Mobile for son

I had some plain felted balls left-over from the winter experiments in felting, so my daughter and I decided to turn them into fish by wet-felting some colour onto them and adding organza tails.

I also had few shells from the bag of broken jewelery I bought years ago at a charity shop. Quick trip to the hardware shop to get the last ingredient that we needed (wooden dowel rod) and the fish mobile was created to hang above the changing mat.

Now I need to make a bird mobile for my daughter - the room she is moving into doesn't have much space, therefore I'll have to come up with something small, yet interesting.

Dancing to fun music

Katya and I spent five days mostly in bed or on the couch due to the horrible flu. Today in the morning, when we felt significantly better and had some energy, I couldn’t resist giving Katya one of the items that was supposed to go into her stocking – Dan Zanes and Friends’ CD Family Dance. It turned out to be great for dancing and jumping around and being totally silly. Who can resist being silly to the “All around the kitchen”? Here is the video of it from their YouTube channel:

(BTW did you notice the orange dress in the video? I definitely need to learn to sew so I can make one like that for myself as I totally love it.)

And according to Dan Zanes & Friends website they are coming to London in February – maybe we can go and see them live and be silly in public.

I want to ramble on about music for kids, cloth for boys and sewing, but I better go and see if I can make five stockings in the next 32 hours.

Knitting in the round

I was looking after my friend’s son on Saturday, so spent most of the Sunday feeling that it was the first day of the weekend, which may explain why I totally forgot to write the usual post with a quote. Ironically enough on Monday my husband stayed home due to a bad cold and I managed to complete a number of the boring household tasks only to end up with a splitting headache by the end of the day. The only cure for which was to go to bed early preventing me again from blogging or crafting.

Anyhow on Saturday I was very glad to discover that I can now knit (albeit very simple things) and look after two toddlers. I too clearly remember the time just two years ago when I needed extremely quiet and peaceful environment to manage knitting few stitches without getting horribly confused or knitting them a wrong way, which meant that knitting was reserved for evenings and progressed dreadfully slowly.

The two balls knitted from leftover Noro Kureyon Sock following the pattern from Itty-Bitty Toys by Susan B. Anderson are my small addition to a hat requested by a very good friend.

The hat (pattern by Ginny) was so easy to knit and will hopefully help me break my fear of attempting to knit wearable items. I’m so much dreaming of knitting socks for myself as my feet keep on getting too cold every time I go outside this winter.

Unlucky for my sock-knitting plans upon seeing the little hat my daughter requested I’ll knit her one (multi-coloured, orange and red and yellow) and when we looked on Ravelry to find the perfect pattern, she also requested another hat, a toy and a vest. And wait, she also wants four knitted balls, not three as requested previously. Hopefully I have enough Noro Kureyon Sock yarn left, as most of it was used up in knitting a long rainbow snake.

I'm glad my daughter likes it despite the fishy face, which is result of me improvising instead of following a pattern, .

My husband also wants a beanie hat – light brown with orange and blue stripes, but thankfully is happy to wait. So maybe, just maybe, by next winter we’ll all have hand-knitted hats and socks to keep us extra warm.

I’m back (yet again)

I took this photo of the snow and a robin planning to wish you all Merry Christmas, only to discover on trying to upload it that our Internet router died completely. And then we went to Cape Town at the exact time when I needed to escape the multiple levels of confusion, stress and self-doubt, in which I was slowly wrapping my everyday life. And there, having time to sit still without thoughts of n0t-done housework and ever-growing ToDo lists nagging at the back of my mind; I achieved some sort of clarity and found some answers. They were scattered like little gemstones through watching the children play joyfully and freely, the sincere warmth of family and friends, slow evening conversations and accidental book choices. Ah, I discovered that looking through my sister-in-law’s books is a dangerous activity for someone who already has too many dreams and interests. I finally got to read up on permaculture and now want to attempt to grow a bit more than just carrots.

Carrots - August 2009

After glancing through a book on cob building I’m dreaming of building a small round house for my studio one day. And do I really need the desire to try out Papier Mache for the first time in my life when I’m already struggling to figure out how to find time to practice crochet, knitting, drawing, sewing?

And then we were back to London covered in snow and grey clouds and somehow this time the subdued colours of my surroundings didn’t trigger the feelings of dejection and gloom, but made me feel at home. And yet, in Cape Town from the first breath of warm air I felt sharply homesick for Australia.

Eucalyptus leaves in Cape Town

Home is where the heart is. Sometimes it feels like my heart is shattering into ever smaller and smaller fragments, but I also know it is getting filled by being able to observe the beauty of so many different places and various people.

And eventually the Internet was fixed and I am back here. But I have a chest infection and am on antibiotics for a week, which are making me feel very weak and worse than the infection did on its own. I haven’t made any New Year’s resolutions regarding regular blogging, so no promises about the next time I’ll write.

Russian honey cake

I'm not sure why I decided it will be fun to try to bake a proper cake for the first time in my life with a help of a toddler.

I ended up feeling rather stressed, the kitchen was covered in flour, but the 15 Layer Russian Honey Cake turned out OK (even though ours has only 8 layers).

A Russian food blogger calls a very similar cake "younger simpler brother of the traditional honey cake", but after reading her traditional recipe (in Russian) I doubt I'll find enough courage to try making it. Yet, it is my favourite cake, so maybe...

Summer week

This week I was grateful for the shade these trees provide.

After two damp grey summers I'm glad to have a lot of sunny days to enjoy, but at the same time I'm realistic about my ability to deal with heat, which is pretty low. So we mostly stayed at home playing in the new sandpit, splashing in the tiny paddling pool and enjoying picnics on the newly made picnic rug (Tutorial is over here).

All week I was planning to make a skirt for Katya and maybe one for myself, but at the end of each day I didn't want to be anywhere near a hot iron. Eventually over the weekend with the help of the intended recipient and following very clear, detailed and illustrated tutorial from Erin of House on Hill Road I made the Strawberry skirt.
Actually the Picnic Blanket tutorial is also Erin's - she writes great ones, specially good for beginners like me, who have to be told all the steps. Maybe I should make her Sunny Day Dress or Top? Or maybe I should start thinking about autumn and knit Them Apples cardigan? I'm still a horribly slow knitter due to the lack of practice. I was thinking a lot lately about my inability to concentrate on one craft, yet with every new skill learned the more I notice the relationships between various things; the easier it becomes to pick up a new skill; the more appreciation and understanding I have for the work of others and the more I want to learn. Maybe one day something will capture my interest and hold it for the rest of my life, but even exploring the depths of one area I'll always keep in mind words attributed to Socrates:

The more you learn, the more you realize how little you know.

In last few weeks

Was it really more than a month without posts? But I guess you know how it is – I didn’t post for few days and there were more and more topics I wanted to write about, so I kept on postponing until tomorrow and with every day it was getting harder and harder to find time to sit down and start typing.
It’s been busy few weeks:
We painted the guest room, which will become the study/studio at the end of this summer. Katya helped, so it took much longer than expected.

I finally made something from Weekend Sewing book by Heather Ross - one headscarf for me and one for my daughter. I'm planning to make few other things from that book, maybe even next week.

Paul from Oz and his lovely girlfriend stayed with us and on their departure gave Katya a box of LEGO DUPLO . She loves playing with it and so do I.

Few other friends were in London for few days, but we didn't get to spend as much time with them as we would like.

My mum managed to get to our house despite Tube (underground) strike and spent three weeks with us. Every morning she managed to tempt Katya into hairbrushing by promise of braids.

We went to Chatham Dockyards and Maritime museum at Greenwich, which reminded me that I find naval (especially Arctic exploration) history fascinating.

While my mum babysat, my husband and I went to Browns for high afternoon tea (delicious, relaxing and fascinating part of English culture) and to see new Star Trek movie, which made me want to run away from home to join Starfleet.

I got a box of books at the Amnesty International book sale and one of them, Mog in The Dark by Judith Kerr, became Katya's new favourite. I'm so glad I no longer have to read "Railway Series" stories everyday.

We are slowly adding plants to our garden, but I came to accept that it will take years to get it to the harmonious state.
Katya seem to like wakeing up shortly after sunrise - it's not too bad during long London winter nights, but is pretty early (even for me) in summer. Tomorrow she'll be up at around 5:30, it's almost 10pm now and so it's time for me to go off to bed. Sweet dreams to you all.

Handbag love

I love handbags. The people, who know me in real life, may express disbelieve at this statement as I own few and buy new ones very rarely. But I do. The problem is the ones I love are usually too expensive or too impractical or often both. I like unique bags that are outlandish, full of colour, texture, embroidery, images, stories. One day, when I learn all the skills I'm aiming to, I may be able to create few perfect ones for myself. For now I couldn't resist making this cute buttercup bag, even though it is too small to be really useful for me now - I need a bag that will hold at least a ball, a kids book, sunscreen and lunch for the Little Girl and myself.

After I finished making it I stumbled on to a tutorial, which explains how to modify the original free pattern to include a zip - maybe I'll make another bigger one.

From pincushion to toy

I needed a pin cushion for a long time and last week I finally made one using the tutorial by UK Lass in US.



Of course a day later it was abducted by my daughter to be used as a plaything, so I'll have to make another one for myself. There are so many to choose from:
- matching pear one from UK Lass in US
- yummy tomato one from Martha Stewart
- simple, yet cute toadstool, square or hexagon one from Kootoyo (she even has videos of how to make them)
- adorable tiny bottelcup one from Very Big Jen (check out the ones she made)

But I should remember do something really boring to avoid the upgrade of its pincushion status to the toy one.