Author: Ruth Singer

You remember Maud, don’t you? She’s a fine-looking (wo)mannequin but she was rather world-weary and threadbare.Now, to give her a new lease of life, ready for a starring role in a forthcoming bestseller (my next book), she’s had a face-lift. Or rather a body-lift. A re-cover. So what I did was make a pattern using…

A few weeks before Christmas, my cousin Ben demanded a hat. An actual demand of “Knit me a hat!” When people ask for (or demand..) knits, I take this as a good thing – they want and appreciate handknits. Or maybe he just had a cold head and didn’t want to pay for a hat.…

I have decreed that February is for knitting. This has been much helped by lovely friends on my birthday at the weekend. Mary bought me this: Colinette Zanziba. Two skeins, destined to be a tiny cardigan thing. A week or two ago I was in raptures about Jen’s handspun yarn. I love natural cream wool.…

Enough of the London-love, at least for the time-being.How about some Leicestershire love instead? Seeing this (in London…) made me think about rocks, so the next day, I went here: We’re good with rocks, round here. And the roads are pretty good too. And the ivy. The Sisley exhibition was excellent. There was one painting…

Window shopping New Look at Blackout 2, Endell Street, Covent Garden. I love this coat! It was a bit beyond my budget (as my budget was allocated to handbags – which also came from here). I didn’t even dare try it on as it might have had to come home with me. And I’m not…

A jacket for my penguin-loving godson. Or perhaps slightly more for his fabric-loving mum. We both fell in love with this fabric at the Festival of Quilts. Its taken months to make it. It wasn’t exactly hard. Then it took ages to find the right button. It was in my button stash all along, I…

Finished and wearing! On the needles: In the stash: Ok. Not autumnal colours at all in that last one. But it is number 3 in my list of fine things to do with a day in London. Go to Loop! Its a fabulous place. This one ball of sock yarn is ALL I BOUGHT. I…

Although its deep January, full-on winter, I’ve been noticing Autumn colours creeping into my life. Wool birken-slippersShoe shopping. Number 2 on my list of nice things to do when in London.Apparently they look like cut-off wellies. But I don’t care. They are the best slippers ever. Green wool felt, Birkenstock insoles, also lined in wool…

I was blessed with a nothing-to-do day in London, a couple of weeks ago, thanks to some teaching being canceled and having already booked a train. So I went for a day out and indulged in some of my favourite things.Number 1 Vintage handbags. A small, fairly restrained obsession. This one is vast, very tatty…

I always have had an eye for the little things, decorative details, quirky stuff. When I was a teenager, into photography, I liked nothing better than cycling around my town, photographing the details of Victorian houses; doorknobs, terracotta tiles, peeling paint, brick patterns. I am the child of an architectural historian, after all, and the…