new homes

October 8, 2015 Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)53 Comments

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Thanks so much to everyone who took the time to enter my giveaway. It's been lovely reading all of the comments and the fact that so many of us get such great pleasure from the small things in life and the presence of those we love and treasure strikes me as a very special thing.

The winners from the draw have been notified and have selected their prizes (you can see their comments and winning numbers at the end of the post about the draw). Catherine has chosen Saffron and Denise is having Candice. Here they are getting packed up and ready to travel.

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Saffron

Candice

It's interesting that both winners have chosen cats. This is the first time that I've made cats so it's nice to know they are a welcome addition to the little cotton rabbit clan. I have a few more cats along with a mouse, a trio of foxes and a bevy of bunnies which I'm going to list for sale as soon as possible. I'm just sewing on the last buttons and writing out their descriptions ready for making labels for them. I hope to have them ready for new homes in the next few days. You can see all 20 of them in detail (minus Saffron and Candice of course who will shortly be on their respective ways to New Zealand and the USA) over on my flickr photo stream or follow the links below.

I'll email the mailing list once they're ready and update facebook once they are listed for sale.

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1. cinnamon, 2. coco, 3. pepper, 4. maemi, 5. aisling, 6. hudson, 7. bowie, 8. marmalade, 9. marmaduke, 10. rosalba, 11. mairi, 12. wyeth, 13. bennett, 14. fantine, 15. calico, 16. tabitha, 17. lucia, 18. finnea, 19. felipe, 20. jack

Autumn has definitely arrived here and I'm enjoying the feel of it. Will pop back soon with some pictures from the last few autumny weeks,

see you then x

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a ‘better late than never’ giveaway

September 23, 2015 Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)1,348 Comments

Dressingroom

Firstly, thank you so much for all of the messages about my finger. Happily the hefty dose of antibiotics did the trick and kept me out of hospital and I now have a normal looking finger again which can bend and, most importantly, knit (hooray!). Never again will I have complete faith in antibacterial hand soap – I now have an industrial sized pack of latex gloves and put a pair on every time I go into the chicken run.

Now, on to the purpose of this post…

On September 4th of this year I started my 10th year of blogging and it has become my tradition to host a little giveaway to mark these anniversaries. Writing a blog is a mostly self-indulgent act, a way to record passing moments that would otherwise fade and be forgotten but truthfully it would be an empty pursuit without the comments, emails, encouragement and friendship that all of you bring with you as readers. So thank you all so very much for visiting here with me, for taking the time to leave me a comment, for encouraging me, supporting me in my little knitting business and for generally helping me to stay up-beat and positive in the face of a challenging home life.

As always I've pondered ways of putting my thanks into a tangible form and as usual I've not really found a solution. I have however written up a small free pattern for a little capelet to fit the knitted animal patterns* which you can download directly from the link.

Capeletbunny

There is also an open draw with 2 prizes of a knitted animal. The two winners can take their pick of the latest batch of knitted animals that I am just finishing off and I'll include with each an extra outfit and a little suitcase to store the extra clothes in.

Suitcasetravels

In order to enter the draw to win one of the 2 animals please just leave a comment below. You can write anything you like but I'd most like to read about anything that makes you happy so if you have time to tell me then please do. If you're busy and still want to enter then just say hi, it won't make any difference to the draw as I'll use a random number generator to pick 2 random winners from the comments on this post and I'll happily post the animals anywhere in the world. The draw will close on Wednesday 30th September and I'll then write about the winners and about the next batch of animals that I'll have available soon.

Hope you have a good week and again my sincere thanks for dropping by to visit with me x

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* There are some other free supplement patterns too. You can find my entire current pattern range over on Ravelry and I'll be adding more patterns soon.

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PS: The suitcases and the clothes rack are made by Maileg and I bought these ones from Bijou Lifestyle – a lovely little on-line shop with lots of tempting things! The coat-hangers I made myself from garden wire.

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Post Update, October 2nd 2015: The random number generator was used and came up with the following 2 numbers:

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Denise said…

Julie, your blog makes me happy. To see how your family supports each other and interacts with Toby makes me smile. I have a sister with Down Syndrome who lives between my other sister and I. Your story makes me a better sister and caregiver to her. Keep up the wonderful work. I have one wish…. That I could remember how to knit as I did as a child. Now that there is a grandchild, I will have to try again so I could make her one of your adorable critters.
Thanks for the chance to win one!! September 23, 2015 at 02:40 PM

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Catherine Small said…

Happy anniversary! Planning, anticipating and starting a new craft project makes me feel happy! (Finishing them, makes me feel virtuous.) September 29, 2015 at 08:17 AM

I'll be back soon with pictures of the animals that they chose as their prizes and news of the little batch that are almost finished and ready to find new homes.

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Just to note, there's a bit of a glitch with the comments displaying properly. After the first page of 100 comments you have to click 'show more comments' to see the next 100 and at this point the numbers after comment number 98 will be out by one digit because of an erroneous glitch which pops up at number 98, which then incorrectly boosts all subsequent comments up a number.

There are a total of 1332 comments entered in the draw, so if you want to view them all and see your comment then please follow this link.

crafts & knitting

First week

July 24, 2015 Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)52 Comments

When you've written a blog for a few years or more a pattern tends to emerge and you find yourself writing annually about the same kind of things at the same times of year. It's probably because a year has a rhythm, especially for those of us who live with four distinct seasons. Most of us are creatures of habit and whilst we enjoy change and variation many of the things we do are similar year in year out – or maybe that's just my family! Anyway, the start of this years school summer break has been very much like the one we had last year…

Amy has dyed her hair blue again (with a little help from me) though this year her hair is substantially shorter than it was last year. She decided to say goodbye to long hair a few months back and loves it (I kept her 12 inch pony tail, as I couldn't bear to see it thrown away).

Bluey

Toby has been enjoying the garden and helping me tend our tiny patch – he's become very good at watering the plants though I do have to remind him to point the hose in the right direction and I have been sprayed a few times when his concentration has wavered.

Garden - Copy

Wild

Sadly there will be very few beans and peas to harvest this year – I've resolved to start them off inside next year and invest in a beer trap or similar non-chemical slug eradicator, pesky things have ruined my bean and pea plants. The squash are doing well again though, as are the courgettes, kale and broccoli.

Squash

Courgettes

> Curly kale

Nero

The new raspberries that I planted back in winter from bare root canes are yet to ripen but they're coming on and the herbs have gone a bit wild and overgrown with some going to seed. Which is fine by me, as the bees really like the flowering thyme, hyssop, coriander and marjoram.

Raspberries

Raspberry

Coriander

Hydrangea

The hydrangeas are doing well too – I really love those big frothy white balls of flowers.

Well, that's it from us for this week. It's a cool day with heavy rain here today so we're pottering inside and I'm hoping to get some time for knitting (I'm working on a shawl – Pebble Beach by Helen Stewart in beautiful delicate merino from Walk Collection.)

Hopefully summer will return next week!

Pebble shawl