Time for Tea

 Weekend walks followed by afternoon tea are a favourite of mine, and this weekend the weather was so beautiful it was wonderful to be out walking in the fresh autumn air and bright sunshine.....

....and then home to tea with scones, rock buns and cupcakes.....and my new tea cosy which was commissioned a while ago and is my project in this month's Crafts Beautiful magazine, in the shops now ;-)...

......i am not an adventurous cook though sometimes i try something new, like this delicious vanilla frosting from the  Humming Bird Bakery....

 There are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea. Henry James

......i have collected a lot of quotations about homely things over the years to use in my stitching, and there are quite a number about tea and the taking of it......

                       ....a little close up of the CB teacosy, with its ribbon and button on top.......

 ............and its decorative ribbon bow at the side......i enjoyed making this commission, and in the magazine there is a cupcake card to accompany it, if it's to be made as a gift.........

 ....some pictures of the colourful flowers and berries we saw on our walk yesterday afternoon at our favourite nearby gardens....it was stunning to see how just many things were still in flower there and to enjoy the sight of so many beautiful shrubs full of berries or rosehips......

             The mere chink of cups and saucers turns the mind to happy repose. George Gissing

There are still some mushrooms being made here, and i found some to photograph on our walks too, but they will have to wait for another post.....Thank you for dropping in to tea today in my little bit of blogland it was lovely to see you, thanks for your sweet comments and emails...and a big hellooo to my new followers. Wishing you a wonderful week with plenty of moments of happy repose....back soon xxxxxx

Autumn Days

Sewing and making is the theme today.....more toadstools - or mushrooms - are appearing around our house, some decorated, some not.....all dotty whether they are large or small....

...i am really enjoying exploring this idea and have lots more mushrooms that i want to make yet......

 .....i made some simple card templates to create the top of the toadstool and the stalk which can then be used to draw round and make lots of others quite quickly.......

 .......so far for decoration i have made some felt flowers, but have some other ideas percolating too....

 .....as i'm working on spring themes in my studio this week, it's fun to also make something with an autumn feel in my spare moments.....it feels just right to be making these just as they might be appearing in the woods nearby or even in the garden almost hidden amongst the leaves.....

 ......i had a wonderful surprise this week when a parcel arrived for me...the next picture shown below is of the gorgeous bag that i won in Karen's wonderful giveaway over on her blog Karen's Crafts here....i was thrilled to receive this lovely gift as you may imagine, and even more so when i discovered.....

                                 ......lots of other treats and surprises hiding in the pockets....

 ....an adorable pincushion, a pretty tissue cover, and  lovely crochet jam jar cover so beautifully made by Karen, and a sweet little strawberry pink candle, too. Thank you so much Karen for these generous gifts....do go and visit her lovely blog it's lively and inspired and full of crafty things....

 .....my autumn days wouldn't be complete without a quilt or two on the sofa, and that thought this week inspired me to tidy up my quilt cupboard, which i have mentioned and shown before and is in the sitting room, handily next to my sofa where i spend many happy hours stitching away. Sometimes i keep fabrics in the cupboard too but at the moment i have taken them all out for a grand fabric sort out...so there are just quilts in there which seemed like a good time to take a photo....

 .....while they are tidy and folded neatly.....the fabrics are now in the dining room also known as the sewing room in a huge pile and i am going to organise them ready for a big project that is about to begin....

.....so much sewing and quilting and mushroom making this week.....i love it! Other things i'm loving are: berries, crunchy leaves, cosy evenings by the fire, candle light, apple and blackberry crumble and custard, home made bread {in a breadmaker so didn't take me long ;-)}, reading a Persephone book, piecing a quilt, watching the grandbabies laughing and playing together, hearing the front door when Mr P arrives home from work...so many simple things to enjoy and make the most of......i hope you are having happy times this week too. Thanks so much for dropping in to see me and for the lovely comments. I'm off to do some crafting again now....but i'll be back soon. xxxxx

Sew Autumnal

It's been a wonderful autumn week here, with all kinds of autumn weather and so many of the things that mean autumn to me....plus a little autumn sewing too.... like this stuffed toadstool i made....

 ....i've spent a bit of time in the potting shed too this week, here is the outside of it with the lovely hanging toadstool garland that Mr P bought me last year, such a nice surprise....

 ....the potting shed is a great place to arrange flowers and berries, as well as potting plants and bulbs....

 ....i bought some new ones to plant this autumn, narcissi and hyacinths as last year i was mad on tulips and planted a whole lot which hopefully will appear again next spring....

 ...the toadstool  above was easy to make and there will be more of them in a future post, as like many crafty things, once you make one you just have to make another....and another....and then try out different fabrics and decoration....so look out for more to pop up here (as real toadstools do) .....

 ...i treated myself to an adorable set of garden buttons from Jenny, and here is the toadstool one fitting in so well with my autumn week....these are so beautifully made and designed...you can find Jenny Arnott's gorgeous shop here.......

 ......this glass jar is filled with a bunch of small rosehips from my favourite florist in our little town, she always has something special for the season....

 ....autumn supper table ready for friends visiting..... it will be cosy with candlelight when the evening draws in

....loving this autumn time, even with a night of gale force winds that knocked the runner bean canes flat  to the ground, and even with the chill and damp...there are also sunny days and that wonderful low light you get at this time of year, as well as all the autumnal nature finds for my nature table....hope you are enjoying a very happy weekend. Thank you so much for popping in to see me here, and for your lovely comments too, enjoy your autumnal times.....Back soon xxxx

Here, There and Everywhere...

 The title of my post today refers to the contents of my studio, which are now spread here, there and everywhere round the middle floor of our house as the new flooring will be put down on Monday....

 ...so I decided, when the afternoon brightened up and the sun began to shine with that special autumn brightness that it would be a good idea to pop down to the potting shed....

 ....gathering a few windfall apples on the way as I don't like to see them being wasted, however marked and misshapen they may be....

 ....some of the tiny geraniums I bought in Ambleside in the spring, and a little slate sign for messages given to me by a dear friend (the fact she bought it from the shop at Kew Gardens for me makes it even more special)...do you find your writing goes funny when you use chalk on a blackboard or is it just me?....

 ...sunshiney apples...these are lovely cookers maybe I'll use them for an apple cake this time.....

 ...red berries against the blue sky, something I always love to see, the same way I love blossom in spring....

...a little peek at some studio odds and ends scattered about, some recently discovered....jars and boxes of buttons, (open up a little drawer in a little box and what do you find....some thread, some lace, a starfish and a shell)...a LoT of sorting is required before things go back into the studio again...some old artwork from a folio, shells and feathers was the theme in those days....and containers stuffed with threads, adhesives, and a whole host of bits and bobs.....oh well, after Monday we can begin to make everything orderly again...not long now....

I hope you're having a wonderful weekend and enjoying whatever you are up to....thanks so much for dropping by to my little space, hello to my lovely new followers and to everyone who comments or visits...back soon xxxxxx

Casting On

 We are wearing our cardigans again here, and searching in the cupboards for our autumn knits....and last week I ordered some wool ready to cast on a new woolly garment....

 ...the last cosy wool knitting I did was earlier this year when I made this for my younger daughter's birthday. It's the Beth jacket by Kim Hargreaves from her book Amber....

....it's made with Rowan Big wool and  it certainly is BiG and so are the needles...rather HuGe actually and when I first began knitting it was more like grappling and quite a different experience from the usual  knitting one...but it did make a lovely garment with a lovely textured look....

 ...so now the season is on the turn and autumn is bringing us it's treats and treasures as well as damp chills and nights closing in, and I needed to have some new wool and some knitting on my needles again.....

 ....I bought this wool/cotton blend...I love all the Amy Butler colours but the blue is the one I liked best this time....

 ....the pattern is a Sirdar cardigan I've knitted before and I hope when it is finished that Dolly will model it for me....as well as a parcel of lovely wool arriving this week another surprise parcel came for me...I won a giveaway at Fin and Gabs and Andrea sent me a gorgeous collection of treats...

 ...the parcel was beautifully wrapped with a gorgeous little black and white heart charm...Andrea is a talented designer who creates all kinds of lovely stationery designs, including bespoke ones, for her shop Andrea Willis Designs, and for Crafts Beautiful magazine too....I was thrilled to find one of her pretty covered notebooks in the parcel specially personalised for me!!

 ...here are all the treats in the giveaway parcel...I love everything...thank you so much, Andrea! Do go and visit her bright and colourful blog and shop...she has some gorgeous designs .....

I love this little birdie ....when I'm knitting I often make plans and think things through, dream of things I'm going to make and things I want to do...I'm planning to do a bit of knitting and dreaming this bank holiday afternoon, after a busy weekend......click click knit knit...

I hope you have a happy week ahead with time to follow your dreams whatever they may be....thanks for dropping by to my little space today, I love your visits.....back soon xxxxxx

Orange

This post is a celebration of the colour orange! I noticed this sign in the local garden centre and snapped a picture of it - it reminded me of the Keep Calm posters. And today I was inspired to use my most orange autumn pictures to celebrate the colour this week as suggested by the lovely Ginny at sweetmyrtle.

I realised that I rarely use the colour in designs, except for autumn designs or sometimes for a really bright contrast like a flower power card set I did for a magazine. Yet it is such a bright and cheering colour - why not?

It's good to have a fresh look at orange and think of all the things we like which are that colour - the fruits themselves, pumpkins, gourds, tomatoes turning from green to red, marmalade, lots of autumn berries on the trees, falling autumn leaves, chinese lanterns...the colour is so close to golden shades of honey, and to russet apples and certain varieties of plum that have an orangey glow...

So those are some of my orange pictures - I hope you like the spicy autumn shades and enjoy a bit of orange this week too!

P.S. Thanks so much to everyone who commented on my red flowers quilt - I'll show you what I've done with the flowers very soon! x