I spy: F G H

Joining Lete in her weekly I spy project: every Monday we share photos associated with a letter of the alphabet. Today we spy H...

I'm way behind with my spying so today I'm sharing also the letters that I have missed: F and G

f is for fruits

 g is for ginger

h is for honey

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Have a happy week!

The Dude abides.

Not much has been happening lately in my knitting world. I have few projects snoozing on the needles and the only thing I've been working on almost every day is The Dude  but I'm struggling with it a lot. The first excitement is long gone, replaced by frustration. In two months I've only finished back and left front. I'm tired of constantly ripping it off and redoing. I'm sure more than ever that knitting in pieces is not for me; I'm overwhelmed by the amount of loose ends, the fair isle worked flat is a nightmare and I feel like it's killing all joy of knitting. Not good. Especially that I have to carry on knitting it: C. is in desperate need of warm cardigan and I really don't want to waste this lovely (and expensive) yarn. Oh, boy. I hope I'm done with it soon.

Corner View: Homeplace.

When I was a girl I dreamed that one day I would have a house in that exact place. Years had passed and I left my country (Poland) to live in another (England), then I fell in love with a foreigner and moved to his country (Italy) and then we moved again to England but then we decided to move from there to Scotland.  So I guess this is our homeplace for now. We are where we are and we try to make the best of it. Because we know it's not going to be forever. Because we know our hearts are somewhere else and we're trying to figure out how to get there. They say: your home is where your heart is. And I think they're right.

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For more corner views, please visit lovely Francesca.

Simple pleasures

Some of you already know that I'm not very good at baking but for the past few days I've been feeling   unexplained urge to make something sweet, to fill our flat with some delicious smells and aromas. Maybe it's the weather (cold and grey and depressing), maybe it's a memory from my childhood that comes to me every now and then (my mum baking cakes for afternoon tea) or maybe it's just because of all these great recipes out there, supported by fabulous photos that make my mouth water...

This afternoon I wanted to cheer us up a bit. I wanted to make something I'd never done before,  something sweet and tasty but easy enough to bake. So I baked these chocolate muffins/brownies with mascarpone and raspberries. 

The recipe for these muffins comes from this fantastic blog. For a long time now I've been feeding my eyes there with beautiful photos of deliciously looking food and today I finally decided it was time to start feeding our bellies too. I decided to try some recipes and the muffins looked easy enough to make and very tempting at the same time. And although I feared one huge baking disaster, I must proudly announce: I have finally baked something edible! And not only my muffins are edible, they actually taste good. Here is hope for my future baking :)

I spy: E

Joining Lete in her weekly I spy project: every Monday we share photos associated with a letter of the alphabet. Today we spy E...

e is for espresso

(make it double, it's Monday today...)

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From old folders: Camogli

Camogli, beautiful Camogli... Small fishing village on the Italian Riviera, popular among tourists but still peaceful enough to enjoy its beauty. These photos were taken in September 2009.

Have a great day Everyone!

FO: Love affair.

This project was inspired by this beautiful nightdress by Francesca: when I first saw it, I fell in love with it and wanted to do something similar as a summer top. I'm not very good at working with crochet but I decided to give it a go anyway.

In the beginning it was love affair between knitting and crochet (I planned to crochet the lace part and knit the rest) but as it usually happens with love affairs: they start with excitement but they rarely work out well and they finish with tears. I don't know how many times I had to rip this project off. I don't know how many times I changed my mind about it. But in the end I decided to stick to hook only and crochet the whole thing. And I think it was a good decision.

Joining the fabric was tricky since I'm hopeless at sewing. It took me few days to gather my courage to pull out my sewing machine from the depth of my wardrobe. Few tears here and few swears there and it was done. It is not perfect, it actually is very, very imperfectly sewn but I like it anyway. I only hope I get a chance to wear it. Summer in Scotland doesn't seem to be very summery...

Project notes:
Yarn: Wendy Supreme Luxury Cotton DK, one skein
Hook: 3 mm
Fabric: 100% cotton bought on sale in John Lewis
5 mother pearl buttons for closure

I spy: D

I'm joining Lete in her Monday editions of "I spy...". Every Monday we show an image associated with a letter of the alphabet. Whatever comes first to your mind, whatever you see around you. You spy with your eye...

d is for drawing

d is also for dude (slow progress jumper for my dude)