tiny happy

So much has happened over the past month.
I haven't felt like writing here, or on my other social media accounts, much since the devastating terrorist attack that took place in Christchurch. But at the same time reading articles, blogs and social media posts online have been comforting and illuminating to me in the past few weeks.

It's just that I haven't found my own words to add. And I still haven't, really. In the last photo above you can see a sign someone left on a concrete wall on our street. It's a simple statement but it does sum things up. I hope it won't be painted over anytime soon.

At the beginning of March, we left Wellington for Japan. It was a trip we had been dreaming of, as a family, for a long time. While our house rather needs painting and many other things should have taken 'priority' we just decided to go for it while we could. I feel so incredibly privileged to have had the opportunity to do this. We had a fabulous time – both as a break from work and just soaking up a different place with all its difference and energy and beauty.

I felt that we had stepped into a kind and calm place that was also very busy and important. I wish I had written a diary while we were there to help me remember all the details. I will have to see if Keira will let me read hers from time to time, as she carefully documented her days and annotated her journal pages with receipts and museum tickets, sweet wrappers and labels.

Photos, from top:

– in the hallway of my textile artist heroine, Naomi Ito (Nani Iro) on my way to visit her studio. More about this in my next post…

– one slice of the view from Tokyo's famous SkyTree tower.

– I took photos of the drain covers in each place we visited. This is the beautiful design on drains in Nara.

– Keira turned 14 while we were in Japan. Her wish was to visit the Tove Jansson Akebono Children's Forest Park in Saitama, so we did. This was one of the little buildings in the park. There was also a beautiful mud-brick house with a spiral wooden staircase and a reading room where you could sit and explore Tove Jansson's books. There will soon be a new Moomin park built nearby, but we missed the opening by a few days.

– we burned some incense alongside people from all over the world at this special communal shrine at Sensoji Temple in Asakusa.

– plum and cherry blossoms were starting to come out in the last few days we were in Japan, like party decorations. They're so pretty. Like nearly everyone else, I took a hundred photos of them.

I was lucky enough to bring a few craft-related purchases home with me. I'll show these in my next post, coming soon! 
I hope you are well and happy, dear reader.

A weekend away with friends to learn, play and experiment with making.
That's on offer at the inaugural Craft Camp, a weekend-long retreat near Wellington organised by Tash and her team at Holland Road Yarn Company , July 12-14.

While Tash says this event is aimed at knitters and makers, there are no knitting classes. Each session is designed to complement your existing skills, either to help you celebrate what you already know or add a new talent to your tool belt.

The classes on offer feature weaving, photography, mindfulness and more. I'm thrilled to be attending and teaching wool embroidery.

In my class, we'll use fine wool yarn to embroider onto linen. Suitable for both beginners and more experienced stitchers, embroidering with yarn is fun and much faster than thread. It's also a great way to use up leftovers from your knitting stash. I'll be sure to bring lots of materials, samples and templates for us to use.

Tickets to Craft Camp go on sale on Monday March 11. I'd love to see you there if you can make it!

My sister gave birth to her second daughter last week. Such an exciting time! I made some things for my new niece, including the knitted things you can see above. Baby was a little bigger than we were expecting so hopefully she will get some wear out of them! And if not I will happily knit her some more. 
The booties are a great design – the pattern is called 'Hodge' and you can find it free here. The cuff on each shoe folds over and is ribbed underneath for a snug fit. The little socks were made using this pattern and some leftover sock yarn, and the hat was knit from angora yarn and the pattern made up as I went. I can't wait to meet my little niece, H.S.N.

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Late summer is a good time to harvest flowers although it's been a bit dry here this summer. I did find a few things to put in the flower press though, and when I opened it up, I found a batch of last summer's blooms. I used these to make up some little tags to attach to presents and etsy orders, etc.

To make these, I place the flowers on scrap bits of card and then add a layer of clear plastic seal. Then I cut around the flowers and punch a hole in the top for fastening.

Inspired by the pressed flowers, I also embroidered some botanical pins. I really enjoy making these, and the way they provide the chance to use up the tiniest scraps of linen, thread and felt. 

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The middle photos above were taken from the deck of the inter-island ferry on the weekend, and walking down a fern-lined path upon our arrival in the South Island. Tom and I were lucky enough to attend our friends' wedding on the lawn in front of a beach house by the sea in the Marlborough Sounds. 

I hope you have had a lovely weekend, dear reader! 
We are going away on a family adventure for a couple of weeks. I'll be back in late March, so see you then.

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It's blackberry season, which means summer won't be staying for much longer. There are blackberry vines that grow along the side of our road by the bus stop and I've been watching the berries ripen every afternoon on my walk up the hill. No-one seemed interested in harvesting them. But the other day I 'helped' Tom by holding the ladder steady while he climbed up and picked enough for a pie. It was delicious, as once-a-year type of food always is.

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Another special thing this week was the arrival of a skein of yarn from Lindsay of A Wooden Nest. Lindsay creates beautiful natural-dyed yarns and I've been admiring her work for a while. If you like podcasts, she has one here you can follow. I happened to be perusing Instagram when I saw she had put some yarn in her shop, so I popped over and managed to secure what i think was the last skein! It's a gorgeous deep/brownish pink cashmere-merino-nylon sock yarn coloured with cochineal (hence the beetles mentioned in the title of this post). Looking forward to knitting some good winter socks with it. Or maybe something for a new baby in the family. 

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In the other pictures above you can see the panel I made as part of the recent Suffrage in Stitches project. This is a NZ-wide project that celebrates the 125th anniversary of NZ women getting the vote. The panels made by a range of New Zealanders will be exhibited together at Wellington Museum in August.

To take part in the project, each maker chose (or was allocated) a name from the original signed petition and made a textile panel to honour that woman. We were given the dimensions (quite a long and narrow rectangle on a larger white rectangle) and requirements (that the panels should try to re-use textiles in our possession, and include 46 stitches somewhere to represent the other women on the same piece of petition.)

I confess I chose the name Emily Wastney because we shared a surname, but I didn't know anything about her, nor did I realise she had once lived in the house I grew up in.

Through the experience of making this panel I've learned a lot about Emily, thanks in particular to our national library and museum's digital resources. It took me a while to realise (and perhaps, accept) I needed to look for her under her husband's name, 'Mrs G Wastney', but once I did, it opened up a world of interesting insights into her life.

Born in Nelson as Emily Alborough in 1863, she married into the Wastney family who farmed at North Nelson. In 1915 she helped establish the first 'Daffodil Day' with the aim of raising money to send to NZ soldiers (among them, her son Edward Fox) on the Western Front at Christmas, and was in charge of supplying bulbs for this purpose.

She had five children and a special fondness for arum lilies (those she probably planted are still growing abundantly where she lived) and made displays of them for community and church events. She was known for propagating different types of daffodil bulbs and won prizes for these as well as her fruit cake, sweet peas and lemon cheesecake. She also played hockey and tennis. I think she might have been competitive! That's why I included a prize ribbon and bulb on the panel.

I've used mostly free-form embroidery for this panel, but also a bit of patchwork to honour Emily's 'make do and mend' skills, crosses for the 46 other women who signed the sheet, and applique for the lilies. I'm grateful to the organisers of this project! I loved making this panel for my ancestor.

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Hello!

I finished another knitting project since I last wrote here, a whole shawl even. In truth, much of it was knitted over the end of the summer holiday, just before work and school started up again. It's the Hedgewitch Shawl by Canadian designer Nat Raedwulf and there was a fun knitalong happening over midwinter/midsummer that I was inspired to join after watching an episode of the gentle knitter podcast (highly recommended if you love knitting, by the way).

I wanted to use yarn from my stash (aka the box under my bed) and settled on a beautiful grey-mauve yarn that was a gift from my friend Susanna a few years ago: two skeins of Purl Soho flax down that she bought when she was in New York. I'd been waiting to find the perfect project for it, and I found it! It's the most beautiful soft yarn, and it was lovely to knit with. For the shawl's border I used some grey possum/merino, also from the box under the bed.

The shawl's design is very simple but it has a feathery textured pattern and the finished item is quite large – I can't wait to wear it when autumn comes around. Tom's joking that we won't need firewood this year. If you follow the designer on Instagram (@wolfandfaunknits) I believe she's having a sale on her patterns for 24 hours or so, so it might be the perfect time to buy this pattern if you like it!

More information about my version of Hedgewitch, including the yarns and needle sizes, etc can be found in my Ravelry notes here.

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My favourite summer fruit is cherries, and to my mind cherry pie is the next best thing, but I never seem to have enough cherries to use in a whole pie. But it's easy to find them in jars any time of the year, and that's how the pie in the photo above came to be. For this pie, I used my favourite flaky-ish pastry recipe (you can find it here – just ignore the apple filling part of this recipe) and then I used the cherry pie filling recipe from this recipe. It was delish! And I'm sure it would still be so without the brandy if you prefer 😉

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And lastly, i wanted to show you this beautiful calendar I was sent by Making magazine. It's a real beauty – with watercolour paintings of a plant or animal that provides fibre for us to craft from, along with a plant that can be used for natural dyeing. When my sister and I were kids, we used to excitedly flip through calendars to see what the picture was on 'our' month (to correspond with our birthdays). In this calendar, October has a painting of a cochineal bug and a hemp plant. Perfect.

Hello! I hope you're well, and the end of January is ticking along nicely for you. I can't quite believe that February starts tomorrow.

Despite a small 'heatwave' we're having (with apologies to those in extremely cold temperatures elsewhere!) I haven't wanted to put down my knitting needles.
I finished knitting the linen pullover I mentioned in my last post – the Nuala top. This is a pattern designed by Libby Jonson (Truly Myrtle) for linen or cotton yarn. I love my new top! It's super comfortable and it was a fun thing to knit. I'm even considering making it again but in a wool yarn for winter. I think it would be a great winter layering garment in black… You can read more about my particular version – details, yarn used, etc, here on my Ravelry page.

When it's been truly too hot to think about knitting (a rare thing here in Wellington!) I've been doing a bit of embroidery, and also working on my hand-pieced quilt top that I started last summer. I mostly forgot about this project last year, but once I'd remembered it again I couldn't stop working on it! It's a slow process, but I enjoy it, hexagon by hexagon. I'm using entirely recycled cotton fabrics for this – mostly old clothes but also off-cuts from other projects and some bedding (there are a couple of faded pillowcases and duvet covers I've cut up to use). The goal is to keep going until it is queen bed-sized.

Last week I was lucky enough to listen to Nigella Lawson speak at a live show. She was just as intelligent, funny and beautiful as you'd imagine. The experience reminded me that I adored Nigella's first book, How to Eat when I first came across it in my twenties. In fact I still think of a passage in there about marmite and butter sandwiches every morning when I eat my marmite on toast. The event also reminded me that men tend to ask more questions (and give more 'statements') during 'Q and A' sessions.

Did you notice the photo above, showing my latest garden addition? I first saw these beautiful native hibiscus flowers, called Puarangi, at Tom's aunt Fini's house over the summer. Her plant was quite large and covered in both blooming puarangi flowers and the papery capsules that encase them before blooming. The flowers are a creamy yellow with maroon centres. Fini kindly gave me seeds to try in my own garden, but then on the weekend I saw larger Puarangi plants for sale at the Paraparaumu community market so I had to buy one. I'll post a photo of the flowers as soon when they feel comfortable enough in our garden to bloom.

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If you follow members of the craft/making community on Instagram you will know about the important discussions about diversity, inclusiveness and racism in the craft world. It's wonderful to be talking about this! It's overdue. From the bottom of my heart, I thank Instagrammers sukrita, ocean_bythesea, thecolormustard, arohaknits and many others who have been doing a lot of the emotional labour in this discussion. You can click on their links to read their posts and stories, even if you're not an Instagram user. I'm sending strength and love to the BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Colour) members of our community and I hear you and thank you for sharing your stories. 

This month I've been reading Sister Outsider, essays and speeches by the wonderful Audre Lorde as well as working my way through Me and White Supremacy, a resource by Layla F Saad, which can be downloaded for free or a donation here.

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See you next week! I hope you have a good week with enough time for the reading, thinking and making you want to do! XX

Hello!
I hope you have had a lovely summer (or winter?) break and a very happy new year to you, wherever you may be.

Tom, the kids and I returned from a very long and lovely break in the South Island. There we visited our families and spent lots of time together, reading stories to baby nieces, reading on the beach, hiking, drinking wine and gin and tonics, swimming in the sea and various rivers, eating ice-cream and berries and lots of other lovely things. Tom turned 40 and we had a party and he went sky-diving! We saw the new year in from a bonfire on the beach.

It was such a good and relaxing break from our normal life! I'm now back at work but the children still have a few weeks of holiday left. 

I thought I'd share some of my holiday snaps so I've popped some pictures in above. The last one shows a beautiful little beach hut made by Arlo, Keira and some of their cousins. They've been building these together every year for as long as they can remember.

Despite bringing three craft projects with me I only really worked on one, which my Mum gave me for Christmas. She gave me the pattern and yarn for the Nuala top by Truly Myrtle and I started knitting it on Boxing Day. It's a lovely linen summer top and it was the perfect thing to knit on over the hot summer. It's nearly finished, so I'll show you in my next post.

Wishing you a very happy 2019 dear readers and friends and fellow makers! I'm looking forward to another year of making and writing and sharing with you.
X X X 

Hello lovely readers,

Wishing you a very happy Christmas and holiday season if you celebrate it.
I hope you find time to relax, read, knit (if that's your thing) and hang out with friends and family. 

Thank you for visiting my blog this year. See you back here again in January!

Lots of love,

Melissa XXX

Hello! I hope you're enjoying this special time of year and it hasn't been too hectic where you are. I've been staying up far too late working on projects of various kinds, as i seem to have a strange sort of extra energy as the days get longer and warmer. I'm sure it will crash soon enough and I'm really looking forward to a holiday over the new year.

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Here are some of my recent projects. Most of these are gifts, but I have made a few other things for people who may or may not read this blog, so I haven't shown those.

+ + I've been saving our avocado stones to try some natural dyeing for a while and suddenly realised I should use them before we go away on holiday! I had lots of fun with this experiment and learned a fair bit. The skeins (from left to right are wool yarn, cotton/wool blend, bamboo/cotton blend and cotton embroidery thread. i love that dirty pink/peach colour in all its shades and am looking forward to experimenting with more natural dyeing next year.

= = I made these funny little bears for my youngest nieces. The blankie version is for baby M and the patchwork bears are for preschoolers I and P. They were such fun to make! I used a very soft cotton jersey to make them extra squishy.

+ + I knitted some washcloth/facecloths from cotton and linen-blend yarns, to wrap up with soap and give as small (hopefully useful) gifts to friends. I love using soft hand-knit facecloths myself and knitting them is quite relaxing too, in my opinion. I found a free pattern on Ravelry for the diagonal garter cloth: (it's this one), and for the blue ones I cast on 39 stitches and knitted a series of garter and seed-stitch sections.

= = I had the Ogden Cami top pattern downloaded and printed out for a while and finally found an evening to sew up a few. These are two new tops to wear this summer. The black one is sewn from linen and the other is my current favourite Liberty print lawn. It's a great pattern – I recommend!

+ + In other news, a small collection of project bags I embroidered for Loop London has arrived (just in time for some last-minute shopping…?!) You can see a little glimpse here.

I hope you are well and happy wherever you may be! Sending warm summer vibes your way. 

XX

Hello! I hope the end of the calendar is going smoothly for you and yours. It always feels a bit frantic in December, doesn't it?

I've been doing my best to distract myself from the usual anxiety brought on by an extra-busy schedule and finishing work projects, etc by making more. I don't know if this is a particularly good strategy, but it's an enjoyable one!

I finished knitting myself a new top/jumper from some local yarn I bought back here. The cone of black yarn was un-labelled except for a tag that said 'cashmere blend'. I couldn't resist that of course, but the yarn felt more like a cotton to touch. So I thought it would be fun to experiment with it, and I used it to knit the Ranunculus pattern by Midori Hirose. You can see my project notes and modifications, etc here on Ravelry. 

I'm really pleased with the finished garment, which is quite boxy and cropped, and I think it will be great for wearing over summer dresses, etc. I like the design so much I'm considering making another in a summery yarn (maybe a cotton/linen blend?) and another wintry one for next year. 

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In the first photo above I'm holding a lovely little gift sent by my friend Elizabeth. It's a small glass frame for holding pressed flowers. It's now hanging in my bedroom window but i think it would make a great necklace too! And luckily I always have lots of pressed flowers waiting in books around the place.

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I feel like i post these links every year. But it's the last week of school for the kids and that means gift-making time. They've been helping me make sweets and biscuits to package up for teachers and school friends. There are no doubt hundreds of good recipes for the things we make, but here are our favourites:

apricot truffles (vegan, gluten free)

shortbread (all the childhood memories!)

chocolate fudge (only three ingredients)

chocolate crinkle cookies (kinda like brownie-cookies)

lemon-barley syrup (great for summer cocktails! and mocktails)

russian fudge (unbelievably sweet but kids love it.)

And I think that's it!
Wishing you a very peaceful and happy week, whatever it may bring. XX