Monday 29 April 2013

Music To My Ears

Just to increase the crazy jumble of things I waffle about on here, let's add music into the mix! And today's track has, I gather, gone to number 1 in the UK charts - I haven't had much of a look elsewhere!



Purchased on a whim, we are talking here about Daft Punk's return in the form of Get Lucky feat. Pharrell Willams - put simply it is fab! The French duo haven't really broken any boundaries with this track and at times it has major shades of Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger sweeping through it, but in my view this is no bad thing. Pharrell Williams' voice melds beautiful with the track too - he was a good choice - and overall the track let me with a warm, fuzzy feeling. It's good, very good, to have them back.

I was a late-comer to the Daft Punk scene. I remember when One More Time came out, but I was too deeply entrenched in my emo-indie phase to pay too much attention.Though this old love it very much still present and correct there was no way that the wafts of song from my brothers CD player and increased listening to Radio 1 wouldn't eventually wear me down and I knew it was absolute love when my brother played me the live mix of Around the World/Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger. Then there was the Tron soundtrack. I saw the film on a whim, and whilst overall not greatly impressed by it, it had been worth it for the soundtrack alone. I love a good soundtrack at the best of times, but this one was something else!

It really is so good to have them back and I am waiting for the album with bated breath!!

Toodles,

Nelly x

Sunday 28 April 2013

A Few Old Creations


I've been searching through some of my old sewing projects and there a more than a few I've not shared! One of the first that spring to mind was this: an Amy Butler Weekender bag bag that took me two years to make! I'd been lurking on Craftster for quite some time before I managed to create this beauty... Ikea fabric and a light lining (so I could see everything inside) and my first experience of interfacing. I didn't use all the interfacing suggested in the instructions, but that's because I didn't want it to be as stiff. I like my bags with a bit of give. I made the tag too, just for the fun of it!

I even made the wee luggage tag!

Another one that's been lost in the mire for a while is this dress:

Ignore me, focus on the dress!!
I have made a lot of use of this pattern:02/2011 Bustier #113 .This was one of my earlier attempts with the pattern, I'd made two tops previously (one from one of my grans old dresses). It's a pattern I keep going back to. I like how versatile it is and how many changes you can make to it! And what's better than that is that the fabric came from an old duvet of mine and not only is it wonderfully soft but it's also nice and cool as well! excellent for the heat of HK!!

Looking to (one day) get better picture of these and perhaps others (but hope this delights for now!)

Wednesday 24 April 2013

And We're In Double Figures (52 books #10)

So yes, it is a book I've read before (many times) but not in the last 16 months *sob* and this was the book I went to Flow in search of! Seven Ancient Wonders by Matthew Reilly is one of my all time favourites, aided in no small part by my horrendous bias! I have loved every story Matthew Reilly has written and though for a long time Scarecrow and his crew were top of my list, there were well and truly usurped by Jack West and his multi-national team of heroes!

Flow Bookshop (courtesy of their webpage) - How utterly brilliant is this place!!




I was first introduced to Matthew Reilly's books back in the early 2000's when a friends brother took a tip to Australia and returned with three books: Contest, Temple and Ice Station. After they had been consumed by the brother and my friend it was my turn. I read them in the order above and now own all of them (and the rest) myself. Temple is also high up there on the list, and I can say that with two specific pages in mind. They bring back the memory of my friend and I sat on her bedroom floor, each with a Matthew Reilly book in hand and quite content. 

Seven Ancient Wonders is the first in a set (well trilogy for now, but I'm keeping my hopes up for more) about Jack West Jr. Being a history nut the story here was always going to be a winner for me and it did not disappoint. Add to that Reilly's ability to create a vast range of colourful characters and imagine increadible things and you have a book that made moi almost squeal with glee. The inner Indiana Jones was more than satisfied. 

It's a race against time, space and the bad guys with a group of central protagonists who themselves are not all entirely at ease with the lot that has fallen to them, but fallen to them it has. They do what they have to do, and we get to rocket along with them. Reilly's balance of action and explanation is (for me) prefect. 

Reading a Matthew Reilly book is like reading a film. It takes your imagination to new levels with his excellent description and with the odd plan thrown in. What I will forever be sure of is that so long as Matthew Reilly keeps publishing, I will keep reading.

Toodles, 

Nelly x

Monday 22 April 2013

Oh No!

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.
Terrible things have happened. I went and finally got round to getting the sewing machine out today. It is beyond dead, so no sewing on the horizon for me and the handmade wardrobe challenge will have to take a backseat (if my handsewing skills were as good as i'd like them to be i'd perhaps consider this but sadly they are fairly poor on larde garment scale.)
Then another terrible thing happened... the laptop decided it was time to die barely two weeks after being fixed. Clearly there are deeper problems than were realised and it is timt to put this wee love out to pasture... It's a blow on a few fronts and I barely managed to get the current draft of the primary novel off in one piece - does nothing for the heartrate I can tell you.
April has just compounded in March's series of hick-ups and it feels a little like it's two steps forwards and one step back at the moment, and all the hope and promise of the beginning of the week has all but floudered away. It's going to be a very long end to april, returning to the long hand part of the manuscript and attempting to do cross-checking as I go.
Thankfully I have a useful phone that with it's bluetooth connections mean I can use this wee beauty if a keyboard and all hope is not entirely lost, but it is floundering a little...Well no excuse for getting angry at typing on a touch screen anyway...
Resolutly holding out for better things around the corner...
Nelly x

Friday 19 April 2013

I Swear I'll Never Doubt Again (52 Books #9)

The first book I picked out of my mammoth pile was The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency. To my shame, despite the popularity and my love of Alexander McCall Smith's 44 Scotland Street series, I have never made any attempt to pick up one of his No. 1 Ladies books. I even bought this one on a whim rather than making a pointed effort to seek it out. Here is why I bought it:


This copy had such a lovely cover and I really like the stamps inside the front cover (there are also scribbles in the back too). I like a book that's traveled and this one feels loved and appreciated. 

Then I started reading... and all I have to say is I will never again doubt or question Alexander McCall Smith.  I was in love from the fourth line:

"Then there was a teapot, in which Mma Ramotsew - the only lady detective in Botswana - brewed redbush tea. And three mugs - one for herself, one for her secretary, and one for the client."
Quiet frankly any book where tea is placed in such high regard was going to be a winner for me, and this is no exception. From there I just fell more and more in love with the story, the characters and the place. I have no doubt that a lot of this is to do with McCall Smith's own love of Botswana, it shine's though the text pulsing through every word McCall Smith committed to the page.

Anyone who's read through any of my other book related posts will know I'm not a plot spoiler and I don't go into vast amounts of detail. The reading of a book is a personal thing and everyone takes from it what they believe is the most important and each subliminally bookmarks their favourite moments. I like to talk in terms of how it makes me feel and "if you like x/y/z give it a go!" A traditional crime book this is not but it was a joy to read and if you, like me, are an Alexander McCall Smith fan and you have not read this book... well what are you waiting for!

Hope the pages keep turning!

Nelly x


Thursday 18 April 2013

The Pinterest Challenge

One of my favourite things to do is peruse Pinterest. What with the list of things I want to do with my time I have figured that the best way to make my way through them is to take on the Pinterest Challenge. I first came across this concept on the wonderful Merrick's Art blog (ironically I discovered her on Pinterest).

I was inspired by the idea of a challenge focused on the mass of Pin's you can amass without batting an eyelid. A happy time spent trawling through said amassed pins later, I plumped for the following 6:

1: Blossom Canvas/ 2: Tea box
3: Butterfly gift box/ 4: Painted pasta bows/ 5: Gift bag
6: Button Biscuits

I don't know how many of these I'll get through in the next six weeks as of Monday 22nd, giving me a few days planning before embarking on all these challenges. I would have loved to have included some sewing challenges but until the sewing machine is up and running again that is going to have to wait. I think there is enough appeasment in the inclusion of a tea-based, and this will be doubly useful as the tea "area" of the kitchen really needs a pinch of organisation! I am not looking forward to a happy weekend (day) of plotting. See you back here in 6 weeks for the results!

Nelly x

Foodies Unite

What makes a good chef? Is it the qualifications possessed  or an innate ability to understand and combine flavours in a unique way. Is it it the ability to follow recipes to the letter or is it the bravery to experiment. Though all these things come in handy I believe that there is one key ingredient that makes a chef better than good (pun most likely subliminally intended). It is nothing more, or less, than a love of food and finding joy in cooking it to share that love. This is how I feel when I'm baking and I know that is how my friend and founder of The Portly Gourmet feels when he gets into the kitchen.



This may be one of the reasons that the two of us get on so well. We have a connection in our appreciation of food, and that's not in terms of quantity but in terms of ingredient, flavour, occasion and of course company. If made perfect sense, therefore, for him to return home to the family business and then branch out into the aspects of cooking that inspire him most. And the world of relishes, jams and chutneys has found an amiable friend.

This is where anyone in the Cambridge locale should listen up. If you happen to be anywhere near Fish Burwell Ltd (18 The Guineas Center, Newmarket) pop in, and not only to buy some excellently sourced fish. (Follow them on Twitter for the days fish: @FishBurwellLTD or pop to their website where you will find fish recipes aplenty http://fishburwell.com/press/.) No, not only will you find fish on these premises. You will also find jars carrying the Portly Gourmet label (and have I mentioned just how much I love the label). Jars that will delight the soul and tickle your taste-buds. Among them you may notice the ever dependable Pickled Onions, and a delightful and slightly exotic Sweet Chili Relish!  




And if you (like me) are not in the local area then we need not fear. All that needs to be done is to head to: http://portlygourmet.wordpress.com/page/2/ for all our culinary dreams to be ignited (with recipes attached.)

Portly Gourmet, we can never thank you enough!

Nelly xx

To The Wire

There was a dress I made before I came to HK... I say before,  but I was actually handsewing the hem in my bed the night before my flight. This only just made it into the suitcase. And boy am I glad it did. It is the handmade dress I wear most frequently.\

The fabric is a vintage liberty print that my mum had vast amounts of lying around and it's fully lined in a cotton blend. The pattern is the one pictured below. I tweaked the sleeves a bit also. This is the best picture I have of this dress - sadly not full length but it's the best picture ever taken of the dress...





I found this a relatively simple dress to make. It was at the end of a run of three fully lined dresses that I made and with a few skills that I'd never used before, so this was always going to be the easiest of the three. It was simple to construct and the instructions were clear. The only change I made was to make the sleeves shorter so they suited me! I'm already looking forward to making another - the fabric awaits! 

Nelly x

Tuesday 16 April 2013

A Book I tell You... Another Book... (#8)

So it's not a week, but maybe I'll be able to hit 52 by the end of the year... (see post below). Challenge heartily accepted and here is one that I have read through at double quick speed: Going Solo by Roald Dahl.



I have read Boy many a time and delighted in Roald Dahl's wonderful ability to recount his memories in the most humours and laugh-out-loud ways. Going Solo maintained much of this but also had a level of seriousness that I have not encountered in any of his writing that I have read up to now. This alteration is of course because of the time to which he was referring (from 1939) and the stories and ideals of the people he meets. Despite this backdrop Dahl still manages to inject much of the book with his wonderful humour.

I was hooked within the first two pages simply because of the explanation of the collective vocabulary the the Empire Builders as-was had in common, regardless of location. Some are words that I am very used to hearing and I can put this down to the fact that my father and my grandfather are all connected to various parts of the British Armed Forces. The fact there are a few words thrown in their that I use makes it all the funnier.

I would always recommend Roald Dahl to anyone. The Twits and Fantastic Mr Fox have long been favourites and I vividly remember the first time someone but an old battered copy of Boy into my hands. I didn't put it down until it was finished and there was little difference for this. Dahl's autobiography is a must for any fan of his writing and it is so much fun to join him as he flies (almost literally) through Africa. Magical!

Nelly x

Go With The Flow.

So it is no surprise that my 52 books challenge has become as flat as a pancake, but I have not stopped reading, oh no! I recently discovered the most amazing bookshop in the world: Flow.

Flow is a second hand, predominantly English bookshop tucked away in a tiny room just off the Mid-Level escalators in Soho (and who ever thought a few years ago that I'd be writing that sentence!) Flow really is the last word in second hand bookshops. The organisation is brilliant and logical (titles in alphabetical order or books by subject) and but the overflow is a jumbled mess of all sorts, but to my mind this makes the experience ten times more exciting. You never know what you are going to find! Flow is so called because it is all about the flow of the books themselves; coming into the shop, leaving and coming back to be sold again. It's like a localised Book Crossing!

I finally found my way to Flow (it felt a little like a treasure hunt) in order to find one particular book. I had been hankering after the book for a few weeks and it is one of the many books that I have sitting on my shelves back in England that have not been digitalised. The book in question was Matthew Reilly's Seven Ancient Wonders. I love all of his books, but this one and Temple have always been two particular favorites. To my joy of joys, there the book was, sitting happily on a shelf calling out to me to be bought. And so it was.... along with seven others... (though one was for a friend). Flow has thus cemented itself as one of my favourite places in HK!

So I have a reading list and all in proper book form. There is nothing better than having a real book with real pages in you hands, and the books that I will soon be reviewing are:

  • Little Bee by Chris Cleave Finished!
  • Vernon Godlittle by DBC Pierre  Had to call it a day on this one!
  • The Guernsey Literary Peel and Potato Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer
  • Hell Island by Matthew Reilly  Finished, see review here.
  • The No.1 Ladies Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith Also finished, see review here.
  • Excavation by James Rollins Another finished, see here. 

Alongside these I am also reading Bloodlands by Timoth Snyder and Tea: A History of the Drink that Changed the World (I am a devoted tea lover) and Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone in French (somehow Madam Pomfrey became Madam Pomfresh....!) Really it's not unusual for me to have a good ten books on the go at any one time, but that's the way I like it. Reviews will hopefully be flooding in shortly!!

Nelly x

Growth Over Regression.

The only direction in which to travel is forwards, going backwards doesn't allow the space for growth and development.Going backwards is not what I want to do and the last few days have thrown up options and ideas that once upon a time I would have jumped at had I been given the chance. When these became a reality it turned out that it wasn't what I wanted at all. Now no longer a 'what if' it can be put to bed and the path forward is now, for the moment, cleared of um's and ah's.

So, feeling as free and as positive as I felt in November 2011, life seems ten times more exciting again and I'm looking forwards with great excitement and a new personal challenge. This challenge concerns the wardrobe and will I hope (technology permitting) kill multiple birds with the proverbial stone! I am going to attempt to construct an (almost) entirely hand made wardrobe. I think that jeans are going to be beyond me, so it's going to be all about the dresses, skirts and tunics. Here are a couple of my inspirations (with major credit to Roisin at But it can't be from Dolly Clackett. She gave me an Easter egg! and her many Elisalex dresses - I have now bought the pattern!):





BurdaStyle is just too good to me!

Hopefully this will keep my brain whirring and my fingers occupied and I can amass a collection of garments that I want to wear, like and feel good in whilst saving money at the same time. The added benefit is that once summer come's round here it can sometimes be too hot and oppressive to spend time outside, so there won't be too much guilt and the fabric choices here are beyond amazing... I already have a fabric in mind for that wrap dress... So here's a prayer to the sewing machine gods - let me work out why my pedal is not working!!!

Toodles,

Nelly x

Tuesday 2 April 2013

The Induction of Tradition

I love public holidays. Free days off work are always a winner. This Easter has been particularly sweet as I have finally been well enough to enjoy my time off!

This Easter has also brought with it that most wonderful of delights - a visitor - and begun what appears to be the bi-annual tradition of celebrating Easter in a random eatery at odds with the local cuisine. Two years ago it was Chinese in Glasgow, this year it was American in Hong Kong (we had originally been aiming at Mexican  but it was sadly closed!) Who know's where we'll be and what we'll be eating in two years time!!


I have also finally made it to Aberdeen of the Hong Kong variety. It made me feel much the same way that the Scottish version does, but was worth it for the comedy value of the confusion that it caused, and the promenade is a nice walk with sampans and fishing boats aplenty (though I can't imagine that it's anything Dad would recognise at all!)



The bonus of a visitor is the excellent excuse to go tourist, brush of the back pack and see all the sights again. I still haven't got bored of the light show or this most amazing of skylines. It even looks good in the rain! (helped by finally working out how to use the low light setting on the camera!!)


And for the "Mind.Blown." moment of the weekend, there was this semi-circular escalator. I kid you not, it was incredible!!


However work has returned and things will now once again rumble on, but the visitor is still here and Hong Kong is a city alive at night, so here's to a lack of sleep till Tuesday!!

Nelly x