Over the bank holiday we headed over to Newbury to help Jam’s mum tidy out a few things. She has bought a house in Malta and so quite a few of her lovely things were up for grabs. Having admired the chestnut roaster and toasting fork as well as the fireside tools for some time Read more about Some things old some things new[…]
On arriving home from Nichi and Liam’s wedding this amazing cake was waiting for me, the Jam came up with the flavour (lemon) while Carol our neighbour and baker extraordinaire baked it using a lemon yogurt recipe with added poppy seeds, I think you’ll agree it is phenomenal so thank you both very much (if you Read more about A late entry on the birthday front[…]
This weekend one of the most recognisable landmarks in Oxfordshire was drastically changed. Didcot power station lost 3 of its 6 cooling towers (we were aiming to get up and see it but in the end it didn’t happen, here’s a link to the video though), the remaining 3 will be demolished next year. There was also Read more about Demolition[…]
At the weekend I set aside some time to do the final big process on my wild boar puppet. The labour intensive needle felting was complete and all of his body was of the same stiffness and the metal core that the wool was built around had all been sufficiently hidden. The last big part Read more about Piggy progress[…]
what you see above is my nearly felted wild boar, since I took the above photo I’ve added his legs & the only things left to do to him is ensure all the felt is tight enough before dying him dark brown & adding his strings. The head above shows how I decided to do Read more about Puppet and garden progress[…]
I bought the wood for my puppets a couple of weeks ago, but we’ve been so busy I haven’t had time to start carving them. With the puppet challenge finishing at the end of this month now would seem a very good time to start! First order of the day was to create a scale Read more about The beginning of carving in earnest[…]
I’ve been squirreling away at my desk these past few weeks which is why the blog has been a bit quiet (that and I’ve got a few gig reviews to put up but they are somewhat still ‘coming together’ & so far all I can say about them is that they were awesome, must try Read more about Just like that my first lot of made things heads out into the world[…]
This week at work I was lucky enough to attend an event as part of the World Literacy Summit held in Oxford. It was the UK launch of the Jane Austen foundation and a talk by Jane Austen’s fifth great nice Caroline Jane Knight. Caroline spoke at length about growing up on the Chawton estate in Hampshire as Read more about Austen and Easter break[…]
So after Christmas I had a few Amazon vouchers to spend. I bought a book on papercutting with them and after looking through the suggested designs tried a few card cuts of my own. I decided to cut the designs into black card with a coloured card backing. I drew the original design in chalk Read more about First steps in card cutting[…]
I think like many people I’m guilty of making too many resolutions and then failing to keep to them, so even though I have lots of tiny little resolutions written down in a small book by my bed this years main focus will be the one below. Happy New Year to all readers of this Read more about A New Year Cometh[…]