Mists and mellow fruitfulness?

It seems to have been ages since I posted here, so I have a rather long, but I hope not too boring post today.

The first project I am sharing today is a 8 x 8 canvas made as a housewarming gift. I used a variety of techniques and mediums, using gelatos and acrylic paint to colour through stencils, collaging different papers, stamping onto tissue and adding home made crochet flowers with button centres. This took a couple of hours to make and as you might imagine it was a pleasant time of messy creative play.

My recently rediscovered love of crochet has continued to keep me busy. I finished my Cosy blanket following the pattern of Lucy at Attic 24. This pic reminds me of one of the pleasures of making a blanket - that you can sit under it when it gets bigger. Not a benefit to making a blanket in the summer months though for sure!

I also started and finished (just yesterday) another lap blanket using the leftover yarn from my Cosy and Lily Pond blankets. These are both presents for family members. I really love the idea of making cosy crocheted gifts for my loved ones. I have just started on a crochet wrap in some gorgeous yarn for my Mum which is already growing nicely and is a very easy pattern.

 

This was my first attempt at doing overlay crochet, following the lovely Circles of the Sun pattern. Now this is a real challenge, not least as the yarn is rather prone to splitting, but I keep telling myself it is a good learning experience! There are also some incredible tutorial videos over on the In a Nutshell blog, that lady is a saint to spend the time to make such helpful films!!! I have a lot of practising to do with this pattern I think!

 



I love this time of year. The light has a gorgeous quality, as I witnessed on a recent walk around the grounds, and along the beach of Osborne House.

There are beautiful colours out there in the trees and plants, fruits and veggies seem abundant in the garden and there is a bit of a nip in the air (but not too much). I always feel like it is time to gather in the harvest and prepare to batten down the hatches and get our homes and larders ready for winter.

Despite some neglect this year due to other demands in our lives, the garden has come up trumps with some lovely produce. Plenty of interesting tomatoes and some useful, if rather small onions.

 

 

I have been busy with preserving some of the harvest and some bought in goodies, including chutney, amazing seeing a panful like ....

...... this transform into rich thick loveliness. I think my camera steamed up a little at this point!

 

 

I made some stamped labels for the finished article using some magnetic WRMK alphabet stamps I got in the charity shop. They make rather wonky lettering which I rather like. The lids will be covered with some pretty paper before the chutney goes to new homes.

 

Some of our damson harvest has been transformed into jam.

The latest yields of crab apples picked yesterday are destined to become mint and crab apple jelly this week.

We haven't really had much in the way of mists here yet to be honest, but we have certainly had plenty of fruitfulness!!!

Happy autumn!