Post-Christmas Post

Here we are, in that strange no-man's-land between Christmas Day and New Years Day. A time of clearing away, finishing off, sales fever, and reflection. I'm sure there will be many blog posts about New Year Resolutions, and reviews of Old Year, and I may or may not go down that route later on, but for now I'll just keep it low-key and local.

Above is a post-Christmas view of our little tree, sans the splendour of all the presents round the base. We don't do 'large and natural' these days, this pretty good artificial has done us proud for a good few years now, and the size s just right.

Christmas cards are, apart from the tree, the sum total of our decorations. Oh, and a wreath on the door.

Oooops! Did you spot the reel of elastic nestling between the cards here? Luckily it is not the knicker variety, I don't know how it found its way here!

The sunny view out of my sewing room window this morning, across the nursery field to where the cattle are chomping at hay bales. It is gorgeous here in West Norfolk, but very cold outside!

The garden in the sunshine looks a bit thread-bare this time of year. Jim spent yesterday afternoon hoovering up the fallen leaves. Well, most of them!

I've done a fair bit of embroidery on the quilt - sometimes in my sewing room listening to audio-books, sometimes in front of the television while we watched a bit of Miss Marple, or a video. Can't say the Christmas tv has been all that spectacular.

Finished the applique on this, ready for stitching  into a cushion cover. Need to find a cushion form!

And here is my ready-to-go box for bangle-making; it's handy to just grab the box and bring it into the living room in the evening.

So, are you tuckered out with turkey and trifle, or have you got rid of all the left overs? Planning your New Year Resolutions, or firmly forsaking the very idea? Back at work, or at least back in the old routine, or still enjoying a little peace and quiet before reality kicks back in? I'm pleased I've got back into the swing of blogging, and I shall now go and catch up with what you've been writing on yours. If I don't manage another post before next Thursday, Happy New Year to you all!

Stitching down the Wind

Wow! What a storm! I do hope that you aren't among those poor unfortunates who have lost their homes, or have had to move out while repairs are effected. We escaped here in our corner of West Norfolk but up on the North Norfolk coast they took a real battering, and I know in other parts of the UK the wind, rain and high tides have wrought devastation and loss of life.

In expectation of a couple of days of bad weather Jim and I planned for staying home and 'pottering' - home chores, long coffee-and-crossword breaks, and blissful hours to tie flies and order from fishing catalogues (Jim) and sorting threads and stitching (me). Mind you, the wind was so strong on Thursday afternoon in the little conservatory that is my sewing room, that I thought the roof would be ripped off and judiciously repaired to the Big Table in the dining room!

I made more headway into the task of tidying up the thread straggles - you know, when you cut into a skein of thread you always end up with an impossible tangle eventually, so I have started to wind the threads onto bits of card. It's a deliciously mindless occupation, high on the list of anyone with OCD I'd imagine! If you do it before things get too bad it's not such a task.

I did a little more on the Farmhouse Quilt. Some of the fabrics are quite gorgeous to quilt through, and this pale flannel here is one of them - see how the stitches just melt back into the cloth?

All the applique pieces will be embroidered when the quilting is finished and I have bound it. Yummy!

I'm using one strand of a hand-dyed 21st Century Yarn 4-ply cotton to quilt with - so much softer than quilting thread against the flannel, and I love the way the variegated colour changes just add a little something to the stitches.

A little Christmassy felty something. Bet you can't guess .......

And some more wool felt bangles. On a roll with these now. The bowl in the top photo contains tiny felt squares ready for embellishing the bangles. I must get my bead boxes out and see which ones will work with the wool.

So that's how I've spent these last couple of stormy days, stitching down the wind and really quite enjoying being 'stuck in the house'. I hope they have been good days for you, and if not, my good wishes to you.

Now then before you whizz off to your next blog stop, do me a favour and pop over to Potter Jotter, as Cathy is doing a really fab give-away of some of her lovely ceramic buttons. Hop across and say hello!

Bye for now and thank you all for your lovely comments these last couple of weeks about my lengthy wait for a hospital appointment. Believe me I know I am not in dire straits and other bloggy friends have been having a much more drastic time of it, health-wise. But it has been so good to read your remarks, thank you.

Count Down

Hello Everyone, this post should have been all about my preparations for going to Towersey Folk Festival with the Ouse Washes Molly Dancers. At the last moment I discovered it was to last a day longer than I had thought, throwing out our plans to set off to Wales very early on Tuesday morning. Also one or two small but pressing problems with my mum's care arose. So I made the decision to pull out and use the weekend to get things sorted.

I'm really sorry to be missing what I know will be a fun-packed week-end, already the face-book photos and comments are being posted, but as I'm typing this I know I made the right decision; a few more things have now come to light which needed dealing with - not great problems, but they are things I might have overlooked had I been away by yesterday evening. It also means we can leave a day earlier. A huge weight has dropped off my shoulders, I hadn't realised how stressed I'd been getting trying to organise not just myself for Towersey, us for Wales, and my mum for the week. Thank goodness for a good friend, a good neighbour and a lovely son and his partner - all stepping in so we can get away. The header photo is our caravan site. Can't wait to get there!

So here are a few of the things I've been getting organised for our get-away.

The first involves a packet of "cooking bacon" from Sainsburys, some veg, and a pack of oven roasting bags. These bacon packs have become a bit of an on-going thread between a few of we Norfolk bloggers, notably Dc, and Pam, who gives a link to an excellent recipe for bacon casserole. Pam's idea of making up the uncooked mix, bagging it and freezing to take with her to their caravan - also in Wales, prompted me to do the same. One pack cost me £1 10p (they've gone up 10p since we all started buying them!) A couple each of carrot and parsnip, 8 small new potatoes, an onion, 2 sticks celery, some button mushrooms, some garlic and some herbs. Oh and some courgettes from the garden. Chop all ingredients to chunks. Season, pop into roasting foil bags, and into the freezer. I'll pack one in the cool-box just as we set off to Wales on Monday, so it will defrost slowly and be ready to stick in the oven when we want it for supper.


The second is something to keep me out of mischief while Jim is fishing, or in the evenings; some wool/felt stitching on the cushion cover, the panel, and a couple of pin-cushions. Also hexagon papers and fabric to make them up. I've done a few, you can see their size relative to the embroidery thread.

I'll also be taking these -  been itching to read them but have resisted!

Not sure I will find any wifi where we re, so unlikely to be blogging, face-booking or answering emails. However I will use my lap-top for watching DVDs and playing cds, checking my iPhoto stash and uploading the tons of photos I will be taking.

And of course this! (Don't worry, I shall find a remote corner of a field, not to inflict my music on fellow campers/caravaners!)

So whatever you are doing this coming week - and I know a lot of my friends are at various festivals over the week-end - I hope we all get a look-in with some great weather and fun. Catch up with you when we get back.

Floral Friday

I understand from Jo's blog ( Jozart)  that today is Feelgood Friday. And I do! I love this hot weather - yes, I know it's too much for some people, and there have been some terrible fires. However, I have been waiting over a year for this and I'm blummin' well going to enjoy it! And this weekened I will NOT be paradin' meself around wearin' a funny hat and makin' a noise in Furrin Parts, for a change. No, just me, myself and I,  Jim finding HIMself in an open field neath blistering sunny skies instead for the weekend. I hope you have something planned that is pleasing to you, whether you are chillin' out or doing something interesting but perspiration-inducing!

Speaking of funny hats, I had a good chuckle earlier this week reading Cathy's blog (Potter Jotter) Her name is Cathy Daniel, and she had used some of the lovely ceramic tiles she makes, to come up with a few anagrams of her name. This was especially for me:

Isn't that clever? If you want to see what the equally clever other anagrams were, pop over and check out her blog. Thanks Cathy, this is just great!

So, mooching round the garden doing some garden tasks this morning (ahem) I thought I'd bring some of the loveliness indoors, and set about with the secateurs (well, the kitchen scissors, actually.)

 
                                                           The moody, shady shot.

                     I am probably the world's worst flower arranger but I think they look pretty.

So after a quick nip into town - I see Sainsbury's car park was half empty even at 10 o'clock when I left, so much for the obscenely expensive new parking ticket machines which seek to curb all the millions of pounds the council is losing with people sharing their unused tickets! One poor lady couldn't see to key in her reg. number how ridiculous, someone needs shooting on the council. I put heaven knows what reg. number, I nearly always get my letters back to front, and I know I missed the letter off the end. So I am awaiting any minute the Knock on the Door from some Jobsworth or other.

Anyway, too nice a day to rant. So when I got home, quick bit of house work. (Yes, I do on occasion get the feather duster and vacuum cleaner out!) then it was me for the garden.

And this is what I spent the afternoon doing.

                                                        Materials and tools at the ready.

                                   Embroidery in progress on the Big Cushion.

And the reason for the Big Basket of Felt, seen above :

The Little Cushion, or a pin cushion to be precise. The grey looking blanket background is actually quite a nice green but the colour leached out in the sun.

So there you have it. A short post about what's made me happy today. Oh, and one other thing did too, but you can't see that - a phone call from a very tired chap in a field in Worcestershire! Hope you had a Fell Good Friday too!