Happy New Year

 Happy New Year to you all...........i love the start of a new year, the turn of the page on the old year and lots of fresh plans and new experiences to look forward to................

 ..............(the little stitched signs shown here are part of my project in the january crafts beautiful magazine)............i hope you had a wonderful christmas time and happy holidays.......

 ...............we had a happy and loving family christmas....my eldest daughter and her husband hosted christmas day (this is their gorgeous house above....i loved the little chair back wreaths my daughter made with snippets of greenery from the garden) and on boxing day they all came to our house........it was such a joy to see christmas through the excited eyes of the little grandchildren and to watch the little cousins playing together....so nice to have my youngest daughter and her family staying with us too and have time for lots of chatting and laughter...........

 .............after a couple of days i just had to start a bit of crafting, even though i had packed my work away temporarily........i found a basket of pretty scraps and some diamond english paper pieces.....

 ............these are quite tiny ones..........i made some little scrappy stars which was fun to do watching tv or chatting..........

 ...............i began to join the stars with white diamonds.........loving the fresh flowery colours of this patchwork and the way you can include so many different fabric scraps...........

 ...............now that christmas is over i like to tidy it all away, clean and dust and then have lots of fresh flowers and bulbs around me.....

 ............flowers are the most cheerful sight in a room i think and even better if they are scented....

 .............i am already looking forward to the planting season and browsing garden catalogues....i am also looking forward to lots of reading in the coming year and have some new books ready to enjoy......one of my xmas surprises was a pair of little maileg pixies, one from each of my girls......

 ..............besides stitching i have been knitting with this beautiful rico bamboo yarn.....this will be a shawl.......it is fun to knit and very relaxing...........

 ...........our first outing on new year's day was a walk on the local beach with our little dog molly.....the day began cloudy and grey but later in the morning the cloud lifted and the sun came out......we had such a lovely walk and saw lots of seabirds out on the estuary...peaceful and beautiful..

 ...............thank you for visiting me here all through the year, dear readers, and for your kind comments and emails.......i look forward to visiting your blogs too and catching up with you all.....

..............i wish you all a very happy, loving and peaceful 2017 filled with joy, inspiration and creativity...................back soon xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxoooooooooooxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Merry Christmas

 It is almost here.....the sleigh bells will soon be jingling and we have been busy with all our christmas preparations over the past week............baking, shopping, wrapping, card writing, stitching, knitting and hurrying to finish off work deadlines............here are a few pictures taken around our house this week..........

 ................this is a lovely maileg pixie girl who is keeping me company in the studio while i finish drawing templates and writing up a project............

 ...............below are the sugar mice, back again in their little maileg pram.............

 .............the things i make for my books and magazine work are things i would like in my house too, like this tumbler patchwork pillow.............

 ................i made some cute little festive flower arrangements in a variety of glass jars......

 ...............they have to be placed well out of molly our little dog's reach though.......she thinks the berries are yummy...........

 .................a seasonal sampler from one of my earlier books......this is all hearts come home for christmas from my home sweet home cross stitch book..............

 ..............we have quite a collection of vintage postcards........i love the spidery writing......

 .............we have bundles of very old letters too.......i decided to use them in my christmas decorating this year, dotted here and there...........

 ..................i love little houses like this one........it lights up which is sweet.....the lights also flash on and off rather rapidly but that is not the setting we prefer ;)

 ...............here is my advent calendar.....there are tiny chocolate figures in the little drawers for my grandchildren to discover whenever they visit..............

 ..........later this week i will be minding my two oldest grandchildren for a few hours and we will be doing some cookie decorating and christmas crafting together............

 .............my publishers recently entered modern vintage gifts into the homemaker magazine book awards and the title came runner up in the best patchwork and quilting book category.......this was such a lovely surprise and i was very happy to hear the news last week......

.............thank you for visiting me here dear readers, and for all your visits and sweet comments this year..........thank you for dropping by to share my crafty life, and to all those who buy my books, patterns and the magazines that feature my work.......your support means such a lot to me...........thank you all...........i will be taking a little blog break next week to spend time relaxing with my sweet family so now i would like to send you all my warmest wishes for a very merry, happy and peaceful christmas..............with much love to you all........xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Merry Makes

 We have been very busy here with our christmas making, gift buying and list writing..........

 ..............for the past couple of months, in between working on commissions, i have been sewing with the bright and colourful flower sugar holiday fabrics from lecien...........i showed you the star and bauble quilt in a recent post and as you can see i have used the scraps and made some cute pincushions, one with an applique star..........

 ................and one with an applique heart.............

 ............they make nice little extras for my stitching friends at christmas.............

 .............i also made a little holly scissor keep for a bit of festive stitchery............

 ................and a stocking with the gorgeous bauble decorated fabric...........

 .................the tiny mouse has a nice new quilt and pillow to snuggle under on christmas eve...........

 ................the bedtime mouse pattern is in my book modern vintage gifts..........

 ...............and i sewed a few of my favourite hearts...........

 ..................these are decorated with holly berries and hung up with candy cane baker's twine.....

 ................a few weeks ago i found my lost box of tiny baubles in a rarely-looked in cupboard among my old diaries....(so that was my safe place?).....last christmas i looked for them for a long time and just couldn't find them :)...............

 ..............and now it is time to declare the winner of last week's christmas giveaway..........first a huge thank you to everyone who took part and left such sweet and lovely comments xxx..........
the winner this time is rhona at tangled threads...........congratulations to you rhona and please will you email me your address so i can send your gifts to you .................

..................there will be another giveaway in january so do look out for that :).......

.............thank you for visiting here dear readers and for your kind comments............i hope you are enjoying the countdown to christmas and getting all your lists ticked off ...........i had a lovely christmassy city shopping day with my eldest daughter last week and got quite a few gifts sorted....just got to wrap them now............wishing you a happy week and some merry making, especially of the crafty kind....back soon xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Christmas Giveaway!

 Happy December everyone!...........today we have a giveaway to say merry christmas and a big thank you to all my lovely blog readers and followers...........we have a bunny called holly to give away :)...she is dressed in one of my newly created knitted dresses and a soft little woolly hat with a red pom pom..........she is a little lop eared rabbit with pretty fabric ear linings and rosy cheeks............

 ...............and the giveaway includes a bright and festive cath kidston mug too.................

 ..............those who know me both in real life and through my blog know that i love crafting, i love bunnies and i love pretty mugs filled with tea or coffee............so i thought i would share the love here this christmas month with a bunny to cuddle and a pretty festive mug to use.............

 ............if you would like to enter the giveaway all you have to do is leave a comment on this post.........if you are a follower you are welcome to leave two comments for two chances in the draw..........everyone everywhere is welcome to join in  (if you do not have a blog please leave an email address so i can contact you if you win)......the giveaway will close on december 11............

 .............my little wool winder has been kept busy this last week winding wool for my small knitted projects, like holly's dress and hat..............

 .............there have been a lot of quiet knitting moments here among the busyness.............

 ..............knitting is so soothing and calming.........peaceful yet productive.............

 ..............loving all the decorations and pretty candles around the house.......

 ...................loved these little houses we saw at the christmas market a couple of weeks ago and thinking i might make a new project inspired by them...........

 .................a posy of garden flowers with a festive feel in a red and white jug........

 .............and the tree is up and twinkling every day, dotted with red and white decorations......

 ..................a couple more pictures of holly...........besides the ck mug she will be bringing a little sweet surprise with her too when she sets off to her new home....

................thank you dear readers for your visits and kind comments......i love sharing my crafty work here with others and many blog readers have become friends over the years............wishing you all a happy homely peaceful week..............and good luck in the giveaway............back soon xxxxxxxxxxxx