twice pie

What could possibly be better in life than a tasty home-made pie for dinner? Why, two pies of course! I have long had a strong affinity for traditional blue and white enamel pie dishes, and in fact most things enamel, but have never owned any myself. So I rectified things at Christmas by buying not one but two such pie dishes for D. I would like to point out that it honestly wasn’t out of pure greed that I bought two – it was just that the dishes were quite small, as pies go, and I figured there was a lot more potential for two dishes than one (twice as much, no less!). Armed with these, I thought, we could make a savoury pie and a sweet pie, or two dinners’ worth of savoury pie, or a meat pie and a vegetarian pie… the pie possibilities are endless.

To accompany the tins, I also bought a copy of Paul Hollywood’s new Pies and Puds book. Not because I like Paul Hollywood (quite the opposite – in spite of never having seen him on TV, he seems quite the shiny, preened antithesis of my personal cookery hero Nigel Slater), but because I like pies. A lot. But so as not to seem presumptive, I also added a free pie voucher into the mix, promising to christen the tins with whichever pie the recipient desired most. He requested a pork, cider and apple pie for our second dinner of the year – a very good choice – so this is what you see in the picture above. As there was plenty of filling I made two, and numbered them, so we ended up with two nights of tasty pie dinner for just one night’s pie-making. For anyone contemplating the same pie, I heartily recommend the filling, it was delicious. But I probably wouldn’t bother making the special cider pastry again, as it was quite dry, and normal shortcrust pastry would certainly taste better. Plus that would allow you to drink more of the cider during the cooking process, which has to be a good thing. As Weebl and Bob would say, mmmmm pie.

made in 2013

While it’s still only just 2014, I felt like doing a quick round-up of my creative output from last year. In total (unless I am missing anything, which is possible, if not merely hopeful) I finished 13 things in 2013 – how fitting! Plus that works out as just over one a month, which makes me feel happy, as a sort of proof that I wasn’t just twiddling my thumbs all year. Here is my output in small:

So in roughly chronological order, and starting from the top left of the images above, these are the things what I made:

a basket
Noro basket weave socks
Tour de France hankies
camel pillowcase no.1
blueberry stripe socks
yellow lace scarf (my first ever lace scarf!)
Hanne Falkenberg scarf
skein no.2 of handspun yarn
Kettlewell jumper
felt reindeer bunting
lavender bags x 4
cushion covers x 5 (though only two are pictured here)
bow tie

Not a bad haul! Some of these items will be a complete mystery to you if you rely solely on my blog to see what I get up to, since my rates of making and blogging do not correlate perfectly. Far from it. Though I’m sure it’s better for things to be this way round. Of course, I’ve got plenty more where those beauties came from; these are just the things that I completed this year. I have projects in progress in more or less every room in the house, and I acquired yet more wool and fabric at Christmas that now needs transforming into new and exciting creations. But this is not the time to dwell on that. Well done 2013, and here’s to an even more fruitful time in 2014!

the last bow (tie) of 2013

I know it’s 2014 already, but only just, and I don’t think it’s too late to squeeze in one last creative effort from the end of last year. I learned a very useful lesson this Christmas (and one that might well be the cause of real downfall in the future): that contrary to popular belief, Christmas Eve is absolutely not too late to start making Christmas presents. It all began when my father asked for a new bow tie for Christmas, to wear to my wedding in February. I inspected the offerings on the snazzy men’s accessories site he had found, but I wasn’t really terribly taken with any of them. At which point my mother helpfully pointed me towards this very handy tutorial on how to make a bow tie from scratch. And because at that time I still had a whole week before Christmas, that seemed like a jolly good idea.

I went to my favourite fabric shop, the Cloth House in Berwick Street, London, to look for suitable material. My luck was clearly in that day, as I found just over two metres of the perfect stuff in their remnants basket: finely-striped red and purple cotton with sparkly threads in – the last of its kind. So far so good. I made a mistake, though, by not reading the tutorial closely before attempting to start sewing the Sunday before Christmas, since as soon as I did so, I found I needed interfacing as well as just fabric, and immediately the project stalled. But luckily my mother was able to rescue me once again, this time with her plentiful supply cupboard, so it ended up being Christmas Eve when I finally made a start on the tie.

Apart from a horrendous start in which I melted a huge patch of interfacing as soon as I put iron to fabric (a simple enough error to fix – I just added a hasty replacement patch), the rest of the project went remarkably well, and took very little time. The only thing I did differently from the tutorial was that I cut my fabric on the bias, following the advice of a couple of sewers wiser than I. And I think that as well as helping the fabric to lie flatter, having the stripes going diagonally actually looks better too. This was a wildly successful last-minute sewing project and I would recommend home-made bow ties to anyone. Even for a first-time bow tie maker like me, it was easy as pie. The key is just to get hold of the neck measurement of the recipient, as, once finished, these ties are not adjustable like shop-bought ones are. But the recipient of this tie seemed mighty pleased with it, and wore it all day. I am now threatening to make bow ties of all varieties and colours, for every man I know, as I think they’re pretty darn smart. Don’t you?

the reindeer are right on time

While they may not have made it out of their paper bag last winter, this year we managed to cut out and finish a whole herd of felt reindeer on the last day of November, and string them up immediately. So in fact they ended up not merely being on time, but a whole day early for the festive season (which, in case you were wondering, officially begins on December the first)!

The inspiration for these Christmassy decorations came when I was working at the Knitting and Stitching Show last year, on the stand next to these guys and all their colourful mountains of felt. They were selling kits with which to make your own felt reindeer bunting, which got me thinking. I decided to combine their cunning idea with the shape of my favourite Swedish design moose, Moz, for some festive Nordic-inspired bunting. On the last day of the show, I bought four large squares of red felt from the people next to me, and some plain-ish cream- and taupe-striped ribbon from another nearby stand, and set to work making a reindeer template from that iconic Scandinavian beast. (N.B. My apologies if I am offending anyone’s sensibilities by blending reindeer and moose so unflinchingly. I am aware of what I’m doing, but am unrepentant.)

I sized the reindeer just right to fit four in per felt square, and cut them out with tiny scissors to accommodate all their wiggles. They didn’t take too long – maybe ten minutes or so per creature. We got sixteen reindeer in total, and threaded them on four or five metres (I can’t remember now, and my ability to mentally measure things by eye is woefully flawed) of ribbon. As the animals are free to slide up and down the ribbon, it means this is a cleverly resizeable decoration, which will fit into as much or as little space as you want it to, and you can always add or remove reindeer if you need to. And the advantage of these being winter decorations means that they are under significantly less threat from moth attacks. Take that, moths.

I am incredibly pleased with these reindeer – they are so jolly! Everyone in our house is happy with them. I heartily recommend a bit of cheery felt bunting to anyone. You could make all kinds of animals or shapes, or use different coloured felt for a more varied effect. I think I might make more next year, so we can decorate all the rooms with reindeer. Ho ho ho.

kettlewell done

This Kettlewell jumper is the happy product of an impulse yarn purchase at the all-too-enticing Oxford Yarn Store in April. It’s knitted in reverse stocking stitch, using Rowan Purelife British Sheep Breeds Chunky, in mid-brown Jacob colour, which is a lovely, sheepy yarn, and very pleasant to knit with. I cast it on straightaway, as soon as I got back from the shop. I finished knitting all the pieces on my commute by the end of July, just before going to Shetland for the In The Loop conference, but didn’t seam them together until October (and to tell the truth I didn’t seam most of it myself at all, as you may already know if you read my confession), or complete the finishing touches until November, and by that point I had to incorporate moth repair into the process, as the blighters had nibbled the neck edge in the intervening months. Then what with the dwindling light levels of late, I didn’t manage to photograph it until today, as either the weekends have been too gloomy and unsuitable for photo shoots, or I haven’t succeeded in getting dressed before sunset (ahem). But hey, did anyone notice how I started and finished this whole project within seven months? As the self-professed queen of all things slow, that’s a wild success in my book!

It is a tiddly bit on the short side, and my mother says I should undo the ribbing and make the whole jumper longer, but I don’t want to. Partly because when I wear it with high-waisted skirts I don’t think it’s really a problem, and partly (mostly?) because I am downright stubborn and when I think something’s finished I don’t like to find I’m wrong. I am also a strong advocate against my mother’s unhealthy unknitting habit, so I suppose I am just putting my foot down out of principle. Additionally, foolish me made the sleeves ten rows longer than the pattern, because I didn’t take the actual position of the shoulder seams in relation to my shoulders into account when doing my calculations; but that’s fine, as I like having long sleeves that I can hide my hands inside when it’s cold.

I think it’s definitely safe to say that Kettlewell was a general overall success, with or without some minor setbacks depending on who you talk to. I’ve received several very kind compliments on it (though if one were feeling mean-spirited, one could say they don’t all count, seeing as I have a cheeky tendency to point out the fact that I made my jumper myself to my lucky companions, and wait for them to say how nice it is…), and I wear it all the time. It’s so wonderfully warm, it’s my new absolute favourite garment. May many more snuggly handknitted jumpers follow this one, is what I say.

the second skein

Maybe it’s something about this chill autumnal air, but after a two-year hiatus, I’ve been feeling a real urge to get my spin on again. Mostly I blame the juicy pictures of artfully-dyed fibre and freshly handspun yarn that I keep seeing on other people’s blogs, which make me so desirous of handspun yarn myself. (Alright, to some extent I can only blame myself for going out of my way to look for pictures of other people’s spinning…) I’m such a lover of all things woolly that there is little else that fills me with such lust than beautiful images of pure handspun loveliness. Except maybe pictures of dinner in recipe books. But that’s another matter. I think what really did it for me this time was something I discovered last week: WoolWench’s special Valentine’s yarn with crocheted hearts in. It’s stunning. I am so impressed by the patience and care that went into making this wondrous stuff.

Anyhow, at the weekend I found myself musing out loud about how lately I had been feeling more mentally prepared to start spinning again than I had done in a long time; then realised how ridiculous that sounded, and how I would never spin anything unless I actually sat down and did some spinning. So I fetched and dusted off my poor neglected spinning wheel and set to work. I picked up where I left off with the light grey Corriedale fibre that I was last using when I unintentionally gave up spinning two years ago, and spun until I had about half a bobbin’s worth. Then I started afresh on a new bobbin, and filled that one halfway too. And then I really went for it and plied the two together! Woah. All of a sudden Sunday became an unexpected spinning frenzy.

Fortunately, as I was pondering to myself on what to do next with my newest little beauty, I read the advice on the ever-wise Knitty about knitting with handspun yarn and discovered the importance of washing it first, before attempting anything else. I dutifully followed their instructions, and my yarn is hanging up to dry as I write. I quite enjoyed washing it, as putting it in hot water somehow made the yarn smell super sheepy and comforting. Maybe that’s not to everyone’s taste, but I liked it.

And now have a happy little 31g skein of very poorly spun light grey Corriedale, all ready to use. Initially I was hopeful that, if combined with my first ever skein of handspun yarn (that’s the one with the minty blue twist in the pictures) – of what I think was a mixture of undyed Wensleydale and Blue-faced Leicester for one ply and a light blue merino for the other – together that would be about enough to make a hat. But then I weighed the first ever skein and realised there are only about 14g in it, so I suspect that a whole grown-up sized hat might be pushing it. Which, I suppose, means I will just have to go and spin some more before I can go forth and create my crowning handmade, handspun masterpiece. Watch this space for further developments. But not too closely…

progress of sorts…

For a long time I have dreamed of taking a creative holiday at home; not going anywhere, just staying in and getting things done. For a serial project-starter such as myself, this has always sounded like the perfect solution to my ever increasing collection of unfinished things. Last week, since my usual partner in crime was away on a work trip to Germany, I had the perfect opportunity, and so scuttled back to my parents’ house in Oxford for an industrious week-long creative holiday with my ma, with a suitcase full of half-completed projects.

It was a very pleasant week indeed. We went for dog walks on Port Meadow (we even saw a snake, indulging in some unseasonal sunbathing); we went to the market – something I haven’t done in years – where I bought shiny pink sequins and my ma bought a spectacular matching red cape and skirt to transform into cushions (lamentably I couldn’t persuade her to just wear them as they were); we made an enormous pot of cassoulet to welcome in the cold weather; and we visited our local knitting and sewing shops (just to keep them in business, you understand) where I bought some silk to line a dress with and some wool to knit a Christmas present.

You could say that things didn’t quite work out as planned, however… My grand ambitions were foiled, and I was forced to scale down. I started the week gently (or so I thought) with an attempt to rectify my Jaywalker socks, which were coming out far too small. But when I started afresh to make them bigger, they just came out elephantine. So eventually I simply unravelled everything, and am now back to a ball of yarn with some needles in it. Ever so slightly more successful was my purple cardigan, whose tension was only mildly too tight (in spite of having done a tension square before starting). So although the end result was the same, i.e. I unravelled all the pieces, I did manage to achieve the right tension on bigger needles, so at least I know how to make it right the next time, which feels like some degree of progress.

I took two other knitting projects with me on this excursion: my Kettlewell jumper, which I finished knitting in July but haven’t had the heart to seam up, and my pink tweed shawl-collared sweater, which has been abandoned for years since I enlarged the armholes on the body and was then at a loss as to how to knit the sleeves to match. With the former, I came to a very agreeable deal with my mother in which she offered to seam my jumper if I would do her embroidery in return – which of course I did. I was feeling mighty pleased with myself for that little bit of negotiation, and was relieved to be so close to finally completing a jumper, until I came to finishing off the neck edging only to discover that the moths had got there first. So then I had to darn over a large area first, just to hold it together. Fingers crossed I’ve now put paid to those dastardly moths’ efforts to destroy my lovely jumper. Then with the latter, I haven’t actually made any physical progress, but thanks to my wise mama (who, like me, detests seaming knitting and will go to any lengths to avoid it) I have got the next move all planned out, and I think I understand how to go about knitting seamless, top-down set-in sleeves. This feels like a brave step, but easier than coming to terms with seaming in the long term.

It wasn’t a week of pure knitting, though – oh no. (I did say this was an ambitious week, didn’t I?) I also attempted to finish sewing my first ever skirt (I will have to write a separate blog post about that though, as it was an adventure all in itself), but only got as far as adding a zip (neatly – which I am extremely chuffed about about, I might add) and half of the waistband. So this is still languishing unfinished chez mes parents, awaiting my return when I can sew the other half of the waistband and hem it. Plus I also made a grand total of two lavender bags for Christmas presents before the sewing machine started acting up, and so I had to bring the rest of the material home again to finish; and the same goes for my great aunt’s needlepoint, which I had planned to turn into a cushion for her.

So at the end of the week, in spite of my best efforts and intentions, somewhat disappointingly I didn’t actually have a single finished item to show for myself. But I have made progress of sorts, even if it’s only to go back to the beginning of some projects, ready to start again (though I am unashamedly planning to re-set the start dates for those on Ravelry, to make them seem less never-ending), or to make a plan of attack for finishing others. I have all of about six inches of seaming left to do on the Kettlewell jumper now before it’s finished, which I think I can probably manage without assistance. And as for the rest, all I really need now is another creative week’s holiday!

*P.S. Any particularly astute or suspicious readers might notice that these photos of Oxford are not recent. I wholly admit that this is the case, but I was a bit stuck for visual material to accompany a whole post about not making things, since – as is to be expected – I don’t have any photos to show for that. You will have to wait for me to finish something first.

the four-year scarf

What’s the longest it has ever taken you to knit a scarf? My record so far is four years and seven months. I started said scarf in March 2009 and finished it last week. I would like to add, for the record, that I haven’t actually been knitting solidly all that time, in case anyone was beginning to worry that I really am a hopelessly lost cause. The actual time spent knitting the scarf was just a tiny fraction of those fifty-five long months; I’m sure I spent far more of that time knitting anything and everything else (for instance, most recently I’ve created a whole lace shawl from start to finish in just two months of train knitting alone). I still need to sort out the fringes, as they vary wildly in length and need a haircut, but I couldn’t resist wearing this scarf out a few times already. It’s the perfect autumn scarf – just right for this blustery weather of late – and though I say it myself, it looks great against my orange jumper in the autumn afternoon sunshine. I’m so glad I finished it at such a fitting time! For anyone wondering, the scarf in question is the Lascala scarf, by Danish knitwear designer Hanne Falkenberg.

The pattern looks a lot more complicated than it is: in fact you only ever knit with one colour at once, and slip the stitches of the other colour without knitting them. Simple as that is, I still managed to cock up a couple of things. Firstly, due to the enormous time lapse between knitting the two halves of the scarf (the pattern requires that you knit two identical strips and sew them together), my tension had relaxed so much in the meantime that the second half came out more than 10 cm longer than the first. Quite fascinating, when taken as a scientific experiment in knitting, though I’d rather I hadn’t discovered this in the process of creating a beautiful garment. But I suppose I’m lucky that this wasn’t a jumper, where the result might have been unwearable. Secondly, my 3 mm circular needle managed to spirit itself away into some other knitting during the course of the second half of the scarf, so the final border had to be knitted on needles 0.5 mm bigger than it should have been – but hey, no one except me is ever going to pay this scarf that much attention, so who cares. (And thirdly, I also botched the beginning of the seam between the two halves, but you didn’t hear that, OK?) On the bright side, I don’t actually think the varying tension is at all noticeable since joining the two halves together, and nor are the other faults. Phew!

Although I really admire Hanne Falkenberg’s designs, and I would love to make another one, it irks me that you can’t just buy the patterns – you have to buy them as kits. I’m not sure why. Maybe this is an obsessive person’s method of making sure that one’s designs always turn out just how one intended them? Or it’s a better means of making a living through knitwear design, as the mark-up on the yarn produces a more viable level of income? Maybe both? Whatever the case, I’m not always as taken with the colourways that these designs come in as I am with the designs themselves, and I would prefer to have the opportunity to choose the colours that I want to use myself. So I think it will be a little while before I invest in a second project of this kind, but you never know… next time I am feeling flush with cash…

While we’re on the subject of never-ending scarves, I realised I’ve got another scarf that’s a close contender to the first: I cast on my lacy Percy shawl a mere forty months ago, in June 2010 (look! this is where that sneaky 3 mm needle got to!), and although I’m significantly further through it now than when this picture was taken, I’m nowhere near finishing yet. Setbacks in this case include: the fact that the design involves lace patterning on both sides (no purl chillout rows in this one!), an unfortunate moth attack early on in its life, and leaving such long gaps between knitting it that I think I’ve messed up the pattern and now I can’t work out how to fix it. I can’t decide what to do with this project now, and am tempted just to unravel it. Then I can see how the prospect of starting again from scratch takes me, and act accordingly.

First, though, since finishing the Lascala scarf I’ve still got 92 g leftover of the Shetland yarn that it was made from, in all seven colours, so I think a less mind-boggling plan than attacking Percy afresh would be to make a sort of matching hat. I say sort of matching, as there is no way I would ever attempt to tackle those slip stitch zigzags if I had to incorporate decreases into the mix. I’m thinking of making a Fair Isle tam kind of a hat with the leftovers, which would match insofar as it would be made from the same colours, so the two would go well together and look as though they were related. But how many months this project will take remains to be seen. Don’t hold your breath!

a taste of east anglian life

One Saturday at the height of the summer, I went on a long-awaited trip to Stowmarket to visit the Museum of East Anglian Life. Outdoor museums are one of my absolute favourite things ever, so when I discovered a few years ago that there was one I hadn’t seen just down the road from me, I made up my mind to visit it while I still lived nearby. The trip involved trying out a whole new bit of train line that I had never been on before (always fun), and when we arrived in Stowmarket I realised that, museum aside, the town itself was very pretty and worth a visit. It was one of those really super-hot days, and the sun was shining like there was no tomorrow, so it was the best kind of day to visit anywhere. The station at Stowmarket is beautiful, with curly Dutch-style gabled roofs. Part of the station building was for sale at the time – it would have been tempting just to move in then and there.

Inside the museum, which is right in the centre of the town – just a ten-minute walk from the station – we soon discovered what an enormous range of different things are bundled into East Anglian life: everything from farming equipment to old reconstructed shops and workshops (including a huge, working printing press), to the largest collection of gypsy caravans that I’ve ever seen. Unfortunately I don’t have any pictures of those to share, but they were quite something. And then on top of all their usual exhibits, it just so happened that when we went to visit there was a bonus collection of quilts on show to boot! OK, I lie. In truth it was no accident – I knew this would happen all along, I just thought it would look like a more innocent suggestion for a daytrip if I neglected to mention the quilts. There were several great quilts there, and one really lovely one that I particularly liked made out of wool tweed fabrics, quilted in concentric circles:

I have always wanted to make a patchwork quilt out of wool fabric. I love these colours, and I’ve always thought it would make for a perfect autumn or winter throw (especially in times when I have dreamt of living in very cold places). But I also have to share a picture of another quilt, even though it wasn’t by any means my favourite, simply because the sentiment of this patch is one that I wholeheartedly agree with. Where on earth would we knitters and textile lovers be without the humble sheep? I commend the maker of this quilt on her well-placed respect.

And speaking of sheep, if like me you are a fan of these adorable but disappointingly nervous woolly creatures, I recommend so highly that you take a trip to the Museum of East Anglian Life, as it has in its grounds by far the friendliest sheep that I have ever encountered, anywhere. These sheep were so great: they actually came running towards us as we approached their enclosure, and they even allowed themselves to be stroked! How many times does that happen with sheep? In fact, their inquisitive nature meant that they were quite hard to photograph, as they were quite keen to get intimately acquainted with my camera through the fence. I ended up with many pictures just of bits of sheep face, taken far too close-up. This was more along the lines of what I was looking for:

I also recommend the rabbits, while you’re there. Always happy to be fed the greener grass from the other side of the fence. We got along super well.

We also saw inside lots of old buildings, had a lovely walk along a riverside, and finished off the day with ice creams in the sunshine. So all in all, it was a great day out, and one that I would recommend to anyone in striking distance of Stowmarket. Or even anyone who’s not – the sheep are really worth it.

pattern extravaganza

This afternoon I had the pleasure of receiving three new sewing patterns in the post! Normally such a purchase could be said to go against the order of frugality (which is, sadly, the order of the season). But the whole reason that I was lured into buying these in the first place is because a bad influence at work pointed me towards this irresistible pattern sale, and who was I to turn down the opportunity to buy three new dress patterns for less than £5? I don’t think I’ve ever actually bought a paper pattern before, so today was a momentous occasion. My mother bought me one once, when I was a teenager or younger, which I’m ashamed to say I still haven’t used, and other than that I have only ever pilfered one from my mother (albeit with her permission). So this was today’s joy:

Earlier this year, I embarked on my first attempt at following that same pilfered sewing pattern. It was for a skirt, and since I chose to make my creation more complicated than the pattern intended, it’s still not finished. This is why (apart from the obvious, i.e. because I am the world’s worst blogger) it hasn’t yet seen the light of day on this blog. But the aim is, she says boldly, to rectify all that next week and finish said skirt, and tell the world about it. And then I can get started on my second daring sewing adventure! I’m not sure yet which it will be out of the two different summer dresses, smart work dress or jacket. Whatever the choice, I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I don’t make a hash of it, but the encouraging ‘Yes! It’s easy’ labels on every one of these patterns is filling me with absolute confidence in the run-up to the big leap…