HAPPY CHRISTMAS

HAPPY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE.

xxx

Update....

Helloooooo Everyone!!!!

Well, I'm afraid this will just be a very short post, just to let you know I am still around, I have just been sooooo busy that I have not had time to update my blog, which is looking rather sad and neglected!!!

There will be A LOT of updates and posts to begin with in the New Year, and hopefully things will be more normal and less hectic and I will be able to return to my weekly blogging!!!

So........sadly no pictures this time, but keep an eye out in the New Year, when I will be back after a two week break!!

Hope you have a lovely Christmas and all the best for the New Year!!

Hugs and Best Wishes to you all!

xxx xxx xxx xxx xxx

Happy..........

Hello Everyone!!!!

Happy December!!!  These last couple of weeks have really flown by in a blur!!!

We have had a small fluttering of snow, which quickly disappeared with the rain!  It was lovely to catch a brief glimpse of it...... but, it also reminded me of last years snowfall......

This picture is from last year.

You may recall this post where I told you all about our snowfall and a few posts after we were still having bad weather!! 

Still it has an upside...... we get to have snow fights, followed by warm cups of hot chocolate with marshmallows!!!!!  Mmmmm, I can smell it all now!!!

Creatively, I have been flat out working on that commission I told you about!!!  Things are coming together, but it's keeping me away from blogging!!!

Never mind, it pays the bills, which I am very grateful for.

Well, must dash!!!!  Hopefully see you all soooooooooon!!!!!

Keep warm!

Hugs

xxx

Really???.....

Welcome Back.......

Things have been very strange recently...........

You may even think I have lost the plot.......

Why????????

Because of this..........

YES.....

Really!!!!!!!

As most of you know, I do not like to hand knit!!!  And I really do not like creating things in Black and White!!!!

But...... one of the commissions that I recently completed involved black and white creativity, and when it is your livelihood, you just sometimes have to give in and work in colours that the client wants!

I didn't have loads of hand knitting to do, but I did find these pictures that I took during the design process, and they made me smile, as if I am totally honest, I thoroughly enjoyed doing the commission, and creating in black and white!!!!  

I may even do more!!!

See you soon!

xxx

More Hexagons.......

Helloooooo!!

How are you all doing?

Well, we really have been having a lot of cold and overcast days up here in the Northern Hemisphere!  Not that I am complaining, but they really are not good when you try and take pictures!!!!

These are the new colour way hexagons and as you can see..... you can't get the true colour!

The photo's came out either too dark (these are not completed and I have only tucked the ends in so it's not too messy! Hehehe.)

Or....... too bright!!!!!!!!!

Although...... I did manage to catch this hexagon in progress and it is almost true colour, but still a tad bit off!!!

I've been trying to complete a couple a day, so that I can get this project finished before I start a new one, as when I last counted........ I had 7 UFO's!!!!!!!! (Un-Finished Objects) That is truly terrible!!!!!! 

Still, on the bright side, I have plenty to keep me busy!!!

Well, must dash....... got lots of work on the commissioning side to complete and I have to do that!!!

Until next time....

xx-oo-xx-oo-xx

New Knitted Fabrics

Goooooood Morning!!!!!!!!!!!

Well, you may recall from here that the girls were busy creating!  

Well, it got me thinking that there are a few things that I want to do and I always push them to the back of everything else, because sometimes looking after the little peeps and day to day life gets in the way, so this was a time when Bean and Peanut were content doing what they were doing and whilst I was occasionally helping, I could maybe start getting on with some of the bits I wanted to do......

I managed to create all these fabrics.......

Fourteen (14) in total!!!!

Please excuse the creased appearance, but I did not have time to press them, as I was soooooo excited and couldn't wait to share them!!!

I have ideas for their use, I just need to find time to do it, which at this stage is VERY limited! But, I'm not going to complain, as I wouldn't change anything!!!

Well, I best get on.... I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

See you soon!!!!

Hugs

xxx-xxx-xxx

Teeny Bear

Well HELLO Everyone!

Sorry for being so lax-a-daisy with my blog during this last week, but I have been really busy with a commission!!!!

A friend is launching a new range of bespoke clothing and accessories in December, and has asked me to be  part of the design team (Eeeeeeeekkkk!! - A very excitable eek!), so I have been busy doing stuff for that!

You may recall from here that Bean and Peanut were on half term and our thoughts had turned to creating things for Christmas......

Well, I have to sift through a lot of pictures and sort them out into order before I can upload them, but I just have to show you Bean's attempt at a Bear pattern that I have from my childhood....... I used to make loads of these little bears for friends and family, and it was all very nostalgic for me that both Bean and Peanut chose this pattern as one of their choices to create as presents for friends....

Here is Bean's test bear......

He is very cute for a first make, although a tad lopsided and not as stuffed as he should be, and Bean did not give him a mouth!!

Bean was not as impressed with him as I was, and that was purely down to the fact that she is a bit of a perfectionist and he didn't come out ........ perfect!

I am pleased to say that whilst Bean discarded him, Peanut was quick to adopt him and take the picture above, with him holding her lip balm!

On a good note, Bean did not give up, she has proceeded to perfect her bear making skills, and when I get a chance, I will post more pictures :-)

Well, until next time.... have a good day and thanks for popping in.

xxx

Edited to add:  I've just realised........ this is my 100th post!!!!!! Yaaaayyyyy! xxx

Progress

Helloooooo!

I've just popped on for a sneaky five minutes to let you know that we have been busy,busy,busy!!!

I've even managed to do the next set of colours in my project..... here's another sneak peak....

I am using all sorts of colours, and hexagon mixes, I just need to try and randomly plan how to put it together!

On the christmas creation front, the choices have been very cute and sweet and kept the girls occupied.  They have been that engrossed with their christmas projects that they have hardly noticed that miserable wet weather we have been having......

Mind you, in comparison to the US, our weather has been very mild and I hope everyone that pops in occasionally on here is safe along with their friends and families, my thoughts and prayers are with anyone who has been affected.

Until next time, stay safe everyone and see you soon!!!

Hugs and Best Wishes

xxx

Beach Huts.

Good Morning!!!

How are you all doing?

Well, I have taken a very small break from all the knitting and crochet that I have been doing lately and completed this small cross stitch of beach huts!!

I have an idea for it, I just need time!!!!  

This week is half term for Bean and Peanut, and we agreed that we would use it to make a start on Christmas presents and gifts they both want to make for their friends, so I have dug various bits and bobs out and have let them have a look and decide exactly what they want to do!!

If I remember, I will take photo's and post them for you all to see.

So until I get a chance......

keep creating and see you sooooooon!!

xx-oo-xx

It's Finished!!!!!!

Hello Everyone!

Welcome Back!!!!

Do you remember this post?  Well....... I have finally finished it.......

 You may recall the design idea came from my sketch here, and I pondered and played around with ideas, and finally came up with this sweet little house.

I have quite a large number of pieces of paper all bundled together with various bits of design elements, including the graph I charted before I could even begin to knit it!  I just need to now put them into an orderly manner and into my sketchbook!

Well..... here is the finished article......

I am really pleased with it, and have already received an order for two more!  In different colours!

Hope you have all had a fab weekend!!

Until next time...

xxx

Butterfly Centre

Good Morning!

I hope you are all enjoying a relaxing weekend!

A couple of weekends ago, we took Bean and Peanut to a butterfly center  and we had loads of fun seeing all the butterflies and other animals at the center   

In fact we had so much fun, that I felt I had to share my favorite pictures with you!!!

This first picture is of bean feeding a really friendly little parrot, he was just so sweet and good natured, we couldn't stay away from him and kept going back to him.

This picture of the butterfly was one of many!!  But it fascinated me that the butterfly lay on this notice board as flat as can be in the hope of blending in, and I have to say, most visitors to the center walked straight past it and did not see it at all!!!

I could inundate you with loads of pictures like this, of all sorts of birds and butterflies, spiders, snakes, leaf ants, stick insects and various other creatures, but I thought I would just show off my two favourites!  Maybe some-one would be able to tell me what type of parrot and butterfly they are, as sadly most of the notices about these two were very faded and illegible.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Hugs

xxx

A little bit of.......

Helloooooo!

Well, I have been playing with an idea for absolutely ages and ages!

When I was at University, we did all sorts of bits and bobs, and you may recall from this post, that I struggled with the process of transfer printing, right up until my final year, when it all clicked into place and I knew how to use it and create with it, in a way that suited me.

Well I had a lot of bits left over from uni, which I have kept in a safe place to experiment with at a later date.....

Well, I gathered all my bits up that I required......

Traced my template onto the back of my transfer paper, lay them onto my material as I deemed fit for purpose and then.... Pressed, pressed and pressed!!!!

Hey presto!  The end results!!!

I was very pleased with the results, considering I didn't use my press, I used an iron.

The results are absolutely fine for test pieces, and I will be playing about more in the future, as I have a plan for some work like this, but all will be revealed in due course!

Hope you enjoy them.

xxx-oo-xxx-oo-xxx

Yummy Yarn!!!

Hellooooooooo!!!

Well, I can contain myself no longer!!!!!!!

I ordered a mixed bag of yarn, as I want to make a blanket in rainbow colours, and it finally arrived!!!!

17 balls of delicious colour that makes me all happy and warm inside!!!!

I keep looking at it and feeling it's softness and playing with it and thinking....... thinking...... thinking!

The thinking going on is ...... what will this blanket look like?  Will it be stripes? Ripples? Hexagons? Squares? Will it be crocheted or knitted?

So many decisions to make!!!

But....... yes, sadly there is a but!  I have told myself that I am not allowed to do anything with it, until the other UFO's are completed!!!!

It may be some time, as I know without even checking that I have at least 5 UFO's and no doubt, there will be more when I do check!! (Sigh)

Oh, well!  Best get busy and start making progress!!!

Until next time....... get those UFO's finished!!!!

;-D

xxxxx

Autumn has landed!

Hello!

Welcome Back!

Well, we are heading towards winter up here in the Northern Hemisphere.  Autumn is here and the days are becoming shorter and colder.

We were fortunate enough to have a fairly warm weekend this weekend, so spent some time out in the garden, tidying up and trying to sort out in preparation for winter, when we were distracted by this.........

A somewhat large Dragonfly!!!!  His body was larger than the palm of my hand!!  He is the biggest one I have ever seen, and was absolutely beautiful!!!

We all spent ages watching him, and trying to get as close to him as possible.... I think he thought it was a bit of a game, as every now and then, he would fly behind us and hover for a bit, before going back to this same place (the wall of our garage, by the garage door!) Can't say I blame him, it was extremely warm and cosy there.

The garden has started to get its Autumn colours.....

It all looks extremely pretty and colourful, but, the only trouble with that, is the leaves start to fall off, which means lots of leaf sweeping, which turns out to be an extremely lengthy process, as we rake the leaves..... and then..... who can resist kicking them all over the place or playing in them???  Certainly not any of us!!!!!

Until next time....

Try not to disrupt too many leaf piles! :-)

xxx

Update.

Good Morning Everyone!

How are you all doing?  I can hardly believe it has been two weeks since I last blogged!!!!!  Where does the time go to?  

I have been very busy meeting a few deadlines on bits and pieces I had to get done, and I have to confess, I love it when a deadline is looming, as it gives me the drive and passion to get everything done!  I thrive on a bit of stress!!! The weird thing is..... I get so annoyed with myself for leaving things to do so late!!!  You'd think I'd learn and be more prepared next time! But..... NO!  I don't think I will ever change if I'm honest! (tee hee hee.)

Do you remember this post?

Well, I have been very bad, as I have still not completed the second one, but I have started a third one, which is completely different, and uses these colours.......

Yes...... it is knitted, and I have half left to complete!!!  So I am hoping to do the big reveal next week!!!!  I'm really quite excited about it!!! It is not squares...... this was just a test piece to see if I was happy with just two colours!

What have you all been busy doing???

Well, I think I should take myself off and create a UFO (Un Finished Objects) List to put up for you all to see........ as it may give me the incentive to complete them!!!! I'm terrible when it comes to completing things that I want to keep, as my brain is always whizzing about, thinking about the next project....... and my sketch books are being filled daily!!!! We'll see what transpires!!!

Anyway, must dash......... sketchbook is calling!!!!!! 

Until next time...... keep creating!

xxx-xxx-xxx

Mmmmmmm Cake!

Hello......

Have you ever been working hard (either creatively or day to day), and suddenly decided you could just eat a nice bit of Chocolate cake???????

Well, that happened to me the other day and I remembered my late Mum used to make a Mug Cake, so it took me a while, but I found the recipe she had given me in my useful recipes from family and friends book!

Here is my Chocolate mug cake!

doesn't it look good??????

I had a couple of teaspoons full, and had to take another picture to show you what it looked like!   It was delicious, and very moist........

The recipe can be found here.

You can leave the chocolate chips out completely and ice it instead..... whatever you decide, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did! :-)

Until later........

xxx-ooo-xxx-ooo-xxx

Kitten Update!

Good Morning Everyone! 

I hope you have all had a fantastic weekend, and welcome back to my blog!!!

As I previously told you, I have numerous bits and pieces to update you all with, so I thought I'd start by  giving those of you that are interested, an update on the kittens!

The picture below, is the one and only one I have of all seven kittens together, all other attempts seem to have missed one or two, or were blur from them moving around so much!  They were five (5) weeks old here.

 This next picture is one of my favorites  and is a happy/sad picture, the reason being that this was the runt of the litter and he was very sweet natured and very, very small compared to his siblings and cousins.  It earnt him the nickname Tiny.  

Tiny was seven (7) weeks old here, and sadly we lost him to a respiratory infection a couple of days after this picture was taken. You can see him in the above picture Second kitten from the right at the bottom.  If he had survived, I would have kept him, purely because he was one of the kittens I had spent a lot of time with in the beginning, making sure he learnt to suckle after his traumatic start in life, but I guess some things are just not meant to be. But, at least I have this picture of him, and he has a special place of rest in our garden.

In this next picture, you can see the two black and white kittens.  Bean wanted the one on the bottom, a boy, which she has named Treacle. A friend was going to have the one on the top, but changed her mind (she has only just recently lost her own cat.)  Anyway, I discovered this kitten (a female) has a hernia on her belly, and when other friends came to look at the kittens, no-one wanted her because of it, so M has adopted her and called her Whiskers! We have to keep an eye on her hernia, but have been told it's nothing to worry about, and when she is spayed, they will sort it out at the same time.

Whiskers is a very laid back kitten and is quite happy sitting curled up on my lap, sleeping!

In the final picture above, you can see Treacle (black and white kitten) then the next kitten you see (the one he has his paw on) is called Candy (female kitten).  She is Peanut's kitten.  The male kitten (in the corner - Candy has her head on him) is called Crackers.  His owner is a friend of Bean, and she absolutely adores him to bits.  

The final two black kittens have yet to be named, although they have gone to a friend of a friend, so the nice thing is, we get photo updates and news about all of them, which I am extremely happy about!

No doubt, I will post bits and pieces going forward about how Treacle, Candy and Whiskers are growing up.

Sorry if I have rabbited on, but I do hope you enjoyed the update :-).

Until next time!

xxx

Deadlines!!

Hello Everyone.

I hope you are all keeping well and busy with your creations!  

Sorry I have not been around much, but I have a few deadlines that need to be met, and unfortunately blogging is not one of them at the moment!

I am hoping to be back sometime next week, with lots of bits and pieces that I haven't quite got around to showing you yet!

For now, I'll leave you with these little snippets........

Enjoy!

Until next time.....

Hugs

xxx

Surprise Holiday!

Welcome Back!

Well, you may recall from this post that I mentioned that we were going on a Special Holiday......

Well, we went here.......

Yip...... Disneyland Paris! 

M and I were very proud of ourselves, as we managed to keep it to ourselves until we had to take the passports and tickets out at Euro star at St. Pancras and then Bean and Peanut went crazy!!  They were besides themselves with excitement!!!!

We went for four nights, five days, and I can say, by the end, I was more than ready to come home!!!!  We walked 10 miles each day, making sure we saw as much as we could and did as much as we could, and having been there before, when Bean was 6 and Peanut was 9 months old, we were a bit apprehensive about Peanut, especially as we knew how much walking there was....  She coped very well, as very last minute, I bought both Bean and Peanut a pair of Heely's. (Not these exact ones and I got them on sale!) We had bought Bean a pair when she was 7 and she knew how to use them, so we only had to get Peanut to use them, which she got the hang of after a day!

By the end of the holiday, I did wish I had bought myself a pair!  We had lunch at Cafe Mickey and met the characters, we went on lots of rides and did everything we wanted to do and more! It really was fantastic!!!

I'll leave you with a few of our favourite pictures from the fantillusion and fireworks.

Until next time.

xxx xxx xxx

Normality Returns!

Hello Everyone and welcome back!

It was a bit of a hectic week last week, with both Bean and Peanut returning to school.  I suddenly seemed to have accumulated piles of washing and ironing, and Monday consisted of labeling all new school clothing up, and making sure they both had everything they needed! 

The washing, tumbling and ironing seemed to be never ending! There were mountains of the stuff, which I couldn't really figure out, as apart from Saturday and Sunday, I wash, tumble and iron every day!

I finally managed to get on top of it all by Wednesday evening..... but then..... I had to spend the rest of the week doing invoicing and accounts for M!

I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but M has a consultancy business, with a few people working with him, and because I did Human Resources and Accounting in a previous life, he asked me to look after the office and accounts side of his business, which I am happy to do, as I am able to do it in between the important stuff like being creative! Hehehe x. 

So creating wise, I did very little last week, but hey ho, that is how it has to be sometimes.

Well, I won't bore you anymore, I'm disappearing for now, as I have hundreds of photo's to sort through and select for various updates for you all! So keep your eye's peeled!

Until later!

xxxx