yarnstorm

Living for today

I went out to buy multi-purpose potting compost and came home with this Midwinter set and an art deco drinks cabinet for £40 from a hospice shop. The tea-set I can justify as I've wanted this exact one for years after seeing it in Living etc and it will, of course, be an excellent design for a tea and cake embroidery. The drinks cabinet...mmmm...maybe I can use it to store my fabric stash and the odd bottle of Madeira and my secret bars of Green & Black's white chocolate.

I made a pavlova on Sunday and was left with lots of eggs yolks, so then decided to make lemon curd. This is the yellowest, lemoniest curd I've ever had, made from a Nigella recipe (take 8 eggs etc etc). So then I had to make lemon curd tarts, and they look so nice with the tea-set that it seems a shame to eat them. But this hasn't stopped the children.

I had a wonderful parcel from Alison yesterday. This was an incredibly generous and thoughtful thank you for a favour I did.

She sent one of her lovely basket bags which will be just perfect for taking my sewing kit wherever I go this summer as we have ascertained that my button pincushion will fit perfectly into the basket. There was some great Japanese stationery which Alison said we could fight over. (This issue has still not been resolved and Phoebe, Alice and I are at stale-mate.) And she put in the most amazing book of Japanese bag designs - lots of felt and beads and colour and and embroidery and simplicity. How ever did she know I'd love it?

The compost remains unpurchased. But as Scarlett O'Hara would say, tomorrow is another day.

Happy days

It's quiet here today without the ladies to occupy my hands and brain. Florence and Cynthia have gone to the Royal Academy's Summer Show and Muriel and Verity are on an autoroute bound for Provence. (There's a group photo at the end of this post.)

But plenty's happening in their absence. I've planted out tomatoes and chillies in Phoebe's patch, finished the sewing on the fruit embroidery, started my second Clapotis and read a book. I've had some great stuff in the post, too.

Julie Arkell very kindly sent me her recommendations for New York - better than any Time Out guide (and on a par with Regina the Concierge's - thanks Regina). She also invited me to the Private View of her new exhibition which, ironically, is on the day I fly to New York.

I've just finished Lady Rose and Mrs Memmary by Ruby Ferguson, published by Persephone. It's a wonderfully beguiling and then shattering read, and is so much more than it first appears to be. I've also re-read Mariana by Monica Dickens, again from Persephone, because I didn't enjoy it the first time, reckoned I'd missed something, and now realise I didn't. It's just not for me. But still a beautiful book to hold, as are all the Persephone books with their lovely end-papers taken from period textile designs. I'm now on to Hetty Dorval by Ethel Wilson and already captivated.

I've been meaning to write about Juju's amazing beaded jewellery. For the last two or three summers Juju has made me a couple of lariats so now I have quite a collection. Her style evolves each year and I just give her a colour idea then I wait and see what she sends. This is her wonderful take on a lime green specification.

The ladies would love some of that, I'm sure. And here's a group photo of the quartet. I went to photograph them and discovered that they had been to their style guru, Phoebe, who had raided the wardrobe I made at Marilyn's. Trinny and Susannah had better watch out.

 

Cynthia Cecilia

Cynthia Cecilia is Florence Margery's best friend. She went to a rather grand girls' boarding school and met Florence when their children were young. Cynthia is a large girl ('big boned' the tactless gym teacher told her during the excruciating, public weigh-ins that blighted the start of every term) and has never fully forgiven her parents for giving her the initials C.C. which have been used ever since to tease her about her size and intake of alcohol.

Cynthia is a Bohemian. She trained as a classical harpist, but now sells her oil-paintings (mainly of hens and geraniums) to galleries in English coastal towns. Johnny, her husband, no longer 'bothers' her, which is just as well since that course of HRT upset her figure and her hair. She likes to cultivate the gypsy free spirit that was so long suppressed by children and private education, and wears close-fitting beaded cloche hats and wild Venetian glass earrings. She has a dressing-room full of vintage accessories, including several boas which once belonged to duchesses.

 

Cynthia re-reads DH Lawrence's novels every summer and will not hear a word against his overblown sex scenes featuring outsize women's thighs. She dreams of 'taking a lover' like Lady Chatterley, but Johnny plays golf with the gardener, so that wouldn't do.

Cynthia uses whatever perfume is on offer in Harrods and drinks copious amounts of wine from wine-boxes. Quantity, not quality, is her by-word when it comes to alcohol. However, she has expensive tastes in chocolates, preferring violet and rose creams from Prestat in a heart-shaped box tied with a satin bow.

While Muriel and Verity are away on their Grand Tours of Europe, she and Florence rarely get further than the kitchen table and a box of Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon. The pair are regularly put to bed by their children and both keep paracetamol next to their beds for the morning. They know they are destined to grow old disgracefully together.

Verity Rose

   

Verity Rose is Muriel Fay's best friend. They met when they were in the Upper Thirds at the girls' high school. Both were scholarship girls (Florence, Muriel's sister, had her scholarship taken away after some shenanigans by the school railings with a grammar school boy).

Verity recently retired as a librarian, but her wardrobe has not changed. She insists on wearing hand-knitted scarves (or 'mufflers' as she call them) in all weathers, and collects vintage Czech glass beads in the shapes of fruit and vegetables which she wears as buttons. Her hat is a relic from her first pay cheque and has been re-confectioned many times since. She remains faithful to Coty L'Aimant after all these years.

 

Her ne'er-do-well husband disappeared years ago for a new life in Bolivia, and since then she and Muriel have enjoyed many coach holidays with groups of ladies visiting the gardens of Italy and France. At weekends they plan their visits to English gardens in the Yellow Book with a precision that makes Florence snort.

Verity Rose has been known to steal cuttings from the gardens she visits and she always carries a small pocket knife for this purpose. (She rather enjoyed the recent resultant frisking by a handsome Italian customs officer.) Her heroine is Vita Sackville-West whose Sissinghurst garden inspired her white window-box. Verity rarely drinks but, if pressed, requests a Pastis. She hates the taste, but it does make her feel like a sophisticated woman of the world. Although she adores Dickens (she recognises her kinship with Miss Tox in Dombey & Son), she did manage to read most of the romantic fiction on the shelves in her library. She also harbours an undisclosed passion for Mark Rothko canvases.

This week the pair set off with thirty other ladies for a ten-day tour of the gardens of Provence. They may even share a bottle of rose after their Pastis.

Hands on

I've been putting the finishing touches to Muriel Fay's best friend, Verity Rose. I'll introduce her very soon.

It's been a busy day here doing things like exterminating whole armies (squadrons?) of flying ants which have been invading all day because of the heat. I'm in danger of mudldling up the ant powder with icing sugar and their dead bodies with currants. Mmmm, lovely.

I made these little rose cakes for the children, one of whom is already in and eating. I used her as my hand model and the photo makes her look like a new version of the Addams Family Thing. I brought the cake tin all the way back from Williams-Sonoma in New York last year - it weighed almost as much as the rest of my luggage put together. But it was worth it as when you dust the cakes with icing sugar all the rose petals are revealed.

And now I have to get the other Things from school.

Muriel Fay

Meet Muriel Fay, Florence Margery's sister (they are secretly proud of sharing the same initials reversed). Muriel may appear older than Florence, but in fact she is two years younger. She is somewhat spinsterish and lives frugally like the heroines in her beloved Barbara Pym novels. She favours neat collars and a rather tight perm which she has set every week, and has used the same shade of Rimmel lipstick since she was seventeen. Her three-carat diamond earrings were bequeathed to her by their Great Aunt Agatha and are her only sartorial excess. (Click on photo for a close-up of her perm and Asprey diamonds)

Florence, on the other hand, sold her inherited jewellery and squandered the money on wine and bath salts. She embarrasses her grown-up children  by dressing flamboyantly and flaunting her child-bearing hips. She is off to Glastonbury this weekend (with feather boa) which will prompt her offspring to phone Aunt Muriel to share their mutual disapproval.

Despite their many differences, the sisters do share a love of Pre-Raphaelite art. Muriel wishes she had been alive to meet, and fall in love with, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, while Florence likes to shock art-historians by telling them how much she adores Millais' later paintings.

 

Muriel does loosen up from time to time when she and Florence share a bottle of Manzanilla. In fact, today is one of those days, as Florence is excited about the festival and wants to get into the party mood. She may even be able to ply Muriel with enough alcohol to get her onto the trampoline to dislodge those curls.

Jane loves Basil

I grow basil in my study every year. It seems to be the best place in the house for it, and I love the smell when I'm in here. I have a very unorthodox way of growing basil which flies in the face of most horticultural advice, but it works brilliantly.

In May I sow the seeds (this is sweet basil) quite thickly on the surface of several large pots of multi-purpose potting compost. I cover them with clingfilm and place them in a warm, sunny position until the seeds germinate - usually only two to three days - when I remove the clingfilm. I then just let all of the seedlings grow and grow, and I end up with these vast swathes of basil which I can cut from as much as I like. I always water from the base and keep the soil relatively damp.  I never thin the seeds and I don't take the pots outside because I hate greenfly and whitefly in my food, and basil seems to attract them. These pots last several months and many meals, and look great on my windowsill.

Florence Margery

This is Florence Margery (Florence to me, Margery to Phoebe). I started her at the weekend after I'd finished the mini-wardrobe and then added her top and tiara yesterday. She's completely hand-sewn, made out of two pieces from vintage, hand-embroidered tablecloths. She has a felt base, and is stuffed with kapok and a few Whitstable pebbles to stop her toppling over. She wears a hand-made tiara/crown with beads and shell sequins plus a demure necklace. She has been made in time to enjoy the English 'Season' - and is dressed accordingly. She may have arms and a bag added when I get round to it.

This is her rear and top. As you can see, she is very much at home surrounded by my sweet peas and nasturtiums.

I'd been wanting to have a go at making a really primitive doll for a while using some of my stash of old embroidered textiles. Florence M is inspired by a doll Marilyn made which she very kindly said I could use as a starting point.

She was quick and easy and very satisfying to make. I like this sort of freedom as I can add all the embellishments I like - and I do like embellishments - and not worry about edges and stitch neatness. I have more planned to use up all sorts of bits I have accumulated.

Florence Margery's crown is in the style of this one at Marilyn's made from sea glass and wire, modelled by an incredibly glamorous, if somewhat bald, dummy.

   

Back from the beach

Wonderful weekend at Marilyn's in Whitstable. The workshop was on memory boxes and Julie Arkell was the tutor. She makes whimsical little papier mache dolls and figures, and knits and sews outfits for them. They then go into their own boxes, again made by Julie.

Now I have to admit that papier mache is not my favourite medium, but I really enjoyed the whole memory theme. I did make and cover a box in pages from a Famous Five book, but didn't do the doll bit. Instead, I made a wardrobe to hold the type of clothes I wished I'd had as a child. So the jumper above is covered in sequins and beads. The one below is knitted in Kureyon because all the hand-knitted jumpers I had when I was little were in such dreary colours.

I also made my ideal dirndl skirt which would have had this velvet ribbon and, again, sequins and beads on a bright floral print.

And every girl needs a posh haute couture frock with lemon velvet ribbon:

The jumpers are 3"-4" long and the skirt is about 5" long and they hang from tailor-made coat-hangers.

I'm not terribly happy with the wardrobe, but here it is anyway to give you an idea of the concept. Ignore the knitting needle which is just a temporary measure.

The sun blazed and we crafted and ate and talked and drank. We had real Battenberg cake and dozens of tea breaks, breakfast on the deck just yards from the sea, and lots of laughs. I feel totally restored.

And here are two shots of Marilyn's kitchen which go some way to explaining the magic.

Something for the weekend III