Attic24

Easter 2024

HeLLOoOoOooooo to you all out there in the world!!! I thought I would pop in for a quick catch up in amongst me being a mad busy thing as I prepare for my first retreat of the year this weekend. We're fully back to work and school this week after the Easter holidays - schools here in North Yorkshire had the Easter weekend in the middle of the two week break and it's honestly been the loveliest time for my little family. We've had the usual mixed bag of weather which included some glorious spring days and some hideously wild, wet and stormy ones too, so we've been out and about whenever we could but also enjoyed our quiet stay-home days too.

As I'm short on time today, I'll try and keep my word count to a reasonable digit, but I do hope you enjoy the visuals. I absolutely LOVE taking photos of everyday life, it's my most favourite type of blog content to create and also to enjoy on other peoples blogs (although there are so few active bloggers left these days).

Eastertide twenty-twenty-four....here are twenty snaps to tell the tale......

1. Laaaaaaambs!!! I'm sure there've been lambs around for a while already, but these were the first ones we saw in the fields close to home. Cute, playful little things they were too.

2. Sunday stroll. This is a walk we do when the fields and footpaths are still too muddy and wet, it's a 4.5 mile circular route which passes through a couple of small villages, then all the way back to town along the canal tow path.

3. Canal boats. Quite a number of people have suggested to me that I should design a blanket inspired by my daily walks along the canal. Of course this creative seed has now been sown and you may or may not be interested to know that it is taking root and sprouting leaves. I've spent the past four months building up a photo gallery of the boats I've walked past and the colours and decorative details are really making me feel the joy. It's not a done deal yet, but I'm beginning to form an idea of how this blanket might look and it's a distinct possibility for the 2025 CAL. Do let me know what you think of this idea by the way, I'm always open to hearing your thoughts. You can look ((here)) if you want to see a little of what's inside my Creative Mind!)

4. The Blobby Tree (!).....well, that's what I call this tree, I've no idea exactly what these blobs are but it tickles me every winter when we walk this way. They are tangled, dense balls of twiggy stems which I think are a parasitic growth (like Mistletoe, but these aren't mistletoe I don't think)

5. Naughty Pancakes. Not mine I might add, no, I've been on a health kick aside from a small daily ration of mini eggs and some Easter biscuit therapy. This plate was in front of Little B, and was an Easter Holiday breakfast treat at the pancake café in town. Triple chocolate American Pancakes, down the hatch in record time and one very happy Little B.

6. Bees and Blossom. My neighbours cherry tree was spectacular this year and I enjoyed it very much in the few weeks while it bloomed. On sunny days it was a buzz with bees which is such a happy sound, easy to miss if you are rushing past but lovely when you happen to slow down and catch it.

7. My hill view. Always a daily delight,  I love the way it connects me to the landscape and the seasons (and the weather).

8. My yarn tribe. We had a lovely get together at Coopers on Good Friday - coffee, crochet and some upbeat chatter, you just can't beat it. I finally finished my Blooming Sungold cushion cover, but it needs some gentle blocking and then the two sides joining together, so it's currently still in the WiP pile until after my retreat.

9. Easter celebrations......one of my favourites of the whole year. I'm not religious, but I do enjoy celebrating the return of the light and the start of spring. This sweet little lamb was a Craftpod project some years ago and I adore it.

10. The Mantel Twigs....how many years old now? I've no idea, but well over a decade (they were in situ in 2011, most likely earlier than that). They have seen many years of Easter and Christmas decorating and even though they are nothing fancy I just love them.

11. Chocolate eggs. I bought the Little People one medium sized boxed egg each this year, and then decided to pretend that I'm still the Mother of Little-Little People and bought a whole load of these egg hunt foil wrapped eggs. No actual egg hunt for us now of course, but it was lovely to have a little stash of egglets to offer as an after dinner treat. The giant Little People approved.

12. Seasonal Colour Inspiration. I pulled together this basket of yarn as I was contemplating colours for a future project, and then realised that I was being heavily influenced by the Eggs. The colour palette wasn't quite right in the end and has been shelved, but it's undeniably pretty.

13. Double daffs. These were on my table over Easter and I really enjoyed watching them slowly open and unfold. Gorgeous things.

14. Wild garlic. I was all intent on going to forage some from the woodland myself, but my good friend has it growing in her abundant woodsy garden and gifted me a generous bag. The scent....oh, how I wish you could smell it!

15. Wild Garlic soup....yummmmmmmmmmmm!! I made it as you would a basic leek and potato soup, wilting in the wild garlic right at the end to keep the green colour and the fresh flavour. It was wonderful, truly a taste of springtime.

16. Pub life. I'm not a big drinker, but I do enjoy going to our local pubs every so often for a few drinks with J and meeting friends. We have some really lovely local places to drink all within ten minutes walk - in the above photo we are settled into the Narrowboat on Easter Saturday around 5pm, waiting for friends to come and join us. The drink is mine and J's current favourite, it's a Belgian cherry kriek beer served in a lovely half pint glass. Delicious.

17. Easter Sunday walk. We went early to Bolton Abbey to beat the crowds, a gentle stroll up and down the woodland paths, over bridges and along the river bank.

18. Resting.... in the gentle warmth of the sun on this log, wondering as I always do about the quirky history of the money trees at Bolton Abbey. I was waiting for J who'd had to run back to pick up his hat which he left on the bench, what a treat to have hats off and feel warmed by the sun.

19. Slow travel. Oh, how I love love love a bit of slow travel!!! Last week we took a little holiday, travelling from the east coast across the north sea to the continent. We've taken this journey before (I think this was our seventh time) so we knew what to expect, but the excitement of large ship travel and also a night away in a hotel was real.

20. Holiday memories....just the loveliest things to have swimming around in my brain! As you can see, our trip last week was to Amsterdam, and it was fabulous and fun and I hope you're going to be OK about me showing you some visuals next week because I'd really like to share what I saw and how we spent our short time there.

Well, it's been really lovely chatting to you - I hope you all had a great Easter and that April is shaping up to be wonderful wherever you are in the world. Tell me something you're excited for this month, I'd love to know.....

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EDIT >> Thank you so much to Alison for the intel on the blobby tree! Apparently called "Witches Brooms" (which I LOVE), it's a deformity which creates "a dense mass of shoots  growing from a single point, with the resulting structure resembling a broom or birds nest" . So now the blobby tree is renamed the witches tree..

 

 

 

 

Yuletide Season 2023

Hey - hi - hello - happy new year !! 

I thought it was high time I dusted off my laptop (literally) and opened up my attic window to let some fresh air blow in. I've been hibernating it seems, content to shuffle about in my own little world enjoying the Yuletide season and grounding myself in my real life world for a while. Don't get me wrong, you know I adore our online community, but every so often it's good for me to gently disconnect from my digital world for a bit and take a rest.

I've had a super-relaxing few weeks spending quiet time at home with J and the Little People. I know it's a bit ridiculous that I still refer to them as Little People because they are anything but little these days - my two boys (age 21 and almost 14) are enormous humans compared to my short five foot three self. Our school holidays fell very late this year and Little B didn't break up until Friday 22nd. On the plus said it has given us this whole week at the start of January where we are still in holiday mode and it feels like a luxury to be able to start the year in a deliciously slow way. Back to school next Tuesday.

J decided to take a full two weeks off work to coincide with the school holidays which has been so, so nice, I can't remember the last time he took such a long holiday. There was a part of me which desperately wanted to take advantage and organise some sort of New Year holiday or short break away (the sea is always, always calling me) but nobody else wanted to do anything so I had to quieten myself down and accept the reality. In hindsight I realise it has been the right decision and there is a lot to be said for gentle, slow, stay-home days where the focus has been on rest and relaxation. 

The photos above were all taken in the late afternoon in mid December, which shows how very long our dark hours are at the moment. The first two images were around 4pm, and the one just above where you can see the moon is 4.30pm. I was looking at it just now and wondering what on earth I was doing walking along that particular stretch of road as it was getting dark, and then remembered I was heading to the pub with Little Lady for a cheeky pre-dinner drinky. So often it catches me by surprise that I have these wonderfully mature, grown up offspring now, I somehow keep forgetting that. 

I decorated late and slow for Christmas, the tree went up on Sunday 17th and other decorative bits and bobs happened in stops and starts over the following week.

I enjoyed the tree just as much as ever, the familiar clash of colours and decorations gathered over two decades of family life. Nothing new on the branches, but I've come to adore the sameyness of our old Christmas tree and the nostalgic memories that pour forth from its branches. It's been an absolute joy to have my latest blankets around too - the Starbright colours make me so, so stupidly happy. Colour-filled happy nostalgia is the very essence of Christmas for me I think.

Unpacking my homemade Christmas decorations is always a bit special and I love the quiet rediscovery of them each year. This is my Festive Garland from three years ago (the blog post and free pattern is ((here)), ahh, the colours are just so good!

I didn't take very many photos of my mantels this Christmas, but they are the same kind of thing that I do every year. I don't really go all out with my mantels, I have fairy lights and candles on there all year round so I simply add just a few decorative things along with the garland change. 

Winter Solstice was a day later than usual and fell on the 22nd which was the same day the schools finished for Christmas so it felt like a lovely time for quiet celebration. I lit a Clementine scented candle and made a small ivy and eucalyptus wreath to go around it, and it was just enough. I've learnt over the years that it's only me who cares about celebrating the four turning points in the year as the rest of the family don't share my love of the seasons. So these days I resist the urge to drag them all into it, and just go about my own personal little rituals which have meaning to me.

For quite a few years now I've been treating myself to a special festive bouquet, usually timed to arrive for the Winter Solstice. This year I decided not to use the usual online letterbox flower company (their festive bouquet had flowers in it which I didn't really like all that much), but instead I went to a local florist shop in town. I told the lady what I liked - mainly foliage and berries with some bold red flowers so long as they weren't carnations (!) -  and she said she would need an hour to make something up specially for me. I honestly was a bit nervous as this is a real indulgence and I only ever buy myself expensive flowers once a year. But my goodness, the bouquet they created for me was stunning! You can see in the photo above, I had just collected it from the florist and the single Amaryllis stem has five beautiful buds just about to burst open....oh I was soooo excited that they included one of my favourite blooms. In fact, I never realised that you could buy an actual amaryllis stem in a florist shop?

Over the Christmas week the flowers opened....

....and I couldn't love them more. In fact, two weeks on and the bouquet is still looking really good - I've thinned it out a bit and re-cut the stems and I reckon it'll be good for another week yet. What a wonderful treat I gave myself.

Christmas day itself was wonderfully relaxed, just the five of us taking it easy, enjoying good food and drinks and simple family time. I know I've said my Little People are no longer little children, but every year they do seem to delight in the same traditions that we've built throughout their childhood. One of those is party poppers at the dinner table - does anyone else do this? My kidlets absolutely love them, and there is always a competition between them to see who can get the perfect aim with the streamers over the lampshade.

We had old fashioned Christmas crackers with paper hats, jokes and little gifts inside. This origami frog was made by the Big Teen who has always loved paper folding since being young. I've kept the frog on my mantel, a little memento of a wonderful Christmas time full of simple traditions.

Something else we did a lot of this Christmas was jigsaw puzzles. Again, this is such a strong, long standing tradition carried forward from my own childhood. There is something so enjoyable about sitting at the table on a quiet morning to work on a jigsaw, the slow simplicity of it really makes me happy. All the family join in too, the Little People and J, all of us taking turns over the course of a day or two. We favour the smaller 500 piece puzzles which can pretty easily be completed in a day - we have two Christmassy ones which we bought many years ago, and this year I also purchased a new one.....

 

.....Nutcraker Magic. Oh, this one was SO MUCH FUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was interesting all the way from start to finish, and the puzzle pieces themselves were so, so good to fit together, do you know what I mean? When there is zero wiggle room and every piece just plunks in place in a really tightly, satisfying way? Well, this puzzle delivered peak jigsaw satisfaction, can ten out of ten recommend.

I can honestly say that these quiet days at home have been restorative in the true sense of the word. I've spent a lot of time on the sofa wrapped in colourful blankets, passing the time doing nothing of note. Sometimes reading, sometimes snoozing, sometimes watching easy films which the Little People chose, and sometimes just daydreaming and allowing my mind and body to be completely at rest. It's been absolutely bloomin' lovely. 

The weather has been awful really. I honestly think it has rained almost constantly for about three weeks now, so much water falling and everywhere so waterlogged and sodden. Of course I've still been out and about as my lifestyle involves a fair bit of daily walking, but it's been very uninspiring out there.

The woodland paths are exceptionally wet, more like little streams than footpaths, so it's been wellies for the win. 

It's not been possible to get into the countryside for walking because fields and paths are just mud slides at the moment. But last weekend we drove out into the Dales to see how the river was looking at Linton Falls.....

.....this river is always impressive but right now it is mind blowingly full. It was exhilarating just standing near it - the noise of it was incredible. 

One day last week we decided to go to Salts Mill, it's been a while since I've been and amazingly we realised that J has never been. Not ever?! Surely he has?! But no, in the sixteen years of living here it's always just been me and the Little People who have visited and I was keen to show him what he's been missing.

It was so beautifully decorated for Christmas, and although it was busy it still felt very restful and just a wonderful place to slow down and spend idle time. We took our time browsing the whole two floors, taking it all in and marvelling at this incredible building. J and I both share a love of art materials, so I knew he would adore Salts - it has a massive art shop section full of pens, pencils, paints and all manner of creative inspiration (he bought new pens, I knew he would)

The Home shop was looking glorious, it's always very special at Christmas time with a lot of effort put into the displays.

I mean, just look at this ^^ isn't it beautiful?

It was a really enjoyable family outing - top notch browsing and then a late pub lunch down by the river in Saltaire village. Wonderful, wholesome holiday stuff.

I bought a few cards from Salts like I always do, they have a very extensive selection of artists cards there. I fell in love with the above image titled "the Strollers" by Dee Nickerson - it reminded me so much of our many visits to Saltburn over the years, and honestly I am madly craving a visit to the coast right now. Maybe sometime in January I will just go off for a few days like I did in October, the call of the sea is running strong.

I packed Christmas away yesterday, boxed it all up for another year. My Starbright blankets are staying though, I can't bring myself to lose the joy of those colours in this season of low light and greyness.

Creatively I've been in a bit of a lull during the past few weeks. I've been slowly, slowly working on my new Sungold stripes which I'll talk to you more about in a moment. I did pull together the above collection of yarn balls before Christmas though, and I sat for a few solid days and crocheted some Christmas gifts for friends. It was a fun thing to work on a new design, sitting and hooking and stitching something new - I'll show you next week what I made because I think there could be a new pattern to share which you might enjoy. 

So Sungold stripes - oh, they are looking so so so GOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm not going to spoil the surprise because you will see them soon enough when the Sungold Crochet-Along begins.....ToMoRRoW!!! Eeeppppp.....it's come around all of a  sudden and I have much still to do. Thankfully I had the sense to get the pattern all written up a while ago and J (love him) has already made the charts and worksheets and PDF things for you, but my job for today is to pull together the tutorial. And by pull together, I mean I need coffee first and then I am photographing and editing and uploading and writing and checking and checking some more. Always so last minute, but it's just the way I am.

If you are joining in, then we shall be getting going on Friday morning - I think between 9 and 10am tomorrow I should be ready to sing and dance with you......see you then!

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Feels Like Winter

In my humble opinion, the end of November should really still have an autumn feel to it, because in all honesty our winters are long enough when they span from December to March. This year however, winter came howling in at the end of November and snatched away any hope of a gradual seasonal shift. Yes, it's safe to say there's been nothing remotely gradual about the early arrival of winter this year, and the sudden icy freeze came as a bit of a shock.

Despite the freezing chill, it's been beautiful out there, a real gift to have days (yes, multiple days!) of blue sky and sunshine.

These photos were taken in the middle of last week during the final days of November, and as you can see it looked and felt very, very much like winter. The temperatures stayed on the low side, and waking up to a minus four icy start was bracing.

You've probably gathered by now that I walk a lot in my day-to-day life, and I am not generally put off by the weather. I mean, I much (much, much) prefer walking when it's bright and sunny but getting outside to walk at least once a day is a non negotiable part of my wellness routine, rain or shine. I usually have two walks each morning, the first one is a fast "wake-up walk" at 7am with J, and then the second one I usually take on my own as I head out to do our daily grocery shop.

This second solo walk is much slower, and I love to take my time. I find that walking is a wonderful opportunity to practice mindfulness, and for me personally, my morning stroll is often a time of mental clarity and creativity. It's a time when I absorb my surroundings, often stopping to really look at things in detail....

....it's a wonderful practice, to consciously slow down and spend time appreciating the seasonal details of nature.

Taking daily photographs has become a way of life for me now, after so many years inhabiting Blogland. I just can't imagine going through life in too much of a hurry to stop, appreciate and photograph the things that inspire me.

Frost is such a beautiful thing, a sparkly dusting of winter magic which makes even the dullest plants look enchanting.

On this morning I was actually on route to the supermarket, with a spur of the moment detour around the meadow and along the canal bank. I am so thankful that I have such freedom in my days that allows me to spend time outside....

....I'm someone who needs a regular sun/light fix and I feel my whole soul craving it if I go too long without.

We had our first dusting of snow last week, it wasn't much, just a soft sprinkling that made the landscape look beautiful.

The canal froze over too, always a sure sign that winter is most definitely underway. I took a slow, slip-slidey walk to Coopers café on Friday morning, it's a highlight of my week and I always wake up on Friday's with a happy heart.

It was extra special last week because I had friends visiting, so my stripy Starbright was not alone for long.....

.....awwww, I had the best kind of yarny company! I LOVE the above photo, it's the three of us sat around the table laughing and chatting and eating caramel shortbread and yarning along all day. In case you are curious about my visitors, the sock-in-progress belongs to Christine Winwick Mum, and the delicious granny squares belong to the lovely Emma Varnam. We try and get together every few months if we can (out last meet up was early September), to chat all things yarn and design and blog and creative living. We can quite literally talk all day long without pausing for breath, it's just the best thing having friends who are totally on your wave length.

Our days are so short now as we head through December, but it does mean that I often get to see the most beautiful light in the late afternoons.

It's Saturday morning now, and I'm out walking the hilly streets of my neighbourhood with J and the Peeps. Well, two of the LP at least - the eldest Giant Child lives a very independent life these days. I so appreciate still having our 19 year old and 13 year old come out with us though, and more and more often they are asking to come without an ounce of bribery or coercion needed. It's just before 9am in the above photo....

.....and yes, it was proper cold and frosty still.

We walked along the farm track...

...stopping often to oooo and aaaaah over the beautiful iciness of everything.

It was lovely and still in the woodland, a gentle, chilled quiet as we strolled along and breathed in the cold air.

I love that we get to start our weekend in this way, it makes me SO happy. It might seem a bit odd to walk up hills and through woodland and around a castle on the way to do a grocery shop, but adding on that extra hour of time is worth so much and I love that the Little People are living this kind of life with us.

My flowers for this week came from the market which I'm delighted about - a wonderful lady who is fairly new to the market, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to be a regular customer. She had some mixed bouquets and wreaths for sale, but it was her buckets of floristry blooms that really caught my eye. Buying individual stems is not something I get to do very often because I am usually just buying the standard cheap bunches that the supermarkets sell. But just look at these flowers, aren't they spectacular? The flower lady told me they are a chrysanthemum variety called "fuego" which is Spanish for "fire" and I fell instantly in love with them. She wrapped them so nicely for me in brown paper tied with rafia, and I could not take my eyes off them all the way home.

I only bought two stems as they were quite expensive, but I am so enjoying them on my table. Such beauty right there. Love 'em.

Something else I'm loving right now is the return of the leafy clems, a regular seasonal supermarket purchase which always makes me glad for winter.

The leafage is a bit extra on this batch (more leaf than fruit) but I love the look of them on my table, and the fruits themselves are just sooooo sweet and juicy.

I've been feeling quite tired of late, kind of like my body is naturally wanting to send me into some sort of mild winter hibernation state. I took a nap on Saturday afternoon, it wasn't planned, but I found that I simply could not keep my eyes open. I was on the sofa with the kitty (you can just spot her in the above photo) and what with the cosiness of the blankets, the gentle weight of the cat, and the rhythmic rows of gentle v-stitches on my hook, well, I was tipped over the edge into a deep and restorative power nap. I woke up a bit disorientated but felt so much better for having the extra zzzz's.

All this talk of winter, and we are in December of course, but I just can't quite bring myself to face up to the idea of Christmas just yet. All over social media it seems like Christmas things have been happening for many weeks already, but here in the Attic I'm still weirdly embedded in Autumn. 

I did hang up my one solitary strand of tinsel.....

.....and I've been eating mini mince pies which is about as festive as I can manage this early in the month. The Little People are nagging about the tree, so I guess I will have to rally myself quite soon and get on my hands and knees and into the attic cupboards to perform the annual drag-out of the Christmas Boxes.

How's it with you, are you all decked out or are you taking your time like me? And do you do a real tree or a faux job? We'll have our usual ancient old tree-in-a-box again this year, it must be at least twenty five years old, an old friend. I really should get a move on and let it see the light of day.....

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Springy Easter Things

There's a small but prolific ornamental cherry tree growing in my next door neighbours front garden and during the past two weeks this tree has bloomed it's little heart out. After a very cold,  slow start to the spring season it's been absolutely glorious to gaze up at these gorgeous flowers and feel the gentle warmth of the sun on my face.

The tree has been a-buzz with bees and it made me feel grateful for our neighbours who grow such lovely flowers, shrubs and trees in their small patches of front garden.

There aren't any floral trees in my own front garden just yet (our butterfly bush is an August flowering shrubby tree), but I did plant up a large terracotta pot of grape hyacinths and narcissus which is looking rather lovely on my door step. 

I've had these daffodils on my table during the past week, and I've been swooning over them on a daily basis. I splashed out an extra pound on this fancy-pants frilly bunch in celebration of Easter and they've been so lovely, if just a bit extra.

Also on my table this week is a cute bowl of mini eggs. Along with hot cross buns, these delicious little chocolatey morsels are an essential taste of Easter for me and I absolutely go mad for them. The mini-egg season is over for another year and I'm quite sad about it, but then again I don't think they would be so special if you could buy them all year round.

I unearthed the Easter Box from the depths of the attic eaves and was overcome by a tender wave of fondness and nostalgia. So many memories held in this miscellaneous pile of bits n bobs, a precious reminder of years gone by when the Little People were still oh-so-little. 

I love decorating for the seasons (I think Easter is my favourite actually), and bringing out the same decorations year after year feeds into my emotions for sure. At one time I used to decorate purely for the enjoyment of the Little People, but that faded away some years ago and honestly, now I do it all for me, me, me. 

Easter weekend was mostly quite sunny and warm and I was able to use my outside washing line for the first time this year. Sun dried cotton bedding has to be one of life's great pleasures - getting into bed in the evening when it's all fresh and clean and smells DiViNEly of the outdoors is just the most joyful thing.

Day by day the trees are waking from their winter rest and this particular shade of new-leaf-green really makes my heart sing. 

On the woodland floor there is no shortage of greenery because we are right in the middle of wild garlic season and I'm very happy about it.

I picked some leaves to bring home a few days ago so that I could whizz up some wild garlic pesto. I generally manage to make one or two batches each year (here is my recipe blog post) - the wild garlic picking window (when the leaves are young and fresh and before the flowers arrive) is pretty small so you've got to be motivated when the time is right.

I made a jam jar full of this vibrant green sludge and it tastes wickedly garlicky, it's incredibly potent. In fact, I'm almost too scared to eat it because I fear I will reek of garlic for weeks on end and repulse everyone. I went and bought the most expensive and Italian-looking spaghetti I could find in the supermarket to make a simple bowl of garlic pesto pasta....but I've yet to pluck up the courage to do it. I've got the garlic fear.

Since Easter weekend came and went, the warm, springlike weather vanished and a storm has blown in across the UK. It's been rotten, absolutely rotten this week. Really cold, seriously blustery and wet, wet, wet. I think the official term would be "Squally Showers" (and shamefully I just had to look up the spelling of squally). In amongst the weather chaos there have been odd little patches of unexpected sunshine, and we were lucky on Tuesday to time it right and spend a couple hours walking at Bolton Abbey without getting drenched. 

It was a lovely amble along the riverside, made even more special by the sighting of a peacefully grazing deer. This is only the second time we've spotted a deer at Bolton Abbey, although I'm pretty sure they are there all the time and are experts at staying hidden. I love walking with the family so much (we had Little Lady and Little B with us), and the pleasure of it has only grown over the years since they were small little peeps walking with us.

We drove home via the "scenic route" which takes us up over the top of Barden moor, and it was lovely to see the hills rolling into the distance under a blue sky with nooooo raaaaain. We stopped the car very briefly and Little Lady and I got out to get a blast of fresh air - it's the kind of fresh that steals your breath clean away and I love to inhale it right down to my toes.

Do you recall the very first photo of this rambly blog post, the one where I showed you my neighbours cherry tree? Well it has reached its peek now and due to the squally conditions this week, we've been showered in petal confetti every time we step out the front door. So pretty, despite the bloomin' rain and wind.

Did I mention how cold it's been too? I wish my Springy April narrative was different, but alas we've been plunged temporarily back into winter and the past few evenings I've even lit the fire to keep out the chill. I hear next week's supposed to get better, and this morning the ladies in the coffee shop told me to expect double digit temperatures next week, woohoo.

I wish I had more exciting things to talk to you about, but truthfully life just lately has felt like a bit of an uphill trudge. I think my immune system must be a bit fed up because I've got yet another cold, hot on the heels of recovering from that awful one last month. I've struggled with low energy levels, and not a lot of motivation to do anything much. 

The week before Easter I went down to Dorset, my second visit of the year. I travelled by train to go and stay for a week with my Dad again, a trip planned so that Lady B could take some days away from the responsibility of caring for him. I never know quite how much to share about this kind of thing as my family affairs are pretty personal...but the reality is that I am carrying a fair bit of worry about my Dad's health and it does affect my equilibrium quite a lot. We are around two years into a steady dementia decline and I can tell you it's tough. I do try and deal with it in as positive a way as I can, and of course I do still love to be down in Dorset - but yeah, it's not at all easy. Maybe I'll chat to you more about it in another post, and show you some of the photos I took there?

Thanks as ever for calling in to visit, and if you have time to leave me a comment then I'd love to hear your news. 

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Easter 2022

Thank you for all your lovely messages following my last post, you always show me such kindness and support and I am ever so grateful for that I can tell you. After a slow, restful week I'm feeling a smidge brighter so I thought I would spend some time trying once again to catch up here.

At some point I'll tell you a bit more about what's going on in Dorset, my Dad isn't doing so good and it's a huge cause of worry for me. I try and shake it off because worrying doesn't really help - at this point in time there is very little to be done other than to wait things out. So although I still absolutely LOVE to be in Dorset to reconnect with my special place, it takes a lot out of me emotionally.

I was really glad to come home after five days away, but I came back to a house that desperately needed attention on all fronts. J is really great at making sure the Little Peeps (and the kitty) are fed and safe, but that's the extent of his housekeeping. Things like laundry, basic bathroom and kitchen cleaning (which needs doing every day in house with three children), recycling, tidying, food shopping - it all got a bit neglected. It made me realise that even though I am very slack when it comes to cleaning, I actually do way more daily housekeeping jobs than I give myself credit for. Put it this way - there was a LOT that needed my attention when I got back, so I spent pretty much a whole day getting on top of the jobs, including four loads of laundry. I know I was missed, I got multiple hugs from two out of three children and J was definitely very happy to have me home again.

I've come to realise in recent years that having familiar routines and gentle structure to my days is a highly underrated source of contentment. I always used to say how much I value my freedom, but what I only recently realised is that freedom only feels good for me if it's underpinned by routine. I wonder if this is connected to me getting older, or if it's always been that way and I just never realised it before? Either way, I am grateful for the ease of my days and the familiar rituals which bring me pleasure.

Yeah, it's often all about the coffee for me - well, more specifically the little outings with family or friends which surround the coffee drinking. I just love hanging out in cafés, there is something about the happy, relaxed ambience of a good indie coffee shop that greatly appeals to me. It's been a part of my life ever since I moved here fourteen years ago and found my way into an unexpectedly wonderful "café lifestyle". Having J able to join me on many days of the week now is a real pleasure, I happen to really enjoy his company which is something to celebrate after being together for almost thirty years.

During the school holidays we've continued to take our daily walk but it's generally been mid morning rather than our usual early morning jaunt. Sometimes it's just us two and sometimes we manage to persuade Little B to come with us. Since I had covid I haven't had enough physical energy to do my home workouts but my daily walks give me some much needed gentle exercise each day.

Our little town has been very busy during the Easter holidays with a lot of folks holidaying here, but I don't mind it at all. I love it when the town feels jolly and bustling and thriving, it's a special kind of feeling to know that I live in a place where people actually choose to come on holiday. I quite like strolling leisurely around the place pretending that I'm on holiday myself and wondering if I look like a local or a visitor, have you ever done that? 

The canal is getting busy again now that the holiday season has started and there are many boats coming and going along the waterways. The boat in the above photo is a local resident, it's a small open air one which offers short 30 minute cruises. We've been on it a few times in past years when the Little People were small, ah, fond memories of playing tourist in our home patch.

We hadn't made any plans for  Easter weekend and that felt absolutely just right for me. I've been trying to conserve my energy and rest when I feel like my body needs it, so have kept socialising to a minimum just lately. Since my blanket making has been put on hold (sill undecided what to do with that) I've been spending time doing other creative things instead of crochet. Over the Easter weekend I occupied myself with this unbelievably cute little stitching project from the spring Craftpod box. 

This was stitching on a teeeeeeeny tiny scale - delicate little lines of blanket stitch to join the felt pieces together, and simple black embroidery to create the face....

......awwwwwwwwww!!!!!!!!!! Such a sweet project and well worth the effort involved in creating it.

My little lamb became the guardian of the mini eggs over Easter weekend - I think I refilled this dish three or four times but that's exactly how it should be at Easter. I bought the Little People a modest sized Lindt easter egg each (this one) and they were very happy with my choice (we are all huge fans of Lindt chocolate in this house). But for me it was enough to have these little eggs to enjoy, gosh, I do so love them and Easter is not complete without them.

I went into the Attic eaves and dug out the old shoe box marked Easter which contains much loved decorations gathered over many years.

Some are shop bought and some are handmade and I love the happy, colourful chaos of it all.

The pattern for the little flowers is ((here)) and the Mini Chicklet pattern is ((here)), with Mini Bunny variation ((here)).

On the absolute spur of the moment I crocheted some new decorations for my twigs on Easter Monday, but you'll have to wait until next Spring to see those. I know, so mean of me! But I've written up the pattern (they are crocheted eggs with little flowers) and have made a note to share it next year in good time for you to purchase the polystyrene shapes and make them yourself if you want to. 

When I unpacked my Easter box I discovered these really pretty paper honeycomb egg decorations that I'd purchased last year, but which had arrived too late to use for Easter '21. It was a lovely surprise to find them and I hung them up across the archway where I have fairy lights all year round. I bought them from eBay ((here)) - I don't think I'll ever tire of decorating for seasonal celebrations and in many ways I love Easter decorating more than Christmas.

Right now as I sit and write to you there aren't any flowers on my table (shock horror!) and the whole room feels bare without them. I had a beautiful jug of spring blooms flowering away over the Easter weekend, a mix of hyacinths, tulips and the most fabulous frilly daffs, oh, I did enjoy them. Having fresh flowers in the house is high on my list of priorities and I consider them a weekly essential on the same level as milk or pasta. I think we're lucky these days that supermarkets sell beautiful seasonal blooms for just a few pounds so you can easily pop a bunch into your basket along with the groceries. Highly, highly recommended as a feel-good treat.

I've managed to do quite a bit of gentle walking this holiday and  I think walking in a woodland is such a wonderful way to appreciate the seasons and feel connected to nature. Right now in the north of England the trees are just starting to show the very first signs of greenery, but it's on the ground where you really take note. The wild garlic is at its peak (in terms of leafage) and as usual it's looking (and smelling) absolutely magnificent in the woods where I live. As you can see, it grows in abundance so I always feel OK about picking a small handful of leaves because it doesn't harm the plants at all and there is just soooo much of it.

I made some delicious pesto using around 100g of wild garlic leaves combined with a small handful of fresh basil, olive oil, lemon juice, 50g parmesan and 100g cashew nuts. It was absolutely insane - the flavour was incredible and we've eaten it for several meals simply tossed through with a good pasta.

I've spent some lovely time with my Little Lady this holiday, making the most of these last few weeks of her childhood before she turns eighteen next week. She is such a delight and I love our easy friendship, in fact I was thinking just the other day how grateful I am for the fact that all three of my offspring are very low drama and cause us the minimum of parental concern. I am truly grateful and make sure to tell them often.

Little Lady is coming through a fairly stressful period in her life right now (A levels begin in just a few short weeks, and then the BIG decision about university), so I've been supporting her in every which way I'm able. Often times it just means regular check-ins with her to make sure she's doing OK, a quick chat to catch up and hear her current thoughts and plans. But sometimes I find the need to parent more strongly, to dig in and pull her out of her anxiety and over thinking. If the weather permits, the pulling is usually something physical - a walk through the woods or a visit to her favourite coffee shop to get her to detach from screen time and breathe in a different environment. I've found it's much easier for her to offload her worries when we are walking, it's less intense I guess and a more natural way for us to talk things through.

In the above photo we had walked into town to pick up her favourite iced latté as a takeout, then strolled along the canal and into the park to sit, sip and chat. We spent almost an hour sat on the grass with the sun on our faces, taking in the view and talking about all sorts of things and later that evening she came to me just before bed to thank me for it. Sweet girl, she really is.

I absolutely love love love this time of year, in particular the light evenings that we are gifted after what seems like the longest dark season. In the above photo it's just after 8pm and I was walking home from my weekly Slimming World meeting. It's what I dream about in October when darkness closes in around 4pm, these beautiful, long, light-filled days of spring and summer are what my soul lives for.

I mean, how beeeeeeautiful is this sky? No filter, no editing, the sky really was this colour the other night.

It's been really nice to catch up with you, and I hope that my words are reading OK because I generally don't edit them once they have spewed out onto the page. What you read is what comes directly forth from my brain pipes, so here's hoping it all makes some kind of sense.

Today it's Saturday and we are back to work and school on Monday. I've enjoyed this much needed restful holiday but at the same time I do feel ready for some gentle routine to underpin my days again. It's all about the balance I guess.

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Winter Garland :: Ta-dah!

I've been wanting to make a winter garland for a few years now, something pretty to hang on my mantel in January once the colour and sparkle of Christmas has been packed away. In past years I've really enjoyed making seasonal wreaths and garlands, and you might remember me making my first garland for Autumn, and then one for Spring too....here are the links to those projects if you fancy taking a look....

((AUTUMN GARLAND)) and ((SPRING GARLAND))

I had a good idea of the colour palette I wanted to use, inspired by the soft, muted, frosty shades of this cold season. You can see my inspiration photos in the collage above - winter skies, frosty leaves, snowberries, pretty hellebore flowers and winter flowering cherry blossom. 

I picked out ten shades of Stylecraft Special DK for my Winter Garland :

Pale Rose : Powder Pink : Pistachio : Meadow : Lincoln 

Duck Egg : Parma Violet : Hint of Silver : Cream : White

These colours look exceptionally pretty together and make me want to sigh with pleasure because they're so calm and easy on the eye. There is definitely a hint of Spring in those colours, but with a cool, wintry undertone that makes it a great colour palette for January-March. I think it's definitely more spring-like than I'd first envisaged, but honestly, I'm absolutely fine with that!

A little note about all the pattern details :

Most of the patterns I used for this garland already exist as part of previous projects, but I did make some tweaks and alterations along the way. Rather than trying to explain it all in this post, I created a separate pattern page which is listed over in my left hand sidebar so that all the pattern info is held in one easy to find location. I just thought it would be easier that way, in case any of you have an urge to make your own garland now or in the future.

Here is the link to the pattern page >>

WINTER GARLAND PATTERNS

I had a clear idea of the kind of things I wanted to make for my garland and the first thing to fly off my hook was a flurry of winter blossom. These little flowers are very quick and easy to make and I used two shades of pink as well as cream. Here where I live, we have quite a few trees in the neighbourhood that flower right in the middle of winter, so I'm used to seeing these delicate flowers as early as January.

As soon as I started thinking about a winter garland, I knew that hellebores had to be included. I took the above photo a few weeks ago in the supermarket of all places, they had some wonderful hellebore plants on sale this year.

I used Cream and one of Stylecraft's lovely new neutral shades "Hint of Silver" to make my hellebores, inspired by the ones I'd seen in the shops. I combined Cream and Pistachio yarn to make the stamens in the centre.

I had lots of creative fun trying out my new watercolour pencils, using them to add a little extra colour and detail to the petals. 

As I've made hellebores before, I already have a full tutorial for the pattern ((HERE)), which includes guidance on how I make the stamens. 

I think they turned out beautifully!

Next up were some wintry leaves - I couldn't think of any specific leaves I wanted to make so I decided to use an existing pattern. I did end up changing the edging so that they look ever so slightly spiky/frosty. I've detailed the changes I made on the pattern page.

I used six different colours to make the leaves, and I think to be honest if I was to make them again, I would probably leave out the light green Pistachio to keep the palette more soft and muted.

More leaves, this time some delicate ferns in Lincoln green which I decided to combine with white and pink winter berries. A bit of artistic license at play here as I have no clue exactly what I was thinking when I came up with this idea - I just thought it would look pretty! Haha! 

The ferns already existed as a pattern from a previous project, but I made them much shorter than the original design. Again, you can find the pattern alterations on the garland page ((HERE))

They're a bit fiddly, because the whole thing is crocheted with chains and slip stitches, but I really love the look of them and think they are worth the faff.

The winter berries were also rather fiddly to make, but because they're so small they take no time at all really. I made 24 of them in total (each fern leaf has 3 berries attached)...

....and think they look quite cute. Perhaps I should have made the leaves in Hint of Silver to make them look more wintry? Ah, but the soft Lincoln green really looks like the colour of frosty grass to me, so that was my thinking at the time.

I made all these pieces slowly here and there over the course of about a month - I think the first blossoms were made in the middle of February, and I finished the last pieces yesterday. It's been such a lovely thing to work on, either sat quietly at home, or at the café with friends, slowly creating my little pile of flowers and leaves. It's just the kind of gentle creativity which I find incredibly satisfying.

I also loved having a playing with it all too - this kind of faffery and photography is soooooooo much fun!

I'll show you all the pieces laid out in order now, so you can get a measure of how many individual bits I made...

....what do you think? Isn't that just so beautifully satisfying to look at?!

Starting at the top ::

4 Hellebore flowers

16 blossom flowers

8 fern leaves, with 24 berries

16 winter leaves

That's 68 individual pieces of crochet !!!! SixTy EiGhT!! 

In the last week or so as I was finishing up the crochet, I started to have a play to see how these individual bits would work as a garland. My fireplace is quite a wide one, and I hang my garlands in four "swags" - this makes it a bit easier to visualise the garland as I can focus on designing one swag, then repeat it four times. You can see me working it out in the above photo, using the hellebore as a centre focal point.

There you go - all laid out in order and ready to join, how exciting!!

On the winter garland pattern page, I explain in more detail how I crochet the chain to join all the little bits together. The hardest thing is working out the spacing, it took me three goes to get it right so that the garland fit my fireplace (I made 6 chains in between each piece to achieve the right length).

The finished garland measures 180cm.

The joining process is very easy and surprisingly speedy. After spending near on a month creating all those delicate little pieces, the joining took me less than an hour. Making my chain spacers, then slip stitching through each little piece, one after the other......

.....until the first quarter was suddenly joined.

I thought you might appreciate seeing my very professional photographic studio (!), it's all very homespun here, well of course it is. Nothing fancy, just an old desk top propped on the arms of a chair, and me with my camera jigging about trying to get it all done while the morning light was good.

Half way through now......

....and then suddenly just like that the last piece is joined.

Sixty-eight itty little bits of crochet all chained together and the garland is finally finished.

Well actually, there was one last thing to do....

I remembered at the last minute that I'd meant to add a little bit of colour to the blossom flowers and had completely forgotten. No worries though, it was easy enough to do it at the end and I'm so pleased with how it all came together......

........I mean, just look how beautiful it is............

..............Ta-dah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love love love love love it. I LOVE it SO MUCH!!

I could not wait to hang it, and you better believe that within a hot minute of darning in the last end, my winter garland was right there on the mantel.

You can see what I was meaning when I described the four swags to you - I use tiny clear plastic Command hooks to hang my garlands, the sort that stick on without harming the surface underneath.

I have to say, it's so nice to have a garland hanging here again. My mantel has been empty since Christmas and I've missed not having some decorative hooky to cheer up the dark wood.

I'm so in love with it, and it was most definitely worth the time and effort to make something that I know will give me pleasure every winter for many years to come.

Well, you know what's coming next, don't you??????

↑↑ Here is my Spring garland (I'll hang this one up in April I think)

↑↑ And this is my Autumn garland which goes up in September when we reach the Autumn Equinox.

And winter is now covered.

What's missing??? Only my favourite season of all - SUMMER!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, of course I'm already pondering on what to include in a summer garland. The trouble is, I could probably cover six mantels with all of my favourite summer flowers, there are just so many to choose from. Should be fun?!

Well, I hope you've enjoyed today's little ta-dah moment, I'm so grateful for the top notch encouragement you always give me with these creative projects of mine. It's lovely to have you to cheer me on, thank you!

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ps here is the link again to the pattern page for this project, it's in my alphabetical list of patterns over on the left if you need to find it in future.

((WINTER GARLAND PATTERN PAGE))

 

 

 

 

 

Winter Comforts

Hello my lovelies, how are you all doing? I didn't manage to create a blog post last week in between my Friday CAL posts and I found that I missed it. So yesterday when I was doing a little bit of planning for the week ahead, I decided that more effort is needed to make the time to do what makes me feel good. Writing and sharing photos from my ordinary days happens to be a most excellent activity for my soul, and luckily I never seem to run out of things to air out in public. It constantly baffles me that I continue to do this blogging thing year after year, and more importantly that I continue to get so much out of it. Who would have thought it??

I had a bit of a to-do list running yesterday, an actual real list written down in my planner which I ticked off with much satisfaction. One of my tasks was to pot up the next generation of hyacinth bulbs for my mantel to replace the worn out ones that finished flowering in the new year. At the moment I can pick up a plastic pot of hyacinths from the supermarket for just £2 which is a such a bargain and brings me so much pleasure. They can easily be removed from the brown plastic pot and popped into an old bowl, then finished off with some home-grown moss and a bit of a twiggy support system. Tick! Such a good feeling to work my way down a list that contained such worthwhile, cosy jobs.

I got a new candle at the weekend, a gift from J who waited patiently while I sniffed out a million different candles in the shop. I am very fussy with my taste in candle scents as I don't like anything too sweet, too floral, or too woodsy/musky - my preference is for fresh fragrances, often with a citrus undertone. Or anything containing eucalyptus. J picked this one out for me and I was a bit dubious when I read that it was lavender and cedarwood (which is usually a woodsy no-no for me), but I absolutely love love love it. It's named "time to be CALM" and my goodness it really does deliver on that score, the fragrance is incredibly soothing as it fills the room. Hyacinths in a stripy bowl and a new candle to enjoy - winter pleasures that go a long way.

Another thing on my to-do list this weekend was to hang my new picture from Janet Bell, I chatted about it in a post last month.

I really love the picture which is called "Morning Light", it's got a beautifully cool, wintry feel to it which perfect for the season and now completes my set of four. I have the others hung on walls around the house, with the idea that every 3 months I'll give one pride of place above my fireplace. How lovely to think that the next one to follow on will be this one, gosh I can hardly wait, although I am trying very hard not to wish the time away this year.

You may have noticed that my mantel is currently garlandless which is making me feel like something is majorly missing from my life. Four years ago I made a very simple Little Balls garland in wintry shades (pictured above, you can read more about it in this post) but every winter since then I always think to myself that I'd really like something more nature inspired. I've made an Autumn garland, and a Spring garland too, and now I would love to make a winter-inspired one. I'm just not sure what to include - perhaps snowdrops might be cute? Or the palest of pink winter blossom mixed with some frosty leaves and maybe a flurry of weeny snowflakes? I'm feeling very inspired to just dive in and gather together a winter yarn palette and see what flies out of my brain and onto my hook. Watch this space.

I received a really happy parcel in the post this week, a little purchase I made which has absolutely delighted me to no end. Isn't it just the cutest thing you ever did see?

I stumbled upon the happy world of Thimbleville on Instagram and fell instantly in love. Helen makes the sweetest little collectibles out of painted wood, buttons, polymer clay and vintage items - the bobbins are vintage wooden Dewhurst sylko cottons that still have the original label on the underside, just precious. I love my little bobbin house so so much! Helen's handmade items sell out very quickly in her online Folksy shop, so if you are interested my advice would be to follow Thimbleville on Instagram and keep an eye out for future shop update announcements. Then sit tight and get ready to shop like a ninja, you'll need to be stealthy and swift. Just saying. 

I've made a conscious decision this year to truly embrace the winter season and to appreciate all the good that comes from spending lots of hours indoors. I have to say I'm really enjoying winter this year, it's a revelation for me to feel this way and I am genuinely loving the feeling of cosy hibernation. At the weekend the weather was just terrible, the market was cancelled and yet I felt unusually delighted by it all!

Maybe it helps that I am now in a new phase of parenting where I have less demands and more child-free time for myself during the weekends which I've not had in almost two decades. It means I can happily settle down on a wild and wet February afternoon to enjoy some quiet crochet or gentle pottering around the house while the rest of the family is each doing their own thing. It's just marvellous, and is making a big difference to my wellbeing. 

I continue to nurture myself with healthy food and am really enjoying my meals, especially the ones that I prepare and eat by myself (breakfast and lunch). In wintertime there is often a craving for comforting carb-heavy foods (buttered toast is a particular weakness of mine), but for my lunches I'm trying to lean away from the carbs and focus on good proteins and healthy fats instead.

The above bowl is a typical kind of lunch for me at the moment, and is so tasty and nutritious, a real pleasure to savour. In essence it's a good protein (a sweet chilli salmon fillet in the case), some kind of healthy wholegrains (a brown rice and quinoa mix in this case), then plenty of veg/salad (baby leaves, cherry tomatoes, cucumber and edamame beans here). I added a bit of crumbled feta cheese which needed eating up and a drizzle of homemade honey/mustard dressing. Yummmmmmmmmm!

With all the cosy hibernation happening at the moment, I'm not tending to be out and about all that much. I do have a pretty solid routine of meeting up with friends regularly each week, and J and I often sneak out for a quick coffee in the mornings, but other than that I'm surprisingly content to simply stay at home. I don't tend to go to the shops unless I really need to (for food mostly) and I'm not feeling the need to leave the familiarity of this little town either. My life feels quite small and safe and repetitive right now, and I am absolutely embracing the comfort of that fact.

We usually try and get out and about with the Little People for a weekend walk, even if the weather isn't especially inspiring. I know I always feel really good afterwards, even if at the time there is a reluctance to leave the warmth of home and venture out into the cold. The landscape is very drab right now, the fields and woodlands seeming bleached of all colour with the exception of the moss which is having a fiesta all of it's own. I LOVE seeing so much beautiful, bright green moss in winter, it really makes me absurdly happy. The colour of it is so uplifting, a vivid brightness that I am very drawn to.

A rather majestic stag appeared amongst the trees at the end of last year, another stunning work by artist Anna and the Willow. We've had quite a bit of rain recently, so the poor thing looks like he's stuck in a sea of mud, but hopefully things will improve as the weeks move on and better weather comes. Another few months and the wild garlic will be growing, I'm excited to see some fresh green shoots again.

I took this photo of my hill view at the start of last week (yes there is a hill out there) - you can see that when I say we've had very heavy grey skies I really do mean it. I don't think I can ever remember such a dull, grey winter as this one.

The light is slowly changing though, and our days are noticeably lengthening so there is much to look forward to.

J and I are still taking our early morning walk together, I can't recall when we started this habit but it has really become an essential part of my morning routine. We set out at 6.45am, and for a good many months we've been doing the whole 45 minute walk in the dark. 

This morning though - wow - it was a crisp, freezing cold frosty morning with clear skies and for the first time we got to see actual daylight and the birds were singing!! Such a beautiful change to our walk, and very, very much appreciated. Its magical to observe the seasons each and every day, such a wonderful aspect of daily life.

Well I think that's about all for now, After chatting to you I feel inspired to go and pull out some yarn oddments in delicate winter shades and start hooking up some pretties for a new garland. I'm excited!

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December End

Well as I sit and write this it's very, very close to the end of the year (less than four hours to go) and I'm happy to be looking forward to a new year beginning. I don't tend to celebrate New Year's Eve any more (I actually can't physically stay awake for it) and find I'm much happier looking forwards than looking backwards. A brand new start to a brand new year always fills me with positivity and it's a day I really look forward to. 

We had such a lovely, peaceful Christmas this year, and the days that followed have been slow and happy and very restorative. We've been out and about a little in the gloom of these short winter days, but most of our time has been spent cosy at home. I've absolutely love love loved ditching my carefully built routines for a while - no alarm clock, no morning workouts, no rush, no schedule to keep. I've enjoyed waking up naturally and spending an hour or so sat in bed with a coffee or two and my new daylight lamp filling my brain with much needed light.

The weather has been absolutely dire the past few weeks. J told me that apparently this has officially been one of the dullest months ever recorded as we've had so little sunlight in December. Today though, there was sun, and it felt momentous and glorious and soooo uplifting! You can see it in the last photo, and although it was only a few hours, my goodness, I soaked it in as much as I possibly could. 

Yesterday morning I went out with Little B, a necessary outing to get his wild mop of hair cut into submission. It's not all that often that we spend one-on-one time together any more, and I really did enjoy it. I gave him freedom to choose where to go for a spot of late breakfast as a treat and he picked a little creperie café that we'd not been into before. Goodness me, it was one of the best things I've eaten in a long time - a simple lemon and sugar pancake cooked to perfection, and it was huuuuge - in the photo above it was folded into thirds and still managed to fill the plate. Yummmm. 

I took down the Christmas tree and all the other little festive bits today ready for the new year and it feels good, if a little on the bare side. But tomorrow, joy of joys, we are heading to the coast to spend a few days pottering beside the sea, so I wanted to be able to return home on Monday and feel like everything is in order for school and work to begin again. Oh, the sea!!!!! I shall be beside the sea tomorrow, and I cannot think of a better way to begin a hopeful, positive new year. I'm very, very happy about it I can tell you.

Well I think that's all for now, I hope you're feeling good as we move into twenty-twenty-two, and I wish you a year of love, light, creativity and joy.....lots of it!

See you next week, with some sea views and salty good times....

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ps a little reminder that my annual blankety crochet-a-long starts next week on Friday 7th, all details in this post if you missed it xx

 

 

 

Christmastime 2021

It's Christmas Eve and all is calm and peaceful here in the Attic so I thought I would pop by to say hello and share some Christmassy bits and bobs with you. 

On Tuesday I celebrated the Winter Solstice in my own quiet way and as usual it made me feel super happy and contented. I love this gentle celebration of light, and the feeling of the year coming full circle never fails to uplift my spirits. I ventured out in the damp, murky grey afternoon to collect in some greenery and made a simple wreath from ivy, evergreens, eucalyptus and a few berry sprigs. 

My solstice candle this year is a green one called "Christmas Tree" and has a lush scent of pine combined with some other subtle festive scents. It's really lovely and makes the room smell ever so christmassy. Sometimes pine scented candles can smell a bit too much like toilet cleaner, can't they? This one is definitely a good one.

On Wednesday I went on the train to the city in the afternoon, something I'd completely forgotten I was doing until about half an hour before I needed to leave. Little Lady had a 4 o'clock appointment to sit her driving theory test so I'd offered to go with her for moral support. During the hour when she was doing her testing thing, I wandered around the nearby streets and soaked up the Christmas spirit - it wasn't very busy (no complaints about that from me) and I enjoyed just mooching about even though it was blinkin' freezing.

Little Lady came out of the test centre clutching her piece of paper with a big smile on her face and I don't mind telling you I was massively relieved that she passed first time. So happy for her! To celebrate, I treated her to a freshly made chocolate crepe from one of the christmassy food stalls, and then....... a spontaneous ride on a big wheel....!!

Confession from me :: I was a little bit wobbly about sitting in a little spinning box so high up in the sky but I think I coped pretty well all things considering. It was a lovely end to a rather hectic and slightly stressy day.

So, Christmas Eve today, and for the first time EVER (honestly) I managed to finish all the food shopping and all the present buying and wrapping with days to spare. I know, it was a minor miracle. We made a trip to the market early on Wednesday morning, and came home with....

....another small crate of clementines, yay!!!!I absolutely love these fruits and am so happy that I can buy them in large quantities.

YUM!!

Candy canes made it onto the tree again this year, much to Little B's delight.

I took a very low key and slow approach to decorating the house for Christmas this year and nobody seemed to even notice. We put our tree up during the first weekend in December (the Little People insisted on it) and since then I've gradually added a few things here and there when I was in the mood. My friend gave me a pot of hyacinths last week, so I popped them into an old  cup and topped it off with some moss from my front garden and the whole thing makes me sooooooo happy every time I look at it. 

My other hyacinths from the supermarket are on the mantel and just beginning to bloom in time for Christmas which is great timing, accidental, but great.

Over the years theses simple white flowers have become winter essentials for me and I can't imagine not having them in the house at Christmas.

By the way, did you notice the lovely painted wooden horses?

This was one of those to-me-from-me Christmas treats, a small gift for myself. They are from a lovely online shop called Frank and Lusia which sells hand made folk art from Poland. I absolutely love love love EvErYthInG in Zara's shop, the colourful homespun style is right up my street. Zara travels to Poland herself and sources all the items directly from traditional artisan makers and I love following her on Instagram.

I hung my beloved Christmas Wreath up yesterday, oh, what joy it is to unpack this creation every year! I love love love it so much. It was the start of my love affair with crochet wreaths nine years ago and I just adore the exuberance of it.

Another gift I give myself every year is a bunch of festive flowers. In years gone by I would usually buy some red tulips from the supermarket, but last year I upped my game and ordered a bunch from Bloom&Wild to be delivered through my door on Winter Solstice. As I'm on their mailing list I usually receive a worthwhile discount code to use at this time of year, so I take full advantage. I know it's still an extravagant purchase, but well, I do believe I'm worth it ;)

They really are very beautiful and usually stay looking good on my table for the whole of the festive period. 

I didn't really feel like decorating my mantels this year, the effort involved just seemed like a bit much for me to be honest. However, this morning I had a good tidy up and a clean in our downstairs space and suddenly felt like the room needed a little bit more Christmas cheer. I dug out some silver baubles and decorated the twigs that sit on my mantel all year round and the extra sparkle has really made me happy. Can you also see on my twigs I've hung some very sweet little white and red spotted toadstools? These were knitted and gifted to me by a friend and I absolutely love them. As you know, I'm usually very full on with my decs and use allllll the colours, but somehow the simplicity of red, white and silver is doing it for me this year.

Well, having said that, our tree is the usual over the top, full-colour affair that it is every year, nothing changes on these branches and I like it that way. I bought one new decoration for the tree, a little felt mouse that I found on the supermarket shelf looking rather lonely and in need of a loving home. 

Well, I think that's about all from me for now, I'm sat writing this by candle light at the dining table and J and Little B are sat at the other end of the room watching a film. I think it's time for me to go and warm up by the fire and crochet a few rows before bed.

Sending love and light to you through my Attic window, I hope this Christmastime is full of all good things. Enjoy every minute....

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Mandala Hoop Love

I've been meaning to write this post for a long time now, and today seemed like it would be a good time to do it. I wanted to document the collection of mandala hoops I've made over the years so that all the blog post links and pattern details would be easy to find in one place.

I've been making mandala hoops for years, ever since I was involved with Yarndale and had the idea to create colourful crochet decorations for the yarny event. 

At first I was just making these gorgeous starflower mandalas for the creative thrill and excellent colour therapy. But after I'd made two in quick succession and realised how large and eye catching they were (45cm across), I thought that if I could work out a way to attach them to hoops then they would make really excellent hanging decorations.

I made the Starflower Mandalas in 2014 -  the blog post and pattern links are below >

♥ Starflower Mandala blog post ♥

♥ Starflower Mandala pattern by Zelna Olivier ♥

Two years later in 2016 and I was at it again, working on more large 45cm mandala hoops to hang in the trees at Yarndale.

The above two hoops were made using the central part of a free doily pattern I found on Ravelry. Doilies are traditionally made with very fine crochet thread, but the patterns work equally well when crocheted with DK cotton, only they are obviously very much larger.

The blog post and free pattern details for the mandalas shown above are linked below >

♥ Mandala Hoops blog post ♥

♥ Autumn Spice Doily pattern by Elizabeth Ann White ♥

A short while later and I was still obsessing over making these mandala hoops, I just couldn't seem to get them out of my system.

The one pictured above was taken from a pattern for a summer shawl which was published in Simply Crochet magazine (issue 47). Similar to the doily patterns, the shawl was made using much finer yarn, and the original design made a substantial circle. Upscaling to DK weight cotton, I simply crocheted the first 19 rounds to make a 45cm mandala which fit the plastic child's hoops I'd bought.

You can find blog and pattern links below >

♥ Mandala Hoop blog (includes photos showing my method of attaching the mandala to a hoop) ♥ 

♥ Mandala Love Shawl by Elisabeth Davis de Herraiz ♥

Another couple of years later in 2018 I began to make a collection of slightly smaller 30cm mandalas designed to fit into metal craft rings. 

These are quick projects to work on and insanely satisfying, I can highly recommend them if you want to have fun with colour and make something pretty to hang on the wall or dangle somewhere eye catching.

The blog post and pattern links are below >

♥ Mandala Hoops blog (including my own design) ♥

♥ Spirit Mandala pattern by Lilla Björn (shown above) ♥

♥ Dream Catcher Mandala by Emily Littlefair ♥

The mandala pictured above is my own design and I named it the Positivity Mandala.

You can find links below >

♥ Blog post showing colours and photos of the Positivity Mandala in progress ♥

♥ Positivity Mandala pattern and photo tutorial ♥

The above photo shows the first six mandala hoops I made to fit 30cm metal hoops - I LOVE them so much!

Another year on and it's the Spring of 2019. The rather grand building in the photo above is a chateau in the French Alps which has been converted into a beautiful hotel, and I had the pleasure of staying here during the Spring of 2019. Lucky, lucky, lucky me!! This was a working holiday for me as I was invited to be a tutor on a week long crochet retreat, how splendid is that? As it happened, the retreat was so popular when it was released on the Arena Travel website that it sold out in less than 24 hours, so I was asked if I would do a second week. Did they really have to ask??! 

Springtime in the French Alps is absolutely delicious and I had a wonderful time teaching two groups of very lovely ladies. I created a workshop which focused on some elements of colour theory, as well as giving lots of help and advice about planning and creating colour palettes for crochet projects. 

I decided to use mandalas as a way of experimenting with colour and putting some colour theory into practice and I designed some new patterns especially for the retreats.

This is a smaller 20cm hoop and I called this the Daydreamer Mandala. The simplicity of the pattern allowed for the focus to be on the colours, and the decorative dangly bits were a fun way to finish it off.

We used a combination of crochet with felt feathers, wooden beads and ribbons.....

....and the ladies really enjoyed this project. The resulting mandala hoops were so lovely!

I also designed a bigger 30cm mandala hoop which I named the Chateau Mandala. In the photo above, my hoop is the one at the top left of the photo. It was fascinating to see how the ladies selected and ordered their own colours, and how unique each mandala looks even though everyone started out with the same yarn palette. 

Another year on and it's 2020, the year of the pandemic. I crocheted the above rainbow mandala for no other reason than I needed some colour and yarn therapy, and mandala hoops are most excellent at delivering in times of need. This is the same pattern I used in France - the Chateau Mandala - made using a rainbow palette of Ricorumi DK. 

I love the way it turned out, and really enjoyed working from my own pattern which added another layer of satisfaction to this sweet project.

The rainbow Chateau Mandala is here in the Attic right now, but not for too much longer. You see, I've offered to donate it to a charity raffle which is happening this coming Sunday 17th. The raffle has been organised by my lovely blogging friend Helen to raise money for a charity which is very close to her heart. There are prizes to be won every week, and they are all of a yarny nature - my mandala is only a small part of a larger prize this week and it's absolutely fabulous - you can see more on Helen's blog .

The raffle is run via Just Giving, so the idea is that you donate to buy raffle tickets. So £2 will buy you two tickets, £5 five tickets etc. You can donate right up to the end of Sunday, and the winner will be announced on Monday, does that makes sense? It's open worldwide too. Here is the direct link to the raffle page >>>

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/helen-kurtz

Helen has raised more than £21,000 in the past two years which is a remarkable achievement, please support if you can.

Well, I think that's all my mandala madness for now, I hope you've enjoyed seeing my projects from the past seven years all in one place, and who knows, perhaps you might feel inspired to make some for yourself?

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ps I forgot to add links in for hoops, so here they are for reference >>

♥ 30cm white metal craft hoop

♥ 30cm wooden craft hoop

♥ 45cm child's hula hoop