Well here we are on the final day of this year’s Summer Craft Challenge. I know I say it every year, but it’s gone by very quickly. I’m so glad I do this each year, it’s a little diary of where we have gone, what we have done and what I have created throughout the school summer holidays.
Next summer will be very different for me, as Youngest will be doing his GCSEs and after that, unless he goes on to Sixth Form, there won’t be any more school summer holidays in our house after 18 years of them!! What a thought. I don’t want to wish my life away though, next summer is a long way off – we are only 2 days into autumn after all.
So for the final time this summer, here is my weekly look back at Summer Craft Challenge 2026!
I started week 6 of my 2026 Summer Craft Challenge playing board games – a perfect summer holiday activity. In between manoeuvres towards global domination, I managed a few rows of my current shawl/scarf project! I think my feigned disinterest in the game worked in my favour as the boys paid so much attention to each other’s moves they didn’t notice me slowly claiming North and South America and the North West tip of Europe!
Nothing to report that was exciting on Day 37 of the challenge, just a spot of sock knitting in front of the the telly after work!
Had a bit of a play with mosaic crochet – Eldest has just moved into a new place and has asked me to make him a housewarming blanket! Not sure how long it will take me with my track record, but I enjoying the swatching process.
More mosaic swatching today playing with different colours to match in with the colour scheme.
On the final straight of the marathon scarf/shawl I’ve been concocting this summer. Border time!
And at last, it’s finished. A two tone crossed treble stitch shawlette designed by me this summer – feeling chuffed to have another finished object to show for my time.
Managed a bit of embroidery on this summer companion which has kept me company again over the past 6 weeks. I was kind of hoping I would get it finished, but there’s still a bit of a way to go. Maybe next summer?
And on Day 43 (and day 8 of this final week?! Who’s counting?), my Summer Craft Challenge and my son’s school summer holidays come to an end today. Tomorrow, the early alarm for the school bus will ring and we will be back into the swing of things again as if we were never away! My final evening of creating has been spent with a little bit of knitted colour work in the form of a patten by Annah from Needle & Feather – I love her patterns. I picked up her Peace by Piece Cowl pattern booklet at Carry on Crafting back in July, so thought I’d make a start with a vibrant pink against a silver background. I haven’t planned my colour palette I just took a dive into my stash and these colours shouted at me!
In the past few days, people have been slowly bowing out of the challenge too, as their summer breaks came to an end. Thanks to @alisonswoolnwalks, @crochet_at_holme, & @jothiquestscraft for joining in this week and indeed all summer long – it’s been so lovely to see your many makes as the weeks have gone by. Thank you to everyone else who has joined in over the past 6 weeks, including those who I know are out there but haven’t shared photos. It’s good to know that creativity is in full flow and doing us all so much good!
It’s 1st September – hello autumn! I don’t know about you but there has been a definite autumnal feeling over the past few days where I am, with heavy rain and thunder storms so it’s been feeling a little bit like summer had come to an end already.
Normally I feel a little bit melancholy at this time of the year as I mourn the end of the summer weather and lighter evenings, but this time, I’m feeling that as we had into a new month and a new season, it’s a time for fresh starts and new challenges – I’m not entirely sure what they are, but if I hear of any, I’ll keep you posted.
Summer Craft Challenge 2026
My summer craft challenge is about to come to an end for another year – this one being my 10th which is a little bit crazy. Again, it’s been lovely to give myself permission to carve out a little bit of time every day since the start of the school summer holidays in our house to be creative. It all started 11 years ago, when I was a stay-at-home Mum with three young men to entertain during the long summer break in Gibraltar (which was 2 months-long). I found those long summers very hard going at times and something which is as true today as it was back then, is that if I don’t manage to do something creative (crochet, painting, sewing etc) for a while I tend to get very grumpy. By setting aside at least a few (guilt-free) minutes of me time each day, it made the summer run a lot smoother.
Even though my boys are all a lot older these day (one has left home, another is soon off to university) I have kept the challenge going and I have loved doing it. It’s so easy to be busy and not find the time for such things, but this summer, as always, it’s been a fun endeavour.
PARIS!!
Paris sightseeing
We didn’t make our annual pilgrimage up to Scotland this year, it felt like the end of an era with just one child still in school, and I have the feeling the older two may not still want to go on holiday with their old mum in the years to come, so we decided to do something different.
We opted for a city break and hopped on a flight over to Paris. Half of our traveling party had never been before, so it was fun to be able to share the city with the other two. We did all the usual things, the Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe, the Louvre (from the outside only – they didn’t fancy the queues to see the Mona Lisa etc). We also caught a double-decker train (very exciting) out to Versailles.
As I didn’t have my brain in gear early enough to book tickets to go inside, we just did some of the outside areas. We took a walk through the gardens and watched the lovely fountain displays accompanied by classical music. We also hired bikes and rode them around the wider estate for a couple of hours. I’m so glad we did this, because this is the one thing that everyone has spoken about being their favourite bit!
Versailles
We also took a ride out to a beautiful park called Buttes-Chaumont out in the suburbs which I visited with Eldest on our previous visit a few years ago, and we visited the Paris Natural History Museum for the first time too with its amazing gardens and stunning interior (would highly recommend even for people visiting without young folk in tow).
Natural History Museum
All in all, it was a brilliant 4 days – including some gorgeous food. We found a favourite new eatery called Bo & Mei which had the most amazing pastries for sale. We visited two different branches, one was near the Louvre and the other at Bastille en route out to visit the park. I can highly recommend a visit if you find yourself near one. The Pain au Chocolat was out of this world!
Buttes-Chaumant Park
A trip up to the Lakes
We had a very quick turn around when we arrived back home from Paris – less than 24 hours later we were up in the Lakes! I had to do some emergency washing and speedy packing to be ready in time to load the car up for a trip up to Grasmere to visit some very dear friends who live up that way now. We had such a lovely time with them out in the fresh air, star gazing on our way home from an evening playing pool, riding bikes through the Langdale Valley and generally having fun.
Back to reality
And then, as if by magic, the summer was over and it was time to get things ready for school and an impending move to University for Son number 2. Just before we headed off on holiday, A-level results day happened. I’m very relieved to say things went well in our house and he’s off on his next chapter very soon. It’s going to be strange in our house with him gone…..
There’s no podcast news this month, as I have taken a break from putting episiodes out, but Making Stitchest Podcast will be coming back again soon. Watch this space…
That’s all for this time, I’m off now to do an emergency shop for school stationary which I forgot to grab at the weekend! Thanks for stopping by!
Hello there, I’ve gone double bubble with this post seeing as I was on holiday for a good chuck of the last two weeks and away from my laptop. Since we last spoke, we have been to Paris and to the Lake District. I feel very lucky to have been able to spend time with my boys away from the usual routine and in such beautiful places – more on that in a different post I’m sure though – now down to the crafty side of my life… and what I’ve been up to on my travels. Here’s Weeks 4 & 5 of my Summer Craft Challenge 2026!
It already feels like a long, long time ago, but after the partial eclipse on Wednesday evening 2 weeks ago, I sat down for a bit a more crochet on this scarf/shawl I’m working on.
A little post A-level results embroidery on Thursday evening. After a few days of growing tension in the house and the emotion of everything that day, it was nice to be able to unwind with my needle! (Good news was received in our house thank goodness, but I spare a thought for those who didn’t get the news they were hoping for).
On Friday, I managed a little bit of doctor’s waiting room sock knitting. Back on Wednesday evening, post eclipse, we sat in the garden chatting until late, ruminating on what lay ahead in terms of exam results and what might happen next. While I was out there, unbeknownst to me, I was bitten on both ankles by something nasty which resulted in my feet and ankles swelling up way beyond what was decent to share with you. It turned out I had an infection in both bites. Knowing I was heading off on holiday just 48 hours later, I thankfully acquired a doctor’s appointment and secured some antibiotics to counteract the nasty reaction.
With the medicine kicking in and my ankles and feet slowly returning to their ‘normal’ shape, I sat down for a bit more sock knitting on Saturday.
Ooh, the most exciting type of crochet here on Sunday – plane crochet! Three of us flew to Paris and met Eldest there who had come from London via the tunnel. Such a lovely start to our few days in France.
Monday was a lovely hot, sunny day and perfect for some sightseeing. This photo was taken late afternoon, while sitting on a bench having a break in a park a short walk from the Eiffel Tower.
A spot of regal crochet was on the cards on Tuesday – I took my crochet hook and yarn on a train trip out to the Palace of Versailles! What a beautiful place it was. We didn’t manage to get into the Palace – tickets to get in are booked until the end of the year (or something like that) we didn’t fancy the humungous ‘without prebooked tickets’ queue so visited the majestic gardens and hired bikes to ride around the wider estate – what a stunning place!
Summer Craft Challenge 2026: Week 5
Onto Week 5 here on Wednesday last week – although I had completely rather a lot of the blue section of this scarf, I just wasn’t happy with it, so frogged back lots of rows to where I thought I was happy and started again… This was in my hotel bedroom after a lovely morning at the brilliant Natural History Museum in Paris.
Homeward bound means more plane crochet! Still not happy with the blue section, I sat at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport and ripped all the blue back to the start and started again. I think I’m happy with it this time!
New day, new location – this sock knitting happened at one of my oldest friend’s kitchen table in the Lake District! We had a very quick turnaround, landed back at home from our French trip at dinner time, did 3 loads of washing, ironing, repacking and was on the road by mid afternoon on Friday up to the Lakes.
Al fresco crochet this time, post breakfast while waiting for a certain teenager to get out of bed so we could go out for a walk!
Back at home and ready to face the real world with a bit of Sunday night embroidery. The car was unpacked, washing done, cases back in the loft and packed lunches made ready for work on Monday – why does the fun have to come to an end so quickly?
At least there’s a bank holiday coming soon, so no Monday morning alarm next week…
A bit more evening embroidery on Monday evening in front of the TV… slowly making progress filling the pattern on this lovely kit from Hello Hooray Blog.
And my last post for this week, a bit of evening crochet after work and the sad news that Dolly Parton had died. What an amazing lady she was – I think we should all be a bit more Dolly.
Thanks to the wonders of Instagram, it’s not just me taking part in the Summer Craft Challenge this year. It’s open for anyone to join in with too. All you need to do is have a moment (or longer if you can manage) of creativity in your day. Take a photo of what you are working on and share it on Instagram with the hashtag #SummerCraftChallenge2026 and we can all see what you are doing. Thanks to @alisonswoolnwalks, @crochet_at_holme, & @jothiquestscraft for joining in during the past two weeks!
Thanks for stopping by for a read, and thank you to everyone who’s joining in with the Summer Craft Challenge this year too! It’s fun being creative together.
Until next week (the final week), take care of yourself!
Blimey just looking back at my photos reminds me of just how busy July was in my world. I had 3 trips – not my normal kind of month at all! We made our annual trip to Norfolk and Suffolk to visit family, I headed off down South to Carry on Crafting AND our family went to London at the end of the month to celebrate the graduation of Eldest from university.
Trip to East Anglia
Sunset on the River Yare, Norfolk
At the start of the month, we made our annual pilgrimage down to Norfolk and Suffolk to visit family. We were blessed with lovely weather and were able to get out and about to enjoy it.
We had a lovely evening walk along the side of the River Yare in Gorleston (the opposite side of the river from Great Yarmouth). We stopped for an evening drink outside the Pier Hotel – which for film fans was the location for the ending of the Danny Boyle film Yesterday.
We also made our regular visit to Southwold. We have so many happy family holiday memories of this place – when we lived in Gibraltar, we would often stay in Southwold and use it as our base for a week while we visited family nearby. It’s such a lovely spot, although it does get busy on a sunny summer’s day, but if you are lucky enough to stay there overnight, you find that once the crowds of day trippers leave around teatime, you feel like you have the place to yourself.
There are so many Instagramable corners and alleyways, the little fishermen’s cottages are so well looked after and painted lovely colours, there is often an abundance of hollyhocks growing in the tiny front gardens adding to the pastel-coloured palette of the place. I do so love it there!
You can’t go to Southwold and not get a portion of chips to sit on a bench and eat – we did that – I also managed a bit of seaside crochet too for old time’s sake.
I don’t really know what I expected, but it was brilliant in every way – Justine managed to arrange beautifully dry, sunny weather for us and even arranged for England to win in their World Cup match while we were there! (Sadly it didn’t last).
Carry on Crafting 2026With Eleonora from Coastal Crochet
It was a truly lovely weekend. I arrived on Friday and met up with my glamping buddy for the weekend, Nicky from A Heart Shaped Cherry. Nicky was there as a stall holder and she had a space in her bell-tent for one more (me!). It was a long old trip down there by train from Manchester to London, across London with heavy bags and camping chair on the Underground, then an overland train to Haywards Heath and a bus to the show ground – but my word it was worth it!
On the Friday I helped Nicky pitch her gazebo and get ready for the visitors coming the following morning. We had some dinner, a nighttime herbal tea and then collapsed onto our camp beds!
Nicky on her Heart Shaped Cherry stallWith Kitey aka The Yarn Whisperer
Morning brought with it more sunshine and lots of opportunities to wander, potter, chat to people, meet new friends, see old friends and generally have fun. I joined a wired crochet workship with Kitey from The Yarn Whisperer. It was such a treat to get to meet him IRL after being a customer for quite a few years AND speaking to him for the Making Stitches Podcast back in 2022**. The workshop was very addictive – we were creating feathers or petals by crocheting around wire using Kitey’s hand dyed yarn specially created for the weekend – called Carry on Crafting 2026.
It was so lovely to chat with Kerry Lord from Toft in person too after speaking to her for the podcast a few years back. I was able to see quite a bit of Eleonora from Coastal Crochet too on her own home turf! We have met in person a couple of times before up north at Yarndale, but this was the first time at her local festival.
Lovely to meet Carol from @nanaseamakesThank you Justine!
Can we just have a moment of appreciation for Justine and her amazing team of volunteers who bring the festival to life. It’s no mean feat. It’s a huge undertaking. You are talking about campers, toilet/shower facilities, food, traders, craft and vintage vendors, craft workshops, publicity, electricity, football and movie screenings and that’s probably not even half of the things that need to be looked after to put on an event of this kind.
Thank you Justine for the most amazing weekend. I loved every minute of it. I’m just sorry I had to leave on Sunday morning in order to get back in time for Sunday dinner time and getting everything ready for school and work again for the following week.
Footnote: Thank you also to my brilliant little brother and his lovely wife who were ‘present’ in the house while I was away and for the amazing job they did dismantling my back garden decking!
If you would like to get a flavour of what happened at Carry on Crafting this year, you can listen to the latest episode of Making Stitches Podcast – I took my microphone with me and recorded my favourite episode of this year so far. You can listen to it on all good podcast apps and on YouTube too, or here.
Graduation Trip to London
Celebratory mini me for Eldest
We hit a milestone in our family towards the end of July when Eldest graduated from University. I can’t put into words how proud I am of him for what he has achieved. He’s a clever lad but he worked so very hard to get the grades he got.
We had a family trip en masse down to London to celebrate with him. Only two of us were able to be with him when he got his degree conferred on him, but the rest of the gang were able to watch on a livestream while it happened. We then all got together to spend the rest of the day with each other, and he got the chance to give Grandma and Grandad a tour of the campus.
Such a brilliant day. Here’s to the future for all the fabulous young people who have been celebrating their graduations this summer – the future is bright for us all.
Podcast News
As well as sharing the episode on Carry on Crafting in July, I also shared a fun episode with a film maker who explored the journey of yarn from sheep to finished products.
I published a chat I had with a film maker called Paul Wyatt, who made a film called Sheep, Actually exploring the story of wool. Paul visits city farms in London to see where sheep live with the capital city, he also speaks to crafts people (including Kitey from The Yarn Whisperer) who use wool in their crafts from yarn dying in Kitey’s case, weaving, knitting and other crafts and the project to collect the fleeces from all of London’s city farms, wash and process it and turn it into wool. It’s a lovely film, and one you can apply to screen at your own local venue. You can listen to Sheep, Actually here.
Summer Craft Challenge
My 10th annual Summer Craft Challenge is well underway and it’s brought me a lot of pleasure already. You know what it’s like when you get stuck in a rut with things? I was seriously getting worried about losing my crojo in the recent weeks and months. I had to consciously decide to pick up my hook and wasn’t always too happy with the results.
Despite that, the prospect of doing something creative every day during my sons’ school summer holidays as has become a tradition for me, filled me with such joy thinking about what interesting places I would be able to take my projects with me to, and encouraging me to dig to the bottom of my wip pile and get busy finishing some things off at last.
As in previous years, I have been joined by a merry band of creative folk who have joined in and shared photos of what they’re working on as part of their own Summer Craft Challenge. So far we have had knitting, crochet, cross stitch embroidery, weaving and flower arranging photos shared, I wonder what else we’ll see before the summer is out?
If you fancy joining in too, please do – just take a photo of what you are working on in your moment(s) of creativing and share it on Instagram with the hashtag #SummerCraftChallenge2026
And that just about brings this Postcard from July to a close. Thank you for stopping by and for reading my ramblings! It’s been lovely to have your company.
Hello there, a bit late with this weekly round up this week. It’s been a very busy time in our house with A-level results and a University place secured (hurrah!) so this fell down the to-do list somewhat. Anyway, I’m here now, so here’s what I got up to in Week 3 of my Summer Craft Challenge 2026!
I made some curly whirly stamens for my wired crochet flower on Wednesday, it’s almost finished and ready for the grand reveal. This project was started in a workshop with Kitey from The Yarn Whisperer when I was at Carry on Crafting Festival in July.
My first finished item of my Summer Craft Challenge this year – the wired flower from Carry on Crafting. The yarn was dyed specially for the festival by Kitey from The Yarn Whisperer and is called ‘Carry on Crafting 2026’.
It was such a fun project to work on and a dangerous new crochet rabbit hole for me to disappear down! Thank you Kitey!
On Friday, my lunchtime was spent parked on a dusty road being wobbled by the big HGVs and tipper trucks thundering past while I did my Mum taxi thing and waited for a teenager to be finished doing what he was doing. At least the sun was shining as I sat there knitting my sock!
Saturday morning alterations were on the cards for Day 18 of the challenge. I bought a top in the supermarket a couple of months ago and I really loved it, but it was just a bit too big round the arm holes. So, rather than take it back (they didn’t have any smaller sizes) I decided I’d just take it in on the sides. All well and good, but it sat in my bedroom all this time waiting for it’s alteration moment – seeing as we were forecast some more hot sunny weather, it seemed appropriate to fire up my old sewing machine and get on with it – mission accomplished!
Time for a bit more crochet on Sunday, all while listening to a great podcast episode featuring Kitey from the Yarn Whisperer chatting on the Make Joy Podcast – I highly recommend a listen.
Time to mix things up a bit and introduce a new colour in this crochet pattern….
And finally, to bring this week to a close, I decided on a little evening embroidery. I managed a few more colourful sections on this embroidery kit from Hello Hooray Blog.
And, thanks to the wonders of Instagram, it’s not just me taking part in the Summer Craft Challenge this year. It’s open for anyone to join in with too. All you need to do is have a moment (or many) of creativity in your day. Take a photo of what you are working on and share it on Instagram with the hashtag #SummerCraftChallenge2026 and we can all see what you are doing. Thanks to @alisonswoolnwalks, @crochet_at_holme, & @jothiquestscraft for joining in this week!
Two weeks done already, blimey, this summer is running away with itself! How’s your week been? Good I hope!
Here’s what I’ve got up to in my creative endeavours this week (another 7/7 week!).
It took a few hours in the afternoon to get to grips with yesterday’s failed heel flap. I got into all sorts of trouble – in part due to tension and in part due the yarn being a bit splitty and having a bit of fluff to it which felted together into a right old mess.
I’m pleased to say I managed to frog it back to the start of the flap and started again. This time I took my time, paid more attention and tried to keep my tension a bit looser and it worked! Hurrah!
There you go – it’s not the most beautiful heel flap known to man, but it’s a darn sight better than it was looking 48 hours ago! The gusset shaping has begun!
On Friday I felt it was time to try something new, so I got a few of my crochet books out and started playing with textured stitches. This was a cross between moss/linen stitch and crossed treble stitch. I really liked the way it looked.
I think it’s safe to say I fell well and truly into a rabbit hole of texture this weekend. After yesterday’s experiment I decided to have a go at creating a new pattern…
I didn’t quite have the stitch count right on yesterday’s experiment, so I cracked open a new ball of yarn and tried again. This time, I think I’ve cracked it. I didn’t want to unravel yesterday’s work just yet as I didn’t want to lose what I was aiming for. Now that I have this cracked. I can unravel and rewind the ball from yesterday and stick with this one.
Back onto the sock. Had a bit of a stressy evening and didn’t want anything which required too much counting. As I had finished the shaping of the gusset and am just going round and round in circles with no counting whatsoever, this seemed like the perfect antidote – a little al fresco evening sock knitting!
Thanks to Christine from Winwick Mum for the brilliant pattern!
And finally to bring the second week to a close, I dipped into my WIP pile and dug out this very recent WIP – the project I started when I attended a workshop run by Kitey from The Yarn Whisperer when I visited Carry on Crafting Festival a few weeks back.
It was for wired crochet petals and feathers. It’s a bit fiddly to begin with but looks really effective when it’s finished. I am determined to get this finished soon. It’s a lovely palette cleanser of a project. Thanks Kitey!
And of course it’s not just me taking part in the Summer Craft Challenge this year. It’s open for anyone to join in with too. All you need to do is have a moment (or many) of creativity in your day. Take a photo of what you are working on and share it on Instagram with the hashtag #SummerCraftChallenge2026 and we can all see what you are doing. Thanks to @alisonswoolnwalks, @crochet_at_holme, @jothiquestscraft & @woodedgecrafts for joining in this week!
Hello and welcome to first of this summer’s weekly round-ups for my Summer Craft Challenge. I know I say it all the time, but I can’t believe where the time has gone and that we are at the start of week 2 already! Mind you, it has been quite a busy time for us as a family with a trip down to London for a couple of days for a very special celebration, but more on that later! Here’s what I’ve been up to this week…
I started Day 1 with a new amigurumi project – I couldn’t share it at the time as it was a special gift (which I will reveal at the end!). I used this brilliant pattern book by Carla Mitrani. It was a gift a few years ago from Eldest – and this time I used it to make a mini me of him (not that he’s an iconic woman, but he is pretty iconic in my book).
Day 2 featured my first lot of train crochet of the summer – I’m not sure how much of that there will be this year, but we’ll see what the weeks ahead bring. I was continuing work on that project from Day 1 whilst on the train down to London.
Now to the reason behind the trip and a clue to what I was making – last week, my Eldest graduated from university and the family made the trip down south to London to see him receive his degree. It was such a proud moment for me. I am still on a high from it all. I’m thrilled to bits for him and his future.
Now for the big reveal… here’s Eldest’s Mini Me!
He’s been created based off the pattern for Greta Thunberg (in case you were wondering!)
Back home from our trip to London and feeling a little tired, I reached for a project which hasn’t seen the light of day since last year’s Craft Challenge! This embroidery kit is from Clare Albans at Hello Hooray Blog. I loved its cheerful colours when I saw it and knew I had to have one for my house – not sure how long it will take me to complete though…. It was nice to get back into some calm, slow stitching!
It might not look like much progress but over the past 48 hours, I managed 9 different sections of colour on this!
Sticking with the golden oldies of my WIP pile – I revisited this unloved and abandoned sock, which was started back in the spring of 2025! Onwards…
It was a bit of a false start yesterday – I began the heel flap and was knitting quite tightly in the tension stakes, this wool has quite a bit of fluff to it which knitted together in knots and stopped me from being able to see where my stitches were on this slip stitch heel flap. Disaster! I lost so many stitches that I had to unravel. I put it in the naughty corner.
And finally one of the joys for me of the Summer Craft Challenge as well as being creative myself, it brings other people to the part too. My thanks to everyone who has joined in on Instagram this week and shared their own moments of creativity including @amandaswoolnwalks @crochet_at_holme @jothiquestscraft @sarahsheehangib and @wonders_of_wool!
It has been great to have company on this challenge so far – if you fancy joining in, please do! There’s no pressure to post everyday, but if you have a moment of summer creativity in the next few weeks, please just take a photo of what you’ve been up to and share it on Instagram with the hashtag #SummerCraftChallenge2026 so we can all see who is in the Summer Craft Challenge community this year.
Thanks so much for stopping by, see you next week!
☀️ Today is the first day of the school summer holidays chez Making Stitches and while it’s a normal work day for me, I’m still marking the official start to summer with my Summer Craft Challenge!
This will be my 10th year creating posts throughout the school summer holidays showing a bit of creativity every day.
The challenge was born in the summer of 2016 when I was a stay-at-home Mum of 3 young men, aged 12, 8 and 4!! Back then, we lived in Gibraltar and experienced/endured 8-week-long school summer holidays – believe me, they were lengthy!
My first ever Summer Craft Challenge photo taken in Gibraltar on 9th July 2016
Each year I would feel completely exhausted and bogged down in the hamster wheel that is being a parent and my creativity took a back seat – there just wasn’t the time (or at least I thought there wasn’t). Then, in 2016 I read something somewhere that basically said it was up to me to find time to do something for myself (even if it was only for 5 mins) and surely it would have a positive impact on my mood. I tried it and it worked.
I made sure that I didn’t leave home without a small crafty project with me, crochet, embroidery, knitting or anything ‘creative’. That way, if I had a window of opportunity, no matter where it was, in a carpark, a waiting room, the beach, on a bench, I could do something creative and I felt like I’d achieved something that day.
By posting a photo each day, it kept me accountable and kept me going on days I felt I couldn’t be bothered.
That year, and every year since then (except in 2020 when we moved countries) I’ve been joined by fellow creativity seekers who have also shared their summer makes and that has given me such joy to see.
If you want to join in, I’d love you to! All you have to do is take a snap of your daily creativity (or weekly, or whatever you can manage) and post it on socials with the hashtag #SummerCraftChallenge2026
There’s no pressure to do it every day, some people just do a week or two when they are actually on holiday. Dip in and out at will, you will be most welcome!
Hello there, I hope this finds you doing ok. I’m a bit earlier with this monthly review than I managed last month, but not by much! I had a lovely month in June – although it didn’t produce many exciting pictures to share (other than a very impressive evening I spent at the Etihad Stadium in the company of Gary, Howard & Mark!).
The main reason for being so late to the game with this update is because of the Carry on Crafting Festival which happened just over a week ago – it was utterly amazing and I look forward to sharing more of it with you next month. In the meantime, you can catch the latest episode of Making Stitches Podcast to hear a flavour of Carry on Crafting (which was an absolute delight to edit last week!). Anyway, back to June..
Crochet Corner
My Carry on Crafting Squares so far…
I had a bit of a dabble with designing again in June. I am working on another little amigurumi character, but I want to wait to share her with you once she is finished – she is currently sitting on my sideboard without a head (poor love!). Away from amigurumi, I had the chance to give away a pair of tickets to Carry on Crafting festival on my social media channels, and that inspired me to make a few CoC inspired squares. I am hoping to make a complete Carry on Crafting blanket over the course of the summer, so will share more squares with you as they develop!
Also, a good friend of mine at work celebrated a big birthday last month and I simply had to knock up a mini-me for her. I was bought the Crochet Iconic Women book by Carla Mitrani by Eldest a few years ago and along with creating quite a few of those wonderful ladies (including HM Queen Elizabeth & Emmeline Pankhurst) I have used the pattern to create so many little people as gifts when they have hit milestones like big birthdays and other events. I can honestly say this is the most used crochet book I have! As a matter of fact, I am using it right now to create some more little characters – more on them next month!
A mini me gift for a lovely colleague
Take That!
Now to the biggest thing which happened to me in June…
Back in the 1990s, I met Take That very briefly when they visited the place I was working at (conveniently during my lunch hour) I got Gary and Mark’s autograph on my spiral bound notebook! I had never seen them play live in their original incarnation, but amazingly during our last summer living in Gibraltar (in the days before Covid) they came and did a few songs at the Gibraltar Music Festival which was literally a 10 minute walk from our home! It was at the very end of their big world tour. It was not a Take That concert in the conventional sense, but it was a thrill to see them at last as they sung about half a dozen songs between Rick Astley and a Mel C DJ set!
A couple of years ago, I was offered a last minute ticket to see Take That appearing in Manchester at the AO Arena – and when I say last minute – I mean literally hours before. It was an unexpected and very pleasant surprise. It was a truly amazing show – I’d heard they put on a good show but it blew my mind. When I heard that they were coming back to Manchester this summer, I joined the online queue for tickets when they went on sale and was amazed to be successful in getting a couple of tickets.
Take That in Gibraltar 2019Take That in Manchester 2024
My Mum said when I went the last time, that she wouldn’t mind seeing Take That and that she’d never actually been to a ‘gig’ before so I offered her the other ticket. She didn’t hesitate in saying yes! So, I took my Mum with me which was lovely.
Belinda CarlisleThe Script
The support acts were Belinda Carlisle (I was amazed how many songs she had and how many of them I remembered from my teens) and the Script (who we also saw at the Gibraltar Music Festival in years gone by). They both put on a great show with the crowd singing along.
Then the show began – wow! It truly was a show. It went on for hours, had a cast of hundreds of performers, acrobats, dancers, a tightrope walker, trapeze and the most amazing mechanical elephant which had a woman dangling upside down at the back to give the impression of a tail! I felt privileged to be able to witness it – it defies description.
I’m so glad I got to share it with Mum too. It was a perfect evening – apart from the journey home which including queuing in the world’s longest queue for a tram home which didn’t help Mum’s legs.
The longest tram queue in the world – this was less than half of it!!
Podcast News
In June, I released a couple of episodes of Making Stitches Podcast:
Episode 107 Connection, Confidence & Community with Melissa Santiago-Val – I really enjoyed my chat with Melissa who set up the charity helping people through sewing after a lockdown Covid mask making initiative grew into something lasting and very impactful.
Episode 108 Reconnecting with your imagination with textile artist, Murron Fraser – Murron is a textile artist based in my hometown of Manchester. She uses her work to encourage others to reconnect with their whimsical, childhood imaginations and is inspired by nature, folklore and storytelling.
Anyone for a Craft Challenge?
Back in the summer of 2016, as I approached the 10-week-long school summer holiday in Gibraltar with apprehension, wondering how I was going to manage the juggle of entertaining 3 young men for all that time and keep my sanity.
I decided to set myself a challenge. The plan was to do something creative every day during the long, hot school summer holiday. It worked – and the #SummerCraftChallenge was born. The simple act of giving myself permission to do something for me (even for a short while) really helped.
Every year, since then, (except for during 2020 when we relocated back the UK that summer holiday) I have kept up the challenge. This year, I am going to do the same.
My youngest is the only one still in school – GCSEs loom next year – but even as they got older and I found myself back in work rather being stuck at home, I kept the challenge going. His school breaks up for the summer today, so as of tomorrow, the #SummerCraftChallenge2026 will begin.
If you’d like to join in, please do! All you have to do is share a picture of what you have done that day (which can involve any sort of creativity) and use the hashtag #SummerCraftChallenge2026 – at the end of each week, I will share a blog post with a round-up of peoples’ summer creativity. There is no pressure to do something every day (I don’t always manage it myself to be honest), it’s just a gentle reminder to do something that makes you happy and takes you away from the stresses of the everyday grind.
It would be lovely if you could join me!
That’s all for this time, thanks for stopping by! Lindsay x
Hello there, this is coming to you more than a little bit late! I was in the midst of lots going on at the end of May/ start of June so it didn’t see the light of day until now. Such is the pace of life at the moment, that I can’t even remember what was going on which took my time back then – so it was nothing drastic, just general busyness!
Anyway, here we are, at the end of June and here’s a little snapshot of my life last month…
May marked the end of an era in our house, Son number 2 left school and went off on study leave ready to start his A-levels. It felt very odd, just having one child left in school. Times have certainly changed since the early days of this blog when I had three young men in school… I am pleased to say that at the time of writing, the big A-level exams are now finished and have been survived, it’s a waiting game now.
Crochet News
For several months, my crojo had been a bit off, but in May, it came back in abundance inspired by the lovely spring flowers on display – you can’t help but be inspired by all the lovely colours! I bought the yarn to create a Bluebell inspired ‘Up the Garden Path’ character about 3 or 4 years ago, this spring the appearance of Bluebells in my back garden as the inspiration I needed to crack out my hook and get busy – Belle is still a work in progress, but thankfully she has at least appeared!!
Did someone say flowers?
I found myself at our local National Trust property, Dunham Massey early in May and was thrilled to see a brilliant exhibition of what looked like botanical drawings. They were, in fact, the most intricate decoupage I have ever seen. Created by Mary Delany in the 18th century, they were as vivid and crisp as if they had been created yesterday. The exhibition was put on in collaboration with the British Museum and is running through until autumn. If you get the chance to visit, I would highly recommend it.
Going underground
Last year, Eldest went on a tour of a disused Tube station and when he reported back, it sounded fascinating, so this year, for his birthday present I booked for us both to go on another one – together. It meant a night away from home – you can’t guarantee that the trains between Manchester and London will actually run or not at the moment, so I travelled down the day before to ensure we would be there in plenty of time for our tour in the morning.
After arriving down in London, Eldest took me on an epic walking and railing tour of the capital which involved the most amazing Rhubarb crumble with frozen custard in Spittlefields Market, a long and very warm and sunny walk around the Olympic Park in Stratford (which I forgot to take a photo of!) and a wander through the West End and China Town. My word, we walked!! I clocked up just under 30,000 steps – I don’t think I’ve walked so far in one day since my days doing the Med Steps 5 Challenge back in Gibraltar (where you climb to the top of the Rock and walk back down to the bottom of the Nature Reserve 5 times in a row).
On the day of the tour – around Moorgate Station – which is still a functioning station on the network but which has lots of secret tunnels and interesting bits not open to the public, we got to go through doors and passageways not normally visited by folk who don’t work there. It was actually part of the very first Tube line back in Victorian times and has had lots of uses for its tunnels through the years including as an interchange between overground local trains and a World War II bomb shelter. If you have any interest at all in recent history, transport or London in general, I would highly recommend the tour it was super. It was booked through the London Transport Museum if you’re interested in finding out more.
Back to the V&A
When I was at secondary school, we had a brilliant English teacher called Mr Dixon. Sadly he’s no longer with us, but his memory lives on with those of us who were lucky enough to be taught and inspired by him.
Mr Dixon had spent his undergraduate years in London, and it transpired, he spent all his free time between lectures traveling around the capital and immersing himself in all the free entry museums and art galleries. At our school, he set up the ‘Cultural Society’ where one afternoon after school each week, he would play classical music, speak about art or his beloved Japanese carvings and Samurai swords.
I was lucky enough to be allowed to join the Cultural Society and, being in that exclusive club (which a lot of my fellow students had absolutely no interest in) we would, at least once a year, have a day trip down to London with Mr Dixon leading a route march around the city taking in a couple of significant destinations. We rarely took the Tube, because Mr Dixon said we would miss too many important things. As we walked he would regale us with tales of the goings-on which had happened in the streets we were pounding, from the Great Fire of London to the sites of royal executions to tales of scandal in the 1960s, and countless other interesting tit bits.
One of our regular destinations to visit was the V&A where I fell in love with the textiles department. I loved the gorgeous designer gowns, the fabulous textures and colours, and I decided back then I wanted to be a fashion designer.
Fast forward 30+ years and Eldest and I found ourselves with some time on our hands before my return train was due and he asked me where I’d like to visit next. It had to be the V&A for old times’ sake. My word, it was so lovely to be back.
I made a beeline for the textiles area and was thrilled to find so many costumes from the worlds of stage and screen! It was amazing. There was a film showing how wigs were made for the Crown – that was mindblowingly complex – plus Kylie’s entire dressing room from one of her tours. If you get the chance to go, I’d highly recommend it!
Great Run Fun
Regular readers to this blog may remember that when I hit the big 5-0 I set myself the challenge of running my first ever 10K. It was supposed to be a one-time-only event, but on the finish line, son number 2 said he’d run it with me the following year. I couldn’t say no, so signed up again last year. Then, when the email saying early bird places for this year’s event landed in my inbox, before I knew it, I found myself hitting the enter button again.
Lo and behold on Sunday 31st May, I found myself back on Portland Street in the centre of Manchester city centre along with thousands of other folk in trainers and set off on my third Great Manchester Run 10K. In the run up to this year’s event I chose not to do it for charity, but that may have been a mistake as I didn’t have the same dedication to training as I had done in previous years. Despite that, and against my own prediction, I managed to run the whole thing and was less than 1 minute slower than last year’s time so I’m taking that as a big win – there’s life in the old bird yet!!
At the end of that run, I promised myself, I would keep up with the running, however, as I write, I have still not put my running shoes back on…. oops!
Kit very kindly invited me to his home and showed me some of his Sewing Bee creations including his Pop Art inspired paper dress. It was absolutely fascinating to hear his experiences from inside the sewing room!
I loved hearing about some of the items which have been donated to the Collection and the detective work which goes into finding out who made things and the lives they led.
You can listen to both of these episodes and the full back catalogue of over 100 episodes over on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and YouTube as well as on my website.
And that brings this little postcard to a close, I shall have to press publish now so that it goes out while it’s still June (for a few hours at least!!).
