Craft & Thrift Podcast

According to my substack, my last podcast was released on June 30th, 2025. That was almost 6 months ago, and corresponds almost exactly with when life got busy and stressful with the renovation of my house.Want to know more about my newsletter and podcast plans? Sign up here!I’d always planned to come back to podcasting, I love a good yackety-yack and apparently have no end of thoughts and opinions to share with you all. In the meantime, I’ve learned some light editing skills, so hopefully in this season (I’m calling it a season to make it sound like the 6 month hiatus was due to something glamorous and official, like a writers’ strike, or actor diary conflicts, rather than overwhelm and lack of mental bandwidth) you’ll hear an upturn in quality. Except apparently in this episode, because I realised too late you can’t edit away wind noise. I’ll be buying a microphone for future episodes I think.In this episode I’m chatting about my plans for the newsletter and podcast for the next few months. I’m considering turning on paid subscriptions when I reach 1000 subscribers, which incredibly isn’t that far away now. For paid subscribers, I’m thinking of offering an additional weekly newsletter and a monthly podcast episode. I’ve been banking additional content, as a way to mitigate future periods of overwhelm. I feel strongly that I want paid subscribers to feel they get good value for money and my main concern would be that life gets busy and stressful, and the quality or frequency of my content drops off. Having a source of pre-written newsletter material to draw from, would give me peace of mind to know I could keep up with the frequency without too much stress.12 Week Year by Brian P MorganI hope you enjoy this short and sweet introduction to season 2 of the Craft & Thrift Podcast. Enjoy the ASMR ice noise Rosie and I generate for you at the end, you can see in the photo above how sodden and frozen the ground was on this walk.Speak to you soon! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit craftandthrift.substack.com

Life has been pretty busy recently with DIY projects - filling holes left behind by the electrician, sanding walls ready for decorating, researching & planning a new kitchen and bathroom. I love learning a new skill, so on the whole I’m enjoying renovating the house, but it hasn’t left much bandwidth for actual creative work. I treated myself recently to a Woolly Mammoth Fibre Company Patreon membership, I found myself craving something restful and chill at the end of a long day of DIY. Emma is a natural dye yarn artist from Northern Ireland (apologies to Emma, I stumble over whereabouts in Ireland she was from in this episode!). It’s been the perfect accompaniment to knitting on the sofa in the evening and I’m finally making some headway on some longstanding projects.If you like knitting, sewing, gardening and renovation, then Craft & Thrift is for you!Here are some links and pictures to accompany this episode:My Sophie Shawl for my Mum (assuming the pink isn’t too hot for her!), made using Black Elephant yarnRhubarb & ginger jam - made using this BBC Good Food recipeTrying on a toddler-sized cowl, to make sure it goes over the head. Made using this vintage pattern from EtsyHome made pesto, made with home grown basil. Eaten in front of Woolly Mammoth Fibre Company on YouTubeLearning to fill the holes left behind by the rewireBadger & Daisy are unimpressed with the state of affairs in the house at the momentGrape jelly, made with grapes grown by a family friend. Made using this BBC Good Food recipeI tried to find a photo of my over sized Grandad sweater. You can get an impression in this picture of how this would have been the perfect indoors sweater, but how it was really too big and long to easily wear under coats. I still feel a lot of sadness and shame, that I cut it up and botched it, so I lost this sentimental piece of my Grandad’s wardrobe. It will live on in my Hobbit Robe and I’m planning on knitting Sweater No 18 by My Favourite Things knitwear as a more wearable substitute.Wherever you are in the world, I hope June has treated you well. Happy Solstice and welcome to the second half of the year! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit craftandthrift.substack.com

Andrew took this photo for me, I love how the early evening sunlight catches the chivesIt’s been a little minute since I published a podcast, but join me in my greenhouse to listen to the rain and talk about how the garden is growing. I find it so hard to be a beginner at anything, there’s a lag between the vision in my head and the skills I need to achieve the vision, but I’m trying really hard to just enjoy the process and the journey with my plants. If you like knitting, sewing, thrifting & gardening, then Craft & Thrift is for you!In this episode I talk about my raised beds (inside and outside the greenhouse, plus the mega raised bed from the podcast episode below), my birthday blueberry bushes, starting a stumpery from the remains of a plum tree, and sourcing plants. I bought a selection of plants from a charity plant sale at the local botanical gardens, you can see my selection below. Mental note: write down the names next time, I can’t remember half of what I bought. Everything appears to be thriving though, for which I’m very grateful. I love the marigolds and salvia in particular.One of my favourite places for a snack, a cuppa and a book - in my greenhouseIt’s probably obvious, given I’m talking about the Chelsea Flower Show at one point, that I recorded this several weeks ago! We’ve been so busy with our house renovation that I haven’t had the creative bandwidth to edit and upload this podcast until now. I have been playing around with editing software though, so hopefully you enjoy the changes (mostly editing out an excessive amount of ‘umm’ noises). The audio quality sounds a bit fuzzy in the first few minutes but it’s actually rain in the background. I thought it would be a nice idea to record in the greenhouse in the rain, which makes for some lovely background noises at various points, but also makes it sound like there’s an issue with the audio in the first few minutes. I’m still a beginner at podcasting, as well as gardening…!My winter gourds are flowering!If you listened to the end, thank you as ever for your support of my little corner of the internet. I’ve got several draft posts waiting to be finished and published, so hopefully I’ll be dropping into your inbox sooner rather than later. In the meantime, may your sage flower and your strawberries be plentiful. Mine are getting munched by the slugs, but I don’t overly begrudge them, I’m just happy my strawbs are happy. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit craftandthrift.substack.com

A little departure from the norm today, as I chat about my current reads-in-progress. I’m trying to prioritise reading, as a way to spend less time on my phone. It’s as simple as taking my book downstairs in the morning, so it’s more to hand throughout the day when I want to sit for 5 minutes. It stops me reaching for my phone on autopilot.If you like sewing, knitting, gardening and other sustainable, handmade content, Craft & Thrift is for you!I’m pretty good these days at not mindlessly scrolling social media, I have a 30 minute timer set for Instagram and very rarely go over it. I just don’t find Instagram anywhere near as inspiring and joyful as I used to, which is naturally limiting how much time I want to spend on it anyway. I have far less motivation to post any more, especially since deciding to focus more on improving my writing. The Bare Minimum Artist’s Way has helped me recognise that I want to be a writer, not a content creator. I’ve definitely conflated the two in my head in the recent past. The problem with using social media to build a following, is you’re learning and practicing a lot of skills and techniques that aren’t necessarily then applicable to your ultimate goal. Of course there are transferrable skills, but there are also a lot of potentially time-wasting rabbit holes to provide distraction. Making reels is not quick! In the end, my aim isn’t to build a huge following on Instagram and then sell them stuff, as is the business model for so many influencers. I would like to earn some kind of living from writing, in whatever form that may take. It’s fun to make and watch reels, don’t get me wrong, I love and appreciate the creativity of others. But posting on social media is ultimately not serving my longer term goal of becoming a better writer, then being paid for that skill.I’ve read that having a large following on social media can help you when it comes time to finding a publisher for your work. It makes sense that having an online presence can help with discoverability. I’m not sure how to square that circle yet to be honest, do I need to maintain some kind of presence on Instagram or is it enough to be posting regularly on Substack? I don’t use Twitter, Facebook, Threads or any other form of social media, so will Instagram really make that much difference? Surely authors are published who have no or minimal presence on social media? These questions feel like I’m getting ahead of myself, you have to walk before you can run after all. The only way to become a better writer is to write, not to create video content.Back to the original topic of this podcast - my current reads. Another way to become a better writer is to read widely, and that’s something I can definitely prioritise right now.* Want by Gillian Anderson* A Court of Thorns and Roses series - currently reading A Court of Frost and Starlight* Persuasion by Jane Austen - reading alongside listening to Pod & PrejudiceI have a lot of thoughts on the fantasy smut genre (if that’s what it’s called) but I need to come back to that topic, once I’ve worked out some more coherent thoughts! In the meantime, enjoy your reading wherever you are. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit craftandthrift.substack.com

I’ve been talking a lot about raised beds recently, and you’ll be pleased to learn I think that period is nearly over! I built my last raised bed, the one in the greenhouse, last week, so now I’m focusing on filling and painting them. I’m sure I’ll mention them again in a future post, since I’ll be proudly showing off their new paint job (Cuprinol Garden Shades in ‘Urban Slate’ is our choice), plus the plants I choose, but in the short term it’s nice to have another big garden project mostly complete.I lifted the uneven slabs in the greenhouse, they made the greenhouse look unkempt. In so doing, I disturbed an ants’ nest, so I gave them time to disperse before I needed into that area to finish screwing the raised bed together. Turns out, if you kneel in a disturbed ants’ nest, even one that looks empty, they will get into your clothes and bite you. Luckily their bites were small and barely noticeable, but I still feel bad for them. And me. They’ve survived though, and taken up residence inside the raised bed, which is currently filled with a base layer of moss and straw. I hope they don’t mind when I fill the remaining couple of inches with compost.This is the blossom from the plum tree I talk about in this episode. It’s quite old I think, and doesn’t have a lot of blossom relative to the size of the tree, but I can still see it’s going to be an issue in the autumn trying to keep the dogs from eating the dropped plums. It’s also slowly bringing down the back fence, so unfortunately, once it’s bloomed we’re going to take it down and replace it with climbing plants instead.My daffodils are so pretty, and I’m very much enjoying bringing cut flowers into the house. I’m meeting a friend tonight and I’m going to take a bunch for her as well. It’s so lovely to be able to give flowers away, I definitely want to grow cut flowers this year and in the future. I’ve got yarrow seedlings in the greenhouse, borage in the raised bed, and cosmos in some of the garden beds, so we’ll see who survives and thrives. I’m also planning to plant marigolds in May.My Jazzy Rose sweet peas are coming along nicely, another week or two and I’ll be planting them out in the garden I think.I planted some nasturtium seeds in the long raised bed alongside the greenhouse, mixed in with leftover last year’s onion sets. The pigeons keep pulling the onions out, which is annoying, so I’ve mulched them with straw to help keep them hidden until they establish themselves. I have visions of the nasturtiums tumbling over the side of the raised bed later in the summer, I hope that comes to fruition!Basil, tomatoes, chillis, parsley and coriander are all doing well in the greenhouse. Once the raised bed in the greenhouse is filled with compost, I’ll be planting these little seedlings out. I’ve got an oregano in the external raised bed that is struggling, so I think I’ll move it into the greenhouse too. I’ll report back on their progress over the coming growing season!Another couple of links from this episode:* East Coast Organics* Vital Seeds* Jazzy Rose Flowers This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit craftandthrift.substack.com

Those who have been following my blog for a few years (love you!) will have heard me talk about the Hobbit Robe. I’ve mentioned it on and off in various newsletters and Instagram posts, but I’m finally on the home straight. The end is in sight and I’m so excited about the first morning I get to wake up, don my wool quilted Hobbit robe and take a turn about my garden (pipe optional).A few links I mention in this episode:* the original inspiration was from Ivy of the Sewlo Artist. You can see some of her dedicated content to the Hobbit robe here and here* Rachel of Minimalist Machinist for the crumb quilting. You can see examples here and here* Beth of Sew DIY has a Substack here: Beth Wood. The Improv Quilting class is here and the Tasi robe pattern is here* Deborah of Dastardly Line, who did the quilting for meI’ve only got ropey mirror selfies in artificial light so far, mostly because I want to save the good pictures for the big reveal! In the short term though, I wanted to give you a sneak peak and an idea of the finished garment. Those internal pockets will be made longer and a neckband is still to be added, plus the obvious side seams, cuffs and bottom hem to finish. But the end is in sight and I’m hopeful that within a month or so, I’ll be able to show the final piece. It feels like a work of wearable art, at the risk of sounding grandiose. Wearable art and personal history. I hope I’ll be wearing it for many years to come. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit craftandthrift.substack.com

I have had the loveliest, most calming and soul-soothing time in my garden this afternoon. The sun shone, the birds sang, and I quietly pottered between the greenhouse and the raised bed. As I write this, I’ve sown parsley, sunflowers, borage, winter squash and sweetpeas. It’s so delightful to have started to sow my own seeds, I’ve been dreaming of this moment for 20 years. I bought my seeds from a company called Vital Seeds, who produce their own seeds in the UK. According to a video I watched on Huw Richard’s YouTube channel, where the owners of Vital Seeds are interviewed about their principles and business, I should be able to collect seed from these plants and grow from them again next year.The sweetpeas are from Jazzy Rose Flowers, which is owned by Lisa Comfort, of Sew Over It fame. I followed a video on her Instagram as to how to germinate the seeds on the windowsill, before planting some today.The sunflowers are the variety ‘Hello’ and came free with my Gardener’s World magazine. My inner child is very excited to see how tall these grow. Fingers crossed they make it over the top of the fence, then I’ll be able to see them as I park my car on the driveway.From Vital Seeds I’ve planted:* Yarrow - Summer Berries* Borage* Winter squash - Desert Spirit Landrace* Parsley - Italian GiantI stole the picture above from the Vital Seeds website, but I really hope I get proper knobbly gourds in a variety of colours! I want to decorate with them in autumn, and then eat them over the winter.Most of the plants will be going into my raised bed, which is 95% finished! You can hear all about the construction in this episode, I’ve just got to paint it now.I’ll be writing or recording an update on the raised bed, about how I sealed it and filled it, plus my plans for what plants to grow. Here’s a spoiler picture though, of some of the plants being introduced to their new home.For now though, thank you for joining me on this episode recorded in my greenhouse! As ever, I very much appreciate you all for reading and listening to my content and I’ll see you again in a few days. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit craftandthrift.substack.com

Nothing grand of note to report in the podcast this week, other than some little updates on ongoing projects. I almost didn’t post a podcast episode, but there’s joy to be found in the little things, especially in these dark days. A few rows of knitting here, an hour spent in the garden there, for me these are the wee bitties that add up to peace, joy, and living a creatively fulfilled life.The Christmas cards are a dead giveaway that this is not a recent photo of the robin on the window feeder!The birds are busy in the garden, collecting nest material and raking through my bird feeders. I’m considering going down to Harbro (the animal feed warehouse) to buy bird seed by the 12kg bag. Am I ready to commit to feeding the birds in that volume? Or am I just deluding myself by repeatedly buying 500g bags of seed from the supermarket?I talk about my current knitting project, the PetiteKnit Barbara Balaclava. You can see my progress above, and my inspo pic from a recent Guardian Fashion Statement email newsletter. Knitting is one of the few areas of craft, where it can be cheaper to make your own, assuming you don’t factor in your time!The reason all the blankets in the house are ‘odiferous’, in the words of my mother-in-lawThe bulbs I planted back in November are flowering and I love seeing them from the windows of the house, even on cold wet days like today. I wanted to spend the day in the garden but it’s been raining sideways intermittently and it’s freezing cold. So instead I made myself a cuppa and settled in for some sewing. The slow cooker is on and gradually filling the house with warming, homely scents of dinner. The radiators are quietly clicking away, and the dogs are snoozing on the sofa after a short, chilly walk in the rain. I rather optimistically hung the laundry out on the line (I’m still so delighted to have a garden to dry washing) and it’s currently hanging damp and bedraggled, waiting for a break in the rain for me to retrieve it for the warmth of the Dry:Soon. But for now, I’m not leaving my cosy nook. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit craftandthrift.substack.com

If you follow me over on Notes, you may have seen a spoiler of my raised bed. It’s a bit of a beast, standing at 72cm high (roughly hip height on me), I’ve built it from decking planks and 2x2” timber. The aim is to be able to grow a variety of fruit and veggies, without the dogs charging through my plants or toileting in inappropriate places (Badger took to pooping on the rhubarb for a while there, sigh). I’m also hoping it will protect my back and knees over the coming years. Having spent a large amount of time weeding my gran’s veg beds over the last decade or so, I can attest that traditional height raised beds don’t necessarily protect your back, you still have to bend at an awkward angle to weed and plant.That’s the idea in theory, but I figure if it’s too tall in the long run, I can always remove the top decking board and cut the posts down to size. Tanya from the Lovely Greens (a very inspiring YouTube channel I would highly recommend if you’re into gardening and soap making) recommends sealing the inside of raised beds with silicone sealant, of the type used in vivariums and aquariums. This will apparently lengthen the lifespan of my raised beds significantly, whilst minimising the chemicals and microplastics that can leach into the soil from other methods of wood protection. I’m then planning on sealing the inside of the wood with linseed oil (similar to my compost bin) and the outside with Cuprinol garden shades, in the colour we’ll be picking to match the fence. The linseed oil and external painting have yet to be done, that’s the plan for my next set of days off.You can see from the picture above, taken just after we moved in, the garden hadn’t had much love in the recent past. The previous owner was very into growing veg, but hadn’t been physically capable of it for a while. The area where the raised bed is now, just in front of the greenhouse, was full of half-rotting rhubarb, old herbs growing wild, and bits of netting and plastic. In this photo, we were in the process of lifting all the gravel, hence the black plastic bags, pulling out all the rotten wood, and rescuing as many of the remaining plants before we laid turf.This was taken just after finishing laying the turf, less than a week after we moved in. We were on a bit of a deadline to get the turf down before it became too cold for it to survive. It was a mammoth task, but we managed it! I cleared all the rotten rhubarb leaves, finding some healthy looking rhubarb plants underneath, and moved the surviving herbs into other parts of the garden or into pots, whilst I decided where they would go next.And here we are today. It’s looking a bit chaotic because I’m mid-raised bed build. The pile of greens to the right of the image is chopped up holly tree, which will go into the bottom of the raised bed once I’ve treated the inside with linseed oil. The chopped logs on the patio table will either go into the raised bed or into a pile in a hedgerow in the front garden, to form a habitat for beetles and other insects. I’ve got 2 redcurrant bushes I’m hoping to replant behind the greenhouse, where they’ll get a lot of sunlight, and the remaining 3 pots of rhubarb in the bottom right will be either going to the next door neighbour, or back into the raised bed. It’s definitely a work in progress, but I’m getting there! The next step is to fill the raised bed, I had a metric tonne of topsoil delivered last week and I’m heading out at the weekend to collect horse manure to mix into the topsoil for added organic matter. And then the final, and most joyful step will be planting! This was on my Spring joy list and I’m so excited to almost be able to start.Thank you so much for listening to, and supporting my little podcast corner of the internet. I really appreciate you all for being here, for clicking like or leaving a comment. I hope wherever you are, you’re enjoying the spring weather (or autumn in the southern hemisphere!) and seeing signs of life appearing around you. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit craftandthrift.substack.com

Wearing the repaired sheepskin coat and Morgan jeans!I recorded a podcast last week about a sewing day I had planned with my bestie, who came to visit our new house for the first time last week. It was a lovely to see her, we went for a walk in Glen Affric, did a charity shop trawl and got coffee, and talked about house and garden plans for both of our new homes. We’re both in the renovation phase of life, so it was wonderful to be able to knit, sew, and dream about our future homes and gardens.I had a pile of mending and alterations I wanted to work through, including a sweatshirt needing a patch on the chest, a sheepskin coat needing a hole in the armpit repaired, a pair of jeans needing a new button, a pair of trousers needing taken up, and two half-finished Blackbird Fabrics Bestie bags to complete.I should have made myself a list before I started recording this podcast, because I realise now I forgot to talk about the sheepskin coat repair, which was arguably the most epic of the mends. This coat was gifted to me by my mother-in-law, having been her sister’s, then hers, and now mine. I think it dates from the 1980s, and I wore it a lot when she first gave it to me. It’s warm and thick, with the leather material acting as a wind barrier, as well as keeping out the cold. Sadly, after several winters of wearing it almost non-stop, it developed a large hole in the armpit so I was forced to retire it, lest the hole get bigger over time. A stitch in time and all that.At the time (I think this was early 2020 if I remember correctly), I didn’t feel able to repair this myself, so I took it to a tailor to get an opinion. This was just before lockdown I think, so I never went ahead with the repair, and the coat went into storage for the last 5yrs. Since then I’ve sewn a lot with leather, so felt more confident to affect this repair myself.I started by unpicking the armpit seam, then cut away the damaged piece of leather. I found some leather in my stash that was a decent match for colour (thank you to my parents’ old dining room chairs for the donation) and cut a pair of appropriately sized patches, with the intention to have one on the inside, one on the outside, with the coat material sandwiched in the middle. This would approximately match the weight of the sheepskin and stabilise the edges of the cut leather. I then planned to sew the armpit closed again, this time catching the patch in the seam.I cut the first patches too small, so had to try again with a larger pair. Sewing a neat square around the hole was easy, the tricky part was trying to sew the armpit closed again. I realised part of the seam had been topstitched, so after sewing it closed and realising it looked awful and puckered when worn, I unpicked my stitches and hand sewed the topstitched areas back down. I then machine sewed the underarm and ended up with a repair that, whilst not perfect, is close enough to be invisible to anyone not staring into my armpit.That repair took the majority of my mending time, meaning the rest of the repairs flew by. I talk about the others in the podcast, some are yet to be completed but I finished the machine sewing sections, and will spend some time on the sofa in front of Succession finishing off the hand sewing parts. It’s very satisfying to have most cleared my sewing to do list, so I can focus on some more exciting and joyful projects in the future!Some links from this episode:* My previous Morgan jeans, which got a new button* Bestie bags by Blackbird Fabrics Patterns* Angry Girls Club patch by AnnekeCaramin on Etsy, used to Amyify a sweatshirt passed down to me from Andrew* My Spring joy plans! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit craftandthrift.substack.com