Lessons Learned!

A pile of grannies!

My stitching group put a call out for unwanted crafting materials so we could make things to raise money for local causes. These granny squares above are the start of something I'm making with some of the donated yarn. I think I've made a final decision, and it's going to be a cushion.

Felt creations

These cute little cosies were made by son's girlfriend, Grace, at college, where they were also selling their crafts for charity. Being a beginner at sewing, these 2 were rejected from the stall so she put a couple of ££s in the pot and brought them home for me! I think they're very sweet, and not bad for a beginner; I've seen a lot worse for sale on craft stalls! Grace made me laugh when she told me how she and a fellow beginner kept pulling the thread completely off the needle when they were sewing, and how her friend didn't realise and kept on sewing - with no thread. I remember doing the same when I started sewing and it made me think about why I don't still do it. So, the next time I sewed I concentrated on what I was doing, and realised that I automatically held the thread between my 2 middle fingers as soon as it popped through the fabric. It made me realise how much detail I'd have to go into if I decided to teach workshops, especially if there are complete beginners present.

Some supplies I picked up at a flea market when OH and I went out for the day for my birthday.

The subject of how we learnt to knit came up at the stitching group the other week. Some said they learnt in school, with a rhyme about a rabbit and a hole that I'd never heard before. I remember sewing in school, but not knitting (my great aunt Kate taught me). As the conversation moved on to other skills learnt at school, it was clear there was quite a difference between us, with members coming from different corners of the country. One had been instructed in how to lay a fire and use a twin-tub, which surprised the rest of us!!

We held a wedding party last week for people who didn't/couldn't come to Florida for the wedding itself. The groom's mother did the food while I made the cakes. I made a big cake to display the cake topper from Disney World, and cup cakes for the guests. This is my solution to the dilemma of how to transport 70 cup cakes in a car for a 30min journey. The big cake and 3 'boxes' of cupcakes went in the boot (trunk) while the three of us in the car each held a tray with 2 boxes. Maybe I was being ultra careful, but I learnt my lesson when transporting only a quarter of this number to the Hen Party, without boxes.

Bye for now
Teresa x

P.S. My camera seems to make purple look blue. The blue in the granny squares and the felt cosies is actually a lovely deep purple.

So Lucky!

The other week, I finally got around to spending the vouchers I received for my birthday in March.

I took my daughter with me to enjoy the afternoon tea for 2 at The Angel Hotel. As well as the 3 tiers of scrumptious goodies above, we had scones with jam and cream and pots of tea.  Other people having afternoon tea around us took some of their cakes home in boxes because they didn't (or couldn't) eat them all. We didn't need a box!!

 It took me 3 visits to The Woolcroft to decide what to spend that voucher on.  I wanted the large knitting needles, to knit my home-made t-shirt yarn, but couldn't decide what else to get. There was too much choice - but I eventually decided on this lovely book; mainly for the stylish photographs. Apparently, you can buy ready-made t-shirt yarn now - someone's got their finger on the pulse!

On the crafting front, I've been trying to finish off some of my larger, ongoing projects, so there isn't much to show. This is my tumbling blocks quilt progress. The finished size was, as usual, governed by me stopping when I'd had enough of it. You can see that I've worked out a shape to fill in the top and bottom, to make it straight - next, I have to do the same for the sides.

Car Update. If you remember, we had to leave our car in France, and it was delivered home a few days later.  Well, I'm pleased to say that it is now fixed and back where it belongs. The repairs weren't cheap but, luckily, the money came back to us in fortuitous circumstances a few days later.  First, when looking for son's passport, hubby found an old building society book. He cashed it in and closed the account resulting in enough money to pay the labour costs for the car. A couple of days later, I received an unexpected letter from the HMRC with a tax refund that covered the price of the parts!!

Bye for now
Teresa x

France, June 2013

Our base for the week - Moulin de Garreau

 Hello all!  We got back from a lovely week in France in the middle of the night, the Sunday before last.  Our car came back the following Friday!!! But I don't want to start on a negative note, because we did enjoy ourselves, so I'll leave that until later.

The lake we walked around or fished in.

 There was so much to do at the house we could have amused ourselves there for the entire week, but we did take time out on a few days.

The Green Room (ours!)

 The weather picked up nicely after the drizzly drive down from St Malo and we didn't have another bad day until the day we left, which meant it was more comfortable to drive in.

 This is the first of four evening meals we ate at the house.  I think I enjoyed these meals more than when we ate out. It was quite a rural area where the locals didn't speak much English, so choosing from a French menu without much help was a bit hit and miss.  Who knew that 'gesiers' were gizzards!! Apparently they were quite nice.

 This is our communal sitting/dining area with the table set for dinner.  That shoe dumping area became quite messy by the end of the week!

 We dined alfresco a couple of times, making good use of the brick BBQ in the garden.

A couple of glasses of Pimms went down well while the BBQ was cooking.

A day on the beach at Isle de Re was just the thing on the hottest day of the week.

The 15 minute walk to the pizzeria was through the beautiful French countryside (You can't see the brick and tile factory on the other side of the road from this angle :-) We met an ex-pat at the pizzeria who works at the factory. He helped translate a little for us and arranged for us to go with the owner of the pizzeria to one of his wine suppliers, after we'd asked if there were any vineyards we could visit.  We met them one evening at 4pm and they led the way.  We would never have found one without their help because they don't seem to advertise for tourists.

There seemed to be a take-it-or-leave-it attitude, in general, towards tourists in the area, and sites of interest were tucked away down side streets with no signage until you were right there.  We followed a town map of Fontenay le Compte, that was in the house, in order to find a couple of gardens and a castle to look around.

This was the fate of our car after filling it up, following the day on the beach.  To cut a long story short, the steering 'went' when we were 45 minutes from the house. The following days involved 3 taxi journeys, 3 different hire cars (one with a crack nearly all the way across the windscreen) and many phone calls.  In total, we probably lost about 8 hours to-ing and fro-ing but, luckily, we had taken out extra European cover with the AA. The car couldn't be fixed in France so we still have that cost (and we haven't had the phone bill yet either), but it could have been so much worse.

Incidentally, in attempting to converse with the first taxi driver we told him we were from Wales (Pays de Galles).  OH told him, more specifically, 'Raglan' which he repeated like he knew it, which I thought was odd.  He must have been trying to think of the right words for the rest of the journey, because, when we got to the house, he turned to us and said, "My - girl (daughter we presume)  - work - Raglan - Arms"!!! We managed to communicate to him that our son worked there too and he said, "Small - world!"  

Small world, indeed!

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I haven't heard anything, yet,  from Penny who won my giveaway before I went away. I've joined Google+ but have yet to find a way to get in touch.  If I don't have any luck soon there's a chance I'll be re-drawing the winner.

Bye for now

Teresa x

27 Years and Counting!

Rather than take a new book away, I decided to take the one I've been reading at work during my lunch hour: Bill Bryson's "A Short History of Nearly Everything".  I'm really enjoying the fascinating run-through of the history of planet earth, with all the interesting facts (and guesses) as to how we got to where we are now.

Unfortunately, I was up to the chapter concerning the atmosphere when we boarded the plane, which proceeded to describe the phenomenon of  'clear-air turbulence' and a typical incident when a flight suddenly fell 90 metres flinging passengers against the ceiling! It also helpfully described air pressure and explained how it tries to equalise itself, like 'in a balloon, an air tank or an airplane with a missing window'!!  It was a good thing the flight was only 45 minutes long.

Moore's Hotel in St Peter Port, Guernsey where we stayed

 Just like Jersey, which we visited a few years ago, Guernsey was occupied during WW2.  A visit to the Occupation Museum was a must for us, with the most interesting exhibits (to me) being the ones that showed how the lives of civilians were affected by the presence of the Germans.  In the typical parlour scene below the mother is keeping watch as the father listens for news on his homemade radio set.  All radios were confiscated by the Germans so the people improvised to make crystal sets, then had to find ingenious ways to hide them from searches. I also found the personal items very poignant; newpaper articles, postcards, diaries and especially photographs.

The remains of the defences built by the Germans are in evidence all around the coast, as we saw on our drive around the island.

 Although 'British' in many aspects, Guernsey is a Crown Dependency and therefore rules itself.  As a result there are subtle differences.  The driving experience was one of the most notable differences to us.  The registration plates had only numbers with no letters.  There were few roads more than 2 lanes in total, and most of them were hardly wide enough for 2 vehicles to pass, so the maximum speed limit is 35mph. And where we have signs at junctions saying 'Stop' or 'Give Way', they had 'Filter In Turn' - and they did!! 


Our hire car



 The way of life is generally very relaxed and certainly conducive to unwinding on holiday,

 enjoying the views......

.......and the food!

We hadn't thought of visiting this Little Chapel but did so on the recommendation of our hotel manager. While we were there an elderly couple asked OH if he would mind taking their photo in front of it.  They were on holiday to celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary and were revisiting the places from their honeymoon. We had a lovely chat as they explained how they'd flown to Guernsey all those years ago in a 12 seater plane, where they could see the controlling cables moving under the wooden planks beneath their feet and the pilot looked like "Captain Bird's Eye".  We told them it was a co-incidence that we were also celebrating our anniversary but they had 33 years on us.  When we later realised it must have been only 5 or 6 years after the liberation of the islands when they visited, it somehow brought the history there to life. 

This display of sewing machines is on show at a Folk Museum we visited.  The oldest (on top of the cream stand at the back) was from the late 1800's.  I wouldn't be surprised if there are still a few like the one on the bottom right still in use today - I can certainly remember family members having similar ones.

There were also lots of workshop set-ups showing the tools and methods of different trades in the past.  This cooper (barrel maker) has slight damage to his left hand just at the base of the thumb.  I thought he would be made of a hard material but it looked like sponge inside so I leant in and touched it.  He was a lot lighter and less stable than I expected and immediately started rocking.  It looked for all the world like he was working on his piece of wood (a bit spooky actually, as I was alone at the time!). OH couldn't resist touching either, when I told him, and almost knocked him over!!

It was very windy and turbulent on the flight home but, luckily, I'd moved on from the chapter on the Atmosphere and was now onto Bacteria.  We had to wait about half an hour for our luggage when we got home and when they appeared I can honestly say I have never seen so many people running around the conveyor belt after their bags!  It reminded me of a game we used to play as kids where one child would skip around the outside of a circle of children facing inwards while singing a song, eventually dropping a piece of paper that represented a letter behind one, whereupon they would both run in opposite directions around the circle to get back to the space.  The one left out would then skip round, and so on. 

Stitching progress since last time:

Knitted cardigan - All I've managed this time are a couple of hours knitting.

Does reading a patchwork magazine on holiday count I wonder. 

Bye for now

Teresa x

Back on Track!

So many times in previous years I've failed to make the most of a welcome spell of lovely sunny weather thinking that there'll be plenty more to come in the summer.  Well, I've finally learned my lesson and will make the most of any opportunity that comes my way, no matter how dirty my house is or whether there's anything to eat in the kitchen!!  For the last few years, our summers seem to have come early and not taking advantage of them has resulted in missing out altogether.

So.......



.....this is what we did, this weekend, and last.  Loaded up the bikes and took off for a cycle with friends (six of us last week and 8 on Sunday).  Last week, we took our usual route along the old railway line by the river from Monmouth to Symonds Yat.  This week, we rode along the canal path from Abergavenny to Crickhowell (a much longer route that required 2 pub stops as opposed to the usual 1!).

 People were out in droves - walking dogs, pushing children, cycling like us or narrow boating. 

 Being the slowest cyclist (and therefore last) I had the advantage that I could photograph the others while moving along, but it was a disadvantage when groups of walkers had just managed to reform after the others had scattered them, then I came along!!  It was a fun afternoon out and I'm sure if we do it more often there'll be no more saddle soreness (despite wearing gel pants)!

Stitchy news in brief - (because this is all there is, due to taking advantage of the good weather - you can't have everything!!)

I'm right up-to-date with my Tag Square Bee blocks now with this latest offering for Jen in rainbow colours.  I had a real struggle finding all the colours and I'm not sure that this fits the brief entirley because the fabrics aren't modern enough. I've a feeling that another member of the Bee wants rainbow colours, but I'll worry about that when the time comes. I have yet to recieve my March and April blocks though so I'm looking forward to that.

Bye for now
Teresa x

April Antics (or What I've Been up to the Last Few Days)!

Spring has definitely sprung.  All the countryside has come to life (plants and animals) which also means it's the beginning of 'road-kill' season.  Yes, my route to work is strewn with the bodies of little birds and animals that had no concept of what a road is, never mind the Green Cross Code!  Last week I was following a van that hit a large bird. Luckily, I didn't hit it too because it was knocked onto the verge in a flurry of feathers. 

Yesterday, however, I was to claim my own victim in the cycle of life.  A female pheasant sauntered delicately across the road from the far side and right  in front of my car as if I weren't there.  I attempted to avoid the collision by slowing down and willing the bird to speed up (it didn't) but, as I glanced in my mirror and saw 2 cars following me, I couldn't brake too drastically.  I actually didn't feel a thing but I'm afraid to say the pheasant probably did because I saw the same tell-tale flurry of feathers in my rear-view mirror! :-(

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Now onto more pleasant things!!  On Saturday morning, before going on to my quilting club, I called in at a Coffee Morning and Craft sale in the village with my mother.  We spent a pleasant hour browsing the stalls, buying homemade cakes and raffle tickets, drinking coffee and chatting.  When I got home later, I found out I'd won this wonderful food hamper!

The goodies kept coming the next day too with it being Mothering Sunday.  I received these lovely cards and presents from my 2 wonderful offspring.

Do you see the card with the buttons stuck on it?  The first thing I said on receiving this (well, the second after 'thank you') was 'I can use these buttons when I make something'.  My son and his girlfriend looked at each other and laughed because they'd said to eachother that I would say just that!

I'm up-to-date with my Bee Blocks now with this blue and white one finished.  The colours are not as muted as they appear here.  I'm wondering if it would have looked better photographed on top of something brighter.  I must experiment more with this sort of thing!

The Book a Cook evening I mentioned last time was great fun but not what I was expecting.  I thought it was a going to be a group of ladies enjoying a chat with a chef brought in to do all the work.  Instead, it was at the home of the Cook and was in fact a demonstration of cooking various dishes which we got to eat afterwards!! 

Before I go I must tell you about my Indian Head Massage experience.  (It was actually on my way there that I murdered the pheasant so I was in dire need of relaxation by then!).  I was met at the door by a lovely lady called Lorraine who's relaxed manner immediately put me at ease.  Sitting on a chair having a complete stranger massage my shoulders and neck with scented oils was a new experience for me.  It took me a good few moments to get over my uneasiness but I soon drifted into a trance-like state and began to enjoy the experience. 

Although I was relaxed, my mind was whirling with thoughts such as, 'I wonder if anyone has ever dropped off to sleep and fallen off the chair' and 'Will Lorraine be offended that I am not relaxed enough if I scratch my nose?' and 'If I open my eyes, can she see me in the mirror on the wall opposite?' I didn't do any of those things because, although I could think it, I couldn't actually do it  - or anything in fact, until it was over. 

Immediately I stood up I could tell that the tension had gone from my shoulders and for the rest of the evening I felt lighter than usual (not in weight - in spirit)!  I will definitely be going back again and I think I'll benefit more next time because I'll know what to expect.

Bye for now
Teresa x

What's been happening around here since we last met!

Here it is, my new-to-me car, as promised (I nearly put 'she' instead of 'it' but I'm not one for giving personalities or names to inanimate objects!).  It's quite...well....Blue!!  It actually looks shinier and slighty blue/green in real life.  It'll do for me for a while (no heated seats Leslie but that's not where I feel the cold!).

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My Scrap Swap parcel arrived yesterday from Sally exactly on deadline as arranged by Ali of Very Berry Handmade. A great selection of scraps here, many of which I've not seen before.  I'm sure they'll come in very useful.  Thank you Ali and Sally!

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The look of the little bags I've been making recently all depend on the zip.  My starting point when making these has to be whatever zip I have in my stock that's a suitable colour, length and type.  In this case a dark green one.  Next comes the fabric to go with it.  Finally, the size and design of the bag depends on the length of the zip and the size of the pieces of fabric available.  This process is obviously governed by the used materials I'm able to get hold of, but suits me fine in that quite a few of the decisions are out of my hands.  Therefore, procrastinating is kept to a minimum and precious time is saved!   This is a birthday gift for one of my sisters and will be filled with a couple of pampering goodies. See, I remembered my label (only the 2nd time) and didn't sew it in upside-down like the last time!

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Two tiers of tasty treats here; My usual batch of muffins on the top and a double batch of Oaty Ginger Cookies from a recipe from Ali's blog (see Ali's link above).  The muffin recipies always make exactly 12.  Don't know what happened this time but only just managed to scrape 11 out of it (I know what you're thinking, but no, I didn't succumb to temptation before taking the pic)!

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And finally......I know it's 1st March today and not April but I had to check twice before I sent the email requested by my boss via his assistant.  I was concerned that I was being taken for a fool.  He wanted me to ask everyone in the office to save the the 'dots' from hole-punches and collect them together for him to use as confetti at a family wedding next year!!!

Do you see why I had reservations?

Bye for now
Teresa x

Doing my Bit for the P.O.!

Due to the fact that I was camera-less last week, I should have twice as much to show today. Wrong!!  The photos of the zipped bag I made for DS's girlfriend were lost somewhere during the changeover, but you'll just have to believe me when I say it was very pretty!

I've been on a sending/receiving spree and made good use of the postal service this week!

This is the lovely Tuscan themed block I received from Jo of Bear Paw for The Tag Square Bee for February.  I've been very punctual about getting my blocks sent out so far but this month I am delayed due to a serious shortage (complete lack) of black fabric. 

 I've been better organised for the Scrap Swap organised by Ali of Very Berry Handmade which had to be sent by 28th Feb.  This is the little parcel of goodies that is winging it's way to Jenny of Gingerbread House, if it's not arrived already!

 It's not diffucult to find recycled/rescued fabric to add to my stash but old reels of thread are another matter.  I've, very rarely, picked up the odd reel in charity shops but Ali (see above) came up trumps with her recommendation for the site Rag Rescue, which is where I got these beauties!  I was a bit worried that, if they were very old, they would be weak and unusable but they seem to be fine and they're exactly the sort of colours I use quite often.

 Brightly coloured buttons are also not easy to come by so I supplemented my collection with a couple of 'lots' from ebay. (Wonder how that rogue purple got into the yellows?)

I finally got the red thread, from my auntie, that I needed to finish this cushion and, would you believe it, the reel was so big it wouldn't fit on my little domestic machine!  So, instead of satin-stitching the little linen hearts on, I blanket-stitched by hand.  Here it is reclining on a kitchen chair................

.............and here posing on a comfy chair.

Here's the obligatory close-up - pores and all!!

Next week I will have swapped my car (and some money!) for a newer one.  OH tells me I need a car that is more economical on longer journeys so it'll have a slightly bigger engine.  Don't ask me anything about cars because they don't interest me one bit.  So long as they get me from A to B I'm satisifed, although I did want a green one (it's blue!!).  I'll show you next time.

Bye for now

Teresa x