Echoes of a Dream

Still on cloud nine.........

We're back and didn't we have a wonderful time. I had been a bit ambivalent about going on this camp for some reason. Maybe because it was so close to home, maybe the list of crafts hadn't grabbed me - I don't know but I do know that I had a fantastic time. Can you imagine a week without any cooking, a week where you just absorb yourself in your chosen workshop, a week where the children are totally happy doing their stuff and in the evenings they are playing with other children, a week where all you have to do is relax and sit and talk to like minded people. I WANT TO GO BACK. It was utter bliss.

On the first night the tutors did a blurb about their workshops and I couldn't decide between leatherwork and weaving so I went for both. I went to the leather workshop for 2 days and made a bracelet and this wallet:

and then I legged it over to weaving and made this picture:

In both groups the tutors really instilled a respect and knowledge of their raw materials. All the wool in the weaving was hand dyed (with plant dyes) and woven by the tutor (a man incidentally) and I did manage to use some of my own green and blue for the sky. I loved the weaving and I'm amazed at how well it turned out. I loved all the greens that were on offer and started out just weaving with them and then the picture took shape with the lake and the mountains. Now I know what to do with all that wool I dyed last week. I'm also thinking of doing this with my class at school sometime. I'd like to go through the whole process of getting the fleece, washing it, plant dyeing it, spinning it and then the children weaving pictures.

My children also had a wonderful time. Amber signed up for stained glass and made this:

It's to going to be a panel in the front door. She really enjoyed doing it. Rohan did a medieval-ages workshop and made a beautiful bow and arrow, a spear and some coins. Raj was in a young children's group where they did a bit of everything - they made little clay pots, a dream catcher, a simple bow and arrow, they had lots of games and walks too.

It all ended yesterday after lunch and eight tired but very happy people dragged themselves home. Imagine my surprise when I opened a parcel from prairiemouse containing these:

I felt like it was my birthday. There were three of her gorgeous hearts and they are really exquisitely embroidered, some lovely fabric, a really old reel of sewing cotton, some cucumber and manuka honey soap and a lovely glass bead.  Thank you Louise it was all so lovingly put together and it finished off my week perfectly. We're off to a village show this afternoon where we are exhibiting various jams, vegetables, handcrafts etc hoping to win a few prizes. Fingers crossed.

I'm off a-crafting

Back in February I booked the children and myself on a craft camp in July and suddenly it's July and it's today. I don't know if I've been complacent because it's virtually on my doorstep or what but it's Sunday morning and I haven't packed or dug out the tent or all the other paraphanalia. Thank goodness Tom's at home because I know he'll get us there and help us pitch up. My sister and her three arrive at lunchtime and then we're off in the late afternoon.

So much to do before I go. I have to do my share of a wholesale food order I do with some neighbours, fill out our forms for a village show that we enter each year and send them off asap, finish off the madder dyeing and ofcourse, decide what I'm actually going to do on this craft camp. There is so much to chose from - stained glass, basket making, stone carving, green woodwork, felting, leather work, instrument and bowmaking, workshops for the children too. I know what I don't want to do so that leaves me with the leather workshop. I think I'll go for that and try and make a few Christmas presents. Rohan wants a leather wallet, I need a new purse, someone wants a belt. Not terribly ambitious I know but useful. I'll see what the tutor has in mind too. Otherwise the stained glass sounds interesting.

I'm going to take the dyed fleece with me and my drop spindle and maybe do a bit in the evenings around the fire. Then at least I'll have done something useful with the stuff I dyed. By the way all the food is provided so there will be lots of time to just sit and be - or card fleece in my case.

In true English fashion it's raining and I hope it will stop by this afternoon. The weather is supposed to be very hot especially midweek - oh good the compost loos will smell nice! I think we may come home for one night to get some sleep and to have a decent wash NOT you understand, to check my e-mails and my blog for comments, although I may just do that!!

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More results

Just a quickie this evening to show you what happened to the horrid blue skeins that I dipped in the onion skin dyebath last night. This is how they were before going in:

and this is how they turned out this morning:

much nicer I think you'll agree. The lovely, lovely man at P&M Woolcraft did send the madder dye out as soon as I ordered it so that I received it this morning. I soaked it in hot water for about 6 hours and then I got impatient so I added more water and simmered it for an hour and then added the wool and a blanket to it. I didn't keep the muslin bag of dye in the pot this time but put it in another pan and soaked it and simmered it again. Then I added it to the pot with the wool in and kept it warm etc etc. So now I have soaked and simmered that new dye three times. Here is what the dye pot looks like this evening:

Much deeper colour but still orangey. I'll probably redo the whole process a couple of times tomorrow and then that's it. It's not a problem if it stays orangey as I'm sure the colour will still suit Raj but I did want to achieve that deep madder red - maybe next time!

Dyeing - the natural way

Here they are in all their glory - my bits of dyed fleece, blankets and some skeins of wool. I have so much to tell you ladies and such little space. Where do I start?

Well firstly I'll mention some of the dyes we used. They were madder, indigo, logwood, fustic, weld, safflower, clover, cutch and onion skins. Most of them required an alum mordant except the indigo and the cutch.

The recipe for the mordant was as follows: for 500g of fibre you need 40g of alum and 35g of cream of tartar. Dissolve each of these seperately in a little boiling water and then add them to a pan of cold water. Stir well. Add the wool, blanket or whatever and bring slowly up to simmering point and keep there for about an hour. You can then leave everything in the pot to cool for a few hours or overnight.

The first thing my friend and I did was to start the indigo vat because that needs to be left for an hour or two before you can use it. For this we used 50g indigo, 40g of thiox and 90g of washing soda. (I think there are recipes for this on the internet so I won't go on about it here).  We placed some cling film on the surface of the liquid and put the whole lot on the warming plate of the Aga to maintain its temerature.

Next stop fustic which had been soaking overnight. We placed that in pan, added the fibres and put it on the stove like so:

Brought this up to a simmer and let it sit like this for an hour or so. I wasn't that impressed with the colour it was a nice light yellow but nothing to write home about. Still it was nicer than the weld that went on the stove next (in the same manner).

Then we tried some logwood which I had had lying around for about 5 years! You're supposed to soak this overnight but I only found it in the morning so I poured boiling water on it and it sat on the warming plate for 7 hours. With this one we just added water to it and boiled it to extract the dye. Then it was strained and we added the wool and the blankets like so:

Now this was the success of the day. What a colour. I was ecstatic. We simmered this for an hour and left it in the garden for an hour or so. After that we re-boiled the logwood chips, strained them, added them to the now empty dye pot and we added some skeins of wool and repeated the whole process. Here are the results:

Then my friend had brought some safflower which we simmered for an hour to extract the colour. Added this to the dyebath and then we put more wool, fleece and blanket and simmered the whole lot for about an hour. This was my next favourite. Here's a pic of one of the skeins:

I was keen to try some cutch that I had because I wanted to dye some blankets brown. For this dye you just mix ther powder to a paste with boiling water and then add warm water and then you add it to your dye bath. For a deep brown you don't use alum mordant but add a copper modifier afterwards. So in went the blankets all evening and overnight. No heat necessary. (I added the copper after a few hours). Here are my beautiful blankets (or at least one of them):

Then it was time for the madder. Also soaked overnight and then warmed up on the Aga (you musn't let it boil if you want red and orange colours). I wanted to dye 400g of wool so in it went and it simmered on the stove for a few hours. I left it overnight because the dye didn't seem to be strong enough and a phone call to P&M Woolcraft this morning confirmed my suspicions. I hadn't used enough dye for the amount of wool. So I've ordered another 200g and I will repeat the process and hope the wool goes darker. Here it is in it's pot:

Meanwhile the indigo vat was ready. Hurrah. Firstly I dipped in 800g of wool - a very quick dip:

Then in went some fleece and another skein or two. After this I wanted to make a green so we dipped in some of the yellow wool that was dyed with weld, fustic and safflower. I have to say that the results weren't that impressive. I had hoped for a grassier green but we got this instead:

I've redipped these in an onion skin dye bath tonight to see if the green colour improves.

Now I'm conscious that this post is going on and on. Sorry prairiemouse I PROMISE ONE DAY I WILL WRITE A SHORT POST (she's been teasing me again). So I'll just tell you that we boiled up some onion skins next and some clover too (seperately ofcourse). I don't have a good pic of either of them but here is one with the indigo dyed fleece and a piece of onion dyed blanket:

This next one is yellow blanket overdyed with indigo and then dyed with onion skins (because I didn't like the shade of green it was):

I quite like the mottled-ness of this. It'll be good for gnomes.

Well, that's it for now. I think. Suffice to say that I really enjoyed it. It was so nice working with natural materials and never knowing how anything would turn out. Just to sum up: I am really happy with most of the results but I need to redo the madder tomorrow. I would use all of them again except the weld and fustic - the safflower and onion produced nicer shades of yellow.  Would love to hear which colours you like.....

Making hay while the sun really shone

We were invited to an impromptu hay making party this evening. This is Rohan in his pink T-shirt watching the tractor make the hay bales. Some of you may know that we are in the middle of a heatwave in England and the temperature has been 37C (95F) around here. It's going to break though and a thunderstorm has been predicted for tonight so our friends were keen to get the hay in.

I, who still live in the world of Enid Blyton children's books had imagined that we would actually be doing it ourselves. The children thought this was rather sweet as I gawped open mouthed at the tractor zooming around the field. The adults did get to help pile up the bales on the other tractors though and the children managed to procure a few to make a den. Otherwise they had lots of tractor rides and we all ate a lot of food. Amber made a gooey chocolate pudding from Nigella to take up and we dug into the salads, the felafels, the burgers etc. On the way home we stopped off at our other neighbour's who was also getting her hay in and having a party. She had musicians though. The food looked even nicer here but I was completely stuffed sadly.

So on this mad hot day the only thing I managed to do this afternoon is mordant my wool and some blankets ready to dye tomorrow. Here is a really exciting pic of the blankets in the sink!

I put them in a large pan with 500g of blanket and 40g of alum and 35g of cream of tartar and water to cover. Brought the whole lot up to simmering point and let simmer for about an hour. Then I tipped it, or rather placed the whole lot carefully, in the sink and poured the mordant liquid over. I'll let it sit overnight. I have to soak the madder and the weld overnight and as it's 10.30pm I'd better go and do it or else I'm stuffed. I'll keep you posted on the results.

By the way I had to borrow a camera from our babysitter. How else was I going to dye and post up about it without photographs? In the days before blogging it didn't matter if your computer went down for a few days or if your camera conked out but these days it's life threatening.

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Can you believe how mad I am - at 11pm I was out in the garden with a torch hunting for buckets and pots in which to soak the dyes. Offcourse they were all over the place and when I did eventually find them they needed washing. The kitchen sink is full of blankets so I'm out in the garden washing (and cursing) the buckets. Now it's 11.15pm and I'm tired but I need to read up about which dyes to soak and how. Then I'm confused about whether to use the whole hundred grams or not and whether I need to fill the buckets halfway or full (bloody book doesn't tell me). Can't phone my friend because sane people are in bed at this time especially if they have a busy day tomorrow. Decide to just go for it and then realise that I need to soak three dyes and that I need to boil the kettle (slowly on the Aga) six times to fill the buckets. And I'm asking myself - as I look at the clock - why the hell didn't I prepare all this before I went out this evening????

Didn't we have a lovely time

Well, didn't I make a great hooha before I went off to the Gower. No excuses. I was just plain crochety. I did get some lovely e-mails and comments though. Thank you soooo much ladies/friends. It's what I say all the time: there is such a lovely supportive community out there and it's so nice being part of it.

Well, we/I had such a great time. The weather was amazing and the our campsite was really nice. The Gower seems to be a well kept secret. Well some of it anyway. Further down the shore Oxwich Bay was heaving. (Sorry about the mark on the photo above).

Our beach is approached from the campsite and is all downhill and a very hot and tiring walk back. (The pic only shows half of the walk). Therefore not many people bother to go down to it which is great for those that do! It's pretty vast anyway so everyone has lots of space.

Tom had borrowed a boat so he and the children footled about on that and swam a lot. I read and read and read which was BLISS. I never get the chance at home to really pour over the papers or get into a book so I read the weekend section and the arts&crafts section of the Telegraph cover to cover (I took ones from the previous two weeks that I haven't managed to read). I love reading reviews of books that I will never get around to reading. I'll never read 'Colour Bar: the Triumph of Seretse Khama and his Nation' for example but I was really interested to learn about this amazing man who was called the founding father of Botswana. The Dangerous Book for Boys is logged in my mind for future presents and I found out about Jane Juska and the poet RS Thomas. I know it's a bit lazy just reading the reviews but what's a girl to do. I would love to read more but I know that I just don't have the time these days. I can't cram everything into a day as it is. I try and read in the evening but just end up nodding off.  So instead I read about what's out at the moment, what's recommended. It's quicker and easier and ocassionally I will come across something that will interest me enough to take on holiday.

Of the books that I took with me I managed to finish Captain Corelli's Mandolin. Well, what to say about it? I enjoyed it, found it a bit long and I HATED the ending. Why didn't he just stop with Corelli coming back three years later and he and Pelagia living happliy ever after? I couldn't believe that Corelli would see her with a baby and just assume the worst and not ask anyone in the village to confirm his suspicions? I just didn't get the last few chapters - thought they were unnecessary. I couldn't understand the point of them getting togther at 70. I was cross and I nearly threw it into the sea. There that's what I thought of it. I didn't get around to reading Meera Syal but I must as it's supposed to be very good.

We came back yesterday evening and I was greeted by two parcels. One with the knitting wool that I am going to dye and the other with the dyes. I ordered indigo, weld, fustic and I already have madder. Before Thursday, when the dyeing is supposed to happen I have to wash my fleece, wind the wool into skeins on a Niddy Noddy and then mordant everything. I'm getting really carried away in my head about what I can dye. I've washed and shrunk a blanket and I might dye bits of that too. Meanwhile the digital camera is making horrendous noises and won't work - I think it's got sand in it! What to do?

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Thank you for your helpful comments about the cat. I think it was out of proportion because I used a felted jumper for the head and it expanded when I stuffed it. So it seemed even odder with the smaller body. I'm going to keep it as it is (last pic) and do the arms and feet ... or maybe .....???

Sun, sea and reading

How do you write a post again when you wrote it yesterday, saved it as a draft, went to eat your dinner and came back and Typepad was down. This morning it's disappeared.

Oh well, it's 8 o' clock in the morning and we're off camping after breakfast. We're going to the Gower (peninsula) in Wales until Sunday. I hope the weather is going to be HOT as I want to sit on the beach all day and read....and doze...and maybe play the odd game of cricket and rounders too. I went round the house trying to find something to read yesterday and I went through everything - Thomas Hardy, John Fowles, Graham Greene, Carol Shields, Andrea Levy, Amy Tan and so on but I wasn't inspired by anything. I don't know what reading mood I'm in currently. I know I already have three books on the go but I got fed up with Clear the Clutter and I need a break from William Morris. So I'm probably going to take these:

Maybe I'll dump Timeless Simplicity and finish The Magic Apple Tree first. Sorry I'm in an odd mood this morning and losing this sodding post doesn't help cos I'm doing this all in a rush now.

Anyhow, I did start a cat from a pattern in a Japanese craft book yesteday but I just couldn't get the body to work. It took me about four attempts to get to this stage. Do other crafters/bloggers do this or is it just me!! I look at their creations and I'm in awe - do they get it the first time round or keep at it until the finished creation is perfect (in their eyes)? Here's the first attempt:

That's the original body on the left from the pattern. I thought it was too small so I made it bigger.

Then I changed the face but I'm still not happy with the body. So I enlarged the pattern and changed the fabric.

Threads hanging out all over the place and I've just pinned the arms on. I still think the body is too small. I dumped it last night as I just didn't seem to be getting anywhere. I'll come back to it next week and see what I can improve. What do you think? Could the body be a bit wider and maybe not so long?  I'd love some feedback.

Infact talking of feedback why not click on the Comments below this post and say Hi. I'd love to hear from you. I think I'm going through what every new blogger goes through after a while. Is anyone reading this stuff, am I saying anything worthwhile, would anyone miss me if I didn't do it....

Yeah I'm in a strange mood this morning and looking at the grey sky isn't helping. See you on Sunday.

PS I've changed my mind about the books. I'm taking these instead:

Summer Fun

Traditions are a funny thing aren't they especially for children? You start something with them when they're little and years later when you absentmindedly forget to do it or you suggest a change they protest. They certainly do in my family - a voice always pipes up saying ' Mum you can't not do that - it's a family tradition'.

Summertime and Christmas are when we have most of our traditions and one tradition that we always start the summer holiday off with is getting our summer scrapbooks ready.

The children have been keeping these for a number of years now even before they could read and write. It's a great keepsake to make and I have a stack of them in the cupboard that they love to look at time and time again. Great also if you had good intentions of compiling a photo album for them from when they were tiny. I have a box of photographs going back twelve years of the children that are still waiting in a box. Well, at least when they leave home they'll have their scrapbooks!

I know scrapbooking is mega trendy these days and you can buy a ton of stuff to use but not in our house. All we do is buy a bog standard scrapbook and some stickers . Then we paint a huge picture that will cover the book. I usually print their names in a pretty font on the computer that then goes on the front. Then you're ready to start. Sometimes I give them a disposable camera but more often than not we take pics on the digital because you can get them printed sooner and use them more immediately. We also collect postcards, tickets and programmes from places we visit. Last year the children did a play and put the programmes and scripts they had made into the scrapbooks.

Obviously someone like Raj needs help doing his. So we sit down with him and paste in his pictures and things and he draws on some of the pages. Amber and Rohan like to record some of the events in writing and to decorate the pages around the photos.

Give it a go - it's  a great way for the children to record their holiday time and it's cheap and easy too.

My bible

Now's the time that I get out my trusty home preserving 'bible'. I found this book a few years ago at a charity shop and I haven't looked back since. In my mind it's the only book to have if you want to make jams, jellies and the like. I didn't know anything before I had it and look at me now - I'm no expert but I'm not phased by making the odd jars of jam anymore. What is this amazing book I hear you cry - here's a picture of the cover... I hope you're not expecting anything fancy or colouful.

It's commonly known as Bulletin 21 and was issued by MAFF in 1929. My copy is 1979. In the foreward it says " the results of research by Miss M Leach and her colleagues in the Home Preservation Section of Long Ashton Research Station." Did you ever know that such a place existed? What was it like to work under Miss Leach - she sounds scary. I bet she made you wash your hands all the time. I often imagine what she was like. There aren't many pictures in the book just a few pages of black and white photographs of equipment, cans, jars etc. There's only one with a bit of a person in it. This one

I wonder if that was Miss Leach or one of her minions. I think it was Miss Leach and I wonder if she knitted that jumper?  I also wonder if she decided on the chapter headings or was it left to some higher up official in MAFF. The chapters are: Principles of Preservation, Choice of Methods, Fruit and Vegetable Cultivars and Uses, Jam Making, Fruit Cheeses and Butters, Fruit Syrups, Candied Fruit, Chutney, Vinegars and a whole lot more. I love it because it's so basic. It holds your hand and guides you through all the stages (it has four ways of testing for a set).

Each year I try something new from it. Last year I made a few bottles of blackcurrant syrup. It was a bit of a pallaver what with the straining overnight and bottling the next day - you had to boil up the bottles in a huge pan of water - but it was worth it. I use it for making ice lollies, pouring over ice-cream and making hot and cold drinks. Luckily, I've still got some left because I don't think I've got the energy to take on such a mammoth task this year. I think I'll just stick to a few jams and maybe chutney in the autumn.

Raspberry jam

Summer is finally here - maybe not weather-wise- but it's here at last. I couldn't really say that until the children broke up from school on Friday. Nine weeks (this year) of lolling around, sleeping-in in the mornings (I hope), going for walks, going camping, cooking over fires in the garden, day trips and larking about.  I asked the children to think about anything they want to do over the holidays but they haven't come up with anything yet cos they're still bickering and getting used to being together. Anybody would think they went to boarding school and never saw each other but we have this every holiday. (I think bickering might be a tad incorrect - shouting and screaming at each might be more appropriate sadly).

Never mind the children. I did start making a list - I love lists and on top of the list was to pick some fruit and make jam. So first thing yesterday morning we went to the pick-your-own and picked raspberries, strawberries and blackcurrants. We came back and I promptly made some raspberry jam. I just love the way lots of people in blogworld are also making things with raspberries - there's Jennyb, Turkeyfeathers, Bigandlittle - it makes you feel so connected.

Sadly there are only just enough raspberries to make Summer Pudding now. I only got what I needed because they were so expensive - £5.95 a kilo. So this jam cost me about £12 and I made 7 and half jars. That's nearly £2 a jar and it's cheaper in the shops! Still it's much nicer then the stuff you buy and it's a great jam recipe to start with cos it sets so quickly. Here's the recipe if you fancy a go:

                                   Raspberry Jam

• 4 lbs raspberries
• 4 lbs granulated sugar
• juice of 1 lemon

Put the fruit in a preserving pan and crush some of the berries with the back of a fork.

Place on the simmering plate of the Aga or over a low heat for 5-10 mins to soften the berries. I then place the pan in my simmering oven for 20 mins to extract juice from the berries. You can keep the pan over a low flame for the same amount of time.

Here's what they look like afterwards - swimming in their own juice. Now add the lemon juice and stir.

Then add the mountain of sugar and stir over a low flame until it has dissolved.

Now bung in your thermometer, raise the heat or move the pan to the hotplate on the Aga and let it boil. Boil until the temperature reaches 105 degrees C - this is the setting point. You can remove the pan from the heat and do the 'saucer test' if you wish. That means putting a little saucer in the fridge before you start. Then you put a blob of jam on the plate let it cool for a minute or two and push it with your finger. If it has set and crinkles then the jam is done. Sometimes the jam can go up to 106 degrees - mine did yesterday. It only took about 20 mins boiling to reach setting point.

Meanwhile you have washed and scrubbed your jars and put them in a low oven to steralise. Now take them out and ladle in your jam. Put on the lids immediately (like I didn't). Well, I'm off now to eat the stuff for breakfast.....