January in Pictures
It’s a nice idea to celebrate the end of the month with a pictorial round up, so I’m joining in… I’m glad it’s February tomorrow, it’s not the end of the Winter, but you can see it from there!
I’ll see you tomorrow with Reasons to be Cheerful…have you though of yours yet?
x
It’s hard to believe that another Monday has come around again, and not only that, we’re at the end of January. How did that happen?
It’s been a very cold grey day here today, but we’ve had a couple of bright and sunny ones, and I’ve been out pottering, quite literally, in the veg plot as I’ve been rounding up all the plastic pots which were ‘going to come in handy’ and in fact have blown into various nooks and crannies, binning the broken ones and washing the useful ones and stacking them in the new mini greenhouse. I’ve started a diary of my gardening efforts which you’ll find via a tab under the header so I won’t repeat myself. Not much happening at the moment but hopefully there will be!
I found a cheerful bunch of tulips in the supermarket yesterday which have brought a ray of sunshine into the gloom today….
The big excitement of the week was a long awaited delivery. My very own rainbow in a box! I’ve got some wonderful new cotton yarn to play with. Not available in the UK just yet and I shall have to be a little secretive about it for the time being…
…but I can let you have a peek…
…do you want to see?
It’s so pretty. It’s a thinnish DK weight cotton with a beautiful sheen, and crochets like a dream on a 3.5 hook. I’m going to be doing lots of experiments with it over the next few weeks so watch this space…
And coincidently, the day before it arrived, I had an email from Jill, who writes the Stocki blog, about the Beautiful Blogger Blanket. I don’t know if you have come across it in your travels through the Blogosphere but you can find out all about it it here…
Jill was letting me know that my name had come up on the Beautiful Blogger Blanket Wish List, proposed by BebeRouge (Thank you BebeRouge, what an honour!) as somone she would like to see creating a square for the blanket. So this has been my very first project with this fab new yarn.
I will replace this photo asap when I have better light to do the colours justice!
I’m sorry I won’t be able to share the yarn brand just yet, but the pattern, which I have devised, will be available in the tutorials very soon.
I’ve had a little help with photography from Henry …
…whom I’m a little worried about at the moment. He’s been much brighter since he had his big operation last summer, and still rules the roost and keeps Higgins in order, but he’s never really regained the weight he lost despite having a big appetite. He seemed to be showing all the signs of having a thyroid problem but the tests have come back negative, and he’s lost a little more weight. He’s under observation, and we are keeping our fingers crossed, but he still likes to be involved in everything that’s going on, so that a positive sign. (Oh, and note the socks. A sign of how busy I’ve been, socks still on the needles, and I’ve hit the supermarket!)
And while we’re on the subject of cats, I’vew been working on samples of needlefelt animals for my next course at The OutHouse Studio and this is the first one..
And finally, I had to show you this. Higgins in his favourite spot in the sunshine, in a good vantage point to shout abuse at passing tractors, bicycles and joggers. (Note the chewed remains of a ball, and the stolen flower pot, great fun to steal that when I was trying to stack them up)
And now the back view, not easy to maintain ones upright watchful position without the aid of a box…
…and eventually it all gets too much, and you have to let things slide…
So all that’s left is to hand you over to Wendy over on 1st Unique Gifts where she is hosting this week’s Handmade Monday and where you will find lots of other handmade goodies to see.
Have a good week,
see you soon! xx
The first thing I found this morning when I went on the computer is that the Guardian has a feature called Reasons to be Cheerful, so we are in good company! And one of their reasons made me very happy, new in at IKEA is this…
Oh how I love raspberry pink! Now IKEA is a day trip for us, we have to do the meatballs and everything, but I might have to work on a visit very soon. I realise there’s a whole love/hate thing with IKEA too. When we introduced Aimee to it she nearly had to be carried sobbing and screaming into the carpark after half an hour but lured in by something like raspberry pink dishes I think I can be brave!
Going from one extreme to another, in this case a multinational Super Store to an individual business, I love the way most of the things I buy on line from small retailers tend to arrive looking like little presents…
…bamboo crochet hooks from Wool and Buttons…
I love using bamboo knitting needles, I’ll let you know how I get on with these…
I’m being optimistic about the garden too, although the last few days have been too gloomy and wet to get anything done at all. I went out in the drizzle this morning to encourage Higgins to follow, he’d really rather not when it’s wet.
I had spotted the yellow crocuses which grow in the lawn were about to open and thought I could get a lovely shot of Higgins smelling the flowers…
‘Higgins! Look! What’s this?’
Gallopy gallopy…CHOMP!
…one less crocus to brighten the gloom…will I ever learn?
We went off to the garden centre to replace the mini plastic greenhouse which was really useful for starting off seeds but had been ripped off the wall and seen off by the gales. Fortunately, still half price so it didn’t break the bank at less than £15.00. This time we’ll put in stronger fixings. This is a problem when you live in windswept Norfolk.
A new trowel and fork in bright blue. New because you might have noticed someone chewed the handles off the old ones, and bright blue so I don’t keep mislaying them…
…and they look very jolly along with my gardening gloves…
And while I’m waiting to get to grips with the great outdoors, I have a few indoor projects from the cut price shelf to be going on with.
I’m very cheerful that I’ve sold one of my Love Bird Hearts on Folksy and later today I will be adding the larger one, which has been finished off with a primrose…
So, despite the gloom, I’m managing to keep my spirits up, how about you? If you’ve got some cheerfulness to share please join in with the Linky below, or leave a comment on the post. It’s always lovely to hear from you….!
I’ve just been nominated for an award! Isn’t that fabulous? Thank you SO much, TillymintBoutique…
It’s to be awarded to blogs with fewer than 200 followers, and I don’t actually know many followers I have, as WordPress doesn’t work like Blogger. (I’ve recently started using Bloglovin’ which works really well, so if you would actually like to officially follow me, the button is up on the left hand side bar! Ed. to add: and now I’ve found a subscribers widget too! )
The rules are simple:
– Show thanks to the blogger who awarded you by linking back to their blog…
– Post your top 5 blogs and let them know by leaving a comment on their blogs…
– Post the award on your blog!
…and I have chosen five ‘young’ blogs to pass on to you all…
They are, in no particular order:
Do visit them and say hello, there’s lots to see!
I’ll be back very soon with this week’s Reasons to be Cheerful. I hope you’ve been looking for them amongst the January gloom so you are ready to join in!
Hello, It’s Handmade Monday time again! Doesn’t it come round quickly? It very good for concentrating the mind though, otherwise SO much time could be wasted on Pinterest, purely for research purposes of course!
I would like to say thank you to every one who left such kind comments on last week’s Handmade Monday post about my exciting trip to the hospital. I’m still absolutely fine, but I really appreciated your concern, thanks so much …
I’ve been busy making, but plotting too, so I’m going to run my latest plan by you as it may be something you would like to join in with. A while ago I had two beautiful raised beds put in the vegetable area of the garden. They have lovely chunky railway sleepers which you can sit on, and metal bars over which I can put a polythene cover to make them into mini poly tunnels. (If you’ve been visiting for a while, you’ll know they have featured on several occasions in Higgins type incidences and if you put ”raised beds’ in the search box you will find plenty to have a giggle at, too many for me to add individual links to here!)
Last year I got so tied up with the Open Studio plans that nothing really got started, so I decided that this year, I will get to grips with the whole thing, and see how much I can produce using the two raised beds and some containers. I’m going back to basics, and I will be picking the brains of my friend Gaynor, who lives in the next village. Gaynor is one half of Home Grown Revolution, who specialise in raised beds, and one of her New Year’s resolutions was to get out from the office and to get her hands dirty in the veg garden. As the other one was to start a blog, we are going to be helping each other along, so watch this space, I hope it’s going to be fun!
With Valentine’s Day fast approaching I’ve been turning my thoughts to something new to needlefelt, and so we have the Love Bird…
He’s just 2 to 3 inches tall, but he has some smaller little friends too, who have come to roost in little woolly hearts…
and they’ll be for sale in the Folksy shop very soon.
I’ve been playing around in the button box again…
…and I’ve tried, but not quite managed to produce a crochet square a night with my lovely New Zealand wool…
…if only there were more hours in the day!
With that in mind I will step away from the computer, and leave you to pop over to 1st Unique Gifts where Wendy is hosting the Handmade Monday Linky to find out just what everyone else has been up to over the past week.
See you soon …x
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