Motherhood is ...

... inviting a friend round to look at your new nit comb. And both getting excited about it.

Sunday Harvest

Our own apple tree. It probably has about 40 fruit, but we're competing against the birds and the squirrels. That we have stopped counting the exact number is proof of abundance. None has ever tasted as good as the first apple, when the tree bore one, lone, giant, snow-white-like red apple.




We've been part of a community vegetable garden that started last winter on the council estate opposite mine, making use of an derelict locked-up playground. It is transformed and I only wish I'd taken photos of how it was before. On Sunday we reaped our little share of the harvest and made an entire lunch from the produce. The cucumber was divine, and the beetroot leaves tasted like sweet butter.
The project is so simple, entirely run by local residents, but who battled with the Council for their right to dig and grow. Brings a new meaning to Dignity - which is what the project brings to the whole neighbourhood.

My repairs

Ruben's best wool long-johns. I hope to get one more winter out of them.

Rag rug

I'm making a plaited rag-rug. Takes a lot longer than you'd think.




The ingredients and history are: A blue towel that's a least 20 years old from my mother's house, I remember it wrapping be from had to toe; a pair of paisley pink pyjamas bought from a secondhand shop in Bristol when a student, that I sometimes wore clubbing; some red tartan pyjamas from a dear friend; a stripey dress bought just after Ruben was born in the hope that it would be flattering and easy for breast feeding (it wasn't, flattering or easy); a turquoise top bought in Lisbon on a rare frivolous shopping spree with my dear ballerina friend who I haven't seen for so long; and an old black ribbed top, another cast off from a friend that served me well for many years (the friend and the top).
Old Rope.

Scraps to doll #3

Challenge: make a doll entirely from scraps in 30 minutes. No, wait, 60 minutes. Ok lets make it 2 hours?

You can see my first 2 dolls here and here.


Ingredients: A pair of my mother's velvet trousers that were too past it to get the patching love, an old pajama top and some scraps.

I knew straight away I would use the trouser pocket as a mouth, and the button said "nose". I did play with lots of different possibilities, especially a flat-fish, and tried stuffing the two front pockets with white cloth so they looked like giant eyes.
Anyway, he's a dog. Elwin? I'm open name suggestions.


This is where I got to after an hour. The body isn't stitched to the head. Everything was slower, not only because was I experimenting with other options, but because he's entirely handsewn. (Why handsewn? Have I been overcome all ethical about body vs machine? No, I've just moved into shared studio space! Hurrah. Hurrah. Notice how I casually drop this vital information into conversation. However I haven't moved-in my sewing machine) I also ran out of sewing cotton and had to pull threads from cloth. Hardcore.


Here he is after 2 hours. As always I've over stepped my deadline, he's still not finished, at least another hour or 2.... He's too large to stuff with my scraps. I'd like to turn him into a puppet as the pocket-mouth is already half the construction. He reminds me of a Muppet.

A27046

Accession number: A27046
Titled: AKHA EMBROIDERED LEGGINGS, THAILAND, S.E ASIA
Handwoven cotton leggings decorated with applique and embroidery are part of the traditional costume worn by women of the Akha hill tribe or Northern Thailand. Hand-stitched and hand-woven with Indigo and natural dyes.

I've always associated leggings with 80s fashion and fluorescent colours. This summer on my camping holiday I finally appreciated that they may have a function: I was trying to cook 100 corn fritters over a large open fire (another story) and I would have liked some extra leg cover. In the evenings they would have been handy to stop the midges biting my ankles. I have no idea of the Thai use for leggings but I bet there is some utility behind their gorgeous decoration.

My mother's trouser repairs

Make Do and Mend; patching and darning.

Circus quilt

This Circus Quilt is my contribution to the book:
Whip Up Mini Quilts: Patterns and How-to for 26 Contemporary Small Quilts

I'd almost forgotten, as it was made over a year and half ago. It's strange to make something intently, cast it away, and then have it returned a year later in a nice fat padded parcel. Suddenly the intervening year comes into relief as I touch the cloth.

Kathreen Ricketson is the indefatigable motor behind whipup.net. She found my sewings through flickr (I do love flickr, I've made real friends through that site). I was flattered and emboldened to be invited. I admire the confidence of her convictions; she asked people whose work she liked, joining the professional with the amateur (that's me). More about the book and the other contributors here.
I'm really excited to see if someone can actually follow the instructions and make their own version of the Circus Quilt.

Circuses have been a constant theme in my life. I saw more than most in my childhood as my mother wrote the Kid's listings for Timeout magazine in the 70s and 80s, when the status of Circus was relegated to children only. I also remember a surreal church service full of dressed up clowns at Holy Trinity Church in east London. They still hold their annual Joseph Grimaldi Memorial Service in February.
In my 20s I went to live in Portugal, where my first job was teaching English at Chapito, the Lisbon Circus School; watching sultry chubby teenagers attempt the trapeze and practicing juggling in their lunch break.
Two weeks ago my son Ruben and I started Circus Skills classes at Circus Space. I don't have the upper arm strength to hold Ruben over my head (really, he is heavy) in the balancing moves and only just managed a backwards roll. He in turn attempted every flip and threw himself on and off every piece of equipment.
I have vivid childhood memories of the Pickle Family (and Mr Sniff), Circus OZ and Victoria Chaplin's Cirque Imaginaire. The past year highlights have been NoFit State at the Roundhouse and the Seven Fingers show Psy on at the Peacock Theatre (tonight is the last night). It has breathtaking acts and brilliant group choreographed sequences fusing dance and circus and theatre. Go go go if you can.
But my favourite circus ever is in the video below. Alexander Calder. A very great and joyous man.

Spring Knitting

Hopefully we've got a small select knitting group started, steered by my mother's nimble and creative fingers. Meeting again in two weeks. Ruben made us each a club card with the colours of wool we're using.

Asian textiles from the Library

A cow's head-dress, the holes are to go over the horns. Indian.




Pakistani child's waistcoat. The trimming is an old metal zip. Inside pocket.


A Rajastani child's dress coat. Very petite.

Somewhere to lose my head & heart & wallet

V&A Exhibition
Quilts: 1700 - 2010
Opens 20 March 2010
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Reprints of vintage fabric designs from the V&A online shop.
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Curators blog

Better than school

Can there be anything better than playing shop in a real shop?
Leila's Shop. Better than school.

Love-ly Stuff

Spitalfields Life - Amazing writing, amazing spirit, celebration of a neighbourhood, celebration of life and huge stamina. He aims to write 10,000 blog posts.
Creative dad at home with kids; Made by Joel