Our Easter.... in Pictures mainly :D

Easter has been beautiful this year... we have spent many happy hours together as a family and I am sat here tonight remembering how wonderful the last few days have been and slightly disapointed that it is over... at least until next bank holiday, which is only round the corner.

A gorgeous sun drenched walk through the woods.... teeming with new life that arrives with the welcome spring... a sea of bluebells and the tinkle of laughter from children mingling with the buzz of the bees and the sweet song from the many birds up above

And a day at the beach... something for the child in all of us, who can not resist the sand castles? buring daddys feet or trying to splash each other in the sea?  The joys of children seem to be magnified by the ocean and sand, especially for land locked midlanders... the sun shone and we laughed and smiled until home time stopping only to eat our seaside fish and chips.  Now where did that diet go?  I have no idea but I know my children won't look back on this day as the day mum burst out of her jeans but as a day where we all smiled and laughed and had a wonderful day at the seaside.

Oh and for craft?  no easter bonnets here I am affraid but we did have a little easter bunny in our living room for a while.  Meet The Energised Bunny :) made from the same energised yarn my lovely e-reader cover was made from :D

My little niece is only 6 months old so a chocolate egg just wouldn't do would it so this little bunny was created especially for Ayanna... I heard she likes him very much, as did I and I am glad he went to a home where he is loved.

So what do you do when you are addicted to spinning but no time to spin...

Well I think it is easy to see in the short time I have been spinning (since Decemeber 2010) I am totally addicted.   Not a tiny bit addicted but ALOT.... having 4 children milling about, 2 cats, 6 kittens, and working takes its toll on the spinning time and the hassle of getting my lovely wheel out is sometimes not worth the bother for the 10 minutes I may get sooooo....

For my Birthday my lovely husband bought me this.....

It is a Gorgeous 23g top whorl spindle bought at Wonderwool in Wales made of yew and it is divine! I am seriously hooked on Spindling. It is portable, my beautiful hand crafted wooden spindle wasn't vast amounts of money and it spins like a dream!  I am a lucky girl indeed!

So whats more wonderful than that lovely spindle?  Oh yes the My heart Exposed fibre in "cheer me up stream" which I am currently spinning on it!  My photos could never captured the rich and fresh green tones in this fibre so soft and spring and heavenly to spin.... my favourite colour and spun lovely and even on the spindle...

So when I get 5 minutes I can pick up my spindle and spin a few arms lengths of yarn, then put it down high out of reach of children and pets....  I can spin a little bit here and there without lugging my wheel about, I can get the enjoyment in a more portable form, ideal for me at the minute.

Don't get me wrong, even mastering thigh rolling I would be hard pressed to spin as much as I do on my wheel as I love it so... but it's so liberating to be able to spin freely in the day... out and about.

I love spinning

Toni x

And here we have it!!!!

Well I have not had time to post for a little while work has kept me busy into the night when I usually post but I am so proud of my beautiful new e-reader cover I wanted to share with you all...

I am such a slow knitter this took me a couple of days but I am sure it would be be a much faster knit for someone else....

I can't explain how lovely it is to finally have finished this... I had spun the fibre from My Heart Exposed and plied it with red merino.  Once I saw the plied yarn I thought the red was a bit strong so I decided felting it may bring out the beautiful jewel tones of the Energised fibre.  I was right!!!

It is lovely.... although it is taking an age to dry!

This time last year I was a total none finisher when it came to ANY projects and I am still in awe each time I get a finished article!

So where did the day go?

I wish I could sometimes just pause my day.... maybe not at the "perfect" moments, the moments where everyone is getting along so well, the times when the children are kind and considerate to each other but the times when they are arguing and shouting and generally being awful...
 I wish I could pause it, and look closer to appreciate it.  To remember they are little so short a time that even these moments should be loved and savoured rather than what I tend to do and join in the argument and try to even the playing field sometimes for the little ones...
I should watch them and delight in the expressions, even of sulleness, remembering soon they will be grown and not here to notice how C's nose crinkles when he is pouting, or how B's defiant glare makes her look even more fiery and determined than ever, the way J's lip juts out is so cute if it was not for the tone of his voice which follows it and how G mimics all around him, enjoying the sounds, the actions and rhythm of the house I can only try to....
Oh for a pause button so I can collect my thoughts.  Oh for a pause button so I can take that breath and breathe them all in in this precious too short of a time that is their childhood....

Another hobby or just a fad?

well it's 9:08 and what a day!

What a wonderful day in fact, although my eyes are now very heavy and bed is calling it has been a really lovely day....

I have been spinning, spinning, spinning like mad and have various skeins of wool lying about I have been too lazy to tackle the knotting stressful event that is getting it into a ball single handed BUT for my birthday I had a yarn winder!!!! and it came this morning !!!! ~happy dance~  so the next time I get 5 minutes it will be winding like mad!

~sigh~  so once I got over that excitement I remember I have a big deadline to meet and so while the lovely Mr Unconventional holds the fort with the children I head to a coffee shop with no wifi (I have no will power) to do my essay... and what do you know 1800 words essay in an hour and half!!!

Well I am sure you will all agree with me that such dedicated hard work calls for a reward no? Well a lovely dress I have been admiring for a while and a pair of jeans came home with me :)

So what was so wonderful about this day?  Well we discovered Geocaching fab site about it

We took the children out on a treasure hunt and they all loved it!!! from the biggest (Mr Unconventional) kid to little G everyone had a fantastic time!!! so maybe we have discovered THE family hobby!

Everyone LOVED it when we found the little cannister and signed our names.... Everyone was slightly annoyed when we failed to find the last one but it was amazing! Fresh air and a common goal for the family 

Just can't wait to do it again. 

Once we ran out of phone charge to continue Geocaching a bit of playtime on the local park... 

So feeling hungry we came home and I cooked the best risotto... bathed the little ones and they are now sleeping soundly

one of those days where I feel truly blessed and the squabbles and sibling rivalry is nothing to concern me

and now to bed....

And here is the yarn!!!!

Quick update as I am SOOOOOO happy with it.....

So with my wonderful "Energised" from Link to delightful My Hearts Exposed turned into THIS!!!!  Amazingly squishy and chunky!

Energised!

Oh and I finally have a dry "on the vine"  also hand painted with natural dyes from My Heart Exposed,  It's BFL and spun up a dream into the most subtle mix of greens and purples with a slight hint of the red of a grape.... It is so soft it is hard to believe it is wool!  it's so floofy.

This skien has been n-plyed which is new to me and although it is far from perfect I am hugely proud of how this has turned out.  But what to knit?  I have no idea!

Phew... that was a busy day!

Well day two of the school holidays and what a busy one we had!

B spent almost ALL DAY playing with her Ello construction set while her brothers played Meccano... luckily for me at the time littlest Unconventional G was sleeping ~dance~ Which meant once I got my work prepared for tonight I got to play with fibre...

I bought some beautiful fibre from My Heart Exposed Yarns called Energised ~ and it was divine to spin... it spun like candyfloss... light and fluffy!  but to my surprise it started to look like a wonderful wrap I once owned called Earthy Rainbow sold by Wearababy.... feeling inspired I spun a second single in reds as the weave of Earthy Rainbow has a red weft....

So you can see the singles....  and then the experimental part.  I love the both singles and I was hoping for a dramatic earthy sunset with bright jewel tones like how the setting sun seems to set fire to the ocean.  So with the children happily playing or sleeping I got to plying them together!

Not exactly as I had in mind as I think the red over powers the beautiful My Hearts Exposed fibre and the candy polling is a little too strong for my liking I think,  it is to be knit into cover for my beloved e-reader so I think I may have a go at felting the holder in the machine... I think the colours would merge and soften and it would HOPEFULLY look more like earth rainbow!

As I was on borrowed time with the sleeping boy, I didn't quite finish the plying but hopefully I will finish the yarn tomorrow and get to the knitting stage!

Well Hello!!!

After much faffing I have a blog!!!!  how about that then!

I am notoriously bad at doing things like this but I am going to aim to update this as much as possible...

I'll give you a bit of background on unconventional us.....  we are quite unconventional funnily enough,  We don't have a TV to watch (even though Mr Unconventional Us works with TV's which is quite ironic) We try and practice attachment parenting as much as possible meaning G (almost 2) has never been in a pushchair, slept in our bed until recently and rarely use outside childcare.

G has multiple allergies so that may end up a bit on here as our battle with food continues and my daughter who is almost 12 and my own crafty endevours will inevitably end up on here with pictures of hopefully many successful projects and I'll probably share the disasters too and why not?  Those mistakes are just another opportunity to learn.

I hope you will enjoy seeing what we get up to as a family of 6, and sharing in a tiny bit of what makes Us.