Tag: bees

Milly’s 2013 Christmas Dresses

Milly's Christmas Dresses 2013

Today I have been mostly making Christmas dresses. Yes, I only have the one niece… but I got a bit carried away in the fabric shop! The pattern is Butterick 3772, again. This time it’s in the largest size I have, so I want to get a few more made before they’re outgrown.

Milly's Christmas Dresses 2013

I didn’t deliberately buy birds and bees… in fact I didn’t even notice the combination until Paul pointed it out to me! But given that birds and bees are two of my favourite things, it’s probably no surprise that I was smitten with these fabrics.

Milly's Christmas Dresses 2013

I was waiting in line to pay for the fabric when I spotted this button across the store. How perfect is that? I kind of want to knit myself a cardigan now, and put great big BEE BUTTONS all down the front.

Milly's Christmas Dresses 2013

Not wanting the birdy dress to feel left out, and in the absence of a matching bird button, I thought these little pink flowers would do very nicely. In case the super-observant amongst you are wondering why you can’t see any buttonholes, it’s because the buttons have great big snap fasteners sewn underneath.

I haven’t added any pockets to these dresses, as I want to use the leftovers to do the same thing as last year and make a couple of matching outfits for her rag doll. I’ll make a start on those tomorrow, and if there are still any scraps big enough then these two dresses might end up with pockets after all.

(Note to self: Don’t wrap them up just yet!)

Birds and Bees…

Birds and Bees

We haven’t got enough space to put up our Christmas tree this year, so I wanted to try and make the house look a little bit festive with some other decorations. I’ve been coveting these tiny sparkly birds ever since I first spotted them, so I decided that a Christmas wreath was as good an excuse as any to go out and buy a set.

These are the ingredients:

The birds and bees are all on little clips, so it was just a question of positioning them on the wreath and speading them out neatly. Easy peasy, took about ten minutes, and required absolutely no crafty or artistic skills at all!

Once I’d added up all the bits, £21.98 seemed like a lot of money for what looks like a few twigs with some chocolate wrappers chucked at them. But it looks very sweet (no pun intended), and I can put it away safely in a box at the end of the season to be used in future years.

Actually, as it doesn’t really look all that Christmassy, I might just relocate it to the Shed and leave it up all the time. It feels like better value for money if I can look at it every day, rather than just for one twelfth of the year!

Bee Brocade Waistcoat

Finished waistcoat

I made this waistcoat so long ago that I’d almost forgotten about it! The pattern, as for the shirt underneath it, is Simplicity 4923.

Although this was already the shorter view, most women’s patterns are too long in the body for me, so I decided to shorten it even further. Men’s patterns are even longer, so I folded out about four inches from the front and back. I didn’t interface the brocade because it was already fairly stiff, and I wanted the waistcoat to be nice and light. It fastens with poppers, with decorative buttons sewn over the top. There are twice as many buttons as poppers!

The cravat is simply a piece of silver habutae, which I ran through the overlocker to finish the edges.

I wore this to a goth night, with leather trousers and silver Doc Marten boots. I had to go a choir rehearsal first, and as I walked in one of the Tenors exclaimed, “Bloody hell!”

I hope he meant it in a good way, because I absolutely love this outfit.

Scarves for bees!

Bee

No, not tiny little woollies to keep them warm. Instead, Seasalt in Cornwall are holding their annual “Go Knit!” charity drive.

This year they’re collecting donations of hand knitted scarves, and all proceeds from their sale will go to the Bumblebee Conservation Trust.

Bees and knitting are two of my passions, so obviously I’ve sent my scarf down to Cornwall. If you’d like to do the same, you can find the details here.

While I was thinking about scarves, I’ve re-listed a few on Etsy.

I have a whole pile of things that I’ve made which I haven’t got around to listing yet, so I should probably do that quite soon. Those badges and wheat bags aren’t going to sell themselves from the depths of my Shed!

Busy as a bee…

Bee

I’m sorry I haven’t been posting about anything other than work lately, but that’s because I haven’t really been doing anything other than work!

I have finally managed to buy a new bike, so today Paul and I cycled all the way to (guess where…) work, so that I could time the journey. The theory is that I’ll cycle to the Museum and back starting from next week, but I’m not entirely certain that my knees will agree with that decision. I’ll have to see how it goes.

It was an absolutely beautiful afternoon, so we mooched about in the Museum garden with the cameras.

Paul took the macro lens (how does he always manage to hijack the lens that I want to use?!), so I took photos of things from a long way away with the 300mm. I have some lovely ones of the chimneys on the East Thorpe building, but seeing as I’m so short of things to blog about, I’ll save those for another time.

Butterflies and Bees.

Painted Lady

To make the most of the fact that I happened to be off sick on the one day in the last fortnight when it wasn’t chucking it down with rain the entire time, I went for a very short walk with the camera – just down to the edge of the lake and back.

Paul’s taken the 300mm lens with him to Germany, so instead of struggling with the 200mm, I decided to have a play with the macro (70mm) lens.

Sitting on the teasels was a slightly ragged Painted Lady butterfly. I sneaked up on it with the camera, and it wasn’t bothered in the slightest.

A bit further along there’s a big bank of thistles, and they were covered in bees! I saw at least four different types of bee, although I wasn’t able to get decent photos of all of them.

I’ve been lucky enough to have a very positive response to my photos since I’ve been using a digital SLR. I do have some up for sale in my Etsy store, but I thought I’d simplify the process even further and make a page right here when you can buy prints and canvases in a number of different sizes.

Up at the top of the page, there’s a shiny new tab marked “Photos“. Have a look, and let me know what you think!

Bees! In the house!

No, it isn’t as alarming as it sounds.

As you might have gathered from the picture, I’m talking about wallpaper!

Farrow & Ball* have the most beautiful ranges of historical paints and wallpapers. With paint colours such as String, Dead Salmon and Cat’s Paw, who could fail to be intrigued? I’ve often longed for a period property, just so I could say things like, “The drawing room? Oh, that’s decorated in Bone and Mouse’s Back, darling…”

 

Anyway. Bees. I really like bees.

A friend sent me a link yesterday, with the subject “I saw this and thought of you”. I couldn’t imagine why I would remind anyone of paint or wallpaper, so I clicked through to find out.

Farrow & Ball have bumblebee wallpaper!

From their website:

Bumble Bee is one of 4 designs from Papers 5; a collection of block printed papers, produced in the traditional manner using only our finest water based paints. The Napoleonic bee signifies the French worker and the design was originally found in Josephine Bonaparte‘s boudoir, as a silk fabric. The 7 Farrow & Ball coloured grounds are traditionally trough and brush applied before the design is block printed. The 4 designs are drawn from existing Farrow & Ball blocks used in restoration of great British houses.

It comes in 20 different colourways, and costs £57 per 10 metre roll. I’ve sent off for a couple of samples, in the colours shown above. Hopefully one of them will match with my beautiful bee fabric, which I’ve been meaning to turn into curtains for quite some time. Then I need to work out how much wall I can cover with just one roll of paper…

…or perhaps I’ll have to settle for framing the samples, making my curtains, and dreaming of the day that I can afford to have a complete bee room!

 

 

*Note – you might have to tell their website which country you’re in, before you can follow the links. Tell it you’re in the UK, and you’ll be able to click through with no trouble.