What do you think of that for an Autumnal photo?  Albertine usually only does her stuff, very spectacularly, for three weeks in June!  She’s a little confused!

It’s been a little hectic this week, and again I’ve had moments of ‘Humph, what is there to be cheerful about?’ but it’s always there when you look for it.

We had a bit of worry over my mum.  She struggles heroically with all sorts of health issues and keeps amazingly positive but this week new pills rendered her a bit more wobbly than usual and for the first time she had to use her alarm necklace and we had a call to rescue her.  She’s less than a mile away so we were there within minutes to find that she had gently capsized rather than fallen, and had only damaged her dignity.  It was so fortunate that Tim was home though as I could never have got her off the floor single handedly and probably would have had to call the emergency services.  Knowing  my mum, she’d have said, ‘Ooh, lovely, firemen!’

So for a couple of days I’ve been going round every couple of hours but now the doctor has been and the pills sorted out we are back to normal for the moment.  Such a worry though.

Any way, The sun’s been shining through the last remaining cherry leaves this morning…

I think over the next week the rest of the leaves will be down, but there’s been a lovely sparkly carpet for a small dog to rush about on!…

If you look in the top left hand corner of the first Higgins photo you’ll see my  Drummer Boy rose which is still blooming too…

I rescued it from the ‘Nearly Dead’ bin at the local garden centre some years ago and it has been gratefully flowering every year since!  And talking of buying plants, I was very happy to find hyacinths to buy at the Farmers Market last Saturday.

You might remember last winter I had these…

…and now I have these to look forward too…

This morning Selvedge arrived…

Which has gone into the pile with Country Living…

…and Country Homes and Interiors…

…to be read, sometime, when I’m not wielding a a red hot felting needle!

Which reminds me.  Thank you for all the suggestions which were made about listing the Felty Balloons on Folksy.  I’ve taken them all on board, but I think I will wait now until after the Pick’n’Mix Market which is in 10 days time.  It would be rather lovely if I don’t have any left to list, wouldn’t it? We’ll see!

Yesterday afternoon I went out to the studio with express intention of have a good tidy up, walked in, spotted a particular piece of fleece, had a brainwave and ended up needlefelting again!  But it was very productive, because I made this little chap…

I thought if he had a couple of brothers, they could go carol singing, and here they are!  This one has the music…

…this one rings the bell…

…and this one knows all the words!

They are quite wee, just over 2″ tall, and look SO cute on the mantlepiece. However, I will be sensible, and they ARE for sale! (Ed. to add: and were sold, the very next day! Another reason to be cheerful!)

I hope that you too have found some ‘Reasons to be Cheerful’  even if you felt it’s been a tricky week so far.  And I hope too that you’ll be able to join in with the ‘Linky’ so that we can spread a little happiness about.  I’ve really enjoyed popping off to other blogs,  and sharing the cheerfulness.  I’ve decided to start the Linky slightly earlier, Wednesday afternoon rather than Thursday morning to give as much time as possible for people to find it and join in and so here it is!

See you soon xx