More pickles (because we love them)

Sunday afternoon at our house means two things: cheese and pickles.  We are completely addicted - smoked cheddar, blue castello, often a brie or a camembert.  And the pickles: sometimes gherkins, sometimes onions, sometimes both.  Making your own pickled onions is actually quite simple if you can find small onions, and they work out quite tasty too.

The most difficult part of the process is peeling all the onions.  I recommend wearing ski goggles for this part.  No, really.  This is not a task for the un-masked.  Then brine the onions overnight.

Give the onions a good rinse the next day.  At the same time, make heat a mix of vinegar and your chosen spices.  We like to use apple cider vinegar for its flavour, and a mix of ground allspice, mustard and a bit of brown sugar .  Let this mix cool.

Pop your onions into sterlized jars along with bay leaves, slices of chilli and peppercorns.  Then pour the cooled vinegar and spice mix into the jars and seal.  The onions will be ok to eat after a few weeks, but to get really pickley ones I recommend leaving them for about a month... if you can resist!

The socks are finished!

The good news is that the slow/fast socks are finished!  Yay!  What I hadn't mentioned before is that these socks were actually a gift for a friend of mine - hence the hurry at the end to get them finished.  I'm really happy with how they turned out, and I think I've figured out a knitting pattern that I really like - I will try to write it all out and share it here soon.

In other news, another of my colleagues is off to have a baby this week, and so I crocheted some face washers in soft organic cotton as a small gift.  I crocheted into the back of the stitch to give a ribbed effect - looks pretty neat, huh?

A Teeny Tiny Beanie

There seems to be loads of women at my work who are pregnant at the moment.  And while I'm trying not to stand too close for fear that it is catching (joking), I am enjoying making all sorts of cute little gifts as their maternity leave time approaches.  This week another work friend of mine is off to have a little one, so I whipped up this tiny crochet beanie (gender neutral as I didn't know if it will be a boy or a girl).

I took the opportunity to try out making a fork pom pom.  This is a good technique to use for making very small pom poms.  This is how I did it:

Start with your yarn between the tines (spokes) of your fork and start to wind the yarn around.

Continue winding about 50 times.  Then tie a second piece of yarn tightly between your middle tines.

Slip the bundle off the end of the fork and cut the looped sides open.

You'll then have a flat pom pom.  Just roll it around in your hands to make it fluffy!

I still can't get over the size of newborn attire.  I always doubt that this could possibly fit on someone's head! But usually it ends up being too big.

Also, thanks everyone for your ethical fabric recommendations.  I have updated the link list on my blog (on the right side).  I also went and checked out all the links and now I have a terrible itch to go and buy new fabric!  Please keep your recommendations coming in for eco, fair-trade or otherwise ethical fabric so that I can continue to grow the list.

Cheers!

On choosing ethical fabric

Today I started cutting out a new pattern - the very excellent looking Pleated Pants from Papercut Patterns (here's hoping mine turn out just as excellent).  The fabric is nothing special - cheap suiting from one of those large chain fabric stores.  I went into the store to find a colour fasting product (which they didn't have) and came out with two metres of this fabric for around $4 per metre.


As I cut into the fabric I had mixed feelings.  One of the main reasons I make my own clothes is because of the horrible effects that the fashion industry often has on people, animals and the environment.  By making my own clothes I know that no one has been treated unethically in the process, and there was no packaging or shipping needed.  But the problem is that I'm still making these clothes from fabric that I don't know the origin of.

Who produced this fabric?  In which country?  Were they paid a fair wage?  Did the production of the fabric pollute a natural environment?  I have no idea.

It's sometimes difficult to find ethically made fabric - be it fair trade or environmentally friendly or both.  So I've decided to start a list of websites where ethical fabric can be bought - you can see it on the right side of my blog.  I'd love for you to share with me any companies that have ethical fabric - just comment here and I will add them to the list.

So far I have:

• Cloth fabric
• Ray-stitch
• Ink and Spindle

Some of these companies I have supported previously, others are new to me but I will make a real effort to support them in the future.

Do you know of others?  Please add them here!

Please share any ethical fabric websites that you know of!

Cute boots!

Check out these cute boots!  I made them for a work friend who is going on maternity leave soon (or rather, I made them for the little one who will be arriving next month).  I saw this pattern on the lovely (and also expecting) Veronica Darling's Pinterest board and knew that my friend would like them, so I picked up the pattern from I Think Sew and whipped them up last weekend.

I chose a maroon corduroy and grey felt from my stash (I figured the felt would be extra soft and cozy for baby toes).  The boots open and close with velcro, which I suspect is much easier than fiddling around with buttons when it comes to little people, and the buttons on the outside are decorative.

It's such a cute pattern, and with a few of my friends due to have babies soon, I suspect it will get good use!

Cropped Jacket

You can all be very proud of me... I got myself over my sewing 'hump' and finished my cropped jacket.

I bought this pattern from Salme Patterns a few weeks back, and bought two types of fabric to try it in.  One, a heavy blue-ish grey fabric with a bit of stretch and a bit of sparkle, and the other a purpley jersey.  I started with the former, happily cutting and sewing, thinking to myself "this is too easy!  I'll have this finished in a couple of hours!"

Alas, I got caught on a tricky bit of the pattern - a mitred corner in the front of the lapel.  The instructions were like reading origami ("you want me to put which bit where?" "this doesn't look like the picture!") so I took the pattern and half finished jacket along to Browls (otherwise known as "stitchy night") to ask some fellow stitchers.  Between three of us we were able to figure it out, and thankfully I came home and finished the jacket.  Really, this was the only tricky element, and the rest of the pattern was quite simple to read.

The jacket itself has come together very well - look at how nicely the shoulder sits with the lapel and all.  I think it will get worn for work and play, which is something I have been wanting more of in my wardrobe recently.

Preserves

Today I would have liked to show you the cropped jacket I've been working on recently.  Sadly, I recently hit a snag when I couldn't figure out one of the origami-like instructions, and my jacket-making came grinding to a halt.  I have since figured out the mystery instruction with the help of some of my stitchy night crew (also affectionately know as the Browls, as in like, Brown Owls), alas, my sewing mojo has not yet returned.  Soon, I keep telling myself, soon.

With no inkling for sewing, I continued knitting my slow/now fast socks and again spent some time in the kitchen.  This weekend's bounty included lemon marmalade (with a hint of ginger) and pickled beetroot.
 

 

I absolutely love pickled and preserved goods, and I have always have good stock of glass jars ready to be filled should I have a glut of fruit or veg that need the preserving treatment before they go bad.

Next post: a finished cropped jacket.  Hopefully.