Saturday, December 26, 2009

Somewhat belatedly - Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Ready for Christmas

I know it's nearly mid Dec but I have literally lost 2 weeks of my life. Kids have been really ill. I've been really ill. It's only now that I'm feeling like myself.

My major achievement this weekend - putting up the Christmas tree. It took about 2 hours because the children were helping me. Zoe insisted on carrying every breakable glass bauble and dropping quite a few but luckily not breaking any. Here's our tree in all its glory.

Little angel I made years ago.....Rudolf ornament
Angel
Beautiful bauble from Chicago

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Off the radar

I was feeling quite please with myself with regular updates of the blog. Then 10 days of nothing. The reason for that is the children - they're all sick! Coughs, colds and fever. Luckily, nothing more serious (swine flu, anyone!) but it has meant that I've had 1, 2 or 3 children at home with me. So,time for me has been more limited.


Even so, I did manage to start and finish 1 thing for me. It's a litte shrug, Bella from Kim Hargreaves book, Amber. I knitted this in Rowan Big Wool in Merry, a lovely warm red. It took hardly any time and it's very warm. A success!

Friday, November 13, 2009

Baking with little helpers

Everything I do that involves the children, just takes 6 times as long. Take for example, when I decided to bake a joint birthday cake for hubby and Aidan, the children were desperate to help. I let them but the mess that they created took forever to clear up! Actually, I don't mind - they really like baking!


Here's the final product - a very decadent, almost flourless choclate cake.
If you have good cholestrol, please feel free to try out my version:

150g of butter
200g of plain (dark) chocolate, broken into pieces
125g of caster sugar
4 eggs, separated
142ml of double cream
4 tablespoons of plain flour

1. Melt chocolate in a bowl over some simmering water. When the chocolate is almost melted, add in the butter. Stir until all melted, taking care not to overheat. Leave to cool slightly.
2. In a separate bowl,whisk egg yolks with caster sugar until thick and creamy.
3. In another bowl, whisk egg whites until stiff peaks are formed.
4. Stir in the chocolate mixture into the egg yolk mixture. Add the double cream, mixing well. Gently fold in the whisked egg whites.
5. Grease a 10" round loose bottomed cake tin. Pour in the mixture. Bake in a preheated oven (180 deg Celsius) for 25 minutes. Don't worry if it sinks a little as it cools.
6. Finally, enjoy!

Thursday, November 05, 2009

Dotty day

The children's school encourages them to be aware of different charities around and to participate in the fund raising activities. Tomorrow the children are fundraising for a charity for the blind and they are to go to school wearing some dotty accessories (braille) and to make a donation for that privilege. I was going to buy my children some spotty socks but the both of them actually requested that I make them something instead. What's a mum to do except answer the request.

I didn't have time to knit them something but I had time to sew them a few things. First up, a yoyo flower brooch with a dotty Kaffe Fassett fabric. It took all of 10 minutes and it looks so cute that I'm going to be making lots of them.I also made scarves for them. I found more dotty fabrics in my stash (I have a lot of dotty fabric in my stash - I might add!!) and some white polar fleece fabric, cut 2 long strips, sewed them up on the sewing machine, cut the fringe and voila! - spotty scarves.

Sunday, November 01, 2009

Halloween

Halloween -one of the children's favourite holiday (after Christmas and birthdays!) As it was half term, I had devised a few Halloween activities to pass the time with the children. One of it was make Halloween cookies, which was a success. The only problem was that we couldn't find any bright orange icing for the pumpkin - so they look a bit pale and washed out.
The next thing we made was a Halloween wreath - from recycled plastic bags, old wire coat hanger and some black card. I think it makes a good Jack-O-Lantern.

Finally, I made some food for a Halloween party - severed fingers (sausages with cheese fingernails, wriggly worms (more sausages!) and deep fried eyeballs (mini scotch eggs). It had great reactions from the kids.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Autumn





Cold nights = more knitting! (I sincerely hope)

Saturday, October 24, 2009

Teeny, tiny blankets

for Kathy for the neo-natal ICU where she works. These blankets are tiny - 9" x 13". I've really forgotten how tiny premature babies can be. Aidan was 6 weeks early and he was tiny (4.5lbs) but we saw lots of much younger and smaller babies in the ICU, which made us very thankful for our little man. I've got Zoe's little baby modelling the blankets!

Monday, October 19, 2009

Look who's knitting

She's been pestering me to teach her to knit and sew for ages now. I've finally relented and I'm teaching my little girl to knit. I guess being surrounded by yarn and fabric and little homemade goodies does encourage the love to learn. She's making progress. So far, no dropped stitches. She's very excited to be making a blanket for her dolly.

Monday, October 12, 2009

Alexandra Palace

I had a lovely few days doing a few things for me. On Thursday, I went to Origin and had quite an inspiring time looking at other people's work. There were lots of textile artists and jewellery designers with amazing work. Speaking of which, I really must dust off the loom and practice some weaving.

On Friday and Sunday, I went to the Knitting and Stitching Show in Alexandra Palace. There was just so much to see and buy (although I didn't do too much damage to the credit card!). I was very well restraint and didn't buy and yarn, I'll tell you why in a second. I did buy lots of fabric for more quilts. I love making quilts. One of the kits I bought was the Hungry Caterpillar quilt kit - I've been looking at it on the internet. When I saw the shop sample hanging up, I knew I had to have one. The kids are fighting over who should have the quilt, as it's one of their favourite children's book.


I also bought a few beads and findings for more bead crochet.
Now the reason I didn't buy any yarn because there was a yarn mountain in my home. I mentioned to my mother-in-law, on her way to Hong Kong, to keep an eye out for a good bargain. Guess what turned up at home - 12 bags of yarn with 6 balls in each bag and weighing 500g in each bag. That's enough for sweaters for everyone twice or three times over. OMG!!
And this is Zoe at Ally Pally - having a great time charming the stall holders and visitors alike. She was so well behaved and patient eventhough she was being dragged around looking at more yarn, books, fabric or beads by mummy for about 3 hours!!


Saturday, October 03, 2009

Projects galore

I have been so busy working on loads of things, one or two things in secret, one or two things which I forgot to photograph and they've gone to new homes, but everything under time deadlines. In fact, a few things are still under some deadlines.


I've been bitten by the quilting. In fact, I have 5 quilt projects on the go at the moment. They are all very similar. Here's one I finished this week. It's for my baby niece, Celeste who turns one this month. The quilt measures approximately 1 metre by 1 metre. It's just strips with some hand quilting (and some quirky little details!) Hope she likes it.


Next up, some cute and creepy little fellows from The Cute and Creepy Crochet book. These are for my brother in law who bought me the book. This is the corporate zombie - as he is one!And an army of ninjas, for protection!

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Hello again

It feels like I've fallen off the planet - a whole month with no blogging updates. I do apologise.. It's them pesky kids. They just create this time black hole......

Having said that, the two big ones are back in school and I only have one little one to distract me. And the little one turned 2 in August and she's just started nursery (preschool) for 2 mornings a week. That means I have 3 hours of mummy time, 2 mornings a week. Hallelujah!!! Have a glass of champagne on me, wherever you are.

On the knitting front, I've been working on Blithe, from Kim Hargreaves book, Breeze. I have nearly finished the front. It's a summer tank. The weather is definitely autumnal in London, so much so that I'm contemplating turning on the heating. I guess, I won't be using this much until next spring. Oh well.

On the beaded crochet jewellery front, look at what I made for a friend's birthday. I crocheted the necklace with 2 different beads, so that it spiralled. Then, I found the focal beads which worked so well with the necklace. What do you think??

Saturday, August 15, 2009

Finally.....

A post, not only a post, but one with some craft content! I finally finished mum's cardigan. It took approximately 5 weeks ( I was distracted other craft bits during this time). I finished it on the second last day of the holiday. Mum's happy with it. She's got to find 3 buttons and wash and block it. It's not a bad job considering, I "winged" the pattern.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Ahh the joys of a holiday

I haven't got much access to the computer or the internet at my parents in KL. When I do manage to get on, the kids are continually bugging me to let them get on it too for games etc....


We're having a great time in KL, eating too much and catching up with old friends and shopping (sadly not yarn shopping - too expensive and not that I need anymore yarn!!)


On the crafting front, mum requested that I knit her a cardigan as she had 16 balls of yarn just lying around. So what is a dutiful daughter to do, except do that!! I'm just knitting a top down garter stitch yoke cardigan. I'm at the point of knitting the widest bit and the boredom of knitting 300 over stitches for one row is killing me!!!! Not bad progress for about 5 nights of knitting.Also, I've been practising on my bead crochet, I'm making a necklace for me! Going great so far!

Saturday, July 04, 2009

Summer finally arrives


Apologies for not blogging in the recent weeks, I've been super busy with end of term stuff with the kids (sports day, summer concert, parties......). I have managed to finish one thing recently. It's the Garter stitch cardigan in Rowan Scottish Tweed Aran. Just perfect for the super warm summer that we've been having.

Saturday, June 20, 2009

More King and I

Apologies for the lack of craft content, but please indulge a very proud mummy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcvELubAJpA

Tuesday, June 16, 2009

The King and I

My recent exciting news - Aidan is in the production of The King and I, showing at the Royal Albert Hall (from now until 28 June) with Daniel Dae Kim (very hot and sexy) and Maria Friedman. It's been quite a nightmare, in terms of the logistics and timings. But it's been worth it. He loves the whole experience.

here's 2 shots from the show :


Here he is with Daniel:

ETA: Mummy likes Daniel a lot, especially since he is soo lovely to the kids. He knows them by name and chats to them and the mummies. Plus he is hot and shexy!

Monday, June 08, 2009

Crochet Crazy

I'm being unfaithful to my knitting. It's been all about crochet recently. I've been a blah about my knitting, so I thought I would pick up something else and have fun with it. Boy, was it a welcome distraction. And look what I managed to achieve in about a week or 10 days.

I was teaching a friend to make granny squares for a blanket and I was inspired to make a few squares as well. While making the squares, Keira requested that I make her a bag. As it was her birthday, how could I refuse. 2 days later - voila! Bag - completed. Child - happy. Result!!
I've always loved the hexagon blankets on Ravelry. So I thought, why not start one of my own. I had bought on ebay 750g of DK cotton in 5 colours (pink, light burgundy, pale yellow, gold and cream) and I'll be using that for my blanket. I need 99 hexagons for my blanket and I've done about 25 so far. Watch this space.
Finally, I've finished my beaded crochet bracelet. I may have mentioned it before, it was Keira's birthday. I had another request by the Princess herself, that she needed the bracelet. So I made it for her. (DH is always telling me off that I spoil the children - I know!!) And because I enjoyed making it so much, I decided to start another one for me. I'll show that another day.