And Sew...

 I can't believe it's Friday already!! This has turned into a very busy week for me, with several work projects on the go all at once, and some things I wanted to stitch just for fun too! I managed to get most things done, but have lots of unanswered emails and other things waiting for me on Monday...

But I did finish my little sewing set which was almost done when I showed it to you last time. I wanted to play with the scrapbook idea but in textiles - I love this theme and am following it in various projects at the moment....I love using words on fabric, just as I loved stitching samplers because they always had text and letters mixing in with the motifs - one of my favourite things...

 The little scissors charm I've used here is one I've had for a while - they actually open and close. I love finding vintage sewing things, and little bits of antique embroidery with tiny letters or numbers. That was what inspired me to stitch the tiny word 'sew' on linen, using one strand of cotton over one thread of linen...it makes such a tiny little decorative label....

In my tea breaks this week I've been perusing the gorgeous new DMC catalogue - filled with delicious sewing treats...fabrics, accessories, kits, threads...so many sewing things I've just realised I need...

 I love using special threads and am always on the look out for anything new. I still need threads for cross stitch, but also for other types of embroidery and for paper crafts too. Lots to choose from though not much time...but I can have a further browse at the weekend...

This weekend my daughter Rosie and her boyfriend are coming to stay, so I will be up bright and early tomorrow baking them a cake! I have heard the weather is going to be very cold so the kitchen will be a good place to be - I was going to start some gardening but prefer to do that when it's warmer. Thank you for visiting me here today. I wish you all a very happy weekend, with happy times doing things you enjoy. Keep cosy.  See you soon. xxx

Happy Week

These beautiful flowering tete tete bulbs were a little present I gave to my mother yesterday - so bright and cheery I had to snap a picture before I gave them to her. And I have been given something too...another blog award! I feel very lucky to receive this award from the lovely Millie at milliemeadowsweet - do visit this pretty blog, if you haven't already, and you will wander into a magical and enchanted world. Thank you so much Millie!!

As I've already told you lots of things about me recently - how about seven pictures of my week instead?

one: opening the box newly arrived from my publishers, David & Charles, containing the makes from my two latest books - Home Sweet Home and Simple Sewn Gifts...lovely to see all the things again and I'll show more pictures of them when they are all fully unpacked....

      two: choosing seeds for my new spring planting - the plan is to have the most flowery garden ever...

    three: spending time in the kitchen sorting out the baking cupboard and putting the flours in labelled jars..

       four: and at the same time making flapjacks again...mmmm....only eating one a day though!...

     five: finding this sweet vintage jug at the back of a cupboard and bringing it out to enjoy properly....

 six: loving these tulips flopping around on my kitchen table - when they open out they form such huge flat petalled flowers not at all like tulips but beautiful all the same....

seven: and loving these little yellow violas which I rescued from the garden centre where they looked unhappy and weather beaten and in need of tlc - after a day or so on my windowsill they look much more perky and content.....I hope you've enjoyed my seven things today. I don't really know who to pass this award on to - everyone on my list who hasn't already got it? You are all stylish bloggers!
I hope you are having a happy week and enjoying life's little pleasures, with maybe a bit of spring sunshine too. Thank you so much for dropping by and reading this and for your wonderful comments too. See you soon! xxx

Yellow Flowers

 Hello everyone - I'm just stopping by in the middle of a busy Sunday, to post some new pictures...of a new picture. This is a print I recently ordered from Vanessa at Do You Mind If I Knit - a blog you probably all know and love as much as I do! As soon as I first saw Vanessa's work it 'spoke' to me - I loved looking at it, at her unique style and colour sense.

The print I chose is called Yellow Rose and Greys - I love the painted containers that hold the flowers...I love the flowers themselves and the soft grey background colours...

The print was wrapped so beautifully, in dotty tissue, with green stripy string and a delicious little card.

I stood the print up to admire in my sewing room - Lovely! Gorgeous!- and then I took it to the framers and was without it for a little while. I found a new interest in the colour yellow and began stitching a sewing set using this gorgeous yellow Lecien floral fabric....

 I'm still making this little set and will show you the whole thing when it's finished. And here is the Yellow Rose and Greys picture, back from the framers. I photographed it like this because of the reflections making it difficult to see otherwise, but it will be hanging on the pale yellow wall in the (dining) sewing room...You can find Vanessa's beautiful pictures and exciting new paper mache creations at her etsy shop here.

I hope you enjoyed  seeing the real and the painted yellow flowers here today! I've liked looking at the bright fabrics I'm working with at the moment because it's rather bleak outside....But a bright work lamp, some printed cottons and embroidery threads, yellow flowers and the new picture soon chase the gloom away! Now I must go and put some food in the aga as the family are coming here for a meal on their way home from the zoo!!! Hope you have had a happy weekend so far. Thank you for dropping by and for all your sweet comments. Back very soon xxx

Sew Flowery

 Hello and welcome to everyone dropping in here to see me today! What a bright and sunny day it's been here - an amazing amount of sunshine has been flooding in and I realised how little we've had lately because it seemed so bright, I'm not used to it...We're looking at a little sewing theme pincushion here - I was just experimenting with the idea and may yet add more to it. It's already in use, though. I just love pincushions, can't have too many, and I have to have them in almost every room...

The cute little scissors are actually a button from Duttons For Buttons, the wonderful button emporium in York (no website, so I can't link to it) - I could have spent hours and hours selecting from the hundreds of brown boxes of amazing buttons they had in stock and did spend quite a bit of time choosing just a few.

These are the brightest flowers I've ever put in the little blackboard planter, I think! Quite dazzling too in the spring sunshine. I love the way that primulas often look as if they've had a white outline painted round the edges of each petal - so pretty. I love all the colours, but at the moment the bright pink are my favourites.

And speaking of favourites: I was very thrilled this week to receive this sweet little award from the lovely Mia at HandmadebyMia. Thank you so much, dear Mia!!!

This award is to encourage visitors to crafty blogs with less than 300 followers, who sell their work online, to spread the word and get their name known more widely. I am intending to pass it on, but so far each blog I was about to mention has just received it from another blog friend!! So I will have to think a little bit longer before I choose who to give it to...I'll do so soon!!!
I hope you are all enjoying your week and that you have a bright and beautiful weekend. Thanks for visiting me and for your sweet comments - I love to read them all!! Back soon. xxx

All White

Hello! Here I am at last - I had intended to write a post a bit sooner today, but this morning I stitched a project and this afternoon I spent idling around with an old college friend so ...here I finally am! I wanted to write about white because although I adore colour, and mixing colours, I also love the plain, cool, peacefulness of pure white.... and the pop of other colours against it. (The little white bear here is from my Cross Stitch Keepsakes book).

I love lots of plain white china to eat and drink from, to contrast with the bright floral and spotty mugs, jugs and teapots I also love. These big white cups and saucers are a bit like cafe ones....

    This is a teeny little vintage coffee cup from a set my mother in law gave me - and kept for special times.

 Everything looks nice in a white bowl - especially  these white mini eggs - one of them is cracked so I'll just have to eat it...

             I love this little white birdie on the alarm clock - so perfect and perky and  well, bird-like!

I absolutely love paintings in white frames and I absolutely love Janet Bell's colourful pictures - this one is Harbour By Day, the first one of Janet's I bought years ago, and it is hanging in my studio above the mantlepiece which has a changing collection of bright things I collect - against a white wall. You can find Janet Bell's Gallery here.

And finally I must have some white flowers, mustn't I? I often have a vase of lilies in the hall - they brighten up the corner and scent the air as you go in and out, as well as wafting scent up the stairs....
Thank you for visiting me here and for your sweet comments, I do so enjoy hearing from you. Have a lovely week, enjoy the lengthening days and the spring promise in the air...see you soon. x

Little Quilt

 Hello!  I'm showing you this little doll's quilt today, made from some bright fresh printed cotton fabrics and lots of white too - a combination that I love as the white squares can have added decoration without looking too busy.

I chose the prettiest prints I could find in my stash and some of the nursery ones that  fitted in well with the doll's theme. On some of the plain squares I added applique hearts, and on some I cross stitched little motifs or words using waste canvas. When the quilt was finished I sewed on some pretty buttons here and there.

I loved this litle birdie print for the back - I used the blue colourway in the end though the pink is lovely too.

 If you like this little quilt you can find the whole project  with step by step instructions and the cross stitch charts in the new February 2011 Crafts Beautiful magazine, which is full of other inspiring projects too.

Today's flowers are the now fully flowering hyacinths-in-the-trug....they grew so big and beautiful and there were so many bulbs in the little container that we didn't even miss the one that accidentally got broken off!  The scent of these delicious flowers and the gorgeousness of the perfect fondant coloured petals have brought me so much pleasure over the last couple of weeks .... hope I get hyacinths next year too...

It's very windy here today, though milder, and we are planning to go for a walk soon. I had a look round the garden to see if there were any snowdrops out yet, but not a one so far! Maybe I'll find some on our woodland walk in a sheltered place? Thank you so much for visiting me here today. Wishing you a lovely, relaxing almost spring-y weekend. xxx

Happy Winter

Hello! I hope you've been having a happy winter week! Here are some of the things I've been enjoying in mine. Knitting clothes for toy rabbits... much quicker than knitting them for me and I'm sure that  the bunny likes being cosy...

    Seeing Daisy playing with the soft blocks I showed you in my last post - she loved them sooo much!!

       Baking bread mmmmm there's nothing quite like the delicious smell of fresh baked bread is there?

 Reading this sweet book - I've heard of it for ages and was curious about the quirky title, and I loved the cover design especially the postmark and stamp bit, but have only just got round to reading it...I'm so glad I did.

     Cutting into these scrumptious dotty fabrics to make something new which I'll be showing you soon...

And sooo enjoying my spring bulbs...another present from xmas...this is a wonderful little postcard-y decorated container with the deepest blue sweetly scented hyacinths - a bit of heaven on the table in my studio, delicious wafts of scent while I am working at the computer (like now!)
What have you been enjoying this week? Thank you for visiting me here, for your sweet comments and  a big welcome to new readers who have just found me here!! Have a happy week! Back soon xx

Spring Sewing

 Hello and Happy Monday to everyone who visits me here! Here are some examples of how I sew up the scraps left over from my book projects - I can't keep using the same fabrics in different projects so once they've appeared in print I have to move on to something new... well, it's a good excuse to keep adding to the stash, isn't it??

I sewed the simple cubes in pretty colours and I think little Daisy Dot might enjoy playing with them. These soft cubes are such an old toy idea, something most babies of the past would be familiar with! A little bell inside makes them more fun to throw about too....

 A few weeks ago, when I was getting the top floor of this old house ready for visitors, I came across the little pile of Beatrix Potter books that had belonged to my daughters - and suddenly I had to stop the bed making and dusting and sit down for a little look! The books are very worn because they were read and re read - partly because the girls loved them and partly because I did too. I still appreciate the beautiful illustrations, soft but bright watercolours and so evocative of nursery days.

 I had to take a bit more time to find one of my old favourites - the sewing mouse from the Tailor of Gloucester - yep, I still love it! I remember reading that Beatrix Potter actually studied the historic brocades in the V&A to create the illustrations, which is why they are so lifelike....

And today's flowers are a bunch of candy pink tulips in the lovely blue jug my mother gave me a couple of years ago - I use it for all kinds of things but it is wonderful to plonk a bunch of tulips in, especially when they are rather unruly and won't stand up properly!
Wishing you all a wonderful week - I hope you have a lot of sunshine and a little feeling of spring! xxx