2nd Blog Give away

Laurie was the winner of my first blog give away, i have yet to hear from her but am keeping the mags safe until i do.
In the meantime here is my second mag give away.

Cross Stitcher from April 1997 & WOCS issue 138. The WOCS mag has a bonus chart of Paddington Bear!

Below are some of the charts in the magazines.

As before, if you want to be included in the draw for these magazines please leave a comment saying so and i will draw a name from the 'hat' on Saturday. Please leave me your e-mail address or link to your blog so that i can let you know if you win! Joanne & Susan (from Friendly Stitchers) if you are reading this i have already put your names in the draw as you asked :-)

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I have been stitching and started a new project but not enough to show a WIP just yet so i will save that for another time, right now i have an appointment on the sofa to watch The Bridges Of Madison County which i recorded because it was on too late last night for a 'school night'.

Tara-a-bit x

The Winner Is.....

Congrats Laurie!

The 2 mags will be winging their way to you very soon.

I will have another 2 up for grabs this week if anyone is interested.

Tara-a-bit x

Did You Get Snow This Week?

No this is not the snow we got in my area, the photos are from the winter of 1947.

From 22nd January to 17th March snow fell EVERY DAY somewhere in the UK, the temperature seldom got a degree or two above freezing, there were snow drifts 8 feet deep in some areas. Throughout January 1947 there were 46 days of sunshine & 13 days that were totally sunless, February got even worse with snow drifts reaching 12 feet in places, neither schools, shops or factories closed though. By the end of the month there was chaos, fuel was in short supply and the railways were impassible with striking workers to boot! This was all before motorways, computers & central heating, fuel was in short supply so people just kept one room heated and rationing was still here in the UK too at that time, women were queing for food for an hour at a time in this weather. By the end of the month snow or sleet had fell in the area i live in now for 19 days, hail on 9 days and there was fog on 4 days and the sun had only appeared on 2 days by February 23! the first part of March that year bought much of the same with the second half milder and very wet, the rain causing a rapid thaw and then came the floods.

The Big Freeze - 1963

I was born in 1961 but my mother has relayed to me often about the harsh weather of 1963, it was the coldest year since 1740. Glasgow had it's first white Christmas since 1938 and from boxing day 1962 until early March 1963 most of England was continuously under the white stuff, although it was sunnier than average, unlike the winter of '47. 1947 was snowier, 1963 was colder. At Herne Bay the sea froze 2 miles out, can you believe that :-o and talking of cold, in 1684 John Evelyn took a coach to Lambeth along the FROZEN River Thames, now that's cold! (click on the link below to see a short film of Herne Bay frozen)

http://sasesearch.brighton.ac.uk/view/?from=search&fromid=placeid%3D4&film=1032&imagefile=%2Ffiles%2Ffilms%2F1032%2Fimage_a_full.jpg&imagealt=A+Still+from+%27Herne+Bay+on+Ice%27+%281963%29+showing+the+frozen+sea

Met Office - Winter Chills: 1947 & 1963, below

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/education/secondary/students/winter.html

More photos from the winter of 1947 below

http://www.topfoto.co.uk/gallery/1947Winter/default.htm

Somehow this weeks snow seems a little insignificant, don't you think?

Keep warm...Tara-a-bit x

The Big Freeze (Again)

Well we were promised the white stuff again and it dutifully arrived this morning! everything looks very pretty and it has been snowing on and off most of the day here so, as we live on a hill i parked my car at the bottom of the road when i came home at lunch time and have dug my wellies out of the shed so that i am prepared to either catch the bus to work in the morning (don't think it will come to that) or walk to my car without getting my feet wet!

My eldest daughter phoned this morning to say that she was stuck in Nottingham, she had been on a girly weekend to Centre Parks with 4 friends, they went to her car this morning to come back and the battery was completely dead! They were trying to find a security guard to see if they would jump start it for her when she phoned. About an hour ago she called again to say that they found the security guard but they wouldn't jump start the car in case they did any damage!!!! can you believe that?? Health & Safety madness! i suppose they wanted a risk assessment produced first! One of the girls had to phone her dad in the end who was working about 15 miles away and he has gone over to get them going. I just hope they don't come across any delays now because of the weather.

I have a finish to show! the first this year! my SAL ornament, and it's very appropriate for today too lol. I chose an Rainbow Gallery Freebie for January, but in hind sight i should have chosen a different coloured fabric, never mind, it's stopping with me so won't really matter!

I haven't got round to making it up, i had some fabric squares somewhere that i bought when we went to Cyprus in October, and one of them would have been just right, but they must have been swallowed by the house because i can't find them anywhere!
My LK is almost finished , just the boarder to work and i stitched almost half of yesterday, i will show piccies once it's all done.

I'm Having A Give Away!

According to my blogger profile i have been a member here for two years now, so as i have been having a sort out i thought i would have my first give away :-) I have far too may stitching magazines so these are the first two up for grabs.

Issue 140 & 146 of the World of Cross Stitching. They are both unmarked so if you would like to be in the draw for them please leave a comment saying that you wish to be included and i will pull names from the 'hat' on Saturday (7th). Don't forget to either leave me your e-mail address or link to your blog. I will be putting another two magazines up next Sunday.

Enjoy the snow, and keep warm :-) Tara-a-bit x

Traveling The World

By way of blogs that is!

There really are some lovely blogs in blog land; and it amazes me how many stitching projects people manage to get finished & framed or made into the most lovely things. I have not managed to finish ONE thing yet this year, and i only have 2 on the go!, OK they are almost there but it leaves me wondering how people find the time, I'm exhausted just reading the blog posts, lol. That's another thing, most stitchers seem to have WIP's going on everywhere, how do you keep track! I have thought of doing a rotation and having a few on the go but then i just feel that I'm not achieving anything, I have come to the conclusion that i am a plodder lol, i think i work much better when i have one thing going on at a time, don't get me wrong, i have been a serial starter and must have wasted ££££'s over the years, the charts & materials were put to one side because i had seen another that i must do (sound familiar!) then i would come across them at a much later date and not feel the slightest inclination to carry on with them. Not anymore, I'm cured lol, i have the greatest admiration for you ladies out there that can keep several projects going at once and not loose interest (or the chart) but i think i will carry on with my plodding. So, as you will guess, i have no stitching to show you, (sigh), I have one more word to complete on my LK and a few more stitches to complete my monthly ornament SAL which i was hoping also to get made up before the end of the month, so perhaps next week.

On another note, we had a good weekend, OH and i decided to have a day in Bromsgrove (or rather i said i am fed up sitting in on Saturdays, we are going out for the day!) either way we found ourselves there and had a few pleasant hours browsing round the shops and came across a secondhand bookshop and guess what i found? Only the Bill Bryson book i have been looking for, The Lost Continent. It's not a first edition but a re-print of the 1989 London edition (which was when it was first printed) if that makes sense? plus it didn't have the £85 price tag! like i told OH, i saved him £80. Why's that said he? Because i would have paid that much eventually said I, he he.

I do have a book club edition of this particular book but they change with publications, so i shall keep that one too because it does have some nice photos included. I started reading Saturday night. In this book BB has been living in England for 10 years but has a yearning to return to his roots, he borrows his mothers Chevrolet and sets off on his travels through thirty eight states, keeping mainly to back roads and small towns, the book tells of his encounters along the way with the usual BB wit and observations. I had read a review a while ago that said they thought this book was just an excuse to make fun of America & Americans, i don't see it that way, (he makes fun of the UK and the English to), it's just his humour. Anyway...... OH had a couple of books too so we both came away happy. On the way back we made a detour and had a late lunch in a little country pub just to complete the day. It's not often we get to spend time together like that because he works away during the week so it made a really pleasant change. Hope you all had good weekends too.

Tara-a-bit x

Saturday update on life

I seem to have been falling behind with stitching a little this week, on Thursday i had to come home from work mid morning, i was feeling so sick with a pounding head no amount of cocodamol would take away, i went straight off to bed where i stayed till 7pm, didn't feel much better on Friday morning so called in sick and had a lazy day at home. Don't know where i picked the bug up from, but happily today i feel much better. The other thing that has been keeping me occupied is reading, but more about that later. This is my progress on my Lizzie Kate double flip it.

I'm enjoying working on this although it does seem to have been a long WIP. I've only got 2 more 'words' to stitch and the boarder and i will be offering the whole series of charts (minus charms of course) as a swap with anyone who has the whole series of any other LK double flip its, so if you would like to do this keep watching for the finish :-)
The other thing I'm working on at the moment is my monthly ornament SAL, i decided to stitch a Rainbow Gallery 'freebie'. I had thought initially that i would make this into a small pillow, but the finished piece is going to be too small for that i think, so looks like is will be a door hanging.

The reading I've been doing is Bill Bryson's Neither Here Nor There, (travels in Europe) I've been carrying this book around with me everywhere the last week, it's come to work with me to read in between phone calls (which have been a bit thin on the ground soon after the Christmas break). I get some strange looks from the lads when they come through reception and they find me tittering away to myself, they think I've finally lost the plot! . For those who have never read Bill Bryson be warned that you should never read his books in public for fear of laughing out load and being cast as a loony! Neither Here Nor There finds him traveling countries in Europe, it was one of his earlier books and i am finding it fascinating visiting different countries with him, one of them Yugoslavia, which of course is no longer and using their different currencies before the horrible Euro come to be, half the fun of going on holiday before the Euro was the fun of having foreign money, now all we get is the same 'chocolate' coins all across Europe. Anyway, i discovered one of his books one day whilst cleaning out a long forgotten cupboard, the book was called Down Under, his account of travelling around Australia, i was hooked! his wit, observations and description of his travels had me engrossed and wanting more! I think I've learned more about geography by reading BB books than i ever did at school!

DH works away during the week and came back one weekend with Made In America, i was thrilled to find when i opened it that it was a 1st edition and signed, how lucky was that! I have since been collecting BB books and have been looking for 1st edition prints. I've managed to find one more 1st edition that is signed , a couple of weeks ago i came across Notes From A Small Island on a book site on the Internet and treated myself to it. I have yet to read this one, but I'm sure its as good as the other reads. I am happy that i have two 1st editions that are signed, my others are 1st editions except for The Lost Continent which i was duped when buying, it is a book club edition which the seller failed to point out, i was very disappointed as this book was his first and is defiantly out of print, i have found a 1st edition of this book but i shall have to save for it as i cannot justify the £85 price tag at the moment!

I'll leave you now because I'm starting to sound like Bill Brysons agent, lol. Time to get some stitching done, might manage a couple of hours before tea time.

Thanks for stopping by...Tara-a-bit xx

I have no stitching to report on, i've been doing a bit of sorting out when i get home in the afternoon and before i've realsised the time it's been too late to start. At least i am getting to de-clutter! Next to sort is my stitchy mags, i have far too many, i hate to throw them away so i thought i might have a bit of a give-away on my blog, i'm not sure anyone would be interested though, what do you think?

If you have visited me here before you will have noticed that my cats feature quite a lot, they are my babies, lol, so when i came across this on someones blog i had to have a go! They got it spot on about the trusting bit! but 'sweet tempered'??? i think my DH would have a thing or two to say about that one, (he he!)

Til next time...Tara-a-bit x

You Are a Persian Cat

You are very high-maintenance, at least as far as keeping up your appearance goes. But you're surprisingly low-maintenance in every other aspect of your life. You are peaceful and sweet tempered. People enjoy your company. You are loving and a good companion, but it takes you a while to trust people.

What Breed of Cat Are You?