Crochet 20 different granny squares, in a variety of gorgeous designs and colors.

Granny squares are perfect for helping you become proficient in crochet, thanks to their repeating stitches and patterns. They're also excellent stashbusters and portable projects, as they use only small amounts of yarn and are relatively small in size.

Once you've made the multitude of lovely squares in this book, Val Pierce has shared a number of project ideas that you can make with your newly made blocks – from a sweet 'n simple coaster and retro cushion to pretty fingerless gloves and a beautiful baby blanket.

This is a fantastic little project book in a handy pocket-size format, so you can crochet your favorite squares wherever you go.

The Modern Spice Rack is an insightful guide to the most common spices in our cupboards, and offers up how to best make use of them in delicious recipes. Spices have, historically, been a tricky ingredient. They’re prevalent in everyone’s kitchens, but too often are underused, stored badly and kept years beyond their ‘best before date’. There’s the perceived alchemy of making a curry from scratch and the stringent marrying of certain spices to specific cuisines. This cookbook encourages liberal, creative and everyday use – a well-timed pinch to elevate a dish, with a focus on great taste rather than being tethered to tradition. Colourful introductions give context to lesser-known spices and provide new insights into more familiar varieties, and the global, taste-led recipes will have readers cooking more confidently with spices.

More than just a cookbook, this beautifully produced volume in three parts promotes a total understanding of British fish, from their natural habitats to what sauce they go best and how to respect their sustainability, in keeping with the River Cottage ethos. The first part is dedicated to understanding fish - Hugh and Nick explain the ins and outs of procuring a good fish, discussing fish farming, aquaculture, sustainability and harvesting issues, how to buy and catch fish in an ethical way, and how to prepare it for the kitchen. Next they open up a whole world of fish cooking - pickling, salting, barbecuing, frying, potting, stewing, smoking and more are explained in depth, each technique followed by classic recipes from gravadlax to kedgeree, from sashimi to chip shop battered cod. Finally, Hugh and Nick present Britain's best fish by species, giving portraits with notes on seasonality and ecology, as well as listing the relevant recipes from part 2 with alternatives. With a new introduction from Hugh, The River Cottage Fish Book is the only book on fish that the adventurous fish lover will ever need.

Over 75 afternoon tea recipes to celebrate the scandal, the sauce and the sumptuous spreads of binge-worthy regency drama hit Bridgerton. Bridgerton fans are cordially invited to indulge in themed afternoon teas galore. Each character hosts their own imagined chapter, serving up tasty treats to complement their theme. Penelope — with her bright, blossoming frocks — will be offering up a floral spread, while Genevieve Delacroix goes all ooh là là with her ‘French’ accent and Parisian petit fours. Only the daintiest delights will do for Daphne Bridgerton, while devilishly delicious is the order of the day for smouldering Simon — ‘I Burn For You’ Biscuits, anyone? Queen Charlotte’s tea is positively eccentric, while Lord Featherington’s errs on the boozy side... Audiences couldn’t get enough of the drama, deception and, indeed, Duke’s derrière. And they won’t be able to get enough of the elegant savouries, scones, cakes, macarons and other delectable recipes for indulgences here that accompany this seriously extravagant period drama with a twist.  

Create a haven of coziness and calm that embraces you as you walk through the door with Chris Myers’ effortless styling ideas and tips. Taking a room-by-room approach, Chris describes the essentials of creating coziness from the colours to use, the textiles to incorporate, the decorative accessories and lighting to include and how to bring a sense of personality and uniqueness to your own space.  Using natural, or pre-loved and re-purposed objects is an important element of this ethos.  Wherever you live, in an urban apartment, town house, or country cottage, Chris will inspire you to bring comfort and happiness into your space whether by creating  a welcoming wreath for the front door made from foraged items, kitchen curtains made from old vintage quilts, eco-friendly natural cleaning products, or lavender bags and scented candles… Your home will become a sanctuary, a home for the soul surrounded by the things you love, a place you will long to return to at the end of the day and one that is kind to the planet too.

Raise your holiday spirit (and a glass of your favorite holiday spirits) with Cheer: A Liquid Gold Holiday Drinking Guide. From expert mixologists and the hosts of the hit drinking podcast Liquid Gold comes the most complete holiday cocktail book with 125+ recipes to delight drinking enthusiasts of all kinds throughout the busiest entertainment seasons of the year. The beginner-friendly recipes are perfect for mixing drinks with friends and family, or preparing refreshments in advance to maximize your time spent with loved ones. Enjoy recipes for every season, including:  The first chill in the air with whiskey cocktails, apple brandy, and pumpkin spice drinks Halloween cocktails and punches  Thanksgiving pairings, wines, and apéritifs Christmas and holiday whiskey cream, eggnog drinks, and ice cream cocktails New Years sparkling wine cocktails and champagnes  Dry January non-alcoholic cocktails, and a guide to making cordials that allow you to make beautiful non-alcoholic drinks . . . and more! From alcoholic cocktails of all shapes and sizes to non-alcoholic drinks ranging from seasonal coffees to cider, hot chocolate, and teas, Cheer: A Liquid Gold Holiday Drinking Guide is an invaluable holiday resource and quintessential companion for the holiday season.*This is the black-and-white paperback edition of the full-color hardcover format.

A collage of characters shaped the west of the nineteenth century. Large and powerful cattlemen, backed by eastern and European investors, flooded the prairie with herds often numbering 50-80 thousand head. They had visions of doubling or tripling their money quickly while their cattle grazed on the free grass of the open range. Others, like Martin Gothberg wisely invested in the future of the young frontier. Starting with a humble 160-acre homestead in 1885, he continued to expand and develop a modest ranch that eventually included tens of thousands of acres of deeded land. Gothberg’s story parallels the history of open range cattle ranches, cowboys, roundups, homesteaders, rustlers, sheep men and range wars. It does not end there. As the Second Industrial Revolution escalated in the late 1800s, so did the demand for petroleum products. What began with a demand for beef to feed the hungry cities of the eastern United States fostered the demand for wool to clothe them and graduated into a demand for oil to warm them in winter and fuel the mechanized age of the twentieth century. All were a critical part of shaping American history. Through the lens of this family saga—a part of the history of the West comes to life in the hands of this storyteller and historian.

The history of New Texas, the Texas we know today—oil-rich, insufferably loud, and unbearably proud of itself—begins in the late 1920s, when a horned frog wakes from its thirty-one-year nap in a courthouse cornerstone and flabbergasts the nation. In slightly over two decades ten individuals—their words, actions, and accomplishments—come to define the New Texas of the twenty-first century. While the history of Old Texas rests on oft-told legends of Houston, Austin, Travis, Crockett, Rusk, Lamar, and Seguin, today’s New Texas—proud, loud, self-promotional, sports-crazy, and too rich for its own good—is the Texas that percolates throughout the nation’s popular culture. In Texas Loud, Proud, and Brash: How Ten Mavericks Created the Twentieth-Century Lone Star State, author Rusty Williams profiles ten largely unsung men and women responsible for the Texas you love, hate, and (secretly) envy today. Sidebar content throughout the book features historic anecdotes and words of wit and wisdom from Boyce House’s numerous speeches and books about Texas.

The companion volume to Making Concrete Countertops with Buddy Rhodes, this book details the art and craft of creating vertical concrete applications as well as integral sink and drainboard elements and curved-edge counters, for advanced users of the medium. An invaluable manual for contractors, architects, and expert handypersons alike, the project photography within will guide you step-by-step in the creation of an outdoor kitchen project, from the careful process of measuring a template, to building a mold, to casting, curing, and installation. With more than 30 years of experience in concrete art and fabrication, artist Buddy Rhodes shares his skills and experience in this useful, practical book. Most importantly, he shares the process he pioneered for creating the natural, stone-like pressed surfaces that have become his hallmark. As the popularity of concrete in home decor soars, this book will be an indispensable guide for any craftsman who hopes to make his mark on this incredible, expanding market.

Airbrushing is a versatile and exciting art. The technique has been used for some 150 years, and is now finding ever more applications. This beautiful book, now in paperback for 2022, explains how to use an airbrush. It looks at the fundamentals of how to get started, advises on maintenance of the tool and then gives step-by-step examples of a range of projects. Topics covered include: technical illustration; watercolour landscapes; portraits; painting scale models; cake decorating; T-shirts and leather and finally, custom painting vehicles. With troubleshooting tips throughout, it enables you to get the most from your airbrush and create beautiful pieces with a professional finish. 'To those who airbrush the joys are well known, as well of course, the trials and tribulations of managing the instrument itself. The airbrush student has to learn significant new skills - to master not only colour and shade, but also air pressure, paint consistency and the diverse ways of masking and shading that can help to achieve such wonderful results.' Prof Andy Penaluna

Among South Carolina's many treasures is Charleston, a city of  rich history. Since the first British colonists established Charles Towne in 1670, this city has been a study in contradictions – a beautiful coastal environment, magnificent architecture, and sometimes unspeakable cruelty.  Haunted Charleston, a collection of stories of ghosts, mysteries, and paranormal happenings in  the Holy City, will leave readers  frightened and fascinated.  Haunted Charleston includes twenty-five stories from the Ghosts at Dock Street Theater to the Haunted Graveyards, that will send chills up the spines of even the most daring ghosthunters.  Each story includes notes on historical significance and local lore and readers will discover just how haunted and spooky this city is. A bibliography, a resources list of contact information to visit the haunted sites, and a brief “Ghost Hunter’s Guide� for the region or city, are also included, giving readers the resources to explore the haunted areas for themselves. 

A collection of delicious recipes inspired by the simple dishes enjoyed in villages and rural communities throughout the Mediterranean. The Mediterranean diet has long been famed for the proven lifetime benefits of eating simply prepared, seasonal foods. There are pockets of people in the Mediterranean countries (and further afield) who are living longer than most; these communities are most often found in rural villages where they grow their own produce and keep livestock. Chef Theo Michaels explores this concept of 'eating like a villager' and this new collection of recipes was born from conversations he has had with his family about life in Cyprus 60 years ago, when growing produce and keeping a few animals was the norm. He celebrates a way of eating based on these principles through his delicious yet simple food. It's a modern, mindful and relaxed way to eat well with no need to adhere to a prescribed diet – no strict regimes, just sensible portion sizes, no processed foods and a few treats – simple, frugal and honest eating. In practice, it means cooking with what is in season, enjoying a good intake of vegetables, fruit, grains and pulses; eating fish and seafood in moderation and reducing meat consumption. Enjoy his sunshine-filled recipes for Strapatsada (Greek scrambled eggs laced with feta, tomatoes and fresh herbs); Tossed Pasta with Pangritata; Pickled Black Radish Ceviche; Oven-roasted Ratatouille with Caramelized Cheese, and so much more.

Although the representatives from the Penobscot Nation and the Passamaquoddy Tribe don't have voting power on the house floor, they serve on committees and may chair committees. Donna's first session as representative of the Penobscot Nation was a difficult one a personal struggle to have a voice, but also because of the issues: changing offensive names, teaching Native American history in Maine schools, casinos and racinos, and the interpretation of sovereign rights for tribes. Some of the struggles and issues remain as she continues to serve, and the perspective she offers as a Native American and as a legislator is both valuable and fascinating.

Seldom does the début of an antiques publication introduce a completely new area of collecting, but thats exactly what this book does. The authors turn the world of mid-nineteenth-century French porcelain upside-down through their interpretation of two recently discovered factory books from the earliest years of the Haviland porcelain works at Limoges. Shape drawings from a mysterious volume at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, complemented by paintings and prints from a heretofore unknown design catalog preserved in the Haviland family, reveal the shattering truth that many pieces of anonymous Old Paris in collections today are actually Limoges porcelains designed, decorated, and marketed by American entrepreneur David Haviland during his first two decades in France. Anticipated on both sides of the Atlantic as one of the most significant contributions of original scholarship on French ceramics in a generation, this study combines carefully researched text with 450 illustrations, including full-color photographs of previously unidentifiable porcelains and many unpublished documents from archives in France and America. A beautiful volume, it is the indispensable reference for curators, scholars, dealers, and aficionados of French ceramics. Readers will find their views of nineteenth-century porcelains enhanced and transformed.

In 1884 Republican James G. Blaine came within 1,047 votes of becoming the President of the United States. This was the margin by which he lost New York State--and thus the election--to Grover Cleveland in what has been called the dirtiest campaign in American history. Yet his career--arguably the most sensational of any American politician of the so-called Gilded Age--did not end there. He was twice U.S. secretary of state, credited with having started our country on the path to acting like a world power, a powerful speaker of the house in Congress, and a United States senator from his adopted State of Maine. He was also, in the eyes of his opponents, "The Continental Liar From the State of Maine" or "Slippery Jim"--a sort of amiable "Tricky Dick Nixon," as he's been later called. He was hated by certain members of his own party, yet loved by millions of others, including some of his enemies in the Democratic Party. The press called him The Magnetic Man, due to his charisma. This is the fascinating biography of a man who dominated the American political stage, starting just before the Civil War and continuing until the twentieth century.

The world of non-work obligations - defined as disagreeable activities that are neither work nor leisure - is a territory of social life that has largely been ignored by scholars of work and leisure alike. The exception to this rule is Robert A. Stebbins, who over the years has written extensively on the significance of non-work obligations and the mundane and often disagreeable tasks that we are all compelled to face in our daily lives. In this new book, Stebbins brings together years of writing and research on this topic to forcefully argue that the current research interest in work-life balance can no longer afford to ignore the effects that non-work obligation has on it. He contends that, whether we like it or not, non-work obligations bear heavily on both our work and leisure. Having to deal with disagreeable tasks and objectionable people on a daily basis, without the support of any outside agency, can seriously undermine our well-being, and it is only through recourse to voluntary simplicity that we can hope to limit the harmful impact of non-work obligations. Written both as a guide to happy living and as a powerful rejoinder to conventional orthodoxy in the fields of leisure and work studies, the book is essential reading for both the general reader and scholars of leisure, consumer, work and happiness studies.

The creation of classic American Carnival Glass took the world by storm in the early 1900s, bringing color and beauty in the form of iridized glass to homes everywhere. Carnival's iridescent, rainbow colored appearance was achieved by spraying the still hot glass with a liquid solution of various metallic salts. A short while later, Europe, South America, and India (among others) began making Carnival--and the success story was repeated. Featuring over 400 outstanding color photographs and 130 black and white illustrations, this thoroughly researched and visually exciting book covers more than one hundred years in the history of Carnival Glass--from classic American Carnival right up to the present day. A multitude of previously unknown patterns are assigned to their manufacturers. Many surprises are in store, as new producers of European Carnival are fully documented and illustrated: Sowerby, Brockwitz, Eda, Rindskopf, and Jain, to name just a few. Detailed information on over 500 Carnival patterns--plus shapes, colors, and values--is all included, along with a bibliography, three appendices, and an index.

The Christmas season brings swirling snowflakes, cookie swaps and caroling parties, not to mention church programs, gifts to wrap and Christmas dinner with the whole family. You'll need a helping hand, so why not put your slow cooker to work? Slow-Cooker Christmas Favorites features recipes for every holiday occasion from brunch to dinner, from party time to dessert. Invite your best friends for a hearty breakfast of Cinnamon-Raisin French Toast and Brown Sugar Sausages before an all-day shopping trip. Plum Good Sausages & Meatballs and Festive Cranberry Warmer will make your tree decorating party merry! As the days grow shorter, put dinner on the table in a jiffy with Busy-Day Spinach Lasagna, No-Fuss Chicken Dinner or Corn & Sausage. We haven't forgotten Christmas dinner...it'll be one to remember with Honey-Dijon Ham, Old-Fashioned Scalloped Corn and Grandma’s Cranberry Sauce! Cherry Chocolate Heaven, Apples & Cinnamon Bread Pudding and other desserts are sure to bring any meal to a scrumptious conclusion, and they're all slow-cooker simple. You'll also find a chapter filled with sweet memories of Christmases past. It's sure to put you in the spirit of the season. This year, take it easy and leave the work to your slow cooker, while you have the merriest Christmas ever! 210 Recipes.

'Knowing Martin and Paul Kelly's perfectionism and attention to detail it's no surprise that this is the ultimate and complete story of all things Rickenbacker.' - Johnny Marr 'A wonderful history of my favourite guitar. The attention to detail is amazing!' - Roger McGuinn 'There are few things more satisfying than the shimmer of an open chord played on a Rickenbacker through a Fender Deluxe Reverb amplifier. Martin and Paul have given us the definitive history of these magical instruments.' - Susanna Hoffs Rickenbacker Guitars is the highly anticipated follow up to Fender: The Golden Age, charting the story of one of the most important and influential guitar makers of all time. From George Beauchamp's invention of the world's first commercially viable electric guitar in 1931, through the company's heyday during the 1960s - when their instruments were favoured by The Beatles, The Byrds and The Who - and up to the continuing legacy of Rickenbacker today. This definitive collection features unprecedented access to the company archives, 350 beautifully photographed original instruments - including all 7 surviving Beatles owned Rickenbackers - and new interviews with legendary Rickenbacker players such as Roger McGuinn, Peter Buck, Susanna Hoffs, Johnny Marr, Mike Campbell, Geddy Lee and Paul Weller. Rickenbacker Guitars is the most comprehensive history of the brand to date and a must-have for all guitar enthusiasts.

In recent times, many of us have spent more time at home than ever before. Creating a home that instills a sense of calm will cocoon and protect us from the outside world, create a sense of wellbeing and make us feel truly nurtured. Calm will help you create a restful, restorative interior that draws you in and makes your shoulders drop the moment you walk through the door. Sally Denning first explores the essential foundations of a tranquil, comforting home: calming and harmonious colours, textiles, pattern, lighting and decorative elements. She goes on to explore a mix of accessible real-life homes, ranging from city homes to country houses, new builds, flats/apartments, beach houses and more. The spaces may be different, but they all share one thing: a timeless, soothing and restful atmosphere that is a pleasure to come home to.

A vibrantly illustrated exploration of the creative, inclusive, and inspiring movement happening in today's Southern interior design The American South is a place steeped in history and tradition. We think of sweet tea, thick drawls, and even thicker summer air. It is also a place with a fraught history, complicated social norms, and dated perspectives. Yet among the makers and artists of the South, there is a powerful movement afoot. Alyssa Rosenheck shines a much-needed spotlight on a burgeoning community of people who are taking what's beloved, inherent, and honored in the South and making it their own. The New Southern Style tours more than 30 homes and includes interviews with the designers, artists, and creative entrepreneurs who are reinventing Southern design and culture. This beautifully illustrated book is sure to inspire the home and soul.