Digital Book Launch - Preparations

I'm just a teensy bit excited... 

I've 'dressed' my garden room ready for Tilda's Book Launch on Friday! I now have a rainbow dreamcatcher up, my books out, and my very own gallery of imaginary gemstones ready for the competition winners to be announced...

(I've also spent a few hours drawing in the book that's going to be the prize copy as well)

See you on Friday!

Soxploits - or a Coronasock update

The pace has slowed, but I've not stopped knitting... 

Since I last wrote about my soxploits, here and here, I've knitted even more. Think I might need help for this unusual addiction, cos I counted how many pairs I have in my drawer, and I reckon it's almost three dozen! Makes it easy to do a full wool wash of socks though.

Anyhoo, onto what I've created more recently. 

The first pair I knitted since my last update, I didn't keep. The wool was a bit of a pig to knit with for a start and I knew if I wore these, I'd remember the issues I had with them rather than enjoy wearing them. Strands of wool are twisted you see, and sometimes the 'twist' goes opposite to the way you naturally knit, in which case your lovely smooth wool begins to separate into thinner strands. Or the twist goes with the way you naturally knit, and in some cases ends up twisting the length of wool back on itself. As it did in this case. (Sometimes you can prevent this from happening by starting your knitting from the middle of the ball, but as I couldn't find that end in this particular ball, I was stuck.)

Anyway, the number of times I had to dangle my socks in thin air to allow the wool a chance to untwist itself... Ugh! The colours didn't knit up how I expected them to, either. The label states no two socks will be identical, and that's fine, but the stripes of each colour were so wide, one sock ended up green and the other pink. Didn't like that, either.

Fortunately, a neighbour had asked me to knit her a pair of socks (and for sock-knitting lessons once we're allowed to meet up) and as her feet are the same size as mine, I gave her these.

The next sock project was for a friend I met at Charnwood 2016; Bridget had two pairs of West Yorkshire Spinner socks already (you can buy them direct from the company) but she asked me for another, long enough to be welly socks. So...Passionfruit Cooler was the wool she chose, and when it arrived I got knitting. I used a different pattern this time - one which uses a 3.25mm needle instead of the 2.5mm I'm used to, because as this was a longer sock than I'm used to knitting, it might speed things up. 

When I got to the toe of the first sock I posted it to Bridget, to check the sizing. All good, so when she posted it back, I finished the toe off, knitted the other sock and sent them off. They looked a bit odd, because they were knitted all in rib; it's a very stretchy pattern but the garment always appears too thin to fit when it's off a body. I chose rib because I'd wanted to be certain that, if my tension was a bit off on the different sized pins, the socks would be more forgiving when worn. 

Pair number eleven completed.

My rainbows on the left and
Bridget's welly socks on the right.

And then I knitted my rainbow socks... Squeee! Again, West Yorkshire Spinners wool (they are my new favourite brand, I think) in shade Rum Paradise. And yes, I know it's pink rather than red before the orange, so it's not a 'proper' rainbow, but I just love the colours. 

I had to get a bit clever on these, otherwise the stripes would have been wider and then all out of sync when I got to the bottom of the heel and beyond. So I ended up only knitting three/four rows of each new colour down the heel (lots of ends needed to be sewn in as a result!) and by luck rather than judgement, it all worked out so my colours continued in sequence. Hooray! Pair twelve...

They are gorgeous to wear...

 

And then I went on to pair thirteen. I should've guessed there'd be problems, by the number. The lovely plain purple merino is gorgeous to knit and shows lace beautifully (I'd already knitted two pairs in this brand of wool) but could I get the lace pattern I wanted to knit right? Could I heck. I eventually chose a 'zig-zag cable' pattern, which isn't a true cable at all, and they worked out fine; the end result was worth the hassle.

 

And onto pair fourteen... Another WYS pair, in either English Rose or Peony, I can't remember which! It's a lovely pinky-purple tweedy effect when knitted, but boy oh boy. Previously I'd knitted almost a whole sock in it before deciding I didn't like whatever pattern I'd used and pulled it all back. The wool has been sitting in my wool bag now since before Christmas, and I've not felt inspired to do anything with it. The time felt right to have another go.

I found a basketweave cable. Didn't like the look of it. Tried a lace pattern. Didn't like that, either. Tried another...aaaargh! Nothing looked right! I needed something that complimented the tweedy effect, but...then I started playing. I made up a pattern, based on a widened and elongated moss stitch and at last, I was off. And finally, I have socks I like!

 

My next two pairs will be for an old uni friend and her partner, who live down-under; they'll be odds-and-sods versions so I'll share them when they're done, cos I never know what they're going to look like until I get going on them!

At least you won't be bored reading about socks again any time soon... There's some news to be posted later this week about an official book launch event for Tilda and the Mines of Pergatt, so keep your eyes peeled for that, and get your competition entry in soon!

Bye for now!

Me - on film!

Well, that was an experience!

There are lots of people turning to video as a way of keeping in touch, keeping fit (I had my first virtual dance class last night in my garden room!), helping to keep kids educated, etc etc etc.

We're finding it rather useful at church, too, especially now that the UK is virtually in lockdown and all places of worship are closed, even for private prayer. The vicar's already posted her first short video message, and our leadership team have held our first virtual meeting, too.

As part of our attempts to keep in touch, we're trying to encourage folk to get involved, and one of the things we're focusing on is rainbows; It started in Europe, where children stuck rainbows in their windows to cheer each other up, and it has spread.

For me, rainbows are important. One of the earliest posts on the Scribbles said a little bit about it...you can revisit it here. So how could I resist an opportunity to put a rainbow in my window...? Yesterday, one of the highlights of my day was to see a little boy - dressed in a superhero costume, out for a walk with his mum and younger sibling - who stopped outside my fence and yelled "Found one!"

So the two things of course had to be combined; I made a video for our church community, encouraging them to get involved by putting a rainbow in their window too.

Assuming I've done it right, you'll be able to see it below...

So if you feel like joining me, stick a rainbow in your window, too! 

Stay safe, Scribblers!

A sense of achievement

Remember I wrote recently about how my crafting had gone rather crazy?

Well, I've finished one project - hooray!! - and am pretty close to finishing a second.

The completed one is the rainbow lap quilt. I have to say that quilting experts would probably shake their heads over certain aspects of the manufacture of it, (I am not a quilting perfectionist, by any means; I cut corners, my cutting isn't 100% accurate, my stitching's a bit wonky sometimes...) but I like it, and it's just the right size for having over my knees when I'm typing in the lounge on a cold day.

Have to give a shout out to the fab staff at Quorn Country Crafts, who helped me to decide how to edge the rainbow square centre. If it wasn't for them, I wouldn't have ended up with the rather lovely rainbow batik strip border - even though they were a pig to sew, because they kept slipping on the machine and bits weren't 'caught' by the stitching on the right side. A nifty bit of hand stitching later, and any missed raw edges were hidden...

Loved that there were enough colours in the batik pack
for me to roughly match the border colours to the
central panel squares closest to them

They (the staff at QCC) are also a whizz at working out how much fabric you need to back the quilt, too, with only the minimum of excess material. I chose a teeny-tiny harlequin print in grey and white to give a neutral backing;

I have a few of the batik strips left over, so it's created a new project for me - a cushion cover, I think. Though I won't be starting it any time soon... And in the meantime, I might change my mind completely and do a scraps quilt - who knows?

The second project should be complete by the end of today: my socks.

I caught up on Strictly (Come Dancing) last night and managed to do all but the toe shaping on the second sock. I still think it's a really unusual colour combo - pinks, purples, orange and red - but you can never tell until you start knitting up what the self-pattern will look like. Once these are completely finished, my sister's asked me to knit her a pair, but as socks are much quicker to produce than a quilt, I might get those started.

So that's two crafty projects knocked off the list - and I'm afraid I added another one.

I know, I'm a glutton for punishment, but I was given a crocheted Christmas tree pattern by Knotty Knits and Kreative Krafts that I'd like to try. I bought glittery random wool in red, green, and white to have a go at it. Only problem is, I need Squidgeling J to teach me how to do the stitches before I can begin...

I don't think I'll ever be able to say I've got nothing crafty on the go, do you?

When crafting goes crazy...

Not had a chance to blog recently. My dad had a - thankfully - minor stroke a week ago. Can I just say how wonderful and amazing and caring our NHS was? And how grateful I am that Dad's stroke has left him with barely any issues at all...apart from forgetting his PIN number when he next went to the bank!

Even without that, life has been rather busy.

Mr Squidge and I went to see Squidgeling J at Bristol for the day - gosh, but there are some BIG hills down that way! Had a late lunch in Clifton, saw THE bridge and some very posh houses on the other side of the river, and left a little earlier than planned because J was recovering from a nasty virus, so we didn't get to visit the Bag O' Nails, a pub with cats. Seriously. The landlord owns 15 cats which have the run of the bar. But you have to buy a drink if you want to stroke any of them...

I also had an evening author talk - to a group of 15 church ladies, who all threw themselves into the writing exercises and bought a fair few books between them. So much so, I am having Granny Rainbow reprinted!!

It's also been half term, so routine goes out of the window.

But to get to the real reason for writing this blog... Crafting.

I love making things. I know that if I go too long without making something - whether it's something floral, stitching, knitting, writing - I get grumpy. Problem is, I often see something and go 'yeah, I'll have a go at that!' and something comes up, I get distracted, and I end up finding a half-finished something months later.

Which is where I'm at.

Project 1: I started a granny square blanket for the garden room, to cover the cushions on the rocking chair that's down there. I've got about half a dozen more rows to add around the border, and it's taking ages. Lots of sideways growth, but not much depth. Hence I get bored working on it for long periods, because there's not a lot to show for my efforts. (And the eagle eyed among you will see that I was so eager to crack on with it, I didn't even bother to sew all the central squares together properly before I began adding the border...)

Project 2: I loved this little jackety cardy, and started knitting it in the summer. I have two sleeves and half a collar to add. But...

Project 3: The dark nights are drawing in, which is normally a signal for me to get sock knitting. I knit my own socks because proper woollen ones seem to keep my feet a lot warmer than nylon, and I treat myself to a new colour combo every year, then make odds-and-sods socks from what's left over. I've even used socks as a tool to help my writing in the past... I'm about at the toe of the first sock. If I get organised, I can probably knit the other in a little over a day, but there are other distractions to be found...

Project 4: Big quilt. I bought the jelly roll back in April of last year, because the colours in the fabrics are the colours I have in my bedroom. And, if I'm honest, I'm finding that my rainbow quilt keeps me toasty warm in bed even without a winter weight duvet, so adding another toasty warm layer to the bed can't be a bad thing, can it? So far, I have stitched the strips together, but have no idea how I'm going to edge it to make it big enough to fit my bed.

And then, Project 5: Wonder what I could possibly need all of these for...?

Yup, another rainbow quilt. A random one this time. Well, more random than I'm used to. I started thinking about it back in April and started piecing it together in the summer, when I wanted a break from the kitchen refit (which is, can you believe, still not finished yet?). I'm now hand quilting in the coloured squares, picking up the curved petal-shapes which appear on the patterned strips. I have to say I'm really pleased with it so far. It's only going to be a lap-quilt though - much smaller than the original rainbow quilt.

Working my way round the outside squares 

Picking up the petal detail in each square

So five projects. Now, bear in mind these are all projects I've begun. Don't even get me started on the Christmas tree mat thing I bought last year but haven't done anything with yet. Or the pack of squares I have which I want to make into something quilted - but no idea what. Or for who. Or my mum's fabric that she must've bought over a year ago that we were going to make into a quilt... Or the wool and patchwork kit I was bought for my birthday...

If only I didn't have anything else to do except craft!

My author path

This Wednesday, I'm giving a lunchtime talk as part of the Nanpantan Festival.

I've called it Wordy Wednesday, and it'll be a chance for me to tell something of the journey I've been on over the last ten years.

It's been interesting to look back over that time and see that in fact, 2013 was the turning point, when I broke with the agent. I think at that point, I had begun to find out who I was as a writer - to be (fairly) fearless in what I wrote and how I was writing it. To not listen to what others were telling me I should be doing, but to beat my own path to publication.

And then, in 2014, I had my validation through publication; only a few short stories in some very good anthologies - novels were a way off still - but my writing was at last of a standard to be chosen for others to read.

So if you fancy hearing about my author path, the ups and downs of writing and what I get up to as an author, do come up to St. Mary in Charnwood Church for midday if you'd like lunch beforehand (£5 for a Ploughman's, cake and tea, I believe) or at 1pm for the talk, which is FREE.

I'll have my books there - £1 from every copy sold will be donated to a church project I'm supporting, the extension and refurbishment of the Rainbow Home in Pudukottai where I visited last year.

There will also be some unique cards designed by Laura Buckland, Granny Rainbow's illustrator.

Rainbow coloured wings for the Rainbow Home

Squirrel! Which is what I was called before it was shortened to Squidge...

There's also a beautiful peacock - a nod to India's national bird - and a couple of huggy hedgehogs, with all designs available as cards printed on elephant poo recycled paper, or as prints. In addition, there will bracelets made by a partially sighted member of our congregation, Georgina, with profits from all sales given to the Rainbow Home fundraising.

I look forward to seeing a few folks and sharing my own personal story with them, as well as maybe raising a few quid for a good cause, too.

Got an urge to quilt

Remember last year, I did a fair bit of quilting? I ended up making a baby's cot quilt that was sold in aid of charity, and then went on a course to make a rainbow quilt for my bed.

I got a bit carried away too, last year. I have to admit I bought quite a lot of fabric for quilting projects that haven't yet seen the light of day...so I'm trying to get motivated to get a smaller project made up and reduce the stash of material and 'things I want to make'!

I bought a pack of rainbow squares - lovely, bold colours, no two alike - and matched it with a piece of busy-patterned, highly coloured fabric, with the aim of making a smaller lap-quilt to keep in the living room. However, with the garden room progressing, I did wonder whether it would be good to have in there instead? It will disguise the faded cover on the rocking chair - which was my nursing chair when the Squidgelings were babies - that we plan to move into the new space at the bottom of the garden.

I have played and played with the squares to find a pattern I like. I realise I'm quite anal about the colour sequence of rainbows - it has to be in order, I can't cope with a higgledy-piggledy approach to colours though I love to see it in other people's work. But I'm not having much luck with straight lines either! The colour blocks aren't a true graded palette, so some of them I'm trying to find a 'best fit' within a line and it doesn't always work...

Long lines in following colours with patterned strip between...

...or shorter ones? 

And what about the patterned fabric? Should I cut strips to go between the rows? Do I have enough to add a border around the edges instead? Should I cut squares and dot them haphazardly between the bold ones?

One thing I can say, is that I love this selvedge pattern and am definitely going to use this rainbow of hearts somewhere on the quilt, rather than discard it...

Course, I can't do anything until I've decided on the layout, because if I cut the patterned piece wrong...

*sigh*

Wish me luck.

Busy, busy, busy!

What a week! Because of it, this is a HUGE blog post, so grab a cuppa and put your feet up for a few minutes while you read it!

We've got the decorator in. No, that's not a euphemism - we really DO have the decorator in.

Chateau Squidge has been in dire need of decorating TLC for some time; our loft extension was completed Feb 2007, and we promised ourselves we would decorate the hall, stairs and landing as soon as we were able. I bought the curtains I liked (cream base with brown and green circles on them) and painted a few match-pot squares around the place to check I'd found exactly the right colour...

However, about the same time that the loft extension began, Big Bob (our wind turbine) was being built, and that took rather a lot of pennies - pennies we didn't have as Mr Squidge also cut his hours at work so he could manage the project. Couldn't afford to decorate, not just yet.

Then the house started to fall down. It's quite common for 1930's semis like ours, with the staircase built onto the outside wall, to have the outer wall begin to bow and peel away. Unfortunately, in our case, it wasn't helped by leaky drains in the drive. So - drains were mended and the wall was pinned back in place. No point decorating until all that was done...and it took even more of the pennies we didn't really have.

We also needed a new bathroom. A shower was much more practical for two teenagers than the old cast iron bath - which, being essential - rather took priority over prettifying the hall, stairs and landing.

Oh - and then Mr Squidge decided to insulate the same outside wall that was now securely fixed. By now we were OK with the pennies, it was just a matter of lining up the jobs in the right order.

Finally, we were ready to paint. We've cheated - got a man that can in to do it, because we were working on the theory that if he does it for a living, he'll be a lot quicker than us! Plus, although Mr Squidge's back is vastly improved after his operation, we didn't think that so much painting would be particularly good for him.

Dave has done a brilliant job so far - here's the pics to prove it. Mr Squidge had managed to do most of the wallpaper stripping before his recent back trouble, but the ceiling was done by Dave and his mate, Paul. It was a pig of a job for them - and took out some of the ancient plaster as well, it was stuck so firmly...

But we're already lining-papered and painted - still got the gloss to go on a few doors, but we've got walls of Faded Leaf and Crushed Pearl instead of mucky pink...

I am ridiculously excited to think of having everything smartened up at long last. There's only the new stair carpet to sort out now...before I move onto decorating the lounge. At least I can manage that one myself.

But there's more! The final edit of StarMark has been seen and sent back to BInk...I think I might have mentioned that it was available for pre-order? *wink wink* And I've been putting out feelers for a venue for a launch event...

I've also had to prepare some presentations on my trip to India, which will be delivered next week to members of our church congregation at a social event AND to around 400 schoolchildren in two assemblies! Lovely to revisit the photos and go back through my notebooks and remind myself of that amazing experience. If you've not read the earlier blogs about it, you can find them here: First impressions; Saratha's and saris; Tea and elephants; On India and spiritual matters. 

There's something else I've been doing too. Remember I did some quilting?  Made a small quilt as a bit of an experiment? And that I was booked onto a quilting course, with the idea of making myself a rainbow quilt? Well, I've done two of my four Mondays on the course...and I'm loving it!

For the 'Falling Blocks' pattern I'm making, each block is constructed from three pieces;

Oh, the seemingly endless cutting to size!

I ended up with 80 blocks - spot the not-strictly-in-the-rainbow colour, which I had to include to make the finished quilt wide enough for our double bed. (I also had two emergency extra colours in mind to add on the far end if eight colours weren't enough...but I don't think I'll be needing them.)

I had a play with layouts...

...and plumped for the last one, because it has more rainbows in it. Look closely and you'll see there's a rainbow from left to right; diagonally up from left to right, and diagonally down from left to right.
Here's the entire layout on the floor of my lounge;

Next week, I hope to get all the blocks pieced together ready for the actual quilting. Because it's a big project and I only have two more lessons left to complete it (which would have been perfectly do-able if I'd stuck to the small quilt planned!) I realised there is one important thing I don't know how to do - add the binding around the edges - and I'm never going to manage to do all the quilting on the sewing machine before I finish the course. So...I had a play with a smaller quilted project, with the aim of trying out hand quilting AND asking the teacher about the binding.

In my fabric stash, it'll come as no surprise that I have quite a few fabrics left over from different rainbow-y projects made over the years. I decided to add a few more into the bedspread ones and make a vertical rainbow quilted panel. Apart from the fact that I had to buy a lot of extra cottons to match the fabrics (which will be used on the bedspread later), it's looking rather good, and should be enough to find out how to bind it properly.

Not convinced I've got quite the right shade of
green for the top green stripe...

If it was turned the other way up, apparently
the colours are perfect for my chakras!

All that, in just one week! I'm exhausted reading it all back...but I hope you've enjoyed seeing what we've been up to - and why I've not blogged for a few days. 

Here's to a less busy week next week?

Saratha's and saris

We arrived in India around 3pm on the Saturday afternoon, Trichy-time. One of the first things we did was head to the textile shop, because one of my travelling companions is being consecrated as a bishop later this month and wanted some clerical shirts made in Bishop Purple (if that's not an official colour, like emerald green or sky blue, it should be!), while my other companion is a curate and needed clerical shirts in black. (Plus he'd bought a shirt order from another vicar too!)

So, off to Saratha's in Trichy we went...

On foot, we negotiated oncoming tuctucs, two-wheelers, cars, carts and pedestrians in the narrow market street to reach the 1.5 million square feet complex. Started in Trichy in 1969, it claims to be the largest textile showroom in India, with a huge range of fabrics and ready-made clothing.

What an experience! It took some considerable time to find the right shade of Bishop Purple. "Too pink. Too bluey. Too purpley." Yes, really...Bishop Purple is actually a sort of pinky-purple that nudges towards cerise, but isn't. A bit like this:

Anyhow, suffice to say that finding black was a lot easier - though there are actually a lot of different shades of black. And white, which I'd never appreciated before.

The next step was a churithar suit, for me. Oh...boyoboyoboy!

Now, you know when you walk into a UK clothes shop, and there's just THE colour, for that season? And the shop has nothing except that colour in it? (It's a revolting mess of mucky green and grey and black and camel for this spring, it seems). And nine times out of ten, you can guarantee it's not a colour that suits you?

Well, in Saratha's churithar department, there's none of that. You need to know your size - I'm apparently a 40, which sounded huge for my petite frame but did fit; I tried a top on, much to the interest of shop assistants and customers because I took off my shirt and was wearing a vest top under, thus exposing shoulders and cleavage (what little I have) which is NOT the done thing in India.

Then you choose your colour. Simply go to the shelf or rack with that size on it, and the assistants pull out pile upon pile of folded suits, spreading them out for you to take your pick of the myriad colours available. It was like being in a candy store. Contrasting colours, toning colours, pastels, brights, glitter, embroidery...I could've spent hours there, drinking it all in.

Ready-made churithar choices...

More choice if you want to make them yourself...

The devil's in the detail...

The one I finally chose was pink with brown embroidery, brown trousers and a pink-printed brown scarf. It was sleeveless, and I asked about getting one with sleeves - what I didn't realise is that the sleeves are never attached. It's up to you to get them sewn in if you want to.

A rather bad selfie...

 

Embroidery detail around the hem

When you've decided on your purchase, there's none of this wandering around, stuffing it and other items into a mesh bag to go to the tills at the end of your visit. Oh no. One of the (thousands, I'm certain of it!) shop assistants is called over, given the item that you wish to purchase, then you follow him - and it's always a man, the only female assistants we saw were on the bra counter - to the cash desk, where the process of paying begins.

Paying in Saratha's - a step-by-step guide.
1. Assistant hands item(s) to till man no.1.
2. Till man 1 asks if you are paying cash or credit.
3. You hand over your money or card.
4. Item and money are given to the cashier. He sorts out your change. AT THE SAME TIME, you are given a receipt by till man no.1 to say how much your purchases were and that you've handed some money over.
5. You move along a line, trying to keep tabs on your item(s) and hand over your receipt to till man no.2 to show you've paid.
6. Till man no. 2 (or 3, I rather lost track) gives you back your change, your stamped receipt and your purchase in a Saratha's bag.
7. Repeat as often as necessary, depending on how many different departments or counters you make a purchase from...

If you want to see how fast these guys work, take a look at this video clip...Cashiers! 

On the Sunday evening, we went back again - this time to look at gold fabric for other bishop-y accessories (we nearly had a disco-bish when we were shown gold-sequinned lace...!) and to purchase a sari - for me, not the almost-bish - because we were going back to Pudukkottai village on the Monday and Sarah, Reverend Benjamin's wife, had agreed to dress me in a sari for our visit to the school.

I chose a rather beautiful pink and gold silk one, because the Women's Fellowship in the village wear a uniform sari of pink and gold; mine didn't exactly match, but it would be a link. Then we headed off to buy a ready-made sari blouse and petticoat. The gentleman on the counter took one look at me, said "34" and found the right shade of pink to match the embroidery.

Sari bling...

Now - I digress a little from the Saratha's experience here, but if ever you buy a sari for yourself, be aware that most of them come with a blouse bit. This is an extra length on the material which is cut off to make a matching blouse. Except I didn't know that, so poor Sarah had her work cut out when she was trying to use up an extra metre or so of fabric in the draping when she dressed me.

Back to Saratha's...

We had a rest day later in the week, and N and I planned a shopping trip, to buy gifts for our families. Clothing is cheap and there is such a wide choice available...so we headed back to Saratha's again. Another visit to the churithar suit counter, but for N's wife this time; I'd enjoyed wearing the pink sari so much, I decided to buy a second, lighter one. This time, we were accompanied by two teachers from Bishop Heber Secondary School, Shineo and Josephine, who helped us with our purchases. And this time, I had my camera...

Now, there was so much choice, I could have spent hours and hours choosing. In fact, this must've been the norm, as we saw families sitting on the floor in the shop eating lunch, they'd been there so long...

Look to the left, where folk are taking a rest...

I ended up making quite quick decisions, in spite of the teachers encouraging me to keep looking. I couldn't properly explain how having such a massive choice was alien, that I was used to having limited options and found the variety somewhat overwhelming!

Anyway, purchases were made. I left with shirts for Mr Squidge and T, a shawl for J and a purple and lime accented, black and white patterned sari with black blouse and petticoat for me.

You'd think that would have been enough, wouldn't you? Nope.

*whispers* We managed a fourth trip!

And we did it on our own, on our last afternoon in Trichy, this time because N wanted to buy himself a dhoti - the traditional sarong-like item that a lot of men wear - and I wanted to purchase a second churithar suit.

Dhotis were purchased, with the help of a dhoti-dressing team; a young man who had been appointed our guide and four of his mates on the towel counter, one of whom spoke a bit of English and took on the task of showing N how to wear the dhoti. (Some of them have velcro!). Then it was churithar time again...

I was torn between a wine-and-lime-green or a turquoise-with-chocolate version. I could've bought both (good job I didn't, as my suitcase would never have closed) but resisted, as I felt that my Western materialistic side was beginning to rear its head at that point and I felt a bit greedy. So I plumped for wine-and-lime and we set off back to the hostel on a tuc-tuc ride that I will never, ever forget...

Hem embroidery

Neckline detail

I loved Saratha's. The wimp in me, who didn't like the thought of bartering, found the price tags much easier...and next time I go to Trichy, I will book an entire day in the shop I think!

The weird thing is, back in the UK, the gold on my pink sari has lost its gleam. There's something about the light here, about the way we're all wrapped up and the grey skies that seems to suck the colour out of everything. I was moved to write a poem about it the other day;

Indian colour.

Gilt thread, which gleamed in Indian sunlight, 
has lost its brightness in the pale winter light of England. 
The glitter of diamante is replaced with tacky slogans, 
elegance by shapeless leggings and baggy jumpers. 
That coloured world is gone, replaced with black and grey and denim blue. 

Before, there was baby pink with lemon yellow,
wine with lime,
royal purple with satsuma orange,
turquoise with chocolate brown,
forest green with midnight black.
Stiff silk, chic chiffon, cool cotton and luscious linen.
Patterned, embroidered, printed, plain, 
gilded, silvered, jewelled.
No two the same, no ordered rainbow, 
simply a feast for the eyes, 
satisfying an appetite with rich shades, fresh pastels, unexpected contrasts or subtle blends

I wanted to drink in the colour until I was full -
so that I need never feel colourless again.

Handmade books!

I love notebooks; I'm a bit of a one for seeing a beautiful cover and buying it, then saving it for 'something special'.

Like this one, which has still got Ani's story in it, in spite of the fact the story stalled...

Laura Buckland (who illustrated both my Granny Rainbow collections) has recently made handmade books as part of her uni course - and she's been selling them too. Look at these beauties!

(You can see more of Laura's creations and artwork on her facebook page)

I fell in love with the books, and asked Laura to make me one - monochrome cover and (of course) rainbow pages. I received it yesterday - and it's absolutely gorgeous! 

Lovely paint effect with added doodles on the cover...

A rainbow of pages

And a rainbow spine to hold them in place

Now all I need is a special project to fill it with...