Thoughts from the Bus Stop

Loveheart for Eddie and Sharry

Bus Stop — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 10:00:00 +0100

Wedding loveheart (c) Kristen Bailey 2009

Today is a very special day! My best friend from school is marrying the lovely Eddie, and I'm being a bridesmaid (my first time!). Sharry at I met on the first day at secondary school, when we were 12. I'm so blessed that our friendship has lasted this long.

Sharry will be a beautiful bride. The other two bridesmaids and I will be by her side in floor-length midnight blue satin, grinning, crying and trying not to trip over, I expect. I know how much planning has gone into making the day special for everyone and it will be fantastic to see it all come together. Congratulations you two!

Wedding garter (c) Kristen Bailey 2009

Queen Victoria doll for Mum

Bus Stop — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 20:26:48 +0100

Mum's really interested in Queen Victoria, so for her birthday I knitted her this doll of old Victoria in her mourning clothes. Once again I based the doll on Jean Greenhowe's Little Gift Dolls pattern, using the skirt from the Christmas Tree Fairy and the cuffs from Miss Valentine. The widow's cap I made using the veil pattern from the Summer Mouse in the Knitted Animals booklet.

I made Victoria necklaces of pearls and crystals, and pearl earrings, and a mourning brooch with Albert's cameo on it. The crown was knitted in silver crochet thread, using Jean Greenhowe's 'picot hem' pattern, and I sewed on crystal beads. Does her face look amused?

All images in this post (c) Kristen Bailey 2009

Loveheart for Cathy and Tim

Bus Stop — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:21:20 +0100

This little felt loveheart is a wedding present for my friend Cathy and her new husband Tim, who is from Canada. They met while working in Spain, and aren't sure which country they're going to make their home in, so I had to give them something more portable than a toaster!

Stuarts Granolithic

Bus Stop — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:05:31 +0100

'Stuarts Granolithic' paving stone in Holland Road, Hove

Grinding gears at Hove Museum

Bus Stop — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 19:28:58 +0100

Mum and Dad came down for the afternoon so the Blonde and I took them to Hove Museum to partake of afternoon tea. In the foyer of the museum is a wonderful coin-operated automata by Ian McKay.

There's a chap reading a newspaper, seated next to a lady with a flask of tea...

... and a kissing couple!

I love automata. I enjoyed making the sheep automata for my mum, and I'd like to learn how to design one myself. I'm not a woodworker so I'd like to see if I could make a fabric one - over an armature of some sort I guess.

Rob Ives' Paper Engineering and Pop-ups for Dummies looks like it might be a good starting point.

* SONG OF THE DAY: The Rolling Stones - Start Me Up *

Bus phone

Bus Stop — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 19:07:52 +0100

Spotted in Snooper's Paradise in the North Laine - a bus phone! Saved myself the £30 by making do with a photo :)

September sunset in Hove

Bus Stop — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 18:41:00 +0100

September sunset in Hove (c) Kristen Bailey, 2009

Slept most of the day as I'd been awake all night, but still managed to get outside for a walk as the sun went down. Beautiful, eh?

* SONG OF THE DAY: Belle & Sebastian - Another Sunny Day *

Hedgehog pincushion

Bus Stop — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 01:26:46 +0100

This (rather bald) hedgehog pincushion was made by me at primary school as a Mother's Day pressie. I can vivdly remember making it. My teacher had a large shallow box full of brightly-coloured embroidery silks, which I found so exciting that I got told off for sorting them into colour ranges when I should have been sewing! We stuffed our hedgehogs with chopped-up old tights.

Some of our dinner ladies had stayed on after lunch to help supervise the sewing. Take a look at the blanket stitch - can you guess which bit was done by a dinner lady and which was done by a five-year old?

Ye olde Bunn Shoppe

Bus Stop — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 22:11:28 +0100

I found this advertising card being used as a bookmark in a charity shop paperback years ago. It extols the virtues of 'Cowley, Fancy Bread and Biscuit Maker', at 9, Pool Valley in Brighton town centre, off the seafront near the Palace Pier. The Cowley family traded there for 150 years - not sure which of those years this card comes from! They must have closed in the mid 1940s. I love that their telegram address is 'Biscuits, Brighton'.

These days, if you find yourself in Pool Valley with a yearning for something sweet, treat yourself to tea and cake at The Mock Turtle.

Bad Wolf

Bus Stop — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 18:45:52 +0100

Image (c) Kristen Bailey 2009

This made me laugh out loud! A rogue Doctor Who fan has graffitied this tree, near Hove Museum.

The blue tones

Bus Stop — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 14:54:00 +0100

Hove in blue, 21 August 2009 (c) Kristen Bailey 2009

* SONG OF THE DAY: Edwyn Collins - Fifty Shades of Blue *

Tea and talk

Bus Stop — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 22:45:32 +0100

Spotted this ad for the Mental Health Foundation's Tea & Talk campaign, at Victoria Station (London) last week. I thought it was lovely - both the graphic and the sentiment. I've suffered from depression at several points in my life, and during those times I always found meeting with a friend to talk (sometimes about what was troubling me, sometimes about anything but!) was good medicine.

It takes you out of yourself, stimulates your brain and refreshes your perspective on life. Conversation: to be taken several times a week, either in person, over the phone or online.

New knitting booklet from Jean Greenhowe!

Bus Stop — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 22:00:44 +0100

Queen of knitted toys, Jean Greenhowe, has a new booklet out this week. Dolly Mixtures is a collection of 9 inch dolls, including a snowman, a pirate boy, a flower seller girl and a Christmas elf.

It's been ages since she's had new stuff out so I was excited to see this, but I must admit I'm a wee bit disappointed that it's another book of large dolls - they're cute but a quite similar to dolls already included in previous JG booklets. But I am a JG addict so will still be buying it!

All images in this post (c) Jean Greenhowe 2009

Dale Maxey: Seeing London

Bus Stop — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 09:50:21 +0100

All images in this post are from 'Seeing London' by Dale Maxey (c) Collins, 1966

I spent a few days in Kent last week seeing my old schoolfriend Sharry. The trip was mainly to do with my forthcoming bridesmaidly duties, but Sharry was lovely enough to give me my fix of charity shops, in Maidstone. The very last one we went in - and nearly didn't because at first - it seemed to be a furniture-only shop - turned up this gem of a book, Seeing London, written and illustrated by Dale Maxey, printed in 1966.

I always look at the kids' books in charity shops to see if there are any by my favourite illustrators (Janet and Allan Ahlberg, Jill Barklem's Brambly Hedge books) or that just catch my eye. This was only 50p, AND has a sort-of bus on the front cover, so I just grabbed it without much flicking through it! But when we got home and I starting looking at it properly I got more and more excited...

It's a children's guide to London, with wonderful illustrations, hand-drawn maps and lovely writing, describing six different excursions you could take from Trafalgar Square on a big red doubledecker bus, to museums, galleries and landmarks where you don't need to be with an adult to get in (you can tell it's 40 years old!). Maxey says that London's buses remind him (her?) of elephants, "lumbering along through the mist that often seems to shroud the city", and this theme runs through the illustrations.

The covers and endpapers are in full colour but most of the illustrations are in just black and white, sometimes with red accents. There are two full colour maps of London (click on them for larger versions)...

... and several monochrome ones, labelled with the various places visited in each excursion:

The pictures are bursting with life and good humour. Just look at this one, enticing you to take a dip in the Serpentine Lido. I love the girl holding her nose as she goes under the water - especially the way her hair and the skirt on her swimming costume are flying up!

I couldn't find a biog of Dale Maxey online, but he/she seems to have concentrated on children's books, including illustrations for an edition of Edward Lear's The Owl & The Pussycat.

You can find Dale Maxey images on Google. I'll carry on scanning in this book and put my images in a Dale Maxey set on Flickr, and set up a Dale Maxey group, see if anyone bites. Ateeeeeeeeeeen'shun!!!

Baldism

Bus Stop — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 17:28:15 +0100

We were walking to Hove Library when Dad (hairy everywhere except his head) let out a cry of distress at this poster in the window of the hairdressers next door!

* SONG OF THE DAY: Super Furry Animals - Ice Hockey Hair *

Shelter's House of Cards (and... vote for me!)

Bus Stop — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 09:00:00 +0100

Duck House (c) Kristen Bailey 2009

Housing and homelessness charity Shelter is running a campaign called House of Cards, to highlight the plight of thousands of people whose homes have been repossessed, and the lack of sufficient social housing.

A TV ad (below) has been produced to promote the campaign and Shelter has asked 52 artists and designers to created artwork for each card of a deck of playing cards. Their designs will be exhibited at the Haunch of Venison art gallery, and auctioned in aid of Shelter.

Shelter has run a competition to design the deck's Eight of Clubs, and this (above) is my entry. I've made the eights 'clubs' into trees, around a figure-of-eight pond, with ducks and a duck house, as a nod to the recent 'MP's expenses' furore. It's paper collage on a handknitted background. All entries are being put to a public vote online from 21 to 29 August - so if you like my design, I'd really appreciate it if you'd vote 'Love It'! :)

* SONG OF THE DAY: Orbital - I Wish I Had Duck Feet *

Post Boxes stamps

Bus Stop — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 06:39:00 +0100

Image (c) Royal Mail

I love Royal Mail's latest Special Issue stamps, which feature traditional British post boxes. I've been a letter writer all my life, and I love anything with a red post box on - I even collected Postman Pat stuff when I was a teenager (although I see that lately he's sold out to The Man, presumably to fund the purchase of his new helicopter).

I take photos of postboxes, and am part of Flickr's Postboxes by Postcode Area group. I'm currently knitting Jean Greenhow's Christmas postbox for myself, and if I had a little extra cash I'd love to give an appreciative home to one of British Cream Tea's amazingly detailed, beautifully made Red Postbox felt sculptures.

Image (c) British Cream Tea

High Tea

Bus Stop — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 09:05:00 +0100

High Tea (c) Kristen Bailey 2009

Got back from food shopping to be greeted by the scaffolders saying, 'Ah - this nice lady will make us a brew!' I said 'OK, but you'll have to come in and fetch them from the second floor,' but they told me just to leave them on my windowsill - they climbed up to get them and went back down to have a fag!

Knit a Poem

Bus Stop — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 23:31:59 +0100

Poet Ian McMillan (3rd from left) with Poetry Society staff (c) Poetry Society

The Poetry Society are celebrating their centenary by creating a knitted poem! They haven't yet revealed which poem it will be, but they have over 700 people at work creating the individual letter squares which will make up the 40-foot poem. It will be displayed in October.

They're still looking for volunteers to knit or crochet the blank squares between the letters and the edging of the poem - to receive your knitting or crochet pack, email Rebecka Mustajarvi: officeassistant AT poetrysociety.org.uk

Photos: Alison Friday, Hazel Buchan Cameron, Bob Coe, Tracy Farr and Megan Fernandes

6th September - EDITED TO ADD: And here's my square - a lovely soft pink blank (Rowan Pure DK in Tea Rose). They ask you to put your name, town and favourite poem on the back. - wonder if I'll be able to spot it from the front in the finished article?

Score!!!

Bus Stop — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 23:01:00 +0100

Thank you, Person Down The Street, for putting a huge wodge of magazines (some over 2 years old!) out for recycling. You have made a near neighbour and her scissors and scrapbook very happy indeed. :)