Favourite Quotes

" When I can no longer create anything, I'll be done for"
Coco Chanel



Ups and downs

Well, August has turned out to be a month of highs and lows in every area of life. My health has been bad and the heat has been unbearable, but the flip side of that is I have been indoors in the aircon amusing myself with lots of lovely craft.
Apart from crafting, I also do my Family Tree in spurts and while I was browsing through some old photos to catalogue I came across some gorgeous pics my father had taken at the seaside when I was little. So I was inspired to get out my seaside stamps and do a scrapbook style card for my brothers birthday (exactly a week after mine) It is winging its way to the UK right now..

On the scrapbooking front, I have been very busy with more pages for Noah's book as I can deliver them in person in a couple of weeks!




I have also done a couple of pages for my daughters Family Tree scrapbook, but no pics yet I'm afraid.
I've been busy on the card front too, trying to find new things to teach at Craft Club when we start again in September. I LOVE stamping, but not everyone in the club does, so I have to push myself to think of other techniques to do. Here are two sample cards using peel off flower stickers  (from Dawn Bibby) cut out of pretty papers I had in my stash.

 The top one is done using white stickers and a mauve theme and the one on the right is more blue in tone and done with sliver stickers, not easy to see on these scans, but they do look pretty in the flesh. I hope the girls enjoy doing these!












A blog that I look at frequently is written by a lovely American lady called Sue Wilson, who demonstrates how to use Spellbinders dies on Create and Craft regularly. Today she has posted a gorgeous card and the instructions on how to make the flowers here

Aren't they gorgeous? So realistic looking too. Soooooo..... I'm going to try them out this week. Will let you see the results next time.
On the garden front, a little miracle, remember I posted back in the Spring about an hibiscus that was almost dead, but showing one little green shoot? Well finally, months later, here is the flower!

And the fig tree is producing hundreds of these beauties........yummy!

I've cooked some in Amaretto and frozen them for the winter as there are so many.
On the down side I have no knitting or crochet to show you this time, its just been too hot to hold any yarn in my hands, but I have been browsing patterns and planning my winter knitting, nice!
Because I was feeling so rough on my Birthday last week I didn't go to the beach for the day as is my habit, but I did get treated to a lovely fillet steak in the evening at one of the best restaurants in the area
The best present I had though was the news that I am to be a grandma again! Whoop, whoop, now all the baby patterns will be out again, so excited. Don't know the sex yet but I plan to make a neutral coloured sleeping bag (or bunting as the Americans call it) first.
So......I think the highs outweighed the lows after all.
Until next time, take care.
XXX


and the heat is on....

Yep Summer has arrived with a capital S! Too hot to do anything in the afternoons and I need a fan on in the evening to be able to knit. Thank goodness for air-con or sleep would be impossible In June we had July weather early, wished we could have done a swap with the UK, I would have loved some rain and cold winds (then and now!) and they would love some sun! Oh well, there are some benefits, freshly made lemonade from home grown lemons, swimming in the pool, eating every meal outside, gorgeous produce in the market.... no I won't make my UK friends any more jealous...but I think you have had some Summer now?
Did you see all the fuss about a lady knitting at Andy Murray's tennis match at Wimbledon? I was totally with her, I was knitting furiously all through it to help the nerves! Such a shame her lost the final, but this afternoon he has just got a gold medal to make up for it.

On to the flowers around the house right now, hibiscus

Gorgeous rose called ' Parade'


 Pink verbena I think and white petunia

Yep, lots of pink, but there are other colours coming along too.
I started this entry in June would you believe, life has just been too busy and I haven't been able to gather my thoughts into any sort of order for weeks! The heat has been really knocking me out, I had a tummy bug two weeks ago and I have now developed shingles, so I'm hiding in the aircon and being very lazy until the pain and itching subsides.
I haven't been totally idle though, here are some of the projects I've completed recently
Crocodile stitch bag


close up
I am absolutely delighted  at how this has turned out, it was from a free pattern from the Bernat website called Mermaid tears purse. I used 4ply 100% wool from Kauni in rainbow colourway and used a 3mm hook, so the bag is smaller than the original pattern, but the colours are gorgeous! I wasn't sure about the flower, but it has grown on me!
Next up cards..

A wedding card using Chloe's heart stamp on vellum and glittered and embellished with pearls. 


another from Chloe's stamps, the dandylion stamp, again on vellum, its very glittery but you can't see that in this pic

Playing with my peg stamps from Cardi-o this time and a Clarity stamp greeting, love doing these, will be doing more samples for Craft club ideas for next term,

Pretty poppy stamp from Hobby Art this time, coloured with Promarkers, lovely to do.


and finally my little pickle was 2 in July so this was what I did for him. He loves London buses so it was a very patriotic theme this time!

I finally finished my rug hooked cushion, the delay was finding the right backing fabric and i hate doing piping, but I got down to it eventually.

On the knitting front I have been making a denim jacket for Noah and a matching outfit for his teddy Barney



Cute eh? Just love doing tiny things, such fun and he really loves his teddy so its not a waste of time and effort. There are more scapbooking pages on the way, but will not be revealed until I've taken them over in September.
I'll leave you a picture of my Datura in full bloom, spectacular, I promise I won't leave it so long next time!


PS, here is one of my WIP's a scarf from the lovely alapaca yarn my daughter brought me all the way from Peru....