New Year's Resolution

 Hello and I hope you all had a lovely Christmas. I took some time out of blog land to relax and spend some much needed time with my family. It has been lovely. Almost time to come back to the real world now. 

The past few days I have been thinking, reviewing my status in the world I guess. Taking a look at my aims in life and re-assesing them as most people do at the end of the year. I have decided to go 100% rubbish free by the end of the year to help my sustainability. 

This means I will only purchase things that come in recycliable, reusable or compostable containers. And try and buy in a bulk where possible. Not only does buying in bulk save money, it also has less pacakging. 

Inspired by this blog here No Trash Project, Colleen lives in NYC and has given me some excellent ideas, I thought were impossible in a city, so I must try these out.

I have started this a bit early as I was running out of castille soap. I bought the smaller bottle at the end of April last year and only finished using it yesterday. I paid £5 for it and got almost a year's use out of it, so not bad value for money. But to save even more money I bought the next size up which was £8 something so who knows how long it is gonig to last me.

The next thing I was running short of was washing powder. I have been using Daz washing powder since I moved out from my parents' house nearly 6 years ago now. I must give it that most UK washing powders still come in a carboard box which is recyclable/compostable but all the health warnings on the side give me the heebie jeebies. All the grease lifters and optical brightners and heavy synthetic perfumes etc, are they really needed? I looked around online and came across BioD, it is 100% natural with no perfume and it comes in a paper bag which uses less material than a box so it should break down easier and faster on the compost heap. I bought a small 1KG bag to see how it fairs but you can purchase much, much bigger bags.

The next thing is packaged snacks, sometimes I like to make myself something to take to work for lunch, sometimes this isn't possible and I need something to grab and stuff in my bag quickly before I leave. I found these from InSpiral, quite expensive at £1.45 a pack, but they look tasty (haven't gotten round to trying them yet) and the package is compostable which is excellent. Snacks is something I need to work on, but I think it is more a self-discipline issue, as I make snacks for a week, but then end up eating them the day I make them!

 

The next thing I thought about was increasing the amount I compost, most councils in England provide you with a food collection bin which you either empty into your garden waste bin or a sepeate larger bin you keep outside. Which you can put most food waste in and they collect it, compost it down and sell it back to you as compost. 

I wanted to cut out the middle man, and was looking at ways to compost the things you can't easily do on your heap, i.e. dairy products, cooked food and bones. 

The simplist way seems to be a Bokashi bin, where "bokashi" is a japanese term for fermented. Basically you put all your food waste into the special bin, spinkle some bran which contains a bacteria in it and leave it to break down for a few weeks. Most websites suggest you need two, one to fill, one to ferment. I am thinking I might need more, so this is a trial run to see how long it takes me to fill and then I can work out how many bokashi bins I need.

You get two products from the bokashi bin, liquid which you syphon off with a special tap which you can use as liquid plant feed and the fermented waste which you need to dig into the compost heap to finish breaking it down before you can use it. 

 The basic kit gives you one bin and two months' supply of bran. but the actual bin is a behemoth. In the picture you can see it next to a standard issue council food waste bin. It's easily twice the size so not practical for everyone.

 

 

 

Irish crochet

 I recently have been looking at (and admiring) Irish crochet. I came across this on my Pintrerest feed:

 I was immediately hooked as we say. I had a bit of an idea brewing in my brain to make some mini-doilies. Which turned out ok, but look more free-form crochet-y. I have made them into pretty hair ties.

 

 

 

 

and all four together

 

 When  I was looking for some information online initially I found it quite hard to find instructions and information about, it seems to be one of those skills that is passed down through the generations.

Although some digging around has bought up some very useful archives on the Internet, here and there are some lovely old patterns here. There are a few books that I have seen recommended such as the Priscilla range of books and Irish Crochet by Mdme Hardouin (although this one is in French).

I feel super inspired by these books and pictures and will keep you posted about how things turn out.


xxx

Oh and PS we did have snow this morning but it didn't settle!

My crochet waist coat - Yarn Along.

Here is my finished waist coat/vest thing.  No new reading this week. Still reading last week's Landscape and just finished a rather charming article about Harris Tweed.

Unfortunately the lighting isn't very good as we have had a bad storm blowing in all day and it's been super dark. 

Here is the back too

Also there was a lot of ends to weave in too:

Phew. Apparently we are due for snow tomorrow! I am quite excited.

Xxxx

Work in progress

Phew, it has been wet and windy and very wild. But today is a welcome break from all of that. Clear skies and lots of lovely sun.

There's the last of the afternoon sun!

The past few days I have been hunkering down from the weather and working on my next project. A cotton vest.

Here is the front panels. Currently working on the back, which is going to be a large granny square with the same fabric pattern on the top to join at the shoulders to form some sort of yoke. 

I hope you all are well. xxx

Yarn along and Christmas presents

This week I have been enjoying another magazine, Kitchen Garden. In my opinion I find it is the best gardening magazine, it always comes with a pack of seeds and has lots of very useful tips, even though some of them are aimed at the young at heart!

I have been knitting with my hand spun silk, which is super hard as you may know that silk itself is very slippery. 

The finished product.

I have also been busy crocheting candle holders to go in the gift boxes.

Here they are all finished.

And packaged up

Yarn along

Joining Ginny in sharing what I am reading and knitting.

I am on a knitting rampage. I decided to give everyone a couple of knitted dish cloths as a present for Xmas as well as the usual chocolate. I think that handmade useful gifts are much more appreciated than the usual shop-bought chocolate. 

So at the moment I can knock out a dish cloth in about an hour and a half.  

This is going to turn into a bit of review too, so I apologise if you feel this a bit long. I am also reading a new magazine I discovered recently called "Landscape" at first glance I thought it would be like The Small Things magazine. Now, I have picked The Small Things magazine up a few times and had a flick through, I felt the editorial was little weak, although it does have some pretty pictures in and I found the craft tutorials a little basic for my liking. But I was pleasantly surprised when I picked up Landscape.

 

Lots of really interesting articles about various topics, including traditional Christmas decorations, around the garden, animals, crafts and some pretty tasty looking recipes. I am definitely buying the new issue when it comes out on the 11th. 

Gratitude Sunday

Joining Taryn in this heartfelt tradition. A time to slow down, to reflect and be grateful.

This week I have been grateful for

...The lovely few days of sunshine. Feels like were are still clinging onto summer and winter has not quite reached is. Apparently this month is going to get nasty.

...Some quiet time to catch up on my knitting. Still have a whole bunch of things to make for Xmas. 25 days and counting.

...Almost time to put the Xmas decorations up! Getting excited.

...My Mum still buying me an advent calender. Somethings you should never grow out of.

...The chickens finally eating their food. Had a few hiccups with them not eating and turned out no matter how hungry they got, they did not want to eat their feed. We bought a different one and been mixing it with cooked veg scrap and they are loving it now.

...The chickens are still laying! I read somewhere that this breed (gingernut rangers) was great layers. They are starting to look a bit scruffy so I think they are going to moult soon so that could be the end of the eggs until spring.




P.S I totally forgot to post this! I sat on the bus on the way to work and wrote this post but totally forgot to publish it! 

Just a Quick one...

My Mum always uses that phrase when she calls up after she has spotted something in the shop I might like, so I found it appropriate to use here.

I was just walking to the local shop to get some milk (my tea consumption seems to go up as the temperature goes down!) and I was thinking how miserable and dreary it is today. But that all changed when I got to two trees. They still had their leaves on, and they were fabulous golden shades so I snapped a few pictures for you to enjoy:

 

I am also progressing on the other half's Christmas socks. Nearly done now: 

Hope you are all keeping well.

XXXX

Blind DIY

Remember the other week I was talking about crafts using Hessian fabric? Well I gave my bathroom blind a bit of a make over.

This is what it looked like before. It was about 10 years old and incredibly faded. After I put it through the wash to see if it could be saved. I managed to get rid of the icky mould build up, I decided it would be ok to use. 

I carefully unpicked it all and took the backing and thermal lining. Used the old piece of fabric as a template and cut a new piece of fabric from some upholstery hessian. I chose this type because it has a large open weave so it could still let some light through.

I machined-sewed the bits that held the hardware on but to give it a nice neat edge I spent most of the day hand stitching it. 

My rubbish attempt at stich invisible stitches.

And here it is finished! I managed to hang it wonky to boot. I really needed another pair of hands to help me do it.

Holidays are coming...

Isn't it weird that in the UK it is the middle of November and still warm? My plants do not seem to mind. But I am starting to feel rather festive. I saw a few Christmas adds. The perennial Cocoa-Cola add and also the Bear and the Hare from John Lewis. We have had one frost so far, it just seems mad.
 

I have just returned from a brief visit from the West Country. I spent a couple of days staying at my parents' house. It was lovely to see them, but the trip felt ever so short. I didn't take any photos because I was rushing around trying to fit visiting in to the five days I was there. Phew it was busy.

I also had took the weekend off to spend time with my other half, which was lovely. We had a nice walk to town, did a little shopping, went to the cinema to see the film Gravity. (If you get motion sickness I suggest you give it a miss, there is a lot of spinning camera angles!) and then we went for a meal. And had a nice walk back. 

Sunday was a bit more relaxed too, we only left the house to go and do the shopping. 

I began knitting yet another pair of socks. Using the same pattern as before but using noro wool.

I also felt like noodles for breakfast.

And baked more bread.

Hope you lovies are starting to feel the Christmas cheer


xxxx

The Bee Keeper's Quilt

I have been working on the Bee Keeper's Quilt project of a while now. It's the kind of project that has lots of little components that are joined together, known has "hexipuffs", super cute and very easy to master. The pattern is available here from the wonderful Tiny Owl Knits. Her videos are wonderful to watch. Almost like a kindred spirit to me, I love her whinsy patterns too. She is a little crazy and all kinds of cute. And her cat, so so so cute!

So here is my version so far. It's worked in DK on 3.5mm DPNs in the round. It needs to be worked quite tight, so the stuffing doesn't come poke out. Guage doesn't really matter either. The methods I used to make them is a long tail cast on, KFB as an increase, K2tog as a decrease and I use three needle bind off to finish. But the pattern describes many, many methods of making them yourself. I like to leave long tails on the work too, that way if you line them up correctly you can use them to join the hexipuffs together.


I don't really have any plans for colour schemes, just using up all my left over scraps and trying to use up all the icky colours that have been given to me. Here is a bunch of herxipuffs I have knitted up this week.

 

Here are all the other hexipuffs joined together. Nice and "clashy clashy" as my Mum would say. Nice hodgepodge (I love that word) of random colours.

 

Gratitude Sunday

Joining Taryn in this heartfelt tradition. A time to slow down, to reflect and be grateful.

Through out the week I have been grateful for

... Feeling the need to get some DIY done. The house is slowly starting to look presentable.

... Planning the decor and soft furnishing. Finally I have some vision about how I want my home to look.

...the sense of calm and achievement that this brings.

... The breaks in the stormy weather we have been having has allowed me to get out and do some gardening.

...cracking open the bee keepers quilt project again. Feels good to slowly work through all those odd bits of wool that knitters and crocheters collect.

 

 

Business and preparation

Autumn is definitely upon us now. It is cold and murky time, a time to cosy up inside. Firing up the central heating which has been named Clunky. To chase away the cool, dampness that has been hanging around for the past few days.

The nights are drawing in too, it makes the day seem so short. Many times I have felt myself longing for bed around 8pm, which is far too early. Last night I gave in at half past 9. 

I felt that was acceptable after a hard days work. Yesterday I had to repair the chicken coop after the feathery ladies escaped. Luckily there was no Mr Fox around, so everyone is safe and accounted for after their adventure.

I have also been working on the decorating. Still going! Although it was all the boring white gloss for the wood work. Now it looks fresh and clean. I also need to make some soft furnishing for the living to help with the cosiness factor. Maybe some curtains just to help keep the warm in a little more. I came across some ideas for burlap (or hessian as it is called in the UK) curtains.

Here are some examples I have found on Pinterst:

The colours I picked for my living room are brown and purples anyway, so hessian would fit perfectly.  I would post a picture of my living room but it is about to chuck it down so has gone very dark!

Digging around further on Pinterst (as I am sure users of that site are well aware how often this happens!) I came across some pretty interesting combinations of hessian and lace:

 

Some possible future projects maybe?




I have also made mayonnaise. It was a very stressful thing to do and I managed to use eight, yes eight egg yolks! Now I have a whole bunch of whites sitting in the fridge ready to be made into meringue. 

Gratitude Sunday

 Joining Taryn in this heartfelt tradition. A time to slow down, to reflect and be grateful.


This week I have been grateful for: 

...my feathery ladies laying two eggs a day for me 

...Which allowed me to have pancakes for breakfast...

... Having the time to finish the pair of socks I have been working on

...Finally finding a shampoo that keeps my hair clean and doesn't irritate my dermatitis
... Some quiet time to catch up on rest
...The end of British Summer Time which meant I had an extra hour before work