Book Review - for the love of grannies

This is my most favourite crochet book at the moment, and not just for the inspiration but for the colourful photos that draw me in each time I flick through the pages

I dont know how Sarah London did it, but I just want to granny everything!

These are my most favourite out of the book, although if i'm truly honest, I will be making at least one of everything I can promise you that
The best tea cosie ever

 I have plans to at least edge my events table cloth with a simple crochet edge thanks to seeing this

 I'm quite certain my friend said she has a super large cushion that i could crochet a cover for! hmmm must mention that to her again :)

Have you got this book? Whats your favourites and have you made any of them yet?

Easter Crafting

Today is the boys last day at school before the easter holidays set in, so I've got two assemblys to get too, thankfully they are right next door to each other so not too much of a journey!
Riley made an easter tree and to be honest i cant wait for it to come home so it sit proudly in our porch

The creative mess with a 5 year old!

 lots of glue dots (and i mean lots) hold everything in place

 the lavender garden

catch up!

its been a while so i thought i'd play catch up, its busy here with lots of projects on the go for my business and our home,  heres a peek at my week

some pretty daffs in a bargain £1 car boot buy tankard

 I'm slacking a little with my slimming world so i'm back to basics to have a good weight loss over the next few weeks, steak, mushrooms and new pots fried in frylite - yummy

 our garden is coming into bloom, i wish these stayed yellow but sadly there not here for long

 we've just added 4 new koi to the pond! you can just see the ghost one in the middle of this photo

 our garden is totally huge! it needs a lot of work doing to it, we've got rid of so much so now we need to knuckle down and get it how we want it, this week i've been creating little borders around certain shrubs

 i love how the bulbs pop up here and there, because the last owner planted them all, i forget where they are so there really fun to see in spring

 the little man has had so many bumps this week but the chin was the worst the lump is huge!

 the frogs are happy with their new rock pool we made them in the pond

 a few of the tadpoles that are left in the pond

 we bought a few homely items

 i've been creating some fun fabric cake toppers, perfect for spring and summer

 a friend of mine had some cute vintage wooden reels so I had them off her, gave them a coat of green paint, added some buttons and now its a pretty and fun mini bunting for in my studio

yesterday was sports relief, both my boys did a mile walk with the school and raised some money with sponsorships, bless them super proud of them both

last night we sat and watched the instalments sports relief on tv, we were all affected by the prevention basis of it and my eldest was affected quite bad bless him as he is a sensitive soul, although i explained that with his sponsorship he managed to raise funds for 2 vaccines, which then encouraged us to donate a further £10 online which pleased him even more

These celebrities did these amazing things to raise millions of pounds!

David Walliams swam the thames

John Bishop went from paris to london on bike, boat and foot - I followed this on radio one and had tears watching his documentary

Frank Skinner learned to swim, a huge feat for an adult to face up too

Theres still time to donate - http://www.sportrelief.com/

Pretty Crafty Home

After moving into this house nearly two years ago I feel that I can finally start to call it our home, I feel that we are slowly stripping away the previous occupants, I dont know if its because I knew who lived here before or the fact that I loved our previous home thats taken me so long to get comfortable here!

After reading Country Heart and Home blog I followed a link to this blog Cherry Heart where shes wrote a year long project about having a crafty home

My issue with this is that my partner has a very modern view on decor, although I do manage to slide a few of my quirks and handmakes into the picture
I thougtht I'd still take up the challenge as it may help me focus more on the all the areas of our home that need so much work still.
I've copied the basics from the Cherry Heart blog and added my ideals to it

1.  Tidy, tidy, tidy and clean, clean clean!

i love to declutter as it is, but ive already planned a huge carboot in april (whilst the boys are at my parents) so i can deal with getting rid and getting holiday spending money at the same time. once this is done i'd just love to be able to keep on top of the house, its quite difficult with two boys in the house and various animals and of course us too

2.  If it has to live here, it should be pretty.

hmmm this one is difficult, i am the only female in the house! even the animals are boys! my studio is bright pink and i love it, i manage to add some feminine touches to the house and the more we decorate and change each room to our liking i'll certainly be adding some prettiness and handmade into them

3.  If I don't like how it looks, and I can change it, I will.

we already know the amount of work we need to do as there are so many bodge jobs in our home! so lots of changes are happening here

4.  Thrift, re-use and recycling are my watch words.

our budget is certainly not huge, we only have my partners wage at the moment. i love charity shopping and upcycling bits and bobs to keep or sell on my events stalls. i'm planning on lots of charity shopping for clothes for me as i'm currently losing weight and dont want to spend too much on them, i'd like to alter a few peices too

5.  Crafting is king!

I love to create as it is, so adding bits to our home is a must

So on that note, I'll leave you with a pretty picture and get working on my pretty crafty home x you can join in here too x

Market Day

It was our lovely market day at Warkton this weekend
After a very trying start of no keys and a road closure we sure soon picked up and were very busy, to the point the cake stall sold out which is always fantastic
The stalls this month were Chocopop and Michelles Magnificent Makes

Cherry Orchard Treats and Dab and a Dash

 

Glittering Prize and Bloomin Fab

Button It and Crafts of Nature Workshop

Michelle and I love our market so much we cant thank our wonderful stall holders and customers enough for supporting us

shop update

whilst little man has been snoozing i've been updating my online stores with lots of new cake topper designs!

Phew - still lots more new designs to be photographed x

he's still suffering :(

yesterday he slept most of the day, today he's been a lot perkier running around, then from 5pm ish it all happened again, high temperature, curled into mummy and has been asleep since

i know its viral, i know its so easy for a gp to say its viral, but you tell your heart strings that theres nothing more you can do other than cuddle your little boy when he's this poorly
its really difficult as he is such a hyper active boy, quite literally doesnt stop from wake up to sleep time, so seeing him totally out of sorts is just horrid and worrying and anxious for me

i'll be back soon with a happy healthier boy very soon xx

ideas

a plenty - thats my problem i have so many things that i want to create that i dont have one craft, which i dont believe is a problem as i love my quirky boots store looking full of different things but it does mean you have bits of this that and the other lying around unused!

so i've challenged myself to use only what i have! especially some of things i've purchased and never touched at all! apart from purchasing felt (which i need for continuing orders) and sewing thread and adhesive (obvious must haves for a handmade business) i'm giving myself 3 yes three (omgoodness have i really said *3*) months to create new things with what i have!

like to join in! you wouldnt have to do it for as long as me (i'm been very harsh on myself) let me know if you do so i can keep an eye on your progress x

and relax

this is what i was trying to do last night to rid the guilt away!

i sent my little one off back to school today after his predicament last week and now i feel totally awful as it was so much the wrong thing to do! he came home and never got off the sofa once, slept for hours, no dinner (cuddled up to a brioche for about two hours) high temperature
my heart was totally melting as i felt it was my fault sending him back too soon, but he totally bounced through the hand foot and mouth, so this is either part of that illness or yet another one!

you dont understand though my little boys eats so healthily, fruit, vegetables and lots of it and yet he still comes down with everything!

So I lit my favourite candle whilst he was snoozing and i let the waft of sweet pea fill the room - total bliss

Sunshine

does so much doesnt it!
We had so much glorious sunshine yesterday we didnt know where to start with it! so off to the car bootie was the start and then on to the play area for the boys to have a good run around after.
Home for lunch and it felt so spring like I dusted off one of my glass jugs for squash at the table whilst we ate our lunch

After that I started dreaming about where I want our garden to go and how it can be usefull for us! So I sat down for some time drawing up sketches of the garden and flicking through garden books for suitable shrubs to plant away with - I'm happy with the list so far so cant wait to make a start

Then we blitzed the garage! purely because we were looking for mr qb motorcycle manual, too which i found in the house much later - but hey the garage is sparkling now!

Whilst in the garden I went to pick some daffs to put in the huge mug i found at the bootie but was stopped in my tracks by this beast! i mean how big! that there is a full size daffodil!!!!

I've been taking close up photos of our silver birch tree too as its needs sorting out, we cant decide whether to chop it down fully, a sad occassion of course but the roots are coming up through the ground now! or have it trimmed back properly by a tree surgeon!

Personally I like a tree house of sorts built in there! how fab would that be!

On a totally different note! I am *cough* 37 years old and I have never managed to cook an edible yorkshire pudding yet! but today was the day, I actually cried when these beauties came out of the oven! i was in awe of them, i will remember these yorkshires for ever ...

Just to add my little one is much better now, he's so good when he's poorly just carrys on like nothings happening bless him. Back to school today with a skip in his step xx

Meet the boys!

My boys are my boys! these gorgeous moggies are all brothers and this year they will be 13 years old!
They have always slept together, eaten together and played together, they've given me so much joy over the years and when I was going through a pretty difficult time due to a not so good relationship, these babies made me get up everyday and carry on (cause if I didnt they would pluck me until I did)

Meet Gizmo, hes my black beauty whos always been slim and slender, he likes to give you a scratch once in a while but I know him so well I know when he's about to lash, its the tail wag you know!

Meet Apollo, he's black with a super huge white bib and white paws, he's top cat and always has been! when he walks he crosses his back legs over each other and his tail is like a backwards question mark!

Meet Louie - my gorgeous tabby, he's sweet and gentle and I use to carry him around like a baby, he was super poorly when I was pregnant with my first son 10 years ago, and he's never really recovered properly, he's tiny and doesnt have many teeth left now

I hope you've enjoyed meeting my boys, do you have moggies too x

sigh

The last few days have been filled with this!

Our little man gets everything going and in this case its hand foot and mouth, and to be honest my Mum reminds me that I was the same, I was always in and out of hospital with serious problems (I pray it never comes to that with my little one)

So this week hasnt entirely gone to plan but I have managed to bake some Hummingbird Cookies
which to be honest i'm not entirely happy with as they are way too soft! but if you leave them in the oven any longer they burn or go too hard! no win situation me thinks!

To top of the sadness of the soggy cookies I broke my mixer

I bought this 10 years ago when my first son was born to create his meals in, it was quite sad as the handle ripped off in my hand! I did a march of honour to the bin and thanked him for all the years of blitzing he'd done

Happy Weekend x