Lifeschool

One of the many things I love about where we live is the 'small town' mindset - ok, that can have its negative aspects, but I love the community events, clubs, social gatherings and the way folks smile and say hello just passing on the street.  I love that most houses have a porch facing outwards to the road so you can sit and watch the world tick along and wave hello to passers by.  I love that there are very few fences and gates around people's homes, and I love the way that Pot Lucks are the norm for entertaining friends.  Sometimes there are frustrations - many websites and banking and insurance procedures feel like they haven't progressed in the last decade or several.  But then you happen upon some really great initiatives and talent, in all sorts of walks of life, one shining example being the LifeSchool House which has just relocated to a lovely old farmhouse not far from where we live. In addtion to all kinds of workshops, where the presenter is rewarded with donated goods instead of cash, every month there is a Makers' Swap, which I had the pleasure of attending this week.

What a great idea and what good fun!  Everyone takes a few home made things along: baked goods, home brew, plant seedlings, soaps, knitted and stitched crafts, postcards, and more. Everyone was friendly and welcoming, there's no pressure to take a lot or a little and everyone gets to pick something in turn from the table until everything is gone.  I took along some bunting and some greeting cards, and came home with several tomato and pepper seedlings, gorgeously scented home made gardeners' soap, a taster of Fire Cider, beautiful postcards from a local photographer, and a tiny bottle of something that I'm told will properly perk up whatever liquid beverage I care to mix it with and properly perk me up too!  What to make for next month's swap? Watch this space!

Nanoo's Makery

Anyone care to guess the big news in my life right now...? Yep, I'm going to be a GRANDMOTHER later this year - I am over the moon and just so excited - not least because a whole new world of crafting has opened up before me!  As you can see I've jumped right on the grandchildren devotion train. By popular demand I shall be known as Nanoo, which I think is kinda cool as it reminds me of Mork and Mindy which I used to watch a very long time ago, when my firstborn was a only a few months old.  I'm so enjoying getting back to crafting, after a year that was All About The Dog. We got an Aussie Shepherd pup 9 months ago, she's a bit of a handful and ever so time consuming - but things are quietening down a bit now that she's a year old, and I did manage a few crafty moments along the way.

That's our pup, star of this year's homemade Christmas cards. She's getting the hang of snoozing outside my craft room door while I stitch and sew - it's really the only room of the house she's not allowed into, as I just can't trust myself not to drop pins! She's only stolen my knitting from the living room sofa once, and from my reaction I don't think she'll be doing that again anytime soon.  As she took up so much of my life last year, I'll include just a couple of pics below.  Quite a cutie really, isn't she?

And while I may grumble while pulling on my snow boots and layering up for yet ANOTHER dog walk, the sunshine / rain / snow / ice / wind and the gorgeous, soul stirring countryside all around us make me thankful to be alive, healthy, safe and loved. So I guess I have something to thank the little rascal for after all. 

Gettin' Crafty at Christmas

What a gorgeously relaxed Christmas we had this year - one year on from our move to Nova Scotia, properly settled into our home and plenty of time to enjoy the build up to the festive season.  Missed our family madly, but the internet is a wonderful thing for keeping in touch with friends and family.  When I was in my early twenties I lived in California for a couple of years, and kept in touch with my darling Mum by airmail letter alone - not even a phone call as it was so expensive.  So although we would have loved to have everyone here, we counted our blessings as always for living this amazing life in the home of our dreams, and had a very jolly time of it.  Friends came over on Christmas Day, we ate, drank and played silly party games and just enjoyed every single minute!  I went to a Christmas Craft Fair at the local High School, which was super impressive for a small town, and I came away with not-so-secret ambitions to have a table there myself one day; I so enjoyed making all of these things, what a great excuse it would be to make lots more!  I planned to get stuck into it in January, but then remembered that I still need to finish recovering the seat cushions for our tiny caravan, a task that's been hanging over me for-evvvver.  So I bit the bullet and now I am 4 cushions down and 5 to go, very happy that I am making progress with that.  Pics to come soon!

I made a list

Oh summer, where did you go? Ah yes, that was those happy months filled with sunshine and friends and family visiting from the UK - busy, busy busy, and beautiful.  So much fun, many happy hours in the garden, another fabulous wedding and a few snatched hours in my craft room.  I was feeling like I had been slacking off on the creative side and hadn't really made very much, but now I've made a list: Mother of the Bride Hat No.2 for Daughter No.1's wedding (No.1 hat for Daughter No.2 was last February), cable knit gloves and stripey socks for me, curtains and blinds for the house, curtains for the Potting Shed, a bib for an absoloutely darling baby, and my personal favourite, a ScareCrow. Oh, and some dinky little seed packets, which won't win any design prizes but at least I finally found a good use for the butterfly stamp I bought in Amsterdam many moons ago.  So after making that list and digging out the photos, I'm feeling quite pleased with myself and don't feel quite so daunted by the long list of projects I have lined up for the winter. Looking forward to some cosy hours in my craft room, and in the kitchen too - we went vegan this summer (feeling SO good about that!) and I have a stack of new recipes to try.  In the meantime, I'll be making the most of every drop of Autumn sunshine that remains - I'm almost enjoying raking up the leaves this year, even though there are a gazillion of them every day, as I have the time to pace myself, and the view is just gorgeous.

Fits like a glove!

There were some highs and lows at my sewing machine this week: first, I made with great care a dress to wear for my daughter's wedding, and I love it - the fabric is a linen mix which hangs beautifully, I adjusted the pattern so the waist is in the right place, studiously pressed all my seams as I went along and did a couple of final alterations to get it just right. My primary school sewing teacher (Mrs Diaz - no shortcuts under her beady eye!) would be proud of me I think.

Flushed with success, I was keen to make a start on one of the many projects in my 'make do and mend' stash.  With my only pair of oven gloves in dire need of a wash, and spurred on by recently having resisted a pretty and very cheap pair in the local dollar store (on the basis that, cheap as they were, I really should use up some fabric and make them for free), I made a start.  Aiming to keep it simple, I thought I'd just wiggle a bit of quilting on each layer of lining / padding / outer, then stitch together the 2 layers with a snazzy zigsag stitch and neatly trim around the edge - it looked great in my head but turned out - well, see below left! I resisted the urge to throw it in the bin, remembered Mrs Diaz, thought it through carefully, and had another go.  Seems the trick is to cut the padding smaller than the liner /outer, leaving space to neatly stitch and turn - much better!  So now I have a slightly odd pair of oven gloves, which will serve to remind me that mistakes really are ok if I just stop and ask myself what I learned along the way.  Only taken me 60 or so years to really get that into my head!

Time really does fly when having (lots of) fun

Prompted today by a dear friend who said "are you going to carry on with your blog now that you really have something to write about?" (I'm hoping she didn't mean that I didn't have anything worth writing about before...), here I am marvelling at how 4 months can fly by and life change so much in such a short time.  To summarise: I turned 60 in November, retired from office life, and moved to Canada.  After a flurry of unpacking and our first ever childless Christmas (quiet and a bit strange, but helped by lovely friends on this side of the ocean) I quickly settled into my new and very relaxed routine, spending some considerable time wandering around with a vacant grin on my face, revelling in my good fortune - but also cooked, stripped paint and dug what felt like several tons of snow.  My new crafty corner is up and running, fabric (soooo much fabric) stashed away, and I've even managed a spot of knitting for Daughter No. 2: my first ever pair of gloves, first ever anything with 4 double pointed needles, first ever fair-isle type pattern.  I am hooked - quite a revelation to me that gloves, even fancy patterned ones, are so much quicker to complete than jumpers - who knew?!  Even better, as they don't use much yarn, I treated myself to some really nice wool.  I think this is definitely my kind of knitting - next up is a pair of socks and another pair of gloves, both for me.  Somewhere, I have a whole book of pretty sock patterns. And then there's that fabric stash... 2017 is gonna be a craft-fest around here.  Lots of visitors booked in for Nova Scotian holidays, 2 acres of land to whip into shape and our lovely house to beautify - very happy days ahead!

The Homestead

Crafty Corner

Foxy!

Knitting the weeks away

Seems the year has flown by in a flurry of knitting needles, everything else having taken a back seat to sorting, packing and downsizing our Cardiff home in readiness for the move to Nova Scotia - one way tickets booked for December 1st!  Ridiculously excited and can't wait to purchase a new sewing machine and get back to crafting.  Although I have a rather a lot of curtains to make first, not my favourite pastime but I have a stash of rather lovely fabric and no irritating necessity to spend 8+ hours a day in an office. Bliss!  Anyway, here's a cosy little jumper I knitted from this pattern for Daughter No. 1. Made a few mistakes as usual, but I quite like the finished article.  Currently trying to finish a cardigan for my Mum, which am desperate to get done before we move - not sure I'm going to make it but am sure gonna try.  See you on the other side (of the Atlantic) folks!