Thirty-five point seven

More Ditsybead pairs, this time in Double Helix Theia and Effetre dark topaz/amber 016.

These can be purchased on my Available to Order page.

I worked on bead orders this morning but I had to abandon shed at lunchtime when the thermometer said it was 35.7°C in there. That's too warm to think straight. I'll have to make an early start out there in the morning.

In crochet news...

I'm waiting for a yarn delivery as I have a blanket planned so in the meantime I've been making more mandalas.

I find the go-roundy-roundness of making a doily or mandala to be very relaxing. They're nice small projects too, both size-wise and time-wise.

This white one was made using a pattern named 'Chrysanthemum Tea' from an old Leisure Arts doily booklet called More Antique Doilies by C. Strohmeyer. I have two doily booklets by this designer and a while back I had a Google about to see what else they had done. I happened upon a blog post where someone was wondering the same thing back in 2016 and one of their readers told them that C. Strohmeyer was a man who once worked as an engineer and he ended up designing crochet and knitting patterns but he didn't use his first name, Charles, as he thought people wouldn't want to buy crochet and knitting patterns designed by a man. That made me quite sad. Don't worry, Charles, I love your patterns - they're so neat and nifty and I very much appreciate your penchant for picots.

The Chrysanthemum Tea mandala is available in my webshop.

Summertime

Well, summer has truly arrived. It was the summer solstice yesterday and now it's 23°C out there. I've even got my shorts on!

I've been working on Ditsybeads this week and I've made pairs of them available to order. I don't often do this but I'm in the zone with them and I feel okay about staying in said zone for a bit, so I thought I'd take a few orders.

Blue: Effetre dark turquoise 236

Right now there are six options available but I will be adding more next week including some in my favourite purple glass, Double Helix Theia.

Green: CiM Meadow

The pink Ditsybeads will be limited because I only have a few shorts of the CiM Gelly's Sty that I use for them and as far as I know, that particular glass is long gone. I donned my big gardening glove gauntlet thing and sorted through my sharp and perilous rod odds-n-ends box and this was what I found:

So when that's gone, it's gone.

The Ditsybead pairs are £10.00 each (and yes, I know that sounds like a lot but trust me, it's actually nowhere near enough time-wise) and right now the lead time on them is seven working days. You can purchase them on my Available to Order page.

In crochet news...

I'm trying not to shawl. In trying not to shawl I've doilied instead. Then as I was doilying, I thought about my doily stack in its box in the spare room and I felt bad about them all sitting there so on Monday I sorted through them and picked out a few doilies that fit nicely in metal hoops and turned them into mandalas.

Pattern: 'Sunvale' by Julia Hart

I do like the way attaching a doily to a hoop turns it from something that would sit under something on a horizontal surface into something that can be displayed on a wall to be looked at.

These are available, along with some others, in the Crochet section of my shop.

Pure sunshine

The sunflower throw is complete and what a joybringer it is. It makes me smile every time I look at it.

It measures about 100cm x 120cm so it's a good size to use as throw on a sofa or chair back and it's just right for a curled-up-on-the-settee blanket.

I steam blocked the throw to set the stitches which gives it a nice finished look.

The throw is available in my Etsy shop or webshop but for UK customers only.

Pattern: Sunflower Throw by Libbycraftmakes

Yarn: Stylecraft Special DK

More Ditsybeads

I'm not really a pink person but I'm quite taken with these pink Ditsybeads. They're CiM Gelly's Sty encased with Effetre 006 super clear with flowers in Effetre white 204 and Reichenbach opal raspberry.

And these plum-coloured ones are Effetre medium amethyst 042 encased with Effetre 006 super clear with flowers in Effetre white 204 and CiM Hollandaise.

Both of these sets are in my webshop now, along with the lime and teal ones from my previous post.

Faffing is my thing

I'm back into the swing of Ditsybead things. These little beads look simple but I tell you, the execution of them is anything but. If I don't place the dots just so, and if I don't heat them flush in a particular way, they just don't look right. Much faffing is required but that's the way I like it.

The beads that appear easy or effortless are often the ones that take the most skill and experience and it's very easy (and understandable) for non-beadmaker people to assume they are a doddle to make. As a maker I get way more satisfaction from crafting a well-made polka dot bead than I do a cat or cupcake bead but judging by the number of requests I still get for them, people seem to be more enamoured with the latter. I decided a long while ago to make the beads I want to make when I feel like making them and I know that makes me sound like a selfish twerp but honestly, if I'd stuck with making cat and cupcake beads I'd have ditched lampworking ages ago. Sometimes you have to be selfish, I guess.

These two sets are Effetre dark grass green 024 and light teal 026 with flowers in Effetre white 204 and CiM Hollandaise.

I'm hoping to get a couple more Ditsybead sets made this week and then they'll all be for sale in my webshop, probably late Friday afternoon.

I set fire to my cardigan yesterday. While I was wearing it. A glass rod popped in the flame and I could smell this lingering weird whiff and I looked everywhere trying to find out what was melting and it took about five minutes for me to realise it was my cardigan. It's one that I knitted a few months ago that I've practically lived in since I finished it, so that's annoying. I'll have to make me another and keep it for non-shed use.

Nothing particularly exciting is happening in the garden. The rose and hibiscus bushes seem to be settling in, the sunflowers are starting to go full Triffid, the tomatoes are still doing next-to-nowt, but...

 ...my sea holly has finally gone blue. I flipping love this plant. I don't know why it pleases me so much but it does.

In crochet news...

All forty-two sunflowers for the throw are complete and I've started turning them into squares.

I'm off for a tinned red salmon roll and a cuppa for lunch now and then I'll be heading shedward. TTFN!

That'll do won't do

When did I last make Ditsybeads? I think it was about a year ago. (I've just checked and yes it was. I wanged on about them for a whole blog post.) When I've not made a certain design for a while it's like I have to retrain my hands and brain in how to execute it. I spent Thursday doing just that and ended up with five Ditsybeads that made it to the kiln. Of those five, two are not quite right, one is just about passable and two I'm happy with. This photo shows the latter three.

Today will be about properly getting back into the swing of making Ditsybeads, good ones that I'm totally happy with (you know me when it comes to beads – "That'll do" simply won't do) and then I expect I'll make them until I get bored of doing so and no doubt I'll repeat this whole process in about August 2025.

While I make Ditsybeads I'll be listening to a podcast that I discovered a couple of weeks ago called Imagined Life.

It's a Wondery podcast (I love Wondery podcasts) and each episode tells the life story of a world-famous person and you're given clues to their identity along the way but you only find out right at the end who the subject is. Sometimes you'll guess before that point but I've been really surprised by some of them. Great stuff. Imagined Life is available on Wondery, Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music.

Will the weather please make up its mind? On Friday I wore sunglasses and a sun hat for my walk to and from the foodbank warehouse and today it's been raining for hours and I'm dressed like it's early October. As I'm typing these words the sun is putting in an appearance. Sort your mind out, weather!

This harlequin ladybird was loving the lavender in the sunshine last week, though.

I know some people don't like harlequin ladybirds because they pose a threat to our native ladybirds but they're here and living their little lives and if they want to feast on the aphids in my garden they can fill their boots. Munch on, you glossy spotty funbugs!

In crochet news...

Guess what? It's another shawl.

I have got to stop making shawls. I need to. I think I've got one more upstairs that needs blocking (but I made it for me so it doesn't count) and I still have the lacy black one on the go but I must put an end to this shawl madness after that one is complete.

This magma-y, fiery, sort-of-maybe Halloweeny one is listed in my Etsy shop and my webshop. The pattern is the Sis Shawl by Joanna Grzelak of Sis Homemade and the yarn is YarnArt Flowers in colour 259.

I'm nearing the end of sunflower production. I've almost got the amount I need for the the blanket. The next stage will be turning them into squares.

Right, it's time for me to make a brew and get down to the shed. See you later!

Blogging like it's 2008

I'm continuing to blog as if nobody's reading (because they aren't) as I'm convinced that blogging is going to make a comeback. Every day I see another person or two say that they're ditching Instagram and I don't blame them. Even if blogging doesn't make a comeback, I care not. I'm enjoying getting back into the swing of writing future blog posts in my head, taking photos of potentially bloggable things and not feeling any pressure to be seen or read, or feeling like I have to perform some weird meme-like behaviour in order to engage.

Anyway, if you recall, yesterday I was off down to the shed with no fixed idea of what I'd be making. I opened up my own bead gallery on Flickr and had a look through there and some 'Crocus' beads I made years ago took my eye so I made some of those.

These are CiM Hollandaise encased with Effetre dark lavender and the spots and dots are CiM Lapis and Hollandaise, then they've been tumble-etched.

I also made these inky blue ones.

These are CiM Lapis encased with Effetre light blue 052 with spots and dots in Effetre periwinkle 220 and CiM Lapis.

Sometimes I make beads that would look nice etched and sometimes, like in this case, I make beads that actually look better after tumble-etching. I make them knowing that the colours will work better together in their frosted state than their shiny one.

Both of these bead sets can be found in my in my webshop.

The weather is cheering up a bit and things in the garden are starting to be colourful. We planted an orange climbing rose in the back garden yesterday so I hope that settles in and does its thing. This morning I took delivery of an hibiscus bush so I need to work out exactly where that's going to go.

My lavender has gone crazy. I got this from the local greengrocer a few years ago when it was a tiny plant and now it's huge.

Please excuse my washing line

I took cuttings from the lavender last year and I've planted those in another part of the garden so fingers crossed they end up crazy too.

I'm absolutely awful at growing edible stuff but the one thing I can normally grow is tomatoes. One of my foodbank colleagues, John, kindly gave me two tomato plants this year and they're just doing nothing. They're not dead but they're not really thriving either. I've done everything I normally do with a tomato plant but nope, I'm not holding out much hope for these fellas.

I never grow strawberries because I don't think I could grow enough to keep me strawberried up. I eat my own weight in strawberries every year. British strawberry season is here (I'm proper Nigel Farage about strawberries) and I'm in full strawberry mode.

I normally have Greek yoghurt, blueberries, walnuts and a light drizzle of honey for breakfast but I've replaced the blueberries with strawberries and now my breakfast is like a pudding.

In crochet news...

My shawl pattern is currently being test crocheted by some ladies who kindly agreed to make sure I've not written a load of nonsense. It's oddly nerve-racking.

Meanwhile, I've started making some sunflowers which will become squares which will eventually become a throw. Blanket? Are throws and blankets the same thing? (I've just Googled and yes but no. Blankets are designed for warmth and throws can be used as casual cover-up-your-legs-and-feet-when-curled-up-on-the-sofa blankets but are typically more it-looks-fancy-draped-on-my-armchair decorative sort of things.) 

Anyway, the pattern is the Sunflower Throw by Libbycraftmakes on Etsy and I'm using good old Stylecraft Special DK.

Not a lot

I've had a few days off from the shed so I have no beads to show you. Instead, behold my third octopus!

My nephew, Dylan, requested one and he chose these two yarn colours for him which I think are fab. Dylan received his octopus yesterday and he's named him Jaquarius. Fancy!

That's it for octopi (unless anyone else asks me for one) but I'm still going with the shawls. It's a proper addiction. I think I'm going to have to brave getting a craft stall somewhere around Christmas time because I've got so many now. I mean, I could stop making them but I don't want to because I enjoy it.

I made this lavender purple one a few weeks back but I only got round to blocking it last week.

It's on my on my website and in my my Etsy shop along with the twenty-odd others.

Pattern: Honey by Bernadette Ambergen / Berniolie

Yarn: YarnArt Flowers Unicolour in colour 748

I'm back down the shed today and I've no idea what beads to make so I shall whack on some music and just see what happens.