Celtic designs and city skyscapes

Still on the theme of 'decorating for Samhain', the three of us (Himself was busy doing the loft conversion) got creative.

In between walking around the village for Lily (there has been several possible sightings of her  so we have been out all times of day and night in hope) Youngest and I have been carving pumpkins and Eldest has made a brilliant window display.

He first drew a skyscape on black paper, cutting many windows. He was definitely practising multi-tasking as he was watching Fawlty Towers at the same time.... !

We had, on one of our Looking-for-Lily walks, collected some very vibrant leaves, which Eldest then painstakingly taped and trimmed to fill the windows with colour.

I then taped it to our front window for him and we strategically placed fairy lights behind the windows and....

Just look at this!

before switching on the lights

The leaves made gorgeous colours and they really showed off all his 'windows' he had created - I am really pleased with his creativity.


Youngest and I ended up with two decorated pumpkins and a huge pot of pumpkin, chilli and garlic soup and home-made cinnamon bread - aaah heaven!

So, now the house is fully Samhain-ed and souped up.

PS - the possible sightings of our dear Lily are still coming in, I have just had another phone call saying that a cat was spotted - So without much of a thought apart from grabbing a coat and a torch, I set off, but  - nothing.  We do still have hope - how many deep red super furry fluff-cats live in our village?

Hawthorntime horrors

For Angela and C,

Hopefully a little inspiration to set off your Samhain mojo 

I trawled the internet and found some free templates. ** I've listed them below

With a little bit of scissor action and a lot of snippity bits left everywhere.

We now have a murder of crows cackling above our mirror.

A swarming colony of bats dashing across our wall.

Goulish faces watching our every move.

And skulls adoring our walls.

I've not quite finished, there are spiders and their webs waiting to go up and a few last touches.

AND!

Yesterday we bought two pumpkins -

Just think of the fun (and the soup says Himself and Eldest)

For the spider look HERE

For the Crows look HERE and HERE

For the goulish faces look HERE

For the bats look HERE

Thank you for your lovely comments about my last post, they are a delight to read :)

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Walking, receiving,knitting, creating...and forensics

Walking - Troutbeck, Lake District
Receiving - Flowers for our 23rd (yes 23) wedding anniversary - thank you xxx
Knitting - A shawlette in beautiful desert colours in a wool I know absolutely nothing about, except it works up beautifully
Creating - Drift wood heron from wood gleaned from our holidays, have also made a mirror frame but not photographed that yet.
? Forensics? Well, Himself and Youngest have made a start with the loft conversion and to reduce the dust from the rubble and plaster board they have rigged up opaque hessian-style plastic sheeting upstairs.
Looking a lot like a scene from a police crime programme.

There is plenty of scope for finger prints as a thick layer of plaster dust settles happily over the entire house..........the dust sheets work then......! *sigh*

Where have we been?

Here

There

Walking

Working

Crafting

Progress

Loving

Living

Normal transmission will return shortly 

when my life returns to normality. 

Ps watching the Eurovision (surreptitiously on my lap top coz Himself thinks its all a bit too girly!!)

Madness is a state of mind - and yes there is a lot of that sort of state going on here - and I do mind!

As some of you already know, I have another blog called, Kyōyū kyōyū - share, where we knit and crochet squares for blankets as well as make toys for children and send them to Japan.  It is coming up to one year after the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster and this has brought back to the surface that people are still suffering and are still homeless or in temporary shelter.  I have been linked up with another blog called Japan Alive. They have just been featured in The Wall Street Journal and on the video our blankets are there being unpacked and shared with the women who now use knitting and crochet to keep themselves occupied and keep themselves alive. I just had to share - I am so proud of our ladies that have spent time and effort to help across the miles - thank you xxx

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Yarnival - why oh why do I start these things!! 

It always starts off as a good idea....'I know - let's have a fibre festival'.....as if I know anything about fibres OR festivals, never mind the two of them together. 

It is NOT HELPED by the like minded and easily led astray friends who say.....'Yes! what a good idea - yes!! let's have a fibre festival'....

When really what they should have said to me was....'NO-OOOOO..........put the thought down and step awaaay from any more DANGEROUS thinking like that'....... 

But no, they ENCOURAGE me! What sort of friends are they!!!??

Now, many sleepless nights later (and I am sure twice the many grey hairs too) I now have concrete butterflies skipping a merry dance in my stomach.

And...AND....AND what is worse (how could you!) there are voices mentioning things like...when we do it again next year... (WHAT!?!) 

So - to keep sane (well trying to make some attempt at sanity) I am crocheting.....knitting.....blocking....and drinking far too much tea

I have started using wooden needles - lovely to the touch - hand made, smooth and polished***

And rather large................ 'thank you' to my two assistants for demonstrating the dimensions of my knitting

Oi you two - gerrroooffff me knitting!!!

***thank you to Mr Threads through my life for making these needles for me :)

I would like to say that normal transmission will resume shortly but seeing that most of my life has been a bit, lets say, haphazard - fat chance.....

Wow! For me?? Thank you!

Looky Looky! A subject close to my heart❤❤

knitted hearts❤❤

...........err - try again

Looky looky, two subjects close to my skippity happy heart❤❤

hand-knitted hearts❤❤ made by my by sister in law

...........err, umm

Looky look look - three subjects close to my very happily skippity heart❤❤

hand-knitted hearts❤❤ made by my sister in law for me

Aaaah - they are sooo-oo cute!

And now they are nestling in between flowers

Floating happily with birds

Flying free with butterflies

Thank you dear, dear fave-sis-in-law - did I mention 'wow' and 'for me?' and 'thank you' enough times on Thursday? If I did not - here they are again.......

Wow!

For me??

Thank you!

❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤

Ps - did you hear the article about the Graffiti Grannies of Cornwall? It's all about yarnbombing -  listen to it here - courtesy of Radio 4, you will need to fast forward to 0:40:39. Inspired by their name I wonder if we should be called the Knitting Knijas for our Yarnival ! 

In which I have a mini crochet-athon.........

I put it down to nervous energy. I also put it down to new-startitis and a severe case of never-finishing-itum and oh yes I definitely blame short-attention-span-icum and butterfly-brainism......
So... what am I getting to?
Well.

I present exhibit A

A classic granny square.

In a nice chunky cream wool.

I have frogged it back several times as I was never completely happy

(still not)

It no longer looks like the photo.....

Aah.. this more like it.

Not quite finished and probably about to be frogged again.

I ran out of wool 

and had to eke it out very carefully.

Fortunately fav sis-in-law has a cone of it left 

and generously offered it to me!

Woo-hoo!!

Yes - my toe nails are different colours....

S'pose I could be forgiven then for not finishing my granny mat w.i.p..

I now present exhibit B

Bright colours in cotton and buttons

A quick and instant gratification fix

Bunting.

I oohed and aahed at it's bright little bunts

 and the happy little buttons.

Himself asked where I was going to put them.

The catlings (yes - they have grown) thought 

they were brilliant and tried to steal them.

They now reside in a box. 

(bunts not catlings - although that is an idea hmmm)

*sigh*

I also present (part of) exhibit C

A slipper clog for Eldest.

Made with two strands of pure wool (pre-felted)

The wool is something out of my stash, 

a bag of 4 x 50gm balls .

He loves it (it? - where is the other?)

here.................

Youngest is waiting for his slipper clogs too.

I present exhibit D & E 

String bags - I am at it again. 

Thought that making 17 over the festive time would have been enough....

Apparently not.

And the reason for all this nervous energy? Well - I have so much going on in my head regarding our YARNIVAL that I feel that it will explode! Never mind, at our next knit and natter we are going to get down to the serious side of things. 

*watch*this*space*is all I can say!!

Ooh how exciting!

Shame I have to do this boring thing called work!