52 Weeks of Happy...51/52

The happiest people don't have the best of everything, they just make the best of everything.

Have I really only got one more week left of this project? I've enjoyed it so much and I don't really want it to end. Joining in with my friend Jen at little birdie, here is my penultimate selection of happy moments from my week:

1. Finding a bag of rhubarb from my father-in-law's allotment in the freezer when I thought we'd eaten it all. It was washed, chopped and ready to use, and I tipped it into a dish to make a crumble and ate it in front of Downton Abbey on Sunday evening.

2. Unpacking my quilt from the blanket box and making up the bed with an extra layer. It's the only quilt I've ever made and is full of wonky seams and puckered fabric, but I love it all the same.

3. A picnic at Kirkstall Abbey last Sunday. The weather was warm and sunny so we took a lunch of soup and sandwiches to the abbey grounds and sat on the grass to eat it. I didn't think we'd be enjoying eating outside so late into September and it was an unexpected treat.

4. I bought these two postcards by Helen Peyton at Yarndale last weekend. I very much wanted to buy a print but they well were out of my price range. These postcards make a perfect souvenir.

And lastly - wow, what a great response to my giveaway! I am so glad you share my love of Emily Peacock, tea towels other good things, and it's especially lovely to know that so many of you are already readers. It makes me happy, it really does.

My giveaway is still open, here, and will close on Tuesday 8th October at midnight.

Enjoy your weekend everyone!

Giveaway!

Hello! I am rather excited right now because I have some very lovely and gorgeous treats for you in a giveaway today. I don't say this enough: readers, I thank each and every one of you who visits my little corner of the internet for your support and your friendship. Your comments bring me much happiness, and the connections I've built with other bloggers around the world have been nothing but joyful and rewarding. Those who pop in but don't comment - I love that you do that too and I thank you for it.

So. We have Giveaway A which includes a beautiful Emily Peacock "Kiss" tapestry kit, a rather gorgeous Greengate tea towel and a little cashmerino crochet garland made by my own fair hands. I thought the colours went quite nicely together.

And in Giveaway B we have an Emily Peacock "Hug" tapestry kit, a delicious Gillian Kyle tea towel made from the nicest, softest-feeling unbleached, organic cotton, and a print with a pretty great quote by Nikki McWilliams. I agree with the sentiment and feel that, while a cup of tea and a Tunnock's Tea Cake might not solve everything, they may make it all easier to bear.

I am happy to be able to offer you these things; they are products which are very definitely "me" and things which I would gladly buy or make and want in my own home. My first ever blog post was about my own "Kiss" tapestry kit which I started when I was pregnant with Angus and, to my shame, never completed. My mum took it off my hands last year, finished it, framed it and it now looks very nice in her living room. And that is why I offer these kits these to you - I would never finish them!

Please note that the kits are exactly that - kits - and include canvas, wool thread and a colour chart. You can then make it up into a cushion or frame it when you've completed it. These kits are the smaller of the two sizes and would usually cost £54.99. Thank you Emily Peacock!

The tea towels are from the pretty marvelous online shop All Tea Towels. I have a bit of a thing about tea towels - I really love them, probably more than is normal. We have everyday ones, old ones for drying up things like the roasting tins, nice ones and then Tea Towels Which Must Never Be Used, like that really expensive one I bought in Anthropologie a few years ago, my treasured Emma Bridgewater limited edition Coronation tea towel and now this one. It's ok, John is fully trained on which tea towels are actually for use and which ones must simply hang over the oven door handle looking pretty. Whether you actually use these tea towels or just admire them is up to you of course. If you share my tea towel love then do visit All Tea Towels and have a browse. 

The Nikki McWilliams print is from Chirpy, an independent lifestyle and interiors shop here in Leeds. I sort-of know Harriet, who runs it - we met about a year ago through a mutual friend and she was in the process of setting up Chirpy then. It's been open for nearly a year now and it's a triumph, a treasure trove of beautifully selected and displayed products by independent local and UK designers and craftspeople...if you are at all near Leeds, do pop in. Thank you Harriet!

If you'd like to enter, then please:

1. Become a follower of this blog, either through bloglovin' or Google Friend Connect or Feedly, or by signing up for an email alert - whichever is your preference. If you've already done one of these, just let me know in the comment.

2. Tell me whether you would prefer Giveaway A or B in your comment.

That's it. The giveaway will close a week today, on 8th October at midnight and I'll announce the winner shortly after. Good luck!  

Edited to add: This giveaway is open to international readers too.

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EDITED TO ADD:

This giveaway is now closed.  

Many thanks for all your comments.

I'll announce a winner in the next couple of days.

Thank you!

Yarndale 2013

In the interest of honesty and full disclosure I should start this post with a couple of admissions. I didn't really go to Yarndale for the yarn. No, it was more an excuse for my friend Rachel and I to have a lovely child-free day out in the country - a "lady date" if you will. I'm not really a yarn purist. I confuse my double knits and my arans, my worsteds and my tweeds, and care not one jot how organic, artisan or hand spun the yarn is - I just tend to see a pattern or colour I like the look of and work from there. Usually on the wrong size needle or hook.

And I didn't take many photos. Sorry. It was just too busy and my camera was too heavy and I was juggling my handbag, my purse and my purchases while trying to look at yarn, stroke the yarn and not bump into people (did I mention how busy it was?) and taking photos seemed pretty irrelevant after a while. I just wanted to enjoy the experience.

When we arrived at around half past eleven the hills were shrouded in misty low cloud and the light was flat and grey.

But the walk from the car to the entrance was strung with bunting and it added a cheerful, festival feel to the whole affair.

Inside it was heaving. Lots and lots of people. And so many stalls! The venue is used for cattle auctions and each stallholder had a pen. There was a lot of yarn and yarn related paraphernalia. Many stalls were selling gifts and handmade crafts too, but it was the yarn stalls that seemed the busiest. I said hello to Lucy and bumped into Jacquie and it was lovely to meet both of them in the flesh. 

At this point Rachel and I went into a black hole of time where we wandered up and down the aisles in a trance like state and then suddenly, at two o'clock, realised that we were very hungry indeed and needed some lunch. Dispirited by the long queues for food we decided to drive into Skipton and get something there and I'm glad we did as we had the nicest lunch sitting outside in the sun in a little cafe. I left my camera in Rachel's car and took the rest of these photos on my phone. Skipton looked like a nice place to be on a sunny Saturday afternoon with a bustling market and many independent shops and cafes to explore. We wandered over to Lucy and Tracy's studio for a nosy and what a light, bright and colourful space it is. 

By this time is was after three and we decided to walk back up the hill to Yarndale, hoping that the crowds had thinned out a little.

The sun had burned through the cloud by now and the views of the dales were glorious.

Just outside the front doors was a tree strung with yarn-covered plastic balls. I think this may have been my favourite thing from the whole day.

It was much easier to browse the stalls now and we spent a lovely hour re-visiting all those we couldn't get to before. On our way back down the hill into Skipton to the car, we walked through the park and saw some of the yarn-bombing that was on display. It was all quite wonderful and it was nice to see so many people stop and look at it.

I was pretty restrained in my purchases and bought some very beautiful linen thread for potential doily making...

...and this gorgeously soft alpaca yarn plus a pattern so I can knit myself this cowl.

So all in all a rather lovely day out and I hope the Yarndale organisers are relaxing now and feeling pleased with themselves after staging this huge event. Yay for yarn and yay for Yorkshire!

52 Weeks of Happy...50/52

The happiest people don't have the best of everything, they just make the best of everything.

Joining in with my friend Jen at little birdie, here are a few of my happy-making moments from the last week:

1. In an effort to save some money I patched my favourite jeans. John says there are too many hexagons and it looks like I've got an episode of Blockbusters going on on my knees. I beg to differ.

2. Car boot sale bounty. We spent last Sunday morning at a huge car boot sale at Wetherby Race Course. The sun shone, I bought some treasures (total spent - £5!), the kids spent pocket money on small toys, and John browsed as many boxes of vinyl and books as we'd let him. Brilliant fun.

 

3. Yes, I know it looks like random scribbles but this is a family portrait drawn by Angus while he was at school. He was so puffed up with pride when he pulled it out of his book bag and it was duly admired by all then very solemnly mounted on the front of the fridge with dinosaur magnets.

4. Yesterday I was a lady who lunched. It was a gorgeous, sunny autumn day and I put on nice clothes, caught the bus into Leeds and six of us met at a very nice Thai restaurant to honour the happy fact that my friend Rachel will start her midwifery degree next week. There were around 1500 applicants for only 20 places on the course, and she got a place. Isn't that amazing? She's going to be a terrific midwife.

And now, I must go, because I'm off to Yarndale! 

A Crochet Scarf For A Girl Who Is Six

This whole thing started on holiday in France when my niece, Alicia, was watching me crochet squares for my blanket. She started playing around with them, arranging them into patterns and rows, and then said "Auntie Gilly, could you make me a scarf like this for my birthday?" I couldn't really say no, nor did I want to. Alicia wanted pink, purple and yellow one day, pink and purple the next, purple and red the day after that. 

I made eleven squares and crocheted them together adding a border of treble stitch clusters, then a row of double crochet in pink. It's the same pattern I'm using for my blanket, a circle within a square motif*, and I just used what I had left in my stash of cashmerino yarn. You may notice that the cream border is a paler colour than the cream in the squares, despite being made from exactly the same brand and colour of yarn. There's a lesson in batch numbers there! But it doesn't really matter and I like the resulting colour combination very much. I think it's girly enough to make a six year old happy but the bold floral shape and splashes of red stop it becoming too sickly sweet. I'd love to make one with yellow and green centres, like a daisy chain. Wouldn't that be pretty? 

Happy birthday Alicia. 

*It's the Double Bed or Sofa Blanket pattern from Susan Pinner's Granny Sqaures.

Tomatoes and Chutneys

The best thing to come out of our garden all year. Our garden is not large and my fingers are not green, so anything resembling a harvest is greeted with much fanfare and excitement around here. I grew these from seed (from seed!) and dutifully moved them from seed tray to flower pot to slightly bigger flower pot, from cold frame to garden. I think we got lucky with the weather this summer - it was glorious and the sun shone plentifully and so the fruit ripened. We picked everything; big and little, overripe and underripe, red and green and everything in between.

Since I am currently time rich and money poor, I have decided that I will be making my gifts this Christmas. That's easy enough for the women and children in our family as I can think of many things to wear, to play with or for the home that will be happily received. But the men in our family are harder to make for and so they will most likely be receiving consumables this year. Little hampers containing chutneys, jams, maybe a fruit cake and some cheese (I'll be buying the cheese). 

I made this tomato and chilli chutney, leaving out the cardamom seeds (I didn't have any) and swapping the red wine vinegar for malt vinegar as that's what was in the cupboard. It seemed to work well with the cherry tomatoes and I liked the way this recipe made no mention of skinning the tomatoes.

And with the green ones (I just LOVE the colour of these!) I made, yes you guessed it, green tomato chutney. This is the recipe I have been using for the last few years and it works really well every time. It makes enough chutney to fill four jars.

500 g green tomatoes

400 g red onions

400 g apple, peeled and cored

250 g raisins

250 g brown sugar

1 tsp cayenne pepper

500 ml malt vinegar

• Chop all the fruit. (I diced the onions and apple and halved the larger cherry tomatoes and left the really small ones whole.)
• Put all the ingredients into a large pan and mix.
• Bring to the boil and simmer for one hour.
• Spoon into sterilised jars.

The combination of brown sugar, vinegar, spices and cooking time mean that the tomatoes lose most of their vivid green colour, but I like the way you can just see a few little pale green circles pressed up against the sides of the glass jar.

As always, fun was had with matching jar toppers and labels. I'll freely admit that this is the part I enjoy most, and I do think that if you're going to be so bold as to give someone something you made and expect then to eat it and enjoy it, then presentation helps smooth this path a great deal. Also, aren't these jar labels nice? Very mid century, just the sort of colours and patterns I like. Shame about my scrawly handwriting.

Someone kindly pointed out to me that making gifts isn't always the cheapest way to go when trying to save money, and it's a very good point. Much money can be spent on lovely materials and fancy ingredients (not to mention pretty ribbon for wrapping gifts!) which do add up, and I'm conscious of this all the time. So out of interest I costed these jars of chutney to see if it really is cheaper. The red tomato and chilli chutney cost around 48p a jar to make. Most of the cost there is in the onions and sugar. The green tomato chutney was about 59p a jar and the costs there lie in the apple, raisins and sugar. The jam jars are recycled and therefore free. The fabric for the toppers I've had for years and but I can tell you it's pretty cheap stuff, probably bought on sale. The labels work out at 10p each. So yes it is cheaper but - more importantly - I enjoyed the process and that's really why I do it.

Weekending

It felt like the last warm weekend, and it was extra special for it. It was almost hot in the sun under the deep blue sky, but with enough of an edge to the breeze to remind us that it's truly autumn now. What a treat to spend Saturday and Sunday with the kitchen door wide open, the kids in shorts and t-shirts, to-ing and fro-ing between garden and house. 

We tackled the garden. Bella, Angus and I emptied the paddling pool of it's muddy rainwater and packed it away. John and I cut back, pruned and tidied plants in the low afternoon sun. Our apple tree has produced about ten apples, most of which are out of reach in high-up branches, but I cherish it all the same and picked some anyway, just because. The kids dug for worms. I picked the last few alliums which stopped flowering long ago and brought them indoors to dry out. In the kitchen I washed and weighed, peeled and chopped. I pickled and chutneyed (and I'll post about that soon) and labelled. I had fun choosing a woodland-themed fabric for my jars of hedgerow jelly, just to add that extra Brambly Hedge feel to the whole thing. We went to a car boot sale and I came home with many gorgeous things and only spent a fiver. That little pottery candle holder above cost me one whole pound.

In the evenings I lit candles and pottered in a crafty way. I started a little embroidery for Bella's bedroom, full of autumn colour and detail. I love the effect of the leaves on the tree, made by loosely tying french knots. It's been ages since I've done any embroidery and I'm enjoying it. I made do and mended and patched my jeans, and Bella's too. I did a couple more squares for what will eventually become a blanket for our bed. I started this project on holiday and it's a slow burner, something to dip in and out of for the next year at least. There's no rush.

I spent a good while today staring at all the Scarves, Shawls and Cowls page on The Purl Bee. I really fancy making a quick-ish scarf or cowl for myself. I feel like this has to be a knitted project too, I don't know why. I'd really like to buy the yarn at Yarndale this Saturday - I want to use something quite muted and flecked and organic feeling, if that makes sense. 

Ah, autumn. You're here.