Something for Aunty Jan

I'm away from home at the moment - my sister has had surgery on her leg and I'm helping out. I'm really feeling deprived of all my crafty supplies but have brought my crocheting with me to keep my hands busy when we have a break to watch daytime TV - we're addicted to 'Escape to the Country' for some reason!! Can't miss it.

So nothing much so show I'm afraid, but before I left my great-niece visited to make something for Aunty Jan. Here she is at my craft desk busy with my Copics. I must say I was a bit nervous as kids have a habit of pressing hard when colouring but she did just fine. We scanned a picture from a colouring book and printed it out on cardstock and here's the card we made. We also made a tissue paper flower like the one Lauren Meader made here to decorate some sweeties we bought as a gift. I really like this idea - that girl's so clever!

Two Challenges to cheer up a miserable day!

After a beautiful, sunny and warm day yesterday, today is wet and miserable - though the wind forecast has not arrived (yet!). So instead of cutting the grass as planned I thought I would post a couple of challenge projects.

The first is the A Passion for Papertrey template challenge - a little gift to go with the gingerbread man card I have already posted. Its Lauren's small Milk Made template and the little cartons contain a hot chocolate sachet and some marshmallows and sprinkles.

The second challenge is a sketch for the Copic Colour Challenge. As you can tell I'm absolutely in love with Kraft cardstock and seem to be using it for everything!

And there's more...... I must join in the current passion for Lauren's little picnic basket template. I made this to match the button card made the other day and I filled it with fruity boiled sweets. I've given both card and basket to my sister who had major surgery last week and needed something to lubricate her throat after the anaesthetic. Hope you're feeling better today Jan!

The Next Level Challenge 7

This week's challenge is a sketch with a 3D image - I'm not very comfortable with decoupage and this card probably shows it! I've used some delicious stamps from Claire at Waltzingmouse Stamps and my lovely new Sakura Clear Star pen to highlight. I'm definitely going to buy some more of these pens as I really like the effect. The patterned paper is from my tiny precious Papertrey stash. Hope this card fits the bill!

What a Day!

What a horrible day it is! Pouring rain and wind - I've even lighted the fire to cheer myself up. It makes such a difference to the room to have something alive in the firegrate. I did manage to nip out to the local Country Market (used to be called WI Market) before it got wet and bought a pretty posy of flowers, a fresh baked loaf and some new potatoes. Lovely! Reminds me I should lift my own potatoes - they probably are ready to come up. The garden will be taking a real battering in this weather and I'm worried for the sunflowers in this wind.

Yum or Yuk!!!

I know I've posted a lot this week but I've just got to share this idea from the brilliant Heather Bailey! If you've got a Harry Potter fan in the family you have to take a look - and Heather's also provided the labels! These would also be great at Halloween.

Bees and bees and bees

The garden I post about here is not mine but my Mum's. Its very big and it takes a lot of work to keep it reasonably tidy. Because of this my own very small garden has been abandoned and is now just a jungle. The main difficulty is the large privet hedge which takes up more room than the garden itself and in recent years has been left to its own devices. At this time of year its in full flower and I have to say smells lovely. When I was looking out of the bathroom window this morning I saw it was absolutely buzzing with bumble bees and other little creatures. It almost justifies leaving it to grow wild. And its also home to my little flock of sparrows - I hear them morning and evening greeting each other and catching up on the day's gossip!

This is my first attempt at adding a video to my blog - wonder if it will work. Hope it was worth the hassle and you can see the bees.

Garden progress

I spent about 4 hours working in the garden today - it was a lovely sunny afternoon. I was able to get down to some weeding jobs I hadn't managed to finish in the last week or so and as the forecast is for rain tomorrow felt very pleased with myself.

The veg patch is doing very nicely and the currants, raspberries, onions, lettuce and garlic have already been harvested. All this heat and rain has been good for growing! These pink pompoms are a few leeks I let go to seed earlier in the year and now I'm really glad I didn't pull them up as they look so pretty and are covered in bees and hoverflies all looking a bit drunk on the nectar! I just love hoverflies (called Flower Flies in the US) as they often seem to stop by to take a good look at you before zooming off!