After much searching for a hat pattern on the Internet, to no avail, I developed the baker’s boy hat knitting pattern. The baker’s boy cap knitting pattern is an easy knitted alternative to the crochet hats being worn this season.

The baker boy hat is inspired by designs such as the newsboy cap or twiggy style hat – made up in sections, however in this baker’s boy hat pattern all the sections are knitted in one go, rather than sewn together afterwards. The baker boy cap can have either a hard or soft peak, visor, or brim, according to the preference of the maker.

The baker boy hat pattern was conceived in London, developed in South Bohemia and completed in St Ives, Cornwall, and is now being knitted internationally.

Knit your own baker boy hat in an evening. The baker boy cap is a simple pattern knit on two needles (not circular), using only basic knit, purl, increase and decrease stitches.

The baker boy hat pattern is clear and straight forward, and includes photos and a stitch diagram for you to follow as you knit your baker boy hat.

You will need:

• 100g chunky wool (150 metres)
• 5.5mm knitting needles
• 6 hours (for an experienced knitter)

This really is the perfect way to use up wool from a favourite (but unfashionable) old jumper. Or search charity shops for an inexpensive luxurious cashmere or mohair jumpers to recycle into your own unique work.

Please send us a photo of your finished baker boy hat if you would like to have it included in our baker boy hat gallery.

This pattern is also available to download directly from http://www.baker-boy-hat.co.uk. This pattern is provided as a pdf file. If you need another format, please contact us. Many thanks for looking.

There has been a sudden drop in temperature. I needed gloves which were quick to make, warm and practical. The solution was to knit a glove that is made in one piece with no sewing required; and for speed, knitted horizontally instead of vertically in a chunky wool.

Because of the cold, I don’t personally like fingerless gloves or mittens, which have to be removed every time you need to do anything with your hands. These are a good compromise.

These gloves are particularly handy for mobile phone users because the stretchy finger tips finish with a small hole. If you need to answer your mobile you can poke out a finger, or write a text without having to expose your whole hand to the cold. The Handy Mobile Phone Glove pattern can also be made up as a traditional pair of gloves if you prefer.

This is a brand new pattern, designed in South Bohemia at the start of Winter 2007.

Knit your own gloves in a single winter evening. This is a simple pattern knit on two needles (no fiddly 3 needle bits), using basic knit stitch, increase and decrease stitches and picking up cast off stitches.

The pattern is clear and straight forward, and includes photos and a stitch diagram for you to follow as you knit your gloves.

You will need:

• 100g chunky wool (150 metres)
• 5 mm knitting needles
• 8 hours (for an experienced knitter)

This really is another perfect way to use up wool from a favourite (but unfashionable) old jumper. Or search charity shops for an inexpensive luxurious cashmere or mohair for your own unique work.

Please send us a photo of your finished gloves if you would like to have them included in our knitters gallery.

This pattern is only available on Ebay, or as a download from the payloads web site. This pattern is provided as a pdf file. If you need another format, please contact us. Many thanks for looking.

Now the temperatures have dropped and the season has finished, I’m really missing it. It was lovely to take 1/2 hour or so every day to meander through the forest together & I now feel like I know my locale that bit better. I wonder if the start of the hunting season is also a push factor to the conclusion of mushroom picking here – as some varieties still grow now… if you’re wondering around in the forest, there’s a risk of being mistaken for something else (two easy ways to die through misidentification in mushroom picking).

So, in conclusion, we have identified and eaten the following types of mushrooms & are alive to tell the tale:

• Yellow foot chanterelle
• Chantrelle
• Hawks wing (a type of tooth fungus which is edible but can be bitter).
• Hedgehog mushroom
• Parasole
• Boletus edulis (or penny bun)
• Boletus badius (Bay bolete)
• Boletus erythropus (or red foot bolete – this one is great fun & looks really scary with it’s amazing colour changes)
• Boletus subtomentosus (or suede bolete)

Not a bad range seeing as we didn’t even bother buying mushrooms when we lived in the UK (the supermarket button mushrooms are so dull!!!). M said he has eaten more mushrooms in the last month than in the rest of his life.

Many sources had told us that Czechs are fairly relaxed about mushroom identification, but they have a saying that someone with a mushroom book in the forest is on their way to hospital. Our experience is that people are ultra conservative & will only eat varieties which have always been eaten by their families. They may not be looking them up in books, but a few generations of experience is far more important.

Nový Mlýn is at an altitude of 540 metres above sea level. It is this factor which is the main influence on our climate. We’re about 90 metres higher than our nearest town, Tábor, but close in altitude to a neighbouring town Pelhřimov. The average temperatures are likely to be above 10 degrees c for six months of the year (that includes night time temperatures).

Our approach to heating is decidedly ’suck it and see’. This winter we will use the traditional heating method for this area – ie wood burning stoves, and see how successful this is. Will we manage to keep warm? How much wood will we need? Will the daily work of setting fires become a grind? There’s one way to find out.

We’ve moved our bedroom so it’s above the dining room & kitchen, which we keep warm during the day. The bedroom is now adjoining the room upstairs with the super efficient barrel shaped stove. So far, so good, but the temperature outside is a mere 0, and it has much further to go. At the moment, the weather here looks like this, but in the middle of winter, temperatures could be as low as this.