Sucker Pun(ch)

With the slightly insane dramatic commitments I mentioned in a previous post, I have got into a bad habit of not eating properly, and just chomping something whilst walking between rehearsals (I hope my mother isn't reading this, she would be horrified!). As a result, I have now become something of an international expert on the Marks and Spencer sandwich selection. I was in the queue there today, when I spotted these sweets, realised their name was a play on words, and bought them without a second thought, even though I really don't like rock. I can never resist a pun.

Cambridge. Autumn. Pretty.

By the end of this term I shall have acted in three plays. Last night Play #1 ended, and we celebrated until the morning birds began to sing. Today, all my poor, pickled little brain can manage is to bring you is some soothing shots of Cambridge prettiness.

Because this place is only ever so slightly bigger than a postage stamp, many of its glories are piled on top of each other in a higgledy-piggledy fashion, and can be espied peeping over walls, through cloisters, or between rooftops.

On the subject of walls, I have enjoyed watching this one transmogrify from this...

... into this.

Sometimes I do feel a little hemmed in by Cambridge, physically and figuratively. There have been several periods during my six years here when I thought I couldn't wait to flee escape to metropolitan excitement (which in my mind was an ever-changing carousel replete with glamorous bars, yarn shops, boutiques, coffee houses, theatre book shops, haberdashers with every shade of velvet ribbon etc.). Undergraduate terms are so short here that it was hard to form an attachment to the place as a home rather than some sort of academic holiday camp.

For various reasons, though, I decided to prolong my stay, and I have more or less come to terms with my decision. I think I might occasionally blog about nice things to see and do here, to ward of fits of anti-Cambridge grumps. After all, there are far worse places to live, really.

Where do you keep yours?

I awoke this morning to find a big, crafty mess sprawling across my desk. Ugh. It looked like some elves had had a debauched embroidery party, and not bothered to clean up after themselves. Disgusting. I tidied the debris away into here:

This is not the best 'storage solution', I know, and it is most likely I will need another if my floss collection continues to grow. Until it does, though, I am delighted to be able to use my beloved vintage Turkish Delight box, a birthday gift from a few years ago. Edward Said would doubtless have had much to say about its flagrant orientalism, and of course its crude caricatures of a lascivious, pampered gentleman and a promiscuous maiden might be seen as offensive. Personally, however, I am spellbound by this glimpse of an imaginary East. It seems to make sense of Edmund's decision to betray his siblings in return for Turkish Delight The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. I was having a conversation with a friend a few days ago about how we had both built up a mental image of the confectionary from that book, and been most disappointed with the real thing, rather like the protagonist of 'Araby' from James Joyce's The Dubliners. I suspect this box may once have contained dreams along with Turkish Delight, and so it seems a fitting receptacle for the materials to give my imagination play.

To return to the title of this post, do you keep you crafty supplies anywhere interesting?

Mojo, mojo, wherefore art thou, knitting mojo?

Late last night whilst circumnavigating the internet, I stumbled across a whole new archipelago of stitching inspiration, which I shall name The Embroidery Blogs Islands. For those interested, you can find a lot of them through Feeling Stitchy. I started a little something today, which you can see a sneaky peek of above.

I bumped into someone I hadn't seen in a while in the street today, and he asked me 'How's the knitting going?'. Suddenly I felt rather shifty, and replied 'Uh... fine. But look at this embroidery I have in my bag!' The truth is that I just haven't felt the urge to knit recently. This has been a most peculiar experience, as normally my brain resembles a speed-dating service between patterns and yarns, trying to match up a large number of both, and my fingers usually have to knit ever faster to keep pace with its voracious demands. I suspect this lack of mojo may be the result of knitting a whole lot of stocking stitch in black yarn. While I love the way my Audrey in Unst is shaping up, I must confess that I am really looking forward to finishing it. The potential for free-styling with embroidery is a welcome relief from the rather dreary certainty that I can't even pretend to have finished with one half-sleeve and one sleeve cap done. It is also quite exciting to be able to veer off in a different direction, using a different colour, without the need to resort to the dreaded intarsia.

Do you have a craft you use to have a little holiday from another craft? Do you have any tips for coaxing my poor mojo back in from the cold? I'd love to hear from you on the subject!

Turquoise and Tripod: daily outfit #4

How close shall I stand to this thing? This close?

Hmm... no, I want to be able to see my outfit, not the individual pores on my face. How about this?

Sigh. Clearly this tripod thing is going to take a little bit of getting used to. If you can make me out amid the 'arty' blur, I am wearing:

Hat: Rose Red Beret, my own work

Cardigan: Liesl, my own work

Dress: Urban Outfitters

Tights: Marks and Spencer

Shoes: Office

My cousin gave me this necklace several years ago, to wear to be her bridesmaid. The stone is a black opal, and I was and am entranced by it. I remember being mystified by the popularity of diamonds, which in my fourteen-year-old opinion could not hope to compete with the fire and intensity of the opal's shifting colours.

I had always thought that opals were supposed to be unlucky, but after a few minutes of serious, interwebz-based research I have discovered that this is in fact a fairly recent superstition, which seems to date from the publication in 1829 of Walter Scott's Anne of Geierstein. Hermione, one of the characters in the book, wears a beautiful and mysterious opal talisman, which she guards carefully. One day, a drop of holy water splashes onto it; 'the opal... shot out a brilliant spark like a failing star, and became the instant afterwards lightless and colourless as a common pebble', while its wearer is reduced to 'a handful of light grey ashes, like such as might have been produced by burning fine paper.' I have just dabbed a cautious drop of water onto mine, and am pleased to report no fatal consequences.

Rainy Day Blues

I would have shown you an outfit today had I and it not got absolutely drenched walking to and from the library. Instead I am going to have a soothing bath with this:

... and this:

Coraline down a lane: daily outfit #3

Blouse: Uniqlo

Cardigan: Coraline, my own work

Belt: Topshop

Skirt: Radio Days vintage shop, Lower Marsh, London SE1

Shoes: Office vintage

Looking at myself squinting into the afternoon sunlight, I'm still not entirely sure about this outfit - is it a little too busy? It was an attempt to pick on some of the many delectable colours in this skirt (close-up below). I made Coraline a little on the cropped side, which makes it the ideal partner to anything high-waisted. This cardigan is a bit of an autumnal winner, warm yet lightweight.

I am so in love with the print of this skirt, in particular those little outlined, uncoloured flowers, hinting perhaps at a forgetful botanist wandering off for a cup of tea from a thermos and leaving this sketch unfinished.