Snail Cosy

I know, I've been a bit 'AWOL' lately but I had a good excuse- the horror that is moving house :/

But I'm back and thought I would share my snail cosy. I made this one for my Mum's 50th birthday because she has an odd obsession with snails. 

I first tried following this pattern but I couldn't quite get my head around the pattern and the Double Pointed Needles. So instead I used the simple cozy from the Really Wild Tea Cosies book and added the other bits.

So what did the snail say while riding on a turtle's back?

Kitty Wisdom #2

So I thought in this week's Kitty Wisdom I'd share a bit of what's going on with me. 

As many of my friends may know I have been having severe back issues/pain since July and have received every treatment under the sun with no result. Every specialist told me it was something different from an injured disc to tendonitis of the connecting tissues, chore strength problems and neurological issues. But nothing helped.

Finally last week a doctor made a diagnoses. Apparently I have Fibromyalgia. This is a chronic pain disease which unfortunately doesn't have a cure- only management. Widespread ongoing tissue pain, headaches/migraines, fatigue, depression, memory/concentration issues and sleep problems- it's all there. Good fun! 

So basically I am being forced to look after myself better- reducing stress and workload, looking after my diet, hydrotherapy, massage etc. 

My work has been wonderful and shortly I will begin working from home once we move to our new house. I find out this week if I've been successful in my application to study Veterinary Science which will be a challenge, but I am looking forward to using my brain again. 

So this week's Kitty Wisdom is about looking after yourself. Because: 

A new project

A New Year, the first of many new projects! 

Here's a sneek peek... Can you guess what it could be?

Some lovely recycled yarn from the op shop

Quality control and yarn approval... tick!

Knitting's always more fun when you have nice painted nails to look at I think :)

Stay tuned for the end result! 

A Lesson Learnt...

So I have recently taken up sewing bits and bobs thanks to the wonderful generosity of my Aunty Penny giving me a machine. 

I'm just kind of learning as I go with the guidance of my all-knowing Mummy and making things I think are cool. 

When I was in Barcelona we stubbled across this little shop with handmade goods and I found a bag made from recycled materials that I loved and bought. It was so simple in design but such a great slouchy type day bag. 

So for Christmas I was making everyone something and decided to make my two soon to be sister-in-laws a bag each, like this one. 

I cut a rough pattern off my bag and just fiddled and adjusted things as I went. 

This was the first one I made. Everything about the bag is recycled (except the thread) with the fabrics coming from Reverse Garbage.

If you look real close you'll notice the issue :/

All was well (wasn't too happy with my dart placements) but finished it none the less. 

When making the final touches I gave it a last quick iron to make the flap, flop over a bit more. 
Alas, I had the iron up to hot and as it was a plasticky type upholstery fabric, it melted. 

I tried to cover it up with various things like buttons and brooches. My mum even tried with bits of doily, but it just wasn't the same. 

Lesson Learnt- keep the iron low and test it first!!!!

I forgot to take photos of the other bags I made them, so I will have to ask them to take some! 

Kitty Wisdom #1

I learn a lot about life, behaviour and coping from animals. They're not so different to us yet are infinitely wiser in their simplicity. 

Kitty Wisdom will share some of those things they understand better than we do. 

I find this one hard. I have never known when to stop or when it's too much until it's too late. In the end I always deliver and always do it well but then often my health, as it is at the moment, pays the price. Looking forward I will try to remember balance and boundaries. The only balancing these guys need to worry about is Gandalf trying not to fall off the bed- which he often fails at poor little guy. 

I'm a little teapot... I mean Dinosaur!

This little one was my gift to my big brother for his 30th birthday. It may seem strange as a man's gift, but it was perfect for him. 

I'm not quite sure where I got the idea from but searched the web and couldn't find any dinosaur tea cosies out there- so I set to making up my own. I used a generic tea cosy pattern from the book Really Wild Tea Cosies and then just kind of made up the little spikes. The cosy is knitted in the round on 2 sets of circular needles and the spikes are crocheted. 

I debated whether to add legs etc but I just like the simplicity of it like this. He was very pleased :)

Gingerbread House Adventures

This Christmas Season I discovered the fun of making Gingerbread houses! In total I made 2 full size and 1 mini one and I am definitely all gingerbread-ed out for the year. 

Gingerbread House Take 1

The first I made was to raffle off for the charity I work for. It was the first one I have ever made and was definitely a learning experience! I scoured the net for recipes and ideas and ended up using this recipe for the dough and this template for the various pieces. 

Some things I learnt: 

• When it says to roll the dough out to 5mm ROLL THE DOUGH OUT TO 5mm... not thicker. Not only do you run out of dough but the pieces are very heavy and harder to work with.
• The dough itself was quite sticky to work with and kept sticking to the rolling pin
• To stick the walls together I used Nestle's white chocolate melts. The trick though is to melt it and then leave it until it's the consistency of putty before using, otherwise it's too runny and doesn't set in time to hold the pieces together.
• I used Royal Icing from the supermarket to do the piping details but I wasn't happy with the look of it. On my next houses I simply used chocolate for everything. 
• Go cray with the white chocolate and Icing sugar- it will hide all multitude of sins!

Gingerbread House Take 2

I took those lessons and set about making another house for our family Christmas.

This time I decided to use a different gingerbread recipe as the first one used honey instead of golden syrup so wasn't as caramel-ly tasting as I would have liked. I once again took to the internet but found it difficult to find a 'Gingerbread House' recipe that sounded tasty- they all seemed to be more functional/structural focussed. So I took a risk and used this recipe which is just for gingerbread cookies. I didn't know how much it would make so i did a double batch and turned out getting one full size house, one half size house and 2 trays of cookies out of it!

It was the centrepiece of our Christmas Eve celebrations and was destroyed with an empty bottle of Asti!

This Time:

• For some reason the templates printed smaller than the first time without me realising but it was still plenty big enough for 8 of us with plenty left over.
• The dough was easy to work with when rolling and was absolutely delicious! Just the right amount of spice and everyone commented on how tasty it was. 
• The only problem was that the pieces were a bit softer than the first recipe and 2 broke when I was transferring them off the hot trays but that was easily fixed by gluing them back together with chocolate. 
• I made my own Royal Icing with this recipe but again I liked the look and workability of the chocolate better. 

As I mentioned previously I did make a half sized one which was for my Grandma who was stuck quarantined in her nursing home over Christmas due to a Norovirus outbreak. She didn't get it luckily but it was horrible because Christmas is her favourite time of the year and she couldn't get out to be with her family. So I made her the little house, which she loved, but I forgot to take photos! Oops! To make the mini one I just used the same template but cut a 2cm border off each edge of each template piece.

I think of the two, I prefer the decorations of the first one, because as it was larger it was less cramped and could fit more/looks neater. The 'G' on the front of the family house is personalised  for our last name 'Glanville'

So the moral of the story is:

• make sure you get a tasty recipe
• use chocolate instead of icing
• make sure your pieces aren't too thick

All in all it's really not that hard- just time consuming and fiddly- but the looks on everyone's face when they see them and the joy they bring when destroying and eating is definitely worth it!