Little Box of Crochet

Sunday Postcard #004 23.8.20

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Hello there! My word it’s been a busy week this week as you will see. I hope it’s been a good one for you. Here’s this week’s Sunday Postcard…

Stormy skies

Last Sunday we headed out to our local field to play frisbee. It seemed like a great idea at the time – we had a brief frisbee session the day before and the Little Postcards loved it – so we headed back for a longer session on Sunday. It was fun, I’ll give you that, but blimey I didn’t half ache afterwards!! My neck, shoulders, arms, back legs…. I’m showing my age!

Rainy day

After a bright Monday morning, the afternoon was a rather damp affair in our part of the world. Despite that, I thought the rain drops on this spiders web looked rather pretty.

Leaving on a jet plane

Eldest and I had an early start on Wednesday morning…. we were Gibraltar bound for the small matter of picking up GCSE results.

And there she is…

A seat with a view

A postcard from Gibraltar

It had to be done… we left the two youngest Little Postcards behind under the care of grandparents, so we simply had to send a postcard back home on Wednesday when we arrived. I’m amazed to be able to tell you that it arrived in Manchester on Saturday just 4 days later!

Sunrise on results day

We were up early on Thursday so we could collect Eldest’s GCSE results (the reason for our visit). As we were staying on the East side of the Rock this time we were able to witness sunrise over the Mediterranean Sea. It was a lovely moment as we anticipated what might be coming that day.

I’m thrilled to be able to tell you the results were as sunny as the skies above us. I have been having a proud Mum moment ever since.

Friends reunited

Friday evening meant meeting up with some old friends who I only said goodbye to last month! It was great to see them, tell them all our news and hear theirs.

Making waves on the beach

Our trip back to Gibraltar hasn’t exactly been a holiday, there have been things which needed to be sorted following our move back to the UK. A few admin jobs which had slipped through the net before we left and such like. Yesterday though, in the afternoon, I found myself alone and my to-do list was complete so I took my crochet hook, yarn & deckchair down to the beach at Sandy Bay.

I had a few blissful hours crocheting, watching the world go by and also had a solo dip in the sea. I can’t remember if I have ever been to the beach alone before. I normally always have young people with me. I can highly recommend it! It may only have been a few hours but it felt like a holiday after months of planning, packing, unpacking and everything else that moving countries with a family entails. I feel very lucky to have had this time away.

And that brings this week’s postcard to an end. We are now back in Manchester after a very long day of travel – more on that next week!

Have a great week, and thanks for stopping by.

Lindsay x

Sunday Sevens #230 26.07.20

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I’ll be honest with you, it’s been a long three weeks since my last Sunday Sevens! It’s been exhausting and a tad emotional at times. But we survived it. I have come up for air briefly but am heading back into the realm of the packing boxes for a while…

In the meantime, here goes with a look back at our last 3 weeks in slightly more than seven photos from slightly more than the last seven days…

One last Saharan dust sunset on a Sunday

Our last Sunday in Gibraltar was a lovely day for so many reasons, we said goodbye to friends, and ended it with a lovely meal out by the sea. This gorgeous Calima (Saharan dust laden) sunset was the perfect ending.

Haircuts on Monday

In light of the very recent opening of hairdressers in the UK, I figured we might be waiting a long time for haircuts in England, so all three Little Postcards had one last Gibraltarian short back and sides. I love this spot by Southport Gates, I had to photograph it on the way back to the car.

Goodbye Diamond on Tuesday

Our last Gibraltar Tuesday was A DAY. From early morning until late at night it was full on packing. My Fitbit told me I did 18,000 steps. The Little Postcards were entertained with good friends and we said goodbye to Diamond our bunny. He’s gone off to Spain for a short break on the Costa before heading north by road. We hope to see him again in August, he might be glad of all that fluffy fur up in Manchester!

Removal day on Wednesday

Up at 6am for final bits of packing ahead of the removal men arriving just after 8. Once the trucks were loaded I had to cross into Spain to complete the paperwork and pay the duty on our stuff at customs. Off went our things to be stored until there was enough to fill a big lorry to travel up to the north of England.

Thursday by the sea

The Little Postcards had a final hurrah on the beach with their very good friends, while I ran round finishing off the last admin and cleaning up jobs in Gibraltar. When I arrived at Eastern Beach to pick them up we had tea and ice cream with our friends and it was lovely just to be still and enjoy the moment after all that rushing around.

Friday goodbyes…

On our last morning we packed up our final bits and bobs and drove from Gibraltar to Malaga. We had been due to fly from Gib on EasyJet but our flights were cancelled a couple of weeks before and we had to rebook via Malaga. We had to fly to Manchester because at the time of booking we were looking at 2 weeks in quarantine on our arrival and had we flown from Gib to London, we would not have been able to make the trip up north on public transport because of the regulations.

As it turned out, Friday 10th July, which is when we flew, became the first day that travelers didn’t have to quarantine. We were so fortunate.

Queuing to leave Gibraltar

A new view

This is my new view. Once I looked out on the Bay of Gibraltar one way and up the Rock to the summit of the Med Steps the other way, for now, I have this gorgeous leafy colour instead! We have moved into a rented home as a temporary measure until the sale of our place in Gib goes through. I’ll certainly happily take this view as I stand at the kitchen sink – it’s not too shabby!

And breathe

Open space!! Something you don’t get much of in Gib. This gorgeous field used to signal torture in my childhood (think school cross country – I wasn’t built for speed) however now I can appreciate how beautiful it is. It’s just a few minutes’ walk from our new home and en route to the park – a place we have visited a lot recently in a bid to get over the loss of the beach!

Milk bottles!

One of the perks of being back in the UK is the fact we can get our milk delivered to our front door in glass bottles! No more mad dashes to the supermarket for milk to find out there is none, and no more plastic milk bottles going to the recycling.

A not-so-little treat for me

When this special one-off rather large Little Box of Crochet was advertised, I decided to order it to my parent’s house knowing that when I arrived in Manchester, I wouldn’t have any crochet with me until my boxes of stash arrived. What a joy to open it and see all that squishy, yarny goodness.

I thought I’d be able to do a bit each day in my summer craft challenge style of years gone by, but sadly other things have taken precedence. I have dabbled a bit and will share any progress as I go along.

A birthday

We celebrated a birthday too. A Little Postcard is a year older, this time he was able to share his birthday with grandparents (for our first hugs since arrival in the UK) and a socially distant aunt & uncle! (No home made cake this year – my mixer & cake tins were somewhere on the continent in the back of a truck!).

Our stuff arrived!

It all arrived at the back end of last week. Our spacious rental home is now looking a lot less spacious!!🤣

It’s good to know that all our things made it over ok. Now there’s the small matter of finding everything that we need! Wish me luck!

Thank you for stopping by, I’m not sure when my next post will be as I’m still battling my way through boxes and multiple lost items, not to mention still trying to sort schools and other admin bits and bobs. I’ll pop back when I can though. Until then, take care.

Lindsay x

Sunday Sevens was first created by Natalie at Threads & Bobbins.

Sunday Sevens #227 21.6.20

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Hello and welcome to Sunday Sevens again! It’s been a glorious day here, truly midsummery in every way. I hope it’s been a good one for you too. Here’s this week’s Sunday Sevens:

A Sunday jaunt up the Rock

Last Sunday I headed up the Rock for a trip to the Windsor Suspension bridge with the Little Postcards. It was beautiful but a little windy. I nearly lost my hat in a gust while crossing the bridge! There were so many butterflies out and about. I only managed to snap one though.

Noisy neighbours

We have 2 sparrow families nesting on our balcony at the moment. It’s the second lot of chicks in both nests so far this year. They are rather a noisy and raucous bunch. They may be small but they are loud! They get rather annoyed when they see me sitting on the balcony and chirp loudly at me as if to say I’m trespassing on their property!!

Pretty balconies

Speaking of balconies, this is one of the prettiest in Gibraltar. It was looking lovely as I walked past this week.

Last rays of sunshine

I spent all day at home on Wednesday doing jobs which had to be done. It was frustrating because I wanted to get out. I managed a short walk at sunset and it did the job. A beautiful pick me up at the end of the day.

Catching up on pandemonium

I managed to find a tiny bit of time one afternoon to dig out my Pandemonium CAL for a short while. It felt good to get back to it. I’m a good few weeks behind schedule but I’ll get there in the end!

It’s finished

Last Sunday night I managed to get this finished! My Entrelac Tunisian crochet purse from Little Box of Crochet. I’m really pleased with it, although I’m not sure I would do it again. I found it really quite tricky and couldn’t do it while watching telly!

Podcast update

This week episode 9 of Making Stitches went online and it featured my first international interview with Esther from Essie Birdies. Esther and I had a chat all about how crochet became a passion for her about 10 years ago. She designs the most beautiful shawls as well as amigurumi and other things. You can find the show notes for the episode here and listen by searching for ‘Making Stitches’ on your favourite podcast app.

That’s all for this week, I hope to be back with another blog post mid week this week (all being well). Until then, take care and thanks for stopping by.

Sunday Sevens was first created by Natalie from Threads and Bobbins.

Sunday Sevens #226 14.6.20

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So it’s one of those weeks when Sunday Sevens appears on a Monday (a Bank Holiday Monday as a matter of fact – in honour of the Queen’s birthday), it’s a busy old time Chez Postcard at the moment behind the scenes and boring stuff has been getting in the way of blogging, so please excuse the delay! Without further ado, here’s this week’s edition:

Back to sewing class

As I am a little camera shy on the blog I never imagined that I’d be sharing a full-frontal top of the head to knees photo of myself. But there you go, complete with my slightly wonky home made face mask!

The reason for the photo is that last Monday I got back to my lovely sewing teacher; Dorcas Hammond’s workshop for my first sewing lesson post lockdown. It was a real treat and was a one off stand-alone workshop to make a fleecy hooded body warmer. This was actually scheduled to happen in March – fleecy body warmers are a little bit on the toasty side for Gibraltar in June!

Anyway, the three of us students were sitting spaced out with sanitized hands and face masks but it was great to be back in the saddle even if it was a brief one. Thank you Dorcas x

Clear skies across the Strait

Tuesday brought the delights of a trip to the tip / recycling dump. What joy! However on the return journey I stopped for a look at the view across to Morocco which seems so clear these days – one positive of the lockdown has been a reduction in pollution in these parts – let’s hope that continues.

Peony perfection

I have never seen peonies for sale as cut flowers in the supermarket before but these beauties caught my eye this week along with the deep pink stocks. They have been an absolute delight in a vase on the sideboard. They didn’t last long in the summer heat but they were a joy for a few days.

International Yarnbombing Day 2020

So Thursday was International Yarnbombing Day and this year instead of Yarnbombing public places, knitters and crocheters were encouraged to yarnbomb something closer to home. I chose my favourite crochet spot, a bench on our balcony and recycled my yarnbomb from the Alameda Gardens bicentenary year of 2016. A few Postcard from Gibraltar favourites made it out there too like Llanita the Yarndale Sheep from 2016 and Europa the Unicorn who came on our European adventure with us in the summer of 2017 and my first ever crochet blanket; the Granny Stripe designed by Lucy at Attic 24.

Blue skies

How about that for a blue sky? What a belter. We’ve had some lovely weather this past week, a day and a half of blustery grey cloud and showers on Thursday/Friday but apart from that, some lovely sunshine! The pinks of the St Joseph’s school building showed off the blue to great effect I thought as I walked past.

Blocking time

Doesn’t everyone have their ironing board up on their balcony? I’m not sure what passers by might have thought when I was blocking my Entrelac purse on Saturday – but hey, what does it matter. It’s almost finished…

A stunning sunset

Saturday night’s sunset was an absolute stunner. The sky was on fire!

Podcast update

My guest this week on Making Stitches was Phil from The Twisted Yarn

This week episode 8 of Making Stitches went out and this week the theme was stranded knitting. The hugely talented Phil from The Twisted Yarn was my guest and spoke all about her passion for intricate knitted motifs, her famous crocheted chair and Robyn the Robin who visits her garden.

If you fancy a listen, just search for ‘Making Stitches Podcast’ on your favourite podcast app.

That’s all for this week, I’ll be back next Sunday, all being well. Have a good week!

Sunday Sevens was first created by Natalie from Threads and Bobbins.

Sunday Sevens #224 31.5.20

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Hello there, how have you been getting on this week? It’s been a busy one as usual for me. How can life still feel so busy when so many aspects of it are restricted at the moment? I have no idea. Here’s this week’s Sunday Sevens:

Cruise ship calling

In spite of the fact we are still in semi-lockdown here in Gibraltar, there still seems to be a lot of cruise ships calling in. Few of them have passengers though, they are coming in to change crews, fly passengers home or collect supplies. It must be rather strange cruising about the place with very few people on board.

A trip to the beach

At the start of the week Littlest went to the beach for a short while for a socially distanced meet up with a friend. It was lovely and quiet down there and did him the world of good to see someone from outside of our family unit for a change.

Home schooling

I’m so glad that I got the chance to spend one afternoon a week as a work experience helper in a primary school as an A-Level student. It made me realise that I wasn’t cut out to be a teacher and I turned my attention elsewhere. I have to admit I’m struggling with the home schooling during lockdown. My patience levels are at an all time low. I completely understand that the lockdown and school closures are necessary but I will certainly be doing a happy dance when my three all return to school (whenever that may be).

An unexpected delight

I have to thank the ladies at The Crochet Sanctuary for bringing this to my attention – my new podcast, Making Stitches, got a write up in Crochet Now Magazine!! How marvelous is that?! I’m really rather chuffed about it 😊.

Crochet with concentration

I’ve been trying to finish some of my long-standing WiPs during lockdown and this is one of them. It’s an Entrelac Tunisian crochet purse from Little Box of Crochet. I started it and put it away. Upon rediscovering it, I realised the first row of turquoise blue diamonds wasn’t right so ended up unraveling the lot and starting again. This is how far I got yesterday – I’m not quite as far as I was before I ripped it apart.

It takes quite a bit of concentration – something I’m a bit short of at the moment – but as the rows grow it makes more sense and I think I’m back on track now. Hopefully I’ll be able to share a good bit of progress next week!

Also on my hook this week…

I’m still playing catch up on the Pandemonium CAL. It had been going so well but life & boring stuff interrupted my crochet! I think I might need another few rainbow rows…

Podcast update

Amanda Bloom & her daughter Jenny

This week’s podcast episode features Little Box of Crochet’s Amanda Bloom. We had a lovely chat all about her daughter a Jenny, who was instrumental in setting up their subscription box business as well as how the business has grown and the community it’s created. You can find it here, if you fancy a listen.

That’s all from me for this week, I hope the new week is a good one for you. Bye for now 😊.

Sunday Sevens was first created by Natalie from Threads and Bobbins.

Sunday Sevens #178 10.3.19

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Hello and greetings from Manchester! I’m over for a flying visit to celebrate my parents’ Golden Wedding Anniversary. Here’s this week’s Sunday Sevens!

Sunday stroll up the Rock

Last Sunday it was a beautiful warm spring day and we opted to take a wander up the Rock with the Little Postcards. It was rather busy with tourists, but we found little pockets of solitude and enjoyed our mosey through the nature reserve and then dropped down into town via Castle Steps and were about the admire the Octopus House and the new street art paying homage to Gibraltarian artist Gustavo Bacarisas.

Monday morning walk

I was out pounding the streets again on Monday morning, I had an appointment to speak to someone who lives in Upper Town and rather than catch the bus, I walked there. It’s nice sometimes to just wander, don’t you think?

Pancake Day

I don’t know about you, but I’m a traditionalist when it comes to pancakes, lemon & sugar is the winner for me. We had all sorts going on pancakes in our house on Tuesday!

Dressmaking class

The sleeves are on my jacket, and so are the linings…. hemming time now!

Leaving on a jet plane

On Thursday I left Mr P and the Little Postcards to Head home on my own to see my parents for their Golden Wedding Anniversary. I’ve been looking forward to this trip so much, to see long time family friends and family. We had such a lovely celebration dinner on Friday evening.

Ta-dah!

Last week, I could only show you a little bit of my freesia painting in Sunday Sevens, because I was painting it to give to my Mum & Dad and didn’t want them to see it before it was given to them. Here it is, finished. I can’t claim credit for the design (I used a Pinterest image for inspiration – the artist is TwoYShop). I really wanted to do a freesia wreath as they are one of my Mum’s favourite flowers and she had them in her wedding bouquet.

Time for crochet

I have a bit of a backlog of Little Boxes of Crochet to work on, and I thought this weekend away was the perfect opportunity to begin one while I’m away from all my usual distractions! Here goes, my first attempt at Entrelac!

That’s all for Sunday Sevens this week, I hope it’s been a good one for you. As always I’m joining with Natalie from Threads and Bobbins for this weekly blog series.

Summer Craft Challenge 2018 (week 8)

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So at last, the Little Postcards returned after a (very) long 8 week school summer holiday, and throughout that time, I have used crafty distractions each day to keep me going. Here’s my final week (+2 days) just a week or so after they went back to school! Better late than never!

Saturday

Work began on Percy the Gnome’s head.

Sunday

Head complete with eyes, meant time for a little scarf.

Monday

On Monday evening, we played scrabble and I crocheted along at the same time – not advisable as I kept losing count – however near the start of the game I ended up with the letters to spell sewing in my little rack of tiles. How appropriate for a craft challenge, shame it didn’t spell crochet!

Tuesday

A gnome hat with a bell!

Wednesday

And he’s finished!

Thursday

On Thursday, our last full day in Manchester, Percy came out with us to the park, looking for some fairies to hang out with…

… I didn’t see any, but saw quite a few fairy doors.

While the Little Postcards played and climbed, I found time for a last little bit of English al fresco crochet for this summer.

Friday

In flight crochet, crochet and gin goes so well together don’t you think?

Saturday

As I waited for the copious washing machine cycles to finish as I unpacked from our trip, I caught up with one of my favourite blogs (Attic24). I discovered through reading it that this year’s Yarndale Festival was appealing for butterflies to be made, so quickly made one…

Sunday

A little flurry of butterflies (the correct term I believe is a kaleidoscope) all bound for Yarndale. One had to be red and white for Gibraltar 🇬🇮.

And another thing…

Way back just before I started my craft challenge this year, I started work on a new project which I didn’t want to say too much about until I had showed it to someone special. Earlier this year, my little brother and his lovely wife went on their honeymoon to Bali. They brought me back a beautiful sarong. It was too pretty for just taking to the beach so I decided to make a skirt out of it.

I took it along to my dressmaking teacher to get her advice. She told me how to cut the fabric to take full advantage of the pattern.

And here it is:

I’m thrilled with it 🙂 and now I have showed them, I can share it with you.

That’s the end of my summer Craft Challenge for this year, I managed to do something crafty on all but a handful of days, and I loved it!

Edit: for some reason the photos in this post have been rather tricksy and that’s the main reason this blog post has taken so long to publish. Apologies if they take a long time to load, I’m not sure what the problem is…

Summer Craft Challenge 2018 (Week 7)

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This is the penultimate week of my summer craft challenge. I set out on this mission back at the start of July in a bid to do something crafty every day of the school holidays as a way of keeping my head above water in all the chaos of School holiday time. Here goes week 7:

Day 43 (Saturday 18th August 2018

The Rock of Gibraltar part of my Sandy Bay blanket was completed last week, and no Rock is complete without a fluffy Levanter cloud sitting on the very top! The Levanter has led to some very uncomfortable and humid conditions recently, not the best weather conditions to be sitting under a crochet blanket, but I was determined catch up on this CAL!

Day 44 (Sunday 19th August 2018)

A busy day meant just time for a few shells after dark!

Day 45 (Monday 20th August 2018)

Another busy day left time for just a few more shells, this time in daylight.

Day 46 (Tuesday 21st August 2018)

At last! I got time (after packing our cases for our next trip) to finish the shells and after many weeks, I was finally all caught up and up to date with this Coastal Crochet Crochet-along.

Day 47 (Wednesday 22nd August 2018)

On Wednesday, we flew to Manchester to visit my family. Time to dig out my portable holiday project again!

Day 48 (Thursday 23rd August 2018)

On Thursday I did a bit more of this. And a spot of decoupage with Littlest…

We visited a craft shop and bought some supplies to keep us busy on wet days.

Day 49 (Friday 24th August 2018)

I started this little chap’s feet in Commonwealth Park last week… he now has legs and a tummy!

This week is the last week of the school summer holidays, hopefully I’ll be able to finish something before they go back!

Summer Craft Challenge 2018 (week 6)

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Another week gone already, I can hardly believe it. The summer holidays are whizzing by, and we have just 2 weeks left here in Gibraltar. Here’s what I’ve been getting up to this week in my craft challenge….

Day 36 (Saturday 11th August)

I enjoyed doing my Jennie Maizels sketchbook club picture so much last week, that I thought I’d have another go on Saturday and give some Southwold Beachhuts the Jennie Maizels treatment. This time, though, I couldn’t leave them black and white, I just had to colour them in.

Day 37 (Sunday 12th August)

Done! Now, I wonder what I should draw next?

Monday

A trip to Commonwealth Park which running some errands in town meant a few moments of Crochet calm on a bench in the dappled shade. The perfect excuse to crack open another Little Box of Crochet!

Later on, in the evening, I got reacquainted with an old friend…

Day 39 (Tuesday 14th August)

A few more rows were completed on my Coastal Crochet CAL after dark on Tuesday.

Day 40 (Wednesday 15th August)

It was International Granny Square Day on Wednesday, so I had to join in!

Day 41 (Thursday 16th August)

We spent most of the day at the beach on Thursday so my crochet came too!

Day 42 (Friday 17th August)

I’ve been working on my Sandy Bay Seaside Stash Busting Blanket a bit this week, as I had a lot to catch up on. On Friday I spent quite a bit of time on it and am working on making a crochet version of the Rock of Gibraltar (hence the grey & green rows). I think I’ve done about 17 rows this week. Here it is in all its glory:

That’s it for this week. The end of week 6 means we are three quarters of the way through the long school summer break already! Thanks for stopping by!

Summer Craft Challenge 2018 (week 3)

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This week has been a rather crochet filled one, against some lovely backdrops of seaside and fun filled holiday times…

Day 15 (Saturday 21st July)

Sloe gin and slow crochet was the order of the day on Saturday. We stopped off on the way back from visiting family at a lovely country pub with a beer garden – one of the joys of being in holiday!

Day 16 (Sunday 22nd July)

For weeks before we came to Southwold, Mr Postcard and I were dreaming of visiting the Red Lion Pub on South Green for an early evening drink and sitting out on the green as the sun went down. We managed that on Sunday.

Day 17 (Monday 23rd July)

I’m loving the colour changes on this Scheepjes Whirl yarn. I’m having to frog quite a bit of this pattern, I need to pay attention and at times my mind can wander and before I know it I’ve got a couple of rows wrong… whoops!

Day 18 (Tuesday 24th July)

So on Tuesday, I fancied starting something different, so over breakfast, I cracked open my latest Little Box of Crochet, which I’d been saving for my holiday. It came out with us for the day to Orford…

And then to the pebble beach at Aldeburgh…

… it’s one of those projects that once you start it’s hard to stop… just one more row…

Day 19 (Wednesday 25th July)

A spot of sunset crochet was in order on Wednesday. It was only the second day of this project but it was working up quickly.

Day 20 (Thursday 26th July)

My crochet took a trip to the seaside at Sheringham on the north Norfolk Coast.

Day 21 (Friday 27th July)

Where better to work on a seaside themed crochet project than on the pier at Southwold?

And guess what? It’s finished!

The perfect backdrop for my Coastal Crochet designed Little Box of Crochet project, Southwold beach… where will my Summer Craft Challenge take me next week?