WOYWW 865 Happy new year to you all!

I’m joining in on our Wednesday bloghop care of Sarah’s craftshed. Thank you everyone for being such a creative inspiration and supportive community this year. Sending big hugs to Neet, and hoping she’s feeling better. 

I hope you’ve all had a wonderful Christmas. 

Here’s my new ‘desk’ with Bella inspecting my new slipover for Brian. She said it wasn’t wide enough so I’ve started again. She sends you all purrs, but is not well pleased with us as I thought she had a tick on her chin and took her to the vets. They said it was just a scab, so they cleaned it and we went home. 

This is a simple pattern, one colour per row: 3 chains then three trebles into two rows below (covering the 3 chains).

The pattern is here:

Easy 3 colour block pattern

The pattern leaves 3 chains loose in the last row of the blanket it was intended for, which I don’t like, but I reckon I could do slip stitches across the three trebles in the last row. 

I hope you had some nice goodies for Christmas. I’m most pleased with my new Danish crochet bag. 

I also promised you a photo of the chevron blanket I completed just before Christmas:

It’s similar to my first one but with a few darker blues and purple. 

And finally…

I wish you all a happy and healthy new year

Happy WOYWW 

Hugs

Lynnecrafts xx

WOYWW 864 Merry Christmas to you all!

Hello all and merry Christmas! I hope you’re all happy and well (especially our Neet and all others with health concerns.)

I’m sending you all this card, with Minerva’s owl to wish you a creative new year (with a donation to the Woodland Trust).

I have just this minute finished Brian’s chevron blanket, made long and wide as he requested. 

He’s getting it early as it’s forecast cold tonight and it has the Bella-tested snuggle rating. She sends you all purrs, but wants to know where the Crispmouse is?

I’ve also made my apricot and almond bara brith, which we prefer to Xmas cake. 

I had a lovely catchup with our LLJ on Monday. 

This was a real tonic after our shopping in Sainsbury’s. We queued for so long I made up a ditty:

Oh come all ye shoppers

Sainsbury’s wants your money

But it isn’t funny

How we have to queue. 

Oh come get your shopping

And don’t you start till-hopping

Oh come and get your offers

Oh come our precious shoppers

Oh come and empty our shelves

And wait, wait, wait.

It kept me amused in the queue anyway!

And finally..

Wishing you all a merry Christmas and a happy WOYWW

Hugs

Lynnecrafts xx

WOYWW 863 A festive cornucopia and the Möbius strip blanket

Hi all, sending healing hugs, and purrs from Bella to Neet and hoping you’ll be out of hospital by Christmas. 

For our bloghop, care of Sarah’s craft shed, here’s my desk. I’ve managed to match the wrapping paper vollage well enough, but my chilli still needs more work, and I’ve yet to paint the berries, oranges and cinnamon. 

Bella is doing intensive snuggle testing of my chevron blanket and sends you all purrs. 

It feels never-ending, Brian calls it a Möbius strip, but I’ve the last three strips to extend, add the border across the top and it will be done. I’m doing the strips in parallel now, so once I get to the top they’ll be ready for the top border. I did think of it like Adam Smith’s pin factory where it all goes quicker if you all make the different bits  but that only works if you can make a division of labour. I’ve suggested to Bella that she could help but she always has the excuse of not having opposable thumbs  😹

And finally,

I’ll be out having lunch in Hythe with my art class after our class, so I’ll be round to visit later. 

Happy WOYWW,

Hugs

Lynnecrafts xx

WOYWW 862 Shelter under the ever-growing blanket

Hi all, I’m back for our bloghop care of Sarah’s Craftshed Firstly, sending healing hugs to Neet. 

It’s been a rather eventful week for us. Here’s my desk, where we’ve started winter cornucopia paintings with collage. 

We have to collage bits onto the drawing of this and paint the other part so it looks the same. 

Here are our collected squirrels. 

They all have such different characters!

My chevron blanket feels never-ending as it seems to get even longer as I’m trying to match all the strips to the same length, under Bella’s supervision, of course. She sends you all purrs. 

Still, working under a blanket has been useful this week, as our hot water and central heating boiler died on Saturday morning. It was fixed on Monday (broken circuit board) and broke again Tuesday morning. The engineer has just been here again and this time it was a lead disconnected. 

One highlight of the week was having dinner at our excellent local Sicilian restaurant with our friend Pascal and his Ukrainian girlfriend, Svitlana. They went to London on Sunday for a short break. 

Svitlana had baked us beautiful Ukrainian biscuits, and brought us Ukrainian chocolates. . 

We had a lovely time and the food at Let’s Amore was excellent, especially their caponata and cannolis.😋. Svitlana and I have said we’ll go on a literary trip together to Paris at some point, visiting where Hemingway et al wrote, drank etc. It will of course feature my favourite Shakespeare and company bookshop, where Sylvia Beech supported Joyce, Hemingway, Fitzgerald et al. 

And finally…

I’ll be round after art class so put the kettle on 😸. 

Hugs

Lynnecrafts xx

WOYWW 861 Squirrel and cornucopia, chevrons

Hi all, sending big hugs to Neet in hospital and hoping she’s feeling better. 

I’m joining in with our crafty bloghop care of Sarah’s craftshed. 

Here’s my desk at art class, working on my watercolour squirrel. It’s all fluffy and backlit. Tricky. 

And here it is finished:

Lots of use of comb brushes for the fur. 

I’m getting on with joining up the strips of my chevron blanket. As it’s essentially rib, it stretches easily, so I’m having to get the strips to the right length, not easily!

Still, Bella is finding it cozy and sends you all purrs. 

I’ve been searching for items for this weeks winter cornucopia:dried orange slices, berries, chestnuts and a chilli 🌶️  that may not fit. The cornucopia is made of Xmas paper and we’re sticking some of the paper onto the picture as collage, but then we have to paint the rest of the image to match. Daunting!

After shopping, we went to a local pub/restaurant which has changed hands, the Tiger in Stowting, a little village ‘nearby’. I say nearby, which should have meant going back to Stone St (the straight Roman Road from Canterbury to Sandgate castle, down which the assassins of Thomas A’Beckett fled.) Oh, no, we tried to go across country. This part of Kent has lots of valleys and one-track roads, and I very nearly gave up before going back to Stone St. and starting again. It was worth it, though, for an absolutely gorgeous pistachio tart. 

And finally…

I love Wiley Coyote - you won’t fall if you don’t look down. 

I’ll be round to visit after art class and our art class lunch, so put the kettle on!

Happy WOYWW 

Hugs

Lynnecrafts xx

WOYWW 860 Squirrel,& blanket crochet

Hi all,

I’m joining in with our weekly bloghop care of Sarah’s craftshed. Sending big hugs to Neet in hospital and hoping you’re on the mend. 

Firstly, here’s my desk. I suspect shares in Schminke masking fluid will have gone up this week, as I’ve used so much on my squirrel painting. I think another coat of dark green is needed, but here’s what it looks like now. 

I’ve also been colour matching for the fur. 

I’ll be back at art class tomorrow, where we’re learning about techniques for painting fur. 

My chevron blanket is nearing completion and I’m still steadfastly looking away from my next project as I need to get the blanket done. Bella is helping of course. Here, she’s testing it for snuggles. It passes😻

My shoulder has improved, thanks to a steroid injection from my friendly physio, and my finger’s getting better. That’s enough now!

It was a beautiful day today, cold but bright. I see our apricot tree is getting confused as it’s flowering already. Not good news as we doubt these blossoms will set fruit. 

And finally…

I’ll be round to visit after art class - put the kettle on!

Happy WOYWW 

Hugs

Lynnecrafts xx 

WOYWW 859 Art and dark age Kent.

Hi all, sending big hugs from us and purrs from Bella to Neet, hoping you get better soon. 

Here’s my art class desk from last week. You can’t really see my drawing but I’m having trouble getting the size of the squirrel’s head right. 

And here are all our autumn vegetables from 2 weeks ago. 

There are some beautiful paintings

Sadly, as I got home, my art bag (A2 size) got stuck in our kitchen door and I damaged my shoulder, pulling it free.  It’s been quite a saga going from a broken or torn shoulder cuff diagnosis to the cuff muscles being pinched between bones.  I’ve had a steroid jab to reduce the inflammation ,and am on Dihydrocodeine which is infinitely better than nasty sickness-inducing Tramadol. 

I’ve managed to do a bit more crochet, with Bella’s help, just more blanket strippery.

A local friend took this brilliant photo of Hengist and Horsa’s white horse. It’s tricky to get a good angle as it’s behind the Eurotunnel terminal. I’d like to paint that one day, it’s more like the spirit of a wild horse, than the groomed one that’s the emblem of Kent. 

Here’s more about Hengist and Horsa, as I’m not sure they feature in dark age history much beyond Kent. 

Bella sends purrs to you all, in an ‘elegant’pose on my first chevron blanket. 😻

And finally …

I’ll be around this morning to visit as I can’t go to art class 

Happy WOYWW

Hugs

Lynnecrafts xx