Old dogs, many new tricks

 Well it's been an exciting week for the new caravan. (Apologies to those bored by caravans, skip ahead now).  We picked it up Monday afternoon, with much tedious paperwork to fill out and about 30 minutes of handover/training on how everything worked.  I then brought proceedings to a halt by accidentally breaking the door stay that holds the door open - the wind blew the door out of my hand and I reflexively caught it back, which wrenched the stay off the wall of the van.  The salesman took it well, just picking up the pieces and disappearing with them to find the man who fixes things. I meanwhile poked the dabs of sealant on the remains stuck to the caravan, and was surprised to find them somewhat malleable. This eventually awoke deep suspicions in my mind that I was not the first to break the stay off and it had perhaps been previously repaired.  But anyway, the fix-it man arrived and immediately asked 'where's the little spring?'.  We hadn't seen a spring with the components so started peering at the hard standing around the caravan, with more people joining in until eventually about seven of us were pacing around studying the ground closely. I was actually the one to find the little spring - I would have felt proud if it weren't my fault in the first place.  It took Mr Fix-it about 45 minutes to get the door stay back onto the van due to having to find fatter-but-not-longer screws and avoiding gumming up the spring with adhesive etc.   We were told not to use the door stay for 24 hours and are still terrified of it to this day and treat it like glass.

By this point the two of us were tired and fairly fed up, and not pleased to find it was starting to rain as we drove the short distance to the nearby campground I had booked.  DH did amazingly well with his first towing experience in about 15 years, and we managed to reverse the caravan onto our pitch. We plugged in the electric cable and just sat inside marvelling at our new little world until it stopped raining.  The rest of the evening and the next morning were a cascade of new discoveries and problem solving and much peering at manuals.  But we managed it all and the new van is brilliant.  Before we left the site the next day, we practiced reversing onto several pitches until we were getting the hang of it better. We had an uneventful drive to the storage site and managed to slot it into its allotted space before putting it all to bed for the week.

This weekend we actually took it on a holiday break to a site near Cambridge, as it was a bank holiday weekend.  Because I had booked so late, we could only get a non-serviced grass pitch so were operating self-sufficiently just off our own battery and gas.  But it all worked really well and we enjoyed two good nights and brilliant sunshine.  So far we are really enjoying being caravan owners. 

We spent most of Sunday doing a self-guided walk around the outskirts of Cambridge and along the Backs of the river, really relaxing and surprisingly rural.  We saw cows and lots of punts, and quite a few birds including this adorable swan family. And I was surprised to see several people swimming in the river - where we used to live, the Thames was too dangerous to swim in because of Weil's disease. Perhaps it is cleaner in Cambridgeshire.  After so long of having cold rainy weather, it finally feels like summer and we had a lovely time.  We've already planning more breaks for later in the summer.

Before we went, I finished the Drops sock yarn shawl. Not being mathematically-minded, I don't really understand how, but despite decreasing on one side and increasing on the other, it has turned into a triangular/trumpet shape.  It's actually quite large, and the yarns have softened up with washing so it's quite nice to the touch now. Because of the increase/decrease growth, the rows are on the slant which is visually interesting.

I also made a start on a knitted lace doiley from the book I posted about last week, using DMC Cebelia 20 and some 1.5mm metal DPNs.  This turned out to be virtually impossible, with multiple restarts and false starts.  The cotton yarn is very unforgiving when you trying to increase from a circular/central start, the metal needles constantly fall out of the cotton stitches or get twisted around so that you are accidentally knitting the end stitch instead of the beginning stitch (when there are only a couple of stitches on each needle to start), the whole affair was like juggling with string. To make it even more difficult, the Danish book uses non-standard charting conventions which require much looking at the chart key at the front and a certain amount of guess work.  I eventually gave up on the first pattern I had chosen and switched to a much smaller doiley near the front of the book. I also went and found my 1.5mm glove needles (which are much shorter) to decrease the physical difficulty level.  I have now managed to finally knit a small circle of stitches about 1 1/2 inches wide and am feeling very proud of myself.

I've started a new pair of socks for caravan knitting, using a fair isle pattern I purchased called The Lenten Rose socks. I'm doing mine in two shades of rose pink.

Now that the caravan is up and running, so to speak, it should take up less of my time in terms of research/shopping, so hopefully I can get back to some more productive craft time going forward.  Although every trip seems to generate a new shopping list!

I hope you enjoyed the sunny bank holiday weekend as well - what did you do?

rant rant rant

 After being locked down together for well over a year now, DH and I have heard all of the other person's wellworn rants about work colleagues, malfunctioning IT systems, stupid customers, pointless meetings and so on.  We have reduced this to a shorthand of 'rant', as in 'How's work'? Answer: 'rant rant' to mean that the usual sorts of frustrations are being encountered.  'And how's yours?'  'Rant'.   I was doing a lot of 'ranting' earlier this week as I struggled to get to grips with my new phone. Is there anything else more guaranteed to make you feel old?  Why does it have to be so different from my old phone?  Why do I have to swipe to answer a call instead of just stabbing the obvious green round button - why is it a button if you can't press it??  Grrrr. Not to mention all the obnoxious whale music ringtones and notification sounds, and a kazillion bloatware apps that are cluttering up the screens.  After several hours and much resorting to Google and Youtube tutorials, I have managed to bash the new phone into a facsimile of my old phone - only with better battery life. I expect I'll get used to it.

We are also hoping to get used to our new leisure activity in the caravan which we will be picking up next week.  The pile of purchases in the living room has been augmented by almost daily deliveries from Amazon and Royal Mail.  We've watched various instructional Youtube videos and I have prepared many checklists and packing lists.  Today we weighed everything we have bought so far by dint of DH standing on the bathroom scales holding a laundry basket which I kept refilling.  That's because we only have a payload of 119kg on our little caravan so we have to be quite careful about what we are putting into it. It's all starting to feel more 'do-able'  - let's hope the weather cooperates.  It's been quite stormy and windy this week, and the Facebook caravan groups have been full of stories of awnings blown away and caravans rocking in the wind. Not what you want for your first trip out.

So once again not a lot of new crafting going on, apart from the usual in-front-of-the-TV activities such as cross stitch, handquilting and knitting.  I did manage to finish the next repeat of my Bucks point butterfly mat that was in hibernation for a long time.  I only work on it during my weekly Zoom call with my lacemaking friends, so it's slow going.

I did some sewing for the caravan: sewing hanging loops onto teatowels and sewing together pairs of duvet covers to make  sleeping rolls open on three sides.  Then I actually did a bit of patchwork: I've had a box of paired-up triangles hanging about since I finished the Disappearing 4-patch quilt top six months ago - they were the waste scraps cut off the blocks. I saved them as they were already paired up RST.  So I sewed them all into half-square triangles this week and then trimmed them all down to 2-inch square blocks to end up with 17 sets of four.  Pinwheels seemed the obvious choice, in a 4x4 grid (so one block left over) and a border from some Aldi fabric, and now I have a little mat to quilt up. It's looks sort of vintage I think and cheerful. Perhaps I will put it in the caravan.

Also looking a bit vintage is the pretty coloured cotton thread that arrived this week so I can have a go at knitting one of the lace mats from the book I posted about last week.  In fact, it would be quite nice to use all three colours to make a graduated colour mat but I don't know if it would be too hard to disguise the ends in a lace mat because it's so see-through.

I had a call today from the organiser of a lace day which had been postponed from last June until this June, and she was calling to say it is being postponed again until 2022.  I think it's the right decision.  My gardening club is hoping to restart in September  according to the latest email, I think almost all the members are pensioners so they will probably all have had their jabs, but still I question it.  The OIDFA lace congress in Estonia that was rescheduled from last summer to this summer has also at long last been officially cancelled, so hopefully I will soon get back the substantial sum of money they have been holding all this time (the payment for workshops and the various sightseeing tours that I had booked).  We pre-empted this week's relaxation of lockdown restrictions with a trip to the in-laws last Sunday - the first time that DS and I had seen them in person for over a year, although DH had driven down a couple of times in between lockdowns.  We kept our masks on and ate a buffet lunch on our laps in the livingroom (which had the garden door open for ventilation) rather than crowding around a table. DS was probably most at risk being jabless but he wanted to see them.  It was nice to be there but also felt very strange, sort of normal/not normal at the same time.  My m-i-l threw caution to the winds and hugged us all as we left, she was so overcome at seeing us all again.

Are you returning to previous activities yet? or is it too soon?

Superseded

 I've always taken great care with my mobile phones, protecting them in cases and preserving them in as pristine a state as possible, and have generally been rewarded by being able to sell the old phone for up to £100 when I bought a new one.  Not this time - I have hung onto my iPhone 5S for too long.  It has been superseded and is now worth precisely  £6.  Nobody cares how pristine it is, it is old tech.  There is probably some kind of philosophical lesson there about not hanging onto things too long, or perhaps that everything becomes old and worthless eventually?  (laughing on the outside but crying a bit on the inside here because I feel that way a bit some mornings, lol).

This week has been all about caravans, so if you don't care, then skip to the next paragraph now.  After chasing a few times, I have managed to secure an installation date for a towball, which means we've been able to book a collection date for the caravan.  I've also tracked down a storage spot for it in a yard which is impressively secure but unfortunately 25 miles away.  I'm trying to get on the waiting lists for something closer.  I've been watching loads of Youtube videos and doing research to amass tips and shopping lists. Yesterday we did a massive socially distanced shop to pick up contents and accessories, starting with IKEA. It was basically my 20-year-old self's dream come true: pushing a trolley around IKEA with money in my pocket and a huge shopping list ranging from duvets to cutlery.  I was worried about what IKEA would be like but they were actually managing it quite well.  We had to queue for about half an hour in a socially-distanced airport-style snaking queue because they were controlling the number of people they admitted, and while it was busy inside, it definitely wasn't too crowded and we could easily stay away from other shoppers for the most part.  The tills were accessed by a one-way socially distanced queue as well.  I've still got some more things to get, and need to arrange important things like insurance, but it feels like we're getting there and can look forward now to getting our new toy.

The queue at IKEA

The haul from IKEA and from a camping shop, waiting to be unpacked

This week I finished the next house 'D & E' from the cross-stitch little houses sampler.  One more to complete on this row, then I will have the  lowest row of three to do.

I spotted these little cuties in an ad in Quiltmania magazine:  they are needle magnets sandwiched around needle-sharpening foam made by Clover accessories. They were calling my name so I ordered a couple.

And I picked up an interesting knitting book secondhand, from a bobbin lace FB group selling page.  It's a translation of a Danish book, and features re-written and updated patterns based on vintage knitted table linen patterns.  There are some really nice doilies and tablecloths in it. They are mostly knit with DMC Cebelia 20 or 30, which is a crochet cotton.  So I've ordered a few balls of 20 and will have a go at one of the doilies.  I've enjoyed knitting many lace shawls in the past, so I look forward to trying something more practical although I'm a bit worried that my loose tension could be an issue. Also I have found knitting garments in cotton hurts my hands, but lace might be different as it is an airier fabric.

My little windowbox of cacti is flowering away and looking very pretty in the sunshine.  I am generally death on houseplants but the cacti have proved harder to kill (not impossible, but harder) and the current crop have lasted a few years now.

The garden itself is rampaging away in the warmer but wet weather we've been having, and unfortunately so are the weeds.  I went out and weeded for a hour on my day off but it needs a lot more done.  The new plants from a few weeks ago are all surviving and so is the fern that we divided last month - it is unfurling new fronds in both the bigger chunks.

Tomorrow the UK is loosening lockdown restrictions even more, let's hope it isn't too soon.  DH has had his second jab and I get my second one in a few weeks, but still no word on when DS will get his jabs. I wonder if some of the leisure interest groups I used to go to, like lace and gardening, will be thinking about reconvening?

Midlife Crisis much?

 Well, we bought a little caravan yesterday.  It was almost worth it alone for the experience of seeing our adult son's face drop when we told him what we had done.  The shock, swiftly followed by horror, then suspicion as he demanded to know if we were messing with him? followed by more shock when we assured him that we really had bought one, followed by much eye widening and failing miserably to hide how aghast he was, as he attempted to utter platitudes that sounded more like forecasts of doom: "well, I hope it will turn out to be really enjoyable for you both.." etc  before exiting the room with a look on his face similar to what I imagine a 48 year old man would receive on buying a red Ferrari and dating a 20 year old. 

All very amusing, especially as I had fully predicted it to DH in advance that we would have to face the music when we got home.  It's not an impulse decision for us but I guess it seems that way to DS. As well as talking about it a lot the last few weeks, we actually did spend some considerable time discussing the purchase - all the way up to the dealer in the car (over an hour), about 30 minutes inside the caravan and 20 minutes standing out in the rain outside, then another 45 minutes sitting in the car eating our picnic lunch. Not about whether we would get that specific caravan, but about what we wanted in a holiday and specifically in the next five years.  I also pointed out that we, and particularly I, are not getting any younger - so we are moving into the territory of "well if we don't do it soon, then we've probably run out of time to do it at all".  Although we acknowledge our own laziness and reluctance to leave our comfortable little rut at home, I strongly feel it will be good for us to get out into the world and have to problem solve, and see new sights after so long at home, and learn new things. It will be a new hobby we can do together, hopefully for the next 3-5 years anyhow, and then we can sell the caravan and recoup some of our purchase price.

So now I am hurled into a massive spate of organising and arranging: have to get a tow bar installed on the car, find somewhere to store the caravan (everyone is full that I've tried so far), insurance, all the kit and accessories.  There is so much learning online now, so I'm watching lots of Youtube videos on what to pack, and how to tow safely etc. DH will be the driver so I'm going to sign him up for a towing refresher course, as it's been many years since we last towed a trailer. It might be difficult to find places to go this year if all the sites are mobbed but should get easier next year hopefully if international travel opens up more.  Our car is on the smaller side so we could only buy a very lightweight van, which greatly restricted the available choice, not helped by everything being sold out.  In the end we have gone for a continental caravan called the Adria Action because they have a good reputation for quality and for such a small caravan the layout inside seems quite workable for two people. We won't be picking it up for a few weeks because of all the things to be sorted first.  I'll try not to bore you all too much with caravan talk in future. Fingers crossed it will all work out, we'll learn how to do it, and will have some enjoyable breaks in it. I'm already thinking about which quilts could become the caravan quilts and what sewing and knitting projects I can take in it. I've signed up for an Australian Block of the Month which will involve a lot of handwork so could be good for taking with me.

I finished the Autumn coloured socks and blocked the second one.  I wore them to bed last night and they were really warm.

DH helped me refold all the quilts yesterday.  I was smarter this time than when I previously refolded them all a couple of years ago - I measured the shelves of the wardrobe and taped out a rectangle of that size in masking tape on my bed.  That made it much easier to fold them all to a uniform size.  It was lovely to see them all again, all the memories in them whether made by me or by others, or antique.  Quite a lot of work and several trips to get them all back into the cupboard though. They really need a bigger cupboard so they aren't so squashed.

I had a go at a little totebag, trying an online tutorial for a recessed zipper in the top with mixed results. The vinyl I found in my stash was too soft and stretched under the presser foot so my topstitching is somewhat ragged.

It's been quite a busy week both at my (increasingly feeling irrelevant) job and otherwise, so I haven't done a lot of crafting.  Today we took DS to Oxford to see his girlfriend for the first time in months.  Having delivered him, we strolled into town and did a walk around the less crowded western edge of town from a book of Oxford walks that we've used many times.  Despite having been to Oxford so many times over the years (both as tourists and as parents of a student there), it continues to surprise with delightful corners and vistas that we had never seen before.  We walked along a network of river channels and the canal, which felt more like the Netherlands. Apologies for the rubbish pictures, my phone is really old and the camera struggles with light levels. It was actually an intermittently sunny day.  We took a picnic lunch so that we never had to come in contact with anyone else. It did feel really nice to be out and about apart from having to be constantly alert for other people.

Bank holiday nostalgia

 It's a long weekend in the UK and we actually ventured out to do a few traditional things like visiting a garden centre.  And  today (Bank Holiday Monday) it is throwing it down with rain which is also very traditional!  On Saturday we went to a garden centre we are familiar with, so we knew that the outside plant display area was pretty spacious.  There were a lot of (masked) people there but for the most part we could keep our distance.  I was looking for plants to replace the winter casualties lost to snow and cold, and loaded up the trolley with what seemed like a lot of perennials (including a Japanese anemone, some foxgloves, penstemons, Gaura and a few others).  But of course once home and planting them out, they soon are all set out and you wish you had got more.  But it was really pleasant to pretend to be normal  and do something we haven't done for over a year, but used to do a lot in the olden days.  And hopefully we'll have some more flowers this summer.

We also visited a few caravan/motorhome dealers over the weekend as we are toying with the idea of getting something for UK staycations over the next few years, now that international travel is going to be both more expensive and more difficult. Of course we are very late to the party, huge numbers of customers before us have bought up most of this season's stock and the used stock as well, and prices are really high for what's left.  I see on Facebook that campsites are pretty packed and that it can even be hard to find a space to rent at a caravan storage park.  We are very conflicted as shoppers because although I love the idea of getting away and having adventures, at the same time we're both a bit lazy and our own house is so comfortable and so full of enjoyable things to do, that it is hard to see the benefit of making the effort to go away and be uncomfortable in a confined space somewhere else.  And it is definitely not a cheap hobby.  Unless you bought a very basic (and possibly dangerous and uncomfortable) old caravan or motorhome, it's probably easily costing over £100 a night by the time you factor in depreciation, insurance, storage fees, breakdown cover, accessories, etc etc.  Not to mention all the faff of dealing with multiple systems that can go wrong or have to be filled or connected or set up.  Years ago we had a folding camper (fancy tent trailer) and while I loved it, it was a lot of work and DH loathed everything about it.  Neither of us liked being trapped cheek-by-jowl in a campsite filled with other people and their screaming kids, televisions and barking dogs, but if you go off-grid to a more basic site then you really have to keep an eye on your consumables such as your gas and battery levels.  We were impressed though at how much more comfortable and robust the units seem to be now, even campervans had ovens and microwaves, blown air heating, hot water and even toilets and showers.  I had a lot of fun climbing in and out of various units and opening all the cupboards etc., DH was less enthusiastic but still intrigued with some of the gadgets. I doubt anything will come of it, there are big cons and pros for all three types of unit (caravan, motorhome, campervan) and nothing springs out as the perfect solution even though I quite liked some of things I saw.

Crafting this week has been low key, with some pottering in the sewing room altering some clothes to fit better. I had a go at crafting a tiny dollshouse-size beaded bag after a friend pointed out the many tutorials online (and also a bunch here, keep scrolling down through the comments for more patterns).  Apparently tiny beaded bags are a bit of a hobby in places like Japan and Russia.  I should have known better than to jump right into to trying to make one out of seed beads for a first project when I was learning the technique.  The beads are so small and I found it really difficult to manipulate the fishing/beading line and understand how the 3D aspect worked, not to mention just trying to see what was going on.  I tried using my 5x Optivisor magnifier but settled on the 3.5x reading glasses from the pound shop as the best option.  I did a lot of undoing and re-doing but eventually ended up with a respectable bag shape. This is made with size 11/0 seed beads and 0.3mm clear nylon/monofilament beading thread. I've put it into the bedroom of my Canadian-style dollhouse.

Another thing I did this week was to make several trips up to the attic storage room to collect quilts  and bring them down to hang on the banisters on the lower floors. I realised that it had been over two years since I last had them all out, apart from the selected ones that I take out every few months in the winter when I change over the quilts I'm using on my bed.  It doesn't do textiles much good to sit folded up for ages, being crushed under the weight of other quilts.  It can set the fold lines permanently or even cause wear along the fold lines. 

So I'm letting them relax and hang the folds out for a week or so until I go through the work of refolding them all to fit them back into the modified IKEA wardrobe that most of them live in.  Yet another collection I will have to downsize eventually. One of the retirement groups that I have joined online had a post asking 'what would you have done differently when planning for retirement, knowing what you know now?'.  One woman's punchy answer was 'not collected so much cr*p!'.    I have a houseful of cr*p and it makes me happy to own it but at the same time, it feels like burden to think of having to downsize it all.  I have multiple collections, most of which will be extremely time-consuming to sell as individual pieces: vintage linens, vintage magazines, stash/books/tools across multiple hobbies, a room full of furnished dollshouses, etc. etc.  Someone in my old dollshouse club has been taking tables at local dollshouse shows for years and gradually selling off her garage-full of vintage dollshouse furniture.  Maybe I will need to do something like that.

Still handquilting, knitting the shawl and the second sock, and doing a bit of cross stitch on the little house sampler.  I haven't opened the box of the Kyoto Onsen kit yet, I think I will save that for when I am on holiday in June and can really concentrate on it.

What did you do on your bank holiday weekend?