Tutorial Thursdays Linky Party #103

Can I just say "Thank you, Thank you, Thank you" to all you wonderful people who link up their amazing crafts week for week.

Last week we crossed the 100 link up mark and ended up with a total of 103 links!

Isn't that amazing?

It is so wonderful to visit all that talent :)

Talking of the number 103, I was wondering to myself just how long I have been hosting Tutorial Thursdays - it has been nearly 2 years - and guess what number party this is?

You better believe it - Link up number 103!

We are in for another fun-filled, talent-stacked month - I can't wait!

This month there is no theme, and no feature. 

Feel free to link up all your crafts below.

I look forward to visiting all of the links I find below.

If you want a button for your side bar - here you go:

<div align="center">
<a href="http://www.marigoldsloft.com" title="Marigolds' Loft"><img src="http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i51/marigoldsloft/button-3.jpg" alt="Marigolds' Loft" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

An InLinkz Link-up

Felting Friday FO

Today was my last day in our Weaving studio at work and so I thought it would be nice to share the project which I managed to finish up there today with you all.

These are my felted slippers.

I love knitting these, and I love that they don't look like the "ordinary" felted slippers.

Thank you to all of you who posted on Wednesday about the kittens.

It has been a rough two days.

The kittens were not drinking and we had to bottle feed them.

This too hasn't been the biggest success and unfortunately one little kitty died in the early hours of this morning and another passed away just before noon today :(

We are pinning all our hopes on baby number 3 who has been drinking (only very little though) and we are hoping to be able to strengthen the baby enough that it has a fighting chance.

We are still deep in the woods and it is very touch and go right now, but I will keep you updated.

I wish you all a productive, relaxing weekend.

x

I will be sharing this post with my Friday ladies :)

Tutorial Thursdays Linky Party

This is the last Link up for this month and will be open for another couple of days...

This month there is no theme, and no feature. 

Feel free to link up all your crafts below.

I look forward to visiting all of the links I find below.

If you want a button for your side bar - here you go:

<div align="center">
<a href="http://www.marigoldsloft.com" title="Marigolds' Loft"><img src="http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i51/marigoldsloft/button-2.jpg" alt="Marigolds' Loft" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

An InLinkz Link-up

Wow Wednesday!

This has been quite an exciting and anxious Wednesday!

Let me start off with the adorable, scary news!

Our Mommy kitty had her litter of 3 this morning. Here they are:

Aren't they adorable?

Mommy kitty was so brave and gave birth really amazingly considering this is her first litter.

They all seemed good and well, and we gave them their space. A couple of hours in I noticed that none of the kittens had been drinking, and so hubby and I tried to help the kitties get to their teats.

Mommy kitty seems to only have one teat which is filled and kitty number 1 has dibs on that one!

I have been feeding mommy - and she is eating like there is no tomorrow - but there just doesn't seem to be enough milk to go around! Kitties 2 and 3 seem to be very weak and even though we tried to introduce them to the working teat, they don't want to drink!

Hubby has rushed off to the vet to go and get the necessary tools we will need to hand-rear the kittens as the time is becoming critical.

Please keep these little ones in your thoughts for the night as I am guessing it will be a bottle-filled experience! Thank you kindly. x

I will keep you updated :)

My WIP for this week:

My Bolero is growing nicely and I have just started to cast on for the sleeves.

I am hoping to have this finished by next Friday as I have just over a week before we go on holiday and I would like to take this with me for the cool evenings on the beach.

Reading: I have started "The Lifeboat" and haven't read enough of it just yet to give you an opinion. 

I have started to update our Homesteading blog again and will be starting by introducing you to our bees. 

I would love it if you came over for a visit- Holistic Homesteading

What are you busy working on and reading this week?

I will be sharing with all the wonderful Wednesday ladies

See you all soon

x 

Mexian Food is a Must in our Home!

A while ago I signed up for a Craftsy course and got the course - Mexican Street Food as an extra course for free.

The nice thing about stumbling into courses is that I find I almost enjoy those the most because it isn't a course that I possibly would have chosen myself.

I watched this course over a weekend and loved the ease with which Deborah Schneider taught me how to make various Salsas and Taco fillings.

Now if your family is like ours, you also eat Mexican dishes on a regular basis.

When I first started out making these dishes I would buy the kits, but over the years have moved away from those to widen my horizon and try my hand at handmade.

Thanks to this course, I now know how to make tacos from scratch (a couple of different kinds) as well as an array of salsas.

What caught my eye, was the pulled pork recipe - made with Coca Cola!

We are not a soft drink family at all - and I don't buy any kind of fizzy drinks, but I had to try this recipe.

I was fascinated by how it could possibly taste once done.

So off to the market I went to buy some Coke.

I made my pulled pork in my Crockpot instead of the oven.

Wow, it turned out wonderfully!

Kinda has a "Sticky Rib" kind of taste to it. 

The meat was wonderfully tender, and not sweet as I imagined it would be.

I haven't recreated all of her wonderful sounding recipes just yet, and the next one I will be attempting will be one or all of the Salsas.

My next big challenge is to find tomatillos! 

To my Swiss friends, do you possibly know where I could buy these?

I would really like to try them out!

They look like this apparently - almost like a green physalis:

If you are interested in seeing what this course is all about, you will be happy to know that it is on sale today - but you will need to hurry, the sale ends tomorrow!

   

I would love to hear how you find it, and how your food tasted :)

Have a yummy weekend.

x

Finally Finished :)

It is done :)
I have completed my multi-garment project for my Craftsy Course - Tunisian Crochet and have now officially completed the course!

I love it - it was so much fun to make and the colour combination turned out wonderfully too!

I would warmly recommend this course to any of you wanting to delve into the world of Tunisian Crochet.

Not only did I learn these amazing techniques, but I learnt how to use Colour palettes to enhance my projects colour combinations, and last but not least how to make twisted cord using a kitchen appliance ;)

What have you completed this week?

Last year, because I took part in the stash challenge, I managed to focus on the projects that had yarn already stashed for them.

Above you can see my other stash drawer (if you recall last year I managed to empty the first one of its contents - if you missed it you can still read about it HERE) As with most of my stash, it has all been bought with projects in mind.

This year I have been browsing - a little too much - and have managed to choose a selection of awesome projects, but projects nonetheless.

As such I put down hubby's pullover that I started at the end of last year in favour of smaller, easier projects, which ended up becoming bigger and more time intensive projects as time went by :O

As I mentioned on Wednesday, I have created a to-do list for the rest of this year and plan to get through as many of the projects as I can.

List of projects that are in my queue:

1. Hat for Jas
2. Crochet shorts 
3. Another Hat for Jas
4. Another Slouch for Kay
5. Julianna for me
6. Isis Wrap for me
7. Winter socks for Jas
8. Winter socks for Kay
9. 2 Pairs of socks for Kay
10. 2 Pairs of socks for Jas
11. 4 Pairs of socks for hubby
12. Hubby's Pullover
13. 2 pairs of socks for me
14. Rebel Lace Cardi
15. Wristlets for me
16. Wristlets for hubby

There even is another Craftsy course in there which I can't wait to start, but have forced myself to hold back on the materials I need for a little while at least, so that I can give the other projects a chance!

You may agree that it is quite a whack of projects, but I don't mind if they pour over into next year, as long as I get some of them completed along the way. If I can empty the drawer of its lovely woolly hoard along the way that will be a great bonus :) 

Do you have some stashed projects to complete?

A lovely smell of lunch almost done is wafting my way - I will tell you more about that tomorrow......

And with that I wish you all a lovely weekend.

x

Tutorial Thursdays Linky Party

Wow, isn't time flying by?
What have you created this week?

This month there is no theme, and no feature. 

Feel free to link up all your crafts below.

I look forward to visiting all of the links I find below.

If you want a button for your side bar - here you go:

<div align="center">
<a href="http://www.marigoldsloft.com" title="Marigolds' Loft"><img src="http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i51/marigoldsloft/button-2.jpg" alt="Marigolds' Loft" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

An InLinkz Link-up

New Project Wednesday!

Yay - A new project to share - always so much fun to have something new on the needles!

If you recall a while ago I made a bolero for Jas to go to her ball.

Well I tried it on once it was finished and decided my wardrobe also needed one of those! Especially in the cool summer evenings at the beach ;)

And so I cast on one for myself in "Apple-Green" - the colour in the image isn't exactly as it looks for real - it is more this colour:

I think it will be the perfect summer knit. 

I have so many projects that are in my queue at the moment that I have decided to make a to-do list to keep my self on track (and to prohibit myself from adding any new projects to the queue for a while!)

I will be posting this list on my Friday FO post this week so that I can remind myself what I still need to get done!

 How many projects do you still plan to get through in the remainder of this year?

Reading wise: I am still busy on Madame Tussaud, still enjoying it :)

I have a two books that are the next in line and one of them will be coming on holiday with me - so a beach read!

Which would you recommend as a holiday read?

The Lifeboat - Charlotte Rogan

The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini

I have also just found out that my cousin has written a novel!

As soon as I manage to get my hands on a copy I will tell you more :)

I will leave you with an image of my beautiful flowers that hubby gave me this week - yellow Echinacea:

Aren't they pretty?

Smell good too!

The yellow kind are apparently quite rare, so I am looking for a nice little place in the garden where they can feel at home.

Enjoy the rest of your week.

See you tomorrow.

x

T-Shirt Crazy

Finally, something to share with you all again on a Friday :)

This is these weeks FOs:

Jas and I did some T-Shirt sewing yesterday.

The top two are mix and match and the bottom two are Jas's shirts.

As you may see some of the sewing looks a bit off (the last dying breaths of my Pfaff - it is 25 years old, so I guess it was about time!)

Luckily I have a reserve machine so we still managed to finish them off.

These shirts are made from the Craftsy course I did a while back - that is what I love about Craftsy, you can go back over and over again :)

So once again the sewing bug has bitten me and I have got myself a new Craftsy sewing course:

But first I will need to make a plan with a sewing machine - hmmm, does Santa come by in August?

Have a good weekend.

x

Tutorial Thursdays Linky Party

Another week gone by :)
I am loving all the great links that have been linked up already.

This month there is no theme, and no feature. 

Feel free to link up all your crafts below.

I look forward to visiting all of the links I find below.

If you want a button for your side bar - here you go:

<div align="center">
<a href="http://www.marigoldsloft.com" title="Marigolds' Loft"><img src="http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i51/marigoldsloft/button-2.jpg" alt="Marigolds' Loft" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

An InLinkz Link-up

Crochet Movement

Wednesday again!

I am sure somewhere down the line I lose a couple of hours. Just a few here and there to make it always Wednesday! I kinda feel like I have a part in the movie "Groundhog Day"!

Anyway, at least I have had a little movement on my crochet front.

I am way over the halfway mark on the second side and I am hoping that next week the picture above will be filled with a new project and not a similar image again!

What has been great with this project is that I have repeated the stitches enough times to know what is meant by a "trs" or a "tss" and I feel confident enough to try my hand at new Tunisian crochet projects in the future.

Reading wise: I am thoroughly enjoying Madame Tussaud. I thought it would be a slow read and that I would be able to take it with me to the beach, but I don't think that will be happening. It is one of those books that when you start reading it, you get drawn into the book and just want to read!

Well, that is all from me this week.

I wish you all a great rest of your week.

See you next week same time :)

x