Success on the Knitting Front

A few posts ago, I talked about my dream of knitting clothing. I'm now one step closer to that goal. My first project towards this goal was to knit a hat for one of my sisters. It looked pretty simple. Surely even I could have managed that with ease

Or not as time after time I cast on stitches only to undo my whole piece of knitting two rows later. Despite my best efforts, it didn't seem I could actually get past those first couple of rows. The project lay on my desk for the most part, waiting for me to take yet another stab at it.

When I finally did get past the moss stitched edge, the rest of the hat suddenly came together. I knew what I was doing and the knitting project became fun. I worked and worked, determined that this would be a project I'd actually finish.

And now I stand one step closer to knitting large projects like my Mum. And my sister has a nice warm hat to wear with her nice warm cardigan. Success!

Dreaming of Knitting

I have a dream of being able to knit clothing. Every day I watch Mum sitting there with her wool and needles, creating a masterpiece of a cardigan. And every time I wish I had the skills and the patience to make one for myself.

Not being a skilful knitter however, the goal of knitting myself a cardigan seems to be far off at the moment. I've never attempted anything so large, or so complex before. So, it seems I need practice before I can pick up my needles for that project.

My plan then, is to start small and work my way up. And so I am starting with a hat for my youngest sister, Gemma-Rose. Made with odd balls of left over wool, it's going to match her Neenish Tart cardigan made by Mum.

And from there, who knows what else I might attempt? Maybe one day I will at last work my way up to creating my own piece of perfect clothing.

Camp NaNoWriMo Art

It has become a sort of tradition for me to draw themed art in the lead up to a NaNoWriMo event. I drew some NaNoWriMo art last November, and some Script Frenzy art this April. Now I've been doing some Camp NaNoWriMo themed art, almost as preparation for the coming event.

It being a virtual writer's camp, of course we must have some camp-like equipment, including torches and books for reading in the dark.

In this picture, I wanted a more campsite like feel. The basic make up of the pictures is very much like the official Camp NaNoWriMo web badge, but mine is more like a tent, and less like a book.

I wanted my third picture to continue the camping theme, but without the tents and moonlit night. And what says camping more than a pocket knife? And so I invented the Swiss Army Knife: Writer's Edition. Don't ask how the torch and coffee cup fold in. They just do.

So, those are the pictures I've got so far. I have no doubt I'll add to them as we draw closer to the actual event. I can hardly wait for it to start!

Is there anyone out there who has decided to take the challenge with me? Would anyone like to join my cabin? We have three empty beds if you'd like to join me at Camp NaNoWriMo.

What says 'camping' to you? Do you have any funny camping stories? Anyone coming on this virtual camp with me?

Script Frenzy Art

Last year, for NaNoWriMo, I drew some special, themed pictures. With Script Frenzy starting this coming Sunday, I decided I might do the same thing.

The first idea that popped into my mind was that of the traditional red curtains of a theatre. They seem to sun up everything I imagine when I think of stage plays, which is what I'm writing. That and the neon billboard style writing with the lights round the edge.

My other picture is supposed to look a bit like an old program with gold edging and fancy writing. I was quite pleased with the way the paper turned out, all faded and blotchy looking (or maybe it's just I couldn't make it smooth). Plenty of gel pen went into the creation of this picture.

Now I'm wondering, what other pictures could I draw for Script Frenzy? Maybe something away from the stage theme? Hmm.

Which picture do you like best? What do you imagine when you think of stage plays?

Handmade with Love

As Christmas draws closer, we're pulling out the family traditions, dusting off the Christmas music, and have finally swung into proper advent mode.

One of our greatest traditions is to handmake decorations for the house and tree. Over the years we've accumulated these treasures. Our advent wreath is made of salt dough, and has been used for 12 years. Our nativity scene is made of felt and cornflake boxes. This year, our Christmas craft is tree decorations made of felt.

We girls all sat down today, with a pile of felt, a neat bundle of threads, and several pattern pieces. All beautiful and orderly. It didn't last long. Soon snippets of felt littered the table, beads and thread covered everything. And in the middle of all this mess we four girls sat, needle in our hands, creating the first craft of advent.

Gemma-Rose chose to make a felt bell, despite not knowing any of the stitches needed. With my help, she soon learnt though, and flew through her work, her needle more sure than mine as she sewed her pieces together.

Sophie wanted to make a bird. Despite knowing how to sew quite well, she insisted on thinking her bird wasn't any good, and left the table as soon as it was done, though she'd sewn her brid beautifully, and without my help.

Charlotte chose the hardest project: a beaded, tasseled hanging ornament. Her needle never stopped moving. Every time I looked over, she'd taken her felt to a higher level of beauty.

My own project isn't finished yet. It's not even original. I decided on the spur of the moment to make a bird like Sophie. Only, when it was finished, I didn't really want to stop. I wanted to make a whole string of them. So far I've made two out of five.

Though there are many nice Christmas ornaments in the shops, which take less trouble to buy than to make, I believe that homemade things are still the best. So many of my memories are bound up in our handmade decorations. Each one is an old friend, used year after year, never thrown out or forgotten. Yes, the factories may make fine decorations, but they'll never beat a felt ornament made with love.

NaNo Art

Being in a drawing mood today, I opened my sketch book, grabbed a pencil and prepared to draw. What could I draw today? What is big in my life at the moment? The answer was obvious. NaNoWriMo. Yes, I'd draw a piece of NaNo art. But what?

The first thing that occurred to me was that I could write 'NaNoWriMo' down. Maybe that would be a good starting point. And so, with many millions of guidelines, I began. The picture grew and grew, turning into less of a picture, and more poster style.

Bold colours jumped out of the pencil box. Blue and brown, the colours of NaNo, filled the background. Bright yellows and oranges coloured the words. Under my fingertips, the page came to life.

So, this is my first attempt at NaNo art. What do you think of it? Could you see it as a poster advertising NaNo? Because I can.

Knitting a Wedding

Charlotte and I debated over wedding present to give for a long time. Nothing normal would do for us. This was our first wedding in the family. The present had to be special to match. Which meant that we'd have to make it ourselves.

Out came the knitting books, the needles, the wool. We consulted patterns, surreptiously bought new wool and beads, and knitted like mad. No one else knew of our project. We never spoke of it. But every spare moment, we'd grab our needles and knit, knit, knit.

As the deadline drew closer and closer, I started to panic. Still so much to do. How would we ever finish in time? But we wouldn't give up. Not after so many weeks of solid knitting. We battled on.

Mum came into the secret only a couple of days before the wedding. She contributed a gold box and a reel of gold ribbon. But the present wasn't done yet! I went into overdrive, knitting faster than ever, finishing the final piece on the way to the wedding practice the day before the big event.

Wedding morning dawned, and Charlotte sewed the last pieces together. We put the present in the box, and wrapped it in gold ribbon. Done! And only just in time.

It wasn't until the reception that we actually gave the present. Felicity took our large gold box and attempted to undo the ribbon. Then she handed it to Graham to undo the ribbon. Uh oh, I'd done it up too tight. Stepping forwards I released the tight knot and stepped back again.

Felicity lifted off the lid, moved aside the tissue paper and...

"Oh they're lovely." She lifted out, piece by piece, a woollen replica of the wedding party. The professional photographer snapped photo after photo. Everyone oohed and aahed as they identified themselves.

Next time there's a wedding, I want to make another special present. But the things I've learnt from this? Always start months ahead, and never give up.

Charlotte's Pencils

"It's time for bed, Charlotte. What are you doing?" I say, walking into the bedroom one night.

"Oh, I was drawing. Do you like my new picture?" She holds out her book for me to see. I take it from her and examine the drawing.

"Wow, this looks really good. You should put it on your blog."

"Can you help me?"

"Of course I can."

Mum sees Charlotte's pictures on her blog. "These look good. Why don't you make a page specially for your pictures? Then everyone would be able to see them."

Charlotte is quite pleased with the idea. Together we scan her pictures, compress the files, and painstakingly upload them to a special new page on her blog. At the same time we give her blog a snazzy new background. Quite the makeover!

Charlotte is very pleased with all the changes to her blog. Now that her interest has been rekindled in blogging, she starts thinking about our other blog: Paper Dolls By The Serendipity Sisters.

"I think I'd like to design a new paper doll," she says, and sits down with her pencils and paper. I smile, and leave her to it. Soon she hands me her piece of paper. I take one look at the doll and grin.

"This is really nice."

"I've made her some clothes too. See." She hands me some more paper. My eyes take in the beautiful feathery dress, just right for a fairy doll. I see the perfectly shaped wings, the dress made of cloud. This is a lovely fairy doll.

"I'll scan it for you, and upload it to our blog."

Charlotte's face brightens. She sits beside me as I painstakingly scan the doll, colour it, upload it, link it, and write the blog post to go with it. Her work is now on the web for everyone to see.

"I think I'll do some drawing," she says. "And maybe I might draw another paper doll too." I can see that her head is buzzing with ideas.

You can see Charlotte's lovely drawings HERE, and her new paper doll HERE. What do you think of her work?

Mighty, Majestic Dragons

Dragons have always held a strange fascination for me. Of all the mighty, majestic, magical, mythological creatures, dragons are my favourite. If there's a book about dragons in our library, chances are that I have read it.

Recently, Charlotte borrowed a book on drawing dragons and other mythological creatures from the library. After eagerly reading it, she declared that I had to read it, it was just so good. So, I picked up the book and buried my head in it.

Although I am definitely not an artist, I like to read drawing books. This one reached out and grabbed me, filling my head with images of the dragons I could create, would create. I was hooked. By the time I reached the last page I knew that I had to at least attempt a picture.

I grabbed the book, a blank sheet of paper, and my pencil, and settled down for an evening of drawing. Carefully I sketched the simple shapes that made up the body. Then I rubbed them out and drew them again. They still weren't right. Several sheets of paper later, I had had enough.

"I told you I can't draw," I told Charlotte crossly. She was sitting nearby, blissfully creating a hairy dragon of her own. It was so infuriating to see her so easily drawing on her own what I couldn't even draw with a step by step instruction book.

I threw my failed pictures out and vowed never to try drawing dragons again. But I reckoned without Charlotte.
"You should really try drawing another dragon," she encouraged me. "You could design all the separate parts before you try drawing the whole dragon."

"Maybe I'll try," I said uncertainly. She fetched me a fresh, clean sheet of paper. I sat at my desk with a sharp pencil in my hand and tried to decide what I would draw. After much thought, and even more flicking through the book for inspiration, I finally decided to draw a dragon's head in 3/4 view. Five minutes later it was a profile shot.

All through the afternoon I worked on my dragon, and on into the evening. Finally, it was finished. The best dragon's head I had ever drawn (not to mention the only one) was sitting in front of me, coloured and all.

I know I will never be an artist. I'm not sure I really want to be. Writing is more my thing. But I do know that if I persevere, I can actually draw something that looks almost right, even if a trained artist might faint at the sight of my picture.

Dreaming of Art

I have always wanted to be able to draw. Not just cartoony sketches, but realistic pictures. I wanted to draw my siblings, and have everyone know exactly who I had drawn, just by glancing at them.

When I was small, I used to draw all the time. Countless pieces of paper were covered in my scrawls. Cats, little more than a circle head, oval body, and five sticks for legs and tail, coated my pictures. I loved drawing these cats, and would make my pictures tell the story of their lives.

But scribbled cats were not enough. I wanted to draw better than that. and so I moved on to made up portraits. I loved my pictures and believed that I was drawing really well. Until I saw my aunt's drawing.

Aunty Vicky is a portrait drawer, and I only wish I could draw like her. She recently started her own blog, which tracks her works in progress, and explains everything she does.

I watch her blog axiously for a new post every day. It's exciting watching what a real artist does. I watched her first portrait take shape, and marvelled at how good she was. I know I can neve draw like that. That is one dream I have given up. But writing now, that's another matter.

If you are interesting in visiting my aunt's blog, please click THIS link. She'd be pleased to welcome new visitors. and it's a great time to visit. She's just starting a new project. Please take the time to stop and visit her.

The Cat and the Collage

Charlotte and I love doing craft. Whether it's knitting a prehistoric world of dinosaur and cave men, to sewing skirts and soft toys, to handmade table mats, we'll have tried it at least once. Yesterday we tried a new branch of craft, one that we haven't really experimented in before: Collage.

A few years ago, probably for one of my birthdays, I was given a craft book on making tiny books. I fell in love with the idea. Unfortunately, my love of the idea didn't translate into a wish to actually make any, and so the book languished on the shelf, unused and unloved. Until yesterday.


We were bored. The normal things to do seemed so dull. Then, while we were flipping through some of our many craft books, we came across my neglected notebook making book. Flipping through the pages of this book filled my head with ideas.
"Let's make some," I said to Charlotte.

Her eyes lit up at once. Craft of any sort presents no problems to her. We scurried to and fro through the house, combing the shelves for things we could use. Old 'Better Homes and Gardens' magazines, card, curling ribbon, all these joined our stack.

Finally we sat down to work. I measured pages and Charlotte cut them out. Then we scanned the pages of the magazines for pictures of flowers that we could use to stick on our covers. We soon found heaps and heaps of pink flowers to cut out.

We worked for hours on these books, carefully cutting out many, many flowers and green leaves. Sometime during the cutting stage a little black paw appeared under the door. Poppy was knocking. I jumped out of my chair and opened the door for her. She sauntered in and jumped up onto the desk, sitting down right in the middle of our work.

Her orange eyes followed our every movement as we assembled our books. She watched me critically as I attempted to punch straight hols in the pages. She checked out the curling ribbon as we cut lengths of it to tie on.

Then finally we were done. Not a single flower more could be fitted on our books. The word 'Notes' was carefully stuck across the front in fancy writing. But before we could count ourselves as truly done, they had to pass Poppy's inspection. We held the books up for her and she sniffed them. Then she looked away. We could almost hear her say, "They'll do."

We really enjoyed making the notebooks. And making them has paved the way for other collage projects. What will me make next? Who knows?

Have you done any craft lately? Or ever? Please feel free to comment and tell me about it. I'd love to heard about your projects.

Mary's Yes

Yesterday we celebrated the solemnity of the Annunciation, when Mary said yes to being the mother of Jesus. This is such an important feast day in the church that is overrides even Lent. Which means that you can eat meat on the feast of the Annunciation even when it's on a Friday, as it was this year.

Because this is such an important day for us as Catholics, we had to celebrate it properly. So, Charlotte, Sophie, Gemma-Rose and I all made mobiles that reflected Mary's great obedience to God. They were made out of white hearts, each with a YES written in the middle and decorated round the edges.

Charlotte and I did the writing while the younger two decorated them with coloured pens and glitter. They had a lovely time designing each and every heart to be absolutely beautiful. They made mobiles with one big heart with a big YES in the centre. Underneath this big heart were hung two smaller hearts, also saying YES. And right at the end we strung some beads.

Charlotte and I made our own mobiles out of strings of smaller hearts, where every little heart was decorated in a different way. The writing of the words was different and each one had different pictures round the edges. I did the writing on our small hearts and Charlotte, who is the more artistic of us two, decorated them.

Sophie and Gemma-Rose also made a cake for us to share at dinner. It was a vanilla cake, the closest we could get to a white cake, and they iced it with white icing.

How did you celebrate your Annunciation?