Change of plans.

Slight change of plan about the Clematis leaves. I sewed on all the leaves I had finished, just to the end of the stems and not in place as I thought I could do that better when the leaves were attached.

Then I decided that the centre leaf should be a bit further up the stem than the others so started taking them off and re-attaching them.

Then I decided that the bet way to stiffen them was with florists wire rather than find something to spray them with. So I started taking them all back off - again - thread wire through the stitches and sew then back on.

Then I found a longer needle to thread the wire through with so I don't have to take them all off to do it, just the ones that need moving up the stems.

I started crocheting the new ones with the wire included. This means no blocking as the wire keeps the shape so I will be able to sew them on as I go.

It also meant a trip to the Florist as I am going to need a LOT more wire.

The original lot I got at our monthly "Craft and Lace" group when we did a workshop for table centres before Christmas. I asked if I could buy some of the wires used and she gave me a handful.

I went into the Florists on Thursday to ask if she had more or if she could order me a bundle. She very kindly sorted out what she had left and gave them to me. Apparently they are too thin for the flowers and don't support them properly. They are perfect for crochet though. Now I am getting used to it, these wired leaves are working up almost as quickly as the unwired ones. They take about 20 mins each. I still haven't finished wiring the ones that are all ready on there but it has been a bit hot to sit with that heavy thing on my lap in the evenings.

However, sitting out in the garden is perfect! I can rest the frame on the patio table to keep it off my lap and watch the birds fighting over the peanuts at the same time.

And I thought you might like this pic of Benjamin at the Chatteris Historic Festival this weekend.

Print Ready!

I am all excited!

My book is finally print ready. I just have to wait for the person dealing with it to go back to work after his hols to get things in motion to send it to print.

So, what started out as a personal photography project in January 2008 is finally going to be a book.

And more good news, I have managed to sell some to the local schools with payment in advance which means no more scrimping and saving to afford the publishing!

I was able to download a free trial of InDesign which, with just a little bit of cussing, I have learned to use just enough to produce a print ready version pdf to send to the publisher.

That program does some wonderful things and would be amazing for digital scrapbooking but £699 is a little out of my range for it.

Clematis Leaves

After taking a short break to finish off some items I found in the attic, I have got back to the Clematis.

Here is the first batch of leaves on the blocking board. It holds 38 and I am going to have the fill the board up a few more times before I have enough to finish. I have started sewing some on but just 12 don't look very impressive so you are going to have to wait until I have sewn a few more on before I take a photo.

I have been working hard on the book as well.

I have had it proof read and they found loads of mistakes. As it is all still on the computer it isn't major hassle to change them.

Just time consuming!

I now need to do all the technical stuff to get it "print ready". I am not looking forward to that as I have to learn to use a new program.

It should be going to print on June 28th - barring any major problems.

Back to getting it print ready!

Nearly there!

I am really excited!!!!! I am finally going to see my book in print. It has been a while coming because I have had to save my pennies to afford it.

And, of course, the reduced work hours meant a huge chunk out of what I could manage to save. Now I need to decide how many. The prices I have had mean that if I order 150 I can sell them for £8.95 each, 200 = £8.50 each and 250 = £7.95 each.

I have enough to get 150 and, with a little more saving, might be able to afford 200. Unfortunately, 250 is a bit out of my budget range. I also need to do a bit of market research to find out how many I could sell.

So, if you would be interested in buying one, please use the "Ask me, I might" button on the left to contact me and let me know. They will be £8.95 at the most. If I manage to sell them cheaper, I will give you a refund when the book is sent.

I am hoping to go to print before the end of the month which means they will be on sale by the end of July. I will keep you posted on any developments.

Need a Hand?

I do! And I don't mean some help.

I need a "hand" to "model" my puppets. I need to spend ages taking photos of all of the ones I have finished revising so that I finish these patterns off and sell the finished puppets. Another bag full out of the way.

Last time I asked Benjamin for help to model some he was in a very bad mood because he wanted to be off doing other things and was very uncooperative!!!!!!

I was looking at those wooden ones on eBay but when I saw them in a shop, the thumb didn't go where I needed it to. Anyway, Mark helped me make this. He bent the garden wire and I covered it in the no longer needed tube bandaging and stuffed it.

It works like a dream! Of course, if the finished puppets sell well, I may make some more. To be honest, I don't want to spend my time crocheting to sell but I am trying really hard to save up to get my A-Z published - which isn't easy with the reduced hours and a 12 year old son who always needs something new.

So far I have made about £17 on ebay with all the stash. Not as much as I was hoping for but better than nothing and also saving just either throwing or giving everything away. I also found the gorgeous green chenile I knew was up there. No way am I getting rid of that. I have been dreaming for years about what I am going to make from it!

And in the wardrobe, I found the bag of chunky I was saving to make myself a cardigan. Some of my nice warm woolies are getting a bit past their "use-by" date. The elbows are getting thin and stringy and the cuffs are starting to unravel. And there was no way I was going to buy any new ones when I knew all that stuff was in the attic just waiting to be used.

And about that Clematis. I haven't given up. I ordered some of the sagey green thread to make the leaves from. It have arrived and is ready and waiting for me to use it but I have a long list of things which need to be done first. Besides, small cotton leaves are definately a summer project as I can't be making chunky cardigans then!

Funky Fibre Give Away

I am trying really hard to clear a load of stuff out.

I have found a bag of assorted balls of funky yarns which I really don't want to throw away.

So, email me for my address, send me an S.A.E. with a large letter stamp on and I will send you a selection of at least 6 x 6m lengths.

If I don't get a big response, you can have more as I will only throw them out otherwise.

And please pass the news on, I need to clear out my wardrobe!!!!!

Finished Luceting.

At last. It is just as well that I had to make the frame smaller otherwise it would have taken me almost twice the time - if I had been able to finish it!

I ran out of thread. Not a major problem, I can just order some more - or so I thought. Also, I had hunted high and low for a ball of thread I thought I had. I distinctly remembered ordering two balls of 4 different colours at Christmas. However, this was just before I broke my wrist. When they arrived I was in a lot of pain, couldn't crochet and just dumped the whole bag in the wardrobe. When I finally looked properly in the bag, I realised I had been sent one ball of green short which had never been sent on.

I phoned Tandem Cottage, ordered another two (plus two other colours) and queried the ball I was missing. A few days later my thread arrived - minus the green I desperately needed. As it was the weekend I couldn't phone them so I hunted online and discovered that I couldn't buy the colour I wanted anywhere.

Purple Linda was very helpful and I finally discovered that DMC have changed their colour chart for Petra and the green I want is no longer on it.

After saying a lot of rude words, I phoned Tandem Cottage and asked them about it. It turns out her rep has not been anywhere near the place in ages, she can't get any answers from DMC themselves and she didn't know about the colour range changes.

She did, however, have the colour I want in a size 8, so sent me that. I got it the next day and have finished off the bits I needed to after more rude words. Thinner thread used double gets tangled ever so easily and I spend almost as much time untangling it as I did actually making the bits I needed.

As you can see from the first picture, its a bit of a mess. Most of this is due to all the loose ends in all directions. I can't hide them because of the way I have made the frame. But don't worry, they are not staying like that. I will be using all the ends to sew the leaves and flowers on after thay have been crocheted. And after I have decided what colour to make them in! I can go for either a deeper forest green or a lighter sage green.

I hope the other pictures, that I cleared the loose threads out of the way for, give you a better idea of what it looks like.

Summer Challenge - Part Two

So maybe I was being a bit ambitious with a frame that size but I never did do things by halves. I started working with my lucet, 8 brown threads to make the thick first stem, which I separated into two sets of 4 but added two more green to each so I still had 6. I carried on, separating the threads and adding more in to make the various branches. I was going ok to start but as I started making more branches it got very tangled. Very, very tangled.

So I abandoned that idea! Not that I gave up completely, I just needed a re-think. I finally undid most of what I had done and started again. This time deciding to make the branches separately and sewing them on afterwards. However, I still kept the beginning as it was. It was only one bobbin to cope with and hardly any tangles.

I proceded making just the two main stems. While I was doing this, I was thinking of a a way to attach the new branches with out too many ends to sew in. I can do it when I crochet, why not with the lucet?

This is what I came up with -

I worked out how much thread I would need for the bit I was working on. No easy way, make it up, undo it and measure how much I used. It might seem a waste of time but as I was doing lots of bits the same, it saved time - and thread - in the long run. I measured the thread off, doubling the original measurement and putting a slip knot half way along.

Using a tapestry needle, I threaded it through the middle of the stem I wanted to attach it to. The slip knot provided a stop end.

I then used a steel crochet hook to pull two loops through, which I slipped over the lucet - and carried on as normal!

Here are the resulting stems. The loose ends will be used to sew the leaves and flowers on later.

I was actually quite pleased with myself until I went to Craft Club last week and found out that were are supposed to keep them relatively small. About 2'. It is well under 2' wide but........... So I cut it off at the bar across the middle. The way I have attached the jute thread meant that I could do it without having to redo the whole thing. It is now 2'6" and isn't going any smaller.

Did I mention my lucet?

I went to the NEC at the end of March, for the Hobbycrafts and Sewing for Pleasure exhibition. I haven't been to one of these for quite a few years so I was really looking forward to it.

Also, some local online friends were going as well. We had all booked on the same coach trip so I was doubly looking forward to it.

As always, it was mostly paper crafts and cross-stitch so I didn't even spend 1/3 of what I too with me. But I did get a few things.

One was this REALLY expensive ball of wool. If I had realised just how much it was, I probably wouldn't have. However, I didn't. Still, it is for a lovely pair of knitted fingerless gloves that I saw on Ravelry. I downloaded the pattern and a friend is going to knit them for me. I also got one of those 3-D butterfly punches that I have been fancying for a while and a corner rounder for card to go with my BIA.

And a lucet. I haven't seen one before and I was quite fascinated watching the demonstrater using it. I was also quite facinated with some of the things he was making with it. It is basically to make cords but he was doing all sorts. If you want to know more, go along to his site "The Lucet Company", he explains it all so much better than I can. I am no where as near as good as him yet, but I just couldn't resist making some Rainbow laces to match my earrings!

Summer Challenge

At our Craft and Lace Club, we decided it would be fun to have a "Summer Challenge". After some discussion the theme of "Summer" was decided upon as some wanted "Gardens" and some wanted "Seaside". Summer covers everything.

After some considerable thought, and changing my mind about 50 times, I decided to try to re-create the Clematis in my garden. After even more considerable thought, I decided to make the frame from bamboo and garden string. I wanted to make it look as realistic as possible. The canes I bought were about 4 foot long, so I decided to use the whole length. I lashed them together to make a frame. However, my dearest complained that I hadn't done it properly or tight enough, so I gave it to him to redo! I then spent the rest of Saturday afternoon and evening tying garden string with clove hitches to make a latice for the clematis to "climb" up.

I was ever so pleased with my creation and set to work designing the rest. I have decided to use my new lucet to make the stems.

Sofa, So Good!

Our sofa was old. I bought it 2nd hand just before I had Benjamin so it was well over 12 years. It was getting rather uncomfortable.

But the worst thing about the sofa was listening to Mark complain about it every time we used it!!!!!!

The plan was to decorate the front room before buying a new one but we just couldn't wait. On February 24th, we ordered a nice new corner unit from Argos. They told us it wasn't in stock but did we know about their 28 day delivery promise?

So, there we are, expecting our new sofa withing 28 days. Incidentally, the payment came off the credit card almost immediately.

Just before the 28 days was up we checked our delivery status online. It said we would have a call to arrange delivery by March 29th. So much for a 28 day delivery promise.

On March 27th we had a call to say our order had been delayed annd was expected in the warehouse by April 18th.

So I phoned them. No, they don't deliver on Sundays but they do work on Sundays so we should have a call to arrange delivery for the following week.

"But what about the 28 day delivery promise?"
"That only applies if the item is in stock."
"So its a load of bunkam?"
"No, its not a load of bunkam but........"
"Yes, ok."

On April 7th we had a call to arrange delivery. The first available slot was Saturday April 10th between 7 and 12 am. Well, I wasn't going to say "No", was I?

On the Friday we had a call to say it would be delivered between 8 and 9 am and we would get a call an hour beforehand.

So we didn't get up, thinking that an hour was more than enough time to get ourselves organised when they rang. Yes, you know where this is going, don't you?

At 7.23 we had a call to say they would be here in 15 mins. That, by any stretch of the imagination is not between 8 and 9 with an hours notice.

So not only did I have to get dressed and ready in less then 15 mins, I also had to put up with a very grumpy man who hadn't had his two cups of tea yet.

Still, it was worth it. The sofa is really comfy and I don't have to put up with the complaining any more.

However, I used to keep all my bits that I was working on down the side of the sofa. I can't do that any more. Mark has suggested that I get some sort of case to keep the stuff in that can go away when I am not using it. I quite fancy this. But I need to see how big it is first.

I can crochet a Rainbow

And so can you!

I has come to my attention that so many people out there can crochet but can not follow a pattern. This is the one that was featured in Scrapbook Inspirations in 2008.

With this in mind, I have adapted my free Rainbow Pattern over on Rainbow Valley to one that is just for those learning to read patterns. It really isn't that difficult when you know how!

Everything is coming up...

Violets!

I do love these little white ones. They are not so prolific as the common blues ones which took over my trough and choked everything else in there.

Here are some pretty little blues ones. Again, not the common ones. I think they may be cultivated ones but have no idea really as I was given them. I hope they are not going to spread too much otherwise they will have go. I only have my planter with limited space so can't have them taking over.

And this is a Black Viola which I bought at the end of last summer. It was in flower when I bought it so I am hoping that flowering this early means it will carry on all summer. It does look a bit darker than in the photo.

Finally, just a little something I planted this morning! These are some crocuses I crocheted for a Spring Challenge on one of my craft groups. I thought the garden was the best place to take photos of them!

And the Winners are........

I know you have been waiting with bated breath so I wrote down the names, put them in a bag and got my son to pull 3 out.

The Winners are - Jan, Julietk and Viola.

I will leave a message on your blog and you will need to contact me with your postal address and your preference. Use the "Ask me, I might" button in the left bar.

I will get them in the post Monday, provided I have your address.

Thank you to everybody who took part.

And don't forget, if you didn't win one, you can still buy the Egg Cosy Crochet Pattern from Rainbow Valley and make your own.

Nearly Easter

So I thought I would celebrate with a Give-away.

I have a carrier bag full of these characters. They don't all look like the ones in the photos, they are assorted colours and not all of the animals are there.

I have 3 to give away.

If you leave me a nice comment and a link on your blog, you can go in to a prize draw to win one.

If you don't win one, I am selling them at £1.50 each. If anybody wants any, email me.

Or you can buy the Egg Cosy Crochet Pattern from Rainbow Valley and make your own.

An Award

I had this last week from Emma but, as usual, I am running around trying to do 50 things at once so I didn't get to post it. So, a bit belated, but "Diolch Emma"

The rules for accepting the award are:
1. Place the logo within your blog or post
2. Pass the award on to 12 bloggers
3. Link the nominees within the post
4. Let the nominees know they have received the award by commenting on their blog
5. Share the love and link to the person from whom you received the award

So here are my twelve nominees.

Buckinghams Palace - Truly Scrumptious - Woowork.com - Stamping Ground - Debs Cards - Vrons Blog - Scrap Happens Here - Juliet K - Debs Craft Blog - Happy Mum - Secret Corridor - A Crafting Journey

Enjoy Everybody!

And now down to business. I have been crocheting up a storm. I have been re-vamping the puppet patterns and, since having my cast off 4 weeks ago, I have almost done 5 of them. As there are 3 puppets in each pattern, that means I have crocheted 14 puppets. No, my maths isn't wrong - I did say almost.

I took some photos last weekend of some of them. I am not entirely happy with the photos, I will try again next weekend. I have to wait until the weekend as I need my son to model. However, having just checked the calendar, I might be able to do some tomorrow as he doesn't have an afters chool club and I should be finishing normal time.

I am quite pleased with myself and am more or less back to crocheting normally. The first couple of weeks my wrist ached rather a lot and Mark was telling me off for crocheting too much. However, I found the crocheting actually helped and, if I cam home from work with it aching, the gentle movement soothed a bit.

Also, I was told this by a AnnieAnna on Craft Forum

"Seriously - enjoy that crocheting. Did you know knitting, crocheting and handsewing is hypnotic. You put yourself into a sort of trance and your seratonin levels go up and you go dopely happy."

What other excuse could I possibly need?

March Calender

I am having a slight problem in uploading the calendar this month. For some reason I can't get the page to load so that I can upload the files.

And I really wanted to show off the beautiful lilies I had for Valentines Day. I couldn't take photos of them sooner as they all in bud when I had them, so had to wait for them to open. However, I am sure you will agree that they were well worth waiting for.

As always, I have made a "normal" screen and a wide screen version for you to enjoy. As soon as I can upload them, that it. When I do, they will be available from the usual link on the left.

a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFhiD29dXhCl0m9F8oaklNfCGreKOJ2YnWdB3BYw9iu7TmudxB72nNU2vk0T4FvvjgplR5eaGriCMRv5Kq8WB4bLABakAEu_-BSbbACKrOQVR_evkaxENrgCvED9U-sKNm11fHZA/s1600-h/March-2010-wide.jpg">

March 2nd - Finally uploaded. Enjoy!

Raining Cats and Dogs

Somebody sent me the link to this blog and I just had to share.

WooWork.co is the blog of an innovative young man called Howie Woo and his post "Raining Cats and Dogs" will definately make you smile. I hope he doesn't mind me borrowing his photo! I am off to look at the rest of his blog.

SEO-ing

I was under the impression that I was doing pretty well. After all, if you Google for Enfys, my site comes up on the first page. However, I suddenly realised that if you Google for all the other things that my site is about, it is no where to be seen despite the fact that Biz Information thinks it is worth £5,687.13

Suprisingly, my old pipex site is worth £952,709.74!!!! Anybody want to buy it?

Think of a web site like an old fashioned Ladybird book, the ones that have a picture on one side and words on the other. A child tells the story from the pictures where as an adult tells the story from the words. In the case of a website, we see the finished pretty page and Google reads the html coding which makes the page up.

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation. It is about putting keywords into the coding of your website so that Google picks it up. It all sounds very complicated but it isn't really. There is lots of help out there, especially from Google themselves.

First of all, you need a Google account (and if you have a Blogspot blog you already have one) then you need to access Googles Webmaster Tools. Here you will find a wealth of information, all free and all aimed directly at helping you to improve your Google ratings.

They even provide a Free SEO Starter Guide to help you. Although, I have to confess, I splashed out on "How to get to No.1 in Google - in easy steps" as well.

There are quite a few basic things that you can do to improve your ratings. Make sure that each page has a unique page title and description. Use "proper" text for internal links, not just "Click here". Give your pictures relevant names and use "alt" text to give them a more accurate description. Remember, Google searches for pictures as well.

When you have done as much as you can with your site, you need to register it with Google. They will give you a code for the home page so that they can verify it is yours and when the process is complete, you can access loads of information about what Google thinks about your site.

Another thing you need to do is upload a Sitemap and tell Google it is there. This tells Google what pages are on your site and how important they are.

You can either spend ages typing out one of these yourself, or you can ask Sitemaps Pal to do it for you.

Another thing to do is to get lots of external links to your site. These links are one of the ways Google finds your site. Lots of relevant links help your rating. If anybody wants to link to mine, I won't say no.

Of course, the guide sets all of this out so much better than I can so I would highly recommend downloading a copy. And if you can afford the book, get that as well. It has loads more information in it than the Guide.

This brings me to something I have been thinking about for a while. A blog is one of the ways of getting external links to your site. I dont have any on here as it is against the rules of UK Scrappers.

After much consideration, I have decided to use my blog to help with the SEO of Rainbow Valley. This will means links to my site from here and, consequently, removing my blog from my siggy on UKS. I do have a few other things to do before I start the serious SEO of this blog though.

Like re-writing the Rainbow Afghan. This was the first pattern I wrote to sell. It was a very steep learning curve for me. As a result, it is not as user friendly as I would like it. One of the main queries I get is about the instructions for joining. So, I am going to add photo instructions to it.

Only a few days late.

After posting yesterday, I went out to the local market. I have been haunting it the last couple of weeks in the hope of getting some snowdrops.

I am very disappointed in the display in my planter. I only have two there - after all those ones I planted. I am wondering if they didn't like being moved from my old trough to my new planter.

I was in luck. She had loads of pots of them on her stall. I have always been told that snowdrops are better bought "in the green" than as bulbs, as bulbs are a very hit and miss affair. I bought five pots and came straight home and planted them. Of course, the other advantage of "in the green" is that you have instant results.

The ones in these pictures are ones that I had for my birthday last year. I planted these in a ceramic pot around the Holly Tree. They were in flower in the sun and looking lovely. This isn't the best photo but I had to use the compact with my left hand to take it.

As always, I have made both a normal and wide screen version so one of these photos is going to look right on your screen while the other looks weird!

And, as always, download from the normal link on the left.