May Day

Good afternoon blog readers, the weather here in the UK is brilliant sunshine and it's been so lovely for the bank holiday weekend.

Friday started this second long bank holiday weekend of April and my boys decided to work Friday as they are really busy. I know a lot who have no work at all in the current economic climate, so this is good news and neither of them are die-hard Royalists. I spent a lovely day camped out on the sofa watching the Royal Wedding on my own. I thought it was a beautiful service and didn't Catherine look devine.

Shores accompanied me, but unfortunately even with an extra days stitching this month, i still didn't manage to get Block 3 completed in April.

I still have the house to fill in with that wonderful colour white! Going to be very boring, so will do a little at a time inbetween completing Block 4 during May.

Saturday, DH and i spent quite a lot of the day wandering around garden centres. I have a lovely lion faced water feature that was a birthday gift some years ago but during the winter months the pump has become damaged.

We finally located a replacement pump at the 4th one and it's now spouting lovely again thanks to DH and his DIY skills.

I do love to sit outside and read in the sunshine to the sound of a water feature, which is exactly what i have been doing today whilst supervising DH in the garden. When we were at the garden centre a few new plants just happened to jump into the basket and make their way home with us, you know how it is, they look at you and plead to be given a good home and DH just can't resist, good job i took my purse with me to help spread the cost for him LOL

Wednesday as usual was The Sampler Girl SAL that Barb is running over at Neddlecraft Haven.

I took 'At Home' with me to the stitching club and managed to complete the house and a little more besides so a good week this time, and no frogs to hinder my progress.

There are lots of lovely Sampler Girl designs being stitched in this year long SAL and i think it's one that i will be continuing with when i've finished this design.

Do you remember the crochet magazine that had the lovely amigurumi bunny in that Amy wanted me to make.... i finally managed to locate some of the wool it asked for. My local shop informed me that even though the magazine was the latest edition, the wool was no longer available to order.

The yarn was purchased from Meadow Yarn and their service was excellant so i am happy to give them a plug here on the blog. The invoice that came in the parcel had a lovely green tea teabag attached to it, i thought that was a lovely gesture.

Tomorrow to round off this beautiful relaxing weekend, i am expecting a visit from my oldest school friend. Life and family have got in the way over the past few months for both of us and we haven't met up for a chat for quite a while, so i'm really looking forward to some girlie time together.

I hope you too have had a lovely weekend, what did you get up to with family, friends and loved ones?

Happy Easter

Wishing you all a very

Happy Eastertime




I collected a box from the post office this week. It was a lovely parcel for myself, Amy and baby.









Marian over at Gumbo & Grits had put together all of these wonderful goodies for us.

Amy and i opened the parcel together. She's been unwell for over a week now suffering from horrendous migraines. It's been a very stressful and worrying time and this lovely parcel really did cheer her up.

I'm really going to enjoy reading the magazines from the south and making things with the lovelies Marian sent for me and Amy was really emotional that someone else she didn't know had sent some beautiful items for her and baby.

Thank you so much Marian for your kindness xxxx

April challenge

Today was the reveal of this months challenge.

We had a choice of designs from Chroniques de Frimousse. All very similar, but i chose this cutie.

You can see the others in the album here.

I wrapped my little easter basket in cellophane and had a free raffle at the stitching club on Wednesday evening and one lady went home with a choccie surprise.

Floral Fifteen by Just Nan is finally made up. I spent quite a few hours this week stitching it together. Here's a selection of pics that i took, i couldn't decided which view showed it the best LOL

















Round Robin

As you know i'm taking part in my first Round Robin and this month i had the pleasure of stitching on Tina's (no blog).

Hillside Samplings design called Seasonal Samplings is the beautiful chart chosen by Tina. I have loved stitching my part of this one. We're due to pass them on again at the beginning of May.

Sampler Girl SAL was the only other stitching i have done this week.

Stitching over 1 is slow going and also with Wednesday being my night at the stitching club, i would maybe get more accomplished if i did mine on another night as we spend way too much time chatting and drinking tea and not enough stitching time.

This week saw the roofers in, but i must admit there were some frogs hopping about in the roof that caused me some problems with counting - all sorted now and it's growing nicely.

I hope you've all had a lovely Easter with your loved ones. Here the weather has been glorious sunshine, record temperatures for this time of the year and the driest April for over 50 years. DH is not impressed as his lovely garden and allotment is desperate for some rain. I have suggested that maybe we should do a rain dance in the garden, does anyone know the words/moves to an american indian rain dance LOL

Stitching and Unstitching!

Here's my lovely blossom tree and the inspiration for the pink stitching on the blue fabric for the card in my previous post.

The sunshine this week has opened up the remaining blooms and it's at full bloom right now, with no rain or wind to speak of the blossom has lasted for the longest i can remember.

We looked like we'd had a wedding in the garden with the lawn being covered in white blossom from my pear tree, but its all gone now as DH has been busy in the garden with the lawnmower today.

Wednesday was the stitching club and The Samper Girl SAL night.

When i took it out of my bag i noticed a problem .... the left border was one stitch out, and being me i had to rip out the pink heart and the Jane Austin wording. Here's the evidence of the unstitching.

Mr Kipling and his lemon slices were on hand with a nice cup of Earl Grey tea to console me before i began to re-stitch it.

I continued with it when i arrived home and stayed up a bit later than normal so it would look like i had made some progress this week.

Additional to where i left it last week is the pink row, the golden key and the little tree.

I hope the other ladies had a better week with theirs!

The builders will be in next week making a start on the house. DH commented that maybe this week they had been enjoying the sunshine and having extended tea breaks so their work rate had been somewhat slower than normal!!

Shores of Hawk Run Hollow has also had some attention this week.

I'm not sure about the mermaid, her white skin looks a bit stark against the blue sea.

She does remind me of Flat Stanley the childrens book character, does anyone remember him?

Monthly ornament for April

This little design, a complimentary chart by Plum Pudding Needlearts called Fa La La.

I've seen this one stitched lots of times in the past and it's another thats been in the 'to do' pile for such a long time. Fabric is a 32ct offcut that i had in my oddment drawer but its lost it's name, i do think it's a very effective colour for a Christmas design.

I've had a quiet week away from the computer, not feeling so upbeat this week and needed to take a step back and recharge my batteries. Talking of charging batteries, my laptop is giving notice and shuts down on me at the worst moments. We've been shopping this week to look at new ones and DH has narrowed it down to a choice of 2, now he's looking to find the best price before we part with our cash.

I hope you've all had a happy and good week

A week of smalls

There were a few small projects on my 'to do' list for April, so this week i've spent some time getting them done in plenty of time for upcoming celebrations.

An older relative loves to receive a stitched something, but i am running out of ideas what to make for Christmas and Birthdays. This year i decided on a stitched card.

This design of the prunus blossom reminds me so much of the lovely tree i have in my garden that is just coming into bloom. When you see it against the bright blue sky we've been having this week it is so beautiful and that was my inspiration for the sky blue 28ct britney fabric i've used. I had the circular apperture pink card already in my stash so an added bonus.

Time for another birthday at the stitching club too.

For those of you who follow my blog, you'll remember that this year i decided to make them all a covered tape measure with their initials on.

Lesley has made a request though, she would prefer a little fob for her scissors as the one she is using is in desperate need of replacing. I've used the same initial chart but made it into a ruffled edge fob. A jar of my homemade marmalade will also accompany it, the ladies expect that in their birthday parcels LOL

Like Sally, i too was the lucky recipient of a RAK from Barb.

She sent to me The Herb Gatherer, and very beautiful it is too. I have only stitched a couple of smalls by Shepherds Bush so this will be a first for me.

I asked if there was something Barb would like in return for her kindness and a covered tape measure was requested. I spent a whole day going through my charts and magazines to find a design i thought would be suitable for a sheepie fan and one that would fit onto the small tape measure.

Prairie Schooler's Spring chart from the Gift of Stitching Magazine Feb 2008 fitted the bill perfectly if stitched over 1 on 28ct. I finished it earlier this week and and it went winging its way to the sunny south coast of the UK.

Thank you again Barb for the kit, i'm really looking forward to SAL'ing with you real soon.

Wednesday is the Sampler Girl SAL night at NH.

I did take it with me to the stitching club and actually stitch on the correct night and also carried on when i got home. I got quite a fair bit completed. Next week it's time to start to build the house. The saying is perfect for me, as i do love to be at home.

I know a lot of you have already stitched this design, it really is lovely and i don't know why it's been sitting in my box for such a long time waiting to be stitched. I could say that about a lot of things still in the box, and i expect you all could too.

I see i have some new followers this week, welcome to the blog. Thank you to all of you who take the time to comment on my ramblings, i know its hard to put a comment to every blog you read, i really do appreciate you taking time to leave me a word or two.

Till the next time, happy stitching, knitting or crocheting, enjoy your craft time.

Mothering Sunday

to all mums on this special day.

I've had a few quiet moments today taking time to think of those that have angel mums like my DH. He bought some lovely pink carnations for us to have at home to remember his mum Betty. Also, i took time to think of those mums like me that have angel children.

When i was looking in the card shop for a card for my own mum, this lovely one jumped off the shelf at me. DH thought it was really cute so we bought it for Amy. I reduced the size of the baby scan photo and stuck it inside with some lovely Happy Mothers Day ribbon. Amy thought it was brilliant and loved the surprise.


I've finished off the cardigan using the wool that Barb sent in the baby box a few weeks ago.

The lovely pink heart buttons were in my stash box just waiting to be added to something special.

I gave it to my 'mum-to-be' today as well as the lovely card when she came to visit.

I hope you've all had an enjoyable Mothering Sunday and spent time with the ones you love.