Random round up

A couple of completely random pics to round off this weekends triple posting. No hang on a sec, there is a theme, they are both related to purchases made last weekend during our "date" day. Mum came and sat on the kids for us so us grown ups went out to lunch and for a mooch round Harrogate. I found a fabulous material shop and completed buying stuff for the wedding quilt I'm making, three nice fat piles - about a thousand - are now sat awaiting their stitches ...

 

Laying out is booked for next weekend, yay!

The second treat was a set of Orla Kierley storage jars ...



L-R ..... Branflakes, adult biscuits and green tea bags. Scrummy!

Toodle pip
J
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Peter piper picked a pair of pretty posies

Despite the lack of sunshine the garden is producing the odd bloom here and there, enough to supply the windowsill with a wee jug of colour. Not quite the cutting garden I'm aiming for yet but hey, these things won't happen overnight.

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J
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Progress in the pantry

A bit late recording this here but our renovation of the main pantry is now completed, same colour scheme as the previous cupboard including more spotty mats!

Very much before ...



The work in progress ...



Jobs a good'un ...



Freezer homed elsewhere and shelves restocked with all the bottles and jars ...



Next job, a garden gate. Our current solution to garden closure consists of a pallet propped between bushes and it drives me nuts!
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J
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How to kill off the sunshine ...

I seem to have killed off the short window of nice weather we'd been having. Let me explain.

I've muttered about getting myself a traditional deck chair on and off for quite a good while, but I was finding the high price of "nice" ones off putting. The ones I could afford looked cheap and nasty with flimsy looking plastic bits doing the job on the holdy uppy part, now as someone still carrying a tad too much baby weight (ahem I mean toddler weight these days) that concerned me.

So, when him indoors returned from his usual jaunt to the Saturday morning car booty on the York racecourse clutching this beauty I was tickled pink. And this one came in at the bargain price of £10 ker-ching!



So I set to work scrubbing/brushing/hosing down it to clean it up - I think I got a tad over enthusiastic on some bits. Once I was done and it started to dry the canvas started looking a tad thin, the muck was obviosuly holding it together. So twenty minutes and a good a pootle round Google later I came up with this corker of a web site - Deck Chair Stripes - and ordered me some stripey fun. A short wait for mr postie to deliver the goods and ta dah!



Courtesy of an antique wax rub down for the frame, the stripey fun and a batch of upholsotery nails I now have a stylish new perch for flopping out in the garden. The rain aint stopped since, typical!

Toode pip
J
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N-ice cubes

One of my good friends has just announced the safe arrival of her second bubba, a not so little baby boy weighing in at a whopping 10lb 6oz. Yowzer.

On hearing the happy news I immediately whipped out the sewing machine and whizzed up a batch of baby cubes. I made a set of these while I was pregnant with Reuben and my boys have thoroughly loved them - they still get played with today, all be it in a more rough and tumble toddler fashion usually involving hurling them at each other. This game got delightfully named as "bonking balls" by Reu - only toddlers eh? Ah-hem! (Note to self: I wonder if Blogger will allow this post or whether bonking is on some kind of banned words list?)



I don't get to meet up with my friend very often these days as she lives over in Dubin and we now both have two small people to add into the logistical mix. We're lucky if we manage to pin down our schedules to the same country every couple of years, but when we do meet up we always chatter away like we last saw each other a matter of days ago. As someone who doesn't make friends very quickly or easily our ability to do this always surprises and greatly pleases me.

I'll be posting off my congratulations package this weekend.
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J
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Garden of delights

Despite the rather poor spring weather work has been progressing well on hard landscaping the garden here at the patch.

We've re-laid the patio putting down a weed membrane to avoid the intensive dandelion cultivation we had going on before ...



The patio sits at the sunniest corner of our garden and we've designed it to wrap around a Bramley apple tree .. fingers crossed the bees have been busy doing their pollination so we get a wee crop of apples later this year. In years to come I envisage the apple tree providing a little bit of shade to sit under on warm sunny days .. sigh!



We've also got the veggie beds underway. Thanks to the recycling potential of flogging some old possessions via ebay we've pulled together sufficient cash to purchase some gorgeous chunky railway sleepers to make some raised beds. The beds go in ...





Add some wigwams sourced from our local woods - these provide the structure for the peas. You can't have a peapod patch without some peas  ...



And add the odd bus stop of course ...



The wigwam in this shot contains this years attempt at my all time favourite sweet peas, fingers crossed for a bumper crop.

My garden inspiration at the moment is entirely coming from this lady ...



The book was a birthday gift last month. Here is one of my first Raven inspired bouquets adorning the windowsill ...




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J
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