sweater heaven

I knitted Digger a sweater to match Peggy's, just different colours. Trouble is they both love them and when I put them on my dogs they go out into the snow and won't come back indoors. They have had great fun romping around the garden and the green outside the house, pushing the snow up in the air with their noses. Digger whinges all morning until he puts his sweater on for his trip outside; drives me mad!

Here the roads are driveable, but the icy paths are certainly a health hazard. I tried to get to my friend's house this morning but only got as far as the garage then had to turn back. I dug my car out of the frost and drove to the nearest carpark, and walked very gingerly round to her house for a short stay - cup of tea and a chat - exchanged presents and left to do the reverse journey. I almost wished I was impaired enough to warrant a walking stick, but I mustn't tempt fate.

I must thank the post office this year because their job at the moment must be so demanding due to the weather. However, I got presents delivered to me for my friends only 1 day late and the presents I arranged for my sons were delivered on the morning stated in the website. How's that for organisation and customer satisfaction. Well done!

When the snow fell last week my telephone cable came away from the house and left me stranded, no landline, no broadband, it was like losing an arm and I felt very cut off. Thankfully my trusty mobile allowed me to get in touch with Sky who arranged for an engineer to come and reconnect me yesterday. Thus I can now update my blog, read my facebook, collect the books from Amazon bought for my kindle and read all my emails. Whew...life is always throwing up problems to be solved.

more bird houses

Here is the latest bird house; I made it for my dog walker and will fill it with little sachets of pot pouri and a post it note pad and small pencil, as a Christmas 'thank you' for taking my dogs out every week, rain, hail and snow, bless her.  She is a lovely girl but how she goes out in all weathers is beyond me.

These shapes started with a wedding box made from white lace coasters, but I got bored with the same square and started exploring other shapes to see if they would be popular with our tourist trade. A couple i.e. the tower and the bonbon box were failures but the rest seemed to appeal. I'll have to see if I can make enough to sell on a regular basis, but at the moment I'm not sure I want to start selling again...maybe next Spring?

Happiness is a son who asked if he could come for Christmas and that's a big 'Yes'. I'll get to try out my new culinary skills on him, poor soul, and he'll have to smile and say 'its gorgeous'. The one big problem I have is what to do with the waste peelings and left over bits that come from cooking raw food. Devon has issued us with a kitchen caddy to fill, but we can't put any plastic in it, and have to use kitchen roll to line it, then it goes into the green recycling wheelybin which is only collected every two weeks. Boy, does it whiff in the summer! Unfortunately I don't have a compost bin - nowhere to put it and no use for it after as my garden consists of gravel and slate to make it dog friendly. Hey Ho....

Weather...or not

With it being so cold I was 'forced' into finishing off my Christmas presents ready for sending out. I used up all my Christmas paper and that's when I saw Digger taking off with the inner cardboard tube in his mouth. This tube was at least 3 times longer than him and it posed lots of hazards like getting between my desk and chair, through the kitchen door etc. and then Peggy spotted him with it and decided she wanted some, so that meant a tug of war game and lots of growling. They had lots of fun with a simple cardboard tube and I had to laugh along with them.

Our neighbour 3 doors away has put some blinking lights up along his guttering and we can see these from the hall window. This has caused Digger some confusion and he has been growling at them for several days. Here the dogs are at the window trying to decide if they are a threat or not...

 You can't see the lights properly but the picture gives some idea of what the dogs can see and it took a while for Digger to settle down and ignore them.



I also had a little time to make Peggy a new sweater. I had tried the one I made for Vicky (who died) but poor Peggy is a lot bigger and was having difficulty walking in it. So off I went to the wool shop and got some chunky wool and huge needles and a pattern off the internet and made a custom sweater for her. Doesn't she look cute?

I had to bribe her with a doggie toffee to get her to sit so that I could take a picture of her. I also bought some wool off the internet which is still awaiting arrival. I will be making Digger a sweater as soon as it arrives and maybe one for next door's Archie too because Parson's Jack Russells seem to fall between the cracks when it comes to shop bought sweaters. They are either too small or too large whereas this pattern can be altered to suit the pet. I got the pattern from here and do thank whoever was kind enough to put it on the net.

MMM 'Boxes' challenge

November's Mixed Media Monday challenge was 'Boxes' and I had an idea I had been playing with for a while - in my mind - so now was the time to bring it into being. I have been experimenting with shapes for some time now and a bird box had taken my eye when I visited a friend's garden where she had loads of them nailed to her house wall. They were all colours but the same basic shape. I think the one I came up with has too large a hole in the front and next time I'll make it smaller. It could not have a roof either because there would be no way of using it to carry anything or add a little present. So I added a ribbon on the inside of the front appex and tied it through an eyelet hole on the back to keep it together. The bluebirds are made from some pieces of fabric paper, painted and stamped with writing and the flowers are glued onto ribbon bases.

Apart from that I'm busy making Christmas presents and little things for Sue's stall, such as bookmarks, glasses cases and lavender sleep pillows.

My cooking is taking a life of it's own and I'm looking out previous cook books for recipes and inspiration. It is difficult cooking for one because the food becomes boring after the second helping, so I think I'll have to invest in some freezer bags or boxes to carry the meals over into another week.

Has anyone seen the Cloth Paper Scissors mag for this month - it has some very interesting ideas in it and I'm going to try out the Christmas card workshop on page 30 but not in wax, I can get in quite a mess without that, but I do have ideas of how to apply the principle to create some cards. I'll post an example soon.

Winter is upon us

I just had to take this picture of my sycamore tree which I keep in a plastic pot. It has changed to the most amazine colours but sadly all the leaves have fallen off now and all I have is bare branches. Also my clematis has been flowering since March, most unusual, and still keeps going. I have fruit on my passion flower vine and not a clue as to what to do with them. The birds will have a treat instead.

Since I last blogged I had a full on very nasty shingles virus that started across my left eyebrow and up to my hair line plus one really nasty blister at the corner of my eye. This has left me almost blind as the swelling in my face completely covered my eye. I dashed to the hospital and was diagnosed as having insect bites but after a further visit to my doctor, who diagnosed the shingles, this meant that I had missed 3 days treatment and the virus had a complete hold.  Still, this is probably more information than you want to know and now I'm on the mend.  Unfortunately this has left me with a dilated eye where I had to add ointment and drops. Also anyone who has had it will know that the horsepills they give you 5 times a day for 7 days are very difficult to get down a swollen throat. I tried cutting them in half then quarters and finally crushed them on a spoon. It was the only way they would go down. Do you need this when you're so ill?

But, on to more interesting things. I started my Christmas presents, as you do at this time of the year, and made the little brooch pin below, it's designed by Jill Oxley in Australia:

Not bad for a one eyed monster, and I have ideas for other flowers to replace the rose. The pin head unscrews from the pin and allows the beading to be slipped on - very neat - and it can be attached to anything, like a jacket, handbag, rucksack etc. I wonder what my mother will attach hers to? Don't go there...

Well, now I can see - mostly - I must catch up on my blogs and see what next week's challenges are, and whether I can think up an unusual response.

A thought...Amazon are pushing this new Kindle, an ebook thingy that you can download books to, change the font and store them forever!! I really needed something like this to take the boredom away from sitting, feeling sorry for myself, so I must see about getting one for my next disaster.

Happy Birthday to Me...

What a long time since I last blogged, but I have been busy, honest. Here are some pictures of my newly painted house (before and after). It was done over several weeks and I painted the dark red bottom myself. Then had to go through pain and suffering as my back objected very strenuously. However, it was one of the projects Bert and I had put down for this year and I'm so glad to have it off my list.

In between doing this, I have been making small items for my friend at Devon Petals and also some 'shapes' in silk and velvet as experiments. You'll be able to see what she does with the bridal horseshoes I wrap with ribbon. She also makes hearts in a similar way.

Another thing on my list was to get back to my challenges. I wanted to be creative again and this week's Mixed Media Monday was 'Buttons'. I looked through my buttons and came acrosss some gorgeous twinkling flower buttons and I would never use, so I wired them up and put them onto a neck choker in red velvet ribbon. Hopefully this does the trick for this week and I must make sure I leave time for further challenges after next week.



Today is my birthday too, and I'm looking forward to travelling to Plymouth to see two of my sons and spend the weekend with them. I have been given a lovely Pandora bracelet and asked my offspring to let me have beads for it to make it extra special. The beads they have chosen are really lovely and somehow I can see each person in them. It will be a joy to wear.

I am also thinking of Christmas and planning presents. I love to give handmade items then because they are more personal and unique, but sons are difficult to plan for and I'll have to do some searching to find appropriate presents for them.

I'm back

Hi folks, I'm back in circulation again after what seems a long period of mourning. However, life is all about doors, the ones that shut and others that open.  A very kind friend invited me to sit with her on her market stall, helping to sell the wonderful things she makes and from that grew my interest and I started helping her make her goodies. She has tons of vision and the ability to delegate so I soon got stuck into winding ribbon on wire horseshoes for weddings etc. and the occasional bookmark and choker.

Suddenly life has purpose again and my help is where it is needed. I've got my mojo back! I'll be showing pictures of things I'm making soon, and other stuff I'm getting into.

Looking back on the experience all I can say to those who have lost loved ones is - death is about process and patience; the process of mourning and the patience to wait for that next door to open and give life meaning again, but it takes TIME.

Utter sadness x3

Well, Bert didn't manage the 3 months the doctor gave him, and died March 27th. Incredibly it doesn't seem 3 weeks ago, more like years as I miss him so much. Ed and I went to a local church last Saturday to light a candle for him. It was the first time I had been in this church and it was really lovely inside, quite a surprise as from the outside it looked just a pile of blocks. Also the windows had pictures of buildings along the bottoms which was quite appropriate as Bert was a builder. It was a comforting moment.

On a positive note, I received a couple of doll patterns that tested my abilities, especially at the moment, and after some rather harrowing mistakes, I produced my 'Berties' and 'Doris'. The Berties are made from Karen Shifton's pattern = Bouffon. The Bertie with the beard happened because I had this sily idea that I could spray the faces with hairspray to fix the colouring, but the sharpie I used for the mouth liquidised and ran down his chin so I had to rescue him.

Doris also had a traumatic time when I tried to paint her shoes on. I had finished everything else and tucked her on a wall unit to paint the shoes; I had placed the paint on the kitchen roll close by and she fell off her perch straight into the paint, all over her cap. I tried to wash it off, but the watered paint ran all over her face and I ended up having to remake her head completely.

My final 3rd traumatic happening came 2 weeks after Bert died, when my dog Digger swalled a sewing pin and had to have major surgery to remove it. The operation itself was fine, but getting his medication into him afterwards was so stressing for both of us and we ended up in tears. He was off his food for days and a visit to the vet made them rethink his medication and thankfully it was stopped altogether. He started eating again after 48 hours and was ravenous, bless him. He is fine now and bounding aroung the house in his usual noisy way.

All these happenings had made me lose my mojo and I'm finding it hard to get back into the swing of my life. I have made plans to get back slowly to the market, but not making waistcoats yet, just helping another lady with her stall. The local paper has listed a couple of groups of interest, like 'Good Companions' and 'Sip and Stitch' which I'll try and I have booked a day out on one of our local coaches, so I can see something of Devon. Hopefully this will help me develop a set of companions and a focus again.

New doll by Jill Maas

Jill Mass's dolls are fun and quirky and this one has me in stitches. Her name is Maggie and she is a wannabee angel, trying out her wings for the first time. Note her stripey socks but I'm not sure where they come from, maybe you can take something with you for future use?

She is just what I need to bring me out of the doldrums (no pun intended) because the last two weeks have been rubbish. With Bert in hospital and only two months to live, I became mega stressed and then I fell in the street outside my house, banging my face on the edge of the kerb and pushing my two front upper teeth into my mouth. I pushed them back but I have to wait now for 4 weeks to see if I have severed the nerves and they go black. It has been quite painful, and stressful finding things to eat that did not involve teeth - like soup - I'm really bored with that; and jelly - up a tree with that.

So, as I can't go to the market, I'm taking time to be creative and hence Maggie, my saviour.

Zentangles

Here are some of the zentangles I have been working on since Christmas. Although I didn't start out with a definite theme in mind they all seem to evolve into sea forms. The one on the left reminds me of a ship being tossed by waves onto the beach below, the others look like moluscs and a sea horse. The only one I cannot identify is the one on the right which is a free form; I was trying out new fillings and quite like the flow of this one. I have also done heart shaped flowers and leaves that lend themselves to wierd and wonderful fillings.

I started out filling in every inch of space on the pages with fillings, but over the months, my preferences have developed into separating these out and using white space more. I think this enhances the beauty of the different fillings.

Whilst I have favourites, I try to incorporate at least one new filling with each picture, that way I can develop, but there are one or two fillings I just cannot get to grips with. I need more tuition for these.

If you want to know more go to the Zentangle website and look at the newsletters for instructions on the fillings. It seems to be a growing interest in the USA and I've noted it growing slowly in the UK too.

Enchanted

This week's challenge was Enchanted. I had puzzled over this one for a while thinking 'fairies' but having no stamps or pictures nothing came to mind.  However when I did a search on microsoft clipart I saw this picture and decided that was it. Then the question - how to use it?

So I made a book bag for my granddaughter's birthday. She loves to write and draw and be able to keep her journals away from prying eyes, so a book bag is the ideal present. It is printed onto cotton and quilted (sort of) then beaded. A wide tape was used to enclose the raw edges and make the strap.

Now all I have to do is make the journal and for that I shall have to update my stamps to include fairies. I hope she will be as 'enchanted' with this bookbag as I was making it.

Nothing to show

Today I have nothing to show you because I spent last weekend with my mother in Cheshire to celebrate her 88th birthday. I hope I'm as active and in charge of all my faculties when I'm that age (always supposing I reach it!) as she is. My sister Madeleine and BILs met up and we took Mum to the local restaurant for a meal which unfortunately turned out to be a disaster. Our food was almost inedible, cold and at least one of us was served late at each course. How can you spoil an omelette? well, we found out the hard way.

However, not a total loss as we headed home and spent the afternoon and evening playing Monopoly and Tom lost bigtime. As he always wins, it was hard for him to take as we all laughed and commiserated with him.

It was a very poor market on Thursday, no orders for me, but the lady who makes cards in the next bay to me, did well for the first time this year. So I took the opportunity to move my workshop from the outhouse (where it is so cold I ended up ill twice) to the small bedroom upstairs. I managed to give the furniture away and get my neighbour to help me move the work surface up and balance it on a small tressle table. Then I used my pasting table for a cutting out area. I didn't realise that this room was bigger than I had originally envisaged and I managed to move all I needed into it. I just need shelves, lots of shelves everywhere to house all the bits and pieces.

Then the outhouse can be fitted out with new walls, ceiling and door and made into a study - hopefully - and I can move my PC into there, leaving the dining area of the kitchen just for dining.

My week of art

This is another journal I made for Mixed Media Monday's chalenge, Romance. It has an Edwardian look in oldfashioned lavender and lace. I had an ombre scarf in silk in shades of lilac and peach which went together with the sparkles on the trim.

I also made some more pages for my art journal. It was hard to come up with ideas that left places for journalling but I did get to try out some really nice products like the Glimmer Mists over a Tim Holtz grunge flourish, and pasting pieces of serviettes over a colour box background. Just some of the better ideas I came up with.

Bert went for the results of his scan yesterday and unfortunately his cancer has spread to his liver and lungs, and I think it is just a matter of time. We'll have to make some nice memories together.

Apart from that nothing has really happened this week;  it has been quiet so I tracked down my friend Sue at the market today and spent some time with her.

A quiet week

There has not been much going on this week and I've been quite lazy. I had Thursday at the market, and boy, was it cold! even with my little heater my nose, fingers and toes did not feel as if they belonged to me and I felt that frostbite was a real danger. The number of traders was so small that only half of the market was open and I had to move to the top end which I don't like. I never sell anything at that end and people who were calling for orders had a job to find me. Again this was true and I came away early with no orders, just some interest.  On Friday I had a dental appointment, which meant a sleepless night because I have trouble with them. They seem to think I am being paranoid about injections but as I'm allergic to adrenalin I think I have a right to be. Six months ago I was told that my usual dentist had left and I was now with another so I agreed to try her and see if I liked her; however, she put me through some awful stress and start my panic disorder up and I was so glad to get out of there. This time I insisted on another dentist and was transferred to a very nice Romanian person who took time to talk through my fears and, after an examination, said there was nothing wrong with my teeth...whew!!!

These two stressful days as meant it took another couple of days to find my feet again and, yes, made me lazy and not wanting to do the housework, I wonder why?

Still I did get my latest copy of my stamping magazine with the second part of the art journal workshop - painting the pages.  I've had a great time with this, and thanks to Natalea Kanderfer's article in the latest Art Journaling (stampington company) I made some very nice pages. I have only managed to do one page each day and had no idea it would take so long, but it is the drying of the paint etc. that takes the time up, and coming up with ideas and colour schemes for each page. I had decided on birds as the theme but it is amazing that in all the craft shops I went to there was nothing in them bird related. I have had to go online and source places like ebay and out of the way mail order sites.

I seem to have found my feet, so to speak, in that I started out making journals in various forms and sizes but only adding plain sketching paper to them. But this article on making the whole thing has really got me hooked and involved in making the whole book into something really creative but functional too.

P.S. I'm still making my 52Q cards each week and some of the questions are really thought provoking.

Stress, so early in the year

Are other people experiencing stress too? I do wonder. Last week I received an email with a UPS tracker number listed and a winzip file. I downloaded it to print off and suffered a total lockup of my PC! It was a scam and contained a virus so people out there BEWARE! but the good news is that PC World cleaned up my PC, put in a new antivirus software and made the whole thing mega fast again. They did it all in a day which was most excellent of them. However, being without my PC for 4 days was very stressful.

On another note, a very nice thing about Monday was that the refuse collectors were out and about and not only did they empty the green wheelybin but came back a few hours later for the black one. I hadn't put this one out and dashed to the door so I didn't miss them, and the young lad waved his arm, dashed up the drive and took the bin to the wagon to empty it and then put it back up the drive...I can't thank him enough.

Well, as I had no PC I got to work on some journals. The dragon fly one is for the Mixed Media Monday challenge...Wings. The dragon flies are made with a top layer of painted fine lutrador, then a stamped and painted cotton layer, then green felt and lastly a dryer sheet so it moved nicely under the needle. Then I free motioned variagated thread around all the outlines before cutting each fly out. I made these up a while ago as an experiment but had no idea what to do with them.

I made up the journal with stone coloured suede and couched the dragon flies over it.

The inside is a piece of japanese kimono silk that complemented the outside.

I also made a black velvet journal with gold panels which I have done before. This journal looked so good I had to make another to match. I revampted another gold tissue paper one too, adding that bobble wool that's the latest fashion wool to knit around the edge and redoing the inside papers in a more modern twist.

There was a second good thing from yesterday, I looked in at "The Works" shop in town and found all I needed at half price in the sale. The 3rd good thing (my luck just managed to make it!) was that when I did finally get my PC going I had my online bills for gas and electric to view. Both services showed that I had overpaid by quite a bit and they owed me money and I was able to cut my monthly payments down. I went to bed feeling really good about 2010.

Serendipity

One of those 'what if' ideas...I had a Zentangle starter kit bought for me for Christmas along with a jigsaw cutter for my Big Shot. I had this idea to cut the jigsaw pieces out of card, fling them up in the air, and tangle them, then put them back together and see what happened...et voila!

As a first try it will do, but as the only pieces I could recognise were the corners it was mainly pot luck and some of the pieces were heavy and together, but then it wouldn't be serendipity, would it? I think I could be more creative in how I apply the doodles too.

Another project from Craft Stamper magazine is an art journal by Kate Crane, in 3 parts, and I have completed part 1, just have to wait for the other two parts to complete it then personalise it.

Weather-wise it is very confusing. If I watch the weather on BBC it says we are under several feet of snow, however when I look out of my window there is very little snow left and what there is is thawing fast. I was able to drive to the supermarket today and stock up on food etc. I keep waiting for the forcasted snow to arrive but so far it has missed us altogether.

Bored, bored...

I am so bored, with the snow and ice taking away my freedom, I have been unable to go to the market and collect waistcoat orders so time has hung heavily on my hands. I did manage to get my car off the drive last Saturday and fetch some food for me and the dogs, but was unable to get it back there as the drive is quite steep and the road icy, so it had to be parked on the road until I can get it back safely. My dogs, Peggy Sue and Digger have really enjoyed the snow and are in an out of their door hatch all day.

But I have not been idle, I made another of Jan Maas's Violet dolls, cleaned out my drawers and back bedroom when I returned the Christmas decorations to the loft. Sorted out my family photos to fill the space left by the decorations.

Then I went through all the blogs I like to keep in touch with, and came upon this inspiration from Taylor's Textile Trials (see blog list) - a postcard book and 52Qs - a kickstart to my muse for 2010. I made the book to fit the shipping tags I intend to use for the 52Qs, I should have used a thinner paper for folding such a small book, but it does hold the tags better. I also made the first two tags but I'm not showing what the answers are, that's for me.

I also had a go at the challenge from GPPS (see under blogs) but my snowflakes were too big and didn't give the look I wanted so I'll be trying that again.

The snow has kept the postman away for over a week and all the things I'm waiting for are still in transit, much frustration! I'm still waiting for the fruits of my voucher presents to play with and hopefully gender more ideas. I wonder if the refuse collectors will come today? They also have had a hard time getting to houses locked up by the snow and the bins are rather full now.

I'm off to see if I can rescue my car, maybe...