A Spring In My Step

So a productive day spent in the garden when, for once, we were free from rain, hail, wind or anything else designed to ensure too much time spent indoors. Little compassion was shown to weeds, the nettles tried to get their own back by stinging my on my arm as I ripped them out of the ground, but I was armed with secateurs and a trowel and nothing was going to stop me.

Next step will be sewing seeds - anything edible, last year we had a glut of tomatoes and very few beans thanks to the slug army - grrr!

Meanwhile over in Etsy, where I have my little shop (click on the link right hand side!) -
I found myself in a Treasury - subrosa had selected one of my bags for her Spring Fling Treasury. Thank you!


(My bag is on the bottom row, centre)

Glutton for Buttons!

A few days ago I posted about my lucky win in Incywincy's blog prize draw for some of her lovley buttons, and they've arrived! Arn't they just divine?

This elephant is just too cute!




And I have some ideas popping around in my head already for this wonderful pink button.












Don't you just love buttons!

What's In The Box Today Dear

At some point on a Tuesday someone will ask the question "what's in the veg box today?".
For Tuesday is the delivery of our weekly organic vegetable box. Each week we peer inside to see what earthy delights await us, each week we will hold a vegetable aloft to exclaim about how fresh/fantastic it looks, occasionally we will hold something aloft with puzzled looks and ask "so what's this then?".

Since discovering the joys of having unknown vegetables delivered to your door, I have regularly eaten artichokes (couldn't tell you what they were before), have developed a taste for raw grated carrot, and have discovered the many and varied ways of cooking broccoli. There's more to broccoli than a stir-fry you know.

To compliment the veg box is a newsletter which usually contains snipets of vegetable life in the big wide world. Today's installment contained the following facts:

• In one year, the world grows enough potatoes to cover a four-lane motorway going round the world 6 times.
• The % of household income spent on food has halved over the past 50 years, from 33% to 15%.
• The proportion spent on energy has also halved.
• The balance has been spent on housing (up from 7 to 18%) and leisure (up from 8 to 10%).

Oh and butterflies use their antennae to smell and their feet to taste.

Happy carrot crunching!



riverford organics

I won I won!

So today I had a message from the lovely Incywincy, another Etsy crafter, that I had been the lucky winner in her recent prize draw to win some of her buttons - she makes gorgeous colourful buttons, have a peek at her shop on Etsy here.

This of course means I will no longer be able to moan about "never winning anything" and "never being lucky", although to be fair to the laws of coincidence, luck and fate I never normally enter any competitions whatsover. Just goes to show.

Thanks Incywincy!

Sleep Deprived

saturday. 4am.
sounds of high heels clattering quickley
across pavements
to a back beat of birds waking.
deep snores
meet thumps and kicks.
thoughts toss
body turns.

Yarn Snobbery

So the gentle clatter of bamboo knitting needles has ceased as, at last, the knitted shrug is finished. The wool ( a Debbie Bliss yarn, a soft blend of cotton, silk and viscose) is a wonderful burnt orange, sienna. The pattern although wasn't that quick - lots of knit 1, purl 1, lots of bringing the yarn back and forth, but it felt rhythmic and soothing.


Of course this has also resulted in my wool snobbery increasing by the minute - after using such a nice wool it will be impossible for me to use anything slightly below this standard. No squeaky wool for me. And if you've never heard yarn squeak I can only compliment you on never having had the misfortune of using cheap nasty wool.

And while I was tempted to keep this shrug on the basis that it matches my latest hair colour ( a mix of reds, browns and streaks of bleach) I felt the other shrug was getting lonely in my Etsy shop so I've put this one in in there too. For sale. So you may buy!

Much Merriment and Mirth

If you've ever watched "Mock the Week" then you'll be familiar with Andy Parsons, one of the regular panalists. He is currently doing his 1st UK Live Tour, and we grabbed last minute tickets to see him last night. So glad we did, he is absolutley hilarious, it was a real "laugh out loud gig" from word go. So anyone in need of a little cheer try and catch one of his shows - you can get details from his website here

“Perfectly calibrated…. - the King of Political Comedy”
The Guardian

“Andy Parsons can do no wrong”
The Stage


Managed to make myself a little bag as well yesterday which had its 1st outing last night - used my favourite Fern Fabric which is just such a restful shade.





Quote of The Day:

"Emperor Palpatine looks like a middle sized frog" (E aged 6 commenting on Star Wars)

New Day, New Blog, New Bag

So the Crafting Life continues......for the past few months I have been trying to get into a rhythm of life, crafting, designing bags, opening my Etsy shop, learning all I can about selling crafts online - oh and remembering to wash the dishes.




My Etsy shop has been open for about 6 weeks now and have had 3 sales, I have also developed and addiction for browsing fabric stores for hours on end and seem to be aquiring rather a large stash of printed fabrics. Hmmm just need an extra 236 hours a week to actually create things from all my stock.

Latest projects have been these cute little crochet bracelets which are a joy to make.




So off to create another bag now, then quick change and off to see Andy Parsons tonight.