End of November

 November is birthday month in our family. My Mum, David and I all have birthdays this month, with mine being last Saturday.  I don’t often receive flowers, but had 3 lots this time, so the living room looks like a florists!

I got myself a birthday treat and bought a pouch from Mrs Moog  who makes these lovely Herdwick sheep pouches.

And it looks lovely with the other sheep on my sheep shelf.  It’s big enough for a bit of sock knitting or a similar small project.  

My sister gave me some local gin (made in Sherborne), really Christmassy, for which I bought some elderflower tonic to go with it.  Oh yes, and behind that is a small jar of marmalade infused with the gin, which is rather yummy too).

Now this time of year is about secret crafting so I can’t show much here. But I can share this

It’s a folder for my circular needles to keep them in order.

And it has 6  pockets with vinyl fronts. It’s a download pattern by Aneela Hoey called a Flip Pocket Folio.  I’ve used fabrics from stash, which I think is called Radiance for the cover and inside with a variety of Moda Grunge fabrics for the pockets and bindings. I also attempted to attach popper fastenings, which took a while getting to grips with.  Not perfect, but they work and I’m pleased with that.

While shopping in Sainsbury’s the other day I found amongst the small amount of sewing gifts for Christmas, some fat quarters of fabrics with a kitchen theme. The photos are the wrong way round, but anyway, the pack of 5 fat quarters has come in useful for making a toddler sized apron, a couple of ‘tea towels’, and I’ll make a pair of oven gloves.  These will be for my youngest granddaughter who will be getting a toy kitchen for Christmas.

I think that’s all for November, getting ready for Christmas and making a start on the pudding.  The fruit is soaking in citrus juice and Calvados overnight before I put the other ingredients in and cooking in the slow cooker tomorrow. The decorations will start coming down from the loft soon, though we’ve had a small string of fairy lights on the mantelpiece for several weeks to brighten things up.

Roll on December! 🎄

November Musings

 Not a lot happening it seems with lockdown happening this month (it doesn’t finish until 2 December, currently- let’s hope things ease again after then).  So a bit of time spent on making my contribution towards TG Christmas cards and digging out some paper crafting stuff from ages ago as well as using cardstock given to me. I don’t do paper crafting so it was a change to do make these.

All apart from the bottom left (which was the sample I worked from) I made and I used some images to add a bit more festive decoration.

Here’s a close up of one of the completed cards.

I made some time to make some Siblings Together blocks, all sent off and received. Below are two rainbow blocks for this month’s Bee Mama Kerry.

And some pinwheel blocks for Nicky’s mini block drive.

But my finish so far for this month is my Seedhead socks.  They look fab and I must give them a wash and block so I can wear them. Here is a ‘sockfie’ below.

As for a possible future project, a new CAL has been announced by Lucy of Attic24 starting in January, am I tempted to make another blanket? (Image below from Lucy’s blog).

Still keeping busy.

I Forgot to Mention....

 I received a postcard last week.  This was a swap organised by the UK Quilters Unites postcard group last month, but the deadline came up but the swappers  names and addresses weren’t emailed until recently.  So this was the card I made. The theme was Alphabet, I chose D and made it from 2 Dunkards Path blocks.  This was sent from me (in Dorset) to Jean (in Devon) so my choice of the letter was appropriate.

I was sent the letter S from Ren, which was a machine embroidered card with some glittery thread for the wings and the S. The lilies on the card may be coincidental as the photos of the cards made are sharedon the group page on Facebook before posting, but meaning of the name Susan (or my spelling which is Suzan) is Hebrew for lily.   There is a reference to this  on Wikipedia 

Really pretty, isn’t it.

October Furtling

 It’s November, where did October go? Other months during lockdown and the easing afterwards went slower, I’m sure.  

The photo above comes courtesy of the Acer trees of Kingston Lacy (our local NT haunt) , we went there a couple of weeks ago to take in the Autumn colours, but I expect that by now the trees are bare, especially with the high winds over this weekend.

At the end of September and beginning October we went for a couple of  days away to Liskeard and ventured to the Lost Gardens of Heligan and Truro. Then explored Liskeard town and made our way home via Kingshayes, near Tiverton. So it was good to see some different scenery and the last trip away for this year by looks of things.

I have managed to meet up with a few friends for walks or knit and natter (which has to be indoors now after having Thursday mornings outside during the summer); the West Country Embroiders via Zoom this month so a little bit of socialising but not too much. Now that lockdown will start again soon

With the WCE I received instructions and pattern to make a fabric jug so I readied myself with the cut out pieces to make it and after the meeting I decided to crack on and make it

I have lost a bit of sewing mojo so I’ve sewn what I’ve needed to do this month.  So I’ve made blocks for Siblings Together bees, one which I didn’t show last month and this month

October’s blocks

September’s blocks

I had a Project Linus fabric pack to make up

Other than that it’s been Crochet and knitting. I finished the Aria blanket, which I’m really pleased about.

It was just lovely to work on and the photo doesn’t do justice to how vibrant the colour is.  The pattern is by Lucy of Attic 24. She’s been posting daily blogs for October so pop over and have a look.

I’ve also taken part in a mini CAL by Coastal Crochet of 5 Coastal Coasters, which have been fun to make  And can read about that on my last post.

Having made the Aria blanket I returned to my knitting and have knitted all the pieces for my purple cardigan, but they’ve got the be sewn together, then the button/buttonhole bands knitted.  I’m hoping this’ll be a November finish, together with my Seedhead socks.  No pics of the cardi, but I have got a ‘sockfie’ of the first sock.

I started the second sock on Wednesday and I’m now well on the way to getting that finished.  I’m getting better at the Judy’s Magic Cast on, improving on my short row heel turn and Jenny’s stretchy bind (cast) off too.  I made a purple pair a little while ago without the Seedhead patterning and I think this pattern is a good toe up sock pattern that works well for me.

So I’m still keeping busy and hope that the sewing mojo returns for November to get some Christmas 🎄 stuff done, see how we go.  I’m linking up with Mini Archie’s Furtle Around the Blogosphere