Today’s work session was making snowmen decorations. I’m fairly pleased with them, but am coming under quick conclusion that Christmas decorations are not my forte. It’s also shocking how long it takes! Still so much to do today as well. Oh well, only one more lot of Christmas decorations to go!
Normality still hasn’t returned since half term and what with the normal Christmas madness, I doubt it’ll return again now, until January, so things still feel slightly odd. The current bout of oddness has been due to Mr. Lacer and the kids going to the mother-in-law’s this weekend, without me. I had been due to go, but thanks to last week’s illness, I’d got even more behind on my Christmas stall preparation and although I had planned on taking my crafty stuff with me, I just needed every second to work this weekend, so I stayed at home and sewed and sewed and sewed.
Saturday was ‘embroidered pieces day’, you see the plan for my stall, which is turning nothing like the stall I’ve been imagining in my head for going on years now, out of necessity really – and wanting to invest the smallest amount of money possible (I’ve been raiding my current craft supplies to do this, when possible), anyway, the plan for the stall is Christmas decorations, Christmas decorations and more Christmas decorations, as they’re cheap and don’t take that much time to produce (theoretically) however as far as my business will go, with my etsy shop (newly opened, but with currently nothing in it, hence me not giving out the address yet), I will be concentrating on larger embroidered pieces and I’m trying to think of my stall as an advert for my etsy shop, so I’ve planned to have a few larger embroidered pieces on the stall as well, if I sell them on the night, great, otherwise they’re (hopefully good) adverts. So, I spent Saturday working on the larger pieces, my plan is to have three embroidered cushions and two framed pieces and by 2am on Sunday morning, I had finished the three fronts for the cushions. I’m really pleased with them, they’re my own designs (obviously) and I’ll put them up here when I’ve sewn them up into cushions. However, they took me, pretty much literally all day (and the first one I’d done the day before, so it took me all day to do two), which made me think about pricing, I don’t want to make my stuff too expensive, but I am also not going to undersell myself. There will be two large cushions and one small one, I think on the stall I’ll be selling the two large ones at £25 each and the small one at £10 and if they end up in my etsy shop, I’ll have to put the prices up to £30 and £15, to cover fees etc. and I was sitting there worrying on Saturday that that would be too expensive, even though I knew at the same time, that even at those prices, I was working for less than the minimum wage, considering the time it took for me to do each piece.
However, it was a fun Saturday, whilst sewing I finished listening to my current audiobook, which took four hours, which was slightly frustrating, as I had to listen to nearly an hour that I had listened to before, as the book had been split into five audiobook chapters of an hour each and after I had nearly completed the second chapter, last weekend, when I had been out shopping, I must have left it running by mistake, so I had lost my place and it had looped back to the beginning again and there’s no way of forward winding it on my iphone. Even so, it made the four hours pass quickly and when the book had finished, I was rather disappointed that I’m not getting another Audible credit until the end of next week! So I listened to documentaries on iPlayer instead, I’m quite a fan of documentaries, but don’t get to watch them (or listen, if I’m sewing) that often, as if I’m watching TV, most of the time it’s something both me and Mr. Lacer would want to watch and he’s not a great fan of documentaries, so I watched listened to the latest Horizon, about black holes, which was absolutely fascinating and had the most beautiful analogy comparing black holes with waterfalls, now being scientifically trained, science documentaries are always a bit hit and miss with me, most of the time they’re aimed at people (obviously) with a more general scientific knowledge, so they can get a bit boring, but the Horizon documentary on the black holes seemed to be aimed at someone who knew a little bit about relativity and extended it for them. So, thanks to their analogy comparing black holes and waterfalls, I now know a bit more about something, which is always a nice feeling. Science documentaries (or any documentaries really), always make me curious for stories to, I think they’re a great source of story ideas and in this one in particular I found it fascinating how all these scientists were basically sitting their waiting for a new ‘Einstein’, someone to come along and sort out why Einstein’s theories fall apart in black holes, it was great imagining who that person would be and what would happen.
So, after a spot of science, I then went for a spot of history, watching the first two episodes of Andrew Marr’s The Making of Modern Britain, that was fascinating too and rather shaming as well, I had no idea that the inventor of concentration camps and eugenics was us, the British. Absolutely shocking what we did during the Boer War. I loved all of Marr’s stories about the various politicians though and all those black and white photos, they looked like that had a lot more character than our politicians these days.
I didn’t just spend all day sewing and listening to my audiobook and documentaries though, as I did end up needing to go out and get supplies at about 5pm. Oh it felt so decadent being out when normally I’d normally be doing tea and bedtime! I got my supplies from John Lewis’s haberdashery and went upstairs to check out the curtain fabrics (we’d been needing to replace the kids’ curtains for some time and Girl Lacer speeding up the process with the aid of some projectile vomiting whilst she was ill). Curtains are tricky in our flat, as beyond the mess, our flat actually has a neutral decor, I didn’t want neutral curtains in the kids’ room though, that’s boring, but certainly couldn’t have anything too fussy, also couldn’t have anything too boyish or too girlish, for obvious reasons and didn’t want anything too young, as the kids’ will be in that room for at least another five years and I don’t want to replace the curtains again. So, in all the great, fantastic, rather large range of curtain fabrics in John Lewis, I found precisely . . . one, a large, light green and cream check, I didn’t have the window dimensions with me though, but I reckon the whole thing will cost me about £25, bargain considering the rest of the flat’s curtains cost £40 a pair, one of the many times I love sewing!
After the curtain fabrics, I went down to Waitrose, it was just meant to be for some croissants, I didn’t even bother picking up a basket, but with my sudden feeling of freedom, I ended up arms laden with a sewing magazine, two pizzas (buy one get one free), two miniature puddings from The Pudding Club* . . . and some croissants.
Sunday, despite going to bed at 2am, I had to set my alarm and be up and sewing at 8am, Sunday was Christmas decoration sewing day, so getting a lot more actually produced. I made stars, Christmas trees, buttons and Christmas stockings, I still need to make snowmen and some more stars, just doing those four groups took me all day again. I’m really pleased with my Takashi Murakami inspired stars.
The Christmas trees were a pain, I’d had a bright (read stupid) idea to use sparkly thread, which is always a nightmare to use, despite it looking good in the end, so I like the trees, but I’m not making them like this again!
Then I worked on the buttons, which were my original bright idea (read stupid again), I’m not happy with them, I worked several variations but I’m still not happy with them and they took way too much embroidery on each, for something that is never going to sell for that much.
Then finally the stockings, which was a last minute idea, a lot simpler than the buttons, a lot quicker to make and in my opinion look better to.
So, I’ve still got a busy week ahead of me (and I haven’t done any NaNoWriMo for three days now, oops, but I had a feeling this would happen, the stall is more important, also with the NaNo, I’ve now got to that awkward stage where it’s approaching the middle of the book, you know that spot where you’re over the honeymoon but not at the finale yet, so it’s easy to get distracted by other stuff, doesn’t help that I’ve just thought of an excellent idea for another story, which I want to think about but I’m having to stop myself, but I think I’ve just got to expect that I think of all my new story ideas when I’m the middle of something else, the trick is just to remember, but not work on the idea, until after I’ve finished the last one!). Lots more sewing to do first.
*Anyone been to The Pudding Club in Mickleton? Back when I was working, I had to go away a lot for courses and a lot of the time it would be in one of those awful hotels besides a motorway, the ones with awful food, but someone in hotel procurement or whatever, obviously had a soft spot for puddings, as occasionally instead of the hotel in nowhere land, we went to the hotel in Mickleton where The Pudding Club is based and it was absolutely wonderful, even though the pudding club wasn’t actually on whilst we were there, all the food is divine, you know, one of those places where when you think of your favourite ‘insert favourite food item here’ and that hotel is the place of my ‘all time favourite steak’ and my ‘all time favourite risotto’, whether I can remember any of the training I had, that’s a different matter. The hotel rooms are lovely to and some of them are pudding themed as well, I was lucky enough to stay in the spotted dick room once!
PS I don’t put photos up on my photo blog much anymore, so worth a mention that I have just put two on, after playing with a new gadget, the photos are here and here.
I am going through a phase, perfect for this time of year, of loving ghost stories and Kate Mosse’s latest, The Winter Ghosts, fits the bill perfectly. Quite a grown up ghost story, I was pleasantly surprised listening to this book, how Kate Mosse has moved on a little from her Labyrinth and her Sepulchre to produce a simpler yet more satisfying story, whilst still retaining some common themes to her work. I can’t really say what all the common themes are, as I don’t want to spoil the plot, apart from the obvious, that it is again set in the south of France. What I can say is that The Winter Ghosts, set during the interwar years, tells the tale of Freddie, younger brother of a soldier who dies in The Great War, still overcome with grief ten years later, in a world where everyone else is determined to look forwards, he goes travelling round France. After dangerously crashing his car, he is forced to seek refuge in a little village in a mountain village, a village with it’s own sense of sadness. A book about not forgetting but also about moving on.
Like the last book I read, The Darkest Room, these are books to read / listen to, as winter approaches and the nights draw in, I doubt somehow either would have quite the same effect in the height of summer, so read them now, I recommend them.
It has felt like a long weekend round here for a long time, first it was the kids’ half term and as Mr. Lacer also had the week off and we really didn’t do much, it felt like Sunday for much of the time, which gets boring after a while. On the Friday, Boy Lacer got sick but not too bad, bouncing back almost immediately but with no appetite for a few days afterwards, then on Sunday night Girl Lacer gets sick, a bit worse, then Tuesday morning Mr. Lacer gets it and Tuesday afternoon I get it, both badly. So with the holiday and the sickness, there’s been a lot of hanging round the house doing nothing and/or feeling sorry for ourselves. Girl Lacer has only just gone back to school today (two days late) and it was so refreshing doing the school run (and another plus, they had some more photos from the class up outside the door, so that was nice to see, including a lovely one of the whole class, sitting on a giant wooden play ship they have, Girl Lacer was sitting on the prow, Girl Lacer looked particularly cute in that, I always reckon she photographs like one of those politician mug shots, you know all gleam and big cheesy smile, doesn’t help that she chose for her winter coat this year, a most lovely bright red woollen coat that when she wears it makes her look like a miniature White House intern, with her very blonde bobbed hair). The house seems so much quieter now that it’s just me and Boy Lacer again. The house is also extremely messy, which is pretty depressing, specially considering I haven’t completely regained my energy yet.
I’m meant to be at a coffee morning right now, that I organised, so that’s bad I’m not there, I just hope some people do turn up! Just don’t have the energy to traipse up to the cafe nor do I have the energy to get Boy Lacer off the climbing frame there, if he decides to get awkward and he’s been doing a lot of awkward recently and/or I just don’t have the energy to deal with his normal antics, so he just seems worse, probably a bit of both but the climbing frame there, if he gets up there and decides he doesn’t want to come down, I wouldn’t be able to get him down, much as I’m able to get onto most climbing frames with ease, this particular one has a horrible design, perfect size for the average 4 year old but not for an adult needing to get on it. I probably could get on it, if I really had to but as I could tell last time we were there, once I got up there, it was so small, I still wouldn’t be able to wrestle pick up an uncooperative Boy Lacer and get him safely off it again. Serves me right for picking that cafe as a venue.
Other than Tuesday, when I really couldn’t do anything, I have been doing NaNoWriMo, luckily I got ahead quite a bit on the first two days, so an enforced day off wasn’t too bad and I managed to get a bit more than the 1666 words done yesterday to. I’ve broken the 10K mark on my NaNoWriMo, which has been so far fairly easy, I love that beginning of a story honeymoon (don’t worry by the way for my completed first draft of my Egypt story, that is getting rested for one more month whilst I do NaNoWriMo, the timing was so perfect with no novel in progress at the beginning of NaNoWriMo, I couldn’t resist). My NaNoWriMo is my Charles story that I’ve talked about here on my blog before (not very recently mind you), I had been handwriting it and doing a lot of research, writing the beginning over and over again and then gave up on it to concentrate on the Egypt story. So, I started again, discovered that that beginning I had written over and over again, was actually only around 2000 words, I had been under the impression it had been a lot more. Now that I’m above the 10K mark I’m beginning to wonder if I have enough plot for a full 50K, but that’s a common fear for me with anything I write, we’ll have to see.
A spot of culture for me and Girl Lacer today, thanks to a tip off from fellow Day of the Dead fan 5currantbuns, I learnt that The British Museum were having a Day of the Dead celebration today and as I quite fancied going to that, I thought I’d pop into Tate Modern first and check out the new Turbine Hall exhibit, Miroslaw Balka’s How it Is, which was a couple of tantalising days away from opening, last time I was at Tate Modern and I desperately wanted to see what was inside that giant metal crate, which I saw peeking over the barriers.
So, it was Tate Modern first, a quick in – out job. You go down the ramp at the Turbine Hall and there’s this great big steel box in front of you, on stilts. You walk right to the back of the Turbine Hall, which in itself is a lot more dimly lit than normal, where one of the sides of the crate is open, just literal pitch blackness inside. You head up into the box via a large black ramp and as you enter the darkness, wow, it really screws with your senses. I think a lot of people probably have very differing responses to the crate, with me it was like all my sensory processing went down to my feet and ankles, my only contact with the environment coming from my feet, on a floor I could not see, I was instantly paranoid I was going to trip or stumble over something, I had to force myself to pick up my feet instead of sliding them across the floor, as some kind of early warning system of a ridge or hole in the floor. My ankles kept having the strangest of sensations that something was about to hit them. Of course neither Tate or the artist would put holes or ridges for visitors to trip over, health and safety if anything, so it was strange how even though I knew that on a rational level and kept telling myself that, my feet and ankles were telling me, or at least fearing, a very different story.
As me and Girl Lacer walked into the crate, there were other people ahead of us and I was so paranoid about walking into them, luckily there was a boy ahead of us in a white T-shirt and several blonde people, which was handy! As me and Girl Lacer kept walking, I became increasingly paranoid that we were going to hit a wall and I could see the people ahead of us had stopped and turned, so I assumed the wall was where the others had stopped, so me and Girl Lacer stopped and turned shortly before them, it was only when we came out again, did we realise that we (and the other people) probably didn’t even make it half way across the crate, I wonder how many people make it right to the back of the crate, to it’s wall, without chickening out?
Then it was onto The British Museum, now I’m used to queuing outside the Natural History Museum and the Science Museum, but I have never ever queued outside The British Museum, until now that is. And it wasn’t even a moving queue, for a good while it was perfectly stationary. But we got in eventually, saw the tail end of the carnival procession whilst eating nachos and drinking iced lime, whilst sitting on the floor, a green skeleton slithered on it’s tummy towards Girl Lacer, it slithered directly in front of her line of sight, good god she screamed. Everything was extremely crowded and the queueing time for any activity beyond colouring in a day of the dead mask or waiting to see one of the other performances, was too much, too many people.
Un Day of the Dead related, we did go to see the Egyptian Mummies, as Girl Lacer had been inspired by the story at the Legoland Fireworks, where Indiana Jones was chased by a mummy. We also did the skeleton trail, where we had to find certain museum pieces with a skeleton theme, which Girl Lacer enjoyed. But then on the way out, you guessed it, we had to queue on the way out to (first time I’ve had to do that in any museum). So, The Day of the the Dead wasn’t a bad day out, the museum had clearly put in a lot of effort, it was just that it was more a victim of its own success.
Happy Halloween everyone! As I type I am sitting on a cold pub bench ‘minding’ Girl Lacer, although of course it’s pitch black and I haven’t got a clue where she is, other than she’s off having fun somewhere with the crowd of instant friends she always manages to generate. Thank god for secure pub gardens.
We’re at a Halloween party, Mr. Lacer and Boy Lacer were also here, but it was way out of Boy Lacer’s comfort zone. He was mollified for a while with a painting app on my iPhone, but after he’d exhausted that he wanted to go home.
Still, it’s quite a cool party, bouncy castle, lasers, artificial smoke, fire eater, ‘haunted forest’, like a 6 year old I’m easily pleased. And Girl Lacer has been keeping me company a little,
Girl Lacer: I want a drink
Me: You’ll have to come into the pub with me
Girl Lacer: Ok, I like sitting on bar stools
Me: Hmmm
She managed to loose her friend after being given a scyth and a demonic stick to look after whilst he went to the toilet. She then spent ages looking for him and we had a good girl to girl conversation about how all boys look the same (specially when they all wear skeleton costumes and it’s um dark). Luckily, after lots of staring at a particular boy, me going “I think that’s him”, Girl Lacer going “Hmm, it might be”, she did manage to return the scyth and the demonic stick, just as the boy in question was about to go home. She’s now in the Forbidden Forest, complete with ankle breaking holes and spooky purple smoke.
So, on a final note on costumes, me and Girl Lacer weren’t exactly original either, we were witches, Mr. Lacer was the Fonz (yeah right) but the prize of originality actually goes to Boy Lacer, ‘witch bunny’, something Mr. Lacer thought infinitely preferable to his original choice, ‘princess’, even though me and Girl Lacer thought there was nothing wrong with him dressing as a princess, as Girl Lacer put it “I can dress as Ben 10 who’s a boy and I’m a girl so why can’t he dress as a princess?”, absolutely right!
Anyway, the costume is below, it’s an old ballet costume of Girl Lacer’s.
I can’t stop stitching Sublime Stitching onto t-shirts at the moment, I think in combination of wanting stuff to wear for Halloween and feeling so Halloweeney I absolutely don’t want to be doing what I should be doing, i.e. work on Christmas presents and stuff for my Christmas stall, just not feeling Christmasy.
Anyway, this is from the Tara McPherson pattern sheet and is probably the hardest Sublime Stitching pattern I’ve ever done, specially trying to transfer the pattern on to black fabric. I used carbon transfer paper but it didn’t transfer that well and it rubbed off after a while, so in the end I was sewing by eye, referring to the pattern sheet. So, it’s more than a little wonky. I also didn’t include the lips because when I tried they just so did not look right. But otherwise I’m really pleased with it and definitely want to stitch some more from the sheet, may see if I can work them into my Christmas presents.
I made this for Boy Lacer yesterday. It’s the Robot Parts T-shirt from Sublime Stitching’s Embroidered Effects book. This is my first project from the book and I really enjoyed it, I liked how although they’re giving you’re a pattern, they also give you so much control about what you’re going to do with it (in my case I used different colours and the dial and the gauge at the bottom are the wrong way round compared to the photo in the book). Boy Lacer really likes it.
Have I said how much I hate my kitchen? Probably. It’s even worse now, because the hob that only had three functioning rings when we moved in six years ago, now only has two functioning rings, my, cooking Christmas dinner is going to be fun this year. And I wonder (and feel guilty) why my family often exists on sandwiches and stuff that goes straight from the freezer and into the oven, but really when I think about it I can see why.
Anyway in rebellion against the boring sandwich this lunchtime (after making Boy and Girl Lacer sandwiches, as I knew they wouldn’t eat this), I made Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s Chicken with Couscous, Honey and Cinnamon, from his River Cottage Everyday book. I’ve been planning on working my way through that book, which is easily the best cookbook I’ve seen this year, but the going has been slower than even I could forsee.
Anyway, after juggling two large frying pans on the front of my hob, where the only two functioning rings are (and one of those is only a small ring), having to lift off one of the pans every time I wanted to change the temperature as the pan was obscuring the ring knobs. I did manage to make it without causing significant harm or injury to me or anyone else. And it was rather yummy, rather sweet mind you until the savoury-ness of the onion kicked in, but still nice. I put mint in it from the garden (as suggested by HFW), which added another interesting layer of flavour. Mr. Lacer also liked the dish but he, the fussy so and so, refused to eat the mint, because, to quote “it’s a leaf”, to which I replied that he was as bad as the kids, to which he replied “I’m as bad as Girl Lacer, but not as bad as Boy Lacer”, well that’s true.
The Darkest Room
A Swedish Number One Bestseller, The Darkest Room is set on and around Eel Point on Oland, an island of the Swedish coast. A young family moves to Eel Point, a set of two lighthouses and an old manor house and outbuildings. Eel Point has had a tragic past, built from the spoils of a ship wreck, deaths litter the building’s history and as each person dies, the remaining occupants of the house go into the barn on the estate and carve the deceased name on the barn wall. Part ghost story, part crime thriller, tragedy soon hits the latest occupants of house, the story leads to an explosive climax as Christmas approaches and at the height of a blizzard, tieing all the seemingly disparate strands together.
This book is beautifully, almost cinematically written, you can almost sense the camera angles so to speak, the beautiful, windswept landscape, the cold, you almost feel like you’re stumbling around in the snow yourself, I highly recommend it, a perfect book for this time of year.
