I know that it’s a mother’s job to see her own children as the most gorgeous children in the world. But seriously, I could just look at this face all day.

Look at those cheeks! And those eyes! Isn’t she just gorgeous? Can you guys believe it’s been nine and a half months since she arrived? It feels like yesterday.

Anyway, I’m not cruel enough to put an orange hat on a ginger child – she’s simply modelling for me! I made this hat for my wonderful friend Jenn who had a lovely little girl in January. Jenn’s elder daughter is Nairn’s Canadian birth twin – they were born on the same day 3000 miles apart – and both celebrate their 4th birthday tomorrow. Isn’t that sweet?

This hat is made from the candy cane pattern in Itty-Bitty Hats by Susan B. Anderson and knitted in a lovely Debbie Bliss DK cotton in a beautiful bright orange. Isn’t it cute? Greer certainly seems to think so.

Does this photo remind you of anyone..?

I defy anyone to say my girls don’t look alike

Posted under knitting

Readers I have a terrible admission to make. Terrible. There’s a bit of a backstory to this one so you might want to go get yourself a cup of cha and a nice biscuit. Okay, ready?

I’d like to take you back to July 2008. We – Bob, Findlay, Nairn, Erica and I – were staying on a campsite in Saint-Valéry-sur-Somme, Northern France. The weather was beautiful, the site was peaceful and I was bored rigid so of course I latched onto an idea. Nairn’s hair was a tad overgrown and I thought, “Hey! I can trim it!”

Up until that point I had regularly cut the boys’ hair with a set of trimmers – never with scissors – and the only scissors I had access to were the kitchen scissors supplied in our tent. Still this didn’t deter me and I trimmed the nape of Nairn’s neck, his sideys and his fringe. It looked excellent! For reference, this is a ‘before’ picture:

Flushed with success, I decided that actually cutting hair couldn’t be that difficult. I mean, you don’t need a degree or anything for it and it looks fairly straightforward. Right? Right?!!

Wrong.

I started at his crown and worked round in circles, until I got to his fringe. I turned him round and honestly he looked like he had a crop circle on his head. Panicked, I tried to even out the longer bits by cutting them even shorter until I gave up, burst into tears and put a hat on him to hide my shame until Bob got back from the site shop. When he came back I admitted in horrified tones what I’d done and made it clear that the situation would need to be remedied. And here comes the terrible admission. We went to the office of the site staff and chatted to the English liason chap who had been very helpful when we’d arrived and I said,

“Oh I desperately need your help. You won’t believe what my eldest son has done to his brother with a pair of kitchen scissors.”

Yes. I blamed it on poor, unwitting Findlay. A child who would never DREAM of touching scissors without parental guidance never mind attack his brother’s hair with them. Luckily my tale of woe seemed to strike a cord with the site staff and they lent me a pair of clippers to tidy up the mess…

… except the tale of woe ploughs on. Because you see, I was used to British clippers with British guard measurements on them. I was used to the #2 or #3 guard and so I used the guard marked 2mm, except that since it was a European set 2mm was MUCH SHORTER than a #2 or #3. Regardez!

The moral of the story? NEVER assume that you can do something just because you’ve watched someone else do it and it looked easy. It rarely will be. Thankfully Nairn was more forgiving than my Mother, who refused to display this lovely photo of my children taken on the Somme Bay Railway:

With this saga in mind, I have never since cut the kids’ hair. I was too worried about making a mess of it so they have been treated to the salon experience instead, but I have been trying to get Erica’s hair cut for months and been foiled at every attempt. After visiting Bron yesterday for a playdate I marvelled at Miss Small’s gorgeous hair and Bron told me she cut it herself, reassuring me that, “A bob is very forgiving” and I decided that perhaps I could make one final attempt to salvage my reputation as a demon with scissors. So – ta daaa!

I’m rather proud of myself I have to say! I wonder if this means the boys will let me cut their hair again. Hmmm…

Posted under family

It occurs to me that I have loads of blog fodder but I hold back on posting it for reasons known only to myself. What daunts me slightly is the aspect of permission – I have Bob’s permission to blog about him, I’m capable of making decisions for myself about what I’m comfortable blogging but a large proportion of my life revolves around the children who are not capable of providing informed consent. Part of me thinks that worrying about this is being hugely self-indulgent because nobody is going to remember what I’ve posted in five, ten or twenty years time. But. And it is a big but – is it fair to them that I make their moments so public? The kind of moments which are filed away by parents and brought out at 18th birthday parties or meeting-the-boy/girlfriend-for-the-first-time are the kind of moments that I could (and have) shared with the world without their permission.

So it’s something I’m working through because honestly they’ve provided me with some real fodder over the last few days. Plus I can’t blog about anything I’m crafting right now because it’s all for Christmas!

Posted under family

I’m not really the kind of person who suits a hat, much to my chagrin. It is the bane of my existence that pretty woollies are out of my reach. That said, when Bob & I went to Stockholm in January for our wedding anniversary I picked up a phenomenal ear infection which took nearly three months to heal and so this winter I’m simply not prepared to risk that again.

I’ve already half-heartedly started my craft neutral challenge and this yarn (Sirdar Denim Ultra) has been in my stash for about seven years. It met my criteria of being warm, fluffy and quick to knit up so I combined it with this pattern (Ravelry link) which is supposed to be a slouchy beret.

Note the ubiquitous hairbobbles around the wrist mark of the mother of daughters. The eagle eyed amongst you will note an error about three rows into the pattern caused by Erica leaping on me while I was having a knit break and thus losing my stitch marker but since my friend recently told me that Muslim prayer rugs always have an imperfection since only Allah makes things perfectly, I’ve relaxed my ridiculous perfectionist streak. It’s a really mind-altering way of looking at things. In any case, although (I think) the error is highlighted perfectly in the picture it’s really not obvious in reality.

As the title suggests there’s more to this post. Erica has decided that actually she rather likes my hat so I have now cast on Amy Swenson’s Cabled hat (pdf link) for her, but in the meantime I’m having to tolerate this nonsense. Two years old and she’s already raiding my wardrobe. Of course, as is the way of these things she suits the hat much better than I do. Ah well

Posted under for the kids, knitting

It’s Greer’s six month birthday today, and I swear with each child these milestones come faster and faster. I can’t believe that she has been in our lives for such a short period of time and yet we’d be so lost without her. She’s suddenly gone from the newborn stage to being a little person with a big personality, big smiles, big love and a big voice! Not sure who she could possibly have taken that from!

So to celebrate we got a lovely picture of the children all together.

and of course five seconds later got this beauty which I think I might actually prefer

Posted under family

A few months ago, Amanda declared a crush on me. What I haven’t really mentioned is that this is a reciprocated feeling. So I’ve decided to start the Kitschycoo fan club.

A few weeks ago on facebook, I pondered buying this awesome pettiskirt for Erica to wear to Greer’s christening. Opinions were divided amongst my friends and Amanda emailed me offering instead to make Erica a dress. Which she did, and what a dress. Not only is it made from the most awesome bird fabric ever, but it’s REVERSIBLE! It has a massive 60 inch circumference hem which went down very well with my little twirler. Did I mention it’s reversible?

Awesome side 1

Awesome side 2 (she was not impressed at this stage. Also, I’d crossed the ties accidentally which is why the dress isn’t sitting quite right.

When I was last through visiting Amanda, she got a fabric delivery from the States which gave me instant first dibs on the frankly stunning prints new to the Kitschycoo range. Having recently realised that Erica’s wardrobe consists of dresses, dresses and dresses I asked if Erica could have a couple of tunics made from the two prints that really caught my eye. And look what arrived yesterday!!

and

Needless to say I’m thrilled. Erica’s thrilled. And there’s a kind of smug satisfaction gained from supporting another Mum rather than a faceless corporation. Thanks again Amanda – you’re a star!

Posted under recommendations

I’ve signed up for Sam’s button swap after she was short a swapper. I never intend to join in these things but get sucked in by the excitement and fun. I’ve been partnered with Laura which is very exciting as I’ve been in awe of her work for quite a long time now!

I’ve also joined in Apryl’s Fantasy Movie swap which I’m massively excited about. I’ve been partnered with Christa who shares the same favourite film as me (The Labyrinth) so I need to get cracking on with my crafting for her

Also! I didn’t want to post about this until after the fact, but I have been crafting again! My lovely friend Fiona got married on Saturday and she mentioned a few months ago that she had loads to do but no time to do it. I asked if I could help and she asked me to make the ties for her groomsmen (the pink ones). This of course gives me an opportunity to share a photo of the gorgeous bride and her handsome new husband.

Aren’t they gorgeous? I’m so thrilled for them and it was an honour to share their day, they are such a fantastic couple and I just know they’re going to make one another so happy.

I’ll leave you with a bit more pink. I am a bad Mummy.

Posted under sewing, swaps, with the kids

Firstly I’d just like to say what an amazing and wonderful bunch of people I am HONOURED to have as readers and therefore as friends. I was gobsmacked by the response to my last post and I’m truly overwhelmed at the outpouring of support and experience that came from you all. Thank you, all, from the bottom of my heart

OKAY! Now we’re done with the schmaltzy PDA I can show you what I’ve been doing while I’ve not been doing anything. I know this won’t come as a surprise to any of you, given that I have four children but I’ve been indulging a lot in that naughty S word…*

…SHOPPING. You filthy minded scamps. What else did you think I was going to say?

So. My good friend Evelyn posted photographs of her gorgeous daughter Esmé over a year ago and of course being me my first response was, “ZOMGshe’sgorgeousEvelynWHEREDIDYOUGETHERDRESS?!!” Evelyn graciously directed me to Cindy’s shop on Hyenacart but alas, she didn’t have any fabulous technicolour dreamdresses available in stock. I bookmarked the store then completely forgot about it until a couple of weeks ago when I was clearing out my email, I found an exchange between Cindy & I. I decided to drop her a quick line to see if she was still making the dresses and oh FRABJOUS day not only was she making the dresses but she had space for me to place an order. Hooray!

I thought Greer was probably a little young for the full twirly dress effect so I got one for Erica and one for my niece Bailey. My sister Stephanie and I have a pretty good deal going, I give her Erica’s clothes once she’s outgrown them then she passes Bailey’s clothes back to me for Greer. We have just acquired a new niece last week when my stepbrother and his girlfriend had a little girl so no doubt these dresses will be passed on to little Maissie too! Anyway, I digress. Point is, beautiful dresses of wonder arrived this afternoon and I immediately stopped what I was doing to make Erica put hers on. It’s so colourful it has immediately washed away bad mood (I was really irritated today because it’s been raining constantly for months and I need some sunshine!)

I think Erica likes it.

What do you think?

*That reminded me of a story. When I was in Primary 3 (so 6-7 years old) I remember grassing someone in my class in for swearing. The teacher asked me what the swear word started with and my precocious little reading mind went into overdrive and I said, “It began with an S.” The teacher had a think and couldn’t work out which particular profanity had been levelled so told me to whisper it, so I whispered, “shit“. She gave me into trouble and told be it didn’t start with S, it started with Sh! Isn’t it funny the things you remember?

Posted under for the kids, recommendations

So, dear reader, I have a dilemma. I have been baking and cooking away lately but haven’t managed to blog it because SOMEONE had misplaced the memory card for the camera…

Findlay says, “It wasn’t me…”

Nairn denies all knowledge

Erica looks at the camera and shouts, “CHEEEEESE”

Whilst Greer looks cute

So in the meantime I’m afraid you’ll need to make do with photos from my phone. Luckily we have now located said memory card so when I’ve blogged up the camera photos we should be back to normal service. Well, I say normal because knowing my terrible children and messy house I don’t doubt that something else will go missing soon!

Anyway. Today I’m going to show you another wee taste of my childhood. My Nana and Grampa are children of the war era and so had a fantastic ability to eke dinner out on a budget. As classic Scottish weans* we’d get mince an’ tatties and if we ate all that, we might get bread an’ butter pudding after. What a treat that was! As I was the eldest grandchild it was my job to help my Nana and I can remember standing on a stool at her kitchen sink when I was probably about Findlay’s age, peeling potatoes and turnips and being allowed to help bake in return.

Thus, I decided last week that my kids should have some bread an’ butter pudding. Admittedly this was influenced in part because we were skint and had very little food in the house, and in part because I had about 20 million eggs needing used up! Nana always told me to use bread that was a little past it’s best, but bread doesn’t get a chance to go stale in my house so I used an outsider on the bottom layer.

You will need:
6 slices of bread
Butter
Raisins
Cinnamon and/or nutmeg to taste
2 egg yolks
2 tbsps sugar
3/4 pint milk (or more if it’s not enough to cover your bread)

Preheat your oven to gas mark 5 (375F). Butter the dish you’re using to make your pudding in, then butter the slices of bread and cut them diagonally in half. Cover the bottom of the dish with bread slices then sprinkle over a small handful of raisins. I really like cinnamon so at this point I sprinkle a teaspoonful of cinnamon over the top but I know my Nana prefers nutmeg – do whichever suits best or leave it out altogether. Repeat this layering again before topping off the dish with bread. Do NOT put raisins on the top of your dish because they’ll burn in the oven, and nobody likes a burnt raisin.
In a saucepan, mix your milk and sugar together and heat until the milk mixture is bubbling. Make sure you stir regularly to help the sugar dissolve and ensure it doesn’t stick to the bottom of the pan but be careful not to let the milk boil. Beat the egg yolk quickly in a jug then add the milk, whisking gently to combine. Pour the mixture back into the pan through a sieve and simmer for five minutes, stirring regularly. Pour over the bread slices and leave for at least half an hour, gently pushing the bread into the custard occasionally before sprinkling the top with the brown sugar and cinnamon. Pop in the oven for half an hour until the top is a golden brown colour. Serve with custard or vanilla ice cream.

*Wean means child, literally “wee ‘ane” or “wee yin” meaning “little one”. You’re a wean until yir Granny tells ye itherwise!

Posted under baking, family, recipes

Bob brought me my breakfast in bed this morning because we had a dreadful sleep with Greer. Erica always gets into bed beside me in the morning to tell me big stories and let me know in no uncertain terms that she wanted to share by sitting beside me, opening her mouth like a little baby bird and saying, “Aaaaaaaaahh”.

I suppose it’s one way to drop my calorific intake!

I promise I’ll be back soon, it’s the last week of the school holidays here and it’s very hurry-hurry-rush-rush as a result. How are you all today?

Posted under family