I decided to finish cutting out a quilt I started cutting out last year. I stopped off for lunch & came back to this. Zaphod having a little nap.
I love the way he’s using the fabrics as a pillow.
I left him to sleep & later he woke up & helped by holding down the fabric for me, lol. Until he dozed off again.
A gift for my dear friend Helen’s birthday. I pieced it by hand, as it would have been very fiddly to piece by machine & I prefer hand piecing anyway. Helen is a vet so I incorporated quite a few animals into it, plus a few extras. Now we’ve moved to Melbourne I miss Helen’s phone calls, consisting of ‘Is the kettle on, I’m on my way?’ so I had to include the teapots, & the scissors & thimbles are there as Helen is a crafter too.
The project came from this gorgeous book that Emma gave me for Christmas. I also cut some squares to make one for myself.:-)
I have added a pic to the Flickr ‘I Have Pledged a Monthly Make for 2012’ folder. http://www.flickr.com/photos/32055815@N08/6677451441/in/pool-1830444@N20
You can join this group via the link on my blog, (top right). :-)
Ta-da! My first mantel for 2012. I don’t plan to post a heap of mantle shots this year like I did last year, but I’m so pleased with this one I thought I’d share. The picture was my birthday pressie last year & I’d planned for it to go in the bedroom but it looks so good here…….. Btw it’s called, ‘The Sea Hath it’s Pearls.’ We bought the candelabra at our fave vintage shop last week & the cute garland is from Spotlight. They had it with red, pink or cream roses.
We are currently making over our foyer, lounge & dining rooms & I will post pics when they are all done. There has been lot’s of furniture moving, lot’s of cleaning & sorting, & lot’s of huffing & puffing, but it will be all worthwhile.
Hmmm maybe it should be called the lost hours. I was so looking forward to reading another Kate Morton book, I loved The Shifting Fog (House at Riverton) but this is just so tedious. It’s set in 3 different years & each time you feel like something is going to be revealed we change decades. I guess I’ll slog on, I’d hate to give up on the first book of the year, I very rarely don’t finish a book.
Mind you I do have incentive to finish, in the past 2 days I’ve bought 5 more books. Another Marian Keyes ‘The Brightest Star in the Sky,’ 2 Fay Weldon’s, another Katie Fford, lightweight but fun, & PD James Death Comes to Pemberley which sounds fabulous. PD James loves the work of Jane Austen, & as a top crime writer, she has set her murder story in the lives of Mr Darcy & his lovely wife Elizabeth 6 years after their marriage.
48 books! not bad. Next year I’ll see if I can make 52, one for each week of the year & it would also be 1 for each year of my life. :-)
I enjoyed them all. There were a few I’d read before but not many, most were new reads.
My first book for 2012 is Kate Morton’s ‘The Distant Hours.’
I will continue to blog the books I read this year, I’m really pleased some of you are looking for some of the books I’ve mentioned. This year I’ll also list the author, as it’s not always easy to read the spines in the pics. I tend to pick up books in op shops, the $5 bookshop, Big W & sometimes The Book Depository. They aren’t as cheap as they were now that Amazon bought them out, but there are still bargains & free postage anywhere in the world. I don’t ever pay top dollar for my books, I read too many to be able to justify the expense!
A bit if a mixed bunch this month.
I started out with ‘Having the Decorators In,’ the sequel to ‘Having the Builders In,’ that I read last month. I really enjoyed it, it was great picking up with the same characters down the track a bit. It’s a very light-hearted tale with everyday problems of medieval times.
Who Killed Camilla? was a bit too trite & predictable for me.
The Love Knot was another great Charlotte Bingham book. The characters are well rounded & believable. There are three main characters & their stories are all very interesting.
Bridget Jones Diary, what a hoot, just as funny as the film I really enjoyed it. I’ll keep an eye out in the op shops for the sequel.
Ok now Watermelon is one of the funniest books I’ve ever read!! It’s my first Marion Keyes & I’ll definitely be tracking down more. Now the plot really isn’t comedic, the main character Claire has her first baby & the same day her husband leaves her for another woman. Now what is funny, is Claire’s family when she moves back to Ireland to get herself back together. I read in bed last thing at night while dh happily snores away beside me, the problem was I kept exploding with laughter & waking him up lol. Mind you when I read him the funny bits he laughed too. I especially loved that Claire’s mum is a soapy addict & especially loves Aussie soaps. One was referred to as ‘Down Drongo Way’ which sounded remarkably like ‘Home & Away’ to me, lol.
I’m not a fan of Aussie soaps & I remember many years ago when mum used to watch Sons & Daughters, my dad referred to it as Sons & Dickheads, which seemed a much better name to me. I am however totally addicted to Coronation Street.
Pressies I Gave-
I love these multi frames & decided to choose some of my fave Emma photos. They range from 1 month to 18yo, Emma’s Year 12 formal. Now she makes dodging the camera an art form so I rarely get a pic of her, lol. I think she really liked this gift.
Last year, before we moved, I took all our photos out of those awful ‘magnetic’ picture albums. You know the ones where you peel back the plastic & stick the photos to the backing page then lay the plastic back over. Some came out easily, some grrrrrrrrrrrrr, & most still have a sticky residue on the back. So choosing photos meant trawling through 100’s of loose photos, which resulted in a New Year’s Resolution – sort all the photos & get them in new albums.
I spotted this in one of the vintage shops I love & thought that Emma might just like it.
It was a little rickety & the timber brackets just weren’t in the right places for it to open properly. Dh took them all off & replaced them, so now it works quite well. I dragged out my old folk art paints & managed to mix up some paint to match the colour of the box.
I made all the pressies I gave for birthdays this year & had decided not to try & do the same for Christmas but at the last minute I decided to make some mug rugs to pop in with the gifts. They are so quick & easy to make & useful. First up I bought mugs to suit each person, then I made the rugs to match.
For my friend Helen dogs, dogs & dogs.
For Lynne, I always think black & white looks pretty spiffy & Lynne’s pretty spiffy so……..
Now Mum is really a pretty, pastel person but Paul spotted this mug & it’s just perfect. ‘Time for Tea’ with a cup of tea on it, ah made for Mum, the original tea addict. I used to tease her about it but now I can’t live without my tea, so I get it!!!!
For Yun Mi, my nephew’s lovely wife & a total cat lover. Unfortunately her mug was smashed in the post. I wrapped it in the mug rug, bubble wrapped it, tissue wrapped it, xmas paper wrapped it & packed it in a box with all their other gifts & still it arrived in pieces. Fortunately I was able to get another mug the same which I will post this week & keep my fingers crossed!!
Pressies I Received-
Pressies from Emma. A bit of a laugh giving me a cookbook as I don’t cook, but it is absolutely gorgeous with great vintage pics & all the recipes I remember from the 60’s & 70’s & I ‘may’ just be tempted to do some cooking. :-)
The quilting book is magic & I’ve already started one of the projects which will hopefully be finished to be a gift for my friend’s birthday in less than 2 weeks!
Love the Union Jack cat doorstop & the polka dot plates will be great in Lucy our vintage caravan.
Books from Rowan, cool.
Love the felt book from my nephew & his lovely wife & twin pack of novels from my df (dear friend) Lynne.
Pressies from dh. Ah a boxed set of my fave comedy ‘Jam & Jerusalem.’
