Bournemouth

The Boy has started training for two triathlons this summer and has been on desperate lookout for a road bike.  So I was rudely awakened on Saturday morning with "I've bought a bike on eBay so am going to Bournemouth to collect it"!  I managed to persuade him that it was such a beautiful day that we should go to the beach as well.  Apparently the thought hadn't occurred to him!!!

So here are a few pictures from our beautiful March beach trip.  Now I just need the weather to hold for my photoshoot in April!  Off to tackle the garden now, then going to bake some banana bread, and hopefully some time to carry on with my quilt.

Enjoy the sunshine!xx

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to my fabulous Mummy!

We had a joint brother's birthday/Mother's day combo yesterday, so here are some very quick piccies below of the present I made for her.  One Kilner jar filled with fabric and ribbons, preserving disc removed and pincushion in the lid:

And now out for lunch with The Boy's Mum!

What's the fastest cake in the world?

....Scone!  That joke still makes me chuckle, so here's a picture of the scones I made last weekend.

Teeny tiny miniature scones.  With clotted cream and raspberry jam.  So these are the good batch (the five that wouldn't fit on the tray of the first batch).  The first batch (of 18) got a little toasted.  And by a little, I mean a lot!  'Preheat oven to 200 degrees' was somehow interpreted by my feeble brain to mean 'preheat oven to max and cremate the scones'.  Oops!  But this lot were pretty good actually.

What to burn - I mean, BAKE - next? 

Sewing-wise, I've still been piecing together my Blue Lagoon quilt.  I've got all my calico rectangles joined to my four patch squares, and I've got all my individual squares cut up.  Now just to cut the remaining calico and I might have some actual quilting to do!

So until I've cut the rest of the calico, I sat and methodically planned where to put all my four patches.   They were predominantly red, so every set of yellow squares and blue squares is now paired to a red, and the leftover reds are paired with reds (obviously!).  So now I just have to sew the rest of them to each other to finish my rows.  Providing I don't lose my colour chart to remember which order to put them in!

And then once I've finished the rows, I'll put a picture up.  Now, I'm off to scoff the second Creme Egg of the season with a gigantic cuppa!

Birdy Bag

Well it doesn't look like spring's coming to Oxfordshire any time soon.  We've got a lovely mix of rain and snow coming down at the moment, so no glorious sunshine like last weekend.  Looks like the spring wardrobe is going to have to wait a while for its first outing!

So to cheer myself up yesterday I broke open the hot chocolate, and got cracking on my Lotta Jansdotter All Day Tote.  With fabulous results!  I used the bird fabric Mum bought in Malvern, and there's still just under half a metre left for something else.

The terrifying cutting up of all the pieces taken care of:

And the final bag:

Complete with magazine pouch and flask pocket

And interior pockets...

And key chain

I think I've been annoying The Boy with how excited I am about it, but he can't be that annoyed as he agreed to take the photos!  So I'm feeling incredibly positive about it, and not feeling quite "Sew Useless" as before.  It's still going to take some serious bravery to attempt the skirt though!

I've also finally finished piecing together all my four patch squares for my Blue Lagoon quilt.

Just starting on creating my rows now, but still lots of cutting of the calico to go.  More stealing Mum's rotary cutter!

I'm going to attempt making some soda bread now - got to use up the leftover buttermilk from the pink velvet cupcakes.  And then I might even make some scones.  First time for both of them, so really going all out with trying new things this weekend!  Will report back soon on how they both went x

Lots of pretty things

So it's been a pretty busy couple of weeks but I've got lots of nice pictures out of it!  First of all I baked chocolate biscuits for Valentine's day.  The recipe was for Two Chocolate Zebras from The Great British Bake Off book - dark chocolate and white chocolate.  Except I kept my two doughs separate, made little hearts and then sandwiched them together with a suitably Valentine'sy pink buttercream.

Last weekend Mum and I finally got round to starting on the hare.  We cut and stuffed all our pieces, but didn't have a doll needle to do the button joints.  So, this is what he looks like so far....

Not looking especially hare like just yet!  But if you hold all the pieces together you can imagine it.  Sort of!

And then a little more baking.  This time it was for my manager's 40th birthday surprise.  She's a great fan of pink, and I had a giant cup and saucer that I knew would be perfect for something.  So I made pink velvet cupcakes (Hummingbird Bakery's famous ones but with pink colouring instead), iced with cream cheese frosting, and decorated with wafer flowers.

And to go around the saucer, Nigel Slater's chocolate cookies.  Dark chocolate with finely chopped hazelnuts and white chocolate chips.  Deliciously chewy in the middle!

As a brilliant payday bonus, the email newsletter from Seamstar had their new feature of 40% off specific fabric.  And the fabric which was featured was Monaluna Marin Poppies which I've been lusting after for a looooong time!  Two metres for £18 - absolute bargain!  So at some point when I'm brave enough to attempt it, it should hopefully become a gorgeous A line skirt.

So, if that wasn't enough GORGEOUS photos for you....here are some pretty shoes I bought today.  £4, Primark, lovely summery yellow, job done! 

Until next time...xx

Snow day

Once again it has snowed in the Oxfordshire Cotswolds and it certainly feels chilly!  I wasn't brave enough to get out on the roads so am working from home.  And yes I am actually working.  She says, whilst quite obviously updating her blog!  I think you're still entitled to a lunch break when working from home so that's exactly what I've been doing.

I put some birdseed out last weekend for the little birdies, but what was left of it has been snowed over again, so they'll just have to hope it thaws quickly.  The snow's been great for bouncing some extra light into the house though, resulting in brighter than usual pictures for le blog.  Very pleased about that!

So after a stressful week at work (trying to get a school to let you shoot still and DVD photography is easier said than done, and not helped by extremely negative attitudes from unhelpful editors) I was very pleased when my robot fabric arrived from Utah!  Below is a much clearer picture than before and I'm so so happy with it.  Again, if only I had something to use it for.  It's really not helping the broodiness!

And here are some pictures of the bird fabric I'm going to use for my Lotta Jansdotter All Day Tote (when I get round to it), as well as some cute green word fabric which I bought in Wallingford with nothing specific in mind!  I'm sure I'll stumble across some project or other soon enough which will take my fancy.  Just as well the spare room's painted a similar shade of green so it will actually look good somewhere in the house!

Hoping to get over to Mum's this weekend to start work on the hare, and to steal her rotary cutter so I can continue on my quilt.  And that's all for now folks!

Let It Snow...

Winter has finally arrived!  The Boy and I went out for a little walk this morning in the snow.  Nowhere near as bad as Christmas 2010, but don't think I'll be making it into work tomorrow.  Fingers crossed for working from home snuggled on the sofa in my pjs.

No new sewing to report I'm afraid.  Am feeling "sew useless" at the moment...appropriate I suppose!  I can't work on my quilt because I need to steal Mum's rotary cutter and chop up the rest of my squares.  So I thought I'd start on my Lotta Jansdotter bag, but don't have the right coloured thread.  So I'm having a bit of a sewing slump at the moment.  Perhaps my creativity block will thaw out with the snow and I'll have something new to update with then.

In the meantime, here's some pictures from our snowy walk this morning.

And some baking I did yesterday.  Banana cupcakes...some with chocolate fudge frosting and some with vanilla buttercream.

And on that note I'm off for a cuppa, cupcake, and explore of some other people's lovely blogs!