More crochet, and some pages

I've been motoring on with this crochet lark, and finished a girly, frilly-brimmed hat for Holly. In fact, just about 5 minutes ago, I finished a scarf to match, but it's dark and rainy right now, so I'll wait for better light before taking a pic. 

It's half term here at the moment, and we have lots of fun planned this week. Yarrow will be eight at the weekend, but instead of a party this year, she's just having a couple of friends over on Wednesday, to make pizza and eat cake. And then, at the weekend, we're having a family-only treat - something she has been desperate to do for a couple of years now! It will make a change from the usual Halloween party.  

And, speaking of birthday parties, here's a page on the subject that recently appeared in Scrapbook Magazine. I had some fun finding interesting ways to use leaf punches on a few autumn themed layouts.

Crochet bits

After many false starts in the past, I was determined to crack the mystery of crochet this autumn. So a couple of weeks ago, I sat down to practise something more adventurous than a chain stitch. My first project was this scarf - I was pleasantly surprised to see how quickly this lacy stich grew, and what started out as a practise swatch very soon became long enough to be considered a garment. I finished it off by adding some edging and frilly ends, et voila!

Enthused by my early success, I found a pattern for circles, practised a few, then launched into a hat. It was supposed to be a beanie for Holly, but I'd used a different yarn, and found I had to improvise to make it big enough for her head (it was coming up baby-sized). Once I discovered how easy it was to go off-pattern, I went a bit mad and added a brim and flower. Okay, so I still have a lot to learn about sizing.... This one is now too big for Holly. It would actually fit ME, but not really being my style or colours, it has been snaffled by Yarrow. It will still fit her when she's 60 though!

I'm considering it a learning experience, and now have a correctly-sized hat on the go for my younger daughter.


So, crochet has been filling my cosy evenings in the living room - all I need to complete the picture is a rocking chair in front of the fire!! The winter's wood supply is *hopefully* arriving on Saturday, so then we'll have regular crackling log fires on those chilly evenings - can't wait! The excuse to have a fire is the saving grace of winter, in my opinion.

On the subject of the changing seasons, how about these gorgeous pumpkin chocolates for an autumnal treat? My friend, Dave, came to visit last weekend, and brought us these little gems. The girls wanted to eat them immediately, but I had to hold them off long enough to get a photo.

Tarte Tatin

Mmmm!! After several years of hint-dropping, Adam bought me a Tarte Tatin dish for my birthday this year - it's a Le Creuset one, in that glorious Volcanic orange/red colour. That, in itself, was a feast for my eyes!

But I was desperate to try it out as soon as it arrived. I'd never made Tarte Tatin before, but it was remarkably easy. I used Delia's 'Easy Flakey Pastry' recipe, and random (possibly excessive) quantities of sugar and butter to caramelise the apples. SInce I had a bag of wild blackberries in the freezer, just begging to be used in something, I popped them in too - and was delighted with the fabulous colour that resulted.

My second attempt, a few days later (on the excuse of having a guest for dinner), used more traditional ingredients, and tasted equally delicious.  And I know it's not the cook's bias, because my children, who 'hate cooked apples' and normally refuse apple pie or fruit crumble, loved it.  Result!

Christmas is coming...

...and the first of the card projects I've been working on this summer have started to appear in the mags.

I had lots of fun setting up Festive photos back in May, so I could get a bunch of MOO cards and stickers printed up for this article in Simply Cards and Papercraft.

And I also got to play with the free papers in the Winter 2009 Special Edition of Creative Cardmaking... , which are really pretty vintage designs.

So there you have it - I can't ignore the rapid approach of the Festive Season any longer....  No mince pies until after Bonfire Night though, because I have to get rid of all the CAKE I've eaten in the past week for mine and DH's birthdays (that whopper of a white-chocolate-mudcake-with-raspberries-and-white-chocolate-ganache took us almost a week to finish).

Scraptastic!

Toasty Warm
Originally uploaded by Noni Beckman

Wow! I actually got round to some scrapping today, for the first time in weeks... I had bought some new bits and bobs recently, and this was my first chance to have a play (if you don't count the crop I went to on Tuesday night, where I failed to do anything but *look* at paper and chat).

So, here are two pages I finished today while the girls were at school and a beany hotpot bubbled away in the oven. There's another one still on the worktop, but it was too dark to photograph tonight.

All back to school....

Yarrow went back to school last Monday - she's in Year 3, which means that she's moved up to the Junior school.  It's a fairly big chnage, but she is still with her friends, and seems to be settling in nicely.  From her point of view, the Junior school is a big adventure, with its huge choice of lunchtime and after school clubs, the opportunity to learn an instrument (she starts guitar tomorrow!), and all kinds of new subjects, including French.  I have a feeling that she's going to have a fantastic four years!

Holly, however, only started school today.  The Infant School lets the Y1 & Y2 kids get back into the routine before they introduce the new children into the mix.  It's a pretty good policy I think, but it did mean that Holly, who has been itching to get started, had to stay home with mummy for another whole week!!  But today was her big day, and she was thrilled to bits to be going to school at last.  Two of her best friends are in her class, along with several other children form the same preschool, so she had no qualms about settling in.  When I picked her up this afternoon she told me that they had "done no work AT ALL!!!", and had "just played all day".  I think that might change in a few days though....

So here I am, hardly able to believe that my baby is now a school girl!  How quickly they grow up...  I'm incredibly excited for her -  I absolutely loved school, and I have a feeling that Holly is going to fit in really well.  And we are so lucky to live within walking distance of truly excellent infant and junior schools whose staff work so hard to bring out the best in every child.

All that remains now is for me to get a job to fill up my days with LOL!!

It's been a busy summer...

I can hardly believe that Yarrow is back at school on Monday - the summer holidays are over! We have had a fantastic few weeks though, and I wish we had another month!

We spent almost two weeks on the Isle of Man, visiting my parents, my brother's family, and staying with one of my best friends in the world :). It was a really lovely trip - and we had much better luck with the weather this summer, with really only one day that was too wet to do much outdoors. Last summer we 'did' all the tourist stuff, showing the girls around the Island where I grew up, and the whole holiday was jam-packed. This time we set a much more relaxed pace, some days doing pretty much nothing, which suited the small people much better I think - although we did find time to get to Cregneash, where Yarrow had a go at lacemaking. But essentially, the girls just enjoyed spending time with their grandparents, other family peeps, and our friends' children - as much playing as possible...


Anyway, it was all over too soon, and we headed home to a very grumpy cat (2 weeks in the cattery was not her dream holiday), soon to be even grumpier when we headed off to two weddings on the following weekend. Yes - two weddings in one weekend - how likely is that? We haven't been to a wedding for a couple of years, and then to have two in different parts of the country within a day of each other... Well... It was bound to be eventful...

We spent several hours on the road from Devon to Cambridge - the traffic was not good - and when we finally unpacked the car, late, dark and exhausted at Adam's cousin's house, we discovered that ALL our smart wedding clothes had been left behind... hanging in the suit bag on the hall stand back in Plymouth. Gah! We had shoes, undies, nightclothes and a tie. Fortunately, the wedding wasn't until the following afternoon, so I had time to dash into Cambridge city centre and thrash the credit card buying suit, skirt, top, and children's clothes. Ugh! But it was all worth it, and we had an amazing time at Sheridan & Simon's wedding - catching up with friends from Uni, many of whom we hadn't seen since we left London more than four years ago. It is very weird to see good friends with walking, talking children you've never met before!


Next morning we hit the road again, heading to a very different style of wedding in a field in Stow-on-the-Wold! Strictly speaking, it was the post-wedding party - WedFest - for one of Adam's oldest friends, and we managed to catch up with an entirely different group of good friends. The weather was fabulous, and apart from the ridiculous number of wasps (which kept freaking out Holly, causing her to throw whatever she was holding as far away as possible) , we had a wonderful afternoon. It was a long drive home, with two utterly exhausted children, and we had reason to thank Plymouth Library Services for the loan of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets on CD, as Stephen Fry's calm and steady voice kept them enthralled the whole way.


Since returning from the weddings, we've had days at the beach, the park, visits from friends, and days just hiding from the rain in the house. The girls have had their squabbles, but on the whole they have really loved each other's company all summer - school is going to be fun, but they are going to miss being together the whole time. And I have a feeling I'm going to miss them both, a lot.....