sneak peeks

I love looking a photos of other peoples homes and know there is a flicker group called corners of my home which I have spent many an hour looking at when I probably should of been doing something else! I thought my post today would be what I would like to see on a blog, so here goes.....

 My bedroom, I made the patchwork bedspread, the cushions, the bunting, headboard, crochet blanket (just seen on bed)

 youngest sons bedroom, we just decorated it recently, it did have a full jungle mural that I painted for him but now he is a bit older and for ease I just painted everything antique cream, this is a tree he brought home from the park 3 years ago, he's got birds, dreamcatchers he's made, beaded strings and his last two cuddly toys in it.

 another bit of youngest son's room, he loves collecting things, especially warhammer

 middle sons bedroom, he loves bionicles and xbox games!

 our tiny kitchen, I'm guessing in the past it was actually a pantry as it's so small, I'm actually stood at the door taking this photo!

 welcome to out hallway, note the cath kidston bags...all freebies with magazines, I would just love a real one ;) .The indian bridal hanging came of ebay, it's so lovely, full of embroidery...

Up our stairs, all paintings done by me at various times, our walls have been painted all sorts of colours over the years but now I'm doing something I thought I would never do and that's paint everywhere antique cream, it looks so much calmer and tidy, but I do love colour so much. I love all sorts of styles too, shabby chic, retro glam, art deco, all eras, in fact I have always thought how cool it would be to own a street of houses and decorate each one, filling it with furniture of each time period and then when the feeling takes you could stay in the 40s house, or live it up in the 70's house etc. Which interiors period do you love?

This site is so worth checking out for this unusual and very awesome house

before and after.....

Ha! I haven't disappeared although most of you probably thought I had seen as though it has been so long since I last posted anything, I have been extra busy with new boilers, new windows, decorating, having sunny day fun and my mum is 67 and has osteoporosis, she fell in her kitchen and fractured her pelvis, broke her thigh bone in 2 places, shattered her knee cap and fractured her shin bone, she has been in hospital for a couple of weeks having operations and then went to a rehabilitation hospital where she left yesterday, she is now at home with lots of walking aids and hopefully on the mend. She has drove me nuts, I have been having terrible nightmares, running about up to the hospital which is an hour both ways on the bus and generally feeling tired out. That's mainly why even though I have been reading all your lovely blogs I haven't had the energy to update my own, but today is the day when things are not as hectic so I can bring you all up to speed. Big breath and relax......

Right so I'm not sure if you remember many moons ago I was decorating/doing up our lounge, well it's done at last, I love it, such a peaceful space, to read and knit. I have done before and after pics so you can get the idea of what a transformation it is: cast iron fireplace was definitely for keeps after the trouble we had putting it in!

after many hours and hard work and weeks of saving up it was finally ready....

Wallpaper from B & Q's Eco range - very tricky to hang, scratched really easily, paint by Crown's breath easy range, hardly any odour and very low VOC's. We used antique cream on the walls and cotton white on the woodwork. Went on really easily, would use again.

Black chandelier from B & Q half price in the sale, I made the curtains by using up some lovely thick upholstery fabrics with a edge border of brown satin and black flocked leaves. I made the tie backs with silver shot silk fabric and silver beads on chain.

Tom made the TV cabinet right across the bay window, using our local wood shop and FSC wood which they had to order in! underneath is a great storage area.




Cosy reading corner, armchair and sofa from DFS, the first ever brand new sofa I have ever owned, it was such a thrill when it finally came after 5 weeks wait, they really couldn't understand why we didn't want stain protection on it though, even after I had explained the chemicals involved and the health issues attached to them. It is a shame that the whole thing couldn't be free from chemicals, but you can only do your best I suppose. Blanket knitted by me, half finished, lovely and thick with 5 types of wool and size 12 bamboo needles.

Some soy candles, cosy cushions and pictures (made by me) and a lovely pure wool carpet, no stain protection on that either, we also have wool fleece underlay so that is as natural as it gets. I'm glad our formaldehyde laden laminate has been thrown out, the carpet is so warm on your feet.



Scrumptious chenille covers, the armchair looks much bigger in real life, how strange! Really good for falling asleep on!. Even though it took a while it has been really worth it, I have been given the incentive to carry on and do the rest of the house now.

Tut, Tut I should be working!

Oh dear, Ive done it again.... I am meant to be working on getting more things made for my grand opening of my new online shop but things have been so busy around here lately, at the moment our grand idea of moving has been called to a halt, it was driving us mad not being able to find somewhere so for now we are staying put and to cheer ourselves up we have started gutting and re-decorating our lounge. We have a lovely sofa coming soon, I'm really excited as this is my first ever brand new sofa, the sales man that dealt with me seemed astounded that I didn't want stain protection spraying all over it though, he had that "your one of the weirdo's" look about him after that, especially after I explained about how toxic it is. Every other one I have had I found in a second hand shop or antique dealers.

We have started painting with some great low odour B and Q Eco friendly range paint and I'm loving the creamy buttermilk colour we have chosen, normally I'm a bright mix it up kinda girl but this time we are going all grown up plain serious!!, I'm sure I will be adding my own twist though. We have finally sourced a natural/ chemical free option for the floor, this has been tricky to do and I was very surprised how un-enlightened the carpet store sales people are at knowing about natural flooring even though they stock it. We are hoping now to find a local fitter or I can imagine some cursing going on if we try and lay it. I got a gorgeous light fitting in the sale, it was half price and is just the thing I was looking for. When it is finally complete I will show before and after pics, I love looking at those on the living etc site!

My mum is moving on Monday so I have been helping her too, the chickens are still waking us all early on and I have been so tired lots of nights we have gone to bed straight after the children. So in between all that and general life I have been tirelessly making, my lovely sewing machine has not stopped.

Right now I meant to be making but I came on the computer as you do to catch up and started browsing and found this shop in London.....

Look at how delightful these mugs are, oh my god its more Moomins!!! I adore the pink one but at £15 each I would be a bit worried about breaking them, I can dream though.... This gorgeous children's lamp also caught my eye, how magical and cosy it looks, in fact sod the children's room I would love this myself, I could pretend fairy's live in it and it glows from the fairy fire that they light to toast tiny crumpets on..... and now I must be tired as I'm revealing my true nonsensical thoughts to you all!

Have fun dear readers in whatever your busy days ahead bring oh and keep smiling, especially if you live in Blackpool like me and all the bus routes have changed and what should be a 10 minute journey home lasts an hour and you end up far far away from home because the crappy bus driver didn't mention without warning all the routes have changed! xx

Tick tock....

How does time go soooo quickly, I really do try to keep up with blogging but before I know it a couple of weeks or even months have past, I would like to wish for 3 more hours a night please ( I get more done then when all is quiet), anyway I have been busy doing an art day for our home school group which went really well, knitting lots of hats and I'm doing a gorgeous bright pink mohair scarf for me now on huge size 12 wooden needles - I love them, I have been having a big clear out and putting loads of stuff on free cycle in anticipation of moving, we want to move this year, as soon as possible really, to somewhere more green and country like, I'm trying to be a natural woman in an urban environment and we have finally had all we can take, I want a big garden to grow more stuff in and so the boys can have a wooden den with room to have adventures outdoors, I know how much my fellow would love a room to work in that's not our bedroom too, we rent now so it shouldn't be a big thing moving its just finding a house were having trouble with!

Onto other things... we had a day out in Lytham and I went to one of my favorite shops "Fresh" and saw this amazing dresser. I umed and arghed and bought it!

I adore it so much, the bottom cupboard is full of my sewing things, the drawer is great for art paper and I have little pots of buttons and beads on the shelf, each time I come in the room it makes me smile. I got talking to the lady who owns the shop and I'm going to make some sewn items for her to sell, excited that my stuff is going into another outlet.

I'm also half way through doing a website - oh my god, it has been tedious and takes me ages to do, I keep avoiding it and doing other things instead, I think I'm best setting myself an imaginary deadline and it may make me more motivated, I will be selling handmade items for the home, handmade gifts, organic toiletries, essential oils, fair trade products and natural items, some of my things arrived today so the front room smells lovely, here's a little sneak preview....

Hope everyone had a nice valentines and imbolc, we spent both at home together enjoying each others company xx

springish clean

Something has happened to me, I'm not sure when or how it transpired but I have been cleaning, I mean real chuck out all your crap cleaning, paint over the mucky patches cleaning -something which I am not normally accustomed to do. I do tidy round a bit and hoover if someones coming, if its the parents we yell "action stations" to the boys and we all run around the house like idiots, when they arrive we usher them into a room we have tidied and make sure the other doors are blocked by a human so they can't just "pop in" to them. But this tires me, in fact I hate going to other peoples houses that are all lovely and tidy because it makes me feel guilty.. guilty that I spend too much time sewing, baking, reading, playing games, reading blogs about other peoples houses, gardening, going out on trips, just living really, but then as if by magic something came over me, it started with my sewing/dining/computer/home school room. Since Christmas was over and I didn't have the excuse of being in the middle of present making something had to be done, I spent 2 days- yes you read that correctly TWO DAYS cleaning, sorting, faffing about with it. I was so happy on the third day I came down to put breakfast on the table and it was a joy to go in because I kinda just for a moment forgot it was tidy, its lovely. I wanted to share my best bits, 1. because I love it, 2. because in the future if I lapse I can look on here at how tidy it was and 3. because for just this once someone else in blog land can look at my blog and see a nice tidy room. My sewing corner, taken at night but it isn't that dark in real life, I can see to sew.....

here it is in daylight, my CD collection is right behind my chair so I don't have to get up to swap them and out of shot at the bottom is my vinyl collection, my BF built the shelves bless him....

another corner that has oodles of buttons, jars, card toppers, ribbon, craft books etc...

My collection of suitcases, the bottom one was my dads from the war years, they are full of either stuff made and ready to sell or embellishment and lavender, my inspiration board sits happily next to them....

our table, again its not this dark, just think I'm a bit naff with the camera, so glad I started this clean up, I keep putting my stuff on free cycle and taking bags to the charity shop and trying to get over the thought of "ooh it might come in handy one day"!.

Must go and get ready for knit and natter group which I'm loving , ta ta for now x

spring chicks and smiles

Happy spring!

Each morning when the sun peeps through the curtains I actually feel happy to be getting up, those dreary dull winter mornings where snuggling in bed is the only option have given way to a warm sunny feeling where clean sheets drying on the line and daffodils dancing in the breeze come to mind. For mothers day I got these beautiful daffodils that now grace the mantelpiece making me smile each time I look at them, not just because I love daffs but because my boys faces when giving them to me along with handmade cards and a cuppa in bed spring to mind as well. I finished another embroidery and framed this one, this is also on the mantle and if I ever get turn into a thread girl I shall live in this little cottage with my hen and lots of flowers!

The material used for the house is from Japan and I love it!

Oh my how fast do chicks grow?

ours are now a week and 2 days old, they have grown so much, they have wings, each chick has various size wings and one has a tail feather coming which looks really funny, they try and fly every time we open the lid on the box and are really strong pushing with their legs when you pick them up, each chick has its own personality too.

There is a dominant one who is the biggest called Frank (even though we think its a girl), Frank chirps the loudest and flaps a lot. Then there is Mash the middle one who's wings are not quite as big as Franks but tries to escape at every opportunity, likes to rip off the paper towels that line the box and run around with a bit in her beak so the others chase her!

and last the smallest fluffy one I called Katy Perry, she is adorable and if you pick her up and whisper shhh shhh near her head she falls asleep. When we take her out of the box to hold her Frank and Mash go mad chirping really loudly.

We think its great fun having the chicks and a real learning curve for all of us not just the boys.

They don't half poop a lot though, we seem to clean out the bedding twice a day and they just keep on pooping, it brings the reality of intensely reared chickens and the amount of crap they stand in home, thank god we changed to eating free range/free to roam chickens.

since this pic was taken 2 days ago the wings are much bigger!

Has it really been that long...

I didn't realise how time can go by so quickly without posting on a blog, I'm not very good at keeping up with things and often start projects and never finish them, so I guess that's why there has been no posting since august.
I have always wanted a few things in life from being a teen and one of them was a cast iron fire, I wont go into the hassle of finding one then trying frantically to get the money together to buy it but I will tell you about the disasters that followed...
In my wisdom as I'm quite handy I thought it would be OK for us to install it ourselves, so we read up on the net and looked at books on what to do, then late one night I picked up the hammer (the neighbours were out) and started taking off the plaster, I was getting quite carried away and enjoyed the hammering until I realised that there was a big hole in the wall where bricks should of been, I kept going to see where the Lintel was, but there was no lintel, at some point half the chimney must of fallen down (before we moved in) and a bad builder had botched up the hole with bits of brick just pushed in.

We had to get someone in to sort it out, which put the cost up even more. We needed to get extra things which we hadn't even thought of and it took a while until it was in and sorted.
So we thought, since it has been installed the chimney sweep came out and supposedly cleaned the chimney, that night a whole ton of soot came down the chimney and covered everything in black ash, so he came back the next day and did it again... guess what happened a couple of days after that, yep more soot came down, I was pretty peed off by this point, but kept thinking how lucky we were to have an open fire. Then the big day arrived of lighting the fire (we had to wait for the cement to dry). Packed it all up, got it going and loads of smoke kept pouring into the room from around the edge of the tiles. Nightmare, so the builder came and said we needed a higher chimney, he climbed up and took the old one off but then couldn't reach to cement the new one in place!. It has been trying to say the least, lovely to look at but it cost a lot more than we bargained for and it was meant to be saving money in the long run not having to pay the extortionate gas prices.
The only thing we did frugally on this project was our homemade coal shed. We got a free large compost bin off the council and a free hardwood pallet with a board already fixed on from the local shop and fixed the bin to the pallet with L brackets, so the coal man (bottomleys) just comes and tips the bags in the top and we get our coal out of the front composting door.




Now it looks lovely when its going and for all the trouble each time I pass the door and see the fire it makes me happy in spite of how much and how long its taken to get it working.

Happy, happy, joy, joy

This week I have mainly been getting into embroidery, I found my embroidery hoop whilst tidying out a cupboard - it has rained a lot here so I had to find something to do! I haven't used it since I was at college and had a white vintage sheet that warhammer paint spilt on some of it so instead of throwing it out i have been making cushions, this little birdie was too lovely to use for a cushion so I framed him instead.

Meet Henry the applique owl, he is my first cushion I made, I got the lovely retro ribbon from a little craft shop in my town, its full of all sorts of pretties and very inexpensive, I spend way too long browsing for things in it, so my boys tell me!

This one is for my mum, she adores flowers and I wanted to make her something really pretty so I edged it with vintage lace and pearl beads. I have added beadwork to the embroidery too and Im really pleased with the result, she is coming over tommorrow to collect it, she only knows I have made her something so i hope she will like it.

Sometimes as a mum it can all get you down with the kids arguing, the constant "I'm Bored" and the whinging but then things like this happen and it makes the day so much brighter. There was a shout of "Mummm" from the front room, and as I hear that at least a few hundred times a day, I wondered what it was this time, so imagine my suprise and overwhelming joy when my little guy had made me this out of bluetack!

I just had to get a picture, he was so pleased with himself for making me smile so much, but he makes me smile lots of times everyday, he says the funniest things that have us in fits of laughter, things like after playing with water "mum, do i have blood shock eyes?", or when we was having a serious grown up talk about the future I asked him what he wants to be when he grows up and he said after much contemplation " a tortoise". Its the little things like this that makes me so proud to be a mum and makes all the whinging worthwhile.

All things gorgeous

I just love anything for my kitchen at the moment and usually buy things just to put on the dresser and look at, but this juicer i could actually look at and use woo hoo! These come from another site i dream over quite a lot, check out the rugs they are divine.

oh my i love this egg cup, what a lovely way to brighten up boiled eggs! At £4.19 its a little treat to put a smile on my face - note to any family reading i want one please!

Look at the fab cushions i found today when i was having a tea break - ok really i was just being a bit lazy whilst the boys played outside at a great game called capture the flag with the neighbours children, this is the second day they have played it, i joined in yesterday and its great fun although im sure some of them cheat!

this Clarissa the cat cushion made by jane claire is available from a great website called not on the high street where you can find unusual items for your home, this one is £54.95 which is a bit too much for me to pay but i can dream or try and make something similar.

I adore this one even more, just look at the gingham!! Woodland floral is by the same designer and so cute.

Shhh! im a year older

Well today it was my birthday and to be honest birthdays dont really bother me too much except obviously im getting older and according to my 10 yr old now im 32 i cant pull silly faces anymore- im meant to be a grown up!

I did have a lovely day though, apart from being woken up by two scrapping boys, still dont know what they find to argue about but anyway, after looking at my lovely handmade cards i got a special treat of scrambled eggs and toast in bed, this to me is a treat as it reminded me of being a kid, my mum always gave us scrambled eggs in bed after being poorly but today i didnt have to be recovering from an illness.

I popped into town after a lazy morning and bought myself (out of my birthday money off my mum) this gorgeous teapot from Whittards how cute are the ladybirds!

I also was a little naughty and spent the rest of the money on cakes and croissants and real butter from marks and spencer - this is to me another treat as i havent shopped in there for food for ages. Then my day ended with a scrumptious curry made by my lovely fella. Unfortunately me and the boys then watched the second part of flood ( a disaster drama on ITV) i spent most of the time trying to reassure them if a flood of that scale really happened we would be ok because i shall buy a boat off ebay and keep it in the attic - they didnt believe me because i never venture into the attic - i hate attics. Anyway i guess now at least one of them will wake up in the night crying and thinking weve been flooded!!

Native American day and tadpoles!

Wow, what a great day we had today, full of suprises. The boys got their first letters off their new penpals from America this morning, so they were excited as the penpals are home schooled too.
Then we had a look at the tadpoles we collected a few weeks ago to see if they had grown and they now have back legs, whilst looking at the tadpoles we spotted a frog, he must of returned from last year and lots of big water snails. On the downside we spotted a hole in the pond liner so that will have to be fixed, thankfully its near the top so the water hasnt leaked out.

After a question by my youngest about why didnt the cowboys and native americans live together in peace, we ended up having a long chat and listening to native american music and learning all about what really happened, we have a native american friend on the net thats been really wonderful. The boys then started on their crafts

This is half way through, they made shields, tommahawks, necklaces, wristbands and head bands, they learned about the picture symbols they used and decorated the headbands to tell the story of our family through the pictures.

we also made popcorn and i told the native american story about the spirits in popcorn.

The folklore of some Native American tribes told of spirits who lived inside each kernel of popcorn. The spirits were quiet and content to live on their own, but grew angry if their houses were heated. The hotter their homes became, the angrier they'd get - shaking the kernels until the heat was too much. Finally, they would burst out of their homes and into the air as a disgruntled puff of steam.

The boys played for ages after and they posed for this picture as they crossed weapon sign is the sign for freindship.

Hopefully we are going to make a teepee later on this week and carry on learning about Native Americans.

I found a great site full of games, recipes, stories, beadwork, arts and loads of other really interesting things. http://www.nativetech.org/ My boys loved it.