miss marie's miscellany

In a pickle

It's been a good year for courgettes but there are only so many of them one can eat before a mountain of them start to take over the kitchen! I've been looking for some different ways to use them up and happened upon this brilliant recipe. It uses up quite a stack of courgettes and the smell is heavenly. I didn't have exactly the same spices as the recipe; I improvised and used cumin seeds, fennel seeds, black onion seeds, mustard seeds, pink peppercorns and chilli flakes.

I'm looking forward to tasting them, once they have matured a little!

Sunset

There've been some beautiful skies in the evenings lately

This was on Sunday evening........one of those times when you're glad you had your camera with you :-)

Cool and cooler

More African flowers on the go lately, I like this pattern a lot as the possibilities of colour combinations are endless and delightful. I usually favour what I'd call cool colours ie not too bright, but I thought I should get out of my comfort zone and spice it up

I bought these vividly coloured yarns when I visited Liverpool in this fantastic Aladdin's cave of a shop, well worth visiting if you are in Merseyside or North Wales, or you can order online too. I really couldn't decide if they worked or if I was completely mad to try pink, yellow and orange together. but I'm glad now that I went against my instinct. It is bright and summery and the black edging brings it all together IMO.

Just for a cooler contrast, I made some in a different colour mood; there is a bright pink along with pale pink, turquoise/green and white, again edged with black.

Although the green and bright pink are pretty vivid on their own, the combination with the 2 paler shades gives a more spring like palette.

I like them both, the first is very uplifting on a wet cold windy day like it is here in Glasgow today, and the second is soothing on a hot sunny day like it was on Tuesday in Glasgow........yep, it's the good old British Summer, feels like Autumn today and a couple of days ago I was roasting myself in the garden!!

 

July 2011

July was a pretty good month, and even if the weather was a little variable, there've been a lot of sunny, hot days; I'm not a great sun lover but even a pale person like me needs some brightness and warmth!. I had time to chill out and do some thinking about what happens next, there were quite a few birthdays of family and friends, and I visited my hometown of Liverpool, which is where I took this month's photo, down at the Pier Head where there were celebrations for the centenary of the famous Liver Buildings. It was a beautiful evening and the sky looked amazing, as you can see.  Happy times :-)

  

Super arty Liverpool

3 years ago when Liverpool was the European City of Culture, one of the art installations I really loved were the Super Lamb Banananas, strangely named and beautifully decorated sculptures which looked like lambs with banana shaped backs and tails. They were dotted around the city and brought a vibrant touch of colour and texture to the street. There was even a SLB trail which you could follow all over Liverpoool and view all 125 sculptures.. When I visited last week, I ran into a few of them which seem to have re-appeared.........here's a Klimt-inspired one near to the Liver Building

Next to the river

The next 2 are outside the new Museum of Liverpool

 This is the Heroes SLB.....looks lovely with the poppies 

And this mosaic patterned one is inside the museum, it's the Mandala SLB.

I think they're beautiful and fun, and they really do put a smile on your face!

 

 

Dreaming

At the weekend, I took my dad out for a spin to visit an interesting piece of art in St Helens.  When we arrived, we entered the gates and very shortly after, saw 2 deer running around ahead of us......definitely a good omen! We walked through grassy meadows with a gentle ascent

till we turned a corner and saw this

It's called 'Dream'

This sculpture by Spanish artist Jaume Piensa, is on the site of the Sutton Manor colliery, which closed in 1991. It's there as a tribute to the mining tradition of the area, as a landmark and to mark a place of natural beauty and peace.

It's visible from the M62 motorway, apparently seen by 100.00 motorists a day.

It's 20 metres high; very imposing, but also beautiful and hypnotic, in my opinion. I like the way it is totally accessible to visitors; you can go right up to it and touch it if you want.

The statue really gives what is already a natural and peaceful area,  a tangible feeling of rest and stillness.

A lovely way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

 

 

 

Flower power

Much flowery hooking going on in these parts of late, I've been making lots of the ones I showed you in my last post. They just kept on multiplying till I had quite a stack of them. Enough for some floral decorating.........

Voila!

I used some of my stash of Scottish lambs wool in fuchsia pink and scarlet and used 2 different sizes of hook,  3.5 and 4,  just to give a small variety in the flowers; it's hardly noticeable, but I like the non-uniformity of size, much as you would get in a real garden.

i initially was going to make a long crocheted chain to join them together but it just didn't look right and the flowers were decidedly droopy........not good! So I threaded them onto some white cord and it's worked a treat; the flowers have their heads held high and they can be moved along the cord to wherever looks good and they stay put.....result.

I've put it in my Etsy and Foksy shop; please feel free to pop over there and take a look!

I really like this flower pattern, and wondered how it would look in some different colours?

I think they're all lovely, and the possibilities to use them in different projects are many..........so, yes, there will be lots more flowery items being made. Perfect for summer!

 

 

 

What's hooking?

A lovely lazy week spent pottering at home has been just the tonic for me, with the bonus of some hot and sunny weather to top it off nicely. I've done a lot of hooking, playing around with some ideas and patterns.

Some old favourites in a pink, purple and white colour scheme

These are going to end up as a blanket, finishing soon, I hope.

Something for Christmas maybe, just thinking ahead!

I have to block these as the ends of the points are not behaving, but I think they'll look great, a long garland of these in different colours would be very festive!

And last but not least, something pretty, in summery pinks and red

and raspberry and turquoise

I really love these flowers (pattern in Erika Knight's book Crochet Stitch motifs). It's an easy pattern to follow and they don't take long to make. As the weather is a bit changeable today, I'm staying put and will carry on making my pile of flowers grow a bit bigger!

Happy weekend!

Daily snapshot:6

Today I take you into my purple shed for a look at what's happening in there.

A bit of a pink and red theme going on in there on the desk today, with a shades of pink granny square being helped along by a lovely glass of rose with my red iPod playing some mellow tunes! Also a bit of magazine reading going on, a new to me publication Mollie Makes, which I'll save to talk about once I've read it from cover to cover.

Daily snapshot:5

Sunset from my bedroom window tonight.