The post brought 2 exciting letters for me yesterday. Firstly an invitation to Jack's 4th birthday party at 'Boomerangs' play centre in May. We won't be able to make that day but are going to Colchester zoo with him on the actual day, 14th May.
Secondly, Heather sent me an ATC. Wow, it is utterly beautiful and now I have to try and make one to match it! Its title is 'Celtic Copper' and here it is for you to drool over:
I am definitely going to frame this one. Yesterday, it poured with rain all day so gave me a chance to play for the day. I made a patchwork of material stuck onto plain black material, then cut them up into ATC sized pieces to work on. I made 6 yesterday and really enjoyed it. I have a lot of 'findings' in various little drawers and it has given me a chance to use some of them, as well as getting to know my sewing machine. I had only managed to do straight stitch with it until now, so I did have fun. I'll photograph some of them when I've done a few more.Today, I read Ces's blog and there was an award for me! I was so thrilled. I have had awards before, but haven't managed to transfer them to my blog. With my new layout and Jim's help, you can see it proudly displayed on the right. From little acorns.....
Jim made some bread this morning. Now Jim makes super bread but this loaf seemed to get smaller rather than rise! He added bran to the mix and it didn't seem to work quite as well. Luckily the builder arrived just as he'd cooked it so we gave it to him for the extension!! No, seriously, in spite of its size, it tasted absolutely delicious, a bit like rye bread. So we had some for afternoon tea with cheese on half and marmalade on the other half.
It should be about twice that size!
The builders have finally removed the scaffolding from our extension, which is brilliant. It looks much better now and we can get to our barn without stepping over an assault course.
Today in the garden I pottered doing various bits of weeding and Jim did some planting. I also moved all the fuchsia hedge I'd cut down a few days ago. I now have a huge bonfire to burn when it dries again. It's been pouring this evening and I gather it's going to continue tomorrow. At least I'll be able to do some more ATCs.
I took just a few photos of the garden this afternoon in the sunshine.
We have just one of these daffodils. It's so unusual.
Grape hyacinth on the fairy hill
We planted this little skimmia japonica last year and the flowers are bigger than the plant itself!
Tulips
Star of today's show I think, these pretty bi-coloured tulips
Our neighbour from down the road, Joe, came up to see us today and had a walk round. He was quite impressed and liked the new extension too. It's not often we get visitors! He told us about an interesting chap, Brian Merriman, who used to live over the hill from us. Apparently the house he lived is now derelict but the base can still be seen, and the remains of a 'hedge school' nearby. I'll enlarge on this in my next blog.
We must take a walk up there on a fine day, camera in hand of course.
