Spring Crafting and a Giveaway

 It's that time of year again......the time of year when i craft a little something and gather together some little treats to say a great big thank you to my lovely readers and followers.............

 .............as you can see, i have been busy making lots of birds in pretty fabrics.......

 ...........i've made a beaded string of white birds, one of green birds and one of multi coloured birds......

 ..............(i found some gorgeous beads at hobbycraft........and some beautiful anemones at our local greengrocer's)................

 ................the first winner out of the hat will get to choose their favourite coloured beaded birds decoration from the three shown ..............

 .............and as well as the birdie decoration they will win this little cath kidston ticket holder (or card holder) in a cute bird print............and also...........

 .............some pretty speckled eggs in a lovely little bag (from gisela graham)........

 .............and finally something crafty to use as well......some beautiful drops paris cotton in fresh spring green (2 balls of this, also in a cute little bag)...........

 ................two more winners will each receive a string of birds and a surprise or two.........

 ...............the giveaway is open to everyone, worldwide, until april 11...........you don't have to have a blog to enter, but please make sure you leave an email address so i can contact you if you win..........all you have to do to enter is to leave me a comment on this post.....if you have a favourite colour way of the birds here let me know in your comment (green, white or multi)............ and if you are a follower you can have a second chance of winning by leaving a second comment..............

 .........my giveaways are always just a small way of saying a big thank you to my lovely readers, for all your blog friendship, kind comments and for sharing a crafty connection with me through my blog, books, magazine projects and other work............

...........wishing you all a happy spring, a happy easter and good luck in the giveaway :)..........back soon xxxxxxxxxxxxxxoooooooooooooooxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Marshmallow Blanket

 This weekend i spent a bit of time pottering in the spring garden and also in the potting shed.........

 ............i tidied up the shelves and banished the many cobwebs (for now anyway).............

 ..............and i took the newly finished marshmallow blanket out with me for a quick picture too.....

 .................i finished the blanket off with a stripy border and then a shell border in that marshmallow pink that gave the blanket its name...........i loved making this project and i loved crocheting the border to complete it.........

 ..............below it is spread out on the table in my sewing room......you can see some daffodils in flower in the garden if you look closely........soon i will be able to cut some to have in the house...

 ................the blanket is a very simple design of a granny square repeated in two colour ways, placed alternately, and joined by the join as you go method...........

 .............i always keep some real marshmallows in the cupboard for my grandchildren to enjoy and for using in certain recipes so i took a few pictures of some to include here..........

 ...............i don't usually eat a marshmallow in the middle of the day ;).........

 .............. for mother's day i received some beautiful marshmallow pink hyacinths with the most gorgeous scent...........they have lasted all week and filled the sitting room with fragrance........

 ..............it is lovely to see one of my bunnies appearing in crafts beautiful magazine this month......this is betty rabbit and she is all ready to come hopping along in time for easter......you can find out more about the magazine on the website here................

 .............i am planning to make some more bunnies soon, though i am very busy work wise this week with another magazine make, and creating mood boards for an exciting new project...........

 .............some sweet pink primroses, dotted with raindrops from a recent shower, in the sunshine on the garden table..........the wild yellow primroses in our garden and in the fields and woods round here are all beginning to open now..............such a lovely time of year............

...............before i go back to work on my project i might just pop out to the garden for a moment to enjoy the sunshine..........thank you for dropping by my little blog space dear readers and for your very kind comments........very soon now i will be holding my spring time give away as a special thank you to you all, so please look out for that ......i have almost finished making something and gathering some treats too :)...............wishing you a wonderful sunny week with plenty of happy, crafty times........... back soon xxxxxxxxxxxxxooooooooooooxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Sewing a Garden

 Here we are at the start of another busy crafty week.......and this time i am showing you some sneak peeks of my latest quilty work in progress...........a flower garden inspired design..............

 ...............i have been piecing it together for a few weeks and now that the top is assembled i'm adding some flowery applique embellishments...........then it will be longarm quilted.........

 ............the fabrics are from the pam kitty garden line for lakehouse dry goods, available here.....i'm rather excited to use the fences print from the sunrise studio line too for the borders.........i do love flower gardens neatly enclosed by picket fences and i love the knot garden corners too.........

 ..............adding applique flowers after making a quilt top is a bit like working into a painting......

 ...........i have cut out plenty of little fabric flowers to play around with..........i will show you the quilt in detail when it is finished which hopefully will be soon now...........

 ............i had a lovely mother's day yesterday with all my dearies here............such a happy time with my daughters and their families and seeing my own little mum too....we had a lovely weekend and enjoyed some walks in the brief but bright sunshine...........

 .............the flowers are growing in my garden and soon i will be planting them up and weeding the beds too.....

                         ............love these bellis daisies and the bright primroses..............

 ............this week i am working on some new designs, finishing my pink scarf, enjoying my mother's day gifts and finishing off the cakes (with charlie and daisy's help tomorrow), and thinking about little rhys who has grown so much and was beaming and cooing at us yesterday............it was baby bliss for sure :)............

 ..................i am using both my crochet bags this week to keep my projects tidy.......thank you for all your kind words about my new bag in my last post............

...............and thank you for visiting me here, dear readers, and leaving me such sweet comments which i really do appreciate :)............wishing you a happy week ahead with flowers, sunshine and lots of crafty inspirations.................back soon xxxxxxxooooooooooxxxxxxxxxxxx 

Happy Days

 It has been a very busy week here, with work and with some happy family celebrations........but i still found a bit of time to finish off my crochet crafts bag and here are a few pictures of it...............

 .............i made the granny squares from lots of odd scraps and those little balls of yarn that you find when having a tidy up............they always look pretty and colourful and often give me ideas for new granny squares to make..........

 ...............i made 12 granny squares for each side of the bag, used the join as you go method to create the front and back pieces of the bag and used double crochet to join the two sides together...............

                       ...........i finished the bag off with some tassels in different colours.......

 .................lined it with this lovely colourful numbers fabric by michael miller..........

                            .............and made a long striped strap using double crochet.............

 ............i am considering adding a bright button and a loop to close the top but haven't done that yet.........at the moment i am keeping my new knitting project in this crafty bag........

 ..................when i had my yarn tidy up i found a surprising number of balls of pink rooster yarn....perfect to make a scarf for springtime, i decided............i am working it in popcorn stitch.......a few years ago i had a craze on making scarves in this pattern and made them for my daughters, myself and a friend, and my sister made herself one too.......i still wear my grey one a lot.....the pattern is also called trinity stitch, is only four rows (and two of those are just purl) and you can easily find it by googling it............the pink yarn is just like the hyacinths in my studio this week....

 ..................i had to put this little bunny in here today as i am very fond of it and now we are nearing the season when i am thinking about easter decorations and what i might make this year......

 ...............at the start of the last week we celebrated our wedding anniversary by going for a delicious afternoon tea to the chester grosvenor hotel..............the hotel is also celebrating an anniversary this year as it is 150 years since it opened in 1865.........they had a special loose leaf tea blend created for this year called grosvenor grey which combines cornflowers and rose petals to give an authentic victorian earl grey taste............it was delicious and so were the tiny sandwiches and cakes and scones..............a very special time for us..............

 ..............it felt like the first proper day of spring here on friday and i did a bit of my knitting sitting in the warm sunshine on the terrace, watching molly cavorting round the garden, listening to the beautiful birdsong, enjoying the scent of the gorgeous carnations in the bowl on the table (an anniversary present) and marvelling at the fact that i was finally able to sit in the garden again and not be cold.............it didn't last and the next day was chilly and windy again and rather grey........but still it won't be long till we have more of such lovely days......

..............thank you for visiting me here dear readers, i love seeing you and hearing from you too :).......i am planning a spring giveway soon as a special thank you to all my lovely readers so look out for that in the next couple of weeks............wishing you a wonderful week with happy times, sunshine and plenty of crafty inspirations..................back soon xxxxxxoooooooooxxxxxx