Hello Monday

It's funny, as a busy mom I often wish I had a few quiet days to myself to get all my stuff done. Here I am with a few days alone and I have not accomplished one thing on my list. Instead I have gone to bed very early, watched a bunch of movies, and generally faffed about with little to show for it. That's ok though, apparently it is what I need. I am missing my little family but from what I hear, they are having a grand time.

I'm just popping in to tell you that I am being interrogated over here today. Janee of Yellow Bird Yellow Beard has invited me as a guest and I am so honored.

Oh, and I will be back on Wednesday with a very special giveaway! See you soon!

Empty Nest

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Late last night I took The Engineer and Pony Girl to the airport for their red-eye flight to the Midwest. This is the first time they have gone off without me and the house is very quiet indeed. They will be gone for 5 whole days. It was a bit of a last minute thing really. You see a little over a year ago, the Engineer had a rather bad accident with his hand. After all this time, it still has not healed correctly. I am not convinced that the doctors did the job as they should and I have been nagging him a bit to have it properly looked after.

Fortunately for us, The Engineer's father is an Orthopedic Surgeon, and a darn good one. So, He has gone "home" for a surgery and taken Pony Girl along to spend time with Grandparents, cousins, Uncles and Aunts. That leaves me here in the little green cottage to look after things.

I had a real proper sleep-in this morning, followed by a very leisurely coffee. Now, what to do with myself. The only real plan I have, is to give the cottage a good scrubbing today. Whilst this may not sound like a 'not a care in the world gal on her own' sort of activity, there is method to my madness. You see, if I do a good tidy now, I will be able to bask in the cleanliness for 5 whole days! Yes, perhaps I am a nutter, ah well.

I'm off now to take care of business. Have a lovely weekend all!

Cushion Love and Beautiful Bloggers

Look at this magical cushion that came in the post yesterday! It's from Jennie at A Little Vintage. As part of Vic's amazing cushion swap, I didn't know who was sending me my cushion cover. When it arrived I was just gobsmacked by the amount of work and detail that went into this gorgeous work of art. Bits of vintage fabric, lovely stitching, oh my! A truly magical cushion if ever there was one! I wish there were better light to photograph it's beauty. I am imagining it adorning a vintage wicker chair on a summer porch, wouldn't that be pretty? As I have no vintage wicker chair, nor a porch of any season, it now adorns my couch. Though I have had to retrieve it from Pony Girl's bed twice since it's arrival.

That is not where the story ends though, in fact this is the part that brought actual tears to my eyes and filled my heart with amazement at the beauty of bloggers in general, and the overwhelming kindness of Jennie in particular. In her note that accompanied the cushion, she mentioned that after reading my blog, she had to send something along for Pony Girl. And would you look at this!

I mean drop dead gorgeous AND there are horses on her dress!!! With special details just for Pony Girl, I really was completely overwhelmed by Jennie's generosity.

Thank you, thank you Jennie! You are an amazing talent and a lovely soul. Please pop by her shops and take a look at her creations!

Oh yes...
If that's not love, I don't know what is!

In The Garden

Living in the Pacific Northwest presents certain gardening challenges. It seems especially the last couple of years, or that could just be me getting old. In any case, we tend to grab moments as we can; when the sun shows up enough to turn our mud into workable soil. For us, there has always been "The Weekend" every year. The weekend when the weather is just right and we roll up our sleeves and accomplish great works in the yard.

Last weekend was it! The Engineer and I make a formidable team at times like this. As long as we have good, wholesome, (and might I say delicious) sustenance during the day, and ice cold home brewed beer at days end, we are a force to be reckoned with.

There was a fair amount of weeding, sprucing, mowing, and general tidying up. Then there was planting, this bit always makes me happy. Lettuce (our first batch got ate up by the chooks), tomatoes, peppers, lemon cucumber, arugula, eggplant, herbs and such.

We also completed planting our finally finished front rock wall bed. Looking forward to the filling out so our gas meter doesn't make such a bold statement. Why they put it there to begin with has me completely stumped.

We also managed a new chicken fence! I've been wanting this for ages. It isn't fancy but, it gives the girls a bit of open space to run, whilst keeping them from eating the neighbor's cat food, or our lettuce.

We started sod removal to make way for a new mixed bed. We picked up some reclaimed lumber for the back yard fence we hope to finish this summer. I also got to get a close look at what is growing in other parts of the garden. The cotton candy rhododendron has reached it's blooming zenith. The back yard border is in wild abandon, and I'm kind of enjoying that particular riot of foliage right now.

Yes indeed, much was accomplished and much left to do. It will have to wait, as the rain is back and the rumor is it's going to stay awhile.

Well, a little bird is chirping outside my window and it sounds very much like he is singing, "Thrifting, thrifting." I think a shall take his advice, a-thrifting I will go. Have a lovely day my friends!

Weekending

Guess where we went this weekend. No, it wasn't the deep green woods...

It was the beautiful downtown Portland Farmer's Market!

Oh how I love Ranunculus!

Asparagus of wonder!

Pretty peas.

Ruby red Rhubarb.

Cavorting Kohlrabi.

Colorful Clematis.

And of course, a rocking horse balloon hat!

It was lovely! Fortunately the rain held off until Sunday evening, so we were able to fit in a lot of gardening as well. I'll tell you more about that next time. I'm off to attack my Monday.

I hope you had a sweet weekend as well.

Thank you Mr. Sunshine

The sun is out, the flowers are blooming, and I can not bear to be inside at the computer. I have plants to plant, chickens to chase, a bicycle to ride...So until next week, I wish you all sunshine and flowers!

Unearthing

I have a feeling that some of you, like me, have a pile, a drawer, a cupboard, a corner, or a box of unfinished projects hidden somewhere amongst your crafty things. Perhaps you have bits of knitting, crochet with undone ends, scraps of quilts, little soft creatures missing ears and eyes, shirts that have needed mending since 2005, some ambitious embroidery that has gone untended maybe?

I was down in my spidery lair in the basement (otherwise known as my "studio"), shifting things about, when I came across one such pile. Long forgotten stitching in various stages of completion, and I do mean forgotten, like completely. I found there, this sweet little toddler deer dress. It's only missing button holes and a hem, why on earth was it never finished? Is there a 4 year old out there that never received her 1st birthday gift from me? Well, the only thing for it is to finish it off and add it to the drawer of future gifts to give, or pop it in the shop.

I wonder what else I might find...

What might you have in your "Undone" pile?

Call Me

It seems 'blogger' was having a few hiccups the last couple of days, let's hope it's all sorted out and we can get back to business!
And speaking of...I got down to the business of finishing up my cushion for Vic's - Punky and Me swap. I have to tell you, I was completely stuck for ideas for a while there. I was a wee bit worried until I just got over myself and decided to have fun with it. I had fun for sure with the theme of 'communication'!

and graphic prints, bold color play, and stitchery.

Hopefully, the recipient will enjoy it too.

If you want to see some more cushion goodness, check out the links at the end of this post.

I wish you a joyful weekend my friends!

In the works

Just a quick hello today, I'm busy with the work! Diligently applying myself to the details for Vic's cushion swap and the days are ticking by faster than I am comfortable with. I'll be sure to show you the end result after it's been popped in the post to it's new owner.

Since I'm here, I thought I might just give a little reminder that issue #1 of Mollie Makes Magazine is officially on sale in the UK tomorrow! I'm still waiting for my copies to get here! A little bird told me that I might have an extra copy coming my way that I can giveaway to one of you lovely folks at my shiny place here, so keep an eye out for that! And here is a peek at the official cover of issue #1!

If you are outside of the UK and would like to order a subscription, THIS LINK should help you do just that. Oh, and the latest info I have for the US news stand date is June 9th. The date for Australia arrival seems to be in July sometime, available at independent book stores and news sellers. Well, that should just about wrap it up for today.

See you soon!

Hello Monday

I had a wonderful weekend, how about you? I was rather spoiled with crepes for breakfast and a beautiful dinner for Mother's Day courtesy of the Engineer. We spent the day pottering about the garden, I was taken to the plant nursery and told to pick out some new plants, hooray! All in all a gorgeous day with the family.

Now it's Monday and I will admit that Mondays are hard. There's the weekly occupational therapy appointment for Pony Girl, then racing to school to make it there before lunch. Then racing home to clean up the shambles of our weekend frolicking. Then the mad dash for school pick up and grocery shopping and dinner making and homework and, and...then trying to fit in a blog post as well (which always ends up a bit iffy). Still, I can't complain, I have a sweet life and after yesterday's lovely time, it's all worth it!

Unfortunately for Barbie, yesterday's Spa Day did not turn out quite as she had imagined.

May your week be filled with smiles!

New Work

A great big smooshy thank you to all you beautiful muses out there! All of your ideas and thoughts were wonderful. I now have a a whole big gorgeous list of makes for the future. I really loved Flaming Nora's idea for stitching me up some album cover art, that is so gonna happen! Colette told me to try my hand at something I've been wanting to for ages, and that is exactly what I did/am doing.

When you try something new you:
Make mistakes -
Learn a lot -
Possibly let some not-so-nice words escape your lips -
Have the satisfaction of being a bit brave to try something new -
Find out if it is something you want to do again...
...and yes, I do! In fact I'm just a-tizzy with the possibilities!

Thank you my friends, for helping to loose the cogs!

Care to try something new yourself? Have a wonderful weekend!

Calling all Muses

I've made a lot of stuff in the last couple of years. Yet, I have been away from my making for over a month and it seems to have me flummoxed. I feel a bit stuck and need your help. What should I make? What do you want, what do you need, what would you like to see? Please be my muses and help inspire me. I'd appreciate it most greatly. Thank you.

Oh, and a correction: Monday's posted quote (turns out) can not be attributed to MLK Jr. I don't know the exact source but, I do still think the quote said what I wanted to say. Sorry for any confusion.

...

‎"I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that." ~ Martin Luther King Jr.