As I’m sure I have mentioned before, Bob was diagnosed with severe dyslexia earlier this year and I’ve been trying to find ways to help him with his particular issues. Specifically, Bob’s dyslexia manifests itself in processing – you could give him a list of six things to do and by the time he’s done the second, he’ll have forgotten the rest. This makes things like going shopping great fun because unless it’s written down he will remember maybe four things out of a list of ten. So! I got him a diary and notebook, knowing that he’d only use them if there was a way to keep them together.

It’s just a very simple sleeve with a pouch on each side to accommodate the A6-sized diary and notebook, with snap closures. It’s small enough that it’s not an encumberance and big enough to do what he needs it to do. He seemed pretty pleased with it but whether it gets used is another thing entirely

It just dawned on me too that I hadn’t mentioned the other new additions to the house. Our cat, Sia, had a litter of kittens (underneath Nairn’s bed, ugh) on Erica’s birthday. This is the only kitten left that we haven’t secured a home for yet, and he’s been named Horatio. I always wanted a ginger cat I could name Titian but I was heartily overruled by the kids.

On a final note, Bob and I had a big conversation last night about ethics and cheating. What spurred this on? Well, in this photo Bob is embroiled in a water fight with approximately ten kids…

…standing behind a 7ft+ wall with an umbrella and a hose. Ah well, Findlay seemed to enjoy it.

Posted under family, sewing

I am a big fan of any product that makes my life easier and I’ve been mulling this idea over in my head for a fair wee while. I wanted a baby changing mat that I could pop in my bag, one that would be big enough to hold a couple of nappies, some wipes, some cream and maybe a sleepsuit but which I could also change the baby on comfortably. Add to that complication, I use cloth nappies so a couple of clean nappies tend to take up masses of space AND this whole thing by necessity needed to be machine washable

I decided that what I needed was a bag with a box-style base attached onto the mat so with a bit of tinkering this is what I have come up with.

The bag section is on the left and has a snap button closure in the middle to prevent the contents from spilling out. The changing mat is plenty big enough to lie a baby on. The dimensions of this one were decided based on the item I used to pad the mat but in actual fact it’s probably a little on the too thick side. Ah well, the baby will be comfortable! The changing mat has snap buttons at the corners to close it over securely meaning that any accidents can be contained, and the whole bag flips over nicely. What I did forget was a way to fasten the changing mat to the bag in order to keep it closed but as this is only a prototype that can be remedied with the next version

What do you think? Once I’ve tweaked the design I might offer the instructions for download if there’s enough interest!

Posted under for the kids, sewing

Okay okay so I know that none of you have particularly been awaiting this moment with bated breath but it’s a big day for me! The ever lovely Amanda from KitschyCoo kids asked me at the end of February to test a pattern that she’d designed. “Sure,” says I, “No problem.” Hmm. It’s only six weeks later and I’m finished…

This was the first KitschyCoo pattern that I’ve sewn. I also have a coat pattern which I’m hoping to sew up before Christmas, but I’ll admit happily that my novice sewing skills really put me off even though when I flicked through Amanda’s instructions it all looked straightforward. I shouldn’t have worried. In the end, the actual construction of the entire garment was done in less than an hour and believe me when I tell you I’m irritatingly meticulous and therefore slow. The one thing that held me up was that no matter how hard I tried I could not master the buttonhole function on my sewing machine. TURNS OUT that’s because I’m missing a vital part from my sewing machine accessories – namely a buttonhole foot. Doh!

Anyway. This jacket (which is fully reversible by the way) has been semi finished for over a week and yesterday Kat came to visit and whilst Bob kept us supplied with tea and cake Kat did it for me showed me how the buttonhole function works. So! I’m proud to unveil my version of the KitschyCoo matinee coat.

Side one -

Side two -

Erica absolutely loves it. It took a bit of bribery with a new nightie to get her to take it off! I’m extremely happy with the way it’s turned out and I’ll be making another one very soon so that she has a spare when this one is in the washing.

We also owe a wee thank you to Sam from Incy Wincy Stitches. You might remember that in this post I’d mentioned the first hat and booties set was going to Sam and in exchange, Sam sent up the gorgeous blue bag that Erica is clutching in these pics. It’s a crocheted clutch and was filled with hair bobbles and slides for Erica which she was just thrilled with. All in all, a very happy wee girl yesterday – just look at that smile! (She was actually laughing at Nairn and Findlay who were hanging out the window shouting to her)

So what do you lovely lot think? A passable first attempt at following a pattern?

In other news I’m looking for a little bit of input from you lot. It’s Erica’s 2nd birthday in less than two weeks, then Findlay’s 8th birthday five weeks after that. I’d really like to make each of them a handmade gift but I’m looking for suggestions. What are your go-to handmade gift ideas for children? Or as a parent, what would you really be happy for your child to receive?

Posted under for the kids, recommendations, sewing

So last Saturday my friend Sharon came over to visit with her niece for a playdate with Nairn – I had some fantastic ideas for keeping the kids amused including giant paperchain dolls to decorate and cookies for them to cut out and decorate themselves – and of course they spent the entire afternoon running about chasing each other. The best laid plans of mice and men, eh?

When Sharon left, Bob gave her half of the cookie dough that I’d so lovingly prepared so that she and her niece could make them together. The other half was put back in the fridge with the intention of baking them next day…

…but it’s still there! This week has been utterly manic and I honestly haven’t had ten minutes to roll out and bake the cookies. My poor starved children have had to go without baked confections for over a week because Mummy has been just too busy (or tired!) to stand in the kitchen. What would you do? Would you use the cookie dough or would you bin it? I have a feeling that if we’re going to use it then today really must be the day but I don’t want to risk making the kids unwell. But I really hate waste. Decisions decisions.

I haven’t actually tried this recipe out yet but the dough was extremely easy to throw together. It’s another recipe using cups rather than weighed ingredients but I’m beginning to realise that my measuring cups are one of my better investments.

Recipe – Cut out cookies (makes loads)

3.5 cups plain flour
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
225g unsalted butter, room temperature
1.5 cups granulated white sugar
2 large eggs
2 tsps vanilla extract

In a small mixing bowl combine the flour, salt and baking powder. Set aside.
In a large mixing bowl beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy (about 3-4 minutes with a hand blender). Add the eggs and vanilla extract and beat until combined. Add the flour mixture and beat until you have a smooth dough.
Divide the dough in half and wrap each half in clingfilm. Refrigerate for about one hour or until firm enough to roll.
Preheat oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4 and line two baking sheets with greaseproof paper. Take one half of the chilled dough and, on a lightly floured surface, roll it out to a thickness of 1cm. (Keep turning the dough as you roll, making sure the dough does not stick to the worktop). Cut out your shapes using a lightly floured cookie cutter and transfer cookies to the prepared baking sheet.
Place the baking sheets with the unbaked cookies in the refrigerator for 10-15 minutes to chill the dough which prevents the cookies from spreading and losing their shape while baking. One half of the dough mixture will fill your two baking sheets.
Bake cookies for about 10 minutes (depending on size) or until they are brown around the edges. Remove from oven and let cookies cool on baking sheet for a few minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling. Repeat with the other half of the dough.

Icing recipe

2 large egg whites
2 tsps fresh lemon juice
3 cups icing sugar, sifted
Food colouring

In a small bowl, beat the egg whites with the lemon juice. Add the sifted powdered sugar and beat on low speed until combined and smooth then add food colouring to your preference. The icing needs to be used immediately or transferred to an airtight container as it hardens when exposed to air. Cover with clingfilm when not in use.

Let me know if you try these!

My plans for today are to finally master buttonholes so I can finish the jacket I’ve been working on for Erica. As a little taster, here’s a (very poor, taken with my phone) photo-taster of the embellishment I’ve appliquéd onto it. What do you think?

Posted under baking, for the kids, sewing, with the kids

Firstly I’d like to say thank you to everyone for your very kind comments over the last week or so. Things here are still nowhere near back to normal but as the saying goes, “This too shall pass” and in fairness the worst certainly seems to be past us. I am frantically grabbing at the door to touch wood right now!

Secondly, I would like all of you with young children to head on over to Amanda of Kitschycoo fame’s blog, in particular this post and this post. You see, a month ago I bought this pattern and Amanda also sent me the pattern for her Matinee jacket asking me to test it for her. The pattern pieces are still sitting cut out but unsewn – a month after Amanda asked, I haven’t had two minutes peace to finish it. The thing is her patterns are fantastic! Very easy to follow, beautifully put together and unlike anything I’ve seen anywhere else so when I saw she was doing a giveaway I thought, “I must let my readers know about this!”

Thirdly, I finally managed to get my Time for Tea swap goodies posted off today although I’ve missed the last collection. Sue has been very patient with me as the world collapsed around my ears and I just hope that she’s as happy with what I’ve sent her as I was with her package which Sue blogged here. I actually wore the earrings the night my package arrived and they’re just gorgeous so thank you again, Sue!

This is what I sent to Sue – the candle is made from beeswax and is made in a vintage teacup with matching saucer. This was my first attempt at candle making and in fact I made another to burn myself and make sure it was okay! The silver caddy is filled with Faerie’s blood tea from my favourite little teahouse and there’s also a packet of shortbread fingers as I believe shortbread to be the best biscuit in the world

I also made a little bag with a felt cupcake appliqué and Japanese knot-style closure which I’m very proud of!

What do you think?

Posted under general crafty updates, sewing, swaps

Today it’s my wonderful husband‘s birthday. Not a particularly special age, but a very special man.

In our house, it’s almost always Bob who makes dinner. In fact, I think I could count on both hands how many times I’ve taken a turn while we’ve lived here because we cook the vast majority of our meals from scratch and Bob is very quick at putting meals together whereas I am distinctly not. The usual exception to the “Bob cooks” rule is birthdays and Father’s day because really, that’s only fair. I asked my dearly beloved what he wanted and he told me, “lasagne and crème brûlée”. Easy enough, I thought, before remembering that I also needed to make a birthday cake. Hmm. I had decided on a pavlova because Bob had mentioned in passing that he really liked it but I had NO IDEA it was going to involve so much work! Luckily for me he changed his mind about dinner and decided he wanted pizza instead so I didn’t have to spend the entire day in the kitchen!

The most time-consuming and annoying part of this entire process was having to separate nine eggs. I hate separating eggs but luckily this time I managed all nine without breaking any yolks. Hoorah! Following this pavlova recipe I made the meringue first, put it in the oven for the alloted time and opened the oven as recommended to allow the meringue to cool down and dry out before realising that it was only cooked on the outside. I turned it over and put it back into the oven for another hour but I suspect my error was that the egg whites weren’t whipped firm enough before I shaped the meringue (perhaps worth noting here that I used nine regular sized egg whites from our own hens and not the nine large whites called for in the recipe). Delia Smith recommends baking your meringue the day before and leaving it in the oven overnight to cool and dry out, I may do that next time.

In the meantime, I was extremely happy with how the crème brûlée worked out! I made it after I put the meringue into the oven and it was easy as pie. The one aspect I wasn’t happy with is that our grill isn’t really good enough to caramelise sugar so I’m going to have to get my hands on a little kitchen blowtorch. Which seems kind of pointless when I can use it on one thing that I don’t make very often!

Recipe – Lemon Raspberry crème brûlée (makes 8 )

750ml double cream
Grated peel of one lemon
170g caster sugar
9 egg yolks
2 tsps vanilla extract
pinch salt

8 tsps brown sugar
punnet raspberries
Chambord or crème de cassis (optional)

Preheat your oven to gas mark 4/180C. Mix the lemon peel with the cream, put in a saucepan and heat until the cream is simmering. Meanwhile whisk the egg yolk and caster sugar until thick – using a handheld electric whisk this took roughly two minutes for me – then add the hot cream gradually. Take your time at this juncture – I just about redecorated my kitchen at this stage! Add the vanilla extract and salt, then set your custard aside.

Get the largest roasting dish you can find which will fit in your oven and put eight ramekins in it before filling the dish with boiling water to roughly half the height of your ramekins. Pour your custard into the ramekins through a sieve to remove the lemon peel then carefully lift your roasting dish into the oven. Bake for 55 mins-1 hour before taking them out of the oven. Chill uncovered until your custard is firm which will take at least three hours.

About an hour before you plan to serve your crème brûlée, put your ramekins on a baking tray and sprinkle 1 tsp of brown sugar over each one. Put under the grill (or use your blowtorch at this juncture) until the sugar has melted and browned. Put back into the fridge to harden. Put your raspberries into a bowl and add enough chambord or cassis to let your raspberries soak then leave for the rest of the hour. Spoon your raspberry mixture onto your ramekins immediately before serving.

Posted under baking, dyeing wool, family, recipes, sewing

The bright sparks over at Crafteroo organised a challenge with a twist at the end of January, the premise being that members were paired up and had to then produce a gift item utilising both partners’ crafting skills. I was paired up with the very lovely Debbs and we decided that she would make a brooch which could be pinned onto a knitting bag that I’d make but which could also be removed and used elsewhere. This is the final result (with apologies for the not fantastic photograph!)

The bag will be going into the Comic Relief shop on Folksy which is stocked with donated handmade items from Crafteroo members – please have a look! There are some absolutely gorgeous items there from some really talented crafty people.

So what do you think? Would you buy it?

Posted under general crafty updates, sewing

First off, the Time for Tea swap sign-up is now closed! I will be emailing all participants tonight with a questionnaire and I will also email the newer signer-uppers with an invite to the Flickr group where we can share photographs of our works in progress and swap parcels. I’d like to use some of your photographs at the end of the swap so if you’d rather I didn’t, please let me know. Signing up to flickr is not mandatory, just another excuse to get to know each other a little better.

Today’s post is for me to do a little showing off. When I was trying to decide what to make for Annie in the Owl Swap I came up with the idea of a bag she could keep her knitting in. Now for me the critical element in a knitting bag is that it MUST be able to fit my knitting needles in it. Also, personally I don’t like record-style bags – I’d prefer something a little more upright without losing any space. Now with apologies for the less-than-fantastic photographs – this is what I came up with:-

I also liked the idea of being able to close the bag over but still have a little access to the contents, so I made one large strap that can be slung over a shoulder, and another smaller strap for the large strap to go through and hold it closed.

Of course, this bag still had to have some relevance to owls really so I had my first attempt at appliqué. For a first attempt I was pretty pleased with myself although I’d have liked my stitches to be neater.

I only wish I was a neater seamstress because if ONLY I could sew in a straight line, I would make and sell these bags. Ah well, if wishes and all that! What do you think? Would you use it if you were a knitter?

Crafty plans for this week include my first ever attempt at making a cake with fondant icing, a little work on some longies I’m making for the new baby and a start on a couple of patterns from the fantastic Amanda at KitschyCoo. Luckily I will have my partner in crime Kat here to help me out tomorrow. Hooray!

Posted under general crafty updates, sewing, swaps

As I’ve mentioned before I read a lot of blogs, including every blog written by the lovely people who choose to leave me a comment and my one recurring thought when I read your musings or admire your work is, “I wonder who taught them to do that?”

I was chatting with my wee Nana last week on the phone and telling her what I’d been knitting and sewing lately. I was the typical eldest grandchild when I was younger, spending weekends staying at my Grandparents and getting that one to one attention that was unavailable at home with a plethora of siblings. When I was growing up my Nana made me the most amazing jumpers – she was always knitting until she had a stroke when I was about 9 or 10 and then she just wasn’t strong enough – and she taught me how to knit when I was barely a toddler. Before that, she used to let me cut up all the scraps of yarn and play about with them so I had an appreciation of textiles from a young age. It was my Nana who used to let me help her bake, who taught me the basics of cooking and food preparation, and who first let me play around with a needle & thread. Nana commented during our conversation that she finds it amusing that I sew, knit and bake but my Mother never did. Maybe it’s a generational thing?

Anyway. Two things that I associate with my Nana are knitting and jam-making, so it would appear that I’m more like her than I ever thought! Last Summer I used a massive crop of rhubarb to try and replicate the yummy jam from my childhood and it wasn’t bad for a first attempt. Not quite the same, but not bad. Last week I decided to expand my repertoire a little and made lemon curd. It was so easy, despite me making a huge error, that I thought I’d share it with you lovely lot.

The other jar in the photo is the fantastic marmalade that my lovely husband made recently following this Delia Smith recipe. It’s a nice recipe but I’ve found it very tart, next time I think I’d play about with different quantities and perhaps add a vanilla pod to the cooking process.

Those are 1L Le Parfait jars (available from Lakeland) so the recipe I’m giving you will make approx 2/3 of a litre, or 2-3lbs. It’s a bit of a mixture of different recipes I found combined with what I had available to me at the time.

Lemon curd
4 lemons, preferably unwaxed
5 eggs
100g/4oz butter, soft
450g/1lb sugar

Set a pan of water to boil on the cooker ensuring that you have a bowl which will fit on top of the pan to create a bain marie. Crack your eggs into the bowl and whisk them briefly to break the yolks and combine. Add the butter and sugar, then set aside.

Grate the zest from your lemons remembering to give them a good scrub first if they’re not unwaxed. Squeeze the juice from the lemons then add both zest and juice to the egg mixture, then set the bowl on top of your pan making sure you keep the water simmering.

Stir your mixture with a wooden spoon until the mixture thickens to coat the back of the spoon and is all combined. This will take no more than 10 minutes. Do not do what I did and doubt yourself, as I ended up stirring my lemon curd for two hours before giving up and decanting it into the hot sterilised jar where of course it thickened as soon as it cooled down.

It won’t thicken much whilst hot from my experience, but if you are concerned about the viscosity then you can add another egg. Additionally you should feel free to play about with the quantities of sugar. This recipe used a lot of sugar in comparison to others that I found and the resulting curd is very sweet which may not be to everyone’s taste. It is yummy though!

Posted under cooking, recipes, sewing

I’ve had the Oliver+S lazy days skirt pattern bookmarked for six months. Six months! I have no idea why I hadn’t tried it before now but there you go, as I’ve mentioned before I don’t have much (any!) faith in myself when it comes to creating things but I’m fairly happy with the way this has come out.

I made it to fit my little daughter but unfortunately the elastic I used for the waistband is a bit too stretchy so I’m waiting on some heavier-duty stuff coming so I can get this on her. With my new-found faith in my sewing machine I’m going to make her whole wardrobe! Or, maybe not The fabric has been in my stash for aeons, it’s a Robert Kaufman print and I really had to make something with it. I did this last night over a couple of hours watching Dancing on Ice, so it’s a very quick little project to finish. The ironing took longer than anything else!

I thought I’d blogged these items too, but apparently not! My lovely friend Eileen had a baby just after New Year and I made the Vine Lace baby hat (free pattern link) and a pair of Saartje’s bootees (free link – pdf pattern) for her new daughter. I finally finished sewing the buttons on the bootees last night so I’ve popped these into the post today. I just hope they still fit!

Did you all have a nice weekend? I hope you were suitably spoiled on Saturday! I shall return tomorrow with some newly dyed wool for your delectation and maybe some baking too.

Posted under for the kids, knitting, sewing, with the kids