A bit of stitching has been happening, Halloween Ornament Exchange

A bunch of us who meet up at the Nimble Thimble for stitching days have a small FB group and Tracy recently organised a Halloween ornament exchange.  We were to stitch an ornament and include a chart and some sweets/chocolate in our parcel too.

My recipient was Michelle, aka Mouse :-) 

I found a designer, Good Flora Stitchwort on etsy, (she has some lovely charts, go take a look),

I chose Bubble Bubble and finished it as a little wall hanging.

I found a little pack of Halloween buttons perfect for holding the hanging ribbon

Here's the whole exchange I sent, luckily Michelle didn't already have the chart I included

My package came from Chris, (I don't think Chris has a blog)

A cute little pumpkin ornie.  My grandson, Oliver is mad about Halloween things and wanted to claim it for his Halloween tree, lol

Love the chart she included too

This weekend has been quite a busy one, It was my book club meeting on Saturday morning and later I went with Joanne to have high tea at a local garden centre.  It was a lovely treat, lovely to just sit and take our time.  Today was the annual Scarecrow festival in Belbroughton and I went with the girls again.  We started the day with breakfast at another garden centre before going into Belbroughton.  The weather was quite dull and dreary today but at least the rain kept off until we were ready to make our way home.

There didn't seem to be as much effort put in by the residents this year, in fact it was quite
disappointing to be honest, the theme was Fables and Fairy Tales, plenty of choice as to what to
make, you would think, but we counted at least 3 Humpty Dumpty's, 3 Tortoise and The Hare,
and about 4 Little Red Riding Hood .

I thought these were the best efforts

This one was brilliant, a lot of work has gone into making these

And this giant Gingerbread Man :-)

I've been flitting between various WIP's this week, nothing finished except for this little pair of shoes

I came across the pattern on line and just had to knit them right away :-) 

They worked up really quickly, I knit both of them in a couple of hours

I do need to get a move on and finish some of the things I've got on the go at the moment, because I want to make a start on Bonnie's birth sampler this month  so that It can be finished and framed ready for Christmas.

So many lovely things to make, so little time, lol

I hope you all have a lovely crafty time till next week

-X-

A London Weekend, Kensington and Brick Lane

I'm back with a long overdue post of our London weekend, I have no idea where the time went in between then and now, only that I have been busy with one thing and another and the opportunity to blog seemed to keep passing me by.

The weekend was fabulous, we saw and did lots of things that were new to us including a walk through Hyde Park, the Serpentine, a walk through Kensington Park and the Diana Fountain, (not what I expected), but as you will see the weather was beautiful and there were lots of people making the most of the sunshine and children splashing about in the water so it was all good.

Unfortunately the people who organise the walking tours had cancelled the one the girls bought us which was a shame, we were both looking forward to it, the reason they gave was the recent events in London, (the incidents on Westminster bridge and the one outside Parliament).  The tour would have taken in much of this area so for this year at least they made the decision to cancel that particular tour.  Hopefully we will be able to transfer the voucher to another tour at a future date.

As we had now got more time on the Sunday we decided to visit Brick Lane again.  We have already been several times to Brick Lane and absolutely love it.  The atmosphere is fantastic, as is the food :-)  It is also a great place to pick up vintage things, clothes, records and things for the home, which Mark calls tat , but I love :-)  Even if you don't buy anything it's still worth going just for the atmosphere alone.

I'll stop rabbiting on now and leave you with some, (ok, a lot) of photos from our weekend, I hope you enjoy looking :-)

Princess Diana fountain 

The Serpentine, Hyde Park

Street art

See you soon
-X-

A works in progress post

I don't have any finished things to show you this week so I thought I'd show you all the things I have on the go at the moment.

This baby sleeping bag has been on and off my needles for quite some time.  

I started it months ago and just couldn't get the pattern to stay in my head, even though it was basically moss stitch.  After picking it up and finding yet another mistake I decided I would ditch the pattern as written and do a similar stitch but something easier to remember.  I've worked almost 12 inches now in double moss stitch and, fingers crossed, no mistakes.

I want to get this one done by the end of September really so Bonnie will be all snug in her pram when the weather gets cooler.

A scarf for Oliver.  

He will be start Reception at school in a couple of weeks, and this will keep the chills off on the walk to and from school.  The grey was something I already had in my stash, the blue, (Sirdar Aran) was a bargain £1 a ball from the charity shop.

Another little cardigan in a new to me yarn.  Sirdar No1.  I'd never heard of it until I saw it last week.  It's knitting up really nice and is lovely and soft.

Stitching

Yes, I know, I haven't stitched for ages but I enjoyed working on this last night, (and a little more progress made this afternoon)

I've read lots of blog posts that have mentioned the change in the weather, and it's been no different here in the Midlands this week.  The afternoons have generally been ok and yesterday was quite sunny, but it does go chilly late afternoon, we have managed to resist putting the fire on just yet but that may change tonight, it's windy, raining and not very warm at all this afternoon.

Last Sunday couldn't have been more different.  We went to Bewdley for the day as they were having a fun day with stalls and street food along the river over the bank Holiday weekend.

Oliver in the middle shouting at the Punch & Judy show

And Spiderman kindly let him sit on his bike, lol

Despite the change in the weather some things in the garden are still ok, some are almost past their best and will need pulling out soon.  I put quite a few dahlias in this time, the slugs ate three  and two are yet to flower but two have produced the most amazing bloom, from this....

To this.....

One of the roses I bought a couple of months ago has decided to give some lovely flowers at last, the scent from these is gorgeous. 

If this rain and wind keep up though I doubt there will be much of anything left by next week.  

I bought a couple of packs a Autumn plants for some baskets this week that will replace the ones that will die off soon and I got a couple of pack of tulip bulbs too, we have loads of daffs in the spring but no tulips.   All in all I think my plants have done quite well this year, and I've been really happy with how my tubs and baskets have done.

I've got a couple of days off work this week, I haven't decided what to do yet, one of them I might set aside as a 'me' day.   On Saturday we are going to London again, for the weekend this time, we are using another voucher the girls got us for Christmas, this time Kensington Palace, breakfast at the Orangery and a walking tour.  Something to look forward too :-)

I hope you all have a lovely week and I will see you again soon

-X-

Pillow and Project Bags

While my pillow making workshop was fresh in my mind I decided to make another one.

I bought this material some time ago thinking it would make a nice cushion, it was only an off cut, but it turned out to be just the right size for the pattern from the workshop, and, I remembered how it was all done!

This was my first sewing project a few weeks ago.  I wanted a bag for my knitting and after trawling through you tube for tutorials I came across one I thought I would be able to follow.

It came out alright for a first attempt.  It' wouldn't win any prizes in a show, I did make a mistake on the bottom, but you can't really notice it when it's 'sat' with the yarn in, and it's for me, so it's ok :-)

I used Vonna's cross stitch project bag tutorial for the next two.

This is the first one I made last week 

And this one, a little bigger, I made this afternoon.

This one has just a plain lining 

I'm really happy with how these turned out, the tutorial was really clear and easy to follow.

I'm never going to be a sewist but I have enjoyed making these and will definitely make some more pillows but I think that's about the limit of my sewing ability, lol.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Over size pom pom alert!

Joanne and Gavin came around on Friday with Bonnie, Jo had ordered her this hat, it is still too warm for it but and we just had to try it on :-)

(The little blanket is the corner to corner garter stitch one I was working on a few weeks ago)

Today was this little one's due date, and she is already 15 days old!

Time fly's too quickly!!

I hope you all have a lovely week, and enjoy the Bank Holiday sunshine :-)

-X-