So it's not such a great idea to dust your dollshouses with a hoover/vacuum cleaner

Over the holidays I am trying to tackle some bigger jobs, one of which is a good spring/winter clean up of my dollshouse room.  I was using the hoover (vacuum cleaner) to dust the outsides of the houses, and also turning it down to half suction to clean some of the bigger floor areas inside in conjunction with a soft brush to wipe dust. It was all going fine as I worked along the row of houses, until I got to my Japanese house.  I was hoovering one of the tatami mat rooms when suddenly something whisked off the alcove and into the hoover before I could even blink, before I could even see what it was.

So I turned off the hoover and opened it up, it has a paper dust bag which turned out to be full.  So I cut open the paper bag and had to root around in the bucket of dust, cat litter, threads and god knows what else.  I didn't even know what I was looking for. I eventually found a very sorry little paper and wood japanese lantern near the back of the bag, which has lost its carrying handle.  I cleaned up the mess and, much chagrined, returned to work being hugely more careful.

Being stupid enough to try again, I promptly hoovered up a tiny little armrest.  At least this time I had put a new dust bag in the hoover so it was easy to find the armrest - now in two pieces.  Having learned my lesson, twice, I cleaned the rest of the house only using the brush.  It was when I was reaching past the house to unplug the hoover from the wall socket that I managed to snag the outdoor balcony of the Japanese house and yank part of the railing loose.  Sigh. Much repairing ensued.

One of my older houses turned out to be a bit mouldy - I hope it's a one off.  It is a house that spent 18 months of the build facing what is probably the dampest wall of the room.  At first I thought it was glue that had turned brown, but it turned out there was a film of dust all over the bathroom floor (which is made from a vinyl placemat), and the mold was growing in the dust.   I experimented and was able to wipe up the dust and mold from the bathroom floor using a makeup sponge. I've washed the round carpet but the stains wouldn't come out completely. Oddly in the next door room, the bedroom looks fine but the white shirt lying crumpled on the floor (artistically crumpled and presumably stiffened with glue) has also become all stained.  I think it is probably a write-off because if I dampen it, the glued-together shirt will fall apart.

Anyway, after about five sessions of an hour or more, the room is finally all clean and dusted and all the houses have been put back in order.    I'm glad that this big job is over.  One of my friends lives in France and runs a large and excellent miniatures museum (Mayenne Miniatures) as a side business, I wonder how many hours a year she has to spend dusting!

While putting away the accumulation of bits and bobs, I was getting frustrated with my storage system for beads, findings and small hardware.  I knew Wilko (a discount general store) had some cheap plastic storage boxes because I got one for DS for his christmas stocking.  So I headed there and found they have an excellent range from £1 shallow boxes with small compartments perfect for tiny hinges, right up to £4 larger boxes with deep compartments suitable for wooden beads and findings.  I started out with a selection of four and went back for three more later in the day.  I've rationalised all my ancient and inherited jumble of different sized containers into the new storage boxes and it's great, I can see what I've got now especially things like hinges, cupboard pulls and door hardware.

By now being on a bit of a cleaning roll, I tackled my sewing room next.  I dismantled and put away several collections of fabric/pattern/rulers left over from past projects, took down the towering pile of 'waiting to be filed' papers and moved it to the attic (a job for another day to sort those out), dealt with the pile of household ironing, packed up the enormous box that my 'new' sewing machine came in and likewise moved it to the attic, and then hoovered up all the threads, fabric scraps and polystyrene bean bag pellets from the floor.  It looks so much better now, and is a much nicer room to work in.

And I have been working: I pieced the rest of the blocks together for my Let's Bake quilt, sewed the border, and with DS's help, calculated and cut the inner coping strips and sewed the whole thing together.  The original pattern includes an outer plain border but as I plan to display this  quilt as a wall hanging and it's already on the large size, I am omitting that border.  So it's now a completed top!  I love how cheerful and bright it is, like a child's colouring book.  I've ordered some baking-themed backing fabric in the sales, so once that gets here I will sandwich it up and possibly even start quilting it.

As a reward for the big milestone, I pulled out a little kit for fun.  This is the decorated clothes hanger cover pattern that I bought at the quilting show a few months ago.  Here's an in-progress shot, I'm still sewing on flowers.  This was also the first time I've tried free-motion quilting on my new machine, it wasn't too bad. The manual said to set the thread tension to 'Auto' which looked fine on the right side but was too loose so the underneath side doesn't look great. Not a problem for this project as the underneath side will be hidden, but something to keep in mind for when I quilt the Let's Bake quilt.

One more picture this week - the 25 day Petite Properties advent calendar is now over and we're allowed to post pictures.  Look at all the different 1/48th scale kits I got!  Quite a fun treat to open every day, as good as the sock yarn calendar I had a few years ago. 

One finish this week is the Victorian leaf shawl at long last.  I knit the centre panel out of Victorian Lace Today some years ago, and this past year I've been knitting on a different border (I didn't like the one in the book).  It's blocked out slightly oddly as the top is very stretchy but the sides not so much due to the knitted on border.  It feels lovely and light and airy in wear.  The border didn't work out entirely symetrical as I wasn't really trying very hard, I just bunched it up around the point of the shawl by knitting twice into each joining square and stopped when I reached the last stitch in the side when perhaps I should have short rowed a bit.  At the moment I'm just glad it's finished, if it bugs me then I could add some short rows later.

So my first week of christmas holidays is over and I've got a whole 'nother week.  It feels strange, I don't think I've ever had two weeks at home without some other agenda like maternity leave or job-hunting while unemployed.  I've been glad I made a list of jobs to tackle because otherwise I think I would feel a bit aimless without my usual work routine.  It makes me wonder what retirement is going to be like.  I have to impose my own routine of Japanese homework, bobbin lace, jobs, some time out in the garden doing further clean up etc.  And a fair bit of video gaming (currently playing Dark Souls Remastered).  My friends who are retired have all said they are so busy in retirement that they don't know how they ever found time to work, so I guess it will be alright.

Did you have a good Christmas?  We certainly did, very relaxing and far too many sweets.  I judged the turkey size well - we had two dinners out of it, two lunches and the remainder was used up by DS in a traditional turkey leftover curry.  My main craft present was a set of Apliquik rods, interfacing and glue, for doing applique in a new way which looks a lot more accurate than my usual pencil+template method. I also got myself a clip-on Ottlite for doing bobbin lace and other crafts at my desk where the light isn't very good.  Did you receive any nice crafty presents?  I hope you've also had some quality crafting time over the holiday.

With best wishes for the new year!

Happy Christmas

Last blog post before the holiday so wishing everyone a happy and stress-free Christmas with lots of crafting.  I've got one more day of work on Monday and then I'm off for two weeks, woo hoo!  I've already got a long list of big jobs I've been procrastinating about and hope to achieve: like cleaning up my dollshouse room, ditto my sewing room, tackling my scrap fabric mountain, finishing the Let's Bake quilt, tidying up all the photos on my PC etc etc.  I doubt I will get it all done though.

We went to a local church for a  carol service this week. There was a decent turnout and the organ playing was good although the timekeeping seemed a bit variable.  There was a tiny choir of two older ladies and two older men.  One of the choir ladies was attempting the soprano descant for some of the relevant carols, good on her but it was a bit hysterical as her pitch was all over the map.  Several people including me couldn't quite suppress a muffled giggle after a few of her most off-key flourishes.  It was still nice to hear the seasonal tale told once again, in a church that is hundreds of years old where generations have participated in the same tradition. Afterwards there were mince pies and hot drinks and we wandered around a bit inspecting some of the carvings and monuments.

Christmas fudge recipe
Today I made our traditional Christmas fudge, from a recipe my father used to make every year and he got it from his parents I think.  It's basically brown sugar stuck together with butter and milk, very good if you have a sweet tooth.  You only need:

1 Tb butter
1 cup light soft brown sugar (not dark)
1/3 cup milk (whole milk is best)

Multiply the above to the desired quantity, I usually do three times so 3 Tb butter, 3 cups light brown sugar and 1 cup milk.  Cook over a medium heat in a heavy-bottomed saucepan, stirring frequently so it doesn't catch.  Once it is simmering nicely, add your candy thermometer and cook to soft-ball stage.  Remove from the heat and start beating it by hand with a wooden spoon while it cools down a little.  After a few minutes, add 1 tsp vanilla essence then keep beating.  The trick is to judge when the fudge is cool enough to pour into a buttered metal cake pan, you want to beat it right up until it gets very thick and is just starting to crystallise around the edges then quickly pour it into the pan and scrape out the saucepan into the pan.  If you wait too long, it will set in the pan and won't pour at all.  If you pour too early, it may not set very well or may be very hard and crystalline.  Beating it right to the last minute keeps it softer and fudgy.  Once in the pan, let it cool down 5 to 10 minutes then cut it into squares then leave it to cool all the way.  Store in an air tight container once completely cool.  Licking the spoon and scraping out fudge residue from the saucepan is the cook's privilege.

Christmas ornaments

This week I have been making up some of the Christmas ornament kits I've collected.

This first one is a giant Dorset button decoration, a gift for my birthday which I think is probably this kit.    It was fairly quick to make, and looks unusual on the tree.

Then this gingerbread house kit was from The Works and cost a whole £1, but was fun to do. And the snowglobe ornament is from Trimits and is such good value at £2.50, you get all the precut pieces and even the stuffing.  Finally the heart-shaped ornament is made using up some left over felted scraps form the teddy  bear I knit a few months ago.

I'm almost finished a Christmas robin cross-stitch from the same set of three kits that I made the Christmas tree card from, this will go on the tree.

This week on the Let's Bake quilt, I have made the final four blocks up, which are four little vintage aprons.

So now I can sew together the final section and the centre of the quilt will be done!  There is a narrow border to add around the centre and then all the pieced border blocks to sew together.  Hoping to get it done over the holidays.

Hope you have a lovely holiday!

Finally, a day when it is not raining

We've just come in from a couple of hours of tidying in the garden due to finally having a bright day.  Although it is windy, it's not too cold (about 7 degrees C).  So I pruned the apple and pear tree, and gave them a good spray with fungicide.  I didn't do the spraying last winter and our apples had terrible scab this year.  I'll hopefully spray the apple tree again at bud break if I remember.  We also scooped up tons of leaves from the pear and magnolia, the latter having terrible leathery leaves which do not rot down and smother everything underneath.  More hacking back of dead geranium growth and dead iris leaves, and we gave the corkscrew hazel a strong haircut as it had become very overgrown with lots of dead growth in the middle. DH called a halt at the point because we had run out of containers for all the debris he was going to take to the dump. Our last task was to attach the squirrel silhouette we bought last weekend. We've put it on the pergola in the first instance, we'll live with that for a while and we can always move it somewhere different if we change our minds.

I've continued to chip away at the Christmas decoration mountain this week and most things are now put up. There's a small pile of textiles in the living room still awaiting a home: quilted wall hangings and quilted decorations that I've either made or been given by friends.  The tree is up, it's not as tall as some years but it looks nice now that it's decorated.

I brought out a few old miniature Christmas scenes I made a long time ago and put them on display as well.

I also dug out the snowman quilt I finished last year, and hung it in the hall.  It's a bit large for the location, but eyecatching and easy for spotting all the details that I'd forgotten I'd added.

Over the years I have accumulated a small collection of blue and white Wedgewood baubles as I quite like them. I wait and get them half price in the sales.  Last year I thought it would be nice to have a single tree to hang them on and I bought a small white artificial tree in the post-xmas sales.  So I got the white tree out this year and assembled it, it turned out to be dreadful and completely flimsy, a real Charlie Brown tree when it came to trying to hang the relatively heavy Wedgewood baubles on.  So I had a look around on the interweb and came across this tutorial for making a simple wooden tree.  I was able to buy the dowels and 2x2 at our local DIY store and I had a base already.  I couldn't find a suitable finial so my tree doesn't have one yet.  It wasn't hard to build apart from none of the holes I drilled are very vertical.  If I win the lottery one of the things I would buy would be a drill press!  Consequently my branches are not very horizontal.  DH kindly said it made the tree look more natural.  Although he's a bit suspicious that there is room for so many more ornaments to be added to the collection. So this is what it looked like after the tutorial.

I thought it looked too bare and too wonky.  I still had the rubbish white tree so I experimented with taking that apart with wire cutters (I had to get DH to help, it needed some muscle ) and attaching some of the white branches to the wooden armature.  It probably looks a little odd but I think it looks better. It definitely needs a finial for the top of the three.  Wedgewood do a cute squirrel ornament now, if I can get that in the sales then perhaps it would look nice as a finial.

I finished knitting the Cumbria mini-skein fingerless mitts this week and darned in the ends.  They've turned out well but I think look fairly masculine, so I am going to give them to my f-i-l for Christmas to see if he likes them.  So when I washed them, I stretched them out quite a lot to make them looser for his bigger hands.  That's the great thing about pure wool, it's so flexible.

This week I sewed some spoon blocks for the Let's Bake quilt and then sewed together the blocks for  three of the four main panels. It's so cute!  I've only got four apron blocks left to make for the final section.

As it turns out, I am going to have two weeks off at Christmas because the trains are suspended for rail improvement work. I was supposed to go in for a couple of days before New Year, but I don't fancy having to get a rail replacement bus so I asked for, and was grudgingly granted, more leave. So hopefully I can get lots of crafting done and perhaps finish up this quilt top completely. I also hope to do the big clean up in the dollshouse room.  Only five more days to work, woo hoo!

I went to my monthly lace group meeting yesterday and started a new small project. Do you remember this lace bauble wrap I made last year?

I'm going to try a different pattern from the same book of patterns which is the Lace Guild's Take A Box Of Baubles... compiled by Rosemary Green. When I unpacked the bauble this year to put on the tree, it was nicer than I remembered and made me want to make another one.  Obviously I won't finish it for this Christmas but hopefully in plenty of time for next year.

Are you looking forward to the holiday?

Look how big the living room is!

I had to dismantle the quilting frame (a plastic Q-snap type floor frame) for the weekend because DS was having friends to stay and they were planning to watch movies in the living room.  Once that was all moved out, and my crate full of yarn for the Granny square crocheted afghan, and my various other ongoing projects hidden away, we were marveling about how much bigger the living room looks without all the clutter. Sigh.  I think I need two living rooms: one for show and one where I make my nest.

So the 25 block applique quilt has been put away, probably until January.  We'll put the christmas tree and decorations up during this coming week (the tree is purchased but currently living in the porch until DS's friends depart) and there just won't be room for the floor frame.  I don't get on with a hand quilting hoop, I need both hands free for the way I quilt.

I did get a few more blocks done for the Let's Bake quilt this week.

 I did the donuts with fusible applique for a neater result, but it means they aren't as 3-D as using the interfacing technique.

The mixing bowl set still needs to be stitched down.

This is the table cloth block. On the original quilt, the designer stitched this block with chicken scratch embroidery. But I didn't want to do that, so I looked through my vintage doiley collection to find one the right size that would stand up to washing.  I have hand stitched the doiley to the block, and I think it adds a nice vintage touch.

One of the projects I removed from the living room is a cross-stitch Christmas card kit I am stitching for my m-i-l. Due to my inability to count, this is more of an interpretation of the chart than a faithful reproduction.  I will finish it in the next few days hopefully and get it into the post.

We've been away this weekend as a seasonal treat. We drove down to Hertfordshire and stayed near Bishops Stortford for one night.  Quite by chance, we were there for the day of their big Christmas market so we enjoyed having a wander through that (once we got a parking space) and picked up a few christmas gifts. Then we drove a few miles down the road to Sawbridgeworth to visit The Maltings on Station Road, a rambling old industrial building which is now home to no fewer than five big antiques shops.  They run the gamut from posh to tat, but we enjoyed wandering around all the floors and were even provided with free hot mulled wine in one shop.  I bought a few pieces of 1920s pottery and a modern metal squirrel silhouette for the garden.  That night we walked from our hotel to a pub for supper, and came across a little close of modern houses where almost every one was fully decorated with loads of lights.  It was quite a show and there was even  a button to press to play christmas music at one house. This probably seems nothing out of the ordinary to my American readers but in the UK it's not nearly as common for houses to put up a lot of lights (particularly a large group of houses like this street), so we enjoyed the show.  Today we drove back via a few more big antiques centres, including this one in an old textiles mill in Halstead in Essex. It's fun to see these old industrial buildings, and it was full of dealers of varying quality.  I got a few 1930s plates here.

While we were away I was knitting on the second Cumbria mini-skeins fingerless mitt which is almost finished except for the thumb.  I was wearing my Rainy Day fingerless Mitts all weekend, which I knit a couple of years ago from Doulton Flock Border Leicester wool.  They were perfect for the c.10 degree C weather and the generally unheated antiques warehouses, so my hands could be warm yet I could still pick things up to look at them.

A couple more weeks and I will be on holiday for Christmas - yay!!

Advent begins

(secular) Advent kicks off today as it is the 1st of December.  After opening door 1 on my own 'Swizzels' sweets calendar, and installing my son's Haribo calendar in his room (he won't see it until he wakes up around midday :) ), I then hung up my Petite Properties Advent Calendar in the hallway.

Petite Properties are a UK family business manufacturing dollshouse and railway modelling kits in a variety of smaller scales, including a lot of laser-cut furniture kits.  I have a couple of their houses and have used their kits in the past, for example on my Fairfield dollshouse build.  So when they announced on Facebook that they were going to produce an Advent calendar for the first time, I thought it would be quite fun to join in.  I thought it would be popular so I made sure to be all geared up to hit the 'add to cart' button at 12 noon the moment they launched even though I was at work, and was successful in completing my purchase - they sold out in four minutes so I was one of the lucky ones.  The calendar consists of 25 numbered envelopes with a cord and mini clothes pegs to clip them up - I've hung mine in the hallway and I'm hoping the cat leaves them alone.  They've asked us not to post any pictures until Advent is over, to avoid spoilers, so I can't share the treats with you - sorry! But I'm looking forward to a dollshouse surprise every day  from now until Christmas.

I need to go and dig around in the christmas decoration suitcases to excavate a couple more quilty advent calendars that I've made in the past, and then I think we will be covered and in no danger of missing the big day.

This week my Karen Buckley 'Perfect Circles' set showed up in the post and I used it to make the cookies to go on my cookie sheet for the Let's Bake quilt. I hand appliqued these as it just seemed quicker than trying to zig-zag neatly around tight circles on the machine and having to constantly lift the presser foot and re-position.

While I was waiting for the circle set to arrive, I put together the hand mixer.

And at the moment I am working on the cupcakes - they are glue-basted but not yet stitched down.

And last night I finally finished stitching the recipe block.  I had to adapt it a bit as my gingham squares aren't the same size as the designer's grid-printed fabric.  My cross-stitching is a bit wobbly but looked a lot better after I pressed it.

Now that the recipe-stitching is out of the way, I can turn my attention to some christmas stitching.  Last year I pretty much stopped sending physical christmas cards except to a few elderly people  and I don't think I am going to send many this year either. But I have an older friend who sends me a hand-made card each year and I like to send my m-i-l a handmade card as well.  So I want to make a few things. This is a ribbon-wreath kit that came with the box of little magazine kits that I bought a few weeks ago.  As I can't count, my first effort came out more egg-shaped than round, so I pulled that out then basted a circular guideline before freehanding the wreath to a more acceptable shape.  I haven't made the card up yet, I've just put the stitching inside the card to take this picture. the design is surprisingly effective considering it's just straight stitches of ribbon, with some french knots embroidered.

Yesterday I visited the Makit Christmas Fair at Cranmore Park on a coach trip organised by a bobbin lace group.  This was my third visit and while I enjoyed it, the fair seemed to have fewer vendors this year. I felt like I had done it in a couple of hours, but the coach wasn't leaving until after four hours, so it was fairly tedious waiting around in the afternoon until we could go.  The coach itself wasn't very comfortable, too hot and very noisy with a roaring engine thrum that cut through your head like a giant dentist drill, so I felt a bit travel sick by the time I finally made it back to the drop-off point.  Long day.

I bought a half-metre of fabric that might be useful as background fabric for the Let's Bake quilt, some threads for lace, another Prym ergonomic thimble as I find them quite comfortable, and some inexpensive lace lozenge-shapes which I might also use on the Let's Bake quilt. I bought the Yarn and Needles Hat pattern from Beaker Buttons which is quite cute and the sample fit my big head.  And I bought a lovely painted bobbin from Sarah Jones and ordered a monogrammed bobbin from Alison Tolson (also painted).  I also picked up a coaster from the Tudor Rose stand for my sewing room cup of tea.

Have you started any holiday preparations or is it still too early?