Kitchen Update 3

When I last wrote about the kitchen two weeks ago, the builders had left and we had an empty, freshly plastered room, ready to paint. We were really keen to get at least the kitchen half of the room painted before the units and worktops were fitted. 

We started with the "mist coat" (half water, half white emulsion), then gave all the walls a couple of coats of pure white paint. Previously we had painted the dining room an off-white colour, but didn't think this would work with the white kitchen cupboards. White is an easy choice for now and we can add more colour later.

Already we're getting a sense of what a bright room this will be, even without the glass window from the old kitchen door. 

The kitchen fitters arrived and the room started to take shape very quickly.

 The doors went on.

Then door handles, spotlights in the ceiling and under cupboard lighting. I know it looks really stark and cold at the moment but the flooring will really help soften all that white. 

This space between the cupboards below is where the cooker will go when it arrives next week.

The worktops have been measured and were fitted yesterday, although I haven't had a chance to take any decent photos yet. 

The dining room half of the room feels a lot less finished. The channel is still in the middle of the dining room floor, although the plumber has now sorted the radiator pipe issue. It now needs to be filled in with concrete then we have to wait a couple of weeks - at least - for the concrete to dry out before we can lay the floor. This is by far the most annoying thing about the whole project. We'll be lucky if we have flooring before June at this rate.

We chose Empirical Grey by Valspar on the one big wall in the dining room. It looks darker here than it actually is, but this is a bright room and it can take it and I think our dining chairs and new white lamp will look fabulous against it. 

Here it is drying after a first coat. It needs a second and the radiator needs painting too. 

I can imagine that it's really hard for you to tell how that grey is going to look just from this one photo. You need to see other colours against it so you have a point of reference. Trust me, it looks amazing. We chose a grey with slight brown tones, rather than blue, so it's very warm even though it's quite dark. I didn't have a moment's wobble with this colour - we just chose it, started painting it, and loved it. I like it when that happens. 

The dust in the house at the moment is spectacular - like, we leave footprints in it when we walk - but tomorrow I'm going to blitz the house before I go to work. The temporary kitchen is really depressing.  I miss cooking so badly. But when I look at the photos above I start to get a feel of how it's all going to look when it's finished and it's so exciting!

A Tablet Case and Bank Holiday Fun

This is Steve's Sleeve, a pretty stylish little tablet case from Wool and the Gang who, a weeks ago, very kindly sent me a kit to try out. While I'd heard of Wool and the Gang I hadn't bought any of their products before so I was intrigued. 

The kit was well stocked with all the materials you needed for the case plus hook, darning needle and pattern, which I have to say was very well written and easy to follow (although it is written in US terms so be aware of that).

The whole case was easy to make, just rows of double crochet stitches worked in a spiral until you reach the desired size, and it required more of my concentration to stitch the leather flap onto the back of the case than it did to crochet. 

The blanket stitch is not hard, but I wanted my stitches to look as even as possible, not easy with the thick yarn.

This is the finished sleeve. I really like the simplicity of both the pattern and the design; no flowers, no pompoms, no embellishments - although you could easily add some if you wanted to - just the texture of the yarn and leather and the solid blocks of colour. I like the way it's not aimed at women or men, but is just a really useful thing to have.

Little details are there in the small metal tag provided, which is kind of half stitch marker half safety pin. 

It's a cosy home for a tablet and we use it all the time. Things are endlessly dropped in this house and not always by the children, so the cover is useful.

I know I said I liked how unisex the design was, but it occurred to me that this would be a great gift if you really wanted to crochet something for a man or teenage boy, and I think it would be well received. 

Thanks for the kit Wool and the Gang, I really enjoyed making this. 

Wool and the Gang are offering a 20% discount (excluding postage and gift cards) on all items on their website using the code below, valid until 31st May 2016.

20%HAPPYHOUSE

Happy Shopping!

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Thank you all for your kind comments on my last Colour Collaborative post. I will try to respond to the questions soon. I hope you've had a nice bank holiday weekend? Ours has been alright - it's swung between relaxing and productive, lazy and busy, grumpy and happy, wet and dry. Saturday morning the four of us went to Chichester with nothing more urgent on our list than to go to Waterstones and get a coffee, and we did all that plus I had the biggest, most delicious apple doughnut I've ever eaten. It was about the size of my hand. In the afternoon my parents came and picked up Bella and Angus leaving John and I child free for a few hours to decorate. It was a nice afternoon - we played music, there was barbecue pulled pork chuntering away in the slow cooker, we didn't have to tell anyone to stop bickering. The children were returned to us at bedtime, fed and watered, and with a parcel of cakes my mum had baked that afternoon too. 

On Sunday we wanted to visit the Portsmouth Rural and Seaside Show in down Southsea. The sun was shining and we decided to go out early and treat ourselves to breakfast first at a favourite place down on the seafront. Well, the whole morning was almost derailed by the shocking and devastating discovery that they have taken their Eggy Bread off the menu and replaced it with a bagel with peanut butter and banana. I mean seriously, why would you do that? Their Eggy Bread (French Toast to my American friends) was the sweetest, gooiest, fluffiest thing you ever tasted and we'd all been talking about it in the car on the way there and saying how we were missing our weekend breakfasts at home and how we were looking forward to it. Oh my goodness. Angus actually cried when he realised it wasn't on the menu. John looked sad and ordered a Full English but I could tell his heart wasn't in it. Bella stoically chose something different. I ordered Eggs Royale and it was sublime I have to say, with homemade hollandaise sauce, so good. But gosh it was stressful. This is what happens when you don't have a kitchen! Food gets blown out of all proportion. Anyway, it all looked up from then on and we had a lovely morning pottering around the seafront and watching Sheep Dog Trials and Shire Horse Displays and the like. We spent the afternoon decorating, again, then went to my parents' for dinner in the evening. They have really looked after us this weekend, what with childcare and feeding us and just generally being brilliant and supportive. 

Today, I...wait for it...did some more painting. We're almost there with the decorating now, but the kitchen is still very much a work in progress (no worktops or cooker or flooring) and I have lots of photos to show you. I'll do another kitchen update soon. Have a lovely week you lovely people!

The Colour Collaborate: April: Seedling

If you've been reading this blog for a while now then you may be familiar with the monthly "Colour Collaborative" posts. A group of us - and we have changed a little over the years as people have left and joined - post on an agreed date and theme around the subject of colour. My first post was in June 2013 at the very start of the project, and I wrote about Home, always a subject I'm happy to talk about.

But this will be my last Colour Collaborative post and now, at the end of my third year, feels like a natural time to step down. I spent a while looking back through these posts and one of the things that leapt out at me was how often I've ended up writing about nature. This isn't, and never will be, a nature blog. The natural world features here from time to time as part of the fabric of life, but you'll never find me correctly identifying a bird or flower, or offering gardening tips. Others do that so much better. And yet I wrote about nature a lot, about it's rich and varying colour, how it can be pale or bright, quiet or loud, and how endlessly inspiring it is. From the delicate silver and pink of dried hydrangea heads 

Fading - November 2013

to the palest and deepest pinks all tucked up inside the first bloom on a camellia bush

Bud - March 2014

to the pewters, grey and silvers of wet winter's day.

Storm - February 2014  

Colour and contrast and drama everywhere you look.

But the avenue I've really enjoyed exploring is the colour combinations that so often emerge within the natural world. I'll look at the colours really closely on, say, a bird or shell, and start thinking how utterly fantastic they look together, how perfectly matched and balanced they are, how harmonious. 

Some favourites include:

A plate of heirloom squashes in the autumn.

Halloween - October 2014

These beautiful ranunculus stems on a carefully laid table.

Tradition - April 2014

This splendid seagull, his colours reflecting the landscape behind him.

Bird - March 2015

The ear-like interior of a shell.

Found - June 2015

Maybe it's just me, but I can imagine so many scarves, blankets and throws, so many yarn or fabric based creations in the palates above, and I guess that's when it gets really fun for me. When I'm so taken with an idea that I go on to make something based on a colour combination I saw in nature, like the cushion below.

Inspired by the brown trees against winter sunsets and sunrises, the colours in this project chose themselves.

Wooly - January 2014 

And these four hoops - such a delight to make from start to finish - inspired by the colour changes in the seasons, which I wrote about in September 2014.

Which brings me all the way to today's prompt: seedling. I was struggling with this to be honest, as I'm sure you've realised by now, but it occurred to me that something which keeps me going, both in blogging and in real life, is the pure joy I find in making something with my hands, from the thinking and the choosing and the starting to the long process which brings an idea to fruition. And it my seedling of an idea comes from nature, then all the better. It does have the best colours after all. 

Thank you so much for reading and commenting on these posts. I hope you've enjoyed them.

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Don't forget to visit the other Colour Collaborative blogs for more of this month's posts, just click on the links below:

Jennifer at Thistlebear

Claire at Above The River

Sarah at Mitenska 
Annie at Annie Cholewa will return next month.

Bluebells and Paint Charts

A pretty dull weekend, full of chores and dust and cold winds, was completely redeemed by a walk in the woods this afternoon. I wanted to see the bluebells, and oh my goodness, did we see some bluebells.They were magnificent, even better than last year. It did actually take my breath away a little bit when we turned off the path and came upon them in the woods, and all the niggles and stresses of life lifted a little. 

But even on such a flat grey day, with no sunlight filtering through the trees, they were luminous and vivid and completely magical in the still, silent woodland. 

Bluebells aside, normal life continues. I've discovered that I like having all these houseplants on the living room windowsill. I can hide behind them when I'm eating breakfast in my dressing gown. The neighbours all look into our living room as they walk by (I'm not judging, I would totally do the same) and I feel like they give me a bit of protection. 

We've been trying to choose the perfect shade of grey. We've narrowed it down to three. 

This print, a Christmas present from my dear friend Abigail, didn't quite fit the IKEA frame I had so I ordered a mount online. I chose black which was a bit of a risk but I think it looks fantastic, and it might even get hung in the new kitchen. John and I honeymooned in San Francisco and it's a city we love and dream of returning to one day.

It's still daylight when the kids go to bed now and I enjoy looking out of their windows while they read. Bella has the best view in the house and the trees have burst into leaf over the last week. Suddenly everything is tinged with green and it glows in the evening light. 

Our temporary lack of kitchen is bothering me much more than I thought I would. Not just the irritations of reduced space to prepare food, the dust, the fact that the garage is freezing cold (the butter is always rock solid), eating rubbish food and having to boil the kettle to wash up. No, it's more than that. It's such an overused cliche, but the kitchen really is the heart of my home. It's the room I gravitate towards and spend as much time in as I can. Even if I'm not cooking it's where I want to be with a cup of tea and doors open onto the garden. Our evenings and weekends are different without this space. I'll be the first to admit that the kitchen is where I retreat to when I just want a little space on my own with just the radio for company, but John and I miss chatting in the kitchen while we cook together. And I have realised just how important cooking and eating - and in particular talking about cooking and eating - is to us as a couple, how it's something we share. On Saturday mornings we drink coffee and browse through cookery books, we plan meals for the weekend ahead, write a list and go shopping, and a large part of our conversation revolves around this. I think we're both surprised by how much we miss it. I am not moaning (ok, I am a bit) and I realise that this is a first world problem, it could be so much worse, etc etc, but gosh I miss cooking. 

Kitchen Update 2

Are you ready for lots of photos of bricks and plastered walls? Oh good!

Outside, the old kitchen window and door was removed, bricked up (goodbye upvc!) and the new window fitted. It really bothers the builders that they couldn't get an exact match for the bricks, as they don't make them anymore. I don't really mind, it's the back of the house and I'll just put a trellis there and plant something. 

Inside, it's all going on. Below is the view from the dining room looking into the kitchen, with the beam in place and the supports up...

...the with the supports removed and the steel beam plastered in. 

The two photos below show the freshly plastered kitchen, drying out ready to be painted.

And below we have the opposite view, from the kitchen looking into the dining room.

That massive channel in the middle of the floor is for the radiator pipes.

The dining room radiator was originally positioned on the internal wall and so it had to be moved. We tried to connect it to the one in the living room, but it's not working properly so it needs to be connected to the original pipes which are under the floor. Or something. I don't really understand, I just want a radiator that gets hot not lukewarm at the bottom. Honestly, I can see why people choose underfloor heating.

I feel baffled by the pipe work in our house; this one for hot water, that for gas, and we seem to be uncovering all sorts of odd or old plumbing and wiring that needs to be addressed straight away. Hmm, these must be the unforeseen costs they talk about...

I'm sorry these photos are so dark and grainy - they are snaps, really, taken when I get home from work, and with some of them the kitchen window was still boarded up.

But this is my favourite thing so far: a window sill. 

Before, the kitchen sink went right up to the window (where it was splashed with soapy, limescaly water on an hourly basis) and the cupboard beneath backed right up the the upvc panel below the window. 

Now, the width of the brick wall gives us a lovely deep window sill which I can't wait to faff around with. Pots of herbs. Jugs of flowers. This window sill, in an empty room filled with building stuff and plaster dust, is my glimpse of our new kitchen.

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I nearly forgot: THANK YOU for such wonderful comments on my blanket! You are so kind. And thanks for the yarn recommendations too - I know that Rowan isn't the cheapest, and I have used Drops before on my poncho and thought it was fantastic. I'd definitely use it again. Thank you. 

Finally Finished

It's been a long and draining week. No dramas - work on the kitchen is going well -  it's just pretty hard to relax when there is so much happening, plus work has been busy, and I am very tired. So it's really nice to have something pretty so show you. Something that isn't covered in plaster dust.

I am delighted to announce that my very large, very heavy (2 kilograms!) granny squares blanket is finally finished. Again. You may remember I declared it finished early last year, here, but there was just no avoiding it, the blanket was too small for our king sized bed and I didn't love it.

This is what it looked like then:

And now.

All I have done (all! ha!) is add another fourteen rounds to the border.  Yes, a mere fourteen rounds, another eight or ten balls of cream yarn and a couple of black. I dread to think what this blanket has cost me altogether, I really do.*

But it did provide lots of mindless crochet to keep my hands busy while I watched TV and kept me warm on those long, cold winter evenings. Although the evenings never feel that long, thinking about it. Chance would be a fine thing. By the time I finally sit down after everything is done it's usually 9pm and then by 10pm I'm trying really hard to stay awake. I'd love a long winter evening, that sounds brilliant!

Isn't it lovely? I've spent so long working on this blanket that I've often grown weary of it, but now it's finished and on our bed I love it again.. We've packed away our winter duvet so I do appreciate the warmth of the blanket when the nights are cooler.

I pinched the title for this post from Ashley of Lazy Daisy Jones' crochet link up on Instagram. I usually find these things hard to keep up with but it started in the Easter holidays when I had some spare time, and it has been an absolute joy to take part in. I use the daily prompts to think about and share things I've made and I find so much inspiration from other people who also love to crochet. If you're on Instagram, it's #ldjcrochethookup. It's running for the rest of April so there is plenty of time to take part and it's a lot of fun. 

*Actually, I worked out the cost. A blanket that weighs 2 kilograms uses 40 x 50g balls of yarn, and that's assuming I used every last scrap of each ball. The yarn, Rowan Pure Wool DK, is around £5 a ball so that's £200, at least. I didn't buy this all in one go, and half the cost was paid for with birthday money, but I don't regret a penny of it, it's so warm and feels so good. I guess we'll call this an heirloom blanket.