The Birthday

Its quite a while since my last post.


I've been very busy so this is an account of my activities in case you were wondering.
Read no further if not.
We've been giving the house a bit of a makeover


Re decorated the front room.
And generally 'tittled' the place up a bit.
These smell fabulous on the bend in the stairs, now they have opened.


As you may know I have been making curtains.. I need to add more width, they are a bit skinny, but they look very nice behind the new sofa.


Here it is in all its glory, totally unscathed from the party. (What do you think the throw was for?)


(This room is flooded with light if the sun shines so the pics are bit bleached out)
All the books were re-instated in the re-positioned bookshelves.


The old sofa is staying I can't bear to part with it, and we needed the seating, so its been covered with a lovely sage green bedspread from IKEA ....


to hide the terrible truth.



All this in order to celebrate the 60th birthday of my lovely husband.
Here he is looking rather embarassed while 'Happy Birthday' was played and sung.


Here's the cake.

Its a bit of a catalogue of disaster decor wise. I eventually got an image scanned onto a piece of icing at a well known supermarket. (I was going to write 'Still my favourite squeeze'....but its not about me)

I hope the person from whom I 'borrowed' the illustration will forgive me. I didn't think putting it on a birthday cake and subsequently eating it counted as infringement of copyright. I found him in a Google search and then lost him so couldn't ask permission.


We had 46 guests on Saturday, 12 musicians

including the man himself, all playing traditional Irish tunes.


I love this picture because I can see my Husband,Mum, younger son, older sons girlfriend, sister in law, and two good friends.

I do have one concern though, that I forgot to bake the baguettes to go with cheese when the crackers ran out.
Oh dear.
But there was an awful lot of other food!
My concerns about mingling were unfounded..there was movement, activity, chatter, laughter, and generally smiles all round.

(Apart from my husband while he's playing his concertina..he has to concentrate and can't do two things at once)




This is the owner of Blodwen and the dear departed Porky.


There was even a rapper sword dance from my Husband and his University Friends, former Kingsmen, who had travelled from Cornwall, Bristol Nottingham, Newcastle and Durham.

(If you click the link you might see my husband in a few of the pictures in his tender youth with great big bushy sideburns, In picture 4 he is the one on the right of the two somersaulters, and in picture 7 he is on the right doing a Northumbrian clog dance)

They remembered it perfectly even though the last time they practised it was 10 years ago.
(Not counting the quick practice they had in our kitchen on saturday night)

Great Craic!



We seriously over estimated the amount of beer and wine that would be consumed..



and underestimated the generosity of our friends.





The table above has come out of my sewing room.
We also removed the bed to another room for guests, and it made me realise what a wonderful great-big-shelf a bed makes.


How will I ever get it back to normal?

Wednesday update: I did it! I am off to do a bit of theraputic sewing. maybe some more hearts in time for Valentines just to get me going again.

Awards and Bravery.

Have I done something different?
Having spent quite some time working out that photos upload in a particular order I now find that they upload the other way..in reverse order.
If you know the answer please leave a comment and explain.
Anyway I have received a blog award from Jean of Genies Art World
Its quite interesting.
I have to award it to 4 people who are already followers of my blog and one person who is new.
So here goes:
Konnykards
FancyPicnic
From the House of Edward
Gunnels Blog
are my choice for the 4 existing followers, and I have just plucked one I like the look of from the top blogs by crafters list and that is
Rachael Rabbits Blogspot
So if the above bloggers would like to accept the award don't forget to leave to a comment on your chosen blogs and link back to the one who gave you the award (that would be me) and pass it on.



Quite apart from blogging I think I deserve an award.
I went for a day out to York on Tuesday to meet up with some of my college friends.

We met for the first time in September 1969, when we went to train as teachers, at a wonderful place called Strawberry Hill, almost 40 years ago.
We grew up together during three years at college.
We have kept in touch on and off and like true friends we can pick up where we left off no matter how long the gap since we met.

I deserve an award because I overcame my fear of heights and went up in this.

They deserve an award too because they put me to shame, and are all doing good things in schools, having continued to teach and to advise, weathering all the storms that have blown teachers from one new initiative to another recently.
I wimped out several years ago.

I am happier sewing.

'But there is no money in what is called the till' to quote Beatrix Potter.

Gratitude.

I always had a lot to thank arlee for and now I have even more.
She has been a constant source of enjoyment, inspiration and encouragement to me on flickr and it was she who first gave me the suggestion that I might blog. Her blog is wondefully energetic and honest and what she doesn't know about rust , tension, and flowers isn't worth knowing, not to mention her corruscating trousers.
She has shown me how to link.
LOOK LOOK Arlee I can link!
Thank you so much.

Before you showed me the way I was keeping a big sheet of the html stuff and pasting urls into it then cut and pasting...what an idiot and thats why my links weren't working properly.
(couldn't find a picture of a pillock which is my preferred description).
PS. Please don't forget to read
this post and this one which are both quite new and haven't had time to be read yet, and maybe even this one which has quite a bit of sewing and felt in it.

The best laid plans

The weekend went well. I am exhausted .
We prepared the room for two guests.
Our guest came alone.
He was very charming.

I had dusted all the places I could reach.
Our guest was about 6 foot eight.

I offered a choice for breakfast: smoked salmon, free range eggs, ham, bacon, walnut bread, wholemeal multigrain bread, organic cereal, Crunchy nut cornflakes, weetabix, orange juice, apple juice, plain organic yoghurt, low fat fruit yoghurt, creamy fruit yoghurt, apricots, oranges, melon, strawberries, jam, marmalade,real butter..
Our guest ate: cornflakes and toast.



I made a chocolate cake.
Our guest did not eat it, but its not there now.
(Now I’m not Goldilocks..I’m Alice..’Curiouser and curiouser’..but it did say ‘EAT ME’)

I worked hard to prepare a feltmaking workshop for 12 people for two sessions.


I had 4 in the morning and 6 in the afternoon.

I made many Celtic Brooches and hairslides, in preparation for hordes of folkies passing through. There was Morris dancing outside so very few passed through.
I did sell some.
However we had a super day out yesterday. A visit to Gustav Klimt at The Tate Liverpool
A fantastic gallery with great exhibitions and a wonderful cafe where they do the most amazing rhubarb cheesecake .(Not Alice or Goldilocks...Mr Greedy now)
We had our lovely friend Denise with us. She mentioned
Another Place
The Anthony Gormley works on the beach at Crosby.
She had never seen them so we decided to visit that on the way home.

It was absolutely wonderful to walk on the beach and feel the wind and be by the sea, even though it is partly industrial. It must have been the best weather so far this summer.
There are beautiful houses on the road overlooking the sea so we ooohhed and aahhed and decide which one we would like to live in.
One had belonged to the Captain of the Titanic.

The figures on the beach are enigmatic.....and naked

(This is number 88)

but some visitors feel the need to preserve their modesty or enhance them in different ways.
as illustrated by number 86.

And now I'm home alone I have to tidy up again. You can't get down the hall for boxes and bags and......

Art and Garden 2008

To make up for a week of the same thing on my blog there are a lot of pictures in this post.
(If you click on the picture it will take you to flickr where you can click ‘All sizes’ for a closer look.)
Despite what the weather man said we had a lovely weekend at ‘Art and Garden 2008’
Saturday was cool and the breeze was a bit of a problem blowing things off the shelves.
My stall was a bit untidy, but very colourful I think. You might recognise a few things here!
There were a lot of spaces at the end of the event.



Here are my first visitors. Isn’t it a lovely photograph?


Jo reads this blog, (Hello Jo) and it was great to see a real live reader in the flesh!
We had a short shower in the afternoon but Sunday was sunny and quite warm.
Here are some pictures to try to convey the atmosphere.

The weather has been cold,so the garden is a bit behind but that gave us sight of things that have usually finished by June.





Its a magical garden with secret places and winding paths, and heavenly fragrance from a beautiful rose rambling over a folly



Here’s a lily pad..



And here’s the frog, on its way ...(its only a baby!)



A quiet corner for contemplation



Here are just a few of the many exhibitors.


Mary Campbell with beautiful Collagraphs of Religious Processions in Spain, and below, Margaret Evans Fisher who does Landscapes with textured edges.



Mary Holden (who was my City and Guilds Tutor for Part I)with embroideries



Janet Park Stefan with her Batik paintings, wearing one of my brooches!


There were ceramics dotted around the garden, by Jean Bideau,



And all the time the sound of the river.

This young man was having a well earned break from his duties on the gate. The previous night he and his friend had a swim here!

There were marquees all around the garden and some exhibitors were lucky enough to be in the conservatory which has a large platform over the river.

Plant sales here:

And tea and cakes with friends here.

My other half (with the sun in his eyes-he does smile occasionally!) and our friend Barbara

Is that enough information?
I can’t think of a better way to spend a weekend in June.