countryside · general stuff · in the woods

Winter Walks

Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)10 Comments

 

 

The countryside is currently drab and dormant and much given over to mud, so most of the pleasure in a winter walk comes from the promise of what awaits on returning home. Coming back home after a chilly walk in the murk and mist is a delight; closing the door on the cold; peeling off layers of damp, muddy clothes and changing into warm, comfy and cosy things; cupping your chilled, weather reddened hands around a mug of hot tea and snuggling down by the fire is blissful.

But there is still beauty and colour to be found out there, even in the depths of Winter:

  • The beech leaves holding fast to the trees and bright with the colour of a polished copper kettle;
  • the red ember glow of the holly berries still held deep in the dark, prickly heart of hedges;
  • the vibrant green skirts of moss that the trees wear in wet, wintry weather;
  • and the sky, a constant shifting canvas of colour, most spectacular at dawn, but beautiful too when the watery sunshine pierces pearly cloud and outlines the skeletal forms of the bare branched trees.

This scant scattering of colour is not quite enough though, so I am eagerly anticipating signs of spring starting to show, and hope to find the first snowdrops soon as a sign that the greening of the woodlands is coming.

In Little Cotton Rabbit news there is not yet much to tell from here, but there are exciting goings on happening at Lucy Locket Land. Lucy had the brilliant idea to create some special kits throughout this year which mix my animal patterns with her own wonderfully imaginative and creative additions.

 

In January she had the mice dressed as Arfur the Handymouse and Martha the Mousekeeper  and these kits proved to be so popular that they are currently sold out. Februarys kits will be the pigs, so it will be exciting to see what they’ll be doing and I can’t wait to see what other creative fun Lucy comes up with for the other animals over the rest of the year. Here’s a link to her instagram where she’s posting teasers for future kits, and a link to her shop where the kits are sold.

 

 

Images copyright Lucy Locket Land and used with permission.

 

autism · wildlife

January, beginnings

Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)35 Comments

Well here we are again at the beginning of a new year, I hope it has started well for you.

We’re doing quite well here, Toby coped with going back to college yesterday and the much earlier start to his days and I’ve been slowly but steadily ticking things off my to do list. At the moment all of my focus is on preparing for the cliff edge that we currently face at the end of June when Toby’s college placement finishes. That will mark the end of his 20 years in ‘education’ and a humungous change for our family. I’m spending all of my available time trying to put in place support and community activities for him so that he can have some meaningful activities in his life outside of his home here and that I can continue to have time in which to work on patterns and earn a living.

We’ve had no support of any kind since he turned 18 and so have had to begin all over again with preliminary assessments. If you have ever gone through the process of getting a care assessment and putting in place ongoing care for a loved one you will already know about the mountainous burden of paperwork and the enormity of the continuing task, from setting up new bank accounts to manage direct payments; accounting for every penny spent; interviewing, screening via DBS checks and training personal assistants to manage his needs; researching, visiting and engaging placements for day care. It is all down to families to undertake and organise and is utterly daunting and exhausting. This week has been all about recording on paper the struggle that Toby has with every day life, and it’s really laid me low to bring into sharp focus and put into words everything about his condition that limits his life and the enormous impact that has on our family.

So I am trying my hardest to just concentrate on one small step at a time, and have had to make a very conscious effort to focus on the small positives that have come my way so far this year. I’m sharing them here mostly to remind myself that often it’s the small things that lift a moment from despair to delight.

  • I have a new garden friend, Bob D. Robin, who flies down to the garden table each morning at dawn when I’m preparing breakfast for the chickens, he gets a pinch of sunflower seeds as a thank you for brightening the start of my day with his beautiful song, sung from the topmost branch of the old plum tree.
  • Kit the fox is still visiting, very sporadically over the autumn but a little more frequently these last couple of weeks, though mostly after dark so it’s been hard to get pictures of her. She looks well and has a thick and fluffy winter coat. It’s coming up to mating time so it will be interesting to see if she has a litter this year and whether she visits more frequently if she falls pregnant.
  • Sunrises and sunsets, closer together at this time of year with the short winter days, always have the capacity to bring joy and the vibrant colours splashed across the sky are captivating to watch. I often stand outside with a cup of tea in hand and just enjoy the unfolding spectacle.
  • The weather here has been so mild, wet and windy so far this winter but the coming week sees a change to colder, brighter days so I’m hoping to get out with my camera and find the first snowdrops. The anticipation of seeing their beauty is a small joy at the moment too.
  • Looking back over the pictures that I took during 2023 has brought a lot of pleasure too, the first picture above is a mosaic of a few of my favourites

I hope that you are finding some small joys in your days too and if you’re fearful about impending events in your life this year, I hope that you’re finding ways to move forward with a hopeful heart,

See you soon, J x

crafts & knitting

End of year ponderings

Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)36 Comments

small boots (for 7 inch animals):

Large boots (for 9 inch animals):

 

At the beginning of 2023 I had such big plans: I was going to write lots of patterns; make lots of finished animals, some to sell and some to give away; reply to all of my emails; reply to all instagram, facebook and blog comments; comment on everyone’s projects on Ravelry and the facebook group and write some new tutorials.

As always I was overly ambitious and didn’t factor in that the time I have available to work in and the time it takes to do all of these things simply doesn’t match up. I still have the pictures for the tutorials sat here waiting for the words, I was erratic at best at commenting on other people’s projects and replying to comments and I still have unanswered email in my various inboxes. There was only one give-away and a handful of (OK, three) finished animals (including the one above which I can now show as she has arrived in her new home with one of the kindest people I know). If someone was writing my report card, they would say ‘must try harder’.

Still, I did do pretty well on the pattern writing front, with new patterns for small mice, small bears, small sweaters, horses and cows.

And last week I upgraded both the 7 inch and 9 inch removable shoes patterns to include 6 styles of boot: There are 2 main boot options: a hiking boot and a fur topped boot, and by changing some of the details on these (as detailed in the pattern) you can also make a pair of wellies, Yeti style apres ski boots, saftey work boots and iconic DMs. So in total there are 6 boot options in both the 9 inch and 7 inch sizes, see pictures above.

Rather than releasing the boots as a new pattern I’ve decided that I wanted to gift them to everyone who has previously bought a copy of the removable shoes patterns:

  • If you bought either of the removable shoes patterns on Ravelry or my blog then you should already have had a message in your Ravelry inbox (or in your email) with a link to the upgraded version of that pattern.
  • If you purchased via Etsy please log into your Etsy account and send me a message there, then I can access your details and manually email you a new download link.
  • If you’ve not bought either pattern yet then buying it now will give you the new boots pattern included at no extra cost, though I will be putting up the prices to reflect the extra that’s included on these 2 patterns in January 2024. 9 inch shoes and boots are here, 7 inch shoes and boots are here.

Well, I’m going to sign off now until the new year. Over the next couple of weeks I’ll be spending time with my family, just pottering around without much purpose and enjoying a slower pace to my days. Thank you so much for visiting me here, for all of your kind comments and messages over this year and for supporting my work and enabling me to provide for my family through my pattern writing,

my very warmest best wishes for the season to you and yours, J x