Ultimately, I fell back on my classic craft paper vibe for this setup, adding in some autumnal washi tape for a quick and easy pop of colour/pattern, and some leafy doodles (because leaves are, to be perfectly honest, the extent of my drawing capabilities).

Table of Contents

• Equipment
• Quote + Cover Page
• Monthly Calendar
• Blog Planning
• Christmas Planning
• Weeklies
  • Week 1
  • Week 2
  • Week 3
  • Week 4
• November Review
• Final Thoughts

Equipment

To make this setup, I used the following equipment:

• Tombow ABT Dual Brush Pen, N35 Cool Grey 12.
• Sakura Gelly Roll, 10 Bold, white.
• Brown craft paper.
• Autumnal washi tape (mine was from this pack).
• Glue stick.
• Scissors.

Quote + Cover Page

Throughout this setup, I used a simple, lowercase font for all of my headings/subheadings, written with the fine tip of my N35 Tombow. For the Cover Page, I wrote the header in the middle of a piece of torn craft paper, then filled the space around it with white leaf doodles, drawn with my Gelly Roll. I also added a couple of pieces of washi tape, to give the page a scrapbook-y kind of feel.

I wasn’t quite sure what quote to use for my Quote Page, so I fell back on an autumnal classic— a line from All Too Well (Taylor’s Version, of course). It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of Taylor Swift, and this line about autumn leaves felt very fitting to my theme, so it worked out well! I wrote the quote across multiple pieces of torn craft paper, stuck them in, added some washi tape in the bottom-left corner, then filled the remaining space with more leaf doodles (this time drawn with the N35 Tombow). I also used the white Gelly Roll to add little corner ‘frames’ to the written sections, to add some brightness and extra decoration.

Monthly Calendar

Onto my Monthly Calendar now, and I went for a super simple grid format with rounded corners. I drew the grid and wrote in the dates using that same N35 Tombow. I stuck the header, created in the same way as the Cover Page, in on top of a long piece of the washi tape, then added more washi tape and more pieces of craft paper with white leaf doodles, into the bottom-right corner. Finally, I filled the remaining space with grey leaf doodles.

Blog Planning

Next up is my Blog Planning section, where I keep track of my content for the month ahead (and, in this case, the month after that!).

On the left-hand page, I’ll be keeping track of the posts I’m creating for November. In the top box, I opted to use a table format to track the progress of each individual post. The name of the post goes in the far-left column, then the subsequent columns are for when the item is made (m), the photos have been taken (p), the post has been written (w), the text has been edited (e), the photos have been edited (ep), the pin has been made (p) and, finally, a tick in the final column for when the post is completely finished. In the space below, I have 4 separate boxes, to house 4 lots of post-specific to-do lists.

On the right-hand page is my Blogmas At Home 2024 planning section! The format for this one is exactly the same as the table on the left-hand page, but it is much bigger, so I have space to keep track of more posts!

Christmas Planning

I like to get ahead of the game and get my Christmas presents completely sorted by the end of November, so I can fully enjoy the festive season. Therefore, just like last year, I have a Christmas Planning section in my November setup. However! This is not the most extensive Christmas Planner in the whole world, because I have recently created a cute & festive Digital Christmas Planner, which I will be using this year for all of my planning needs, both before & during the festive season. You can buy the planner for yourself, if you fancy, on Etsy. It would mean the absolute WORLD to me if you checked it out!

Back to this spread, though, and, on the right-hand page, I have a big space for any jobs I’d like to do in anticipation of the festive season, as well as a space for notes. On the left-hand page, I have my gift planning section, which I’ve obscured with makeshift ‘doors’ (in case I accidentally leave my bullet journal open and my family members catch a sneaky glimpse!). To make each door, I just tore a large piece of craft paper (making sure it was big enough to conceal the boxes that I had drawn below), and used a piece of washi tape to create a sort of ‘hinge’ on the left-hand side. I then used another, smaller piece of washi tape to keep the door closed— when I want to open it, I’ll just gently peel this piece away from the journal page, use the spread below, then stick the washi tape back down afterwards to ‘shut’ the door.

Underneath the doors, I have a space for keeping track of the main presents I plan to get my friends and family, as well as a space for stocking presents below. For the main present section, I have used a table format: the first column is for the recipient, then I’ll write the gift I’ll be getting them, then the price of said gift, then I have three checkbox columns, where I can keep track of whether or not I’ve ordered, received and wrapped each present. For the stocking section, I just have two simple boxes. I’ll write the name of the recipient at the top of the box, then use the rest of the space to note down stocking present ideas/plans.

Weeklies

Finally, we come to the Weekly Spreads! Last month, I trialled a new layout for my weeklies, which involved cutting the pages right down and using the space before and after them for task lists, and I found it really useful, so I’ve decided to go down that route again, this time around.

Week 1

Because I was under a bit of time pressure, I opted to merge the first 3 days of November in with the first full week and make a spread for 10 days, rather than 7, as my first ‘weekly’ spread. To fit in all of the days, I used a 3-up/4-across layout, using the 2 final spaces for the heading.

As you can see, this time around, I’ve decided to keep the left-hand space of my Weekly Spreads for generic tasks, but reserved the right-hand space for blog-related tasks. I naturally started doing this last month anyway, so it just felt right to make it official with the subheadings! To soften the sharp edges of the cut paper (I have a fear of paper cuts, naturally) and to add a bit of decoration, I folded long lengths of the washi tape over the edges of the pages I cut down.

Week 2

Back to a regular, 7-day week for the second weekly, so I’ve gone for a standard 2-up/4-across layout, using the first space for the heading.

Week 3

The third weekly is another full week, so I used the same layout, but switched up where I put the heading.

Week 4

The final week technically only contains 6 days of November, but I opted to included the whole week anyway, so that I can see any events on 1st December at a glance.

November Review

Finally, we have my November Review spread. Content-wise, this spread is pretty identical to my previous review spreads: on the left-hand page, I have spaces to note down the ATP & WTA Top 10 at the end of the month, as well as my #1 memory from, and top 6 songs in, November. I opted against drawing little squares to house the album art of the songs this month, simply because it’s always a bit of a faff and I just face it this month!

On the right-hand page, I have the heading (created in the same way as the Cover Page, washi tape and all) and a space to stick in my favourite photo from the month. I added a little more washi tape, along with a couple of leaf doodles, just to add some decoration to the spread.

Final Thoughts

Overall, I’m really happy with how this spread turned out. It was quick and easy to set up, but it still feels very autumnal and fun, so I think it ticks all of my boxes in terms of what I set out to do. I continue to struggle with drawing boxes with rounded corners freehand (they get progressively worse and worse as the spreads go on, and I lose my will to live more and more), but perhaps it’s time I just accept they aren’t my calling (realistically, I won’t be doing this… I’m a sucker for a round-cornered box, even if I’m useless at drawing them).

I hope you’ve enjoyed this November setup! I think it’s going to be so perfect for keeping me on track this month and getting me prepared for the busy festive season! On that note, again, if you’re interested, you can find my new DIGITAL CHRISTMAS PLANNER on Etsy here.

Gemma

xxx

I thought this project would be a great way of trialling some of the amazing, free patterns out there for knitted/crocheted pumpkins. I wanted my pumpkins to have a variety of textures, colours and patterns, so it gave me the perfect opportunity to try out lots of different methods and styles. In total, I made 5 different pumpkins. In this post, I’ll go through all of the details for each pumpkin, link the patterns I used & share any amendments/changes I made.

I think it’s time for some pumpkins, don’t you?

Table of Contents

• Pumpkin #1: Wee Pumpkin by Susan Rainey
  • Thoughts on Pumpkin #1
• Pumpkin #2: (Fluffy) Pepo Pumpkin Patch by Sandra Magalhães
  • Thoughts on Pumpkin #2
• Pumpkin #3: Darlin’ Plaid Pumpkin by Stitchberry
  • Thoughts on Pumpkin #3
• Pumpkin #4: Vertical Stripe Pumpkin by Sara Myers
  • Thoughts on Pumpkin #4
• Pumpkin #5: Handsome Cable Pumpkin by Sara Kiesel
  • Thoughts on Pumpkin #5
• Final Thoughts

Pumpkin #1: Wee Pumpkin by Susan Rainey

Craft: Knitting

Pattern: Wee Pumpkins by Susan Rainey.

Yarn: King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply, in the shade Cinnamon (leftover from my Anthology Pumpkin Hat).

Needles: 2.75mm DPNs.

Stem Details: 5-stitch i-cord, made using King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply in Chocolate (023) on 2.75mm DPNs. I knitted 5 rows of i-cord, then pulled the yarn through the stitches to ‘cast off’.

Adaptations:

• Used fingering weight yarn instead of sport.

You can find the link to my Ravelry project page for Pumpkin #1 here!

Thoughts on Pumpkin #1

• This makes a super small pumpkin. It’s SO cute, but a little flat.
• It’s quite easy to make the pumpkin ‘segments’ uneven by accident (I did).
• Pattern used BLCO for increases (not my fave method) and K2tog for decreases (a classic). This pattern, unlike some of the others, does include shaping, which gives the pumpkin a nice appearance.

Pumpkin #2: (Fluffy) Pepo Pumpkin Patch by Sandra Magalhães

Craft: Knitting

Pattern: Pepo Pumpkin Patch by Sandra Magalhães (large size, in-the-round version).

Yarn: Scheepjes Sweetheart Soft, in the shade 06 (leftover from a spontaneous mammoth amigurumi, made a while back for my soon-to-be sister-in-law).

Needles: 4.5mm circular needles (40cm).

Stem details: I followed a similar method to the stem of Pumpkin #5, using the same Scheepjes Metropolis in Valencia (062), but made the stem a bit wider (24 stitches, as opposed to 12) to suit the larger pumpkin. Because of the larger stitch count, I worked an extra round of k2togs before finishing off.

Adaptations:

• Used fluffy, chunky weight yarn instead of worsted.
• I added stitch markers to mark where the purl stitches went on every round. This was super helpful, particularly at first, because the fluffy yarn is quite difficult to see/work with! It also made the knitting process much quicker/easier, because I didn’t have to keep double checking where I was in the round.
• I knitted the main piece until it measured 25cm.

You can find the link to my Ravelry project page for Pumpkin #2 here!

Thoughts on Pumpkin #2

• I had planned to crochet a pumpkin using this yarn, but my GOODNESS it was hard to work with— it was a real struggle to feel where the stitches were! I decided to use it for a knitted pumpkin instead and it was MUCH easier.
• This particular pattern gave some very helpful information on the ratio between the length of the knitted piece and the height of the finished pumpkin (0.4 ish), which I was able to apply to all of my subsequent pumpkin-making endeavours.
• I LOVED the use of purl stitches as a guide in this pattern— it made dividing the pumpkin up evenly SO simple and easy.

Pumpkin #3: Darlin’ Plaid Pumpkin by Stitchberry

Craft: Crochet

Pattern: Darlin’ Plaid Pumpkin by Stitchberry (regular size).

Yarn: Stylecraft Special DK, in the shades Cream (1005) and Gingerbread (1806) (from my excessive stash of Stylecraft Special DK).

Hook: 5.0mm

Stem details: I made a basic, crochet stem for this one using a single strand of the Gingerbread yarn and a 3.0mm hook. The pattern is as follows (as always, UK terminology is used):

Round 1: Work 6 dc into a magic loop (6)

Round 2: 2 dc in each stitch around (12)

Rounds 3-7: dc in each stitch around

Fasten off yarn, leaving long end for attaching to pumpkin.

Adaptations:

• Used DK weight yarn held double, instead of worsted (obviously, this is not equivalent, so my pumpkin is a bit chunkier than it should be!).
• For the surface crochet, I worked all of the horizontal stripes on the right side, leaving 4 stitches between each one. For the vertical stripes, I alternated between working them on the right and wrong side (to add a bit of interest) and left 5 1/2 rows between each right-side, vertical row.
• I didn’t darn in the Gingerbread ends from the surface crochet, just used a needle to carry them right to the edge of the work, in the same chain pattern, then tied them off and caught them behind the work with the ‘cinching’ yarn (though I don’t actually think the pattern calls for darning in the ends either!).
• I used a few extra stitches as well as the ‘cinching’ method to close the pumpkin shut (because my fabric was so chunky!).
• I used the MC yarn (Cream), not the CC yarn (Gingerbread) to define the pumpkin ‘segments’. I think this looks a little more seamless.

You can find the link to my Ravelry project page for Pumpkin #3 here!

Thoughts on Pumpkin #3

• Using DK held double was probably a bit thick— it worked perfectly everywhere except the top and the bottom, where there was a bit too much stiff material to gather it in properly.
• I really liked the effect and colour combo of this pattern!

Pumpkin #4: Vertical Stripe Pumpkin by Sara Myers

Craft: Knitting

Pattern: Trio of Pumpkins by Sara Myers (Pumpkin #1 (Maroon & Beige Vertical Stripe)).

Yarn: Cascade Cantata, in the shades Cocoa (15) and Sand (16) (leftover from my Atlantis Sweater).

Needles: 5.0mm circular needles (40cm).

Stem details: Using the darker shade (Cocoa), I made a 4-stitch i-cord that was about 10cm long, then twisted it back on itself and secured it in that shape with a few stitches before attaching it to the pumpkin.

Adaptations:

• I used smaller needles than suggested (even though I actually used the right yarn weight with this one!) because I was worried about the stuffing poking through. I’m actually glad I did this— I think I could have gone even smaller because this pumpkin definitely has the loosest gauge of all of them!

You can find the link to my Ravelry project page for Pumpkin #4 here!

Thoughts on Pumpkin #4

• I was a bit disappointed that my pumpkin wasn’t as ‘swirly’ looking as the pumpkin in the pattern photo? I’m not entirely sure how you could achieve that, and I do like the stripes, but it’s just not quite what I was hoping for.
• As I mentioned, I think I would use slightly smaller needles if I were to make this again— perhaps 4.0 or 4.5mm?

Pumpkin #5: Handsome Cable Pumpkin by Sara Kiesel

Craft: Knitting

Pattern: Handsome Cable Pumpkin by Sara Kiesel.

Yarn: Fyberspates CoopKnits Socks Yeah!, in the shade Citrine (118) (leftover from a project that I will be sharing soon!).

Needles: 2.75mm (DPNs and circular (40cm)).

Stem details: I followed the instructions for the stem from the pattern, but made it separately (as opposed to directly on from the pumpkin itself) and stitched it on after stuffing because I knew my pumpkin was a little more sparse at that end (because of my reduced row count) and wanted to stitch it together first! Like Pumpkin #2, I used Scheepjes Metropolis in Valencia (062).

Adaptations:

• Used fingering weight yarn instead of worsted.
• After round 62, I jumped straight to round 103 to decrease the height of the finished pumpkin.
• I intended to follow the pattern from there as written, but I was playing yarn chicken, so, I ended up working rounds 103-108, then only worked rounds 110, 112, 115, 117, 119, 121, 124 and 126-134 (i.e. the ones with shaping/cables, plus a few extra rows, just until I was confident I had enough yarn!). I don’t recommend doing this, because (obviously) the top of my pumpkin was a little sparse, but it was nothing a little darning couldn’t disguise.
• I made the stem separately (so that I could fix the problems caused by my above fudging more easily).

You can find the link to my Ravelry project page for Pumpkin #5 here!

Thoughts on Pumpkin #5

• I ran into SO MUCH trouble with this one at first, because I just couldn’t work out the increases vs the stitch count! Turns out you absolutely NEED to use an increase that doesn’t use an existing stitch (i.e. not KFB), otherwise the stitch count won’t add up right. I ended up using a combo of lifted increases and M1Ls.
• This pattern is a little bit fiddly to work up at the beginning and the end (when you’re on the DPNs), but becomes much more fluid on the circular needles.
• This definitely took the longest of all of my pumpkins— it involves a lot more knitting than the rest!
• If knitted as instructed (using worsted weight yarn/ and working the whole pattern), this pumpkin would be absolutely huge. Like, HUGE. If you want a massive pumpkin, this pattern is your friend.
• I absolutely LOVE the cable pattern and yarn colour.
• I’m also a big fan of the slip knot/crochet starting technique used in this pattern! It’s not a technique I’ve come across before, but I thought it was very neat and super snazzy.

Final Thoughts

I have to say, I really LOVE my yarn-y pumpkin patch. I think each pumpkin has so much character— they’re all so different and individual, but still all very pumpkin-y. I think that they make the perfect, autumnal decorations!

Overall, I think my favourite pumpkin is probably Pumpkin #5 (the Handsome Cable Pumpkin), which is funny because it was definitely the one that caused me the most grief as I was making it! I don’t think the written pattern is perfect, but the cable pattern is just so gorgeous, and the Fyberspates yarn is such a pretty shade of orange, I think it all came together really nicely (even with all of my fudging).

Sadly, I do think Pumpkin #4 (the Vertical Stripe Pumpkin) is my least favourite of the quintet. It just doesn’t have the same neatness (dare I say, elegance?) as the other pumpkins, and I was disappointed not to achieve the same swirly effect that the pumpkin from the pattern seems to have. I also think I could have knitted this pumpkin on even smaller needles, because it has a slightly more open fabric than I would have liked for a stuffed object.

Having said all that, I love all the pumpkins together and think they make a lovely, autumnal cluster! What do you think? Which pumpkin is your favourite?

Gemma

xxx

The first stage of any knitting project is swatching (sigh), because it’s important to test out gauge, yarns and colours (so I’m told). In the Strange Brew book, there is a pattern for a colourwork hat called the Anthology Hat. The pattern even suggests that you treat the hat as your ‘swatch’, thereby testing out both the yarn and your gauge AND being left with a wearable item by the end of it. As someone who quite literally despises swatching, this seemed like a great plan for me! So, in swatching for my soon-to-be Pumpkin Strange Brew Sweater, I made two colourwork hats (hence why this is Project Knitwear #6.5— technically, these are wearable knits, but they’re not the knitwear item I have lined up for the next instalment). In this post, I’ll be giving you all the details for both hats, chatting about my experience making them AND talking you through my final colour/yarn choices for my sweater.

Table of Contents

• The Pattern
• Hat #1: King Cole Merino Blend
  • Mini Review: King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply
  • Hat #1 as a Swatch: Thoughts
• Hat #2: Scheepjes Metropolis
  • Mini Review: Scheepjes Metropolis
  • Hat #2 as a Swatch: Thoughts
• Ladderback Jacquard Technique
• To Pom, or Not To Pom
• New Techniques
• Final Thoughts (and Final Colour Decisions)

The Pattern

As I mentioned, I used the Anthology Hat pattern by Tin Can Knits. This is a simple, customisable hat pattern, that features a ribbed brim and a large, plain section for colourwork. For both hats, I made the size ‘Adult SM‘ and followed the instructions for sock weight yarn (the pattern also provides instructions for Aran and DK weight yarns). I opted for a regular (not fold-over brim) and used an amalgamation of the charts provided by Tiny Human Knits on Ravelry for the colourwork section.

I followed the chart above (my amalgamation of the originals), then followed rows 1-4 of Chart 4 (from Tiny Human Knits).

Because I wanted a little more of the cream shade at the top of the hat than I had space for in my colourwork section, I kept knitting with the cream shade for the first 3 rows of the crown decreases on both hats, before switching back to the brown shade and finishing off the hats.

On her Ravelry project page, Tiny Human Knits suggests using the Ladderback Jacquard Technique for the colourwork. This is a technique I’ve never come across before, so I thought I could give it a go when making these hats, to practise ahead of the larger (more intimidating) sweater project.

Hat #1: King Cole Merino Blend

For my first hat, I used King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply (which is curiously also known as King Cole Anti-Tickle Merino Blend 4 Ply), a 75% merino/25% nylon fingering weight yarn, in the following shades:

• Chocolate (023)
• Cinnamon (3298)
• Aran (046)
• Willow (3942)

I knit the hat on 3.5mm needles (2.75mm for the ribbing) and used a basic, long tail cast-on. This cast-on wasn’t the best choice- truthfully, I really thought it was a stretchy cast-on, but apparently that is not the case! This hat’s definitely a little tight along the cast-on edge, but I guess we live and learn. I also added a pom pom to the top of this hat (more on that later— see ‘To Pom or Not To Pom‘).

For the colourwork section of this hat, I followed my amalgamated colour chart, but only did 1 plain brown row (instead of 2) between the chevron pattern and the pumpkins, and the pumpkins and the top white pattern, respectively. I increased the size of these stripes in Hat #2, because I thought the pattern looked a little cramped in this one.

Mini Review: King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply

Overall, I liked this yarn. I thought it worked up really neatly in the colourwork sections and doesn’t have much of a ‘halo’ (which I like). It is a soft yarn, but it’s not the softest I’ve used. I also found that the thickness (squidgy-ness?) of the knitted material drastically reduced after blocking, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but I did find it a little disappointing at the time.

There’s a pretty good range of colours available for this yarn, but, unfortunately, it didn’t quite have all of the shades I wanted for this project. I purchased this yarn from Wool Warehouse, at £3.89 per 50g ball, so it is a pretty affordable option, which is good to know!

Hat #1 as a Swatch: Thoughts

My main takeaway from this swatch was that the colours weren’t quite what I was looking for: the orange was a little too bright, the brown a little too dark and the cream a little too white. The combination just felt ever so slightly too in-your-face (dare I say, garish…?) for the sweater.

I did go back and look at the colour options for the King Cole yarn, but, as I mentioned, it just didn’t have the slightly more muted, warmer colours that I was looking for, so I had to broaden my search a little. That led me to Scheepjes, which, in turn, led to…

Hat #2: Scheepjes Metropolis

I found some great-looking shades in Scheepjes Metropolis (another fingering weight, 75% merino/25% nylon blend yarn), so I decided to make a second swatch-hat using that instead. For the new hat, I used the following shades of Metropolis:

• Valencia (062)
• Mumbai (068)
• Liverpool (065)
• Vancouver (028)

Just like with Hat #1, I knit this project on 3.5mm needles (2.75mm for the ribbing). However, I used a German Twisted Cast-On for this project, which made the cast-on edge a lot stretchier— much better for a hat!

For the colourwork, I followed my amalgamated chart exactly (i.e. with 2 plain rows above and below the pumpkin motifs). This did mean that my colourwork section was slightly longer, but I have a relatively big head (sigh), so that’s no problem.

Mini Review: Scheepjes Metropolis

Okay, not to be dramatic, but I’m kind of obsessed with this yarn. It’s SO soft. Truly, I was trying to describe to my mum what this yarn felt like to knit with and the only fitting adjective I could come up with was ‘buttery’. It’s a buttery yarn. It’s ever so slightly heathered, but not in a dramatic way at all- more of a solid-colours-with-a-little-more-dimension kind of way. It was really good for colourwork and blocked nicely I feel like it didn’t thin out quite as much as the King Cole.

Again, though, the colour range caused me problems— there are so many shades that I thought I had hit the jackpot, but some colours have very few options (e.g. brown, which is a big problem for this project) and others have lots of variations, but no ‘neutral’ option, if that makes sense (I’m thinking about a nice, basic cream shade here!).

Hat #2 as a Swatch: Thoughts

I was SO confident as I was knitting this— I truly thought I’d stumbled on the perfect yarn for this project, but now I’m just… not so sure. First and foremost, I’m just not a fan of Vancouver (the green shade). It feels very lurid to me, particularly alongside the other, more muted colours. I’m also not crazy about the cream shade I chose (Mumbai)— it actually has little specks of a kind of… hot pink shade in it? So in some lights it looks cream (which I want!) and in others it looks pink (which I don’t want!). I LOVE the pumpkin shade (Liverpool), and I think the brown is more what I was after than the King Cole version, but when I look at them together, the hat just looks a little… muted to me? I feel like there’s not enough contrast between the brown and orange shades, which I think is important for this design. I’m disappointed, because I really thought this yarn/colour combo was THE one, but I guess it’s back to the drawing board a little bit in terms of colours.

Ladderback Jacquard Technique

So, as I mentioned, Tiny Human Knits recommends using the Ladderback Jacquard Technique for carrying the floats in the colourwork sections of the sweater, because often there are large stretches between the different colours in the chart. This is a technique I’d never heard of before (I’m not particularly experienced at colourwork), so I figured it would be a good idea to give the technique I try while I made my swatch-hats.

Weirdly, I really enjoyed this technique— I didn’t find it too tricky (once you’ve set up the ladderback stitches, you’re away!) and I always worry about carrying the floats loosely enough, so it definitely helped to ease some of my colourwork anxiety. In fact, for the first hat, I think it went really well for me— I didn’t make any mistakes (that went unnoticed and uncorrected, at least) and I think it looks really neat from both the right and wrong sides of the work. I actually enjoyed the whole process— I flew through it!

With the second hat… I got a little cocky. I became weirdly obsessed with finishing the second hat as quickly as possible, so I was definitely rushing, which probably didn’t help the situation. If you look closely, you can see a rogue ladderback stitch that I forgot was a ladderback stitch and promptly knit as a regular stitch, increasing my overall stitch count and interrupting my colourwork pattern. The worst part is that it was in the lurid green shade! Sigh. Moral of the story: don’t rush colourwork. I will definitely be remembering that when I make my jumper!

To Pom, or Not To Pom

When I made Hat #1, I was fresh-faced and optimistic, so I envisaged the final hat with a big, multicolour pom pom on top, containing all four of the colours used in the hat itself. With the help of one of my handy bobble makers (the blue one (which I believe is 8.5cm), from this pack), I made the pom pom of my dreams, then promptly remembered all the woes that pom poms bring with them. Why are they never actually secure? Why are threads always falling out even though I tied them TIGHT with ALL my strength AND ran a needle through them? Why are they never as big and puffy as I dream they will be? Why do I have to trim off half the pom pom to get it looking like a pom pom? Why do I have to have the skills of an award-winning hair stylist to trim it and keep it round? Sigh. Pom poms. I love them in theory, and I love how they look, but they drive me insane.

Anyway, I made the pom pom for Hat #1 using all 4 colours that I used in the hat: brown, orange, cream and green. To make sure the colours were evenly distributed throughout the pom pom, I held all 4 strands (one of each colour) together as I wrapped it, so there were no patches of colour (this also had the added benefit of making the process a lot quicker, which was a win).

To attach the pom pom to the hat, I used a trick my mum taught me: using a button on the inside. This is great because it means you can easily remove and reattach the pom pom at any point, so the hat can still be washed (without a pom pom massacre), or, if you’re not feeling particularly frivolous one day, you can go pom-less. To do this, you just thread the ends of the pom pom through the top of the hat, from the outside to the inside. Next, you thread those ends through a large button (on the inside of the hat, still), pull them tight, then tie them to each other. This keeps the pom pom secure on top of the hat, but makes it super easy to remove it when needed. And, before you ask— no, you cannot feel the button (unless you have no hair, in which case, you kind of can and I apologise for that).

As I was making Hat #2, I was already starting to dread making another pom pom. It was only once I finished the hat that I remembered not every hat has a pom pom, and, seeing as this was my hat, the decision was entirely up to me! Wow, isn’t free will just great? Anyway, I left this hat pom-less, which I think suits it more sophisticated, muted colour palette anyway (or so I tell myself).

New Techniques

As this is (technically) a Project Knitwear post, I wanted to document the techniques that I used while making these hats: both the new techniques, that I tried for the first time, and the ones I’ve met before, but had an opportunity in this project to practise (as always, previously encountered techniques are marked with an *):

• Long tail cast-on*
• German twisted cast-on*
• Ladderback Jacquard colourwork technique
• Following a colourwork chart*
• Colourwork in the round*

Final Thoughts (and Final Colour Decisions)

Overall, I enjoyed making these hats. It was great practising the Ladderback Jacquard technique (even if I did get a little ahead of myself with it) and I did really enjoy knitting the colourwork sections. It’s not something I’d want to do all the time (it’s much harder to watch TV and knit when you’re working with colours!), but it is pretty addictive and SO rewarding.

Weirdly enough, these are actually my first ever knitted hats! They were so quick and easy to make, so I don’t think they’ll be my last. I really liked following the Anthology ‘recipe’ by Tin Can Knits- even though it felt a little overwhelming at first to have so much creative control, it definitely opens up a whole world of hat-related possibilities!

In terms of my final yarn/colour decisions for my Pumpkin Strange Brew Sweater (aka the reason we’re all actually here), I had to do a little bit more testing and trialling before I found a combination that I was happy with. In the end, I’ve settled on a combination of 3 different yarn brands (because I’m a very minimal person, evidently):

• Yarnsmiths Merino Sock, in the shade Rich Brown (2K079)
• Scheepjes Metropolis, in the shade Liverpool (065)
• King Cole Merino Blend 4 Ply, in the shades Aran (046) and Willow (3942)

The brown was the shade I was struggling the most with, until I remembered that I had a ball of the Yarnsmiths leftover from another project (which you will eventually be seeing!). Sure enough, the Rich Brown colourway was EXACTLY the warm, mid-brown shade I was looking for, plus the yarn has the exact same composition (75% merino/25% nylon) as the other two yarns, so everything worked out perfectly! The contrast between the new brown shade and the Scheepjes orange shade is much better, so I’ll be using that yarn for the pumpkins/orange sections of the pattern. With the warmer brown shade, the cream King Cole shade looks a little less white, so it’ll be perfect for my sweater. Alongside the other yarns, the original King Cole shade of green works perfectly— it’s not too lurid, but brings a nice touch of leafy green to the pattern.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading all about my hat-swatch adventures! I’ve ordered all the yarn for my Pumpkin Strange Brew Sweater, so (fingers crossed) that post should be coming to the blog later on this season! If you want to be notified as soon as it goes live, you can subscribe to my newsletter!

If you're interested...

You can find the Anthology Hat pattern here.

You can find the Ravelry project page for the Strange Brew Pumpkin sweater by Tiny Human Knits here.

You can find my Ravelry project page for Hat #1 (King Cole) here.

You can find my Ravelry project page for Hat #2 (Scheepjes) here.

Gemma

xxx

Table of Contents

• Bakery-Style vs Regular Muffins
• Muffins: 101
• Making the Streusel Topping
  • Ingredients
  • Method
• Making the Pumpkin & Coffee Muffins
  • Ingredients
  • Method
• Making the Maple Glaze
  • Ingredients
  • Method
• Recipe

Bakery-Style vs Regular Muffins

If you missed my last muffin post, I did a deep dive into how to make the perfect, bakery-style muffins. Bakery-style muffins are big– they have super domed muffin-tops and that perfect, fresh-from-an-artisanal-bakery look. When I bake bakery-style muffins, I like to use tulip muffin cases, because a) they’re bigger, so there’s more room for all of the extra batter and b) they look fancy. You can make bakery-style muffins from any muffin recipe, including this one!

However, I realise that, sometimes, home-bakers would rather just make standard-sized muffins. Not only does baking regular-sized muffins help with portion control (who is she? I definitely don’t know her), but it also means that you can bake more muffins at once- when baking bakery-style muffins, you can only bake 6 muffins at a time (instead of 12), because bigger muffins need extra space to grow and puff up! So, with that in mind, I’ve written this post with instructions for both muffin styles!

For this recipe then, here’s a rundown of the two muffin types:

I found that the bake time was pretty much the same for both muffin styles. While you might expect the bakery-style muffins to take longer, you’ll always be baking fewer at a time, so the heat can circulate more easily, which evens out the times.

All of this to say that, with a few little changes here and there, you can make these muffins in whichever way you want!

Muffins: 101

Whether you are making bakery-style or standard muffins, there are some rules in the muffin-verse that you should always follow:

• Don’t over-mix the muffin batter.

Over-mixed muffin batters produce tough, dense muffins. Don’t worry if you’ve got a few lumps/streaks of flour left in your batter- just go with it!

• Use the fan setting on your oven to bake the muffins.

Muffins are best baked quickly and at a high heat (at least, to begin with- more on that in a sec!), so the fan setting is your friend.

• Bake the muffins at a higher temperature for the first 5 minutes.

Bake the muffins at a high temperature (200°C fan, in this recipe) for 5 minutes. Then, turn the oven down (to 150°C fan, in this recipe) for the remaining time, to finish off the baking process. The initial high temperature helps to activate the raising agent in the muffins, which helps them to rise up and become big and fluffy, then the lower temperature helps to ensure that the muffins are fully and evenly cooked through.

Making the Streusel Topping

This cinnamon & pecan streusel topping is super quick and easy to make, but adds great texture and flavour to the finished muffins. If you just want plain muffins, you can absolutely leave it off, but I think it’s a really great addition (plus, it makes these muffins feel even more autumnal, which is a definite plus in my book!). The topping isn’t overly sweet, but, when paired with the super-sweet maple glaze, the flavours balance out perfectly.

Ingredients

To make the streusel topping, you’ll need the following ingredients:

• Plain flour

Don’t use self-raising flour, or your streusel won’t be crisp and crunchy.

• Granulated sugar

I usually use caster sugar in my baked goods, but granulated sugar is preferable here for its crunchier texture.

• Light brown soft sugar

Brown sugar adds a caramel-y depth of flavour to the streusel.

• Ground cinnamon

A small amount of ground cinnamon gives the streusel a warm, autumnal flavour, which compliments the spices in the muffins perfectly.

• Salt

Just a little pinch of salt is added to the streusel to balance the flavours and make it extra tasty.

• Unsalted butter

I prefer to use unsalted butter, so that I can be in control of how much salt goes into my baked goods, but if you only have salted butter, you can just omit the salt.

• Toasted pecans

Chopped pecans are tossed through the streusel topping to add even more crunch and nutty flavour. To get the most flavour out of the nuts, toast (or roast) them first and allow them to cool before mixing into the streusel. I do this in the airfryer (about 5 minutes at 180°C should be perfect), but you could also do it in a dry pan on the stove, or in the oven.

Method

To make the streusel, start by whisking together the flour, both sugars, the cinnamon and the salt, just until everything is nicely combined.

Next, melt the butter and add it to the dry ingredients.

Use a fork to mix everything together. The mixture should form little clumps and crumbles.

Finally, tip in the chopped, toasted pecans and mix until the nuts are evenly distributed throughout the streusel.

That’s it! Now your streusel is ready, you can set it aside while you make the muffin batter.

Making the Pumpkin & Coffee Muffins

This muffin batter is super easy to whip up- you don’t even need a mixer!

Ingredients

To make the pumpkin & coffee muffin batter, you will need the following ingredients:

• Plain flour

Make sure to use plain flour, not self-raising, otherwise the raising agent ratios will be off!

• Baking powder

One of the two raising agents in the muffin batter, this helps the muffins to puff up and be extra fluffy.

• Baking soda

The second raising agent in the muffin batter, baking soda is used alongside baking powder because of the acidic ingredients in the batter.

• Salt

A small pinch of salt helps to balance all of the flavours in the muffins.

• Spices

I’ve used a traditional combination of ‘pumpkin pie’ spices in these muffins: ground cinnamon, ginger, cloves and freshly grated nutmeg. These spices give the muffins a lovely, warming flavour.

• Caster sugar

Back to caster sugar for the batter- I prefer baking with caster sugar because it is finer and so dissolves more easily into batters than granulated sugar.

• Light brown soft sugar

Brown sugar adds depth of flavour and extra moisture to the muffins.

• Sunflower oil

Oil is used instead of butter in this batter to make the muffins extra moist.

• Pumpkin purée

You can buy pumpkin purée in cans in most supermarkets, or you can use homemade purée, if you prefer. If you use the canned stuff (like I did), just make sure it is 100% pumpkin (and no other flavourings/ingredients)!

• Eggs

I always use large eggs.

• Greek yoghurt

Greek yoghurt adds extra moisture to the muffins. If you don’t have greek yoghurt, you can use sour cream instead.

• Vanilla extract

Just a small amount of vanilla extract helps to bring all of the other flavours together.

• Instant coffee granules

Instant coffee granules are used to make these muffins into Pumpkin Spice Latte Muffins! Dissolve the granules in hot water before mixing into the rest of the wet ingredients, to ensure the coffee flavour is evenly distributed throughout the muffin batter.

Method

Start by preheating the oven to 200°C fan. Line your muffin tin(s) with cases and set aside. Remember- if you’re baking regular-sized muffins, you can go ahead and line every cavity in the tin with a muffin case, giving you a total of 12 muffins. If you’re planning to make bigger, bakery-style muffins, you’ll need to space 8 muffin cases out over 2 x 12-hole muffin tins, to give them plenty of room to puff up! You’ll have to bake the trays one at a time, but the muffins will be extra big and fluffy for it.

To make the muffin batter, start by placing all of the dry ingredients (the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices) into a bowl.

Whisk the dry ingredients together to combine them, then set aside.

Place the remaining ingredients (the ‘wet’ ingredients) into another, large bowl.

Whisk well until a smooth mixture has formed.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, then fold together, being careful not to over-mix the batter (it’s okay if there are a few streaks/lumps of flour left!).

And that’s it! The batter is now ready to be baked.

Divide the batter between the muffin cases. The muffin cases will be pretty full- for regular-sized muffins, I fill each case with 1 heaped, regular-sized ice cream scoop’s worth of batter. For bakery-style muffins, I fill each case with 2 level regular-sized ice cream scoop’s worth of batter!

Crumble a generous layer of the streusel topping over each muffin, making sure to get some pecan pieces on each muffin. It will seem like a lot of streusel topping, but the muffins will expand a lot, so it will look a little more sparse on the finished bakes!

Place the muffins into the preheated oven and bake for 5 minutes at that initial, high temperature, then turn the temperature down to 150°C fan and bake for a further 20 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the muffins comes out clean, or with only a few moist crumbs.

If you’re making bakery-style muffins, remember to turn the temperature back up to 200°C fan and wait until the oven has heated back up after baking the first tray of muffins! Then you just need to bake the second tray in exactly the same way.

I like to remove the muffins from the baking tin as soon as they come out of the oven, to prevent the bottoms of the cases from becoming greasy. The tulip cases make this super easy to do, because you can hold onto the papers and not have to worry about burning yourself on the hot muffins! Transfer the muffins to a wire rack to cool completely before icing.

Making the Maple Glaze

This maple glaze is only 3 ingredients and is so quick to make! It adds an extra hit of autumnal sweetness to these cupcakes and helps to balance the flavour of the streusel topping.

Ingredients

All you need to make this sweet, maple glaze is:

• Icing sugar

You need to use icing sugar, or powdered sugar, for this- caster sugar isn’t fine enough!

• Maple syrup

Maple syrup adds a lovely flavour and texture to the icing.

• Water

Water is used to thin out the icing slightly, so it can be drizzled onto the muffins. You could use milk instead, if you prefer.

Method

To make the glaze, start by sifting the icing sugar into a small bowl.

Add the maple syrup, along with a splash of water, and stir to combine.

Check the consistency of the icing- you’re looking for a thin(ish) glaze that you can drizzle over the muffins, but that won’t all run off immediately! To make the glaze thinner, add a little more water. To make it thicker, add more sifted icing sugar.

Once the glaze is ready, you can drizzle it over the cooled muffins. The muffins can be enjoyed at room temperature, but they’re extra lovely if you warm them slightly in the microwave, before serving!

As with all muffins, these are best enjoyed the day you make them, but leftovers can be stored in an airtight container for a day or so at room temperature.

Recipe

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Pumpkin Spice Latte Muffins

Spiced pumpkin and coffee muffins, topped with a cinnamon & pecan streusel and drizzled with a maple glaze. The perfect autumnal treat!

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine American

Keyword Cinnamon, Cloves, Ginger, Maple Syrup, Muffin, Nutmeg, Pecans, Pumpkin, Streusel

Prep Time 45 minutes minutes

Cook Time 25 minutes minutes

Total Time 1 hour hour 10 minutes minutes

Servings 12 muffins (or 8 bigger bakery-style muffins)

Ingredients

For the cinnamon & pecan streusel topping:

• 90 tbsp plain flour
• 2 tbsp granulated sugar
• 2 tbsp light brown soft sugar
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 pinch salt
• 60 g unsalted butter, melted.
• 40 g pecans, toasted and roughly chopped.

For the pumpkin & coffee muffin batter:

• 190 g plain flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1 pinch salt
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/8 tsp nutmeg, freshly grated.
• 1/4 tsp ground ginger
• 1/8 tsp ground cloves
• 135 g caster sugar
• 135 g light brown soft sugar
• 120 ml sunflower oil
• 340 g pumpkin purée (see Note 1).
• 2 eggs
• 60 g Greek yoghurt
• 1 splash vanilla extract
• 4 tsp instant coffee granules, dissolved in 2 tbsp hot water and cooled.

For the maple glaze:

• 60 g icing sugar, sifted.
• 2 tsp maple syrup

Instructions

Make the streusel topping:

• In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, both sugars, cinnamon and salt. Add the melted butter and stir together until the mixture forms crumbles. Stir in the chopped, toasted pecans and set aside for later.

Make the muffins:

• Preheat the oven to 200°C fan. Line muffin tin(s) with muffin cases (12 cases in 1 x 12-hole tin for regular-sized muffins, or 8 spaced out over 2 tins for bigger, bakery-style muffins) and set aside.
• In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and cloves until well combined.
• In a separate, larger bowl, whisk both sugars together with the oil, pumpkin purée, eggs, yoghurt, vanilla extract and the dissolved instant coffee granules, until you have a smooth mixture.
• Fold the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture, being careful not to over-mix the batter.
• Divide the batter between the prepared muffin cases (about 1 heaped regular-sized ice cream scoop's worth for regular-sized muffins, or 2 level scoops for bakery-style). Sprinkle each muffin with a generous layer of the streusel topping, then bake one tray of muffins at a time in the preheated oven for 5 minutes, before turning the temperature down to 150°C fan and baking for a further 23-27 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the muffins comes out clean, or with a few moist crumbs.
• Once the muffins are baked, remove them from the tins and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely before icing.

Make the maple glaze:

• In a small bowl, mix the sifted icing sugar and the maple syrup, along with 1 tbsp of water until a smooth icing has formed. The icing should be thin enough to drizzle over the muffins, but not so thin that it runs off immediately. If the icing is too thin, add a little more sifted icing sugar. If the icing is too thick, add a little more water.
• Drizzle the icing over the cooled muffins, then serve. The muffins are best eaten the same day that they are baked, but leftovers will keep for a day or two, if stored in an airtight container at room temperature.

Notes

1. You can buy ready-made pumpkin purée in cans from the supermarket- just make sure you get one that is 100% pumpkin (i.e. not pumpkin pie filling).

 

Muffin recipe adapted from https://www.brownedbutterblondie.com/pumpkin-muffins-recipe/

Streusel topping recipe adapted from https://celebratingsweets.com/pumpkin-crumb-muffins-with-cinnamon-icing/#recipe

To mark the end of Spooky Season, I thought I would share a recipe for the most autumnal, innately Halloween-y (even though in the US I feel it’s probably more Thanksgiving-y, but I digress) treat: Pumpkin Pie. This sweet treat was always a staple in my house growing up, so it’s a really nostalgic dessert for me. Also, it’s super tasty, so there’s that too!

We’ve always used the same recipe for pumpkin pie, namely, the recipe from Delia Smith’s How To Cook: Book One. However, as seems to be the case with all family recipes, we (read: my dad, who usually makes this- and who helped me make the one pictured!) have adapted, altered, changed (and sometimes changed back) the ingredients & method quite a bit, over time. This recipe is the result of all that tweaking (ironically, it’s not even that different- what can I say, Delia knows best).

This pumpkin pie has a slightly sweet and super nutty pastry, which you can make super quickly in the food processor! The pastry shell is then filled with a silky-smooth, spiced pumpkin custard. It can be served warm or chilled, so it’s easy to make ahead. As a bonus, it is pretty easy to make (especially for a pie!), so it makes for a great, stress-free dessert option for this time of year.

Table of Contents

• Ingredients
• Equipment
• Making the Pastry
• Baking the Pastry Case
• Making the Pumpkin Filling
• Baking the Pie
• Recipe

Ingredients

This pie is made up of two elements: the nutty pastry and the rich pumpkin filling. You start by making the pastry, then you make the filling as the pastry bakes (we LOVE a time-saving recipe here!).

For the pastry, you will need:

• Pecans

A slightly unusual addition, but mixing finely chopped, toasted pecans into the pastry really elevates this pie. Not only does it give the pie a lovely, warm and nutty flavour, but it also adds another texture to the pie. I like to toast the pecans on the hob, in a dry pan over a medium heat, but you can toast them in the oven if you prefer.

• Plain flour

Don’t use self-raising flour here, or your pastry will puff up and not be crisp and flaky.

• Icing sugar

It’s only a small amount of icing sugar, but you just need the slightest hint of sweetness in the pastry, to complement the filling.

• Salt

Just a pinch, to bring out the other flavours.

• Unsalted butter

You want the butter to be very cold when you make this pastry, so that the finished pastry case is super flaky and delicious! Keep it in the fridge right until you are ready to use it, to ensure it stays as cold as possible. You’ll also want to cut it into cubes, to help incorporate it into the dry ingredients more easily.

• Egg yolk

The egg yolk adds richness to the pastry. You will need a small amount of egg white later, to seal the pastry case, so you can save the white from this egg (you’ll need another yolk later on though, so you’ll have one leftover white whatever you do- you can use it straightaway in another recipe or freeze it for another day).

• Cold water

Like the butter, it’s important that the water is very cold to ensure you get the best pastry possible.

For the pumpkin filling, you will need:

• Eggs

For the filling, you’ll need 2 whole eggs, plus an extra yolk. Use the extra white in another recipe, or freeze it for another day.

• Double cream

The cream works together with the eggs to create a silky-smooth, thick custard. If you’re in the US, use heavy cream.

• Soft dark brown sugar

Using dark brown sugar lends a deep, treacle-y flavour and colour to the filling, which really complements the pumpkin flavour.

• Maple syrup

The original recipe called for molasses, but we prefer this pie made with maple syrup. The molasses can make everything a little bitter, while maple syrup adds a gentle, smoky sweetness that goes perfectly with the other flavours.

• Spices

A variety of spices go into the filling to really give this pie that classic ‘pumpkin pie’ flavour. We use ground cinnamon, nutmeg (which is always better when freshly grated, if possible!), allspice, cloves and ginger, which are all very traditional pumpkin pie spices.

• Canned pumpkin

In the original recipe, Delia (very impressively) roasts and purées her own pumpkin. I have very vivid memories of my dad spending a looooong time pushing roasted pumpkin chunks through a sieve and, honestly, I think we unanimously decided that it just wasn’t worth it. If you have a pumpkin you want to use, and you don’t mind the excessive elbow grease required, then, by all means, go for it! But, if, like us, you prefer your pumpkin pie to be a bit less labour-intensive, canned pumpkin makes for a super smooth filling with much less effort on your part. I’d call that a win.

Equipment

Aside from the standard baking equipment you probably already have in your kitchen, you will need a couple of (slightly more) specialist equipment for this recipe.

• 9 inch (23cm) fluted tart tin, with a removable base

We’ve always made this in a fluted tart tin, but that’s kind of optional- you could have a pie with straight sides if you wanted! Having a removable base makes it SO much easier to get the pie out of the tin, so I would definitely recommend that. I believe that in the US, pumpkin pies are usually made and served in pie dishes, which would mean you don’t need to worry about removing the baked pie from the dish. I’ve never tried baking this recipe in a pie dish, but I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t work!

• Food processor

I like to use a food processor to a) finely chop the pecans and b) make the pastry. Strictly speaking, using the processor isn’t wholly necessary- you could chop the pecans finely by hand, using a large, sharp knife, and you could make the pastry by hand, rubbing the butter into the dry ingredients with your fingertips and mixing the pastry together with a blunt knife. However, using a food processor really speeds up the process (and is a lot less messy!).

I recommend fitting the processor with a metal blade to chop the nuts, then a plastic blade to make the pastry (the plastic blade helps to prevent you from overworking the pastry, which is the reason many people worry about making pastry in a food processor. Overworking pastry can make for a tough pastry case after baking, but this particular pastry recipe is pretty hard-wearing, so I wouldn’t worry too much!).

Making the Pastry

Before you start making the pastry, you need to chop the pecans. They need to be very finely chopped (hence why it is so much easier to use the food processor!), otherwise they will prevent you from rolling out the pastry thinly enough. However, make sure you don’t go too far when processing them, or they will release their oils and end up as pecan butter- not what you’re looking for! Aim for a fine rubble, like this:

Once you have your pecan rubble, remove it from the processor and set aside. Switch the metal processor blade out for a plastic one (to prevent overworking the pastry). Then, sift together the flour, icing sugar and salt and add the dry ingredients to the processor, along with the cold, cubed butter.

Pulse until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. If you prefer/do not have a food processor, you can do this by hand in a large bowl- just rub the butter into the dry ingredients using your fingertips.

Now, you can add the finely chopped pecans, egg yolk (reserve the white for later) and cold water. Pulse until the pastry comes together into a slightly crumbly dough (you may need to add a little more cold water- just to bring it together, until it resembles the photo below).

Remove the pastry from the processor and shape it into a flat disk. Wrap the pastry disk tightly in clingfilm, then place it into the fridge to rest for 30 minutes. This will make it easier to work with later, while also helping to prevent it from shrinking too much during baking.

Baking the Pastry Case

Once the pastry has rested, preheat the oven to 180°C (conventional oven). Unwrap the pastry and place it onto a lightly floured surface. Roll it out into a circle about 30cm in diameter- it might be a little crumbly, but that’s okay- it’s a very forgiving pastry that you can patch up later if needed!

Carefully transfer your pastry circle to your fluted tart tin (lightly grease the tin beforehand to help get the pie out later) and press it into the base and sides- patching any gaps as needed. You’re looking for an even layer of pastry all over the base and sides, with a little extra sitting just above the top of the tart tin, to account for any shrinkage.

Prick the pastry all over with a fork (try not to go all the way through to the bottom of the tin- just prick the surface), then brush lightly with the reserved egg white. Bake in the centre of the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes, until the pastry is golden.

If you notice that the pastry is puffing up during the baking process, just remove it from the oven, give it a few extra pricks to release the air, then return it to the oven for the remaining time.

Making the Pumpkin Filling

While the pastry case is baking, you can make the pumpkin custard filling. Place the eggs and extra egg yolk into a large bowl and whisk to combine, before setting aside.

Put the cream, sugar, maple syrup and all of the spices into a medium-sized saucepan over medium heat. Allow it to warm, whisking gently, until the sugar has melted and the mixture has come to just below a simmer.

Remove the pan from the heat and add to the beaten eggs in a slow, steady stream, whisking constantly to prevent the eggs from scrambling. Add the canned pumpkin and mix well, until you have a thick, smooth custard.

Baking the Pie

Once you have your filling made and pastry case baked, you can add the filling to the case. I find it is easiest to add the filling while the case is still in the oven- just pull the shelf the case is on halfway out using one (oven-gloved!) hand, then pour in the filling with the other hand. This way, you won’t spill any filling trying to get the pie from your countertop to the oven, which could lead to, at best, a mess and, at worst, a soggy bottom! Paul Hollywood would be QUaKinG!

Bake the filled pie at the same temperature as the pastry case (180°C) for 35-40 minutes, until the filling has puffed slightly around the edges, but is still slightly wobbly in the centre.

Allow the pie to cool slightly in the tin, before carefully removing it, then transfer to a serving plate. The pie can be eaten warm, but is equally delicious when served chilled- just store it in the fridge until you are ready to eat it.

Admittedly, as pies go, this one is a little rustic, but that’s mainly because of the pecans in the pastry. The added nuts are a real game-changer in terms of taste and texture, but they do make the pie a little less neat and perfect-looking. I kind of like that homemade, rough-and-ready kind of look, though- particularly this time of year! Besides, it tastes so good, it could look like a complete mess and I would still make it over and over again!

Recipe

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Pumpkin Pie

A traditional Pumpkin Pie with a twist: rich and nutty shortcrust pastry, filled with a velvety and spiced pumpkin filling.

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Keyword Pie, Pumpkin, Pumpkin Pie, Shortcrust pastry

Prep Time 40 minutes minutes

Cook Time 1 hour hour

Chill Time 30 minutes minutes

Total Time 2 hours hours 10 minutes minutes

Servings 10

Equipment

• 1 23cm diameter fluted tart tin, with a removable base, lightly greased with butter.

Ingredients

For the pastry:

• 40 g pecans, toasted (see Note 1).
• 175 g plain flour, plus extra for dusting
• 10 g icing sugar
• pinch of salt
• 75 g unsalted butter, cold from the fridge and cubed.
• 1 tbsp cold water
• 1 egg yolk (reserve the white).

For the filling:

• 2 eggs + 1 yolk
• 275 ml double cream
• 75 g soft dark brown sugar
• 1 tbsp maple syrup
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg, freshly grated
• 1/2 tsp ground allspice
• 1/2 tsp ground cloves
• 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1 x 425g can canned pumpkin

Instructions

Make the pastry case:

• Place the toasted pecans into a food processor, fitted with a metal blade, and pulse until they are very fine- be careful not to go too far, or they will release their oils.
• Sift together the flour, icing sugar and salt. Remove the pecans from the processor, switch the metal blade with a plastic one (see Note 2) and tip in the sifted dry ingredients. Add the cubed butter, then pulse until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.
• Add the pecans back to the processor, along with the water and the egg yolk. Pulse until the pastry comes together into a slightly crumbly dough (you may need to add a little more water to achieve this).
• Take the pastry out of the processor and form it into a flat disk. Wrap the disk tightly in clingfilm and place in the fridge to rest for at least 30 minutes.
• Preheat the oven to 180°C. When the pastry has finished resting, unwrap it and place it onto a lightly floured surface. Roll the pastry into a circle about 30cm in diameter. The pastry will be a little crumbly- don't worry, you can patch it later. Transfer the pastry circle to your greased tin and press it firmly into the base and sides, patching any gaps, so that you have an even layer of pastry all over the base and sides. Make sure that the pastry sits a little above the rim of the tin all the way around, to account for any shrinkage. Prick the base of the pastry all over with a fork, then brush it lightly with the reserved egg white. Place the tin on the middle shelf of the preheated oven and bake for 20-25 minutes, until golden.

Make the pumpkin filling:

• While the pastry case is baking, make the filling. Place the eggs and extra yolk into a large bowl and whisk to combine. Set aside.
• Put the cream, sugar, maple syrup and all of the spices into a medium-sized saucepan. Place the pan over medium heat and allow to warm, whisking gently to combine, until the sugar has melted and the mixture is just below a simmer.
• Remove the hot cream mixture from the heat and pour into the eggs, in a slow and steady stream, whisking constantly. Add the pumpkin and whisk well until you have a smooth custard.
• When the pastry case is ready, you can fill it with the pumpkin mixture. Pull the oven shelf, with the pastry case still on it, half out, so that you can pour the filling directly into the case, before pushing the shelf all the way back in and baking the pie for 35-40 minutes, until the filling has puffed a little around the edges, but is slightly wobbly in the centre. Remove from the oven and allow to cool on a wire rack. Once cool, place in the fridge to chill, before serving, though you can also eat it warm, if you can't wait!

Notes

1. I like to toast the pecans in a dry skillet over a medium-high heat on the hob- this takes just a few minutes. Alternatively, you can toast them for about 8 minutes at the same temperature that the pie bakes at (180°C). 
2. I find that using a plastic blade in the food processor helps to make the pastry less tough. You will want to use a metal blade to chop the nuts, though, because the plastic blade will not be strong enough to break them up. 

 

This recipe is adapted from Delia Smith’s ‘How to Cook: Book One’. 

I knew that it was important for me to ensure that my November setup was as quick and easy to create as possible- a super complex, labour-intensive setup, at this point, would only serve to make bullet journalling feel even less approachable to me. Therefore, I made this month’s setup with ease and accessibility in mind. I needed spreads that maintained the usefulness and clarity of my previous setups, but nothing that took hours and hours to create, just to help myself get back into the swing of things. Because of this, I opted to take a couple of shortcuts. I decided on an autumnal, maple leaf theme. For the decoration of the theme, I relied upon these pre-made maple leaf post-it notes– yes, it felt a little like cheating, but that is okay! There are no rules with bullet journalling and this method got me maximum prettiness with minimum effort, so I am here for it. The post-it notes come with 2 sizes- 20x the smaller size and 40x the larger size- they both fit in my journal perfectly. They are a little on the pricey side, but honestly, the ease of them made the price tag worth it for me! I kept the rest of the decoration purposefully simple and organic-looking, to further minimise the time and effort required.

With all of that, let’s get into how I created this low-effort setup, page-by-page.

Table of Contents

• Equipment
• Cover Page
• Monthly Calendar
• Blog Planning + Daily Sunshine
• Christmas Planning
• Weeklies
  • Weekly 1
  • Weekly 2
  • Weekly 3
  • Weekly 4
  • Weekly 5
• November Review
• Final Thoughts

Equipment

For this setup, I used the following equipment:

• Muji 0.38mm pen, black.
• Uni-ball Eye Fine UB-157 pen, black.
• Coloured markers: I used Crayola SuperTips (in red, orange, yellow and brown shades- the exact pens that I used are from a combination of this pastel pack and this assorted pack) and one Faber-Castell Pitt Artist Pen Brush (in India Red 192), but you could use any pens you have to hand.
• Tombow ABT Dual Brush Pen, 990 Light Sand.
• Brown kraft paper (I used this brand).
• Parchment-style paper
• Maple leaf post-it notes.
• Glue stick and glue pen (I like to use a glue pen for more intricate items, like the post-it notes, but you could use the glue stick for everything if you prefer!).
• Ruler.
• Pencil.
• Eraser.
• Scissors.

Cover Page

My Cover Page this month was super easy to create. The great thing about using post-it notes is that you can temporarily stick them down and move them around to finalise the layout of each page before you stick them in permanently. Once I was happy with the positioning of them, I marked where I wanted each leaf to go with pencil, then used my glue pen to stick them down. I found using the glue pen was the easiest method because the leaves have such small points/edges, but you could use a glue stick if you prefer. For the monthly header, I just used some torn paper. I wrote the header using my black Uni-ball pen and a simple lowercase font.

For my Quote Page this month, I spent a little while researching some fun autumnal quotes, to fit my theme. I settled on this quote from Winnie the Pooh (admittedly, not from A. A. Milne’s original novels but, I believe, from the Disney film ‘Pooh’s Grand Adventure: The Search for Christopher Robin’). I just felt it really fit, both with how I personally see autumn (which is my favourite month!) and my theme for the month. I wrote the quote on another torn piece of kraft paper, using a combination of my black Muji and Uni-ball pens, with a combination of a simple uppercase and a thicker cursive font.

Monthly Calendar

Another simple calendar layout this month- just a standard grid of 6×6 boxes. For the dates, I used my 5 coloured markers to make scribbled patches of colour, which I then wrote on top of using my black Uni-ball. If I were to make this spread again, I would have used my black Muji pen instead of the Uni-ball here, because I found that the Uni-ball bled a little when used on top of the markers. In fact, later on in the setup, you’ll see that I started using the Muji pen instead when writing over the markers because of this! I also added a little strip of colour with my Tombow 990 along the bottom of each grid box- just to tie this spread in with the rest of the setup, where I use that pen a lot!

For the header, I used that same lowercase font, written in my black Uni-ball on some more torn kraft paper. I added some more post-it note leaves (which I trimmed a little, so that I could position them over the edges of the page) and some torn paper strips, just to fill the extra space.

Blog Planning + Daily Sunshine

As with my recent setups, I’m including a space for individual task lists for upcoming blog posts. For this, I created 4 boxes using my black Muji pen. For the headers, I created more scribbled patches with my coloured markers. I also added a vertical stripe of colour using my Tombow 990, where I can tick off each task as I go.

For my Daily Sunshine spread, I created a large box (30 lines high), to house one happy memory for each day. I highlighted every other line with my Tombow 990, then used more patches of colour down the left-hand side for the dates. As you can see, I opted to use my Muji pen for writing on top of the markers, instead of my Uni-ball, and I think it looks much neater.

Christmas Planning

A new spread for this month- my Christmas Planning pages! November is always such a busy month in terms of getting things ready for Christmas, so I really wanted a space to collate my thoughts and keep on top of things. On the left-hand page, I have a gift tracker: a simple grid with a column for the recipient, the gift and the price of the gift, as well as checkboxes for when I have purchased the gift, when the gift has been delivered and when I have wrapped it. I also put the header for this spread on the left-hand page and I added a little bit of Christmassy flair with some doodled sparkles.

I divided the right-hand page up into 3 sections for other planning categories: stockings, general tasks and Blogmas (!!!). While I don’t have kids, I do live at home with my parents and I do like to get a few little things for each of their stockings, so I have a space here for ideas for each of them. Next to that, I have a space for general Christmas-related tasks. Finally, I have a… Blogmas checklist! That’s right- this year, I’m planning to participate in Blogmas! That’s one post a day (!) from 1st-24th December- my own little Gemma At Home advent. I mean… we’ll see how it goes. Obviously, it takes a lot of planning, work and effort- so I’ve made this checklist for my posts so I can try to keep on top of things as I start creating them and getting ahead in November. Admittedly, I also have a lot of other planning resources scattered throughout various notebooks and documents on my computer, so this is very much only the tip of the iceberg! I think this will be such a fun challenge for me- hopefully, it will also bring a little extra magic to what is undoubtedly my favourite time of year!

Weeklies

As always, I have used tabs to separate out my weekly spreads. I like doing this because I find it really helps me to navigate through my bullet journal and it adds a little extra decoration to all of my weekly spreads. This month, I used the 5 coloured markers that I have used throughout the setup and coloured one tab with each colour. I stuck in some torn kraft paper on the far left of the first weekly, and the far right of my November Review page, just to add some separation and help those coloured tabs stand out. Full disclosure here: I did actually use the parchment-style paper to start with (I stuck it in and everything!) but it just… wasn’t sitting right with me? The parchment paper is quite yellow-toned, so I think it just clashed a little bit. Anyway, I just stuck the kraft paper over the top and hoped for best- my journal’s a little thicker in those places now, obviously, but it worked fine.

In general, I kept my weekly setups very consistent in terms of style and design. I made sure to incorporate a post-it note maple leaf on each one, made the header using a combination of torn kraft and parchment paper, used my black Muji pen to draw out some boxes, made the subheadings with my Muji pen over the top of scribbled, coloured patches and highlighted everything with my Tombow 990. Honestly, these spreads came together so quickly- they were such a joy to make!

Weekly 1

The first ‘week’ of November spans 5 days, from Wednesday to Sunday, so I only needed 5 daily task list boxes. As always, I accidentally started on a Monday, so, if you can see my little scribbled mistake on the first box… no you can’t. I opted to use square boxes for my daily lists and notes boxes for this spread. I just divided each page into 3 vertically and 2 horizontally and went from there. For my task list, I just used the remaining space (i.e. 2 boxes’ worth) to make one taller box.

Weekly 2

For my second weekly (the first full week of November!) I opted to use horizontal boxes for my daily lists. Admittedly, horizontal boxes aren’t my favourite to use, but I always seem to end up using them anyway. I guess there are only so many layout options!

Weekly 3

For my third weekly, I went for one of my favourite layouts, which is the vertical column layout. Each daily list has a vertical column, with the final column used for the master task list. I find this layout provides me with lots of space to write everything out and works really well.

Weekly 4

Back to the square(ish) boxes for this weekly- very similar to my first weekly, just with a slightly different placement of the header.

Weekly 5

The last 4 days of November fall in a new week, so I included a 5th weekly spread, with space to write down important events in the first 3 days of December. The November daily boxes are on the left-hand page, each box taking up one quarter of the page. On the right-hand page, I have the header, as well as a section for notes, my task list and the first 3 days of December.

November Review

As always, the final spread in my monthly setup is my Monthly Review page. I changed the layout of this spread a little bit for October and I really liked it, so I’ve kept those changes this time around. On the left-hand page, I have 3 boxes along the top: one each for the WTA and ATP Top 10, then one for my favourite memory from the month. Below that, I have a larger space for my top 6 songs of the month: my November playlist.

I’ve kept the right-hand page the same as it has always been- the header, again written on a torn piece of kraft paper, using a combination of a simple, lowercase and a cursive font, is at the top. Below that is a space for a polaroid from the month. I usually make a decorative ‘frame’ for the polaroid here, but this month I opted to go simple- I just stuck in two of the maple leaf post-it notes, over the top of which I will stick in the polaroid.

Final Thoughts

I think this setup was exactly what I needed for the month ahead- it was simple to make, but it’s not necessarily simple to look at- it definitely gives off the warm and cosy autumnal vibes that I was looking for. I know I said that using the post-it notes felt like cheating, but honestly, I’m not even mad about it- sometimes you just have to what is right for you and, this month, this setup was definitely right for me. Besides, I got to reunite with my beloved kraft paper, so, honestly, I couldn’t be happier.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading about my November setup- I’d love to hear what you think of it in the comments below!

Gemma

xxx