Has it been that long already...

I knew when I started this blog that I was unlikely to update it as often as I planned, but this is ridiculous! I really had intended to update a bit more regularly than this, but sometimes I guess life just gets in the way.

So what's kept me away for so long, well, knitting, knitting, some sewing with felt, knitting & a bit of card making. That's just on the craft front, obviously the full time job & 2 year old daughter have also had something to do with it.

Don't really know where to start, there has been so much going on. I guess a good place would be the knitting group, which I'm pleased to report is going really well. We're still meeting on the 2nd Monday of every month and membership is growing, albeit at what I like to think of as a steady pace. Once we had a few meetings under our belt it came time to think of a name for ourselves and much racking of brains and knitting related punning went on.

In the end, it was the fact that a few of our members are more sewers than knitters that inspired a more inclusive choice of name and the 'Urban Craft Collective' was born. For those of us familiar with music of the 90's the name seems to kind of stick in the brain as you subconsciously start humming "I've got the key, I've got the secret.." and wonder whatever did happen to the Urban Cookie Collective.

Our group outing to the Create and Craft show I mentioned in the last blog, although a very nice day out, did leave us all feeling slightly let down. There weren't much in the way of knitting stalls & a lot of what was on sale was quite twee (but twee in an icky sugary way, not a Cath Kidston-esque elegantly twee kind of way) and so it got us to thinking, surely we could better ourselves. It turns out we had all pondered on the idea of having a go at doing a stall ourselves over the years but time constraints of actually getting enough stock together had generally stopped us in our tracks. It seemed like a bit of a missed opportunity with a group of such multi-talented crafters like ourselves though & so before you knew it we'd kicked around the idea of all clubbing our efforts together & I was hunting down an appropriate craft fair for our first foray into retail.

A bit of digging on the net & I soon discovered a company who were organising a fair as part of the Hope St Feast in Liverpool which seemed like a good place to start and so a booking form was sent off & with a couple of months to go the knitting started in earnest.

Prior to deciding to do the stall & having to come up with ideas for what kind of stuff might sell, I'd had a couple of kids birthdays to make stuff for. It was my niece & nephews birthdays respectively, nephews first & his love of dinosaurs meant this was the perfect gift for him:

I bought the pattern from Etsy & it involved knitting in the round & shaping. I have to confess this finished dino is actually the second attempt as my first effort was truly awful. So awful in fact I couldn't bring myself to take any pics, although perhaps I should of done in case I ever need to look at something to give me a good laugh.

The other pressie was for my niece and was a lovely little felt bunny made with a kit my Mum had bought me as a gift when we were at the craft show. It was the first time I'd made a toy with felt and I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed it. Felt is such a great material to work with, it's very tolerant as it doesn't fray when you cut it & yet very soft & easy to sew. Although the little bunny was pretty cute when she was finished, it felt a bit like it was missing something, so I freestyled a dress for her, with an appliqued daisy on the front, which worked out as a really nice finishing touch. I did take a pic of her, but I took it with my Mum & Dad's camera & haven't got round to getting them yet, so I will stick a pic up if I ever get round to doing that.

I also had another very important present to make, which was for my Mum's birthday. I really wanted to knit something for her, but as her birthday is in June it needed to be something light weight. I found a lovely wool, Patons Morocco, which I thought could be nice, but as it's quite textured I needed to find the right pattern. After a lot of experimenting, I finally settled on a pattern which looked a bit like a wave and set to making a scarf. Sadly I ran out of time before it was quite as long as I would like it to be, but it was still nice and it felt great to be able to give a truly handmade gift to Mum as I knew she would appreciate the effort that had gone in to it.

So once the gifts were done my attention turned to the upcoming stall. I reasoned that with only a couple of months to get stuff made I needed to be making stuff which was relatively quick & cost effective. Neck warmers seemed to be the way forward, rarely using more than 1 skein of wool & generally knitted up in 1 -2 nights. I spent quite a lot of time experimenting with various patterns until I found the right ones. Eventually a herringbone design & also a really clever pattern for a flower scarf/headband raised themselves to the dizzy heights of the chosen ones.

I had also been inspired by the felt bunny and wanted to do a bit more with felt. The bunny took a couple of nights to make and I wanted something a bit quicker so I thought some felt animal ornaments could work. Throughout the summer I had become a bit obsessed with all things owl and so inspiration was easy to come by for my first ornament. Realising not everyone might be as owl obsessed as me I also branched out (ha ha, a bit of accidental punning there) into elephants & butterfly's.

I'd also decided that I was gonna need to pick a name for my little craft venture and this proved to be just as difficult as trying to decide on a name for the group, in fact maybe even worse. I'd come up with several possibly candidates, the first was Boo Bear Balina, a nickname for our daughter, but it just didn't sit right & so my second choice was 'What Katie Did', but a quick google search turned up the fact that it's a range of lingerie by Katie Price, not really the kind of association I was looking for. I kept kicking around variations on names including the word Boo as I really wanted my daughter to be represented in the name because she is an important part of why I am trying to do something more with my life & then my lovely husband John suggested "True Boo". I loved it straight away & so it stuck.

Next came the search for a logo and once again Etsy provided the answer. I found a wonderful shop called 'Run Ellie Run' in which a talented designed called Dana has a number of designs for rubber stamps which included a too cute image of two owls, a big one and a little one, sitting on the branch. It immediately captured my attention & a few e-mails later the design for my new logo was sorted & a rubber stamp ordered.

As the stall grew closer I began to get a bit panicky that I hadn't made enough stuff and that the other girls might be struggling too, but I needn't have worried, everyone did the most amazing work. My Mum (Jenny) especially was an absolute legend, she really threw herself full force into getting stuff made & ended up with a wonderful assortment of hats, scarves, fingerless mitts & bags. Jenny had focussed on buying really nice quality wool in wonderful colour ways & the end result was a dazzling array of expertly knitted accessories.

The other girls concentrated on fabric crafts & we were lucky enough to be able to ultimately display a great variety of items including some inspired felt birds with an ingeniously concealed tape measure, stunning padded lap top covers, felt & crocheted brooches, beautiful hand made buttons, fabric keyrings & gorgeous bags.

The day ended up being a great success & we all had a lot of fun doing it so it's onwards and upwards for us all & the next stall is already being planned. I can't help but dream of a future of part time work balanced with a successful craft enterprise, but I'm desperately trying to keep that in check & just concentrate on one stall at a time for now.

So if you fancy coming along, you'll need to buy tickets for Becher Race Day at Aintree Race Course on Sun 21st November & you'll find us running a stall at the Christmas Craft Fair (http://www.aintree.co.uk/pages/autumn-winter-racing-weekends-sunday-21st-november/)

In the meantime, check out some pics from the last stall:

The stall was done just in time for me to turn my attentions to another gift, a present for our friend's daughters' Christening. When another of my friends had seen the felt animal ornaments I'd made, she'd suggested that it might be worth having a go at making some felt letters as they have the advantage that people will often buy more than one to make up a word. It's was a great idea and provided the inspiration for a nice Christening gift, her name spelt out in felt letters. I had this image in my head of the letters being hung from buttons attached to a length of ribbon so decided to give it a go. It was really fun to make, choosing individual colours and adornments for each letter. I was pretty pleased with the result, which ended up like this:

Knitting group-tastic!

Yay! It was the inaugral meeting of our new knitting group last night and what a lovely evening it was. Being surrounded by lovely ladies, with the gentle clack clack clack of knitting needles in the background was a real pleasure.

I have to confess I didn't get much actual knitting done, but I think that was mainly because I was trying to get a new project started, so I've made a personal comittment to have a project underway next time, which I can then just pick up and carry on with.

We've decided to get together on the second Monday of every month, and to be honest I can't wait for the next one.

In the meantime, we've got a group outing to a Hobby exhibition planned to keep our thirst for all things knitting quenched and our purses empty :-)

Before I go, I just want to say thank you to all the ladies who turned out. In particular Clare, who had run a marathon in Paris the day before. Turning out to a knitting group the day after a marathon, now that's dedication to your hobby!

Bunnies and cards and holidays and lobsters and trees and tantrums

Phew! Where to start, it's been a very busy few weeks. Well firstly, as promised in my last blog here is a picture of the rabbit I made for my friend's daughter's birthday.

If I'm being completely honest it's not my favourite thing I've made so far. I followed the pattern to the letter, but if I was to do it again I'd make the ears a bit bigger and more floppy and would use different eyes in an attempt to up the cuteness factor. I was up against a bit of a tight deadline on this one (as ever) so didn't have time to order any other eyes, but if I'd of thought about it more clearly at the time I could of embroidered some instead. Ah well, you live and learn.

Hot on the heels of the bunny was my top secret project! A lobster for my husband to be given as part of a gift for our 1 year wedding anniversary. Why a lobster you may ask? Well I figured nothing says love better than a woolen representation of a sea creature. Nah, ok, so there is a bit more of a back story to it than that. We've been together for many years now and although it took us quite a while to get round to getting married (what, come on, an 11 year engagement isn't that long is it!?) we've always said that we are each other lobsters, because we saw on a nature documentary once that lobsters mate for life and walk along the sea floor claw in claw - awww. I even included a reference to being John's lobster in my wedding vows, so it seemed somewhat appropriate.

Here is said lobster:



Knitting this was my first foray into 'knitting in the round' and it was by far my most complicated project to date. I was pretty daunted by the pattern at first, but a quick visit to the font of all knitting knowledge (my Mum) and some kind words of wisdom and encouragement later I gathered together some confidence, knuckled down and got knitting. It was really really fiddly and I made a quite a few mistakes along the way, pincers going in the wrong direction (which I then unpicked and corrected), one eye bigger than the other (which I chose the leave, feeling it added to the charm) but I learnt loads doing it and was really chuffed with the end result. His eyes are not only slightly different sizes, but also a bit wonky, but again I kind of liked that so left them wonky.

John seemed to like him and dubbed him 'Larry'. There was some debate about where Larry was to live as John's initial thought was to take Larry to work to sit on his desk. It was an incredibly sweet thought, but working in an office full ofblokes I thought that may well lead to a great deal of mickey taking, so it was ultimately decided Larry could perch atop John's prized possession (his X-Box) instead.

The picture behind the lobster is the other part of the present. It's a vintage map of County Galway, showing Kinvara, the place we spent our wonderful honeymoon. The beautiful tree frame was made by my work colleague and good friend Ken, who is in his spare time a very talented carpenter. The theme of our wedding was trees (hence the tree) and the traditional present for a 1st wedding anniversary is apparently paper (hence the map). Ken was quite nervous embarking on this project, as he hadn't made anything like that before and was worried it might turn out a bit like a GCSE project, but I was blown away when he brought it in for me, it's a really stunning piece of craftsmanship.

This in turn led on to another project, a thank you card for Ken. This was made slightly tricky by the fact that I couldn't tell hubby what I was making a card for, without telling him why I needed to give Ken a thank you card, so I had to make a few cards and say I was just experimenting with ideas to try and cover my tracks. I think I got away with it, but he's wiley that husband of mine so there is a good chance he was a little suspicious. Anywhoo, trees seemed like a good place to take inspiration for the card and this is what I came up with.

Blimey, it was a busy few weeks craft wise, so busy in fact that I needed a holiday, which was lucky cos that was what we were about to get! Our long anticipated long weekend in Whitby was nearly upon us, just 5 tonnes of soil to be moved from the road where it was delivered to the back garden lay between us and a nice relaxing break. Poor John, with just a shovel and a trusty wheelbarrow, oh yeah and a very kind and hardworking dad and plenty of blood, sweat and toil (well mostly sweat and toil) that soil was moved and we were free to hit the road.

We managed to make it through the journey, despite several stops to clean up a vomit covered daughter and only an hour or two driving around the steepest and narrowest streets known to man (dodging the many scooters filling the roads as a mod convention descended on the quaint coastal town along the way) to find where we were staying. It turned out the be a great flat with views from the window up to Whitby Abbey (if you craned your neck through one corner of the kitchen window) and so a weekend of the tastiest fish and chips ever, eaten sat on a rock on the beach, walking up very steep hills, playing hide and seek, lovely anniversary gifts and meals (thanks to John for a gorgeous necklace and scrummy risotto), fantastic birthday presents (more about that at a later date) and visiting aquariums ensued. Intermingled with only a handful of horrific two year old tantrums, whoever thought a weekend away with a toddler was going to be restful.

I must say, Whitby was a really nice place and we even made it up the 199 steps (buggy and all) to the amazing gothic graveyard of the Church and then on into the Abbey.

We also did a trip to the nearby Robin Hood's Bay (wondering along the way how the name came about, it's nowhere near Sherwood Forest!) which is a pretty spectacular place. I managed to snag a few lovely stones from the beach as keepsakes, a bit of a habit of mine and on a brief shopping expedition in Whitby the next day I also picked up a nice ball of green and rust coloured wool. I found it in this amazing wool/antique shop situated in what appeared to be some kind of old banqueting hall or some such, it was pretty weird and wacky shop. I picked the wool up with a purpose in mind as it occured to John and I that Larry the Lobster really ought to have a mate, that being kind of the point about the whole lobster thing and so I think that will be my next project.

As I'm sure you can imagine I am now looking forward to some leisurely crafting, of course our first knitting group and also getting some veg planted in the newly soil filled raised beds in the garden (as it would be a shame to let the hubbies good work go to waste)!

So for now dear friends, I bid you adieu.

Calling all knitters!

A very quick hello to update you on my latest venture. My friend El and I have been kicking around the idea of setting up a knitting group for a while now and I've only finally gone and done something about it.

I'd been wracking my brain for ages about a venue that might be suitable and then I suddenly had a brainwave. I'm really lucky to live in a really nice garden suburb, which has it's very own institute (think small church hall type of building) for use by local residents at a very reasonable cost. How quaint is that! Anywhoo, it occured to me that it might be a good place for us like minded knitters to get together, swap tips and most importantly have a good old natter. So I gave the institute a call and before you knew it I'd only gone and booked a room for us to use.

The result is that I am pleased to announce the first knitting group to be held on Monday 12th April, 7-9pm at Wavertree Institute, Thingwall Rd. Any suggestions for a name for the group/night very welcome.

We're hoping to start off smallish, hopefully with about 8 peeps and will meet once a month. I guess if it goes really well we could maybe think about upping it to every fortnight, but I think slow and steady is the order of the day to begin with.

Will obviously keep you posted with updates on how that goes and will also put up some pics of my latest projects soon I promise.

Over the last fortnight I've made a bear for a Christening present and a rabbit for birthday present (very nearly finished but at the time I write this the poor thing is waiting for it's fluffy pom pom tail) and am also working on a top secret project for my hubby as it's out 1st wedding anniversary this coming Sunday. All details will be revealed soon.

Speaking of which, must dash so I can get on with it. We're off to Whitby for a nice long weekend on Friday, so I really need to get the secret project finished before we go. Wish me luck.

A short break from knitting...

So as promised, a small break from knitting was taken to work on my Mum's mother's day card. I bought a lovely necklace with a turquoise stone for her present and when I looked at it the turquoise immediately put in mind of the colours in a peacocks feathers & voila, there was my inspiration.

Celtic designs are kind of a specialty of mine and are always a hit with my parents, so I decided to try and combine to two for the card. I have lots of copyright free celtic design books, a collection which I have built up over the years so I had a quick trawl through and quickly found this bird design (apologies for it being slightly out of focus).

I traced the design and made 3 copies, which I outlined in pen. I then painted it with acrylics, constantly referring to photos of peacocks for colour inspiration. I then cut out the birds, using a stanley knife for the very intricate bits and finally created a mount for them out of colour card & paper. This is how it turned out:

All in all it took about 4 hours and I'm really pleased I did it because Mum seemed to love it. She also loved her pressies which was nice.

Speaking of pressies, I still find it a bit weird that I get pressie's too on Mother's day! I got really nice ones though. My lovely hubby did a bit of shopping on Mabes' behalf and got me two books, which is always a very welcome pressie. The boy done good too and chose really well. I also got the sweetest card which was written from both of them.

As if that weren't enough, my mum decided to do a bit of role reversal and gave me a gift for mother's day, a bottle of vino & some chocolate. Good old Mum. Think I'll be putting them to good use on Thursday when John has his weekly night out with the boys. All I'll need is a cheesy girly flick, then I'll have the holy trinity for a girls night in.

I decided I should mark the occasion of my 3rd Mother's Day as a Mum (we brought Mabel home from the hospital on my first Mother's Day) by getting a pic of me & Mabes. She likes to sit with me in front the mirror when I'm doing my hair, so I thought it would be nice to get a pic of us together in the mirror. Here are the results:

Turns out it was nigh on impossible to get her to look in the mirror rather than the lens/display screen of the camera. Ho hum, I kind of like the pics anyway. You know what they say, never work with children & animals. Easier said than done when you live in a house with 1 2 year old, 3 cats & a dog.....

A present for Mila...

So a quick update, my 2nd knitted soft toy project is complete - hooray! It's a fairy doll knitted for Mila's 2nd birthday (Mila is my good friend Laurence's daughter). I was absolutely smitten with this pattern when I saw it. It's another one by Amy Gaines and knowing Laurence's love of dolls, which I am sure she has passed on to Mila, it called out to me as the perfect present.

This pattern is much more intricate than the owl I knitted for Mabel, and subsequently took quite a lot longer to make, but it was equally enjoyable to work on. It was hugely satisfying seeing all the individual components coming together, I especially liked working on the really fiddly bits, the curls of her hair & the flower & petals.

As with the owl, I had to adlib with the colours a bit using what was available at short notice, but I stayed as faithful to the pattern as possible and I think it turned out ok. I used 100% organic cotton yarn, which gave an extremely soft and tactile finish. I would definitely recommend it for soft toys.

So that's another one done and much as though I would love to get stuck straight into the next one (a Christening gift) I need to take a short break from knitting to embark on a another craft - card making. Mother's day is looming and my Mum would be really disappointed if she didn't get a hand made card so I need to try and get some inspiration for that one quick.

Will keep you posted on developments....

Well, here goes. My very first blog, I'm very new to all this so you will have to be patient with me if it's a bit rubbish or I make a terrible blog related faux pas or break some unspoken blogging etiquette that I'm not aware of.

I dabble in lots of different crafts, but have recently embarked upon a knitting project for my beautiful daughter Mabel's 2nd birthday. I decided I would like to make her something homemade as a special gift and stumbled upon a pattern for a really cute knitted owl on Etsy. It was so lovely I just had to have a go.

It was quite a learning curve for me as although I have done quite a lot of knitting, it's mostly been scarves & squares for blankets, but this pattern took me into the brave new world of increasing and decreasing stitches. Once I got my head around it though it became one of the most enjoyable craft projects I have done for a long while.

It felt so great to be making something for a gift and I'm now completely hooked. So much so that I must warn all my friends with small children that they are quite likely to be receiving home knitted animal toys for their birthdays :-)

Anyway, the owl that I made for my daughter was made is sections in the flat, then stuffed and constructed in sections. I added an embroidered note saying 'Love from Mummy' on the back, which I used an off cut of denim for.

Can't wait to make the next one! Think it might be a bee....will keep you posted.

P.S Apologies in advance to my long suffering husband who is doubtless going to be hearing a lot of "just one more row" in the near future.