May Bank Holidays

Its another week of school holidays! They come round so fast nowadays!
We had nothing planned so just took each day as it come
Country park walks

Wicksteed Park fun with friends

Quality time with films, reading and dinner time chat

The boys had their dental appointment!(Riley still quite nervous of the dentist and wont sit in the chair so Jack was helping and the dentist is amazing with him)

We made an overnight decision to go to Lego Land

 we got soaked on the log flume!

To top of the end of the week was my lovely friends renewal of their wedding vows, we were invited to the evening 'do' and it was just amazing, a swing band, blues brothers tribute act and many many tears and laughter and memories made

and now its back to normality of alarm clocks and school routines...

Deco Guitar!

I got hold of a half size guitar and I knew straight away I wanted to decopatch it
I got this paper free with a magazine some time ago and its a gorgeous woodland scene, sadly I  have no idea where it can be purchased from, otherwise I'd purchase a whole stack of it!

The strings were broken so I binned them and gave the guitar a good clean

Then I set to work on decopatching just the front

 Little man wanted to model the finished guitar!

My lovely fella put new strings on for me and retuned it, as he's good at that sort of stuff and certainly more practised in that department considering he's got 4 guitars of his own!

Now I'll be honest! I was going to keep it and learn guitar myself but I do too much stuff already so it will be for sale in My Little Vintage, Earls Barton very soon

Crochet Hook Wraps

I love crochet and had the idea of making some fabric hook wraps

I got together some gorgeous fabrics I had and made a start on my 'ideas list'
They include bamboo crochet hooks too so a great gift for a crochet 'hooker'

My next batch of these will be using vintage and retro fabrics so I cant wait
Im loving using my name tapes finally too

These will be for sale in Vintage Fleur in Kettering and My Little Vintage in Earls Barton but of course I take orders too

Time Flies...

...when your a mum!
The home has a changed a little over the last few weeks, the man of the house has a new job, a great future prospects job which means he is home more often (struggling to get to grips with that!) so we've managed to spend a bit more time together whilst the boys are at school
I've had two hospital visits in the ENT department due to my ear infections, now on antibiotic/steroid ear drops and back again next week!!

A garden tidy up by having our very large tree cut down (sadly had to be as was causing problems)

has meant having more room so we went ahead and purchased a dreaded trampoline, this was purely after speaking to a friend and having a discussion on Rebound Therapy and the effect it has with autistic children
Riley has not as yet been diagnosed with autism, he has with other statements but we thought we'd see how we went with it! Well!!! he loves it, it really tires him and he's actually pretty darn good at it!

A huge proud moment with Riley was that he actually asked to go to the spring disco at school! my heart melted when he asked to go, what a guy!

In other news, Gizmo is slowly but surely becoming use to been the only cat in the house! although with his loss of vision for the most of the day he spends it in his area in the conservatory as he has all he needs there and doesnt need to think about where to go! the rest of the time he's generally pottering in the garden with me or been a proper lap cat

I measured, cut up and sewed up my first ever cushion, i'm now on a roll and will have lots more for my local stockists and events, I did quite literally squeal with delight!!

Yesterday saw another monthly craft group happen, its so lovely been able to create and chat away with friends, I love it

If your local to kettering I have a facebook page here with details of how to join us

Haberdashery Dreams

I really love buttons and one day dream of running a small haberdashery shop with proper vintage haberdashery units full of buttons, ribbons, wool and so much more

So when I saw a job lot of buttons in tubes on ebay, I had to bid for them, and I was so excited when I won them, I couldnt wait to go through them and sort them into colours

I've already got in mind the new buttons I'm going to add to the collection and make them grow grow grow into a button heaven of loveliness

Not to miss Banana Loaf

This banana loaf has a little bit of this and a little bit of that which makes it super delicious
I adapted a banana loaf recipe out of 'Baking Made Easy' by Lorraine Pascale

What you need is

100g softened butter
150g soft light brown sugar
2 drops vanilla essence
3 eggs
150g plain flour
pinch of salt
1/2 tbsp ground ginger
1 tsp baking powder
2 overripe mashed bananas

dark chocolate for melting

Preheat oven to 170c
Line a loaf tin with greaseproof paper and put to one side

Put the butter and sugar in a mixer and beat well until fluffy
Add the vanilla and 1 egg and beat well
Add the flour, salt, ginger, baking powder and the rest of the eggs and beat for 1 minute
Stir in the bananas and put the mixture in the prepared tin

Bake in the oven for 55-60 minutes or until a skewer comes out of the cake clean
Melt a small amount of chocolate in a bowl over a saucepan with simmering water

When the cake is out of the oven leave for a few moments before you peel away the greaseproof paper from the sides of the cake then drizzle with the melted chocolate
Leave to cool

Eat with friends and enjoy

My Little Vintage

I spent some time updating my space in My Little Vintage as I'm now selling in this space by myself
The tea trolley is painted in Annie Sloan graphite and there are plans for a different unit to be here once this one is sold on

 My new crochet letter bunting is hanging proudly too

I love my little space here, the shop is an amazing place to visit so if your local to Earls Barton do pop in, and as an added bonus My Little Vintage also have two more shops, one at Holdenby House and one in Olney