Festival of Vintage, York Racecourse

I made a last minute decision to visit the Festival of Vintage, based on the weather and OH working today. So pleased I braved the showery weather as it was equally as wonderful as last year.

I got to meet some of the ladies who produce the excellent Pretty Nostalgic magazine and I treated myself to a bargain rate subscription, and I got their lovely Home book for signing up. This is going to be a joy to receive every couple of months.

http://prettynostalgic.co.uk/

Between the showers I snapped a few of the amazing cars with all their chrome, tails and fins shining.

Don't this couple look impossibly stylish and next to that great car too!

Maybe not quite as many home or furniture displays as last year but interesting all the same.

Ceramics were out in force, quite a bit of Hornsea pottery, this was by far my favourite stall. The stall holder was from Leeds and she shared my passion for Scandinavian ceramicists, she also had fabric too, my kind of stall!

This was the piece of fabric I bought from her stall, it's so groovy.

Click off now if you don't like textiles!

I thoroughly enjoyed the display of vintage textiles by

http://retropattern.co.uk/

Lots of screen printed work by Hull Traders, Eames and some lovely old Laura Ashley pieces, mega bucks if you wanted to buy Hull Traders work.

This was some of my haul from their stall, bit of Laura Ashley Emma and some pretty floral.

From another stall, this groovy piece and pretty pins.

At this point my purse was screaming and my head was so overwhelmed with colours and pattern that I decided to call it a day, it was fabulous.

Thank you for sticking this out, apologies for photo quality but the lighting was challenging and here are a few final snaps!
Do go to this event if you ever get chance.

http://www.festivalofvintage.co.uk/

My postcard for Gardening For The Disabled auction

A while back I had an email calling for art submissions for a great cause, it is a silent auction to raise funds for Gardening for the disabled.

They were wanting postcard sized artworks in any media. I should've posted about this sooner incase anyone else was interested in submitting but the deadline is today.

http://gardeningfordisabledtrust.org.uk/events-and-news/artists-wanted/

The auction will be held in June, I can't wait to see the other postcards and how much things go for.

I submitted 2 designs, one was a print from my collection of graphic faces but the one with the most effort was this little stitched textile card.

I hope they raise lots of money, it's a great idea.

A couple of completed projects

I think with the slightly improved weather and the bit extra light on an evening, I've been busying myself with a few projects and staying away from the computer on a night.

Last weekend I cut hundreds, no exaggeration, of fabric squares for patchwork, some vintage and some new. I just had that thing going on where I wanted to mosh up a load of random patterns together and do patchwork.
A week on and all I have to show for it is a small patchwork apron!

I'm sure other things will follow now I have so many bits cut.

I've also been crocheting flowers and doing some fibre felting, some of which will form a brooch.

And lastly, a little cat brooch. 
I need to make a few new things in the coming fortnight as I will be having a stall at a local event on May 3rd.

Making things - "what goes around, comes around"

It was whilst reading the lovely Pretty Nostalgic magazine and blog that the question was posed, "have you or your family kept any souvenirs of things you made as a child?" They were referring to things like wonky pots we made in pottery classes, or in my case a book shelf I made in woodwork which weighed a ton!

I made all sorts of things, many of which were inspired by watching Blue Peter and Magpie, the amount of glue, cellotape, glitter, toilet rolls and egg cartons I got through was phenomenal!
I bet some of you are nodding to this also, our poor parents, all this rubbishy stuff we used to make them for presents which they thought were 'lovely'!

However, A few months ago, whilst rummaging in my parents loft, I was both surprised and delighted to find some little felt dolls I made as a child which they had kept. I was quite amazed that they had survived with no musty smells and were still in good condition because I think I made these age 11 or 12 (35 yrs ago).
The dolls were hidden in a little Quality Street tin.

As I opened the tin, I had completely forgotten that I’d customised the inside into the dolls house. 

It made me smile as the memories came rushing back of happy childhood days crafting.

I had used some 1970’s flock, velvety wallpaper which we had in our lounge  to line the inside of the tin. I’d added little windows made from chopped up scenes from greeting cards, I had kept lolly sticks to use the wood for the doors. It seems I was into re-using and recycling from a young age!

I was a big Charlie Brown & Snoopy fan which is why you can see Snoopy on the wall.

Lets take a look at the dolls then, there are 11 in total.

So why did I make the dolls or what inspired me? Well I think it stemmed from family holidays when it was always a treat for me to have a souvenir foreign doll from the different countries we visited. I had some lovely dolls, this is one of my few remaining dolls from Bavaria.

The foreign dolls inspired me to make dolls from places I hadn't been to so the Eskimo was my first and one of my favourites. 

I soon moved on from making foreign dolls and as you can see I picked on some

subjects closer to home like a nurse, a princess and another favourite is the punk with blue hair!

The dolls are about 6cm tall.

They kept me occupied and out of mischief for hours as I busied myself making them in school holidays.

It's strange to think that I've almost come full circle with this and in recent years I have made little felt dolly brooches which I can happily say are much neater and better made.

It's nice to look back on these finds, I wonder if anyone else has such things tucked away still?

Here are some of the felt dolly & button brooches I make today.

And these are some very new ones, not yet finished but using scraps of vintage and other recycled bits of fabric & wool.

A Whaletail soup - don't worry, no whales harmed in the making!!

I feel in somewhat better spirits tonight as I know it will be a little warmer in 24 hours time. I had a delivery of oil at teatime and the aga man is able to call tomorrow and get us up and running again, fantastic.

Onto the soup I mentioned previously, this comes from the Whaletail Cafe cookbook. The Whaletail is a veggie cafe in Lancaster, it's a fantastic place to eat and they brought out a little cookbook to share some of their wonderful dishes.

We will be sampling the Thai Spiced Carrot Soup, I've made it twice now and it is a lovely fragrant and tasty soup with a hint of sweetness and not too spicy, very velvety, calming and satisfying.

If the text is a little small to read in the photo, here is the ingredient list which makes enough for 4, I made half the amount incase you think there doesn't look to be much in my photos.
Here's what you need:

1 medium onion, roughly chopped
750g carrots, peeled and halved across
4 cloves garlic, crushed
2 small potatoes, cut into 4 pieces
1 red chilli, chopped with seeds
2 sticks lemongrass, take outer husk off and bash with rolling pin
1 thumb root ginger, peeled and chopped
1 lime, zest and juice
200g creamed coconut (I only had coconut cream but it worked fine)
2 tablespoons oil
1 pint stock
40g fresh coriander

Method:
Heat the oil on a low heat in a large pan and cook the onions until transparent.
Add the garlic, chilli and ginger and cook for a couple more minutes.

Add the carrots, potatoes, lemongrass and stock. Bring to the boil and simmer gently for approximately 20 mins until vegetables are soft.

Add the coconut, stir thoroughly and simmer for a further 5 mins.

It is a lovely creamy, orangey colour at this point.

Remove the lemongrass and discard. Add the lime zest and juice and the fresh coriander.

Nearly done.

Liquidise until smooth, adding more water if required. 

Season to taste and serve!

Voila! Hope you enjoy it as much as I did and if you ever find yourself in Lancaster do look up the Whaletail.

http://www.whaletailcafe.co.uk/