trailblaz-z-zer

Dulcie and I are enjoying a long weekend of rest and relaxation at my parents' house in Elgin.  We've been keeping quite busy with trips to beaches and charity shops, but Dulcie has been setting a good example and reminding me that our true purpose in life is to rest.  It's amazing how tired a late-September dip in the North Sea can make a child...!

amalgamate please

 Unable to capture THE definitive image of the romper suit I made for Dulcie, I have decided to blog a multitude of shots from the weekend in the hope that we'll all be able to amalgamate them in our minds and form that definitive image ourselves.  This outfit is seriously and insanely cute in person so it's driving me mad that I can't quite capture it for posterity/bragging rights.  I won't say any more, for fear that I distract you from your mental amalgamating.  Now go and amalgamate, my friends, and don't come back until you fully appreciate how flamin' wonderful this romper suit is!

allow me to plan your evening's viewing

I should have blogged about this earlier in the week (you only have nine hours left to watch it on iplayer!) but did anyone see The Fabric Of Britain: Knitting's Golden Age on BBC Four last week?  My mum (who does all my knitting for me these days - I just dangle the chosen pattern in front of her!) and I watched it together and both really enjoyed it.  The knitting ranges from the sublime (Fair Isle sweaters and baby jackets from the 1940s) to the ridiculous (Gyles Brandreth's jumper collection and poodle wine bottle covers).  Even if you're not a knitter, it's well worth watching for pure entertainment value, and if you are interested in craft, history or design, I am sure you will enjoy it.  Tonight's episode (it's a mini season) is all about wallpaper, so I'm looking forward to that too.

Also worth watching from BBC Four this week, A Very British Murder With Lucy Worsley.  I love Lucy Worsley so much!  I don't think she's had a bad series yet.  She always manages to find an interesting slant on whatever period of history she's looking at and is such a gorgeously enthusiastic history boffin, it's just impossible not to love her.  I can't think of anyone else who would be willing to dress up and act out historical scenes in the possession of so little acting prowess.  Go, Lucy!  She featured in the What I See When I Look In The Mirror column in The Guardian recently, where she waxed lyrical about her gorgeous eyes and eyelashes before sharing her mantra, gleaned from the comments of a French television producer/director, who told her, "Your terrible posture does not matter - you are an intellectual!"  She's so great!

So, your evening... 8.00pm - Knitting's Golden Age, 9.00pm - The Story Of Wallpaper (live!), 10.00pm - A Very British Murder.  No need to thank me :)

he used to give me roses...*

Photo by CasaAbril

I have a love/hate relationship with flowers.  I love the sentiment behind them and they do brighten up my shabby house temporarily, but I'm not very good at throwing them out in time so I usually end up with brown-edged petals falling all over the place and I CAN NEVER FIND A SUITABLE VASE!  This causes me no end of stress and guilt since flowers are not cheap and I hate to feel unappreciative.  I'm sorely tempted to treat myself to this vase by CasaAbril on Etsy but I know I need to be holding onto as many pennies as possible right now and the postage on this item (while absolutely not unreasonable) would push this into the big treat category.  Oh, but it would make me so happy and you could still have it out on display even without flowers so there would be no storage issues...  Hmmm, I smell a self-inflicted sales pitch brewing!  I also love these little pots - ideal for succulents.  I need more ceramics in my life/on my shelves, I think.  Maybe I should reopen my Etsy shop and try to make enough money to treat myself to this.  That would practically be a swap, wouldn't it?  You know I'm going to talk myself round eventually, don't you?  I just hope nobody swoops in and buys this while I dither!

* This title is not a comment on Graham, I just got the Prisoner Cell Block H theme tune stuck in my head while writing this post!

my kind of business meeting

On Sunday we headed down to the Children's Wood where all sorts was happening.  As well as cakes, music and handmade goodies, Katy and Jo from Mimi & Will had a stall, drumming up business for all their fab T-shirts.  It was the first time I'd seen my T-shirt in the flesh and I was so chuffed with how it looked.  All the designs looked great actually, but my wee number was definitely holding its own among all the REAL talent!

Katy had very kindly saved me a cupcake with my design on it.  I was going to photograph it before letting Dulcie eat it as a post-nursery snack, but...

...we got in on Monday afternoon to find this scene!  This is just the sort of thing that always happens when we leave the cats unattended for more than a moment.  The effing blighters had even eaten the transfer with my design on it!  So no photos for the blog and no cake for Dulcie :(

 I'm not sure Lola was the culprit, despite being caught fleeing the scene.  Poppy, the prime suspect, was suspiciously contented in bed all afternoon.  Hmmm...

Edited to add:  Mimi & Will have a special early-bird offer running at the moment, so you can get any one T-shirt for the special reduced price of £15.  You'll need to be quick, though, as there are only a handful left!  You don't even need to decide which design you want just yet, so if you're torn between two (or three!) you can order now, bag a bargain and make your decision later.

I motherfreakin' made something else!

After cutting out the pieces for Dulcie's forthcoming dress (watch this space!) I had JUST enough material to whip up a little top from the same pattern for her friend Sunniva's second birthday.  This top turned out really cute (credit should probably go to the lovely fabric, I'll admit) and makes me excited for the sewing together of Dulcie's dress.  I'm hoping there might be enough bee material left to make the same top again for Dulcie too.  If not, I will using start using up my vintage sheets and curtains at long last.  The discovery of how easy it is to sew clothes for little girls could be just the stash-buster I've been needing for a long while!

news from nursery

Dulcie is still working hard at nursery, gradually building up her hours and her confidence.  Friday was her longest session yet and she even stayed for lunch.  The whole affair is really going very well.  I'm hardly staying any time at all now, just sneaking out after the first five minutes or so.  Dulcie's making lots of new friends and is always excited when we arrive.  When I appear to pick her up, she is pleased to see me but just wants to show me what she's been doing rather than cling onto me or run away.  In a couple of weeks' time, she should be up to her three full days a week.  She's doing so well and I couldn't be happier with the nursery we chose.

Despite having 14 months on the waiting list to prepare ourselves, I am woefully disorganised and Dulcie still doesn't have most of the things she needs to take with her.  In the absence of an appropriately sized bag (preferably one with Peppa Pig on it if you listen to Dulcie) we have been making use of my old Spider-man school bag in the meantime.  I knew I'd hung onto it all these decades for a reason!  I actually think we might just keep using this one - at least none of the other children will have one quite the same and I think Dulcie really likes it, despite the fact it is nearly as big as her!

Dulcie has to take a packed lunch with her.  So far she's had leftovers from the previous night's dinner, but I'm hoping I'll have a few brainwaves and be able to fill the freezer with things I can pop in her bento-style lunch box in a jiffy - vegetable samosas, savoury muffins, homemade soup...  The nursery can reheat things for her, but it would all have to be otherwise ready.  Does anybody have any great ideas for easy and nutritious packed lunches for a toddler?