Where's the grown-up?

This one's for my sisters, with whom I was discussing this very problem last weekend...

Have you ever noticed something out of place in your home, or car, and then, perhaps a few days later, noticed it again and thought “Why hasn’t anyone done anything about that yet?” This happens to me ALL the time, and then I get that sinking realisation that there is no-one else who is going to do anything about it. Either because it’s one of those little things that no-one else in the house would notice anyway, or because (a harsher truth) no-one else cares enough to do anything about it. Or, worse still, it was me that put the thing in that place, and maybe everyone else thinks I still want it to be there, even when that thing is a Thermos mug of now furry tea that’s been in the car for a week. And that’s when I wish there was a grown-up about the place to help.

I’ve officially been a grown-up for quite some time now, and I’ve made it worse by becoming a parent. Before I had children I had time to tidy up after myself (ok, this doesn’t mean I always did tidy up, but I could have done, easily), and generally speaking, things stayed in the places I wanted them to, and weren’t moved, hidden or otherwise appropriated by anyone else. If there was a mess, I knew for definite I had to deal with it. But somehow, now there are three other people in my life, the lines have got blurred. I no longer have time for, well, anything (at least it feels like that sometimes), and quite often I can say hand on heart that I certainly didn’t put that thing there, so why oh why should it be me that has to clear it up?

The problem is - actually there are three problems:

Firstly, I really do want everything to be tidy and in its place. I am a bit of a control freak about this. I dream of spotless minimalist interiors. I would organise and label everything in matching Martha Stewart jars, boxes and shelving units if I could, except that the rest of my family would first laugh at me for being so anal, and then ignore the system to the point where I couldn’t fight the chaos any more.

So in many cases, there genuinely is no-one in the house who cares as much as I do about the heaps of toys in the bathroom, or where the colouring pencils live, or about the fact that there seems to be an odd sock, a lego brick, a sandwich box, two books, a hairbrush, a juggling ball, a shoe, an unidentifiable smell, and a heap of coloured paper under the sofa.

Secondly, some of these tasks are things I can’t do on my own, because I’ve never learnt (changing light-bulbs in the car), or because they require two people (putting things up into the loft which can only be reached by a rickety step-ladder), or because my husband has instilled in me such a lack of confidence that I daren’t try because I know it matters to him that it is ABSOLUTELY perfect, and that I won’t do it well enough (basically anything that involves drilling holes in the wall, or anything to do with gas, electricity, plumbing or computers) but with a 4-hour daily commute and an average office-day of 10 hours in the middle (and since February, a broken wrist as well), he doesn’t have time to do these things or to help me do them so, you guessed it, they don't get done, and I keep noticing them again and again...

Thirdly - and this is the real crunch-point: I don’t want any of this to be my responsibility. I don’t want to have to be the only one who has time or energy to care about dirty socks under my daughter’s bed, or discarded pants on the bathroom floor, or the mouldy food in the car, or the splatters of coffee on the cupboard door next to the dishwasher, or where all the working biros have gone, or the amazing build-up of spiders’ webs in the conservatory... I want someone else to care enough and have time enough to help me: I want there to be a more-grown-up-than-me grown-up in the house so I don't have to be one all the time. I’m tired of being responsible!

Now, will someone please pick up all those toys “someone” seems to have thrown out of their pram? Oh - and tell the butler I’ll take tea in the drawing room...

Well, a girl can dream, can’t she?

I'm linking this up to Sarah Miles' Monday Club - do pop over and see what she and the others have been up to...

Wednesday Window: the garden in June

My garden is a very slow work in progress, but parts of it are beginning to look rather lovely, so if you'll forgive a rather self-indulgent Wednesday Window, we will look out at some of my favourite flowers.

First my climbing rose, a Zepherin Druin, planted last year in honour of the identical rose which has been growing outside the kitchen door of my childhood home for as long as I can remember. It smells heavenly, and is in full bloom at the moment:

Beneath it, the chives are attracting a wonderful array of bees, though the day I took these photos, none would oblige:

Update: I got one!

My peony, planted last year in an attempt to have my own piece of the beauty I found in a rented garden a few years ago. It's nearly out, and I can't wait!

Update: just two days later, it looks like this, and although it looks like there's something dodgy with the colour in this photo, it really does have an extraordinary ultraviolet quality to it.

And finally, lavender. My grandmother had a whole hedge of lavender in her garden, and it's a firm favourite of mine too. Again, it's nearly out...

Here's hoping for more fine weather!

Wednesday Window: Craftivist Collective

There's been quite a revival of old-fashioned crafts lately, with sewing and knitting dusting off their granny-in-slippers image and becoming all cool and trendy. But it can be even more than that... I thought for today's Wednesday Window I'd introduce you to some people I came across recently: the Craftivist Collective.

The term craftivism (activism through craft) was coined relatively recently, but the notion has been around for a while. The Craftivist Collective was formed in 2009 by Sarah Corbett, and was in part inspired by the quiet protests of Chilean women through the creation of complex tapestries, known as arperillas, depicting the brutal conditions of life under the Pinochet regime. Sarah also cites the charity Fine Cell Work, who teach fine needlework to prisoners in the UK, so that they can learn a skill, and with it, regain their dignity. She wrote about her ideas in this blog post, Can craft be used to help change the world?, for the British Museum.

Craftivist Collective's most recent big project, #imapiece involved inviting people worldwide to contribute one or more fabric jigsaw pieces, each individually stitched with a message, to create an art installation to raise awareness of the issues of world hunger and injustice. You can see more about this resulting artwork on the link above, or on the project's Pinterest page.

You can follow @craftivists on Twitter, and if you're moved to join in, there's news of their current projects here. You too can make a noise quietly, and have some fun in the process!

Purple silk, and gorgeous garnets - a Morgan & Pink update

I wrote a little while ago about knotting with silk - an ancient technique that's still very satisfying, and produces a necklace with lovely drape and great strength. It's also great for children's necklaces, since even a breakage should mean the loss of only one or two beads, rather than having the whole lot pinging across the room! At that stage, I was beginning to move beyond using simple fine cream silk with pearls, and now I'd like to share two new designs. The first uses thick pale blue silk, with pale blue and lavender coloured czech fire-polished glass. I'm pleased with the way the thickness of the silk means that the knots become something of a feature in themselves:

The second is a more classic combination of amethyst nuggets and cream glass pearls, but I thought I'd make it more striking by using deep purple silk. Here I've chosen to knot each side of the amethyst, but not between the pearls, which helps accentuate the interesting contrast between the angular stones and the smooth pearls:

In other news I went on a Precious Metal Clay course yesterday and am very excited about using this amazing stuff more in the future. Here are two of the pieces I made during the course - the little flowers will become stud earrings once I've bought some posts to attach:

I've also made a couple of forays into good old-fashioned everyday kind of studs, and I love these garnet cabochons; they're only 4mm in diameter, but they catch the light beautifully:

Some of these pieces will be for sale in my Etsy shop by the end of the week - do get in touch if you'd like to commission something similar.

I'm linking this up to Handmade Harbour's Handmade Monday, so do pop over and see what everyone else has been up to...

Savoury muffins recipe

With a couple of fine sunny weekends under our belt, it seems the time might finally have come to shake the spiders out of the picnic rugs and embrace the possibilities of a suntan. With that in mind, I thought I’d share a couple of recipes that offer an alternative to the humble sandwich at the heart of a satisfying picnic: savoury muffins. I came across the original recipe in the Saturday Times a few weeks ago, and have adapted them a little to suit my tastes. I reckon you could add pretty much anything to the basic recipe; these two are my favourites so far - please share your variations in the comments below.

Courgette, pine nut and chilli muffins
makes 12

275g self-raising flour
1 middle sized courgette, grated
50g parmesan
1 pinch chilli flakes

1 or 2 shallots, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
1 handful pine nuts, toasted

2 eggs
80g melted butter
175ml milk
2tbsp natural yoghurt
salt & pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 190°C / 170°C fan. Line a standard muffin tray with paper cases.
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine the courgette and all the dry ingredients.
3. Gently fry the shallots and garlic in olive oil, and when they’re nearly done, chuck the pine nuts into the frying pan as well for the last couple of minutes.
4. In another bowl, beat together the eggs, butter, milk and yoghurt, then add the shallots and pine nuts. Tip the whole lot into the dry mixture and stir until just combined.
5. Spoon into your muffin cases, and bake for about 25 minutes.

These muffins are delicious eaten warm, but will keep in the fridge for several days. They’re also great eaten cold - as part of a picnic, or as a commuter's breakfast on the train - but if you prefer, they can be reheated in the microwave (approx 30 secs on full power should do it).

Feta, bacon and tomato muffins

275g self-raising flour
24 cherry tomatoes, halved
150g feta, cubed
fresh thyme or rosemary (whichever you prefer, or have more of in your garden...)
black pepper

2 or 3 rashers streaky bacon, chopped into little pieces
2 shallots, finely chopped

2 eggs
80g melted butter (unsalted)
175ml milk
2tbsp natural yoghurt

I’ve recommended unsalted butter this time, as the feta and bacon are quite salty in themselves. Use the same technique as before, preparing your shallots and bacon in a frying pan, your dry ingredients in a big bowl, and your wet ingredients in a smaller one. Once the bacon and shallots are ready, combine the whole lot together and spoon into muffin cases. Bake and eat as before.
These are also delicious without the bacon, if you're vegetarian, or forgot to buy bacon...

Wednesday Window: Mathematical Knitting

I recently bought a nifty little knitting book detailing a whole host of different techniques for casting on, and casting off.

 One that particularly caught my eye was the möbius cast on (which I have yet to attempt, and I suggest you don't hold your breath) where you create a knitted möbius strip. (For more about what that is, try the wikipedia article.)

By a strange coincidence, at about the same time as I bought the book (in the flush of enthusiasm that followed completing a very long project), my brother-in-law sent me a link to an article by Sarah-Marie Belcastro in the American Scientist, featuring some truly awesome mathematical knitting: including the möbius strip, and something called a klein bottle:

Neither my knitting nor my mathematical understanding are in this league, and I struggled with phrases like "a physical instantiation of an abstraction", but I am fascinated by the combination of an old-fashioned craft and difficult three-dimensional concepts. Here's the author's explanation of why it works so well:

You might wonder why one would want to knit mathematical objects. One reason is that the finished objects make good teaching aids; a knitted object is flexible and can be physically manipulated, unlike beautiful and mathematically perfect computer graphics. And the process itself offers insights: In creating an object anew, not following someone else’s pattern, there is deep understanding to be gained.

She then discusses knitting as geometry, the differences between knitting a surface or a 3-D object, and about the complexities of texture and colour in representing shapes and structure. Something for the true geek knitter to get their teeth into?

Wednesday Window: Coryographies

It feels like it's been a while since I've got my act together for a Wednesday Window, but here we are, back in the saddle with another quirky offering for you:

I came across Coryographies on Etsy, where I sell my jewellery. Etsy is a massive global marketplace for handmade and vintage goodies, which can be a great opportunity (my first sale there was to someone in Australia!), but can also seem rather impersonal and daunting. So sellers can join teams, to share information, ideas and encouragement. Recently, a rather special little team was formed for Etsy sellers from Oxford - hurray! And one of the team leaders turned out to be someone who makes jewellery after my own heart - you know, the kind of thing that makes you think "Damn! I wish I'd thought of that first!":

Coryographies is the brainchild of Cory Cuthbertson, a Canadian ex-pat living in Oxford with her English husband, and she makes these lovely little bookcase necklaces in a variety of designs, including an Alice in Wonderland shelf, and a bright pink Valentines version. She also makes little teapot necklaces, and book earrings:

As someone who never leaves the house without a book, and who would carry freshly brewed tea everywhere if it were sensible or possible (a handbag teapot? Someone invent one please!) Cory's designs are really appealing. There's also a Coryographies blog where you can read more...

[If you're wondering what a Wednesday Window is when it's at home, check out the first paragraph here.]