Crafting

Not one, but two finished crochet projects

April 16, 2021 by Penny Leave a Comment

If the last 12 months have taught me anything it is that I was incredibly well prepared when it came to having things to do in the event of lockdown during a global pandemic. I’ve not needed for a single item of craft materials at all. But, I didn’t factor into my plans having to home school two kids whilst looking after a toddler too!

When I see all these pictures of people’s amazing lockdown creations I have to remind myself that I may well have been able to do similar if I hadn’t been grappling with Year 6 English grammar and facilitating Year 3 science experiments! My ridiculous level of craft supplies did make me realise that I really need to finish some projects off before buying anything new, so that’s exactly what I’m planning to do in 2021 and just over three months into the year I’m rather proud of my efforts so far.

Anyone who used to follow me back when I was Mrs C will know that I am a crochet addict, and taught myself to crochet after falling in love with Lucy from Attic24’s amazing crochet blankets. Over the years I have bought myself three of her kits, but until recently two of them sat unfinished as I acknowledged that I’m absolutely useless at sewing in ends as I go along!

With the Hydrangea I’m not entirely sure when I actually started this blanket, but I do know that I was already working on it when I first met my husband nearly four years ago. It’s seem me through quite a lot over that time and in a way the idea of finishing it felt a little strange after it had been such a constant in my life. But finish it I did. I also challenged myself to start sewing in ends before I actually finished all the rows. For every colour stripe that I completed I made myself sew in 5 ends before starting the next. It sounds so simple, but was actually a real challenge. Once I started motoring though the last few stripes though the motivation to get it finished took over and it wasn’t long before I could actually move straight on to the edging and finish it all off. Quite an achievement.

The second blanket had been in my basket for even longer. Looking back I think the Moorland CAL started just after Christmas 2016. I bought myself a kit as a Christmas present and also bought my mum one at the same time. She was a relatively recent crochet convert and I thought it about time she tackle a big project. I managed to roughly keep up with the crochet along itself, but then the dreaded ends started haunting me and once I was left with nothing else to do but sew them in it just sat there on a chair for years. Literally. It’s moved house twice with me in its incomplete state and I was beginning to wonder if I’d ever manage to finish it.

Mind over matter finally kicked in and after several nights sewing in ends (although not as many as I feared!) I was able to start thinking about the edge. The only problem being that I couldn’t actually find the yarn I needed to do it. I was able to make a start based on extras I had in my yarn basket, but knew that somewhere I had kept all the officially Moorland leftover yarn for when the day came. The problem was I’d put it in a safe place before those two house moves!

I cracked on regardless though with what I had and was hoping that I would have enough, but quite soon disaster struck. A meter of blanket edging to go and only a couple of inches of yarn left. A plea for help on Instagram brought along a lovely lady that I’ve only ever spoke to via the platform and she so very kindly popped a bit of yarn in the post for me. Thank you so much!

With one yarn near disaster under my belt I was beginning to think about replanning the colours for the remaining rounds of the edging yet a sudden urge to look inside an old hamper on top of the fridge freezer in our garage revealed the safe place that I’d stashed the left over yarn in over four years earlier! To say I was relieved would be an understatement.

The edging consists of four rounds and I actually deviated from Lucy’s planned colours and swapped the grape for plum as the rich purple is the colour that I love most in all the beautiful moorland tones. If you’re unfamiliar with the blanket I should say that it works it way upwards from the greens, peaty browns and heather purples of the Yorkshire Moors and gradually works up to a blue sky. For anyone that loves the moors it really is a perfect reminder of them and one that I hope one day I will take with me when we eventually move back up to Yorkshire – planned for when the middle child finishes secondary school we hope.

To say I’m proud to have finished would be an understatement. I also weirdly feel relieved too. The two blankets feel like they have been hanging over me in a weird way for quite a long time too. I already miss not having a crochet project on the go and I’m having to try very hard to always have something crafty that I can quickly pick up and get on with when I want a moment’s calm. I won’t pretend I’m not itching to buy another Attic 24 kit and have my eye on the kit for her original Granny Stripe blanket. I’m just trying to make myself hold on until I’ve got a few more completed projects under my belt to justify it. Let’s hope I’m not making myself wait until the very end of the year or else it will become a Christmas present to myself!

Now I just need the weird April weather to calm down a bit so that it’s warm enough (and not snowing!) so I can take some decent photographs of both blankets. The colours of the Moorland in particular are so gorgeous, but you really need to see it all laid out to appreciate it properly rather than folded up.

Sewing a Harry Potter Dressing Gown – Simplicity Pattern S9002

June 19, 2020 by Penny Leave a Comment

Making a birthday special in lockdown is hard work. But when you have a child that is a massive Harry Potter fan, you’re planning a new Harry Potter themed bedroom for her, and then you happen across a sewing pattern for a Harry Potter dressing gown then you have to make it as a birthday present. Even if you are somewhat up to your eyes in home schooling in the middle of a global pandemic at the time!

Harry Potter Dressing Gown

It’s ages since I’ve done any proper dressmaking, but with added confidence from watching this series of the Sewing Bee I figured I should be able to manage a dressing gown. Originally I’d seen someone sharing an Instagram post of a Harry Potter cloak that they’d made, and I then ended up down an online rabbit hole that took me to *Simplicity Pattern S9002 for these house themed Harry Potter dressing gowns, or robes as they call them in America.

I think the last time I made something from a proper paper pattern was actually back in secondary school, yet I have a whole collection of patterns that I bought not long before I left my ex-husband that I’d never got round to doing anything with. There’s also a whole box of vintage patterns somewhere in the garage that also need some love and attention. I figured that I had to stop being so scared and just get on and make something.

Fabric choices

For this dressing gown I decided to make it in fleece fabric as I know my daughter loves that soft feel to a dressing gown. I ordered my fabric from Empress Mills who have an amazing selection of both plain and patterned fleece online. With everyone in lockdown at the time it was a fair while before I actually got the fabric, but lots of people inform me that they normally have a much quicker turnaround.

Sew on patches

I chose an obvious black fleece for the main body of the dressing gown and then, as my daughter is a Gryffindor fan, went for a red wine colour for the edge, hood and sleeve bands. I found a *Gryffindor sew on patch on Amazon which was perfect for the front of the gown. It’s worth noting that this isn’t included in the pattern and there are no hints on where to buy one from. Amazon seem to have a *wide selection of Harry Potter sew on patches though that should work for the four different houses.

Following the pattern

The pattern itself was relatively easy to understand, with good clear instructions and diagrams of each step. I found laying out and pinning the pattern pieces incredibly hard work, especially as I don’t have a big enough table, so was working on a deep pile carpet (80s style!) on my living room floor. It made cutting the pieces particularly difficult, especially as the fleece is really quite thick when folded double.

Luckily fleece is so much easier to sew than it is to cut. It’s also quite forgiving in terms of having a bit of stretch so that if you pin pieces together well you can always stretch one piece enough to line up notches etc. if your cutting has been slightly off.

The part of the project that I found the hardest was the contrast cuffs and edge bands. For all of these you apply iron-on interfacing to one of the band pieces before attaching it, and then you have to attach the other piece of the band and have one edge of it pressed under. It’s relatively straight-forward, but the problem is that fleece doesn’t exactly press nice and neatly, and it certainly doesn’t hold the press. To finish the bands off you’re supposed to stitch in the ditch, catching the folded under edge neatly on the other side so that the finished result is all neat. Let’s just say that the fleece didn’t exactly help to make this happen. As I said before though, fleece is luckily quite forgiving when sewing, and I ended up having to sew a few bits by hand to make sure the edges were caught under neatly.

Finished result

I’m so pleased with the finished result. And incredibly proud of myself for getting it finished, without needing to call anyone on FaceTime to help! Admittedly it’s not absolutely perfect, but it is far better than I expected it to be. If I were to make it again, I’d probably go for a less firm interfacing as the bands and cuffs are a bit stiffer than I’d like, but that really is a minor thing.

And the best news is that my daughter absolutely loved it when she opened it on her birthday morning.

What next

The whole project has certainly given me my sewing confidence back. Probably a good thing, as Master C has asked me to make him a dressing gown for his birthday in September. He’s already chosen the pattern he wants (*Simplicity 3575) and I’m hoping that it won’t be too tricky. I might just have to find a more amenable carpet to cut the pattern pieces out on this time!

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Sandcastle Bucket Hat – Made By Jack’s Mum

April 26, 2020 by Penny Leave a Comment

One of the challenges of lockdown with a small child is that they grow. You suddenly find that their clothes either no longer fit them, or are no longer appropriate for the weather. That’s exactly what’s happened with Tube Stop Baby.

Lockdown seems to have coincided with some gorgeous hot weather here in the UK. Almost like nature taunting us after all that rain we had earlier in the year. We’re incredibly lucky in that we have a back garden and enough space for the kids to get fresh air and exercise each day without having to go anywhere. What I did realise though is that the youngest member of the family didn’t really have any summer clothes, and definitely didn’t have anything to protect her head from the sun. Not really wanting to buy online and with the only shops selling kids clothes being supermarkets I decided that this was the kick up the backside I needed to actually get my sewing machine out again and so that’s exactly what I did.

Choosing a Pattern

There are hundreds of patterns available online for hats, but after asking for recommendations on Facebook several people pointed me towards the pattern for the Sandcastle Bucket Hat by “Made by Jack’s Mum“. Now this wasn’t a site that I knew at all, but it seems that I’m pretty much the last person on the planet to actually discover it!

Specialising in easy pdf patterns, Made by Jack’s Mum aims to make sewing accessible to everyone and that approach seems to be incredibly popular with a whole Facebook group full of people sharing photos of their makes from her patterns. The Sandcastle Bucket Hat is actually a free pattern and it also fulfilled my other requirement of only needing a couple of fat quarters to make the size I needed.

Following the pattern

The pdf pattern was printed out over four pieces of A4 paper. I then simply stuck these together with sellotape before cutting out the pattern pieces for the size I was making. There are different coloured and drawn lines for all the different sizes and it’s easy to follow the size you need.

The pattern is accompanied by an amazingly detailed set of instructions, with photos at every stage. They were incredibly easy to follow. The only practical difficulty I had was attaching the top circle to the ring of fabric that formed the sides of the hat. It just took a bit of re-pinning to get it lined up correctly and was probably due to my lack of practice recently.

The morning I spent making this hat was a perfect way to get me back into dress making and re-familiarising myself with my sewing machine. It certainly helped boost my confidence no end, and my final result was also a brilliant hat for my daughter.

My Sandcastle Bucket Hat

I’m really pleased with the end result. The fabric I used was from a bundle of floral fat quarters that I picked up Aldi a life-time ago. They have just been sat in my sewing stash ever since. It’s great to see them finally in use, and fulfilling a practical need too. I went for a floral fabric for the outside of the hat, and a pink spotty fabric for the inside. But, one of the beauties of the Sandcastle Bucket Hat is that it’s reversible meaning that we can choose which side to show off each day.

Now if only I could get her to actually keep the hat on her head whilst playing in the garden!

The Sandcastle Bucket Hat pattern is available online here.

September – the month that…

October 8, 2019 by Penny Leave a Comment

… vanished without a trace!

Somehow we’re in October. Worse than that, we’re already a week into October and I only just got round to swapping my calendar over from September this morning!

The last month (and a week) has been utterly crazy in so many ways. It was a month in which I celebrated our first wedding anniversary and Master C’s 7th birthday. Both seem somewhat unbelievable as time is going so fast.

It’s also been a month in which I’ve twice been over to Copenhagen with Bonn whilst he’s been working out there. The first time was mainly so that I didn’t have to spend our first wedding anniversary at home on my own, whilst the second trip was with the aim of gaining enough material to allow me to write several travel posts on both Denmark and Sweden. I certainly gathered everything I needed and visited loads of different places that I want to write about, I just need to find the time to actually do so now we’re back.

In addition to Copenhagen and Malmo I’ve also been up to Liverpool and the Wirral and enjoyed checking out charity shops at various other places around the country. We’ve been on the lookout for vintage board games in particular, but also other toy and game bits that we can use for a bit of a new business venture into the world of re-selling and reducing landfill. More on that over on Penny Plays when I get round to writing about it!

There’s also loads that I haven’t managed to get done in the last month – possibly because we’ve been away so much. The house hasn’t got much further forward over the last month, but at least I can now say that the downstairs loo is finished. Or at least it will be when the very final picture is returned to the wall. Once that is done I can finally take some photos and share the transformation with you.

The other thing that is hanging over me are the Clothkits kits that I bought when Tube Stop Baby was just six months old and that I planned to make for her first birthday which is the middle of November. I’ve now got just a month left and really need to pull my finger out and start working on them. I’ve managed to squeeze in a couple of craft book reviews, but finding time to actually craft is another matter entirely.

I’ve also been putting a lot of effort into my online blogging and social media work over the last month. Not as much as I would have liked to, but as much as I have been able to manage whilst still reserving a few hours every night for sleep. On the travel front I’ve started off my writing on Copenhagen and Malmo with details of how we managed to pop over to Sweden for dinner during our first Copenhagen stay earlier in the year. I’ve also teamed up with Three to write about how I make the most of their App when I’m travelling so that I can always work on the move and stay in touch with my kids.

Over on Penny Plays I’ve been desperately trying to catalogue and play all the vintage board games that came our way during the summer car boot season. Once we’ve played the games we’re looking to either keep them if they are ones that we can see us going back to again, or otherwise selling them over on our new ebay store. It’s early days yet, but we’re hoping this is a way to keep our board game stocks to a reasonable level so they don’t completely take over the house (and garage!). On the blog itself I’ve been writing about everything from a pre-electronics teach yourself chess game, through to Ghettopoly – a version of Monopoly set in a US ghetto. Somewhere in the middle I also wrote about a vintage Spears Game in which you are supposed to name things that begin with a certain letter of the alphabet – Tell Me. It’s certainly been varied.

In addition to all this I’ve also been trying to put some work into the Vintage Board Games Facebook group that we set up earlier in the year. It’s slow work, but with Facebook you need to really put the effort in to get the results out. I just need a bit more time for the effort part!

And lastly, but not at all least. Over on Penny Reads I’ve relaunched Ladybird Tuesday! This is probably one of the achievements I’m most proud of this last month or so. I’ve really missed my regular delves into my vintage Ladybird book collection and after losing various physical possessions during my divorce and subsequent house moves they are one thing that I am so glad to still have in my possession. There’s a huge body of work ahead of me to try and move all the original posts over from Being Mrs C, but I’m sure it will give me something to keep me out of trouble whilst the winter weather keeps us at home. The posts I’ve included this month vary from an original Uncle Mac book that I received for my birthday, through to a Learn to write workbook from the 1980s and the recent Climate Change book that was partly written by Prince Charles. Also in there was the Ladybird book about Denmark. It seemed somewhat appropriate seeing as I’ve spent so much time there lately.

What is nice though at the end of a busy month is sitting down like this and looking at everything that I have managed to achieve and not focussing on the things I failed to do. I’ve been pushing myself a lot lately with daily to do lists and sharing them on Instagram stories with the #KatyKicker hashtag to help make me accountable a bit for how much I get done in a day. It doesn’t always work, but what I have loved is reading Katy’s own monthly aims on her blog. One of the reasons I started blogging in the first place was as a way of making myself actually do things. Time to get back to using my blog like that and set myself some (achievable aims) for the month ahead.

Attic 24 Inspired Ripple Blanket for a New Baby

August 16, 2019 by Penny Leave a Comment

So many things that I love doing have gone on the back burner over the last couple of years. Crochet, and crafting in general, has been one of those things. I’m desperate to be able to go back to spending evenings curled up on the sofa watching a box set with some crochet in my hands. I think it would probably help me sleep better too.

I’ve also got some wonderful Clothkits kits to make up before TSB’s first birthday in November. I really want to make her some things to remember, like I did for Little Miss C when she turned one, and I’m scared that time will be against me on this. I bought the kids three months ago, but they’re yet to come out of the carrier bag since returning home. It’s shameful really.

There is one project though that I have managed to finish in the last couple of years and it was rather an important one.

My sister gave birth to her first baby last month and I was determined that this niece or nephew should have something handmade from his Auntie. A crochet blanket seemed the obvious choice and so that’s what I set out to do. My sister didn’t know if she was having a boy or a girl so I wanted to use bright colours that would work for either gender. I managed to raise my leftovers from the various blankets that I’ve made in previous years and came up with a lovely selection of Stylecraft Special DK that I could use.

I based my pattern on Lucy from Attic 24’s Ripple Blanket and just altered it so that my foundation row was shorter, so that the final blanket would be a similar size to one that we had for Tube Stop Baby. I then just kept crocheting until it was approximately square in size. I’m not going to lie, it took months, especially as the only real time I had to crochet was when a passenger on long car journeys around the country, but I’m delighted to say that I managed to get it finished about two hours before she gave birth!

Now I need to just run my attentions to finishing all the other blankets that still need ends sewing in and borders adding. I’m beginning to think that I might just stop sleeping to gain a few extra hours in each day!

Recycled Sewing

March 13, 2019 by Penny Leave a Comment

A very rare event took place in our house last night. I got to watch the Great British Sewing Bee live. So unheard of that I struggled to know what time it was actually on. Let alone what channel it was. (9pm, BBC2 in case you’re as ignorant as I am about live TV these days!) Normally I manage to pick it up on iPlayer the following day whilst feeding Tube Stop Baby.

Last night’s episode is worthy of further discussion though.

The theme was recycling with it being tagged as Reduce, Reuse and Recycle week. Normally there is a weekly transformation challenge when something is plucked from a “charity shop” for them to repurpose into something else. This took it to a whole new level though. It also brought out a couple of key statistics from Patrick that made me gasp.

Firstly, the average person in the UK throws away 15kg of clothes every year. Let’s just think about that for a second. Has our disposable attitude to clothes really got to the stage when so much is being ditched? And is it all really clothes that have worn out, or is it just things that are no longer “in fashion”? And where are all these clothes going?

When talking about the history of more “disposable fashion” they talked about Biba and how in the 1960s people were ready for something different after the war years and rationing. I can understand how those that had lived through such austerity would celebrate no longer having to, but have we just gone too far now?

I really struggle with the idea of shopping (especially for clothes) as a hobby. I honestly can think of nothing worse. If I need new clothes I pop to the shops, go for exactly what I want, buy it and get out of there as quickly as possible. The idea of spending hours just browsing rails of clothes not looking for anything in particular brings me out in a cold sweat!

The fact that so many clothes now are priced so that people can buy them as an impulse purchase may well be part of the problem. If they can buy clothes on a whim, them do they just get rid of them on a whim too?

The second statistic that made me gasp was that 30% of the fabric that home sewers buy, ends up not being used. OK, I understand that depending on what you making and patterns on the fabric you are using, it might be the case that cutting out isn’t always as efficient as it should be. I suppose the question is, what happens to all that fabric?

I’m pretty sure that most sewers that I know would never dream of putting off cuts in the bin if they can be used for something else. A dear WI friend of mine Emma, runs her own dress-making business, specialising in fantastic reproduction dresses (Oh Sew Vintage – look her up, her dresses are amazing!) and as a result has a lot of off cuts. There is no way that they are all destined for landfill though. Instead Emma makes the most of every last bit. Some she passes on to other people, or into our WI crafting supplies, but many are reused into smaller projects. I’ve seen some used to make small purses or make-up bags. Some used to make things like rag rugs or even rag fairy light garlands (like I did at Wine and Wigwams a couple of years ago) which look gorgeous. There is absolutely no reason for them just to go in the bin.

Last night’s Sewing Bee was excellent at highlighting just how much waste there can be – both in terms of unwanted garments and also when sewing at home. It showed how home furnishing items can be reused to make clothes, but I still think it can go further. Not all of us are yet at the stage of being able to make a dress from an old duvet cover (as much as I want to learn to) but something like a rag garland or wreath or even a simple patchwork blanket is achievable.

What we now need to do is show people who aren’t at the Sewing Bee level of sewing skills what is possible. Give them ideas and instructions as to what they can make from scraps of fabric that might otherwise go in the bin. Make them think more about those items of clothing that they no longer want to wear, and try to see them in a new light.

At the end of the day the idea of 15kg of clothes and 30% of sewing fabric being wasted is just criminal!

My own first steps towards all this is going to be trying to actually finish the million and one sewing (and crochet and knitting!) projects that I have in an unfinished state. They include the cot bed quilt that I originally started for Little Miss C all those years ago. I’ve found all the fabric and even the old blog posts from 2010 that I was following to help me and I’m determined to get it finished before Tube Stop Baby moves into a full size cot. Watch this space!

Photo by Dinh Pham on Unsplash.