Eight-by-Six

A customer recently sent a photo of a granny square scarf, it was a picture I'd saved to my Pinterest crochet account a while back. I took the order and as there was no rush to complete it, I've been making squares in-between other projects. Anyway its been some time since I started so I'm attempting to finish it soon and have started to join the squares, over half way since this photo was taken a week ago. The finished scarf will have another round then three pom poms on each edge. It will be a very cosy scarf in merino yarn (Debbie Bliss Rialto DK my favourite) I'll post some more pictures next week, I'm adding the two more tonight before bed. The denim blue from the Heathers range is beautiful and sets of the other colours perfectly. I love it so much I plan to order more denim blue and make one for myself! glorious granny squares I tasted my rhubarb gin last night and its delicious and I'm now officially a gin drinker! We took Moss for a long walk ov...

I came across this recipe over the weekend and I had a bumper harvest of rhubarb in my garden veg patch to try it out. I thought I'd share it with you. I've not tried gin before, but I know my sister loves it and its very popular right now and the colour is going to be amazing. I also made rhubarb crumble cake and it was delicious served warm with cream. I still have lots of rhubarb left over, I think I picked over 3kg! More cake I think and yes more gin. Ingredients: *1 litre of gin *300g caster sugar *600g rhubarb, cut into 2cm pieces *1.5 litre jar (I tried a 1.5 litre jar and it  wasn't  big enough, try a 2 litre instead!) Chop the rhubarb into roughly 2cm pieces, the redder the rhubarb the more pink your finished gin will be. I put mine in a bowl with the sugar and set aside for a couple of hours, I do this for jam making too, the sugar extracts the pink in the rhubarb. Then put the rhubarb into a 2 litre Kilner jar, add the gin. Make sure the ...

I was asked to test knit a beautiful new shawl pattern recently by one of my lovely Instabuddies (Lisa at Lisasattik ) and the yarn suggested was Scheepjes Whirl. You've probably seen this on Pinterest , Instagram and blog land. It's a fabulous new yarn made up of 60% cotton and 40% acrylic. My choice of colour was green tea tipple, there are so many to chose from but after seeing this knitted up (and crochet) I was drawn to the colour. You can follow my progress over on Ravelry just click here looks too good to dive in The only problem with starting with such a dark colour it was hard going but now that the subtle colour changes are emerging the knitting is much easier, quicker and far more enjoyable. I've not tackled many lace patterns before (but the birch trees scarf that I love) but because the panels are inter mixed with garter ridges and garter bands even I've managed to cope. The pattern flows beautifully and the colour change yarn guides you quickly to ...

I've been working on the loveliest of custom orders (from my niece for my great niece). A request came in about three weeks ago would I knit a bunny costume for my great niece because she was attending a fancy dress party in May, she's only two months old so how could I resist! I took two seperate patterns that I had found on Pinterest and made them into my own version adding a few little tweeks. I really love how the knitted bloomers turned out. The pattern does suggest the knitted band on the legs, but the first pair I made were made on 4mm needles and looked a little small and restricted on movement so for comfort I've left this part out. The pattern links can be found here  for an alternative pattern in garter stitch and here  for the one I used. The baby bunny free knitting pattern can be found here I do take custom orders (but please allow plenty of time because I do work full time and this is my hobby in my spare time) So a big ta dah moment from me ....... ...

Not only am I enjoying this new Drops Puna yarn (new to me) its like crocheting with cotton wool, I love it. My  really-easy-crochet-shawl  is coming along nicely in this yarn. I've started with the light grey, on my second ball and the next is grey then some rows of colour or maybe dark grey first. I'll decide when my next yarn delivery arrives from Woolwarehouse, I just couldn't resist ordering the colours they had on their Instagram account a few weeks ago (this is what made me buy the grey yarn!) I'm a sucker for yarn adverts, who isn't? vintage Sunday afternoon I've enjoyed an afternoon drinking tea from my vintage Alfred Meakin china I bought last weekend in Whitstable and of course yummy French Fancies. Reminds me of Sunday afternoons spent at my nans flat in London, drinking the, eating home made cake and counting buttons out of my nans large jar, fond memories.

Earlier this month the weather was very warm for this time of year. After receiving some good news regarding my biopsy results I decided to chill out and potter in my garden. So glad  I did, a few hours on and I was totally loving it again and my compost bin was overflowing with gorgeous new soil! So my gardening mojo is well and truly back. Here are some photos of my work in progress. Lots of seeds have now been purchased, a huge bag of seed compost - I'll start sowing this week. I hope you've managed to get out in your gardens over the Easter weekend. Next job is to get my veg patch dug over and some fertilser added ready for the dwarf beans - still deciding what else to grow. I have started one sack of spuds and two large pots of salad leaves (they germinated this weekend) Lots happening and lots to do in a small back garden in Kent. Ladies Mantle tea break new life and pretty buds Head Gardener Moss gravel garden is tidy again

Do you remember this post from last week? Well I finished it last night (doing a happy dance) isn't it great? I've just listed it to my Etsy shop and plan to start the next one tonight in blue and grey, also in Sirdar ColourWheel, love this yarn. my first granny shawl look at those colours