Chatiryworld

Sew your own Chatiryworld

My Clothkits dolls pictured above are both over 25 years old, and looking a bit faded but new Clothkits is now selling the kits for Kitty and Polly, as well as Kitty's brother Kit.  You can also get their new range of cloth dolls as well, I've got the tea towel version.  I'll probably make it after the wedding when I can think about other things again.  Plus at some point I would love to make myself the Rob Ryan skirt.

Catching up

So last weekend was spent down at my mum's in Yorkshire.  I took the opportunity to have a little hen lunch with two of my sisters, two of my cousins and two of my friends at Browns in Leeds.  I was able to join in the cocktail fun with a mocktail, which pleased me, and we all ate delicious and filling food.  I had a vegetable tart and shared some chips with my sister Ellen.  We couldn't resist pudding and I went for chocolate ice cream that was served with a cookie.  I didn't finish it.  It was really lovely to sit back, relax, chat and eat some good food, so thank you for coming ladies.

On Sunday afternoon my mum drove Ellen, Martha and I to one of my favourite places, Saltaire.  I haven't been since I moved up here so it was great to get reacquainted with Salts Mill and see how much the shops in the main street had changed.  No more second hand bookshop, but plenty of vintage places.  We went to a craft and vintage fair at Victoria Hall, complete with cafe serving from pretty teasets (despite not drinking tea I do like a nice teaset).  The fair had some good stalls, and some not so good, and I was pleased to see that Hannah Nunn (whose lamp I blogged about a while back) had a stall, also selling tealight holders and vases by Karin Eriksson.  We had a little mooch in the shops in the mill before heading home.  If it hadn't been so cold I would have taken more photos of the village.  It's a planned industrial village in the same ilk as New Lanark, only less touristy (which is not to say that it isn't touristy, it just doesn't have the big attractions that New Lanark does). 

I had a great weekend but it was wonderful to see Jon again back in Edinburgh.  He'd spent the weekend in Brighton.

Sea change

Just going through my pile of magazines to see which ones I can live without (and give to Jon's mum and sister to read on the train).  One of them is the October 2008 edition of Coast, which has got to be one of the most self-indulgent magazines out there, but I like it.  There's a photo shoot that's themed around a lovely poem by Cromarty poet Jane Verburg, Sea Change.  You can read it over at Cromarty: Living by the sea.  I think it sums up living by the sea very well.

Fit Sheffield in your pocket

WeLiveHere have brought out these cool tilt-shift postcards of Sheffield.  Some of them may look ugly, but they are classic Sheff landmarks.  Some people would have you believe that Sheffield is a dump, don't listen to them, it's not.  There are some gorgeous buildings, loads of parks, great facilities and a fantastic community.

I like lights - part 2

I think I found the wooden forest lamp I had been trying to find online the other day.

I like lights

Sunjar

Toorde Boontje candle shade

Our Crowd lamp

Here's some lamps I'd like to own:

Hannah Nunn Allium lamp

Habitat Moon pendant

Moon in My Room, yes, I seem to like moon lamps.

Couldn't get a photo, but I like this rabbit nighlight, reminds me a bit of one I had as a child.  I was also hoping to find the lamp I saw in the window of Entrading in Glasgow on Sunday but I'm struggling to find it anywhere.  It's wooden, with a tree carved out to let light through, a bit like the Hannah Nunn lamp above.

Even if I had the money to indulge my lamp addiction, I have nowhere to put them all.  Yesterday I got a copy of the fabulous book Enough by John Naish, which is a very inspirational read.  Buying several lamps you actually have no use for definitely goes against the message of the book.  But one day we will need more lamps, when we live in our own house, one that doesn't come with about 67 lamps included in the rent every month.  Then I can indulge.

Useful christmas presents

After having read In Praise of Slow and Enough this year, I've decided to aim to give people useful presents.  I don't mean boring presents, I mean thinking about what the person might use.  Chocolate and other edibles are good, because people eat them, things like soap and candles are fine if you know the person will want them.  Of course I may totally fail and buy stuff that I think is useful for someone but they totally disagree.  I'm not perfect. 

But what would be useful for me?  Here's some things I've come up with, yes, partly to help family, but also to help us think a bit more about useful presents.  I'd love to know what your list of useful presents would be.

Muji travel slippers - I like wearing slippers and but don't always want to take them away with me, using up vital luggage space.  These seem like the answer.

Liz Earle handcream - I'm a pale northerner with dry skin, handcream is always useful and Liz Earle stuff is gorgeous.  Useful yet also a bit of a luxury.

Big Onya - I love my Onya bag, it fold up much smaller than most reusable bags, but sometimes it's not quite big enough.  But now there's a Big Onya, hurrah!

Soft foam play mat - Why the hell is this useful for someone with no kids?  It's incredibly useful for knitters as you can use them for blocking your work.  I'm going to need something like this when it comes to blocking the wedding shawl.

Spring bulbs - For one reason or another I didn't get around to buying and planting bulbs this autumn so those planting gift sets that you see in shops and think are a bit of a cop out, well, I would appreciate them this year.

What would your useful presents be?  Plus, apologies to my family if the presents I get you aren't useful, this is the first year I've tried it.

Fantasising

This gorgeous place in Stromness, Orkney is my current dream home.  Considering it's a waterfront home it's got a pretty amazing garden that doesn't seem to have been blown away.  The owners must know what they're doing. 

Hmm...

Choice

You can either go and look at a selection of gorgeous calendars or read an interesting article about stopping fundies getting into schools in the UK.

Or you could read both.  I did.

Stripy kids!

I've got an obsession with stripy clothes for kids at the moment.  Possibly because I was asked to knit a stripy jumper for one of my little friends and it made me think more than ever just how cute stripes are on kids.

This mosaic shows stripy clothes from The White Company (stripy dress and tights), People Tree (stripy babygro and hat) and Green Baby (stripy leggings and tshirt).

I wanted the mosaic to feature clothes from Swedish company Polarn O. Pyret, who have a concession in Jenners in Edinburgh. They don't let Big Huge Labs access their images though and I couldn't be doing with copying and all that carry-on.  Had my mum been aware of their existence when my sisters and I were small, I am sure she would have wanted to buy up all their stock (subject to some kind of lottery win) because she loves stripy clothes.  I remember when Ellen and Martha were little Mothercare did a range of different coloured stripy clothes, I think Ellen had some stripy tights and a stripy skirt and Martha had a stripy jumper with matching one-colour dungarees.  I think I've now inherited this love.  If I couldn't knit I would get P.OP clothes as presents for friends and family's new babies.  I'm pretty sure the little girl next door has some clothes from there.

Not to everyone's taste, but Craft alerted me to the pattern for these 'keep baby warm' leggings.  I think you'd want the rest of the outfit to be plain but this is a great way to dress in stripes and show off Regia sock yarn, if you are 3 months old that is.

Finally, these aren't stripy, just very cute, noticed on a bridesmaid dress spotting online excursion, are these knickerbockers and this coat from Monsoon.  If you have a daughter under 3 I order you to buy them.