Little Pink Riding Hat

Yes, it is sewing week!

It is like a positive addiction, but most of you know it. And cooler temperatures usually trigger my hat-making-mechanisms. As I had some fabric leftovers from the Horse Shirt, this hat for Carolina was just the perfect little project for my increasing sewing disease (but actually it is not a dis-ease, it is a pleasure).

For some of you, the shape of this hat might seem familiar, it is the same pattern like Carolina's birthday hat, I just went a head size up. The German pattern is like the shirt also by klimperklein, again with excellent instructions. A breeze to sew.

The hat is reversible, 

but the pink inner hat will probably just be the lining.

After Carolina's afternoon nap, 

the hat was finished and we went grocery shopping.

And you know what? Just at the entrance of the supermarket we met Lena of bootshauskind who had made Carolina's birthday hat. I hadn't met her since the delivery of the hat last November. I could proudly show her my version of the hat and we chatted a bit about sewing and her new blog.

It's a small sewing world.

Oppe Oppe Aita*

* Carolina's version of the German nursery rhyme "Hoppe, hoppe Reiter" (English translation here) and her way of saying Pferd/horse

Look at this. I have really sewn something. Do you know how long my sewing machine had been abandoned?... since before Christmas. And even though I thought I am a sewing-in-summer-knitting-in-winter-kind-of-person, the change of the seasons has made me want to sew. What was it? A cooler wind, a slight feeling of restlessness, a look at this blog here, a Kundalini Yoga set for Balancing the Brain, whatever, when Carolina woke up last Tuesday night and I nursed her back to sleep, I knew that I have to sew her some long-sleeved thing.

The next morning we went straight to the fabric store, and I thought horses might be fun. Her big sister Clara goes horse riding and watches Bibi & Tina videos, so Carolina knows her horses.

The German pattern is by klimperklein and has been waiting in my e-mails since last November (together with a couple of other patterns I bought on an online sewing shopping spree...). Sewing with it was like a walk in the park thanks to the very detailed pictured instructions. It felt that I might not have lost my sewing skills altogether.

Oppe Oppe Aita

And it was really high time for me sew this shirt, because it is called a Baby Shirt and Carolina just fits into the largest size of the pattern.

 And she is too busy to be properly photographed, of course.

But a very proper shirt for our Sunday outing to the annual horse market.

 (undercover-horse-shirt because of rain)

PS: A question for my American readers:

How do you Americans call this kind of neckline? It is called American neckline in Germany, I have learned.

Pink Moments of the Week

This week I BOUGHT myself a KNITTED HAT. Can you believe it? What is happening to me? Just the idea of buying something you could make yourself so easily and pleasurably would have been an absolute no-go for me just a couple of months ago. But on Monday I saw this hat, or more exactly the pink pompom and had to have it right away. No yarn searching and no knitting involved this time.

But I am getting over the initial mild shock. I even wore that hat Monday night riding my bike on the way to yoga class.

And then summer came back in the middle of the week and something must have happened inside me to compensate for the not-knitting:

More about my way back to sewing next week...

Lost Mushroom

Mushroom collecting time has started... but before you think I get all botanical again, remember it is crafty blogging week.

It happened that I randomly flicked through Oldenburg's local newspaper and read a daily column, where the author writes about a woman who knitted covers for the bollards in front of her house.

Actually, she crocheted them... I found out when I went there.

The newspaper column stated that one of the covers got lost, was stolen, went missing.

Have you seen it?

Back to Craft Class

After being all botanical last week, the blogging will get crafty this week (is catcouch still knitting?...). It's been nearly four weeks now since school has started again for Clara. And as for me, with the school routine also teaching the children's afternoon craft class has returned.

There are some changes with the craft class. There is two of us teaching the class now, another mother I know from sewing school joined with fresh ideas. After crochet and sewing last semester, we have started knitting. We got knitting looms for the kids, they can make hats, scarfs and cowls with them. Yes, it's a fall/winter semester!

After a female majority last semester, the girl/boy-ratio is even this time (the children choose their extracurricular activities for themselves and there also was football/soccer).

From the first day the class split in two tables.

Can you guess where the boys and where the girls sit and knit?

Pink Moment of the Week

 

... almost pink: the wine around our house starts turning colours.

(last year here)

Green

This summer we really harvest our own-grown zucchini (last year's was fake... remember?). Hubby's little vegetable garden worked some zucchini magic over the last months. So now Clara has the real green deal in her hands.

Clara was very interested to know how much such a zucchini would cost at the supermarket and how much we paid for the original plant...

... while Carolina went straight for the taste.

Two plants, four zucchini so far.

And there are more to come.

Blue

We all love berries in our family. Perfectly sized to eat for even the littlest one, sweet and so good for you on top of that. On one of his business drives Hubby discovered a blueberry farm not far away from us and last Sunday morning we ventured out there.

It was a perfect little trip. Big fun picking your own berries... 

... and nibble all along the way.

That's just the best way to eat them - fresh, ripe and raw.

Perfect as they are.

... or make Fudgy Wudgy Blueberry Brownies:

(vegan recipe link here)

(I used "perfect" three times in this post, but couldn't think of another way to describe it just as it was... perfect)

Harvest Time

This week I will show you some of the fresh produce in our garden and elsewhere that we are very much enjoying right now. Starting off with my favourite fruit of the moment - figs.

Sweet, succulent and sexy - 

they are something I am looking forward to in late summer.

Pink Moment of the Week

... new pink corduroy jeans to sparkle up the coming fall.

Vegan Progress

I was really amazed when I went to Oldenburg's main bookstore the other day. Just there to get a present (a pumpkin cookbook) for a friend's birthday, an unexpected vegan section caught my eye. No, catching my eye is too soft an expression... totally hit me... in a very pleasant way.

3 shelves of books about veganism and vegan cookbooks (one raw).

Shudder, shudder, and that's meat.

Pink Moment of the Week

... in Clara's room, finger knitting with a friend.

(wondering why it was so quiet)

Handmade Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka is too hot to knit, in my experience. I preferred meditatively staring at the rotating fan at rest times. And I didn't see anybody knit, either. But I kept my eyes open and found these crochet flowers on display in Colombo's YWCA:

So Sri Lanka might not be a lot about yarn and knitting needles, but I saw a couple of sewing machines. Old sewing machines:

Still in use by their proud owners - "It's a Singer!" they assured me.

And not only sewing machines - oddly, Singer seems to be all over Sri Lanka from furniture to financing.

Pink Moments of Sri Lanka

pink dragon fruit

mosquito nets

tuk-tuk time

colourful sarees

a currency with a butterfly on it - the Sri Lankan rupee (20 rupees are 11 €-cents)

our favourite drink and snack - king coconuts (we had about 10 each day)

Clara on safari

not pink, but awesome - catcouch on a surfboard for the first time

Not Bali, not Thailand, but...

Travel Quiz

We are off traveling for the next weeks, a hint about our destination is this drawing by a child from the country we go to. And it's tropical!

Have a great July yourselves!