Week eleven: mostly trousers

And we’re back at ‘school’ for the final stretch – I have chosen not to send Thing 2 (in year 6) back to school as I feel strongly that it’s too early to do so. The R number is still closer to 1 than 0, the hospitals are expecting a second spike after the half term heatwave (and presumably the mass gatherings in cities over the past few days, though I wholeheartedly support the right to protest against human rights abuses) and I don’t believe that keeping children in ‘bubbles’ is the best way for them to learn. Children – particularly the little ones – need the freedom to play, to explore, to self-select their learning materials, and to socialise with their friends.

(On the subject of the protests, I’d like to see drone footage of the gatherings – there was an interesting piece the other day which showed how the same scene could be manipulated using different lenses and angles to make the viewer think people were ignoring rules.)

I will say that ‘school’ hasn’t been entirely successful this week! We have managed something every day, but that’s all I can lay claim to. Thing 1 has been a bit more enthusiastic as we have had confirmation of her GCSE options, and she’s been allocated her first choices – child development, art, French and media studies – and she now gets to focus on these alongside her core subjects. I wish she’d chosen history, but then I also wish I’d done textiles instead of French – she can always self-discover later if it becomes an interest!

You haven’t mentioned trousers yet…

It hasn’t all been trousers, of course. Monday and Tuesday were all about finishing my Sewing Bee dress. This is a tea dress that my favourite Bee, Liz, made in Episode 1 of the current series and teamed with Doc Martens – the best way to wear a dress, unless it’s with fishnets, Converse and a fluffy petticoat! I’d love Liz to win, or failing that, Matt (who is just adorable), but I suspect Claire is going to swan off with the laurels this year.

The pattern is the Shelby dress by True Bias, which can also be made as a long romper (all-in-one), or short versions of each. I plan on making the long romper as well, in a slightly heavier fabric for winter. I chose the classic short sleeve option and chose to grow them on rather than setting them in as I hate setting in sleeves.

I used a cheap and cheerful polycotton fabric with a cherry print, that I have used before for a pair of Lapwing trousers so I know it washes well – the dress can function as a wearable toile to throw on over the summer, and I can make a ‘proper’ one for work. In terms of construction, apart from the sleeve shortcut, I followed the instructions and it was a straightforward make. My one frustration with the pattern is that none of the panel lengths matched the next one, so there was a lot of trimming before I could turn up the hem. I think I’ll be making more True Bias patterns in the future.

One day my beloved will take a photo of me looking tall and thin! Here I am in my Shelby dress, barefoot in the garden.

The rest of the week was all about the trousers, though, I promise.

First up was the New Look 6859 pyjama pattern for my beloved – this is only the second thing I have ever made for him (the first was a pair of Superhero boxers a couple of weeks ago). He actually requested pyjama bottoms in a sort of ‘well, if you’re making stuff anyway‘ kind of way. Again, these are in an anchor & lifebelt print polycotton which can be tumble dried and requires no ironing – from Pound Fabrics, I think. I hadn’t used this pattern before- they have pockets, and they were supposed to have a drawstring as well as elastic but I just left it with the elastic as my cotton tape was nowhere to be found.

Next, it was a second pair of ‘shaggy pants’ for Thing 2, in 100% cotton (from Pound a Metre, this time). Madam chose the fabric herself, and luckily it was just wide enough to be able to cut the fabric against the grain so the stripes ran horizontally. I was impressed that the stripes look so even across the trouser legs, and almost as well on the outer seams. It’s the same pattern as the last pair, but I decreased the seam allowance to 10mm rather than 15mm in the sides and back for a tiny bit more room for her bottom. (You’ll notice that I try and link to Jaycott’s when I share patterns – I’m not affiliated with them in any way but I do use them myself as they are very reliable and often have excellent sales!)

Finally, it was Thing 1’s ‘shaggy pants but a bit more flowy please mum’ – using Simplicity 1069, version A in crepe-de-Chine fabric. I was put off slippery fabrics a few years ago after trying to make a chiffon kimono when I was quite new to sewing, so I approached this particular challenge with some trepidation – particularly when I realised that the pattern had an invisible zip, pleats in the front AND darts in the back. I was pleased to discover that as long as I supported the fabric while sewing it was pretty easy to handle, and they came together easily. I don’t think I have ever put an invisible zip into anything before constructing the garment but it actually made it very easy, and this might be a hack I use again.

Thing 1 modelling her new trousers – note the DMs!

There’s been very little crochet but a lot of cross stitching – I finished the 4th panel and started on the 5th which is coming along well. Cross stitch was my ‘gateway’ craft and still my favourite to go back to, so having time in my days to focus on it is lovely. I suspect, however, that focusing much more on this is going to require new glasses…each panel has 5607 stitches in 37 colours, and there’s 18 stitches to the inch. It should – in the end – replace the print of this painting I’ve had on my bedroom walls since 1991 when I bought it in a poster sale at the Student Union in Freshers Week. It’s looking a bit faded now.

So, you’ve been indoors all week then!

The weather has changed for the worse, though we are getting intermittent sunshine, and yesterday’s walk was very badly timed! A neighbour and I took our girls out yesterday and found ourselves in the flood meadow just in time for the heavens to open with torrential rain, thunder and lightning – and finally hailstones. We both discovered our waterproofs weren’t doing their jobs…we were so wet that the only thing to do was laugh.

Other walks have been less damp – another walking friend and I have been out at 6am a couple of days this week. One morning we were lucky enough to see a pair of hares in a field, as we walked through to Tawney Common. There’s always a muntjac or two on that route, scampering into the woods, and we usually see some of the Ongar Great Park deer in the fields as well.

One day took us through the park farm as well, past Dial House – the kids call this the ‘witch’s cottage’. We spotted deadly nightshade on the railway bridge and some pretty white irises, as well as admiring the continuing progress of the poppies on the rubble heap.

The weather isn’t looking good for this week, either…

True! I’ve cut out the Hot Coffee hoodie and a Beachcomber dress, both by MBJM Patterns – some fun cat-print fabric for the hoodie and Breton stripes for the dress. I want to try and add pockets to the dress without using the colour blocked version, so we’ll see how that goes. The fabric is quite drapey so I’ll tack the panels on in case the extra layers pull the dress out of shape. I should really have made the colour block style but the thought of pattern matching stripes put me off!

So that’s my week! I’m off to make the sauce for tonight’s lasagne now – one of the few meals that everyone will eat!

How’s your week been?

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

The Silver Pigs/Shadows in Bronze – Lindsey Davis (Audible versions)

And I’m onto the last Jilly Cooper!

Week ten: lazy days

So here we are at the end of week ten, and we’ve survived half term. Actually, it’s been lovely: the weather continues to be glorious, and we have taken advantage of the slight easing of lockdown rules to go on a couple of socially distanced walks with a neighbour and her daughters. Her twin girls fall between Things 2 and 3, and in normal circumstances at this time of year the kids would be in and out of each others’ houses all day making up dance routines (or TikTok-ing, this year), splashing in the pools and bouncing on trampolines. It’s been lovely seeing them back together while we grown ups put the world to rights. The best fun was when we walked through the woods to a brilliant rope swing where we spent a good hour jumping off over a stream bed before following the meanders back to the path home.

Rope swings have been a bit of a feature of our exercise this week – we also visited one in Gernon Bushes, near Coopersale, which has been there for years and which someone has kindly fixed a seat to this year! The first time I went on it I faceplanted spectacularly as I forgot to let go….

This route took us through what’s known locally as the rhododendron path – it borders the Gaynes Park estate, and while they did a lot of clearance last year they have left this beautiful section on the way to the motorway bridge. The bushes are several metres high in places, and dense with flowers as you can see. We brought a cutting home at the children’s request to see if we can grow one for the garden.

As I type this morning I am recovering from my long walk of the week – solo today, and covering 8.5 miles. I was hoping for 10, but it was getting hot and I was getting hungry so I took the quick way home instead of retracing my steps! I picked up the Essex Way on the edge of the woods and then followed that to the outskirts of Ongar, past St Andrew’s at Greensted – the oldest wooden church in the world, and very pretty. I love this route as it follows the green lanes with very little road in this stretch. I hope to walk the whole of the Essex Way to celebrate my significant birthday in a couple of years – I have covered the stretch from Epping to Willingale while training for the Shine Marathon last year, and would love to do the rest over a few weekends.

The devil is in the detail…

This week’s making has been very small scale, unlike my walks! Apart from a bit of crochet in the queue for the chemist and the Co-op (the virus shawl has become my queuing project!) and whipping up a couple more pairs of MBJM Four Seasons shorts from some remnants of jersey and stretch denim, it’s all been about the cross stitch.

Thing 3 and I tried some cyanotype printing with some garden plants, with moderate success – we enjoyed watching the paper change colour and developing the prints in water. I think we need to find an acrylic sheet to hold the plants down flat while they develop so we don’t lose definition in the middle.

Thing 2 and I have been baking – this week we made soft pretzels, cinnamon rolls and Hummingbird Bakery chocolate cupcakes with coffee icing from the Cake Days book. All very unhealthy but so delicious. Baking is Thing 2’s happy activity – she does love to cook, and with 16kg of flour to get through it’s nice to have alternatives to bread. We used cinnamon sugar on the pretzels instead of salt, I recommend this as a great breakfast. I also insisted on raisins in my cinnamon rolls.

And here’s my cross stitch update – there’s still a few gaps in this section, but it’s almost finished. The cross stitching technique, with its capacity for detailed colour changes, really captures the pointillist style of Seurat’s painting – looks better from a distance!

Centre top panel of Sunday Afternoon on the Island

What’s growing this week?

The garden is lovely – the roses are heavenly, and while out walking the blasts of elderflower and honeysuckle are blissful. The garden is full of bees (especially when my beloved discovered a bumble bee nest under a raised bed) and they are loving the lupins, lavender, cotoneaster and the mass of foxgloves that have seeded this year. I spent some time yesterday cutting back periwinkle and mahonia to give my hollyhocks a chance for some sun, and cutting hawthorn shoots away from my physalis plants which have self-seeded beautifully so I should have a good show of ‘lanterns’ this year. Strawberries are ripening every day, and its so decadent to be able to pick and eat them warm from the sun – the raspberry canes are blossoming too, so with any luck we’ll get a good crop. Home grown lettuces have been the basis of this week’s salads, and I think we’ll have fresh peas with dinner tonight.

Honeysuckle in the garden winding round a dead buddleia tree

The hedgerows and fields are producing new flowers as well – I spotted my first bindweed of the year on my walk this morning, some beautiful escaped sweet peas, mallow and grass vetch.

One of the most lovely flowers this week has been the poppy – the Oriental one in the garden is still in bud, but the fields are splashed with red and this rubble pile at the local farm is covered with them. I love the way they almost glow in the early morning sun. You’ll also spot the farm cat and – not a flower – a fledgling magpie who let me take a photo of him before he flew off. Unlike the green woodpecker, who squawked indignantly at me and flew off across the field!

That’s it from me for the week – I’m posting early today so I can sit in the sunshine this afternoon! Term starts back tomorrow, much to the Horde’s disgust, although Thing 1 now only has to do GCSE subjects and Things 2 and 3 are on a four day week.

I’ll leave you with an image of a baby blue tit we found on the ground while out walking – no, I didn’t bring this baby home with me! Feeding a baby mouse with milk is one thing, but I draw the line at smooshing up worms. He was a noisy little chap, shouting away at us and demanding food – I made Thing 2 put him back as close to the nest as we could.

Hope your week was as good as mine! One of my favourite moments was a comment about last week’s post that said reading it was like taking a holiday in someone else’s life. Thanks Olivia! Olivia is one of the museum world’s treasures, with her wonderful stories, so this was high praise indeed.

See you at the end of week 11…

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

Still on Jilly Cooper, sorry… the doings of Rupert Campbell-Black and co are much more interesting than the current omnishambles of real life.

Week nine: there was this mouse…

So here we are again – week nine, the end of the half term (anyone else feeling like they’ve run a marathon at this point?) and looking forward to a bank holiday and a week off. Yes, I *know* there’s another half term to survive after this one – and it’s the long one – but we’ve just heard from the primary school that Things 2 and 3 attend that children will only be doing four day weeks from this point on.

We had the ‘Year 7 transition meeting’ this week for Thing 2, via Zoom which was in some ways good as we didn’t have to travel to Ongar; but, equally, bad as then we didn’t get to have fish and chips for tea afterwards. It was good for the children to ‘meet’ some of the staff they’ll be seeing in September (crossing EVERYTHING here) but they didn’t get the chance to see the classrooms and to meet other children. One thing that continues to reassure me throughout this lockdown is the very real care the schools – secondary and primary – have for their communities. Mr O, who heads up the secondary school, talked directly to the children, answered questions both sent in advance and those sent during the meeting, and assured us that any catch-up English and Maths would be delivered as part of the wider curriculum and not at the expense of the creative subjects which made me happy. They have also managed to spin the second half of this term into a positive for Thing 1 in Year 9, seeing it as an opportunity to prepare for the start of the GCSE courses in September.

What was that about a mouse?

Well, I was out on my usual morning walk on Wednesday, taking nice pictures of flowers in the hedgerow, doing the whole “hullo clouds hullo sky hullo sun” thing and I happened to glance down and there was this tiny mouse sitting in the road near the verge. Next to him was his very very squashed mama mouse and an equally flat sibling. The teeny mouse’s eyes were still closed. He was a very small mouse. I gave myself a good talking to about nature red in tooth and claw, and food chains, and all that sort of thing, and I walked away….and then I saw the buzzard hovering over the common. Yes, dear reader, I took the mouse home with me (if his mama and sibling hadn’t been squashed I would have left him, I promise).

With much headshaking my beloved retrieved an old gerbil tank from the shed, and we googled how to look after baby wild mice – off I went to the pet shop for sawdust and kitten milk, and we made him comfortable. He wasn’t injured or worried, and took to curling up on my hand and feeding from a dropper quite well and by day 4 his eyes were beginning to open. The kids named him Noodle because of his tail, and while I was the only one daft enough to get up at 2.30am for the night feeds, Thing 2 took a lot of care of him in the daytime. Sadly, when I was feeding him this morning he had a convulsion of some sort and died, so he has been buried with much ceremony near at least one of my gerbils and several of my beloved’s childhood cats in the garden. Thing 2 is painting a headstone for him as I type. I am under strict instructions to keep my eyes peeled for any more lonely rodents… next time I’m going to pretend I didn’t see anything.

OK, back to the pretty flowers then!

The hedgerows are bursting into bloom at the moment – high level flowers rather than wildflowers in the verge. The scents of honeysuckle and elderflower in the mornings is quite heady, and the high hedges are constellations of wild roses and blackberry blooms.

The garden has also begun to flower like mad, with self-seeded foxgloves putting up spires all over the place (we’ve always had one a year, but this year there’s about 20 scattered about), last year’s lupins which didn’t do anything, more honeysuckle, strawberries, aquilegia, the gorgeous Gertrude Jekyll rose that my late mother-in-law planted and more. The bees are going mad, particularly for the lavender and the lupins. This afternoon we harvested the first bowl of strawberries, which we’ll have after dinner.

You’ve been enjoying the weather then…

Oh yes, definitely – this week has been glorious. I’ve been doing portable crafts – starting a new virus shawl in the sock yarn I retrieved from unmaking my first socks the other week, picking up my cross stitch and generally enjoying the sunshine. I love the virus shawl, it’s so relaxing – at least if you don’t completely forget an entire row on several rounds and have to unpick it. There’s many patterns and video tutorials available, including one by Bella Coco, but as a kinetic learner I found the written pattern linked above to be the most accessible for me. I’ve made several of these over the last few years and they’re a great way to showcase gradient or variegated yarn.

The cross stitch is an IMMENSE undertaking – Seurat’s Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte – which is my favourite painting ever, and it’s very detailed, Fifty colours…it’s going to take a while. It takes several weeks to do one page, and there’s 15 pages. I started in in February 2019 and worked solidly on it for a while but then got distracted, as I tend to do. If the weather holds I’ll be able to do lots in the garden.

I also used the MBJM Four Seasons pattern again to whip up a pair of shorts for me, and made up the last Centerfield top I cut out last week. I can never get the hood to cross over properly, and the neckline broke two needles on my overlocker, but it’s wearable.

On Friday we took the kids out for a bike ride again, this time along the ‘rhododendron path’ which goes through to Gernon Bushes, an Essex Wildlife Trust reserve that we can access without going along main roads. The Essex Way goes through it, and while the local landowners cleared a lot of the huge rhododendrons last year there’s still some beautiful ones left that tower over the footpath. It really is glorious at this time of year, and as an added bonus the path crosses the M11 via a footbridge so we always stop there for a break so the kids can wave to the lorries (oh, ok, so can the adults!).

Wishing you all a peaceful week ahead!

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

Jilly Cooper, all week. Pure escapism.