The Dressmaker's Do!

Sewing bloggers, get your machines ready – tickets for The Dressmaker’s Do are here!

Join us and fellow sewists wearing your best sewn creations for a fun-filled evening brilliant fashion, fine food and drinks.

Hosted by Nichola from Handmaker's Factory and yours truly, it promises to be a great night – with fantastic door prizes to be won, including a brand new whiz-bang Singer sewing machine!

The Dressmaker’s Do will be held at The Kent Hotel, North Carlton, which is easily accessible by public transport. Tickets cost $90, and include finger food plus an open bar with red and white wine, sparkling wine, beer and soft drinks. Vegetarian and gluten-free food will be available, as will funky tunes to get your make-it-and-shake-it boogie on the dance floor later in the night. Take advantage of the photo wall to take great pics of yourself and your friends in your best sewn finery.

Follow us on Instagram for more exciting news in the lead up to the night: @handmakersfactory or @jorthknits – we can’t wait to see you there! 

Tickets available now - would love to see all my favourite sewing people there! 

Details:

Date - Saturday, 18th June 2016

Location - The Kent Hotel, 370 Rathdowne St, North Carlton

Time - 8pm until 11:30

Dress Code - The best finery you can sew!

Tickets can be purchased from here.

The Year of Green Frugality

Summer's over, school is back, and it's time to get back to work. And, in my case, to put my new year's resolutions up on the blog!


This year is all about saving. Saving money, and knocking that mortgage down, down, down, and saving the earth by being as environmentally friendly as we possibly can.


We've always been a pretty green-minded family, but the last couple of years have almost had me in a panic regarding the state of our earth. It is so disappointing to see our elected leaders sit on their hands whilst Rome, and everywhere else, burns.


However, there is plenty that I can do as an individual to reduce my impact. Not coincidentally, a lot of green ways are also very frugal ways, so I'm going to bring the two together and make this our Year of Green Frugality!


The rules are as follows:

 - Abide by the 3 R's (reduce, reuse, recycle) as much as humanly possible.


 - Think very long and hard before making a purchase. Nothing is to be bought unless it is truly needed. Ask the following questions: Do I really need this? Will it serve more than one purpose? Can it be passed on to others in good condition when we no longer require it?


 - If the answer to any of those is yes, then the purchase can be made. It should be, however, at least one of the following: ethically made, second-hand and/or from an indie producer.


- Make as much as possible in the home. This will range from jam to clothes to laundry liquids. Not only will I be saving money, but I will value the things I have produced from high quality materials and will also be able to avoid environmentally destructive ingredients such as palm oil. This means that you'll probably be getting a hand-made or edible gift for your birthday. Hope you like it!


It all sounds a bit full-on, doesn't it? But truly, a lot of this is just about being more organised with my time. Mondays are going to be devoted to cleaning and cooking, so when I come home tired and stressed later in the week I can grab that pre-cooked meal from the freezer, rather than resorting to take-away and squillions of plastic containers. Which I will eat whilst admiring my mostly clean apartment. Win win!


Speaking of plastic, we are trying to avoid it as much as possible as well (like that time we went plastic-free). I'll be hitting up our local health food store and buying lots of our food from their bulk bins. It's going to be great - cooking as much as possible with fresh, non-packaged produce is going to be good for landfill AND good for my tummy!


I'm also on a mission to use up the craft supplies that I have here before even thinking about getting more. I have enough fabric for my wardrobe needs to last me a while, so I really want to work through that before I even think about justifying any new purchases. I had a major clean out last year of my fabrics and yarn, so the only things I have left have already been allocated to particular projects. Tyger will need some new things, though, so I'll have to just get my fabric kicks making things for her! I am banned from buying any new patterns, though - I have enough to sink a ship, and should really what I have. It's going to be tough, but I am determined not to crack!


We have also decided as a family to continue with some big hitting carbon reductions, such as remaining car free (using bikes, feet or public transport to get where we need to go) and to restrict meat to two meals a week, max, being veggie or vegan the rest of the time. The Galumph and I have also decided that rather than buying things for each other (things! things! the last thing we need is more things!) we will give experiences instead. Rather than a gift which we will have to find a home for and never end up using, we're going to go to concerts or exhibitions instead. My house will remain uncluttered, and I'll get a romantic night out with my husband. Ahhh, I'm liking the sound of this already!


So watch this space and see how we fare with our Year of Green Frugality. It's officially starting today - I'll keep you up to date here and on Instagram with our progress. If you have any tips or advice for me, please share - I'd love to hear your thoughts on ways we can reduce our impact!

Pattern Review: Simplicity 1651

So the first summer dress of the season is finished! I've wanted to make up this pattern for absolute yonks, and when I saw the Kaffe Fassett Lotus print in GJ's I knew that the perfect fabric had finally come my way!

There are a few things that I quite like about this dress - it feels very sun smart, with the mostly covered bodice, and high back neckline. It's also got a 1940s vibe that I am really digging at the moment, especially with the cute double cap sleeves and bodice detailing. And it has a skirt that is perfect for swirling in. Not that I get many opportunities to swirl, but I like to be prepared in case a good, grade A swirl is suddenly called for. And you never know when that might occur!


The design features a side zipper, which I'd never actually done before. I approached the zip with some little trepidation, but it went in as easy as pie - phew! My secret is to always baste in my zips these days, and it really does make a different. The old stitch in time saves nine certainly rings true in that regard.


The only quibble I have is that the dress has turned out a tad more demure than I wanted. The cover illustrations make it look rather sassy, but my version seems determined to be well behaved and not bring any shame upon the family etc etc. Which is nice enough in it's way, but sometimes when you have your heart set on sass, you want SASS, BABY!


Not to worry - there's plenty more summer dresses with a pretty high sass factor coming along! Oh, and I've just noticed on the back of the pattern envelope that light weight double knits are amongst the recommended fabrics. Could be a winter version with long sleeves in the pipeline for winter, methinks!

Project Details
Pattern - Simplicity 1651, Bodice Front View B, Bodice Back View C, Flared Skirt
Fabric - 3.5m of Kaffe Fasset Lotus print from GJ's Discount Fabrics
Notions - 35cm invisible zipper

Better than pancakes

Can you believe it? For once we didn't forget that it was Shrove Tuesday, and busted out the pancakes for breakfast. Yay us!

"Coughcough" interrupts Galumph.

Ok, ok. So we made waffles instead. Close enough, and totally within the celebratory Lenten boundaries. Seriously, no need to be picky!

"CoughcoughWHOmade'em?" interrupts Galumph (again).

Geez! Who are you, the blog honesty police? Alright already, so Galumph made the waffles. I didn't even think of doing them, as I was too busy doing my zombie walk into the shower. I am no good to anybody until I've had at least 3 minutes under the water to wake up in. Plus 2 cups of tea.

"CoughcoughWHOmakesthetea?" interrupts you know who.

Good grief man! Ok, you're my hero! Breakfast and life in general would be far more miserable without you around. Happy now?

Strange lack of coughing. But there is the sound of waffles being demolished. I'll take that as yes, he is happy now. Enjoy your Lent, peoples and remember, it's not too late to make some pancakes (or waffles, even!) for dinner tonight if you are as hopeless as I am in the mornings. Especially drenched in maple syrup and topped with sliced banana. Yummo!

Resolutions

Hello friends! Here we are on the other side of the great Christmas/New Year divide, and I for one am feeling fine! I have so many amazing things that I want to achieve in 2014, so I thought that I would post them here, not only so I can refer back to them when they are not so fresh in my mind, but also so I can give myself a quick, swift kick up the ass if I'm not getting them done! So without any further fanfare, here are the things I want to do in twenty-fourteen:

- Read more books. I finished the year on a reading high, having thoroughly enjoyed The Rosie Project, Oil and Honey, Miss Hargreaves and The Two Mrs Abbots. If you've read something fabulous lately, I'd love to hear your recommendations!

- Make a cherry pie. I even bought myself a cherry stoner in the sales. That's a job for next week, I reckon!

- Eat more grains. We've figured out that the Galumph is mildly gluten-intolerant. He can handle a wee bit of gluten (like in his porridge oats) but not much, so we have made a deal: generally no gluten at home, except for the odd homemade baked treat or pasta dish. Having trialled this over the last couple of weeks, it's gone well, so I'm excited to be incorporating more gluten-free grains into our lives. We've been having the most marvellous blueberry quinoa porridge as a change in the mornings - loving the long, slow energy from that tasty dish!

- Eat more fruit. I know, I know - I say this one every year, but I've made a huge effort to eat my two pieces every day of late, and I am feeling so good for it. More fruit!

- Sayonara booze. Remember a couple of years ago I decided that coffee and I were no longer friends, and I kicked it to the curb? Well, it seems alcohol and I have had a similar falling out. I feel so sluggish and crap the day after even one glass, so I'm going to make 2014 alcohol free as I just don't think it agrees with me anymore. I'm going to miss it, but I have a feeling that better energy levels and awesome sleep will more than make up for it.

- Bring back the plastic free. Unfortunately plastic has slowly but surely crept back into our lives since we went plastic free for a month in 2007 (can you believe I've been blogging that long? Cripes!), so I am going to try and eliminate as much plastic from our day-to-day lives as I can throughout 2014. In a similar vein, I'm also going to try and reduce the amount of waste we create in general, such as food waste.

- Blog more. Cos it's fun around here!

- Be a lean, mean, budget queen. I want to use what I have rather than fork out for something new, and if I do have to buy something I'd like it to be recycled and/or ethically made.

- Get out those vintage patterns. I think 2014 should be the year of sewing vintage! Each month I'd like to sew or knit a vintage pattern, and bring a little old school elegance into my life. Should we do a vintage-a-long? That could be wicked fun!

- Do more bike rides. Preferably whilst wearing a vintage dress. Cos that's how I wanna roll! (Get it? Roll? My word, I'm even funnier this year than last!)

- Launch my knitting pattern collection. Wrists, I'm warning you now: I'm going to be doing a LOT of knitting in preparation for my launch later this year. But any wrist ache will totally be worth it. I am SO SUPER EXCITED about this!

Wow. I sure have a busy year lined up! I hope that 2014 brings you much happiness and joy, and if you are in need of a daft joke, don't forget to stop by here!

Orangey cakey messy

Ahh, the weekend. We really should have been doing lots of stuff, like paying bills or mopping floors or putting in our tax returns. Instead we make cake. And mess. And somebody even managed to flour-print his bottom.

And it was delicious. Every minute, every crumb of it!

Recipe found here.

Crafting and sanity

There are a few things that are vital to keep my mental health in a happy, balanced state. Enough sleep, a walk every day in the fresh air no matter what the weather is, not watching television with it's blaring exhortations to buy more and more because you are not good enough as you are, and regularly servings of good wholesome food.

So far, so typical. But to that list I might add a regular dose of making. I seriously think that I would be a far grumpier person without the lift that crafting gives me. Even if I don't get my hands involved in cutting something out, or winding yarn through my fingers, just the thinking - the planning, the dreaming - is often enough to lift me out of any doldrums. Heck, you can make me happy just by insisting I peruse vintage patterns on Etsy for a while!

I'm not sure if it's the pretty colours of the fabric and yarn, or the quiet focus on a solitary activity, or the visualisation of a finished project, or the satisfied buzz of achievement when something is finally completed, but crafting can often fill a hole for me that nothing else can.

I'm so lucky to be able to make. Good times will come and go, and every life will have it's fair share of sorrow and suffering, but it comforts me to know that I'll always have a pair of knitting needles and a sewing machine to hand to give me relief when it all feels like too much to bear.

Another shirt, and the story of Nan's buttons.

My best friend, who is also my daughter's godmother, was blessed to have a wonderful grandmother called Nan. Unfortunately, I never got to meet Nan, but I had long admired the wonderful knits she had made for my bestie, and listened with great pleasure to the stories of the clothes she would make for her and her brother when they were little. Not only did she seemed to be a skilled seamstress and knitter, but in every photo I've ever seen of her, she is beaming out to the world. The best kind of Nan, by all accounts.

A few years ago, after Nan  had passed on and the house was being cleared out, my friend and her mum came across some of Nan's sewing supplies, including a huge plastic bag full of buttons. Nan had kept every button from every item of clothing that could no longer be repaired, and squirreled them away for a sewing rainy day. After going through the buttons themselves and keeping the ones that had especial sentimental value to them, my friend and her mum decided to give the bag of buttons to me, as I was the only crafter they knew who would appreciate them. And appreciate them I did! It felt like an honour to be entrusted with something kept so carefully by one who was loved so much by people so important to me.

Fast forward to this weekend, and there I am, beavering away on my sewing machine to finish another shirt for Grumbles. Usually when I buy fabric, I have a very particular project in mind and try and get all my notions and bits 'n' bobs at the same time, but for some reason I didn't buy any buttons when I purchased the fabric to make this shirt. But before the button panic could commence, I remembered Nan's button stash. I found the bag, hunted about and found the perfect set of buttons. One still even had the original thread caught in the holes.

Now the cynics might scoff and say "Buttons. Really, dudes. What's the big deal?" but to my mind, this is the best kind of recycling. I'm giving new life to something that was important to somebody, even though it might seem small and insignificant to others. I'm keeping the crafting spirit of Nan alive, and forging another life tapestry string between me, my daughter, my best friend and her grandmother. These are not bonds that can easily be broken. Tyger is proud that I would entrust Nan's buttons to her wearing, and my best friend was moved to tears to think that Nan's buttons were not only being given another shot at use, but that we were helping keep the memory of Nan alive in their use.

So here, my friends, is another shirt for Tyger. The shirt may be new, but those buttons have got a heck of a pedigree!

Project Details
Pattern: Rousku shirt (no. 23) from Ottobre Design magazine 4/2010
Fabric: 1m of organic cotton from the Scamper collection by Birch fabrics, purchased from GJ's Discount Fabrics
Notions: 3 of Nan's carefully kept buttons, iron-on interfacing

On a budget? Make ravioli!

Whoosh. Swish. ZOOOOOOOM! That, my friends, is the sounds of money leaving my wallet at the moment. Start of term means payment for activities, so with each piano lesson/sports invoice my wallet become noticeably thinner. July was rapidly becoming what Galumph terms "a tight month"!

And then, of course, the washing machine broke down. Cue red hot budget meltdown when we realised that the machine, after 13 years of faithful service, had gone to the big whitegoods store in the sky, and it needed to be replaced asap.

So our month went from tight to what I'd like to term budgetary strangulation. Ouch! After totting up the numbers, calculating necessary expenditure (i.e. we still need to buy food) and figuring our how long, exactly, we had until the next payday (answer: too long!) we decided that this weekend would be a spend-thrifty as possible.

Cue cheapy weekend activities. Bike ride on Saturday, and dusting off of pasta machine on Sunday after realising that I had all ingredients already in the house for ravioli. Viva la household economics!

Spinach and ricotta ravioli

For the pasta:
500g strong pasta flour ('00')
5 eggs
pinch of salt
semolina flour for dusting

For the filling:
250g fresh ricotta
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
250g frozen spinach, thawed
1/4 cup finely grated parmesan cheese
1 - To make the pasta, place the flour, eggs and salt together in a food processor, and mix until a dough forms. Knead by hand on a floured surface for 5 minutes until the dough is nice and elastic, then wrap in cling film and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

2 - Meanwhile, make the filling. Squeeze out any moisture from the spinach, then mix well with the cheeses and nutmeg.

3 - Roll your pasta through the pasta machine one piece at a time until thin. When you have two lengths, place one on the bench, and spoon small spoonfuls of the mixture on it, with a couple of cms space between each one. Place the second piece of pasta on top of the first, and press down to enclose the filling, making sure there are no air bubbles and that the pastas are stuck together. Cut into squares. Repeat with remaining pasta and filling.

4 - Bring a large saucepan of water to the boil. Carefully drop the pasta in, and cook for 3 - 4 minutes, or until the ravioli are bobbing at the top. Drain, then serve with a simple tomato pasta sauce or melted butter with herbs.

Liberty winner

Helllooooo! Check out that double chocolate cherry cheesecake. At least, what's left of it. Burp! So good. Too good. I now have a cheesecake gut. Oh vell... you only get a birthday once a year. Thank goodness. Otherwise I might have a cheesecake gut... and a cheesecake booty...and a cheesecake earlobe...and I'll stop now. Before it gets totally ridiculous (cheesecake gnathion, anybody?)

Anyway, enough bumf about cheesecakes. You're here for the winner announcement, ja? Well thanks to random number generator, the winner of the Liberty fabric is comment #103, which is Amanda. Lucky girl! Thanks to everybody for joining in - I've found some very awesome new-to-me blogs to add to my reading list. That's ace!

Right. I have to go and do something very important now. Like prod myself continuously in the belly and marvel at how rapidly cheesecake turns into undesired fat storage. This could take hours!

Liberty fabric birthday giveaway!

Wheeeeeee! Today it's my birthday, and you all know what that means. Yup, the streets are lined with people crowded around for the ticker tape parade in my honour. Confetti is filling the air, the float is about to set off and folks everywhere are chanting my name like I am the best. thing. ever.

Whaaaaat? Dead silence out there? Fear not - the streamers and balloons will be released as soon as everybody realises that birthdays at chez Jorth mean an awesome giveaway. Did anybody say LIBERTY?

That's right, folks - it's a mega Liberty fabric giveaway! We've got 2m of Lantana! And other pieces lovingly saved from projects, all much bigger than a fat quarter. Look - more Lantana! And Tana Lawn! And Liberty Lifestyle! There's more Liberty fabric there than you can poke a stick at!

Couldn't you just reach in and grab it? Mmmmmmm - Liiiiiiiberteeeeeeeee! All this could be yours - just follow my blog, leave a message wishing me the best birthday ever (with your email addy, natch) and I'll announce the winner Monday my time (AEST). Cos fabric this fine shouldn't be kept in a cupboard. It needs to be out there, man. Living the Liberty life!

I'm happy to post to Timbuktu if need be, so if your hot little hands are itching for some Liberty goodness, leave a comment!

9

My funny, sassy, clever, always-beaming girl is nine today. Nine! Time sure flies when you are having fun, and I can think of nobody I'd rather spend my time with. You are truly awesome company. Don't ever change.

Have a brilliant birthday, my wonderful kind-hearted girl. I'm so lucky to be able to be your mum. Seriously - I get teary just thinking about how close I was to not being here to share my days with yours. The best years of my life have been since you came along, and every day I thank my lucky stars that I can wake up and see your smiling face.

Love you for as long as the stars shine, and probably a bit longer than that,
Mum xo xo

Hail the hail!

It's got nothing to do with sewing. Or knitting. Or even cooking. But how cool (hee hee, geddit?) is this hail action shot?



Makes me wish so hard that it would snow in Melbourne. Proper snow, like. Not the odd dusting every 68 years.

I love interesting weather. I love hail, I love wind, I love looking up at big storm clouds. In my next life I am definitely coming back as a meteorologist.

Tyger demands handmade!

I was chatting recently with Tyger, my daughter, about the Handmaker's Factory pledge - basically, to minimise your clothing footprint, you choose to make as many of your clothes as possible. This lead to a great discussion about how little our clothing costs us now compared to other times in history, and how the back bone of our cheap clothes is often poor exploited workers with no rights in third world countries. It's a dreadful case of out of sight, out of mind, yet our desire for $8 t-shirts has a devastating effect on so many people every day.

I could see the Tyger chewing over this new information carefully for a while. She then announced that she'd like to take the pledge too.

Now, I'll admit - my first reaction was to panic. "For the love of mud, child!", I thought. "As if I don't have enough to do, without making all of your clothes as well!"

But then I thought, dammit Jorth - don't be such a hypocrite. Why shouldn't me and my girl get together to make her new clothes as needed? This is what I figure - if we can teach them young to avoid the consumer culture that has such a damaging effect - not only on people, but on communities, the environment and even the loss of once-common skills - then it really doesn't matter that I might feel too busy to do this. My girl wants to make a difference, and by gee - I'm going to help her do it, even if it means burning the midnight oil.

So we devised her a winter wardrobe plan, and one most excellent shopping trip later, came home with these:

The fabric will be made into a couple of shirts and three dresses. I'm quite excited about the prospect of an elephant dress. How cute is that going to be?!?

The yarn will be made up into a Sea Princess Cardigan and this Sirdar cardigan, using one of my all time favourite yarns, the Amy Butler Belle Organic. You should have seen me race over to Sunspun to snaffle up as much as I could when I heard it was being discontinued. Noooooooooo! It's such a blimming awesome yarn - warm, brilliant stitch definition, great colours. I feel I'm losing a reliable friend to a far off destination, ne'er to be seen again. Sniff! Anyway, it's heavily discounted at Sunspun, which made these two cardigans absolute bargains, so if you love it as much as I do, get yourself some pronto!

So that's me kept busy for the next few weeks, err, months. Busy fingers and clear conscience. Just the way I like it!

Start as you mean to go on

2013 is going to be, I suspect, a very busy year for me. I have big plans, people, big plans! And an integral part of those plans is related to crafting.

So that is why on the 1st of January I could be found perched on the couch, happily casting on for a new knitting project. Because I'm a big believer in starting as you mean to go on. And besides, who could resist ringing in the new year with some lucious cashmerino yarn? Not this little black duck!

Besides the non-stop-crafting-juggernaut I also want to:
- eat more fruit (I say this every year but this time I mean it, nagdammit!)
- read more books (I used to read like I was breathing - effortlessly, without even thinking about it, and feeling rather panicked if no new reading material materialised - what happened to that?)
- get up earlier and breathe in that glorious morning air
- take more pictures, laugh at more jokes, and enjoy the little moments as they come, rather than always rushing toward the next thing.
- Er, I should probably practice my piano more, too. Two years of learning, and my pièce de résistance is the Tarantella? Surely I can do better than that!

36

Dearest, darlingest, gluten-sensitive husband,

Here's a flourless cake baked just for you, because both Grumbles and I think you are pretty darn ace. What it lacks in flour, it sure makes up for with eggs, chocolate, sugar and lotsa lotsa love. Happy birthday, Galumph!

Life and death and craft

We went to a funeral on Saturday. As always, going to a funeral brings up some big questions that I usually have trouble answering. Who am I? Am I living the best life I can? Am I making a difference? What am I leaving behind?

The mass itself was a quietly joyful celebration, farewelling one who was glad to move on to the next stage. We moved through the hymns, the readings, the homily, and then our friend's daughter stood up to deliver the eulogy. She spoke affectionately of her father, and recounted the many small things that he did that all combined to make him a terrific father, husband, man. And that answered quite a few of the questions for me.

This living business isn't really about accumulating material wealth, or status, or power. It's about doing acts of love, and it's the small, regular ones, performed without any fanfare, that really reflect who you are as a person. It's the reading the wee ones a bedtime story every single night, even when you are tired and full of the can't-be-bothereds. It's making your best friend her favourite soup when she arrives unannounced for lunch. It's smiling at a stranger who looks like they need a bit of cheer. It's donating money to a charity, or giving blood, or volunteering for some essential but unfashionable cause - done because it's the right thing to do, and for that reason only. No reward expected.

Sometimes I lose sight of all that. I feel I should be more. More what, exactly, I'm never quite sure of, but I just feel that I should be more impressive, more respected, more consumeristically awe-inspiring. Which is stupid, because I really am where I should be, right now. I am the mother to a wonderful daughter. I have a terrific, top-notch husband. So what if we don't fly to Thailand twice a year to top up our tans. So what if we don't have a huge, fancy house on the perfect street, with a shiny latest model car out the front. So what if we don't eat out much, or own the latest gadgets because the budget doesn't quite stretch that far. We have each other, and we have plenty of love, and we have more than enough to share in the big scheme of things, so we do. And that is what it really should be all about. I just need to ignore the outside influences, powered by millions of dollars of marketing fees, that try to tell me otherwise. Because at the end of the day, I'm pretty sure that nobody at my funeral will be thinking that I was a fabulous person because I always had the latest Apple iPhone.

So the next day, with all these big thoughts swirling through this old noggin of mine, I gathered my girl and together we sewed ourselves some new pyjamas pants. And as we sewed, and chatted, and taught, and learnt, I thought to myself that if I could be summed with "She was a mother who sewed jimmie jams with her daughter", then I would be happy with that. Because it's not just about pyjamas, is it? It's about spending time with my dearest girl, letting her know that she is beloved, and I couldn't think of a better way to spend a Sunday afternoon than by teaching her, stitch by stitch, what I know. And that I'm honoured that she wants to spend her day that way too.

Whew! Enough of the heavy stuff. Bring on the pjs dancing!









Pattern used for my pants: Butterick 5432   
Pattern used for Grumble's pants: Simplicity 5338
Fabric: Amy Butler and Lesley Grainger flannel from GJ's Discount Fabrics.

Make a wish...

...if it's for more crafting supplies, dear Tyger, I will be totally down with that!

Eight

I swear it was only yesterday that you came into our world, but the calendar tells me that I'm wrong, for today you are eight. And without becoming too goopily sentimental about it all, these eight years have been the best - the very best - of my life.

There are so many things I love about you: The way you ask every weekend if you can go swimming. The ways your eyes crinkle up when you laugh. Your boundless creativity (as evidenced by the thread, wool, cut up paper, glue, sequins etc that follows you around the house). How you never complain about walking in the rain. The enthusiasm you show every single type of food ever presented to you. The grin that lights up your face when you thwack the ball at tennis. How Pride and Prejudice is your viewing of choice. How you still sing yourself to sleep with steam-of-consciousness operas that you compose nightly. How any form of slapstick provokes you to laugh uproariously, like a crazy old man. The care you show if anybody falls, or cries, or heck, even sneezes.

Ruh-roh - somebody sound the goop alarm. I'm hopelessly melting into a great big puddle of goop just thinking about how terrific you are, and how lucky I am to call myself your mother. Happy birthday, dearest darlingest Tyger. xo xo xo

Rhubarb and Yoghurt Cake for Knitting Club

Recipe for a fine winters evening:

Ingredients:

One brand new knitting club, having their inaugural meeting
A good dose of fine yarn and bamboo needles
Freshly baked Rhubarb and Yoghurt Cake, served with lashings of cream

A sprinkling of gossip and a measure of friendly banter
Tea and wine, and plenty of good cheer

Method:

Mix together well, and then consider it a job well done. Mind that the wine doesn't cause any dropped stitches!