Gotta get my big girl panties on and just get on with it!

If I hear me moan once more this week I'll scream!

Although I have moaned about feeling coldy and yuck this week my main gripe is that I find feeling a bit poorly extreeeeeeeemely boring. I try to work through it and not 'give in' (believe it or not). Therefore I've tried to do things this week when I may have been better leaving them for a few days. Today I wanted to get on with some cushions I'm making but everything took twice as long and the end results didn't mirror the picture in my mind.

This bit looked ok:



but this still looks like a pink hippo rather than a monkey:


I know someone (and I really cannot say who - just in case) who takes to their bed at the first sign of a cold and stays there until the worst is over. Maybe this is what we should all do instead of trying to run a home, care for and feed a family, work - whether paid or working for ourselves - you get the picture?

Is this why my creative energy is distinctly lacking?

This evening I shall shut off from all of it and crochet stripes on a certain young man's Christmas blanket. I'll sit on a comfy sofa rather than in front of the computer waiting for inspiration to strike.

The children and I have plans to Christmassyfy the house this weekend - earlier than usual but after the crubbish year we've had we are all feeling the need for some Christmas spirit - mine's a gin ;) Some total saddos people round the corner have had their entire house inside and out decorated with millions of lights for the past three weeks. They also have life-size concrete dogs. Nuff said. (Is it you?)

I bought mincemeat today ready for the first of many batches of DH and Monster's favourite mince pies. We are going to paint some salt dough Christmas goodies for the tree, make paper chains and rather than making all the cards myself I'm going to enlist the help of my little gremlins elves.

Last year all my cards were made and written by the middle of November. We have some catching up to do. I have a feeling potato printing might be the order of the day.

As you all seemed to like last night's music how about this - another chance to rekindle your lust for Sting - always happy to oblige :)

Foiled!

Getting ready for school saga - the update:

I stuck to my guns and didn't nag/shout/nag this morning. Despite the fact that DH switched the alarm clock off and we all overslept (!) both children were washed, dressed, brushed, fed and ready for school by 8.30am!!!

I didn't get to try out my plan of making them walk to school in their pants. Still, there's always tomorrow - mwah ha ha ha haaaaa!!

I managed to avoid doing anything productive for the first part of the morning by shopping for plain hairclips. Not as easy as I had assumed. Most were an inch thick in glitter - nice.

The ones that I did get are now being made into 'pretties', as my Minxie calls them, for next Friday's school fair. As most parents, understandably, don't take bundles of cash with them to the fair I thought I'd better make some little cheaper items so have started with these:


(awful light so none of the colours are anything near 'real life' in this photo!

I've made 12 pairs so far and Minx has already chosen the ones with the heart buttons, so that's 11 left to sell! If they don't sell at least I can give them as presents.

As I've already used a good chunk of the evening up by accidentally pressing OK when Photoshop asked me if I wanted to 'Back up Now?' I feel I should now 'Step.....away....from....the...computer!' and get on with a bit more sewing.

Time for a bit of this though.

Night, night xxxx

I have a cunning plan

Oh how I love your comments and the comfort they bring! It's nice to know that in the face of considerable blog peer pressure there are others out there who, like me, find being a parent a challenge and are unafraid to admit it!!

I've made a management decision. The troops have been informed. From tomorrow we are trialling a new morning regime. It goes like this:

Child A and child B know that every school-day morning involves the same activites:
get up, wash and brush teeth, dress, eat breakfast, brush hair, shoes and coats on and out.

The routine does not vary. The activities are replicated every school-day. Therefore they must show that they can do it themselves without cause for nagging, shouting, arguing etc etc.

You get the picture?

I've told them that they can do it all themselves. If they do not I will still take them to school at 8.30 no matter what state or stage of dress/undress they are in. If they wish to walk to school in one sock and a pair of knickers so be it.

Watch this space!!!

I haven't sewn a stitch today. I've faffed and f**ted around employing all my best avoidance techniques.
I bought some pale pink and lilac gingham ribbon (camera lying again!) for some sewing projects.


I bought some of these for some more sewing projects:


I wandered round and round Hobbycraft stroking things, putting them in my basket, taking them out again, justifying why I should buy something, reminding myself why I should not!

Lucy phoned me mid-shop and tried her hardest to convince me to buy something lovely. However, nothing in there really did it for me today.

I couldn't go home without something just for me, now could I?

A quick stop enroute at Tesco express enabled me to find just what I was looking for.

Unfortunately it was also Ruby's idea of a treat...


and it took some doing to convince her that I should have some. She let me have the small sample bar but she wasn't going to let this baby go!

I couldn't let myself have a whole day with nothing to show for it and cooked a tray of raisin flapjacks when I got home. I know just how to pull the wool over DH's eyes impress my lovely husband!!

I forced myself to do two stripes on Monster's crochet blanket and then it was school, dinner, swimming, bedtime.

I am now going to rationalise my list of things to make, plan some little bits for next Friday's stall and prepare myself for a day of sewing tomorrow.

I have a feeling we need something to round it all off. So this is for you sisters - great video too!!

P.S. nearly forgot that I found this fab bias binding idea over at Creative Little Daisy today - see how the long winter evenings just fly by......

I love kids .... but I couldn't eat a whole one!

There are times, y'know, when being a Mutha can be something of a challenge. I bet you're so glad I told you that as I'm sure you didn't already know ;)

When they are enigmatic screaming babies well-meaning old biddies will tell you 'That's the best age. At least you know where they are.'
When they are tantrumming toddlers said biddies will say 'It gets worse when they are teenagers'.
When they are learning to assert themselves in the world as primary school-age darlings the old biddies will smile benignly and say 'Oh, you wait until they want to be out all night with their friends'.
Yup, I do apparently have it easy right now with a 6 year old girl and an 8 year old boy.

My two darling angels (wee touch of irony) take it in turns to crank it up. This week it seems to be Minx. Maybe it's just that, as a girlie, she's more finely tuned to the Mummeistergeneral's hormone levels - growl!!

We had some Minx 'tude this morning - big time! We were taking her friend to school. He had only been here two minutes and she was treating me like something she'd stepped in.
Me - bull.
Minx - red light.
Result - ifyoudon'tstoptreatingmelikethatwhenfriendsareroundyoungladyIwon'tletyouhave
friendsroundanymorenowgetyourhairbrushedgetyourshoesonandsitonthebottomstep
untilyou'vethoughtaboutitandanotherthingifyouwantpocketmoneythisweekyou'dbetterbuck
yourideasupnowcomeonit'stimetogowhyhaven'tyoubrushedyourhairorgotyourshoesonstop
sittingthereit'stimetogowe'regoingtobelate.

...or words to that effect!

Is that what they call negative parenting? Just asking!

Her attitude is, I have to say, quite fab. Her brother, when admonished (understatement?) bursts into floods of tears (bless!). She does exactly what I'd have done at any her age and shrugs her shoulders whilst dishing out filthy looks.

If she's like this at 6 does that mean she'll be like this at 14?

I may do what my poor mother did one day and run away from home.

Did I say this was a craft blog? You sure?

Oh, in that case then here's a bit of crafty doings.

I have some cushions to make in 'sweet pea colours'. In this instance the camera really does lie.
One is delicate dusky and pastel pinks and the other is shades of lilacs and pastel pinks.

Still to do embroidery on the faces and nooooooo it's not a hippo - it is going to be a monkey - oh,yes it is - no, it is - really. Oh whatever, if you want it to be a hippo it can be a hippo but I know it is a pink monkey. Just like those very rare pink monkeys only found here. They also have rare pink cats and yes, it is a cat and not a fox/linx.

I thought I'd save the most exciting news 'til (almost) last - the pink ripple is finished - done - finito!!! Well, apart from sewing in about 200 ends that I didn't manage to incorporate into the crochet.

To celebrate I may have a glass of special offer cheapo vino plonko courtesy of Mr Co-op - no surprises there then. I may even go mad and have a Pringle or twenty (how fab that they have a website!!!). You just cannot beat a red wine and sour cream and chive early morning midweek aftertaste.

I cannot begin to imagine what sort of an image you may have of me!!! Let's just say you're probably close ;)

So now onwards and upwards to the great psychedelic stripy Monster blanket experience. Hold onto your seats ladies (and gents) it's gonna be a rapid stripe build up - weeeeeeeeeee!!!

Yup, quite, quite, mad. Or maybe just feeling a tad better ;)

P.S. did I mention I forgot my keys when I went to get the kids from school this afternoon? Well, I did - the jangling in my bag was not my keys it was my Dad's - just what you want when you get home at 4.20pm and have to have da Minx fed, changed and out to Rainbows in just over an hour.

DH, for once, picked up his work phone - and had an excuse to ride his MC like a demon through the rush hour traffic. No wonder he looked exhilarated when he got back 15 minutes later!

Have I told you lately that I lurve him?

Wanted: one crowbar to remove bottom from sofa

Thank you soooooo much for your lovely wishes as I recover from the worst cold that anyone has ever experienced. Ever. Ever.

I've annoyed myself so much. I usually just get on with it no matter how crubbish (great Monkee Maker word that I've nicked via Lucy!) I feel. After all us Muthas don't get to take a day off do we?

I did coerce DH into taking the littlies to school today but I was feeling v achey and hot/cold/hot. I drank gallons and gallons of this:

...and welded my bottom to the sofa and snuggled up under the rippling.

I'm so nearly finished with this - just three or four more ripples to do. It's a good job too as it's eating yarn. I had just enough of this purple to do two ripples. It was, however, a very close call.

I've never crocheted so fast in my life. Going faster and faster before I ran out of yarn!!!!

I've done that with knitting before and with painting. Trying to get it done extra quickly as if that will stop me running out before the end!

This is how close we are to the end of the big pink ripple:

Another reason for speeding up is that the sooner I get this done the sooner I can get on with Monster's one! I'm please with the way this one has turned out and especially pleased that I've even got this far as it's the biggest 'project' I've done to date.

I plan to be back up to full speed tomorrow and need to sew. At least my bottom will get a change of scene :)

Things have been a bit quiet round here on the Monkee front of late. Maybe this will keep you going until Ruby and I get snapping. I think the item in the link would be a jolly sound investment ;)

love xxx

We survived!!

We are no longer sleepover virgins in the House of Moog. Sleepovers are like climbing mountains - you do it because you're stark staring mad it's there.

Minx and her friend were little angels. They tried, despite numerous annoyances from the noisy boys, to have a more refined and quiet approach to the sleepover and were both asleep by 10.30pm.

The boys were boys. Lots of noise. Lots of wrestling. Occasional fall-outs/tears/minor injuries. They redeemed themselves by going to sleep by 11.30pm.

I dare say these cakes

and several glasses of Dr Pepper may have contributed to their enhanced energy levels. That and the fact that they are boys, of course.

This was not the best weekend to come down with a head cold but by Saturday morning I was feeling pretty rough. I haven't slept for two nights. I'm full of snotty misery and self pity. I am, in fact, the only person ever to have had a cold. Ever.

I do hope DH doesn't get it. Although his won't be this one. His will be FLU and he will take days off work and spend it in bed.

Great. Now I'm feeling guilty. He has been stupendously brilliant this weekend keeping the boys busy and thinking up great ways of stopping them killing each other. If I'd been on my own I'd have sent them all home by 8pm and that is NO reflection on any of the children - it is totally a reflection on me and my wanting to hide in a darkened room.

After feeling a light sabre whizz past my ear for the third time I decided to keep the girls company upstairs. I couldn't sit doing nothing but I couldn't sit doing the ripple crochet because it's a Christmas secret. Instead I made a start on Monster's crochet blanket.

Each stripe is a double crochet row followed by a treble crochet row. It is growing far faster than the rippling. I was trying to work out how this could be as it's the same stitch combo and the same width. I've decided it must be down to the fact that I have to go slower with the rippling just to make sure I'm keeping the pattern going correctly.


I did manage to get these bottled and just knew you'd love to see a photo ;)


That's about it for now. I'm going to wallow for a bit longer and then DH will be back from taking two kids on bikes and the Moog to the park. This is him. This is me.

Laugh? I nearly cried!

I've decided to make it official - I LOVE YOUTUBE - in the interests of avoiding the housework blog research I was on Youtube earlier looking for today's music. Totally unfocussed curious as ever I put 'Comedy' in the search box. This little video popped up - you really must watch it all the way through - my sides are acheing and the Moog is looking at my like I'm mad - mmm.

Lucy and any others with sonically challenged technology please accept my sincerest apologies - you really need the sound on for this one!

That's better. I just had to get that over with before I got into my other burblings.

I'm out to my friend's tonight for her 'girls' night in' birthday party. Being somewhat low on funds right now I could not afford to go and buy her a pressie.
She's just about to start a fab new job for Benetton and has a meeting to go to in London next week. I know she has to take some files with her and was going to take them in a carrier bag. Not the best look for a fashion retail executive!

As public transport can be a pain with hands full of bags I thought a messenger bag might be useful. I've never made a gussetted bag successfuly before so was nervous about making anything this complicated.

A quick Google search came up with this brilliantly clear and straightforward tutorial . There is also a link on there to the author's blog and she does some beautiful knitting and stitching. This bag took less than 2 hours to make and although more involved than the bags I usually make it was very nice to do.

It has a magnetic clasp closure and the lining rather than the main fabric is interlined with Vilene, which seems to give it good support.

Of course, I now have to make them in every size/shape/colour!!!




Now I really do have to get on with my list! Monster has his first ever sleepover tomorrow night. We have 4 boys and 2 girls, including my two, all in a state of high excitement about the prospect of staying awake as late as possible!!! Before you ask, I am indeed quite quite mad :)

Due to the sleepover I have no idea if I will be blogging this weekend. I may have to get my fix if I'm still awake in the wee small hours!


Back to the lovely Youtube then for some tunes.

Love him or hate him Mr Loaf can really belt them out. I love it when this comes on the car radio - bet the driver looking in his rear view mirror doesn't agree though :)


In case that's not your bag how about this - chillin'. Or this - oh blimey, how did that get in there!
I saw him in concert at the Birmingham Odeon too!

Have a lovely cosy and cuddly weekend xxxx

Getting in a pickle

Thank you all so much for your lovely birthday wishes for the Monster. I showed him all your comments and he was really pleased. He was even more pleased to see that I made him famous by posting baby photos of him and also his birthday cake! Kids are so fantastically unashamedly vain, aren't they?

We had a lovely evening. His little friend is so funny and kept us all entertained at dinner :) Sausage did very well for presents - see below for evidence:

Sorry I was such a misery about the old mouth pain yesterday and thank you for your luuuurve on that one! The Calpol worked a treat, especially once the red wine kicked in ;)

I've had a chilled out, pottering sort of day. After a coffee with my buddy I went for a wander round the local charity shops. This little lot is destined to be cut up and remade into bags, toys etc. From top left: pair of brown gingham curtains £2; pink towelling hoodie £1.50; red needlecord dress £1; pink woven wool scarf 75p; pink linen trousers (new!) £1; mans pink linen shirt £1.20.



Now to justify my purchases! After this I really feel the need to explain why I've bought more. I have a couple of orders for cushions to be made in pale pastel colours and I don't seem to have many pale pastels in my stash - so there! The needlecord dress is like one I bought a few weeks ago. This is such soft needlecord and there is so much of it in the dress that I know it will all get used up. The curtains? I'm a sucker for gingham. The scarf? To be cut up and made into Christmas presents.

I had to get this Postman Pat duvet cover (£2) as I'm almost out of Rupert Bear now and needed a new bit of barmy fabric to line some bags.

Ooh, ooh - look at this too - £1.49!

If you thought all that was good (or not) take a look at my latest addition to the craft library:

I love the dog on the front - have to make one!


Pat Butcher earrings anyone?

Hats? I can make hats now. Got the book!

I do like this and will have to make one:

Not so sure about this skirt...

How about going all Mills and Boon and running up a 'smart shirtwaister' to wear for cocktails? Then you may just meet that tall, dark, handsome stranger. Worth a try.

That thrifty stuff was really just my way of avoiding dealing with this little lot:

I had, for some unearthly reason, decided I'd quite like to make some pickled onions to give away at Christmas to family for people to leave in their cupboards for 12 years until they finally remember they hate pickled onions as gifts.

After warnings from a couple of experienced pickling friends (!) I felt precautions should be taken with regard to minimising tear-duct trauma. A quick trip up the loft ladder provided the perfect solution:

It really worked but, as you may be able to see from the photo, the Sausage Monster's goggles are a little tight for his mummy!! I did actually ditch the snorkel but kept the goggles on to peel the onions (partly as a result of a joke with Lucy, honest!!).

I am soooooooooooooo glad I did this a couple of hours before I have to pick the monkeys up from school. The deep red goggle indentations around my face were somewhat alarming, resembling extremely unsightly facial scars. They've faded now.

Note to self: slacken goggle strap before wearing in future.

Here's a quick bit of music before I go - some '70's groovy stuff. I hope it works ok, my headphones aren't working and I don't know how to get it through the speakers!!

An apology: I am being pretty rubbish at replying to all your lovely comments at the moment. Very sorry!!! Must try harder. I still love you even if I'm too ignorant to answer you :)

xxxxx

Happy Birthday Sausage Monster!

This cute little roly poly pudding is a big 8 years old today!!

After the horrors of newbornbabyhood he became a cuddly cheerful little man. He's still lovely although, at times, a challenge! He still let's me kiss him goodbye at the school gates and likes nothing better than a cuddle.

His Granny loved him so much - he was her only grandson among her 5 beautiful grandchildren. She understood him better than anyone and I miss her advice every day.

He cut his first teeth at five months and walked unaided at 10 months. His feet were so big he had to miss the Clarks' Crawlers stage and go straight into 'big boy's' shoes - a size five and a half!! He became a big brother at 16 1/2 months and as far as he's concerned the Minx has always been here. Know how he feels on that one!!!

Grandma and Grandpa are on their way. We haven't seen them for over 2 months as they've been in Oz seeing B-I-L. Monster's best buddy in the whole world is also coming to tea tonight.

Table's laid. Cake's decorated according to Monster's instructions. All those lovely (unhealthy) colours I have and he chose white!!

Quick bolognese to bung together. Take at least two more lots of painkillers. We're there!!

Ready to party :)

Due to another morning spent in the dental hygienist's chair having ultra deep descaling on the whole of the right hand side of my mouth I am in a slightly distracted state. The local anaesthetic has worn off. It hurts. Like mad.

Therefore, I am going to toddle off now and drink some Calpol as we've run out of grown-up painkillers. I shall save my musical loveliness for tomorrow to be on the safe side or I might link to something dreadful!!

love xxxxx

Chutney Tuesday

It's been quiet craftwise in Moogsville today. The morning was spent whizzing around the shops getting goodies for the young man's birthday tomorrow.

Once home again my friend came round for lunch and I made some more chutney. Having made the two batches at the weekend it occurred to me that there is a basic underlying recipe going on which was open to a bit of tweekage. Therefore, I concocted a potion recipe of my own to include the veg I had festering in the fridge available.

I roasted some pumpkin, courgettes and yellow peppers and then bunged it all together with the rest of the ingredients and out came Roasted Vegetable Chutney. It ..... is ..... gorgeous!!
Nice and sweet, a little bit sour and spicy and tasting beautifully of the roasted veg. I'm running out of jam jars and had to put the leftover bit in a pot.

This leftover bit went on our chicken for dinner tonight - yuuuuuuummmmmy!


My friend went home with a jar of chutney and a sudden overwhelming need to make some herself! She phoned me later to tell me she'd found a load of jars in her fridge with dregs of jam etc and was washing them all out in readiness for chutneymania to take hold :) I do so enjoy being contagious!!!

As I now have a birthday cake to ice, to Monster's exact specification, I will not be hanging around tonight. I'll leave you with a bit of 1980's New Romantic groovy stuff.

I saw them play twice at the Odeon, New Street, Birmingham at the height of their popularity and they were brilliant live. You may hate them and, unlike the past two nights, I shall not be offended if you say so!! I grew up about a mile or so from where they did and knew people who knew their sister's best friend's aunt's step-sister's cousin - oh, the famous people I have almost known.....

I'm going in there and may be some time ...

Sometimes there is just no getting away from the fact that my fabric stash will not tidy itself. As with the rest of our house it inevitably ends in disappointment as I realise the fairies are not going to visit in the night and make it a tidy, clean, uncluttered show home. Down to me then :(

I always give in and do it myself. Maybe the fairies would come if I left it a bit longer. They're probably very busy if Kim and Aggie and Anthea are anything to go by. Guess, I'll never know as I always crack in the end!!

This ponderous grumbling is leading up to the fact that today was the day for filling the living room with four tonnes of fabric getting all my fabric together to sort it out properly.

1. Empty stash out of conservatory, and from all corners of lounge/diner.

Ruby helped with this bit but decided this was not her idea of fun and left me to it after posing.


2. Sort fabric into totally meaningless piles some semblance of order.

3. Rehome fabric in a tidier, more organised looking but ultimately totally impractical corner of the overcluttered glass appendage to our house, laughingly known as 'The Conservatory'.

First time I need to sew anything it will look like no.1 again!!!! At least it should look a little less horrific when DH's parents arrive on Wednesday! I even managed to find about 1 square metre of carpet to vacuum in the conservatory - marvellous.

The slow down in sewing has meant I've picked up Minx's ripple blanket again. It's a wonderful thing to do as it keeps me so warm whilst I crochet.

My camera does not show the colours well at all. There is no red in there, believe me. A dark raspberry pink, yes, but no bright red.

I have about 2 ft left to crochet and then I plan to do a stripy crochet blanket for Monster but his will be just straight stripes rather than ripples. Nothing too 'girlie' for my Star Wars, Robin Hood, Dr Who, football and sword fighting fanatic of a very nearly 8 years old son.




Now, Monkee Maker (Happy Birthday by the way!) I have to explain myself or rather I have to explain my dog.

She found the whole 'woman filling every space possible that I want to go to sleep in' experience a little too traumatic today. After a trip down the garden to bark at blue tits, sparrows, planes, clouds, rain, cats, dogs, leaves, imaginary dog pixies,people going out, people coming in, b***dy everything something she came in with filthy paws and took herself for a little walk over my nice clean flanelette thrifted sheet. I may have told her off slightly.

She is a dog of very little brain after all.

However, whilst I was busy in the 'conservatory' ( hahahahahaha - makes me laugh every time I call it that), restacking my fabric, she finally found a comfy place to settle down.

I told her to 'Get off my b***dy monkee you dirty dog' (or something similar).

I think this face says 'No' - what do you think?




Ho hum! Anyone got Cesar's number?

I had a little lurk in blogland whilst girding my loins for the tidying this morning and had to show you this - dottycookie's puddings . Isn't it lovely? This has gone onto my ever growing list of things I want to make :)

So there you have it - Monday.

Before I go to warm my frozen knees with my crochet here is today's musical goodie. In my very humble opinion the best rock band ever and as such I found it impossible to choose a single track.

It's Queen and the fabulous Freddie, who I still cannot believe is not here. I haven't linked to Bohemian Rhapsody (although I do love it). I wanted to go for some of their other greats so if you like Queen, go for it.......now.
1
2 makes me want to cry. He was so ill here.
3
4 - an earlier one
5 - great to sing loudly in the car. Need a leotard like that one!!
6 - ignore the bird with the bad make-up. Just love the guitar when the train comes through.

We really could be here all night and I'm sure you all have lives so we'll leave it there :)

As with yesterday's Swedish lovelies, if you don't like Queen please don't tell me ;)

I have a thank you before I do - finally - take my leave. Thank You Lucy Locket for reminding me I can open up another window in Explorer - I've been able to listen to all of the above on the PC whilst blogging :)))))) (oops - just reread this and realised I'm totally insensitive 'cos you can't do this Lucy :( )
As you can see MM and Ali the crossing out is being used ad nauseum going well!

Rainy Sunday afternoon

What a mucky day! It has rained and rained and rained.

The perfect day, therefore, for a bit of a play in the kitchen. In my drive to make most of my Christmas gifts this year I have been making preserves using my Mum's old jam kettle.

This wonderful old pot holds such memories for me. When I was small my family had two allotments - my Dad's and my Grandad's. Needless to say there were some times of year when my poor Mum was faced with a vast glut of vegetables. I remember so clearly 'helping' her make jams, chutneys and pickles.

I've had to buy my veg from the farm shop but next year hope to grow some of my own. I've made beetroot chutney:

It looked a huge amount when I started but reduced dramatically and I got three and 1/2 jars out of this batch. They are reasonable sized jars though.

I also made marrow and ginger by cobbling together two recipes off the internet until I had one that I had the ingredients for. I've had the marrow in the fridge for over 3 weeks and I think I caught it just it time. Any longer and it would have walked out of the fridge on its own!

The Minx had a friend's party this afternoon so being a devoted Mummy I got soaked through taking her. As Sainsbury's was right next door I popped in to stock up on provisions. I finally buckled to marketing pressure and came home with these two little guys for Ruby to mother:

I know Tesco had them on buy one get one free but I missed that one. They are two packs of PG, with chimp, for £4 at Sainsbury's. Sausage adapted the empty box to make a monkee house :o)

Ruby seems to be wearing that bewildered expression worn by all new parents - especially parents of twins!

Thanks so much for the help Ali and Monkee Maker re: crossing out in Blogger. As you can see I haven't tried it yet but will give it a try this week.

Now, after the suffering I caused you last week I am about to embark on what may, in fact, be a riskier musical venture. I have an eclectic musical taste. I like pop, rock, punk, mod, reggae, new romantic, soul, jazz etc etc. I don't do the likes of Celine, Mariah and Whitney - just can't take it!

To get the ball rolling I'm going to start with this. This is the track that was played at our wedding as we walked up the 'aisle'. As we got married here it wasn't a real aisle in the church sense and we were free to choose our own music. If you don't like this one I'm afraid that's just tough!! This is totally my indulgence :o)

I had considered this one on the way up the aisle to my lovely groom. I was 33 when I got married and I felt the lyrics were apt - '...finally facing my Waterloo...' There, I may just have given away who it is on tonight's link!

I hope you enjoy it. If you really hate Abba please don't tell me as I love them totally and utterly and have seen their tribute band Bjorn Again four times. Last time was with my best friend at the Pavilion Theatre in Worthing. This was an hysterical night out. We sat in a wine bar opposite the theatre prior to the show and were startled to see bus loads of old biddies drawing up. We questioned whether we had got the wrong night. Sadly not. We suddenly felt the years catching up!! We've known each other nearly 36 years, since I was 6 and have had some great funny times and this one was right up there with the best of them :o)

Early retirement? Not quite ...

Well, I did it - my first ever sale of my bags and bits. I had a very enjoyable evening and everyone seemed to like my goodies. Ruby obligingly posed for a shot once the table was set up but then hid in my handbag for the rest of the evening in case we got carried away and sold her!!



I didn't sell masses of stuff and hardly any of the small bits went but I have come away with a couple of orders.I also have enough stock left for the next fair on 7th Dec so will not have to go quite as mad making for that one :o) I may even have a little bit of a life for a week or so!!


My lovely friend Sarah (that's you Sarah - if you're reading!!!) who does the most beautiful ceramic jewellery and pots was right next to me with her stall. At the end of the night we swapped one of my bags for two of her gorgeous pendants. This one is mine:

She's suggested we do some fairs together as our stalls did look nice next to each other so hopefully we'll explore that one a bit more.

I have an avalanche of fabric to sort out next week as my stash has suffered somewhat during the creative frenzy of the past couple of weeks. I also have chutney to make for Christmas gifts and will be baking a birthday cake for a certain young man next week. Before any of that I'm going to rekindle my relationship with the ripple crochet blanket I'm making for Minxer's Christmas pressie.

I've thoroughly enjoyed having a deadline to meet but have to admit to a great sense of relief that I can now get back to 'normal' - whatever that is!!

Before I open the wine I have a couple more things to do.

The first is a question for you more techy/experienced bloggers : How do I do that crossing out words thing? Y'know where you put a line through what you want to say and then type the more polite version after - I'd rather like to use this as I'm in danger of overhyphenating!!!

The second and perhaps more important is to round off this week of musical wonderfulness with a real cringer - here goes!

To atone for this week's (allegedly) 'naff' music I will be linking to a much better (in my v humble opinion) selection of hits next week.

Hope you are having a fab weekend and thank you so much for all your crafty love and support over the past week.

xxxxxx

Counting the minutes...

Winter seems to have arrived with a bang. This morning we had a lovely hard frost and despite having one or two things to do (!!) I had to take the camera for a walk round the garden.

That done, I threw together a beef stew for tonight and Ruby helped me make these to keep our strength up:

A little bit of last minute sewing was required in the shape of 6 Dammit Dolls one of which is to donate to the raffle. These little guys go together really quickly.

I worked on them while having a chat to Lucy who was having a chat to me while doing her housework - this is us!!!

I had to gather their necks as they were a bit on the thick side! I used top stitching thread for this and I'm a total convert to this brilliant thread, for buttons and anything that would otherwise cause sewing cotton to snap just when you don't want it to :o)

What happy little chaps:

So that's it, all done! DH has gone to get the children from school to enable me to get ready for tonight. Which, of course, is the reason I'm on here blogging - hahahahaha!!!

I wouldn't want to break my promise to bring you naff music every day this week so that was my justification for blogging ;) This little number is a true classic. I even had the album and knew every single word to every song - I know that Monkee Maker cannot fail to enjoy this one as it does have some relevance to her.

xxx