I am now a Mrs!

Life has finally calmed down a little, we've moved house, settled various rodents and furry critters into the new house and unpacked a bit.

I have some new furry family members to introduce you to as well. Remember last time I posted we were going to meet some kittens? Well it was love at first sight and Walle and Ebony came to live with us. They are real characters; Walle is crazy and playful and very cuddly - I would have unpacked far more if I didn't have to evict a kitten from my lap whenever I wanted to do something! Ebony is much more of a free spitir, everything is on her terms. As far as we can tell, this means that we have to leave her to do her own thing until she actually wants attention, at which point we must stop what we are doing immediately and pet her. Of course Ebony wanting attention generally occurs when I'm trying to go to sleep, or actually sleeping. Frustrating feline!

Since Ebony refused to pose for us, here's a picture of Walle looking cute:

We also ended up with another furry friend a week later:

This is Muffin. He is a rabbit. Definitely a rabbit. And not a novelty slipper as some people have suggested. And yes, that is the front. I saw him advertised on a free ad site and decided to have a look, and of course fell in love with him and decided he needed to come and live with me where he would get lots of love and the regular grooming he needs.

Then, on saturday, something much more exciting even than kittens and bunnies happened - I got married!

I started the day with a full english breakfast in bed, then had pink fizz and got ready with my bridesmaids. I had my something new, my wedding dress, and my something old, a horseshoe brooch which my Mum's granny lent to her on her wedding day:

And my something blue was a little heart embroidered into the lining of my dress by my Mum:

It really was the happiest day of my life, from seeing Ben waiting for me as I walked in, to relaxing in our amazing canopied bed in the wedding suite. I don't think I stopped smiling all day and we spent the evening dancing to a playlist of some of our favourite songs with all of our favourite people.

Just stopping by...

A high speed update tonight since life is incredibly busy!

The wedding is only 2 weeks away so I'm finishing the last minute details for that (the bridesmaids are still shoeless) and we're moving house next week.

I've managed to do a little crafting in the meantime although nothing is finished, I've started my christmas knitting, and I've got to hurry up with the baby cardigan since baby Evie has arrived. It's a good job I'm making it to fit a 3 month old really!

I'm also excited because I've ordered a copy of Teeny Tiny Mochi Mochi by Anna Hrachovec, so that I can knit adorable mini amigurumi things.

And tomorrow, Ben and I are going to meet a pair of kittens who will hopefully be joining our furry family.

Very happy right now :)

Life's gone mad!

Life's got pretty hectic lately:

The wedding is just 4 weeks away so we're trying to chase up late replies to invites, sort out the finer details of table decorations and so far the bridesmaids are still shoeless.

I have a new job, which I'll be starting when we get back from the honeymoon. It's as night nurse in a nursing home.

We're having to move house, the landlord has asked us to move out because of our pets....the same pets they agreed we could have 4 months ago. We've found a lovely new house where we are allowed our current pets and also have permission to get Misty bunny a friend and to get a cat. That means that we'll have to move either just before or just after the wedding - we've opted for before so that we can relax and enjoy our honeymoon without having a move hanging over us for when we get home.

So sorry for being all quiet on the blogging front for a bit.

I have been doing a little knitting in amongst all the chaos, I finished these fingerless mittens for the Craftster End of summer random swap:

They were my first attempt at magic loop and the first time I've tried anything that couls possibly count as lace. I love the mock cable pattern and it was incredibly easy to do!

I'm trying to get some UFOs (unfinished objects) finished to clear the way for christmas crafting, but I also have a house to pack up and wedding arrangements to finish....aaaaargh!

Birds

Had a day out with my parents to Harewood House near Leeds on wednesday. I have to admit that I find stately homes all look very similiar inside, but Harewood House have a bird garden. The birds all live in big aviaries or enclosures and look really well cared for. I didn't get many good photos because of the mesh on the aviaries getting in the way, but here's something you don't normally find living in the Yorkshire countryside:

We took a picnic (which we ate in the car sheltering from the rain), it amuses me that despite me having grown up and left home, my Dad still cuts my sandwiches into quarters like he used to for my school lunch box when I was little!

I've got another day out planned for sunday, going to the Great Northern Quilt Show at Harrogate with Mum. Looking forward to seeing gorgeous quilts and doing some shopping.

A sunny sunday

We have an annual tradition in my family - we go to Bamburgh in Northumberland for a day on the beach with family friends. So yesterday we packed up a picnic and left rainy York and headed north to glorious sunshine and views like this:

This is my favourite place, and the setting for most of the family holidays we had when I was a child. We walked on the beack, climbed up the sand dunes and investigated the rock pools. It was a lovely day and we arrived home late, tired and sunburnt, but more relaxed than we've felt in ages!

Some other news - we have some new additions to our furry family. 3 mice came to live with us this week, all named after Disney princesses thanks to the previous owner's little girl. Only one would stay still for a photo, so here's Aurora the mouse:

I hope everyone else has had a lovely bank holiday weekend. I'm looking forward to a week off work this week!

My new favourite meal

I haven't got any finished crafty projects to show off today, so here's a quick update on life in general this week:

We decided to stop buying meat, mostly to save money but I'm pleased because of the animal welfare reasons too. It's created a challenge thinking of meat free meals to cook, but my weekly shop had some interesting things:

 My new favourite meal is chickpea and veg curry - all you need to do is cook a chopped onion, a couple of cloves of chopped garlic, some cauliflower florets, a diced sweet potato and a diced butternut squash, add some curry paste (I bought mine but you could make it if you wanted), add a tin of coconut milk, a tin of chickpeas and a handful of spinach and cook it all till the veg is cooked through, then eat with rice or naan bread. Omnomnom!

I got my partner for the Random End of Summer Swap this week, this swap is a little scary as it is completely down to people and their partners what they make for each other. I’m only at the planning stage for this one but I’m looking forward to getting started.

The weather has been a little insane, poor Misty got caught in a storm yesterday:

And I'll have some new furry additions to our family to introduce soon.

I'm off to get some crafting done now, so I'll have something more exciting than a pile of veg and a damp rabbit to show you!

A lovely weekend

I've had a great weekend, I just wish it could go on for longer:

On saturday I collected my wedding dress! I'd post a picture but I'm keeping it a secret from the groom until the big day. I can't believe how close the wedding is suddenly - there's only 3 months to go. I really must post those invitations tomorrow.

Saturday evening involved board games, good company and the best shepherd's pie ever.

I received my partner for the Tiny House Swap on Craftster. I was expecting to be making a cute little pastel coloured cottage this week, so I was a little thrown when I got a partner who likes bright colours and doesn't want anything too cutesy. I have a great idea though, and what I like most about swaps is the challenge of using the information given by my parter to design something for them.

We've had some spectacular thunder storms, I don't even begrudge spending 10 minutes getting drenched chasing a rabbit who didn't want to go back into her hutch out of the rain!

And today I finally did something I've been wanting to do for ages, but haven't dared to do - I opened a shop on Etsy:
http://www.etsy.com/shop/RachelStitches

All there is there so far are some felt brooches and a fridge magnet, but I have plans for much much more. Here is my favourite item I listed today:

Nothing to report...

Something very strange has been happening lately, I’ve actually wanted to clean and tidy my house... does this mean I’m turning into an adult?

On the plus side getting the housework out of the way has given me a bit more crafting time lately.

But I have a terrible case of start-itis. I have several almost finished things but not the materials to finish them. Waiting till payday to go to town and stock up!

I'll hopefully have some pretty things to show you by the weekend. Until then here's a picture of a pie I made for dinner:

I love getting letters!

My swap partner in Australia received her felt badges yesterday, and I woke up today to find an airmail letter on the doormat...

...it had a cute little koala bear on the stamp, I'm cutting this out and keeping it!

And inside were 2 beautiful badges! We ended up choosing the same themes for each other.

This little elephant is adorable, I love the beading!

And this sewing themed badge is gorgeous, I love the colours and the embroidered detail makes it just perfect.

I'll be adding magnets to the backs of these and putting them on my fridge where I can admire them :)

My attempts to needle felt

I went to a beginners needle felting workshope this afternoon, since my previous attempts at needle felting resulted in shapeless blobs which resembled nothing in particular, I thought I should learn to do it properly! The tutor was briliant and over 3 hours we made 3 mini projects to learn different felting skills.

Firstly this cute little mouse to learn shaping (he has funny looking eyes but other than that I don't think he's too bad for a first attempt):

Then we made a pendant:

And lastly we learned to felt onto fabric:

I'll definitely be trying some more felting soon, I already have a foam block and some needles! 

Back to work :(

I’ had a great week off work and I’m really wishing I had a bit longer before I had to go back! It was my birthday on Wednesday, I spent it quietly this year and celebrated with a lovely Italian meal with Ben. The restaurant was gorgeous, I could almost have believed I was in Italy. I also received a set of interchangeable knitting needles from Ben, he knew I've been wanting a set for ages :)

Saturday was spent enjoying the unexpected sunshine – the weather forecast here is for rain for the whole of July, I am considering building an Ark! We went to a little bird of prey centre a few miles away, it was very interactive and we got opportunities to experience handling all of the birds. I’m very pleased with these photos I took, a grumpy looking falcon and a hawk who was watching us right back: 

I have had chance to do some crafting this week. I’ve been rediscovering my love of felt making these badges for Craftster’s felt badge swap, I can't wait to hear what my partner thinks of them:

 

 

Finally I have some sad news this week, we had to say goodbye to the gorgeous Kammi who we took to the vets for the last time on Friday. He was 2 years old and we adopted him a year ago. He introduced himself by sinking his teeth deep into Ben’s finger and refusing to let go. We had him neutered and with a little time and patience he became a gorgeous, cuddly, licky rat. We miss him a lot.

Hello from my new home

It’s been a month since I blogged, and I’ve spent most of that month in the process of moving house. We viewed several places and none of them were quite right. Then I phoned up one place I’d already scrolled past on the agency website, managed to get a viewing that day and it was perfect! We’ve been here nearly 2 weeks now and we love it. The second bedroom is going to be a computer/craft room and we’ve even got a garden with a vegetable patch:

It’s just a patch at the moment because we won’t be planting vegetables until spring but it’s still very exciting, and I plan on growing some herbs in the meantime.

My other exciting news is a new addition to our furry family:

 This is Misty, she was being rehomed by a lady who’d until recently been taking in unwanted rabbits. She’s very friendly and likes her jingle ball toy. She’s going to have a big run in the garden and eventually a bigger hutch and a bunny friend to play and snuggle with.

The rats also got a new home when we moved; it’s much easier to deal with than 2 separate cages:

We're lucky that our landlord loves animals and is more than happy for us to have 11 rats in the house!

I’ve been so busy that I haven’t quite unpacked my crafty things. I’ve got the next week off work though, so I’ll be unpacking them and using them over the next few days, so I’ll have some Finished Objects to show off next time I post.

Swapsies

Now that my first craft swap is over and my partner received the parcel, I can show you what I made – this pin cushion/tool holder/thread catcher combo was made following a pattern that can be found here (action shot testing it with my things).

I am incredibly proud of how well this turned out and amazed by how much my sewing has improved now I have a less temperamental sewing machine. By the time I finished this I was almost sad to send it away because I wanted one too, so imagine how pleased I was when I opened the parcel that arrived from France last week to find that my partner had made me one following the exact same pattern!

I also received this lovely sewing machine mat and a little pouch for sewing things on the go (although I might have to find a use for this so that I can carry it in my handbag. Card holder maybe?):

 

And this adorable rat which is far too cute to be used as a pin cushion!

The whole swap was such a positive experience, and the excitement of waiting to see what arrives in the post is fun. I’ve just signed up for a felt badge swap and I’m looking forward to being assigned a partner so I can start thinking of ideas.

I have to admit that I’ve been slacking on my knitting lately though, the baby hat is still not blocked and I haven’t even finished the back of the cardigan. Still, there’s nearly 5 months until the baby is due so I should get them finished in time!

Summer's here!

Once again I've been a bit of a rubbish blogger for the past week. Partly bacause I have absolutely nothing to show you. I've knitted half of the back of a baby cardigan, the first project I've done with more than one colour, and it's going quite slowly because I keep stopping to admire how beautifully the cotton yarn knits up and how lovely and stripy the stripes are!

I participated in my first craft swap through Craftster recently, the theme was sewing accessories and both me and my partner have sent and are eagerly awaiting our goodies. Pics of what I sent and received will be up as soon as both packages have arrived.

The other reason I haven't blogged for over a week is that summer is finally here, we've had glorious sunshine since the back end of last week and I'm trying to make the most of it since English summers are so unreliable with the weather! Fingers crossed it stays nice until Sunday so me and Ben can go for a picnic.

I've got lots of lovely crafty ideas floating around in my head, so hopefully I'll have some pretty things to show off soon :)

I'm back!

I had a lovely weekend with my Grandparents; Grandma loved her quilt and said my knitting was very good – great praise from someone who’s knitted for the past 70 years. I finished the baby hat, it’s this pattern here if you want one for your baby, or yourself as there are instructions for an adult sized one! There's even enough yarn left over for teeny tiny mittens. I haven’t blocked it or added the face yet, it reminds me of an aardvark rather than Totoro at the moment:

 On the way there I knitted and ended up having a long conversation with a nice lady as a result of it, she was amazed at the 5 DPNs I was using and asked me lots of knitting-related questions.  On the way back I cast on for a baby cardigan on the first train. Then had to frog it because when I added the second colour I accidentally knitted a whole row with the tail end of the yarn. Then I cast it on again on the second train, and had to frog it because 4 rows in I realised I’d cast on the wrong number of stitches. The third attempt seems to be going ok so far though.