Hooking for Kitties

Having seen Amanda @ crafty in the med appeal for stray and abandoned cats in Spain - we have two here in the coop . Humphrey 

and Sheene

I just had to pick up my hook. Having got my crochet mojo back a few weeks ago – I started to crochet this blanket;

I saw it on Little Tin Birds blog another great blog if you've not come across Heather before – the colours are muted but really beautiful.  I didn't have an owner in mind so perhaps it can be sold to raise some funds.

I will finish these pin cushions and send them to Spain to help the strays cats.

MummyHen X

Ta dah – crochet baby blanket

On our recent train trip to Penzance I started a baby blanket for a colleague who recently had a baby boy.

Good progress was made on the trip and afterwards – except I ran out of the light blue yarn.

 

I hunted through my stash and no I didn’t have any so – do I buy 1 ball on the internet and pay £1.79 for the yarn and £2.25 for the P&P.  I wasn’t going to buy a load of yarn to get free P&P or pay over the odds on certain auction sites. 

I then found to my amazement that the school outfitters, less than 2 miles away that also has a small wool and haberdashery section, sells Stylecraft Special DK – I was so pleased.  It’s slightly more expensive per 100g at £2.15, than I pay online but I can just go to the local shops and pick up a ball, support a local retailer, have the yarn straight away, have a hooky natter to shop assistant.

 

They came to my rescue and over the holiday weekend and I finished a lovely blue gingham baby blanket for baby Joe.

 

 

MummyHen X

Train journey

We had a lovely time – I didn’t take my laptop so wasn’t able to blog.

 

Haven’t been to Paddington station for a long time – it looked different to what I remember – or maybe I look at things differently now that I’m older??!! Statues of Paddington Bear

Isambard Kingdom Brunel

 

a striking three faced clock(!),

 

a really lovely balcony window - this just looked so out of place,

tonnes of iron work

 

Five hours on the train is a long time to keep occupied, I took your advice and did a variety of things to make the journey go by in a wizz; people watching – there are some very odd people in this world – the drivel people come out with?!?!; looking at the scenery; there is some really lovely countryside;

 

crochet – decided to start a blue gingham blanket for a colleague that’s just had a new baby. 

 

MummyHen X

Ta dah Granny square patchwork blanket…

With everything that’s been going on with Little Cat I’d forgotten to show you my finished granny square patchwork blanket.  Well here it is –

 

It’s all Stylecraft Special DK, its 25 x 27 squares, each square is 3 rounds and it fits my king size bed with plenty of overhang on each side, I used the JAYG (join as you go) method of joining the squares together.

 

The boarder is 8 rounds; 4 rounds of granny, 2 rounds of double, 1 round of popcorn, 1 round of granny with long centre stitch and a final round of 2 trebles 2 chain 2 trebles all in the same space.

 

I’m already planning the next blanket – I do love to crochet but I prefer to crochet something with a purpose.  In the meantime I’m making a smaller blanket again out of Stylecraft Special DK but with all the different colours I have in my stash.

 

Here’s the progress so far – still have another 5 colours to go – not sure whether to do join them randomly or do a row of each colour – umm will have to think about it.

 

MummyHen X

 

Thank you

For all you comments about Little Cat - its going to be a long process. 

However life here continues; two of our hens have started to lay after a winter break that started at beginning of October.  Golden eggs, as DaddyHen calls them, hopefully the other three will start soon  - we usually get a good supply from mid February to end September.  Not having any hybrid hens means that you dont get eggs all year round. 

I have nearly finished my patchwork crochet granny square blanket - choosing the edging colours seems to be harder than the squares, another three or four rows to go; this blanket is massive - I'll give you the stats when I do the ta-dah post.

Loads Hundreds of ends have been sawn in, been doing as I went along; the thought of having to do them ALL at the end - was a horrid thought, anyway the are all done except for the last few rounds of boarder. 

Sold some more stuff on eBay which yielded another £109 for the sealed pot or tin in my case.

MummyHen X

Patchwork granny square blanket      

It’s nearly done - 560 squares (28x20).  The colours and the randomness of their placement – just make me smile. 

 

 

The down side is it’s not big enough – I think I need another 5 or 6 rows along the long edge another 140 or 168 squares. 

 

 

 

I have enough yarn – good old Stylecraft Special DK – I have only had to buy one additional ball of light blue I have plenty to finish.

 

I must tell you my ebay selling generated £155.54 – which is amazing; will have to start looking out other stuff to sell and declutter.

 

MummyHen X

Snail mail and email…

Went to the post office today – had a couple of parcels to post one to JuliaB and one to JulieD;  I really hope I put the correct label on the parcels !?!?! Both are of a yarnie / woolie nature so fingers crossed they receive the correct parcel.

Change from the post office netted a £2 coin and £5 note – all for the tin

Sue from Our New Life in the Country posted a few weeks ago on ‘A year of Less – Emails’ this struck accord here in the Hen house – I receive too many, far too many, emails.  I get so many that I setup rules on outlook to move or delete emails from different organisation but this only works to a limited degree.  So for the past few days I have been diligently reviewing all the emails and unsubscribing - some organisation are much easier than others ie just one click and you’re removed, others require email address and to tick various boxes giving reasons as to why; ok it might take a few minutes but it will stop the never ending amount of emails.

I have already noticed a reduction in the number of emails 

A cheery photo – still snow on the ground here

 

MummyHen

 

Bloggy Blanket…

Will be on its way to a new home tomorrow.

JuliaB from Peacock Blue has offered to add a few squares to the Bloggers blanket.  Looking at the crochet Julia has on her blog I can’t wait to see what lovely squares get added.

If you want to get involved let Mum know at Mums Simple Living Blog

Like with most places in South East of England we have snow – my five hens still need to be cleaned out, fed and watered but they are not happy.  They have the option of free ranging in the garden but in this weather they just say in their run which is dry.

 

 

This robin seems to be happy and are even braving the cold for a dip in the waterfall. I need to work out how to take photos through the snow!!

MummyHen

AWOL…

Sorry I’ve not posted for a couple of week but work has been hectic and I’ve needed to keep away from the computer once I finished work.

So what’s been happening …

Two more power cuts which resulted in hours without power and more digging up of the pavement in the middle of the night. I’m no electrician but I don’t think they know what the problem is and how to fix it.  We now have candles and matches at the ready in the lounge, torches on our bedside cabinets.  To be fair these cuts have been at just before 10pm so we’ve not been that inconvenienced but when they insist on digging the pavement from midnight (always seems to start then – umm may be they are on quadruple time from midnight) until 2.30am that really annoys me.  I don’t function very well without at least 7 hours. Ahhh.

My amaryllis came out yesterday – not a great picture – hope that the other two trumpets will open during this coming week.

 

My crochet blanket is coming on a treat –

 

Not been baking as we are trying to lose weight, not been spending as we are trying to save money, as a result not much money has been added to my sealed pot, although I did get a nice shiny £2 coin in my change today when I bought a new back door mat.

Why won’t blogger allow me to up load photos from my computer in compose mode – its annoying me

 

MummyHen X

 

A quiet and silent start to 2013

For some the start to the year brought an added bonus – MummyHen without a voice??!!

I’m usually never short of anything to say but I have had laryngitis – so being without a voice has been difficult; when I have been able to speak I either sounded like I’d been on the smokes or was about to start a new career as voice over artist specialising in deep husky female voice.  I now have a little voice but this coming week is full of meetings so it will take a hammering – fingers crossed I don’t take a step back.

The doctor said ‘rest your voice’ that not that easy; but I have been trying not to speak unless it was necessary.  So it was an ideal time to sort thru stuff, the same stuff that I mentioned in my previous post.  We have loads of stuff; DaddyHen says I am a hoarder but I’m not; I keep things which are either of use, of sentimental value, or have value which pretty much is anything.  There aren’t acres of space in the Hen house to keep all this stuff so some of it has to go.  My yarn stash could rival Mont Blanc; tower of magazines (crafty and poultry) is colossal, fabric collected for projects – not sure which project is huge.  At one point I collected silver spoons and butter knives (no longer) I came across this box last week; as with some of the other stuff they will be photographed and put on ebay but not just yet.  I think I will wait until people have got over Christmas and with January being a 5 week months it’s a long time until pay day.

I emptied my purse into my pot for my Sealed Pot Challenge; not even £1.  I have not needed to spend any cash so have not drawn any cash out so my purse as shrapnel free.  DaddyHen had a £2 in his change this week which was added. Many blogs talk about counting NSD (No Spend Days) well in this house I count spending days – much easier to count the days when we spend – as there are so few of them.

Didn’t go anywhere yesterday, SonnyHen and GF went away for the weekend – his birthday treat; so DaddyHen and I just spent a day pottering me clearing out stuff, watching films and crocheting.  I have now done 500 squares of my blanket which is about halfway - more hooky time to come.

 

MummyHen X

Advent has begun

Four weeks until Christmas, I love Christmas – I had hot Christmases as child when we lived in Africa and cold Christmases here in England, both very different – the food, traditions, and obviously the weather but the constant was the family being together, carols and church. 

How do you prepare for Christmas?

I have ordered meat and poultry from the butcher – in previous years I’ve used high street supermarkets but in more recent years I like to support the local butcher.

I have made drink – mentioned here in my previous post.  This will be decanted in the next week or so ready for gifting.

I have made food and stocked the freezer for the days after Christmas and New Year before life gets back to normal in January.  I am hoping to take time off from work and have a rest so I little planning ahead will help.

I have been crocheting a table running – my poinsettia table runner.  I used 100% cotton and a 4mm hook. 

Start with yellow, create a magic loop or chain 6 to form a circle/loop, chain 3 (counts as 1tr), 11tr in to the same space. Slip stitch into the first stitch to join.  12 stitches in total.

Change to red and work 12, 2tr & chain 1 clusters into each space. Slip stitch into the first stitch to join.

Change to green and work 12, 3tr & chain 1 clusters into each space. Slip stich into the first stitch to join.

Change to white into the next space work 2tr, chain 1, 2tr 1chain.

Into the next space work 2 dtr (double trebles), chain 3, 2 dtr, chain 1.  This forms a corner cluster.

Into the next space work *2tr, chain 1, 2tr 1chain*.  Repeat * *

Into the next space work 2 dtr (double trebles), chain 3, 2 dtr, chain 1.  This forms the second corner cluster.

Repeat until you get back to the beginning the format is two clusters [2tr, chain 1, 2tr 1chain] in between each corner cluster. 

I joined as I went along but you could create all the squares and then crochet them together. There are a few ends to sew in but its worth the effort.

 

 

I think I will block it as the edges look a little wonkie

 

 

MummyHen X

 

I’m back

Well it's been nearly two weeks since I last posted and I've missed having the time and energy.

I worked 12 days straight without a day off, averaging 13.25 each day - I managed 3 hours off yesterday and today. I managed to get to bed before midnight for the first time in two weeks last night - what wind and rain! I didn't hear a thing DH woke me at just before 8 (I usually start at 8) my first teleconf was at 8.30 so time for a shower and some breakie.

I have had no time for anything, DH has been a real rock totally dependable. Some lovely meals, cups of tea and the occasional biccy, popping into the office everynow and then to see if I'm still 'alive'.  Ohh he made a lovely apple cake.

I got to the stage yesterday when I thought if I carry on I will be no use to anyone – I was exhausted.

I'm off to Holland on Monday for the week – work not holiday - will be good to see all the team again (we only managed to get together a couple of times a year) it will be hard work but fun. Still need to prepare my presentation - nothing interesting I to the budgets and numbers, the other members of the team do the interesting techy stuff - some really useful stuff; like putting training material on ipads for field staff so they don't have to carry round 15 A4 ring binders. Lots of other exciting apps but I can't tell you about those - the team I work in develops apps for ipad and android.    

 

This afternoon I managed to feed my Christmas cakes, plant an amaryllis (it’s been waiting for about a month) it should be a light pink colour too late for Christmas but the hyacinths I planted a month ago are looking promising.  All planted the same day, all on the same south facing window sill - some don't like they are doing anything but tiny glossy green shoots are slowly appearing.

 

I crocheted all afternoon,

 

 

sewed in some ends actually there were 300 of them

 

Planning a new crochet project – always got a few on the go at the same time.

 

We have nothing planned for the weekend other than watching rugby, more relaxing and catching up

 

MummyHen X

Cork Christmas trees

Work has been as hectic as usual – I longed for the weekend of doing nothing or crafty things.

We had some wine corks lying around – DaddyHen enjoys a glass of wine or two at the weekends – we had a few but not enough for my tree project.  I asked the local wine merchant and they gave me a huge bag.

I stuck them together with glue – waited overnight for the glue to fully dry and then wrapped either green or red ribbon over the top – simple.

The little cork people – I knitted or crocheted a hat and skirt; knitted pattern from here Korknisse. I made up the crochet pattern.

 

I need some to send the Bloggy Blanket to someone else – I have added a few more squares but it needs more; could you crochet a square or two to add to the blanket – let me know.  It can be a simple granny square or a more complex pattern. For more information about the Bloggers blanket have a look at Mums blog

 

MummyHen X

 

Afternoon Tea with Mum

Mum held a virtual tea party – which was great fun to meet all the others bloggers.

I took a long some cakes and a few biscuits

French Fancies – Lemon, Strawberry and Lime

Chocolate and Strawberry muffin

Blackcurrant cheesecake

Vanilla cheesecake with orange sprinkles

Jammy Dodgers and custard cream

 

Patterns

Jammy Dodger pattern is from Matt - he has some wonderful crochet projects -According to Matt

The other cakes are all from Grietje - English patterns are at the bottom of each post Petit Fours

 

MummyHen X

A parcel from Spain

 

The Bloggy Blanket Chain has arrived – thanks Amanda http://craftyinthemed.blogspot.com.es/

 

Two brown parcels – one containing the blanket

And one containing some lovely gifts for me – thanks so very much.  A few small bells, a magnetic picture frame, three broach pins and the most delightful hand painted fan.

Now what colours shall I use, what square design shall I add to this blanket? Granny, circle in a square, flower, single colour, multi colour - the options are endless...

 

Where will it go next – do get involved in creating this bloggy blanket adventure

 

 

 

MummyHen X