Aaahhhh, wonderful yarns!

I was such a good girl before Christmas. Despite finding the most fabulous wool shop fairly locally, I resisted, I didn't buy any of the yummy yarns for myself, just got some for a scarf ( must remember to post pics of the scarf I made for mother-in-law ). But I certainly did a lot of drooling. And fondling. And a fair amount of stroking. And I did promise myself to pay another visit in January, when hopefully there would be a sale.

So we braved the snow yesterday and took a little drive over to the wool shop. It was open. It had a big SALE sign outside. And I had a big grin on my face! Not an acrylic yarn in sight, instead there was Debbie Bliss, Noro, Manos del Uruguay, Araucania and other equally lovely yarns.

Before Christmas, I had fallen in love with the Manos del Uruguay Silk Blend yarns, and promised myself to get some in the sale to make into a lovely scarf for me. This yarn is just soooo gorgeous! It is a blend of 70% extra fine merino wool and 30% silk, and feels incredibly soft and snuggly against the skin. And the colours, well, they are just WOW WOW WOW. The kettle dyed multi yarns have the most fabulous soft and subtle colour changes, they blend incredibly well. You can tell by now that I am truly smitten with this yarn, can't you, lol?

Now normally I am into muted colours, beiges, browns, greens and all their different shades and hues, but this time I went for colour, glorious colour! I bought one solid and two multi Manos Silk Blends with a purple theme, hows about that then -


I get all excited just looking at the pics right now, how ridiculous is that?

And then I went really OTT with colours, but somehow this yarn really appealed to me. It reminded me ever so much of the beautiful sunsets we get in France, so it was a must have. It is an Araucania wool mix -


Perfect for a cool summer evening throw I think.

And for another summery project I chose this absolutely gorgeous yarn, made from 100% sugar cane !! Aren't those just the prettiest soft blue and green watery colours? This yarn has a really beautiful sheen -


Look, colour!Not beige, not cream, not muted green, but COLOUR -

And here they all are together, looking so so pretty -

Now I am going back to stroking and fondling. The yarns, that is.
xx

And out came the knitting needles

The last year or two I have been renewing my relationship with yarns, crochet and VERY occasionally knitting. It seems I get more and more into snuggling up with yarns and a crochet hook or needles these days. Crocheting is getting better, gee, I get adventurous and make up my own granny squares, lolol, but my knitting is still absolutely basic, shame on me.

I am also a huge cricket fan. And of course its test match season, England is in South Africa at the mo. However, I just cannot sit in front of the telly for any length of time without having something to do with my hands. So the hunt for a teeny weeny project, which wouldn't require much in the way of concentration and attention, was on. On was also a trip to the nearest wool shop. I really had no definite project in mind, whatever yarn took my fancy would sort of dictate what I would make.

And I found this -

Just look at the colours, they are so delicious! The yarn is a very thick boucle sort of yarn, pure merino wool, from New Zealand. The name? Mount Pisa. When I saw those mouthwatering colours, I thought this would make a lovely little scarf for our darling granddaughter Grace.

It was really too thick and knobbly to crochet comfortably, so out came the knitting needles! This yarn is brilliant for basic knitters like me, it is so forgiving! Because of the knobbly boucle texture, it doesn't matter if your stitches are uneven and because of the swiftly changing colours, it looks fab even with the most basic of knitting stitches, don't you think?

I took me all of day three of the test match to knit it and crochet the flowers, and it was the perfect easy project. I finished it about 30 seconds before my DS and my almost-daugher-in-law came to visit with Grace. She looks so cute wrapped up in the scarf!


Thats it for today, but there might just be another woolly post tomorrow. Not with any finished project, but with some exciting buys....

xx

A little angel

I so wanted to share these pictures of a little gift I made ages ago, but I had to be patient ( not something I am terribly good at, lol ) because the recipients of this little gift do read my blog. I need to explain, I think.

If you have been reading my blog for a while you will know that after many years our dear friends Will and Theresa were finally able to adopt and bring home their daughter Mae last year.

This beautiful little girl has finally made their lives complete and I wanted to make a little something for them as a reminder of their first Christmas together as a family. I have to thank Dawn from The Feathered Nest for the fabulous idea. Her fairies in a jar inspired me to make a Christmas Angel in a Jar for them. I had a gorgeous old picture of an angel and a lovely old French jar, which I thought would be perfect for what I had in mind. I think I had a smile on my face the whole time I was putting it all together.

Then came the bad news - Mae had chicken pox and they couldn't come and visit as arranged. But this turned out to be quite fortunate, because W & T just happened to post some photos of Mae on their blog and I thought that Mae as the Christmas Angel would be so much more personal. YAY! I nicked a pic off their blog and printed it out. The wings were made from parts of the Christmas Carol, which the very generous Graphics Fairy Karen had posted only a little while earlier ( I also used it on the bag, see last photo ). I removed the original angel and replaced it with Mae, and she looked just gorgeous. So everything turned out for the best in the end, lol.

And this is it -


I am pleased with the way it turned out, and I am so glad that T & W loved it as well. It was a real pleasure to make, especially the second time round with the photograph of Mae, lol.

xxx

Happy New Year!

I wish you all a very happy, healthy, peaceful and prosperous 2010! I hope the year will be everything you want it to be and that all your hopes and wishes will become reality.

2009 has been an interesting year. I got off my butt and did quite a lot of fairs, which were surprisingly successful. I also started this blog, as a joke to begin with, but somehow it kinda grew, and I have met some really wonderful people through blogging. Some of the blogs I visit regularly have been so full of inspiration that I have been encouraged to do some crafting again. AND... my DH finally retired at the end of the year. So 2010 will be a VERY challenging year, but something we are so very much looking forward to. We will be spending a lot of time doing up this big house and garden over the next 12 months. It is going to be tough as so much work is needed, but then we will finally be able to sell it and buy a small flat as our base here in England and move to our beautiful little cottage in France full time!!! I will always have slightly mixed feelings about that, as this has been our family home for so many years and I do love this home, but our cottage in France is our little bit of paradise and we are so happy there.

Enjoy the last couple of days of the Christmas/New Year break! xxx

What a wonderful couple of days

Ahhh, it has been great. No stress, no arguments, just a wonderful Christmas Day with DH's parents, my two sons who are still at home and middle son and his partner and darling daughter yesterday, and a day of blissful vegging out, watching films, cuddling dogs and nibbling on leftovers and lovely little tidbits today.

Christmas Eve was a little tiring, because as usual, I had left most of the clearing up til the last minute. The hall did finally get tidied up, and looked very Victorian Christmassy with the colourful tree, quilts and candles -


My granmother knitted this Santa, oh, probably 45 years ago or thereabouts. I treasure it -

All the prezzies were finally wrapped in the evening and put by the fireplace in the drawing room

Christmas morning I started early getting the dining room ready for the Christmas meal in the afternoon. The fireplace was decorated, the table was laid, and the table centre was put together. This year I put the candelabra into a lovely old pressed glass bowl, and filled it with vintage baubles.


I love the way the candles drip down, and see the gorgeous old Santa ornaments in the bowl, aren't they just so cute? Oh, and you can probably see this here David Bailey in the baubles as well, tehehehee.

I love the muted colours of winter potpourri, and this one scented our little dining room beautifully

Our guests arrived at lunchtime, and once everybody was happily installed, we opened our presents. It was hilarious, there were many fun presents which had us all in stitches. More about the prezzies another time though. Here are just a few piccies -

Our darling Grace opening her presents
and thoroughly enjoying playing with Mummy and Daddy's stocking presents, lol, I think they have lost them to her

DH's dad was of course wearing his precious Christmas socks again. I really don't know how they have survived this long, we bought them as a silly little tree present for him about 25 years ago, and they are still going strong.

Things did a get a little silly

before we all settled down to our Christmas meal -

It was yummy. We started with a clear chicken soup, just the way my mum and my grandmother used to make it in Germany. Instead of a huge turkey, we had roast chicken and a most delicious honey and mustard coated ham with roast potatoes, roasted squash, carrots and onions. Of course there were brussels ( which we all love ), creamed parsnips, honey glazed carrots, a white onion and parsley sauce for the ham and gravy for the chicken. We did manage a bit of Christmas pud for dessert, but left the cheese and biscuits for much much later.

We really had a most relaxing day and the hours just flew by. Nanny and Popeye left about 9pm, and we realised then how pooped we were. Didn't stay up much later than that, lol, we all went to bed quite early. Such lightweights, lol.

And today, well today was a day for just vegging, nibbling, watching a few films and just spending some happy time together. I love Christmas. And I sincerely hope that all of you had as good a time as we had. I am still full of Christmas joy, lol, and could smile at and hug everybody, so watch out!!! xxxxx

Merry Christmas!

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
(You need Flash to open the card )

Handmade Christmas Swap update

Lots of you have taken part in the Handmade Swap organised by Kim from HEART IN THE COUNTRY , so you know all about it. And some of you have already received the swap packages. I am sooooooo happy to announce that my swap package from the lovely Kim herself has arrived as well! Kim, you have put together such a gorgeous selection of gifts which are just perfect for me, I can't thank you enough.

I tried really really hard not to tear the big envelope open immediately. I was going to be so restrained, mainly because I was in the middle of doing something. Really, I had the best intentions of carrying on with my work for a couple of hours, then making a cup of tea and closeting myself away in the drawing room. I lasted all of 5 minutes. Couldn't help myself. BUT, at least I didn't rip it open in a frenzy. Possibly the calm and peaceful atmosphere in the drawing room helped with that. I carefully opened the big padded envelope and started to gently remove beautifully wrapped little prezzies.

Look at how prettily they are wrapped, and how nice the stamped tags are -

I was really really good and opened the Christmas card first. I wish I could make things like that, look at that little knitted stocking, and the dinky little tree sticking out of it!

Ahhh, the first gift, beautifully wrapped in gold paper, soft and squishy ( one has to squeeze, rattle, shake, sniff before unwrapping, to try and guess )-

And I guessed right, it was the prettiest hanging heart!

Oooh, but there was another little prezzie which felt just like that one, and yes! it was another little heart-

Next was this beautifully presented necklace -
perfect colour for me.

The next little package contained something soft as well, could it be? Of course it was, because all good things come in threes, right? The softest rich dark red velvet heart -

And look, look, earrings to match the necklace! I am going to look so elegant tonight when we are having our fondue-

The hearts are already settling down in their new homes-

You would have thought that was more than enough to spoil me, but no, that wasn't the end of it, just check out this fabulous creation made with the most velvety and soft yarn I have ever snuggled into-
It is fabulous, so unusual and incredibly snuggly.

And last but definitely not least, these beautifully knitted flower brooches, how I wish I could knit like that -

Am I a lucky girl or what? I am so glad I joined this swap, thank you for organising it, Kim, and once again a huge thank you for my beautiful gifts!

xx