Making...

Have been making conscientiously for the Big Project, but let myself have an hour or so off to make this lovely little collar, from a project in Mollie Makes magazine. It was surprisingly easy and I think comes up quite smart. Anything with leopard print is always FTW in my opinion.

I also really like these Vuitton metal collars:

I'm not sure they would be all that comfortable to wear, but there's something pleasingly kinky and sci fi about them. I'm thinking of making a black collar with spikes, in a nod to the spiked dogcollars I used to wear in my gothy days. Apparently there's such a thing as "soft punk" en vogue at the moment, which kind of takes all of the fun out of it.

Went to see "The Artist" last night - it's the story of a young ingenue given her first step to success by a preposterously handsome matinee star during the late 1920s. But he is a star of silent movies and refuses to join in the mania for the "talkies". As his celebrity wanes, hers grows, and it seems like their love can never be.

It's one of the most wonderful, warm, heart-breaking and imaginative films I have ever seen - and the costumes are fabulous. I sigh for the days when men wore top hats and tails and girls styled their hair just so.

New year's resolutions

As well as all my usual self-improving/society-benefiting NYRs, I would like to:

1. Do more of this:

2. And this:

3. Try this:

4. Go here:

5. Have less of these:

Inheritances

My grandma recently moved into "assisted living", and in clearing out her flat sent a lot of stuff, via her son, my dad, to me.

Alongside the flowery towels and ace 50s clothes dryer, I was given a couple of unassuming plastic bags full of the leftovers of my grandmother's creative life. Knitting needles, zips, bundles of raffia and broderie anglais, ribbons, pins, half-used wooden spools of cotton and odd balls of yarn. Among these treasures I also found a tiny leather needle case, soft from handling, with embossed daffodils and the legend "A stitch in time saves nine".

There's something about this little collection that brings tears to my eyes. It's so humble, and yet so thrifty and resourceful and full of craft and care. Who knows what she made from those ends of yarn and thread? I find it so touching to think of generations of women, not just mine, handing down skills and tools to make things, for yourself to use or to give to other people.

I hope I can make something beautiful with them - or something useful. I think either would please her.

New Year's Eve

If only I was hanging out with you guys <3

Adorable

Having not lived anywhere I was actually happy for the best part of a year, I've spent a lot of time walking around and eyeing up other people's much cosier-looking houses. I'm a particular fan of doors, because of the promise and intrigue they suggest.

These are some treats I spotted around Dalston recently:

I love that chalky blue - and, geekishly, the font of the number.

I think a clown lives here.

This is my particular favourite. Imagine waking up every day and thinking: yes I live in a slightly leany dark blue house with a pink door! A pink door! It calls out for geraniums in pots and a frilly apron.

Crafty kitties

Not that I'm completely obsessed with cats - but the jacket of this lovely Japanese craft book instantly caught my attention in Foyles (I like the strapline, which promises "cute handicrafts to make with your cat"- it conjures up the pleasing scenario of sitting down with some dexterous kitties for a crafternoon. Knit and Kit?).

Anyway - actually making things with pet hair has always felt a bit icky to me (when I worked on Knitting magazine we ran a piece about jumpers made from cat hair, which makes my eyes itch just thinking about it) - but there are some super cute ideas in here. Everything seems to be felted so less, well hairy. I like the little stuffed finger puppets in partic.

Orange orange

I've never been a big fan of orange (I'm more of a pink kind of girl) but there's something brilliant and uplifting and strangely nostalgic about it on a smoky December day.

And also I finished these beauties! Quite proud of their triumphant ugliness.