Making Good Use

Chop Chop

Realising I was quickly running out of homemade cards, this afternoon I got busy with my Stanley knife, the double-sided Sellotape and all the card blanks I had left.

 
I ended up with half-a-dozen more cards culled from the damaged-beyond-any-other-use Ladybird book I found at a jumble sale last autumn.  (I'm particularly liking the ambulance image, I think that would make a great 'get well' card.)

 
I've still got a few more images left in the book but they are all rather boyish so I thought I'd save making those until I get a few more card blanks.  Each card probably cost me just over 30p to make.  I think I paid 30p per card blank on ebay and the cost of the double-sided tape is negligible as I got two rolls at a car boot sale a while ago at some incredibly cheap price.

 
After I'd done those, and used up a loose knitting image from a 'Things to Make' Ladybird book too, I suddenly remembered some rather nice recycled paper card blanks I bought at the Vintage and Handmade Fair in Chipping Sodbury a few weeks ago.  I knew the cards were too small for the Ladybird images but had a bit of a 'eureka' moment when I remembered an old 'Complete Book of Sewing' from the 1940's that was knocking around somewhere.

 
Again, it was a book that was totally beyond use - even the covers had been ripped off at some point - but it does have some lovely 1940's sewing images in it.  I rather like the utilitarian one-colour prints against the brown card background. 

 
Total cost of these cards - 50p each for the blanks and maybe 1p on top for the double-sided tape and the original cost of the book.   Don't think WH Smiths or Clinton Cards could match that sort of bargain price!  And these cards are all one-offs too.  Not bad for an hour or so's work.

Hacked Off

One of P's favourite casual shirts had pretty much reached the end of the road - both the cuffs were frayed and worn, and a very thin patch near the elbow was threatening to become a hole at any moment.  Against my better judgement, he wore it on the flights to and from Iceland  as he said it was really soft cotton and very comfortable to wear when travelling. 

Last time I was ironing it I showed him all the damage to the cuffs and lower arms and suggested we put it out for the textile recycling collection.  Very reluctantly P agreed, at which point I had a bit of a 'eureka' moment and suggested I have a go at hacking off the lower portions of the sleeves (which were where all the worn parts were) and turning it into a short-sleeved shirt.  We both agreed that even if I loused the whole exercise up we'd lost nothing as the shirt was pretty much unwearable in the state it was in.

Using another of P's short-sleeved shirts as a guide I chopped off the sleeves to the desired length, folded them under, hemmed them up on the sewing machine, et voila!

 
A perfectly serviceable short-sleeved version and, as P doesn't have many short-sleeved shirts, a welcome summer-time addition to his wardrobe.  I felt quite chuffed with myself when I'd finished the transformation - and it only took about 15 minutes from start to finish.

Swapsies

A few weeks ago I signed up for the Faith Hope and Charity Swapping swap over at Faith Hope and Charity Shopping

I was teamed up with Caroline as my swap partner and my goodness me she sent a belter of a swap parcel.

 
Some delicious toiletries (I am a real sucker for nice toiletries,) and I had no idea that Evian made anything other than water - I'm looking forward to trying their moisturiser and the Body Shop scrub, and hand cream is always useful and very welcome.

 
Some lovely crafty goodies - embroidery threads, vintage knitting patterns and some sweet little cross stitch kits.

 
A book which promises to be just up my street as it's a murder mystery, a DVD starring among others Julie Andrews, Colin Firth and Stephen Fry - again just my cup of tea, and a Past Times scented candle.

 
And, last but not least, the jewellery part of the swap, a lovely chunky necklace.  Thank you, Caroline, I'm really delighted with everything you sent.  And many thanks to Lakota for organising the swap too.

Still on the subject of swaps, my swap partner from the dishcloth swap, Jen at The Woollen Earth, has got a photo of what I sent her on her blog (stupid here had forgotten to take a photo before I sent the parcel off to Nova Scotia!!)

And It's All For Me

Perfect boot sale weather this morning, sunny spells, not too much wind, nice dry field and lots and lots of sellers (and buyers.)  Perhaps for the first time ever, I came away with things that are only for me.  Normally, I'm on the lookout for things to re-sell, or clothes for my nephew, sister, Mum or even P and I was still looking out for those things today it's just I didn't find any.  However, I did manage to find some nice things for myself.

 
Marks and Spencer summer top - £1.00.  When I originally enquired about the price the seller said it was £2.00 (which would have been fine with me) and then in the next breath announced that I could have it for £1.00 instead.  Sold, and very nice it is too when I tried it on at home.

 
An Evans jumper for the colder weather.  This one was £2.00 which is quite a bargain compared to how much they cost new.  Again, it's a lovely length and fit and I'm really pleased I found it.

 
Quite a stash of nice toiletries.  Organic conditioner and shampoo - 30p each; two Crabtree & Evelyn Jojoba Oil soaps - 50p each; three L'Occitane body lotions - 50p each; and a bottle of No 7 Completely Quenched moisturiser - 20p. 

This little lot will be going into my toiletries stash (currently housed in a rather large wicker wastepaper bin.)  It's always a treat to rifle through the stash and find lovely upmarket toiletries that I've bought (for a fraction of their retail price) when I'm needing a new shower gel or shampoo.  It's like going shopping but without spending anything.  When I was looking for shampoo and shower gel to take on holiday with us I uncovered a bag full of travel size Crabtree and Evelyn stuff that I'd forgotten I had - they turned out to be perfect for our trip and had cost me 10p each.  You can't beat that for a beauty bargain.

Linking up with Apron Thrift Girl's Thrift Share Monday and Me and My Shadow's Magpie Monday.

Simple Plain Dishcloth

 
Here's my second pattern knitted from the wonderful 'Gentle Art of Knitting,'  this time one of Jane Brocket's simple knitted dishcloths.  Mine is edged in navy cotton as that was the only colour I had and I'm very pleased with how it's turned out, though I must say that the red edging shown in the book is very spiffy indeed.

I should really knit up a couple more dishcloths in my own 'knife, fork and spoon' design (pattern here if any one is interested) in the near future but for the time being I'm enjoying some totally mindless but very useful knitting of a second blue-bordered simple plain dishcloth.

 
Speaking of knitted dishcloths, check out this rather snazzy patriotic dishcloth here or these coloured-edged ones from the same company if you don't want to knit your own.

So, Yeah, I Even Managed to Find a Charity Shop

 
Even I, with my inbuilt charity shop radar, was a bit surprised to stumble across a charity shop in Reykjavik.  And, boy, it was like no other charity shop I've come across before.

 

 
It was stuffed with rack after rack of beautiful Icelandic knitwear - some of it sadly a bit over-washed and felted - but most of it in beautiful condition and at considerably lower prices than you could buy it new.  Sadly, they didn't have anything that really took my fancy or, indeed, fitted me that well - although I did try a couple of things on.

No worries though, I discovered that Alafoss Lopi Icelandic wool was only £2.50 for 100g (much cheaper than it is in the UK.  And, can you believe it, I came across some horribly icky acrylic rubbish in a charity shop here yesterday where they were charging £1.99 per 100g ball!!) so I bought 12 balls.

 
Two balls of each of the above colours.  I was so spoilt for choice in the shop as they had Lopi in every colour you could imagine, but very little room in our suitcases meant I was limited as to how many balls I could buy.  Now to decide what to knit!!

Lark Rise to Reykjavik

I was a bit surprised to turn on the TV that first evening in Reykjavik and find they were showing the latest series of 'Lark Rise to Candleford,' in English but with Icelandic subtitles.  Ah, the power of a good old BBC costume drama obviously transcends both borders and language very easily (says the woman who NEVER watches a costume drama as they drive me totally nuts - although I did make an exception with 'The Crimson Petal and The White,' which was stunningly good.)  

 
One of the things we both wanted to buy whilst we were in Iceland were the DVDs of 'The Night Shift' (an Icelandic comendy recently shown on BBC4 - bloody hilarious, I urge anyone to watch it if they repeat it,) and it's follow-on series 'The Day Shift' and 'The Prison Shift.'  After much searching in various DVD shops we eventually tracked all three down, although the feature film 'Mr Barnfredason' was sold out everywhere we asked.  The series star, Jon Gnarr, who is, apparently, an erstwhile punk and a stand-up comedian, was last year voted Mayor of Reykjavik.  As an English-language newspaper recently reported, he's a comedian who has become a politician, unlike Boris Johnson who has done the complete opposite!!

During our extensive searches through various DVD outlets, I was surprised by how many Icelandic films and TV series are on DVD (for such a small nation they seem to be remarkably creative and prolific.)  But I wasn't in the least surprised to find shelf after shelf of American imports - that's the same the world over  - although it did make me snigger to find a DVD of 'Life on Mars' for approx. £5.00 (much cheaper than I paid last year) on sale at the local supermarket.  One does wonder how some of Gene Hunt's more infamous lines ('It's 1973, almost dinner time, I'm 'avin hoops' - 'You're surrounded by armed bastards'  - 'Don't be such a jessie') translate into Icelandic.

Anyway, P and I have already made great inroads into 'The Day Shift' which, I'm happy to report, is just as laugh-out-loud funny as 'The Night Shift.'  Excellent, excellent stuff.

(N)Iceland

So, where to begin with our trip to Iceland.  Well, we were both highly amused to see that the Icelandair plane taking us to Keflavik Airport was called 'Eyjafjallajökull'  First of all we thought this must be some massive wind-up by Icelandair but, no, apparently all their planes are called after various volcanoes and glaciers - we just got lucky that the one we travelled in was named after THE most notrious volcano in the Northern hemisphere. 

 
The apartment we rented was in a lovely quite back street yet was only a few minutes walk (or hobble in my case, with my dodgy hip) to the centre of Reykjavik.  It was beautiful and had three balconies which gave wonderful panoramic views over the city.

 
The living space was on the top floor with the bedrooms on the floor below so you could really enjoy the views whilst having breakfast or an evening meal.  Everything in the apartment had come from Ikea and we felt right at home when we saw the exact same shoe rack in the hall as we've got in our house.

 
Here's P enjoying the view from the living room balcony on our first evening.  We were both wondering when on earth the sun was going to set and this photo was taken at about 11.00pm.  Turns out the sun doesn't set until just after midnight (and reappears shortly afterwards) so I never got to see it as I was always tucked up in bed by that time.

One of the highlights of the trip for me was an afternoon bus tour of Reykjavik and it environs - even though the tour guide described me as 'handicapped' (I was using a walking stick) and so we could park in the handicapped bay!!  I'm sure something got lost in the translation there!!!!

 
The tour included a trip to The Pearl which gives panoramic view of the city and beyond.  The actual 'Pearl' bit is a large viewing area and revolving restaurant set atop four huge geothermally heated hot water tanks which supply the city with hot water. 

 
The views from up there were stunning as the air was so clean and clear.

 

We also got taken out to Seltjarnarnes which is not far outside the city centre at all but which has this wonderful Edward Hopper-esque lighthouse.  There were some beautiful houses out this way with stunning sea views.

 

 

 

Of course, no tour of Reykjavik would be complete without a visit to the harbour, and these are some of the whaling vessels berthed there.  They haven't been used for forty years apparently and it seems that whale-watching tours are much more commercially viable for the Icelandic than hunting whale these days.

 

Across from the harbour is the stunning new concert and conference centre - Harpa.  This was started in the boom years of the Icelandic banking industry with private funds and is a building of huge excess - 500 different shaped window panes and a £12 million a year bill just to keep the glass clean.  As we all know what happened to Icelandic banks in 2008, the citizens of Reyjavik have had to dig deep in their pockets in order to get the building completed. 

 
But it really is something else and something they should be very proud of.  It's still not fully completed but it is amazing inside.

I'll be back with (yet) more tales of Reykjavik tomorrow - it's just too disgustingly hot and sticky to concentrate any more today.  Phew, I'll be glad when this hideous heatwave breaks overnight.

 

Birthday Boot Sale Finds

Yup, today is my birthday.  I looooove having my birthday at this time of the year - the evenings are long and the weather is usually warm and sunny, although today is just a tad too warm and sunny for me.  The field where the boot sale is held was like a furnace (I take my hat off to the people who were standing there for hours selling, no idea how they could do that) with no shade whatsoever and very little air to cool things down either.  I had to give up before I'd done all the rows - it was just too hot to struggle round - and P and I repaired to a local hostelry for a jolly tasty birthday lunch eaten outside under the cool of a large parasol.

 
Anyhoo, I found a few nice bargains whilst at the booty, inlcuding this fabbo 1960's / 70's tin tray for 50p.

 
From the same seller was this very pretty but not terribly practical (it's a bit thin) granny-square crochet tea cosy, also 50p.

 
A boxed 1960's / 70's rather funky tablecloth and napkins set - £1.00.

 
A teeny weeny little tube of Dior anti-wrinkle cream which cost me the huge sum of 10p and the woman running the stall said I could have the brand-new box of Ecozone ecoballs (they're for doing laundry without using detergent) for free - which I thought was exceedingly kind of her.

I'm linking this post with Apron Thrift Girl's Thrift Share Monday and Me and My Shadow's  Magpie Monday.

Church Fete

 
This afternoon was the annual summer fete at a local village church.  It's a beautiful venue as the church is built on quite a high hill (well, high for Essex) and there is a marvellous view from up there. 

 
There is an old dovecote in the churchyard and afternoon tea was being served close by - I went mad and had a piece of coffee cake with a gooey sticky filling (the first piece of cake I've eaten since January - it was delicious!)

The fete is always extremely well organised and very well attended.  I made a bee-line for the linens stall and came away with some wonderful bargains.

 
A pair of unused vintage Horrockses white cotton flat sheets, four William Morris Golden Lily print cushion covers, two fabulous pieces of vintage fabric

 
An unused 1970s linen tea towel

 
And another unused pure linen tea towel, this time featuring Mexican motifs.  I also got a couple of unused pots of body butter for me and something rather nice for a swap I'm taking part in.  Even the book stall produced a couple of books that were good for re-selling on Amazon.  P won a football on the hoop-la stall (I was rubbish and only won a small bag of chewy sweets.)  It was a lovely, gentle, very English way to spend a sunny summer's afternoon.  There was also a flower festival going on in the church itself with arrangements commemorating various famous people

 
I particularly liked this display in honour of Baden-Powell, the founder of the boy scouts, especially the wigwam effect and the very ancient copy of 'Scouting for Boys.'

ETA:  I know the 'no cake since January'  line seems a bit bizarre and, believe me, it's not because I haven't wanted to eat cake but its pretty much 'verboten' for me along with butter, cheese, cream, chocolate and any other foods with a high saturated-fat content.  I've had to go on to a really low-fat diet because I developed a problem with my gall bladder in January.  Oddly enough, if anyone had told me at New Year that I'd have to give up all my favourite foods I would have been devestated but it's really not been that bad - plus I've gone down two clothes sizes, which is a great bonus.