A perfectly peachy pinny

In true creative style, when I saw a cute tea towel at the charity shop I decided then and there that I just had to use it to make a pinny like the ones shown in the fabulicious Tiff and Rachelle's ultra fun crafty book, Granny Chic. If you haven't poked your nose into their handy dandy book yet, do go ahead, there are many peachy projects using pre-loved fabrics, braids and trims.

The finished pinny

Here are examples of the fun Granny Chic pinnies!

The tea towel cost me the princely sum of 30p, and together with an embroidered lacy doily (20p) taken from my huge stash of vintage lacy doilies, tray napkins and table cloths, and a piece of lace and some bias binding from my crafty drawer, I set to making my very own pinny. Oh, and I do really have a few, I confess to being a bit of a magpie when I see such handsome pieces of hand crafted loveliness in a forlorn bargain bin in thrift and charity shops! I may not have an immediate use for such treasures, yet they somehow find their sneaky way home and join my fabric stash, with the premise that such a grand piece of history will somehow weave its delicateness into a future crafty endeavour.

Starting with the tea towel 'Wedding Anniversaries'. It has the look of an embroidered sample and is made of linen.

A doily which is folded over and sown on the tea towel making a pocket

Lace is added to the bottom, and then bias binding is added to make ties

And hey presto the finished article! And in Tiff's words - I immediately felt peachier about my daily chores, because how can you not - in such a pretty pinny :o)

As you can see I am quite partial to a pretty doily or two, and change my little displays regularly, adding seasonal flowers and quirky items to create a colour themed corner.

Hope you have a crafty moment or two this week!

Easter decor

It's Sunday eve, and two weeks have passed since Easter. The boys are back to school tomorrow. It's been a hectic two weeks, fitting work and a trip to Grandparents in, together with keeping the boys entertained, so the blog has been put to one side. So to start with...here's with some Easter decor.

 

I bought a couple of pots of  Muscari a few weeks back, and kept them in the greenhouse until they were close to flowering. Muscari are perennial bulbous plants native to Eurasia that produce spikes of dense, usually blue flowers, and are commonly known as Grape Hyacinth.

I have kept Easter cards that the children have made over several years, and displayed them with a cute little chick eggcup.

 

Bunting was made using hessian and stamping words and pictures on, very simple and rustic. And, of course, the usual egg tree was put together with blown painted eggs, chickens and other Easter bits collected over the years.

I also made a little nest as a centre piece for the table. I collected some fallen birch twigs when I was out walking the dog, together with a few lacey pieces of lichen. I added some little eggs and a chick and finished it off with a peppering of fluffy feathers.

Muscari look so pretty in a metallic pot, and can be planted in the garden once they have finished flowering.

These lovely painted eggs were picked up in a thrift shop some years ago, and I like them so much that they don't actually get packed away with the Easter decorations, but are kept on display in a cabinet the rest of the year.

And, of course, the Easter cake! It was made by Sam, with help from his teacher at school. This treat was enjoyed at our family get-together and was quite yummy!


Have a good (and thankfully warmer!) week ahead!

Newcastle in monochrome..

I ventured up north to Newcastle to give a talk at the North of England Beekeepers Convention, and found an hour to have a quick wander around this rather lovely city. The architecture is quite striking, a mix of beautiful old limestone buildings, but with a juxtaposition of modern, but artful, structures. Here are a few photographs which I have posted in monochrome, as the subject matter lends itself to it so well. Enjoy!

On the way home!

Hope you are having a nice weekend!

The Egg Box

I love spring, the promise of warmer, sunnier days, although this year they have been somewhat absent, but we live in hope that spring is surely just around the corner.

And one of the nice things about spring is the enthusiasm with which this time of the year is greeted by our twittering feathered friends. Their optimism inspired me to make a little display made from an old box which has been languishing in the loft, broken and unloved. It previously had semi-precious gemstones and pretty rocks in, and was in desperate need of a little TLC.

I started by taking the box to pieces before painting it with several coats of white emulsion. I then decided to splatter the box with darker blotches to imitate the spottiness of eggs, so out came the box of acrylic paints!

And using the bristles of a paint brush I flickered paint onto the wood, and finished the woodwork off with a couple of light coats of varnish, and then assembled the box.

An old book on birds' nests and eggs (I love these kind of books), painted to scale, provided the perfect picture to scan and print onto computer watercolour (slightly textured) paper. Then it was just a case of carefully cutting around the eggs and the names of the corresponding bird, and arrange all the pieces on the backing board, which I had wrapped in handmade paper.

Using tiny foam pads (from a packet of 200 obtained from a stationers) acting not only to attach the egg to the backing board, but also to raise the individual eggs slightly to give them a three dimensional effect. Since it has been illegal to take the eggs of most wild birds since the Protection of Birds Act 1954 and it is illegal to be in the possession of any wild birds' eggs taken since that time under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, this is the closest I'll get to having my own collection of eggs. I love all the colour variations.

And it sits nicely in a spring display!

I have since seen a photo in a life style magazine showing a framed picture of another egg 'collection' where the artist had made the eggs by cutting them out of old maps. It's a nice picture, although I wouldn't spend £600 on it, and actually I think I prefer my own creation :o)

Happy Sunday to you!

Love is in the air

It's that time of the year again when the pond starts to fill up with new life.  The sound of amorous frogs (Rana temporaria) is quite amusingly loud, especially in the evenings, and whereas the rest of the garden still looks rather drab and uninviting with few blossoms and leaves, the pond is quite green and springing (haha literally!) into life. Sadly few of the many frogspawn survive to full adulthood, this is presumably why the frogs invest so much into producing so many offspring.

The common frog is usually more active at night, though it can be seen during the day too. They become sexually mature at about 3 years old. During February and March the frogs emerge from hibernation and journey to their chosen breeding pond. They have been known to return to the same breeding ground each year.

The male frogs usually reach the breeding ponds before the females, and they attempt the attract a female frog by making a low purring croaking sound, like this:

A successful male will wrap his forelimbs around the female in a mating embrace known as 'amplexus'.  Each female lays 1000-4000 eggs at a time, which are fertilised by the male as they are released.

The frogspawn is encased in a jelly-like substance which protects the little embryos. Depending on the  weather conditions, two to four weeks later the tadpoles will hatch out.

After around 16 weeks the tadpoles start to grow back legs, followed by front legs. When they have fully absorbed their tails they leave the water as tiny froglets, usually in early summer but sometimes as late as September. I for one can't wait to follow their progress this year!
Frogs are a great natural slug deterrent - every gardener should favour a few of these hopping about the borders. Do you have frogs in your garden?

Perhaps you'd like to help with the Million Ponds Project? This Project will create an extensive network of new ponds across the UK. Ultimately the aim is to reverse a century of pond loss, ensuring that once again the UK has over one million countryside ponds. For more information go to the Pond Conservation website.

In the meantime, enjoy one of nature's spring marvels!

Motoring down to the museum

Kattegat's husband here again, let loose with another guest blog post. That's because BB and I were allowed, whilst on holiday in the Cotswolds, to venture into that boy's own domain, the motor museum.

From the outside it looked, well, modest is a good word. As in, maybe too modest to fit a whole car inside. But much like the TARDIS, it must be significantly bigger on the inside, because its seven rooms house a fantastic collection of vehicles and motoring memorabilia.

All the cars had 'drivers'

The rooms are themed according to age, with the earliest cars in the first room, so following the winding route through the building is like traveling forward in time. And although there were, necessarily, a limited number of cars, there were some crackers and every inch of available space was being utilised.

Ooh, I do like a nice Jag!

As well as cars, there were motorbikes and even some caravans, kitted out inside with appropriate period fittings and paraphernalia.

Inside one of the caravans

All in all, both BB and I were very impressed, and it was fun to go round with him comparing notes on the relative merits of the various cars.

'Mod corner', in the 60s and 70s room

I had one of these! Same colour, too.

Ford cars through the ages, both British and American, in miniature

If you find yourself in Bourton on the Water, check out the Cotswold Motoring Museum & Toy Collection - well worth a visit.