide and short if you like) so I tried to keep the border in proportion. I think Tilly agrees with me, she is showing me her Approval Eyes here I'm sure. 

This is  a very SHoUtY creation so the border was always going to be overshadowed by the squares, and that's exactly as it should be.

Now at this point, there is nothing Banner-ish about this bit of crochet. In fact, it's all looking and feeling rather blankety wouldn't you say?

A Banner needs to say something, make an announcement, and for that we need some lettering.......

Ah, there we go - Attic24 has landed!!

I made the crochet lettering quite early on and you can read more about how I did it in my previous Banner blog post.

The letters were made following a Times New Roman font, and measure around 20 cm tall.

I used an iron-on adhesive web with the idea that I could gently iron the letters to bond them to the crochet background so that they would stay put while I stitched.

However, this plan simply didn't work out. Not. At. All.

Obviously you need to be super-careful with irons and acrylic yarn and you absolutely cannot blast the crochet with heat or pressure without doing irrevocable damage to the crochet. So I couldn't get the letters to stick at all as I wasn't able to apply enough heat or pressure to melt the bonding adhesive.

Ah well.....lets get the job done the old fashioned way.....

....with a good ol' bit of big-stitch basting. Success!

One thing the Bondaweb did do well was make the letters beautifully flat and perfectly shaped, so it wasn't all a complete waste of time and money.

I used white yarn and worked  a neat row of back stitch around the outer edge of each letter. It was tedious in the extreme and took aaaaages to do. Stitching on the letters was my least favourite part of the whole thing and I can't say that I enjoyed it all that much, but I was so so happy that my name isn't something ridiculously long and wordy! 

The finished effect is lovely though, and I'm really pleased with the neatness of the lettering and the effective white-against-blue colour choice. 

And this is the finished thing, in all it's colourful glory - ta-dah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It measures  62 cm  x 138 cm and has 144 squares. Lots of colours (sorry no exact colour info) and I think it's pretty scrumptious to look at. 

However, as lovely as this all is, it's STILL not a banner!!!! Ha!!! I realised very late in the day (when it was all supposedly finished and I was photographing the above Ta-dah) that I needed to come up with a nifty way of hanging the whole thing. Banners need to be displayed, obviously, and they therefore require a satisfactory hanging method.

My solution was to add on some extra rows to the top long edge of the border which I then folded over and stitched to create a channel. Then sent J off to the DIY store to purchase me a length of pine stick, cut it to length and pushed it into place.

And here.......finally................is my finished banner..........

ta-ta-ta-ta-dah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Beautifully modeled by my happy little sidekick, who accompanied me to the park at 9am on Sunday morning so that I could prance about taking photos of my banner in the wild.

He didn't complain once, but then his time and holding-up services didn't come for free. Oh no, I had to pay up. This cost me a cold drink and a piece of flapjack from the cafe, followed by a long stint at the pump track so that he could practice on his new bicycle. But it was worth it - I was able to sit on the grass in the morning sunshine crocheting up some ripples whilst he rode his bike round and round, so I wasn't too put out by paying up the required fee. And you get to see my banner in a suitably vertical position, with sweet Little Boy knees on display too. 

So that's the banner all done and dusted, folded up for a while now until it gets to come out to play for real at Yarndale in September. I'm really looking forward to seeing it in situ bringing some much needed colourful cheer to the grey concrete of the rustic auction mart. It's a cheerful thing, this banner of mine. No doubt about it.

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Feels like Summer

The past few weeks have felt like a dream, a tantalising taste of exactly what Summer should look and feel like as our days continue to roll out all warm, bright and full of sunshine. I have been like a flower, constantly turning my face up to the sun, drinking in the clear blue skies and feeling a deep down gratitude for this season of light and warmth.

The effort I put into sorting out my back yard at the end of May is making me so happy now as we jig along through June. Truthfully it wasn't a huge effort, although it somehow felt like it was in the weeks I spent procrastinating over tackling it. All it took was a couple of afternoons emptying out all my pots of old soil and dead plants, re-filling with fresh compost and planting some cheap and cheerful supermarket annuals to bring an instant hit of colour. J also helped me clear some broken garden furniture and a heap of miscellaneous outdoor debris (plenty of rotten and broken things) so that our outdoor space suddenly feels very much tidier and bigger somehow, even though it's still teeny tiny. We need some new seating, and I am hankering after a small painted wooden storage shed, but for now we are making do.

My flowers aren't really established enough just yet to provide me with much in the way of pickings for indoors, but that didn't stop me.  

I snipped a few small stems....

....and thoroughly enjoyed having my first little back yard posy sitting in a small jug on the dining table. This to me is a sure sign of summer and I absolutely love it.

I've used my backyard a lot during the past few weeks, it provides me with a weeny bit of peaceful solitude at times when the house just feels rather noisy and chaotic with children, television, constant comings and goings. I enjoy it most in the early mornings when I can quietly sneak out through the kitchen door without anyone knowing where I am for a short while. 

I've been crocheting outdoors a fair bit of late, turning my outdoor table into a little bit of a working space. I've been experimenting with crochet using non-machine wash pure wools that felt beautifully when the crochet is popped into the washing machine. I'll show you more of my experiments very soon - it's very exciting I can tell you! 

We walked up to the farm shop at the weekend, a slow stroll for J and I with Little B zooming around us on his bike. I couldn't resist this pretty summery chocolate from Yorkshire based company  Choc Affair, oh you just have to know that the taste was something else - so, so good!

Cherries came home in our bag too, one of our favourite summer fruits and always a delight when they are in season. 

I've been working in my studio, even though the weather has constantly called me to be outside instead. I've got a lot on at the moment with various deadlines fast approaching, so I very much appreciate having my studio to go to as it puts my mind firmly in get-on-with-it mode. Ooooo, I had a super-exciting meeting on Monday with a very lovely lady who traveled especially to see me. I can't tell you anything about it just yet, but lets just say I was squeeeeeing inwardly (and maybe a little bit outwardly too, it was unavoidable) at the ideas and possibilities she put forward. I am keeping digits crossed.

I've got a jug of sweet williams on my studio table this week, they make me sneeze a bit but I can't resist their charming colours and old-fashioned nostalgic looks. 

June brings forth the elderflowers, and my goodness this is a bumper year for these frothy white flowers. They are growing in abundance in my neighbourhood, the trees laden down with so many flowers in full bloom.

We went out at the beginning of last week to gather in some floral booty, Little B and I snipping and gathering and getting dusted with fragrant pollen. 

I shared my elderflower cordial recipe a few years ago (here it is, if you wish to see how to make it), and this year we picked enough flowers to make 3 batches. I've frozen quite a bit of it in small plastic bottles, but we all love to drink it so it doesn't tend to last long. J and I have discovered the delights of an ice cold gin and tonic with an added dash of elderflower cordial, oh, you need to try it, trust me, it is absolutely sublime on a sunny late afternoon.

Bubble blowing - I'm not sure what to say about this except for how lovely it is. All of it. The excitement never fades for me where big, blowy bubbles are concerned, they just make me insanely happy.

My hill view is wearing it's beautiful green summer outfit, and the cold, brown days seem far behind us. We've had rain this week for the first time since the start of the month, so the countryside is looking (and smelling) especially fresh.

Quite often I will find a reason to walk down to the supermarket in the evenings, to purchase something completely random that absolutely cannot wait until the morning. I like the feeling of being out and about in the evenings whilst it's still light, it gives me a brief feeling of freedom to escape the house at unexpected times. I like when the days feel longer than normal. I like it a lot.

Work at the allotment continues, I wish I had some better pictures to share with you. My sweet peas are doing well, and so far the beans and spinach seem to be surviving the mollusks. We've seen some enormous frogs hopping about on our plot, so I hope their bellies are full of slugs! I was late putting the sweet peas into the ground (nothing new there) and now feel desperate for them to grow big and tall and flower at warp speed. I absolutely cannot WAIT for the flowers! 

J and I did a shortish walk at Bolton Abbey on Monday, stopping a while on the beach opposite the abbey ruins to eat a picnic lunch. It was peaceful and quiet, and unusually I missed the Little People on that day. Mondays are usually all about relishing our child-free hours together, but there was something about being on that beach that tugged at my heart strings and made me wish for the kidlets to be there. Not that the Teens would want to do that sort of thing nowadays, but I remember them so vividly enjoying this place in years gone by. 

Another evening stroll on a still, warm day - I think it was Sunday evening. I had an urge to walk in the woods as it had rained earlier in the day and I fancied a bit of "Shinrin-yoku" would be a good thing before bed.

I had the pleasure of both Little B and Little Lady with me on this walk.....

...chattering loudly as we walked in the cool damp woodland. It did indeed smell gorgeous, just as I hoped it would.

By the time we returned home it was 9pm and the sun was well on it's way down, shining low and golden through the trees and reminding me for the zillionth time how much I adore the feel of summer. I hope you are loving these mid-year days and finding lots of little things to make you feel happy.

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Cross Stitch Happiness

Hello my lovelies, and welcome to another installment of Cross Stitchin' happiness from the Attic. I love writing about my creative endeavors here on my blog as it's really lovely to be able to keep a record of my projects for future reference - a bit of a visual diary I guess. 

Cross stitching is still a relatively new hobby for me as I only picked it up in February of this year. You may remember the above Libra zodiac hoop which was my first project and got me totally hooked on the business of making weeny neat crosses into holey fabric. I had no idea that cross stitching would make me so happy, but there is something majorly appealing and addictive about methodically adding colourful little regimented stitches to a plain fabric and seeing a picture slowly emerge. It's like the stitchy equivalent of doing a jigsaw puzzle, I love it so much!

Hot on the heels of the Libra scales, I immediately began a second hoop, this time stitching the Pisces fish which is J's star sign. 

I went more slowly with this one throughout March and early April, picking it up in between my crochet projects and other general creative faffery. 

I absolutely love these designs, the colours are stunning and there is just the right amount of detail to keep it interesting without it being a fiddle to count and stitch.

Working on black Aida fabric was a challenge, but I think the finished results are totally worth the extra bit of eye strain and needle frustration.  

Don't the fishes look good? I love the playfulness of the design very much.

These zodiac pieces were designed to fit neatly into a 6" hoop and I chose to use a 6 inch flexi-hoop (instead of a wooden embroidery hoop) which makes stitching and displaying the finished piece a doddle. The whole thing is so neat, and I really enjoy the finished look of a hoop. It's kind of humble and honest, which I rather like. 

You can find all twelve of Jody's zodiac cross stitch designs on Etsy (she designs under the name Satsuma Street) - they are instant digital downloads and I can highly recommend them for newbie cross stitchers.

Libra and Pisces are now both hanging above my bed and I do enjoy seeing them there every day. I think every room in the house should have a little bit of homemade goodness in it, don't you?

During the early weeks of my addiction I spent many obsessive hours trawling through Etsy and Pinterest in search of modern cross stitch designs. I found that I was especially drawn to designs that had a combination of words and flowers (and yes, I have indeed discovered the plethora of *naughty* cross stitch designs out there, oh I have had many big belly laughs over those!)

So for my third cross stitch project I chose the above design. It was the pretty flowers that especially caught my eye, but the sentiment hit home too as I confess that my mornings do always (without exception) contain at least two good coffees. Always. 

I briefly contemplated attempting to use the threads I already had to stitch my coffee design, but truthfully that was never going to happen. Ordering the exact right colours to stitch with is a big part of the pleasure for me, and I am enjoying building up a collection of threads almost as much as I'm enjoying the actual stitching. I took some photos of my threads to share with you - more on that in a bit.  

I made one change to the colour selection and that was the colour of the mug. In the original design (Zindagi Designs on Etsy) the mug was stitched in black which was a big no-no for me.

Instead I chose a beautiful French Navy (DMC colour 336). Its ridiculously hard to choose thread colours on the computer screen (there are around 500 DMC thread colours, with 66 blues to choose from!!). I needed the shade to be quite dark in order for the cream coloured words to show up well, and after much deliberating I think I chose well.

Stitching the blue mug was my least favourite part of this design, especially as I mis-counted when stitching the handle and had to carry out a fair bit of emergency stitch removal. I was so excited to finish with the navy and get started on the flowers.

I made a tonne of mistakes stitching those blooms as I got completely in a muddle with all the different shades of red and pink. But shhhhh, lets not talk about that. Lets just focus on the fact that overall, they look very, very pretty indeed.......

............ta-dah!!!!

The above photo shows the finished design, but to my mind the flowers looked a little bit flattened at the top of the hoop. I think the design was made to fit in a square mount rather than in a circular hoop (which would explain the flattened out florals), so after a lot of procrastination I decided to tweak it a little.

I printed out some graph paper and had a little doodle with some pens, copying some of the flowers and leaves from the original design and having a play around. In the end though, I got impatient and decided to wing it and just go straight in with needle and thread.....

.....adding a few blue and pink flowers with some brown twiggy bits and a few leaves here and there.

I think I did OK?

Not too much, just enough extra detail to add some height at the top of the design.

Awwwww, so, so pretty!

After weeks of stitching, the oatmeal coloured fabric was looking a weeny bit grubby, so once I'd finished all the stitching I gently washed the whole thing in some warm soapy water. I used a towel to soak up as much of the water as I could, then ironed the fabric on the reverse side (placing the fabric face down on the towel to keep the stitches from being flattened) to remove all the crinkles. I left it to dry completely over night before stretching it out in the hoop and finishing off the edges.

 I'm absolutely thrilled with the finished hoop, both the stitching journey and the finished piece have made me very happy indeed.

Now then, I think I need to show you my threads, if you'd like to see them?

They please me on soooooo many levels!!!

Oh, the colours (imagine me swooning!) 

A collection of colourful yarn/threads is the perfect definition of creativity waiting to happen, and I absolutely LOVE the visual stimulation they provide. I get a real buzz out of looking at these three little drawers - yes, they are indeed drawers, aren't they neat? 

I got the storage idea from Lolli and Grace, convincing me that this was a better option than winding all my threads onto little plastic bobbins. I really dislike the kinks that appear in floss that's been wound onto bobbins (they encourage knots which drive me wild), so I went searching for some suitable drawers and fell in love with this simple clear acrylic type.

They are designed with stationary/cosmetics in mind and come in all sorts of sizes and configurations. If you are searching out something similar online, my advice would be to check the scale/measurements carefully - a skein of DMC thread measures around 155 mm so make sure any drawers or containers will be long enough/wide enough.

I bought these ones on Amazon, and am thrilled with how they work for the purpose of not only storing my threads, but allowing me to see them on display too....

....oooooo, so smooch-worthy and delicious in every way!

The other thing I bought and have found really useful are these thread organiser cards. At the start of a new stitch project, I like to cut a length of each colour and separate it into two strands ready for stitching. The designs I've worked so far change colours often, and this method makes it easy to grab a length of the right colour just when I need it. 

So that pretty much brings me up to date with my stitching journey, four months in and still overwhelmingly loving it all. I haven't decided where to hang my Coffee hoop yet, although I think I might take it down to the studio as I have a feeling it would look gorgeous hanging on my blue wall. And the coffee at Coopers Cafe is a bit of a special treat for the taste buds (for coffee lovers out there, Coopers serves Grumpy Mule coffee, oh it is divine!)

My next project is the above design by Tiny Modernist, already purchased and downloaded, and a delicious pale grey Aida fabric stretched in my 8" hoop ready. I'm just waiting on my threads to arrive in the post...I know, more threads to add to my drawers.

What's a girl to do when the creative urge is so strong?

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Early Summer in the Dales

It occurred to me at the weekend that as we only have six more weeks of the school year left, it would be a good idea to make the very most of every available little snippet of child free time before it all disappears in a puff of smoke. I need to make my child free days work hard in the weeks before the summer holidays (my to-do list is a thing of mammoth proportions), but also I really want to make the most of the time that J and I have to hang out together just the two of us. So we've decided that for the next six weeks, Mondays are to be used for leisure and pleasure only, no chores allowed. I am so grateful for this day in the week when neither of us needs to work, and after eighteen months of this routine we finally no longer feel like we are bunking off! It's safe to say that we really enjoy our Mondays together and I appreciate them very, very much.

As soon as we'd deposited Little B at school yesterday we drove straight out of town and up into the Yorkshire Dales. We're lucky to live close to the Dales and within 15-20 minutes we can park in any number of small villages with access to mile upon mile of public footpaths through the most glorious countryside. 

Yesterday's walk took us from the picturesque village of Burnsall up to Trollers Gill which is an ancient Limestone ravine. 

The footpath down through the ravine is a bit of a rocky scramble as you are actually walking down the dry riverbed. For most of the year the river flows underground here and the rocks are completely free of water, but we once tackled this walk after weeks of heavy rain and pretty much paddled our way down, much to the soggy dismay of the Little People!

Emerging out of the shadowy gorge and into the bright sunshine of the day is quite something, and it kind of feels a little bit like being in a film - it's very Hobbit-esk! 

The limestone landscape really feels ancient here, and it's incredibly peaceful with just the sounds of the birds and the sheep. It was lovely to see so many butterflies too, they were impossible to capture on camera, but I especially enjoyed seeing some of the small blue ones fluttering around as we walked.

There is a part of this walk that follows a small road for a mile or so, and although I much prefer walking in the fields or on farm tracks, this road is rural and generally pretty quiet.

Our seasons have shifted in the blink of an eye, and so far June has really felt like early Summer. The grasses are high and full of pollen and the endless days of hot sunshine have been absolutely blissful.

The verges and hedgerows are looking beautiful, with foxgloves and ox eye daisies blooming their hearts out.

See? Doesn't the landscape look like pure Summer to you? It's like we fast-tracked through Spring in double quick time this year, landing in Summer long before we are used to it. I'm not in any way complaining you understand, I absolutely adore the Summer season and am delighted we've been given a head start.

I wanted to stop and photograph pretty much everything, the long distance views and the close-up details all looked lush and camera worthy. But J was marching us along as we were near the river, which meant we would be nearing the end of our seven mile hike and a pint of cold beer would be in our near future. I bet he could practically taste that beer, and we were very hot and weary by this point.

Oh, but just look at the meadows, how can we walk past them and not stop to take it all in? Just look at all the flowers! Stop stop!! I have to stop and look and breathe it all in!

Ah here is the river, and the final stretch of the walk back into Burnsall. All is well.

When we arrived back in the village, we had a little debate about where to go for our lunch. Usually we are picnickers and come prepared with our own fodder, but yesterday I think we were so eager to get out of town that we clean forgot to bring anything but water. So on a whim we pulled in at the Devonshire Fell, which is rather a posh hotel perched up on the side of the hill above Burnsall, with stunning, far reaching views. Gosh, did I say it was posh? I was almost too nervous to step into the bar with my flip flops and shorts and my rather tired and bedraggled look. But I ventured in and ordered up the longed for ice cold beers, and dared to ask for a lunch menu, crikey, it was devilishly expensive. You can take a quick look at the start of this video to see what I mean - it was all very refined and not the kind of down to earth village pub scene that we are used to. Linen napkins and heavy silver cutlery, you get the picture.

Anyhow.....the upshot is that we enjoyed a spectacular ploughmans lunch for two sat outside on the sunny terrace with views to die for, and well, it was all ridiculously lovely. Such a treat and a perfect taste of early Summer.

ps if you're not familiar with a ploughmans lunch, there's an interesting write up about it here. It's very British, and very suited to outdoor summer eating.

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May End

Last week it was half term and I tell you we were all so ready for a change of pace and a break from routine. I'm sure it's the same in every household with school age children, that deep-down need for some respite from the clock watching and the nagging that comes with trying to get the offspring ready for the day and out the door on time.

On top of the usual school stuff we're in the midst of GCSE exams with The Teen, so the slight ease up last week was especially welcome for him, and for me too. I'm trying really hard to trust in his very laid back approach, trying my level best not to keep questioning his commitment or the amount of time he's spent revising. 

All will be well, I'm sure. 

So last week was all about laid back relaxation, which I'm happy to say that we all rather excel at here. However for me personally, I would have dearly loved a trip to the coast in amongst all the laid-backness, I'm feeling a strong emotional pull to be beside the sea at the moment. But when I put the idea forward to the family I was met with a complete lack of interest or understanding. I even offered to down-grade my expectations to a day trip to the West coast instead of an overnight stay on my favourite East coast, but nobody wanted to go and I have to be honest, it broke my heart a little. My Little People are growing up so fast, and most of the time I absolutely love to see their independent and strong spirits thriving. But every so often, oh I do so long to have them little again, when trips to the seaside would be met with such joy and enthusiasm.

Once I got over my disappointment and realised that we wouldn't be going anywhere at all, I settled down into our home space and made the most of the warm sunny days. We did some more to Little B's bedroom which is still an ongoing thing, and we had a bit of a clear out of rubbish in the cellar and the back yard which was very therapeutic. We bought bags of compost and I refilled all my back yard pots before planting them up with some colourful annuals. We worked at the allotment, cutting back overgrown pathways, weeding the main growing beds and preparing to plant out various little pots of veggies and herbs that we've collected from kinds friends and the garden centre. I saw an idea on Pinterest for creating a trellis for sweet peas out of bamboo canes and twine, and that's going to be my next project. I've already got the seedlings waiting patiently to put down their roots into deeper soil - gosh my to-do list really is humongous. 

As well as all the Doing, there was plenty of idling for us all and I guess that's the whole point of these short one week holidays at home. To rest, recharge, and to seek out the little things that make us deep-down happy. I spent lots of time in my back yard, either crocheting or reading, or sometimes (especially first thing in the morning) just sipping coffee and listening to the birds.  My reading was all about drinking in the May and June magazine issues which I had been saving especially for this week of down-time. These are my most favourite issues of the whole year (well this it my favourite time of year in general) and they did not disappoint. Such a lot of visual happiness in those pages, all light, fresh, summery colours to inspire and bring on the happy vibes. Just lovely in a dreamy, slightly unreal kind of a way.

Although I had hoped for some days out last week, in the end we didn't venture further than where we could walk. We walked in the woods, walked to the farm shop and we spent quite a lot of time at the park. 

One evening I took Little B with me on one of my regular buttercup appreciation walks, and on the way there he'd asked me how many buttercups there were in the meadow. I told him to guess how many he thought, to which he answered "maybe around two hundred?" His face was a picture when he saw the true scale of the meadow, it really is breathtaking and his wide astonished eyes reflected it perfectly.

I love the light at this time of year, most especially at the end of the day. I love that a walk in the park at 8pm feels so special when the sun is low and golden and night time still feels a long way off.

Last week I picked my crochet banner back up, and after a few weeks break from it I know straight away what I needed to do for the border. During the school holidays we try and keep our Creative Coopers group going on a Friday morning at the cafe, and I think I appreciate those happy hours even more during the holidays than I do during term time. It's just a fabulous way to round up the week and I dearly love spending time with my creative friends and any visitors who happen to drop in to join us. 

Once I'd finished the 6 border rounds it was time to stitch on the letters. This didn't go smoothly, in fact, it was probably the hardest part of the whole project and took for EVER to complete. My fingers protested at all that stitching (I used back stitch around the outer edge of each letter, so it was very labour intensive), but I stuck with it and am so so happy with the outcome. I'm crocheting an additional piece all along the top now so that I can insert a piece of wooden dowel for hanging purposes, but I promise to show you very soon when it's all done.

So that was the end of May, and although I'm a little sorry that my most favourite month is over for another year, it's been absolutely spectacular. I've never known a month to have so much continuous sunshine and so little rain and I've loved every minute of it. I've loved the abundant greenery and the flowers (how can you not love a month that contains blossom, bluebells, wild garlic, cow parsley and buttercups?!) and most of all I've loved the length of these warm golden days.

Here's hoping that June is just as lovely all round!

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