Wednesday Words (27 November 2013)

Wednesday Words (20 November 2013)

A Blanket For The Boy

As I am now happily plodding along with The Girl's blanket I thought it was about time I started to plan a blanket for The boy.  Yes, I know I have an absolute ton of blankets already started but none of them are boy colour, hence not suitable for The Boy.  He keeps going on and on about the fact he needs a blanket too and how unfair that The Girl gets lots of blankets and he gets none.  To be honest, he is right in what he say but that is only because I never seem to find a suitable colour palette for a near teenage boy.

Way back earlier this year I blogged about a lovely colour scheme I had seen here.  Pigtails gives a beautiful explanation of her colour choices here.  Well I have been reading this blog for such a long time and I was really happy when I saw the finished project Pigtails had made with this yarn.  Isn't it gorgeous.  The colour palette is so different from what I usually choose and so right for The Boy.  

My first job was to stare and stare at this lovely colour palette:

After staring and staring and then some staring more I went away and thought about it for a few days.  Then I came back and stared some more!  After about a week I decided that I would make the same pattern as The Girl's blanket.  This would require 6 colours yet my inspiration contained 9.  I have been loving using the Drop Paris Cotton for the Girl's blanket and would love to use it again.  This blanket has come together so quickly as it is made using a 5mm hook and each treble stitch is slightly over an inch long.

I jumped over to The Wool Warehouse website where I had purchased The Girl's yarn from and went about picking my 6 soft and subtle colours.  These are the 6 colours I settled with:

 

                                      Top Left                                     Top Right

  

                                        Middle                                    Bottom Left

  

                                   Bottom Middle                             Bottom Right         

Here are my choices of Drop Paris yarn:

   

                             Off White (17)                                   Light Turquoise (02)                

     

                              Opal Green (11)                                        Petrol (48)

   

                             Light Grey (23)                                    Light Ice Blue (29)

It's been fun using someone colour palette as inspiration instead of straight copying.  Its was I did with The Girl's blanket too.  Think it is about time I made some simple decisions for myself and I'm going to take confidence in that I have chosen yarn twice now, all by myself.

Do you choose your own colours or do you have favourite crafters you you take huge influence from?

All I have to do now is save the pennies up to purchase the yarn, then away I crochet.

Wednesday Words (13 November 2013)

Blackberry Picking

Seems ages ago since we first went to pick blackberries however, we have been a few more times over the past few weeks as the crop we could reach was not many and I've had them all sat in the freezer for a few weeks.  Today is probably the last time we will go this year though so I have to see what we can make with our meager collection of fruit.

Such a messy job though:

There really were some lovely berries on these plants but sadly they were just out of reach.  When I finally get a house here in Wales, fruit bushes in our own garden are something that I want so badly.  Growing my own fruit and making jam from it is one of the goals on the cooking section of my 50 by 50 challenge list.

I just love making jam but I don't think we have enough berries to make jam unless I mix with some other fruits as we only have just over twice the amount in the tub above.

Any suggestion what we can use them for?

Linking up with Coombe Mill for Country Kids.

Chocolate Tiffin

1 pack of digestive biscuits (300g)
150g of Unsalted butter
3 tbsp Maple or Golden Syrup
4 tbsp of Cocoa
Marshmallows
150g chopped milk chocolate or chocolate buttons


This is one of those nice, simple recipes that the kids can make with very little supervision.  My two are aged 10 & 11 and have great fun making these from an early age.

Melt butter & syrup in a pan (adults)

Crush biscuits

 

Mix in cocoa

Pour in melted butter & syrup (adults)

Mix

Add marshmallows & chocolate

And mix

Pour in tin (unless you want it all over the floor, advised that adults do this part - I speak from experience!)

Press down with the back of a spoon and place in the fridge for at least an hour

Cut into slices

Wednesday Words (6 November 2013)

A Walk Along The Beach At Sunset

Wow, 1 November today!  How did that happen?  This year really is flying by and I had so many dreams for this year and still so many to achieve.

The first Saturday in October was a lovely day here in Wales by the sea and we decided to make the most of it as the sun began to set and went for a walk on the beach about a mile down the coast from where we live.

In order to get there you have to cross the train track by climbing two styles and walk over the golf course before climbing the sand dunes.  

Please note we are not trespassing on train lines, this is an authorised crossing point and safety and common sense must always be used when making such crossings.

The view back from where we have just come.

The view is certainly worth the walk especially at sunset.

Somebody just had to climb the sand dunes:

And then run down them:

Fall over:

Get back up:

The fall over again!:

We live at those houses you can see in the distance:

Somebody had taken a long time to sculpt a sand airplane:

It's so beautiful and quiet when the sun is going down:

Can't believe this was only a month ago and how much the weather has changed since then.

Linking up with Coombe Mill for Country Kids.