3.

3

How is that even possible?

Was it really only three years ago that you were born, dear Erica? Three years? It doesn’t seem possible after your first year which was so terrifying that I wasn’t sure you’d make it to three.

You were so sick that this was your default expression for the first six months of your life:

This is you a week after your first birthday. You weighed just under 15lbs and had finally managed to double your birthweight. At the time it was daunting but looking back at old photographs of you it’s terrifying to see how tiny you were:

You didn’t walk until you were 15 months. You had no teeth or hair until after that, all as a result of your body prioritising your growth above everything else and yet you were always so happy. So cheerful. So pleased to see your brothers, Daddy and me. Then of course not two weeks after your second birthday we made you a big sister. What really struck me when we cuddled Greer into you for her first sisterly cuddle was your hands – how all of a sudden, you’d grown. That moment took my breath away because it was the moment that cemented for me that you were going to be just fine:

For you, this has been the year of making friends. At nursery you have a merry band who excitedly shout as they see you coming to the door in the morning. You are blessed with a beautiful smile & the ability to make friends almost immediately which makes us ever so happy, just as you always seem to be. It is an honour and a privilege to share our lives with you and we wish you many happy returns today on your 3rd birthday.

Happy birthday, darling girl x

Posted under family

Good Monday, my little friends! How are we all this glorious day? Volcanic ash nonsense aside, things have been really pretty good here of late although alas I have to keep a lot of it to myself for now. I promise to share as soon as I can.

Friday I finally got to go over to Auntie M’s cake lounge in De Courcy’s arcade in the West End, which is the brainchild of Michelle. What a fab place! My mini-companion got the cutest pinkest cake available while my new friend Denise and I both elected for the Sweet Potato and pecan praline cake – a combination which I’ll openly admit to being sceptical about but I swear this was the best cake I have ever tasted. (Shhh! Don’t tell Bob!) I stupidly forgot that I had my phone with me so I didn’t take a photo of our cakes, but I snapped a quick photo of the table before we hotfooted it:

I honestly think that any of you who are within travelling distance to Byers Road would be doing yourselves a disservice not to go visit. Go!

Saturday, I was desperate to go to the Made In The Shade Springtime jamboree in the Lighthouse. With Greer not feeling her best, I left Bob at home with her and coerced Nairn and Erica into joining me. They had a great time! I was pleasantly surprised with how well planned the event was, especially with it being over two floors. The lower floor had a table filled with colouring sheets and pens and the upper floor had a table where browsers were encouraged to help make new bunting for the Made In The Shade events. We had brought along some of our own fabric and as you can see, Erica and Nairn put their own little mark on it:

We accosted some poor chap sitting at a stall minding his own business and asked him to film Erica’s first-ever sewing project. Admittedly, that particular bunting flag is now sewn in a crazy paving manner but hopefully nobody will look too closely! We pottered about and bought lots of pretties before heading over to Sloan’s market for a wander. Chrissy was there with Sarah selling their prettiful wares and we stopped for a natter before going to Sloan’s pub for lunch. Now, I have to admit that I’m really very proud of the fact that I can take my kids out to eat and reliably know that they’ll behave themselves but honestly they excelled themselves. They ate their (absolutely amazing value!) lunch, picking a little of each other’s plates and being so unbearably cute that the ladies sitting beside us gave them pocket money as we left! They immediately took that back to Sloan’s and bought themselves a cake each so a good day was had by them, for sure!

It sounds like a fairly normal day out, right? Except this is the first day I’ve taken the kids out by myself for the whole day since before I became unwell in November. We didn’t just survive, we had an excellent time doing it too so I’m proud of them for making it so easy. I’m also thrilled that Glasgow suddenly seems to be springing to life with all of these supercool independant business ventures that are so much more intriguing and appealing than the same old same old on the high street. So much fun!

Posted under family

At Church on Sunday, the lovely Liz remarked upon Erica’s growing likeness to me which reminded me that I hadn’t shown you lovely lot some photographs that Bob’s Dad David unearthed recently. David is quite the amateur geneologist having traced their family tree back to the 1500′s and I have to admit his enthusiasm is starting to rub off on me. I was recently lucky enough to get in contact with some cousins and an Aunt I didn’t even know I had and this has been a fabulous boon to me, so perhaps some family exploration is in my future? Perhaps

Anyway I happened to remark to Susan & David one day that a few people had commented on Erica’s similarity to me when David had told me about some photographs he’d found of Bob’s Mum’s sister and brothers, explaining that he thought I’d be shocked when I saw them. And boy, was he right!

This is Erica, last Summer

This is Aunt Jill (with Uncle David & Uncle Mike) – this is a hand-coloured photograph, would you believe?!

The likeness is absolutely mindblowing but to be honest, if Erica turns out even one iota like her Great Aunt Jill then I’ll be a happy bunny indeed. I first met Aunt Jill and Uncle Mike at the Make Poverty History march in Edinburgh in July 2005 when I looked like this

and Findlay looked like this:

and I’m embarrassed to admit that’s the last protest march that I participated in. Aunt Jill, however, frequently looks like this (in the stripy top):

She’s an ardent anti-nuclear protestor and someone who I admire very much for her stance and her commitment to making her opinion heard. So like I say, if our Erica grows up with even a small element of Aunt Jill’s spirit and courage of convictions then my job has been done well and I guess I can live with the fact that in reality, she really doesn’t resemble me that much at all

Posted under family

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