WIP Wednesday update

Things have been a bit slow this week. I was exhausted at the end of last week - some bad nights, busy days, plus an all-day conference with a 5 am start and a late conference dinner on Friday meant that by Saturday morning I was feeling ill with exhaustion. As if the boys sensed that I desperately needed some rest, when we got back from their swimming lessons around lunchtime they all went upstairs and played happily for about an hour while I rested on the sofa. I even had a little nap! When I got up I felt marginally better and was able to admire the beautiful den they built together. :)

Still, being so busy all week and so exhausted at the weekend meant that I didn't get a lot done this week. There has been some gentle crocheting on the weekender blanket and I've made some progress on Totoro. Boy #3 was delighted when he realised what I was making and all three of them wanted to watch My Neighbour Totoro again on Sunday. I'm quite looking forward to finishing the little fella myself now!

I do have an almost-FO to show for though - the pegloom rug is off the loom! It's not quite finished because I have a bit of sewing in to do and I need to tidy up its overall appearance a bit. There are quite a few bits of fabric sticking out, plus all those loose threads, and I also need to trim the tassles, but otherwise it's all done. It weighs a ton!

As you can see, it's already been put to good use!

I've braided the ends to keep them neat, but it makes the fabric strips 'bulge' a bit in-between. I may sew them in to make the ends neater.

The boys really want to keep it in the living room, but I'm not sure yet. They like to sit there and play or watch TV and have a snack or they carry drinks through when I'm not looking, and unless they change their habits I really don't think they are ready for a rug - the last one we had was trashed after about a year!! Of course this one should be washeable, but that doesn't mean that it would easily wash. It's too big to fit into a washing machine, so I would have to bring it to the drycleaners.

I'm still pretty busy this week, but it's the Easter break now so there won't be any teaching, which is already a relief - just to have the chance to catch up a bit and work ahead to get things sorted for the remaining teaching weeks after the Easter break makes me feel a bit better. Still, it's been a hard term, this one...

I'm still feeling very tired, but hopefully I'll get round to some more crafting this week. I'm looking forward to it. For now, have some Easter craft to admire:

 Boy #2 made this card at school:

I've found a few minutes here and there to bring a bit of Easter spirit into the house too:



Some twigs from the garden - hopefully the flower buds will open. I have no idea what that shrub is called (we didn't plant it) but it has beautiful yellow blooms around Easter time). The picture of the flower (with written descriptions of the individual parts) was done by boy #1 at school.

Some Easter chicks - they don't look half as nice as in the magazine where I saw them, but I didn't have any round safety eyes to complete the look. Still, they are cute enough I suppose...

Shared with:

A Year of Projects

Yarn Along

Keep Calm Craft On

Stitch Along Wednesday

Peglooming...

I need to tell you about another thing I've  been up to during my prolonged silence... I've been peg-looming! 

You might remember that for Christmas D gave me a beautiful peg loom that he'd made himself. Although I wanted to start a rug there and then I didn't want to rush into this project without considering:

a) the size of the rug

b) the right materials (the string to use, the fabrics)

c) that I had enough fabric

d) where to work on this presumably quite lengthy and also quite bulky project

e) a good time to start the project so it wouldn't languish in the corner of the room, half-finished because of other more pressing commitments

I did fairly well with most of these points. I waited until I had enough waste fabric (the moment came when our childminder arrived with 2 bin bags full of old bed linen that she had sorted out and offered to me for use in the rug), I sourced and bought enough strong string, I considered the size of the rug that I wanted, I found that the dining room table was ideal for the task, and that when not in use the project could be rolled up and tucked away quite nicely against the wall of the dining room. The only thing I wasn't so great on was timing. 

Of course this is not usually my strong point, so this is not too surprising. 

That said, this rug-weaving is a lot quicker than I anticipated. 

It's also quite messy. The dining room isn't looking its best... 

The boys thought it was hilarious and they played 'cave' under all those sheets all day (believe it or not, there is a boy under there...). Ocasionally one of them crawled out and helped me rip strips of fabric. I think they quite enjoyed the fact that they were allowed to rip fabric to pieces...

Bus as I said, it's fairly quick as a project. This picture was taken a couple of hours after I started:

I at least waited until a relatively free weekend about three weeks ago to start this. It's not finished yet, but I suspect that if I hadn't been quite so busy these past few weeks it would be finished by now. It's taken an insane amount of fabric, but I'd like the rug to be nice and thick (this has the added bonus of really squishing that fabric together so you can't really identify all those ugly 1980s sheets anymore!).

I anticipate another two or three hours of work on it before it's done.