Miaou

It’s been a long while since I posted - mainly because I have had a lot of problems with access to viewing this blog, as many people are unable to see it. Therefore I have taken the decision to move over to Blogspot which seems to be universally accessible to all! Here is my new blog address: http://miaoucrafts.blogspot.com/ - please come and see the new site (and subscribe to the feed!). This blog will still be here for some time and I will probably put some of the previous posts onto the new blog for reference, but this blog will no longer be updated.  See you on the new blog!

WIP being Works In Progress! I seem to have a lot of things on the go but nothing much finished at the moment.

First up is a lovely wrap cardigan, designed by Stephanie Japel. I was given the yarn as a gift and it is coming together nicely; I just have the final tie to do. However, that final tie is about 12″ wide and 45″ long! The ties go right around the body and tie at the front. It is going to need some serious blocking I think but I am pleased with how it is going.

Second up is a fab little toy elephant. The yarn was another gift in fabulous rainbow colours - I can’t wait to see how he turns out! And he is miiiiiiiine, all mine - my kids can keep their hands off! In this pic I have only made one and a half legs (!); it’s a bit further on now but I’m still only about half way through.

Next is something I am toying with; it may or may not become something I follow through! But I would like a blanket for my very own and found a lovely simple but effective crochet pattern:

And yes, I know I said I wouldn’t do any more crochet projects for a while … but I’m a sucker for punishment And just in case you are wondering how they will tesselate, I need to add a border to each one to make them into hexagons!

And finally, since starting this post and coming back to it, I have an FP (finished project) to show you! A little knitted kimono as a gift for a work colleague of my husband’s.  The colours are a bit wishy-washy but it’s all I had to hand in girl shades! It was fun to make and I hope she likes it.

I had two balls of slightly differing peach coloured yarn, and not enough of either to make the kimono, so I alternated the two shades, which gives the pale colour a little depth:

The crocheted bows were in the pattern but I used a contrasting colour and added a crocheted edging to tie it all in.

Hopefully my next post will contain some more finished items!

Bar the odd blip, I’m now back into taking commissions (the clothkit skirt being one of them!). This week I had a bag to make, and had a wonderfully vague brief (she wanted a jeans bag, but the lining was to be “funky”, that’s all I had to work on!) - which both thrills me and makes me nervous at the same time! Anyway she is very pleased with the result:

This time I added a magnetic closure and an interior pocket for a purse or phone:

Do please contact me if you would like your own version!

I love clothkits, they are so cool! Both the original stuff and the new relaunched version. I was commissioned to make up a kit for a friend who couldn’t sew herself but was desperate to have a clothkit skirt.

(I wish I had thought to iron it first before I photographed it!)

This is the Big Birdie skirt, in fabulous purple corduroy. It was great fun to sew up.

I even managed the zip ok, despite not having a zipper foot (it seems impossible to find the right one for my machine, I have bought a few “wrong” ones now!). I like the attention to detail on the back of the skirt too, not just the front.

And there was a very funky lining for the inside!

I had quite a few bits of material left over, so I couldn’t resist making this little pouch out of them:

And I LOLed a lot at the spelling mistake and felt I had to immortalise it on the back:

(please excuse the wonky sewing on the back, it was v. late when I finished it!

Anyway, the skirt has been sent and the recipient is delighted, so I am a happy person! (Am secretly hoping that I get to make another one soon!)

At last! My rainbow fish blanket is complete. I started it at the beginning of January and finished it a few days ago, so not bad going really. Here it is in all its glory:

I knitted an equal number of fish in each colour, half in a dark shade and half in lighter colours. I knew how I wanted to lay them out and spent quite a bit of time laying them out on the floor until I was happy with the arrangement. I then labelled them all (and didn’t have any sticky labels so this entailed 196 little bits of paper and 196 little bits of sellotape!!) with a column and row number, then bundled them in rows. It took me about an hour to sew a row of fish together and attach it to the row below, and there are 25 rows, so that’s quite a bit of time! However I was so excited about the finished project that I was very motivated to finish.

I then set to with a 6mm crochet hook (yes, I know what I said about crochet in my last post, but this kind of crochet I can handle!) and created a wavy edging with some turquoise yarn to suggest the sea. Four rounds of crochet later I was satisfied and handed over the finished blanket to my delighted daughter Eilish. (I have hopes that her bed might look as neat as this a little more more often, but they are not high )!

I think I am done with fish for now (there was a LOT of sewing up to do!) but it was a really enjoyable project and I can see myself making another one in the future.

I won’t reveal her age (har har) but suffice to say it was a significant birthday and therefore deserving of a significant present:

This is a crochet lapghan, and although I have dabbled in crochet before, this is the first time I have created a whole garment by this method. I shan’t be doing it again - argh!!! I have discovered that as I cannot crochet and do anything else, multitasking is out - I can’t read, watch tv, or even chat much, as I have to concentrate too hard. Shame, but there you are.

I shall stick to the odd small make, a few squares and amigurumi things, shan’t do a big project for a while! But my mum was thrilled with it and says it will come in very useful for cooler evenings when she wants to sit out in the garden.

Also, I want to say a big thankyou to Scarletti at Laughing Mouse, who nominated me for this award:

The rules are to pick 7 blogs that make me happy, nominate them in turn by posting on their blogs. Finally, list at least 10 honest things about myself.

1. I am a perfectionist. I only see the mistakes and faults with what I make, which for a long time prevented me from making anything at all. I try and let go a bit more now and enjoy the process of making as well as the final result.

2. I am not Scottish. In fact I have only lived in Scotland for eight years. People who only know me online, then speak to me on the phone, are often surprised by my English accent! I love it up here though and will never move back to England.

3. When I was a young adult I thought I was not the maternal type at all, and would only have a couple of children. Fast forward a few years and I love being a mother and now have four! I would never have predicted that.

4. I suffer from depression. I make a point of being honest about it with people and get a variety of reactions, varying from acceptance to pity to avoidance. However along the way my honesty has enabled a lot of people to be honest with me, and they talk to me about their own, or their partner’s, depression and how it affects them. I take the attitude that if it was a physical illness I wouldn’t feel any stigma about talking about it, so why should I about depression? The more honesty there is about it, the more acceptance there will be.

See? Rubbish!

5. Although I love lots of different crafts, I cannot make cards. I have tried, and I am rubbish at it. I leave it to the experts!

6. I love lolcats. Everyone needs their daily chuckle fix and this is mine!

7. I love rainbows - the colours inspire me and lift my spirits. Conversely, I do not like black. I do not own any black clothes or shoes, and have no black in my home decor. It’s a colour I avoid at all costs!

8. I hate travelling. I would love to travel - I love the idea of being in new places - but the getting there stresses me out so much that I don’t do it! I haven’t been abroad since I was first married nearly fifteen years ago but will hopefully be going to America in a couple of years, so I have time to psyche myself up for it.

9. I used to love reading but haven’t read a book now in almost eight months. It makes me sad but I’m hoping I will get over it and pick it up again. I love books and used to love reading the classics.

10. I lack confidence and constantly need reassurance that I am doing OK. That’s why blogging is so great - lots of lovely feedback from people who like what I make!

And now my nominations:

Meridian Ariel - who makes the most beautiful jewellery and cakes, and the sweetest little pictures.

Sal’s Snippets - for her infectious enthusiasm and her wonderful finds.

Gina at Fan My Flame - for her beautiful photography, wonderful makes and inspiring designs

Pipany - for her fab pictures of her children on the beach and the beautiful bags she makes

Hmm Designs - for her lovely little makes and descriptions of her life in Belgium

I’m a Ginger Monkey - for her wonderful quilts and enthusiam and all round loveliness

And finally, EthelandEdnasTearoom - for making me laugh!

We have been very busy this week making stuff. I have been working on my fish blanket. It is now all sewn together and I am in the process of adding a crocheted border. But you are not seeing a sneak preview, you will just have to wait for the unveiling! However you can see what the children have been up to:

Eilish made a door plaque and a pompom peacock:

Caitlin made a photo frame and a note holder in her favourite colours:

… and Euan tried to get in on the action!

Have a great Easter, and don’t eat too many eggs

Things have been rather quiet on the blog front - I have been busy putting together a dress for Eilish for a school project. She wanted a traditional spanish dancer’s dress. I used an old T-shirt of mine, 4 metres of plain blue cotton and 3 metres of spotty. I cut the t-shirt down, cut the polka-dot material into strips and hemmed them, then gathered them and added them to the plain blue fabric (which I had cut so that it was narrower at the top than at the bottom. Then I ran a seam up the side to join the skirt, gathered and pinned the top and sewed it to the bottom of the t-shirt (which I had cut shorter to make it waist length). The only spanner in the works was my *!?$&* sewing machine which would not sew through the t-shirt material and kept skipping stitches - I struggled through altering the body of the t-shirt, but when it came round to the sleeves and to adding the skirt, I gave up and sewed it by hand! Consequently, I ran out of time to add ruffles to the sleeves. Ah well.

It might seem like a lot of work to do for a school project, but Eilish had been wanting a long frilly dress for ages (and shops don’t sell them above the age of about 4!), and it will come in again for the Town Gala Fancy Dress Competition in the summer (for which I might have recovered enough patience to add sleeve ruffles). She is very pleased with it and it went down very well at school too.

The knitting has ended - 196 fish later …

Let the sewing up begin!!

A friend of mine asked if I would make her a beanie hat out of some “funky yarn” to keep out the winter winds. “But I have to tell you,” she said, “I have a very large head.” So I went up a needle size and made the The London Beanie for her using Sirdar Peru, which has a high wool content for warmth. She assures me it fits her much better than it fits my 10 year old daughter!