Poorly Plants

For the past 2 weeks, my poor old brain has been struggling to adapt to medication changes to control my bipolar disorder. When this happens, getting through each day is all that I can manage.

Yesterday, I felt well, so Fin and I blitzed house cleaning and the flat looks, feels and smells lovely!

I was doing the sitting room and became aware of my poor, neglected plants.

A couple were hardy enough to have survive the neglect unscathed:

But the others were in a sorry, sorry state. For goodness sake, even the ivy was half dead, and ivy will survive just about anything:

This little baby I have had for 10 years. I knew that World's Clumsiest Cat had knocked into it a few days ago. I hadn't realised that she had dislodged the roots completely:

I repotted it.

A bit of judicious snipping was in order:

I then put the plants on a tray, on the dining table, in front of the window, in the hope that

a) the extra light will do them good

b) as they are right by me, I won't neglect them

This is how they looked this morning:

So there's hope for them yet!

On a positive note, the erstwhile 'Blanket of Gloom' is starting to morph into the 'Blanket of This Might Be a Piece of Alright'! :

                          Watch this space!

Food for thought

Since the New Year, we have been making a concerted effort to eat more vegetables. We always have plenty of fruit but have been slipping in eating our greens. In the past, for various periods, I have stopped eating meat. We have decided not to eat meat, but are still eating seafood.

Because of my disability, I have limited energy for cooking, though 
I do enjoy it. So I have built up a repertoire of quick, tasty meals and thought I would share them with you.

Because they are quite wordy, I will do a couple of recipes at a time, building up to a week's worth.

Day 1: Prawns and coriander

Melt butter and olive oil in a shallow pan. Add sliced red onions, a chopped courgette and chopped yellow pepper. Cook gently until soft.

Add a heaped teaspoon of Indian lime pickle and about 2 tablespoons of lemon juice and stir. Let everything cook for another 5 minutes.

Add cooked prawns and a chopped up bunch of coriander and cook for about 3 minutes.

Turn heat off. Add 3 heaped tablespoons of thick, natural Greek yoghurt and fold through.

Serve with crusty bread and a glass of orange juice.

Day 2: Nut cutlets and special sprouts

Pop frozen nut cutlets in the oven set at 200C. 

Boil a kettle of water.

 While the kettle is boiling, chop up potatoes and carrots that are not peeled. Put the root veg on to boil.

 Make x cuts in bottom of sprouts and steam for 5 minutes. 

While the sprouts are steaming, heat some olive oil in a shallow pan and gently cook a thinly sliced red onion.

Add steamed sprouts to the onion with a couple of tablespoons of balsamic vinegar, a heaped teaspoon of Dijon mustard and a couple of generous swigs of red wind *hic*.

Keep agitating the sprouts to make sure they are thoroughly coated and cooked through.

Remove sprouts, add a spoon of flour to the pan to make a roux and then add water from the potatoes and carrots. This makes a yummy gravy.

Mash the root veg with butter and milk. They look rather 'rustic' as there is potato skin in, but you are keeping all the goodness.

Serve and enjoy!

Pucker up!

A couple of days ago, I had a custom request for a knitted frog. The customer likes the pattern I suggested:

The Frog Prince by Alan Dart.

He is being made in these colours:

For anyone in the Reading area, a new yarn shop had opened - 'Rosie's Wools'. It is next to Fabricland. Check it out and think about supporting local businesses.

So I am enjoying a new project. In between making parts of the frog prince, I have made a new PigglesBoo Bunny - Valentina.

What with kissing frogs and little red hearts, love is in the air.

A brand is born!

Family, friends and you lovely readers, know that for the past 6 months I have been whining about my toys not being quite right. 

I made my first toy 3 years ago, and when I look back on it now, the learning curve has been very steep. 

As my mental and physical health have both declined, knitting has become more and more important to me. It is a therapy - it helps keep psychotic symptoms at bay; it allows me to produce something working at my own pace; my sales give both me and our finances a boost.

Finally, finally, I have got *THE* design that I like. It does not look like others' work; it is a unique blend of patterns and my own design; I enjoy the making and the finished object.

               So... Welcome to the PigglesBoo Bunny:

                  This is Eartha, d.o.b. 13.01,2014.


She has all the features that will be found on the PigglesBoo               Bunnies:

The 'PigglesBoo' button fastening the moss stitch cardigan and the hair bow with a polka dot button and a little Piggy charm.

Her skirt is hand stitched. As as little girl, my mum taught me how to knit and to hand sew. Though I have a sewing machine, I find the 

rhythm of sewing by hand suits me much better. The skirt uses 

hemming, running, back and stab stitches.

It is fastened with a polka dot ribbon:

Like me, she is wearing a long skirt that covers a rounded tum and short little legs:

She also has the PigglesBoo Bunny stripy tights and Mary Jane shoes with polka dot buttons.

Her bottom is quite ample too, and is finished off with a perky tail:

It's been a long haul to reach this stage, but now I can go full steam ahead in getting the Bunnies out there. They will be listed on my Etsy shop PigglesBoo.

Before the next Bunny, though, I have a custom order to make. I will blog about that in a day or two. At this point, all I shall say is 'Pucker up sweetie'!

This is fun

Another, very special parcel arrived yesterday. As far as possible, I like to buy from within the UK, but I only found these in Hong Kong. First off, look at the envelope, with the cutest guinea pig and hamster stamps:

Inside were customised buttons, one of which will go onto each cardi:

Each button says 'PigglesBoo' and has a little heart on it. I am ridiculously happy with them.

Here are some cardis given the PigglesBoo treatment:

I have also done hair bows with the piggy charms and polka dot buttons:

Three legs have been made with polka dot buttons. The keen eyed among you will notice the mistake whimsical way I made 2 left feet in the pink shoes. Such a jolly jape!

I really am having fun with this...takes me back to my childhood, my sons' childhood and my grandson's present when you get loads of things at Christmas and didn't know what to play with first. In a similar fashion I am bouncing from one thing to another (Well hello 

hypo mania, do come in and play) and my work table is just eye candy 

for those of you who appreciate a well organised, efficient, aesthetically pleasing craft space:

Off for more fun.

Lots of goodies...

There have been bugs and nasties in our house all week, which have made me feel rather sorry for myself. But now, apart from being ridiculously tired, I am back to usual functioning.

I wanted to share a few Christmas and New Year goodies with you.

I love a nice cup of tea first thing. If it's not in my 'Keep Calm' mug, it's in my chubby chicken mug:

Normally I dispense with coasters, but Boo bought me a set of dog ones for Christmas, including this beautiful Wolfhound:

This makes me think of my girly Wolfie Hatha, who passed nearly 2 years ago, who was my soul mate for ten and a half years.

I had some money from Ma to spend on things that delighted me. I had a few lovely days trawling the internet and ended up buying 5 
things. 3 of them have arrived in the last couple of days:

First was a lovely set of piggy charms. I bought them from a local, Reading seller who has a wide variety of good quality charms. See 

her here: etsy.com/shop/beadingshaz

I am adding various touches to my rabbits to make them instantly 

recognisable as a 'brand' and given that I am PigglesBoo, what could be more appropriate than piggy charms, which I shall store in a 

piggy ceramic pot that I have had sitting doing nothing:

Then I got some pretty polka dot ribbon at a fraction of the cost of Hobbycraft. The shop's email address is Berrynicecrafts@gmail.com

The ribbons are to thread through the rabbits' fabric skirts. Boo brought me two ceramic bowls from Morocco a few weeks ago. They were just being admired, without a purpose...but no more! The smaller bowl has my tape measure and my Little Cotton Rabbits pincushion, and the larger bowl has my polka dot ribbons:

Then came some fat quarters. I spent ages drooling over lovely fabrics and in the end picked 6 designs, which will be used for bunny skirts. They are so gorgeous, I don't know which one I like most. The birds and the camper vans keep calling to me:

You can follow Pippa's shop at http://www.facebook.com/TheOriginalWindTheBobbin

As I said before, I have various plans for my rabbits before really launching them, and I am waiting for 2 more little packages to arrive.  In the meantime, I have a little warren of rabbits sitting around, awaiting finishing off:

I used to be a voracious reader, but as the symptoms of my bi-polar 

disorder have become more severe, my ability to concentrate has declined. I am planning on making more time for reading this year and have finished the first book of 2014:

I found elements of it both poignant and funny, being married to a diagnosed Aspie, and would recommend the book to anyone who wants to get an insight into Aspberger's Syndrome.

Finally, I am a convert to steam blocking. I tried it with this 

knitted dress, and the results have been great:

More from me when the next packages arrive.

Happy New Year

We have had a lovely, family oriented holiday season. Christmas Day was unbelievably stress free - Will, son #2, asked to be left alone in the kitchen. A couple of hours later a full and very delicious meal appeared! Ma, all 3 sons and one girlfriend were there and it was BRILLIANT! On the 28th, we were joined by Grandson, sister, BIL and 3 nephews - quite the houseful. Will again obliged, with hot Nigerian stew, fried plantain and rice. He is a keeper, that one!

Now it's back to just the 2 of us. Clearing and sorting was done yesterday so today could be as relaxed as possible. 

For my present, my lovely sister ('Boo' from 'PigglesBoo') got me these:

They are lovely and will be added to my growing collection of craft related books:

As we were getting the room set up for Christmas, I moved my tray of buttons and odds and ends from on the dining table, to by the books. This has resulted in World's Clumsiest Cat not knocking everything flying on a regular basis. Why has it taken me so long to work out this very simple solution?

I felt like Santa's helper, working until the 11th hour and 59th minute, finishing Ma's blanket ( which I did not even have time to 

photograph), hat and wristies for Boo and grandson's cowboy:

The cowboy was from a Jean Greenhowe pattern and was beautifully written. The amount of work involved, though, was tremendous.

Talking of knitting (just for a change!) I have been playing around AGAIN with patterns for my rabbits. I have now decided on a very different look for them. The head is a direct rendition of a Fluff and Fuzz bear head. The ears are my own. The body, legs and arms are an exact copy of a TwinsKnit pattern. The clothes are my own design:

Because of her Peter Rabbit button, I have called her Beatrix. She has a sister who is completed except for her skirt. Here she is, sitting in a bowl that a Boo brought back from Morocco for me:

As she will be finished today, I thought Felicity (happiness) would be a good name. Both these rabbits will be for sale in SimplyBearsCraft on Etsy.

I plan for 2014 to be filled with family, love and laughter. As from midnight, I was officially unemployed. I am choosing to see this as an opportunity to branch out in different directions, to be creative, and to be very thankful for the chance to follow my dreams. May 2014 bring you what you desire.