Sweltering - for several reasons.

Crikey it's hot here today and I'm totally overdressed in an angora cardi, tights and my lovely new dolly shoes (pictures to follow as the camera has gone walkabout). Now the other reason I'm sweltering is due to panic rather than this mini-Indian summer we're having.

Bad news on the work front today, Woody's paper is closing it's Sunday edition which he writes an awful lot for so things are very, very unstable. Brilliant timing of course, seeing as we're just about to move house and up the mortgage again and Christmas is on the distant horizon. He's got a meeting with his Editor next week who's said he wants to keep him involved but who knows how and if it will cover the big shortfall in our income this will leave.

Its been an up and down couple of years since Woody went freelance. On the one hand he's been able to work from home and between us we've juggled our jobs so that one of us was at home with the boys. We've been really lucky to both spend so much time with them and thanks to our lovely parents we've managed not to have to pay for childcare but it has meant a minuscule income, working almost every evening for Woody and not having any spare time to build up other writing contracts.

He's a brilliantly funny, observational writer and has won awards for his columns. I'm so proud of him and so disappointed the paper is going to fold after doing so well. I'm sure we'll muddle through, he may have to go back into the office and now the boys are getting older there's the chance I could work more hours but its all a worry.

(My last treat for a while. Joy!)

So, to cheer myself up on this roasting day I am in Jane's camp and looking ahead in an effort to be prepared early for the festive season and avoid the hassle. I managed it last year, even my scatter-brained self realised having a baby in August was going to make things a bit busier so I got ahead of myself really enjoyed it. A new festive tradition has been borne therefore, planning it all in August! (I feel like one of those whacky people featured in magazines who keep their decorations up all year!).


Frugal is looking like being this year's theme, (or even more frugal than usual). We never spend a lot and we don't have a large family to buy for. For someone not very religious like me the whole essence of Christmas is to celebrate a very special time of year with my lovely family and be thankful that we're so close, happy and healthy, rather than splashing out. Christmas means a lot to me for different reasons but its far too early to go into that yet.


I'm going to spend the weekend going through my Christmas interiors books and thinking of some present ideas. I'm not brilliant at making things but I may be able to negotiate the loan of mum's sewing machine and have a go . For friends I'll be making cookies, biscuits etc and I think we'll throw a house-warming when we put the decorations up at the new house and share good food, mulled wine. Is it ok to give hospitality instead of gifts? I'd really love to know others ideas/plans for Christmas and any tips for easy to make, cheap yet special presents.


Sorry this mammoth post is a bit down, I'm werriting today, as my Grandma would say, but it will pass and it is Friday after all. I've not had time to write my Sublime September post yet and celebrate the coming of Autumn but the picture at the top captures what its like here in the Moorlands at the mo. Happy weekends all.

Summer's Last Hurrah!

September for me really means that summer is over but I'm going to restrain from flinging myslef headlong into Autumn and all its glories (especially as the weather has finally perked up!)and thought I'd share some of my favourite pictures from this summer, which wasn't really one in my book, as a reminder of what I do like about the season.

dreamy cow parsley

the Horticulture & Home Craft Tent

(how lovely are these flowers. I've just seen Sarah Raven's Gardener's World programe encouraging people to buy and celebrate British garden flowers. Fab programme and I'll be trying to get mine from Waitrose from now on - when I can afford it.)

country shows (I've never seen so many panamas apart from at cricket matches! Arent they great.)

Cornwall, just my favourite ever holiday destination

summer in the garden (lawnmoving is such thristy work Grandad!)

Hibernating....

Well not from blogging but today I really could curl up under my gorgeous new (well to me at least) eiderdown and sleep for a week. Probably too many late nights and very early mornings (5.30am thanks to early bird Arch). Either that or I truly am a hedgehog and the shorter days (dark at 8.30 already!) are making me think its time to go to sleep for about five months.

Not that I really want to, just having one of those wading through treacle days today.

So, obviously nothing else for it than to lift my spirits with a trip to the charity shops in search of something pretty and joy - I found some.

• A beautiful Woods Ivory ware dish which my grandma had lots of in her china cabinet. Perfect for displaying painted eggs at Easter.
• Couldn't resist this pretty rosebud jug, so sweet and only £1.

My other treats are ebay wins which arrived today,

• Finally my own vintage copy of Willow Farm which I've been looking for a reasonable copy of and £5 seems like a bargain.
• A lovely free brooch which I got with something else, three roses made from modelling clay I think with quite an old clasp.
• Finally the odd, round bobbly thing is really the prettiest, plaster pink brooch. Made with tiny buttons and an odd, bumpy material I have no idea what it could be but it looks sweet and again seems quite old.

Sorry about the pictures, this camera is either hopeless or its me. Hmmmm...a poor workman and all that. Better keep quiet!

I've also bought a baaaaaaaad couple of things on ebay today - two Father Christmas postcards! I've got no defence at all, its still August for heaven's sake but they are lovely. Only £1 each and I was so worried I might miss them. Oh who am I kidding, I must be an elf!

Randomness

I've been tagged on a couple of lovely blogs (Thank you- well if being mentioned on someone else's blog, or a link to yours is on theirs, if this is what being tagged is? Otherwise I'm completely off target do please excuse the following if I'm wrong and put me right!)

I think now that I'm supposed to reveal 8 random things about me so hope this is vaguely interesting, eyes shut, deep breath, here goes...

1) I don't wear trousers - well not often anymore (apart from my divine brown, velvet ones that I slouch around the house in in the evenings). I've finally realised that they don't really suit me. Too short, too round etc. A really good pair of jeans would work miracles but I need to spend a bit and that's kind of off the agenda for now so... skirts are my lifesaver and they're so comfy.

2) I am addicted to buying cards which I know I am not going to give to anyone. One day my inner shabbiness will surface and I will actually whitewash/distress a pile of frames and put them up (rather than being overcome by an inspired moment in the charity shop, buying a load of grim ones and thinking "these'll look great cream, I'll order a F&B tester pot today" then promptly leaving them in the boot for weeks). So for now the cards sit in a bag in the dresser and I occasionally root them out and coo over them. Be better on the walls though.

3) My first job was at the Tower of London. No, not as a Beefeater (wasn't quite hairy enough) but as dogsbody in the press office. I wasn't really cut out for London and only stayed for 18mths but it was a terrific experience and I got to see so much behind the scenes.

4) I don't really like the summer. For various reasons (mainly clothes, wasps, rubbish weather) but as it goes on I find it really hard to enjoy it when autumn is just around the corner - which I love! Everything from the colours, bonfires, hearty food, bleak landscapes, the run up to Christmas, conkers, scarves, big coats - I know, wishing my life away but you watch this blog, come 1st September I'll feel like I can breathe out and revel in the wind down of the year.

5) My reading matter is very limited and I don't mind a bit. Thesedays reading time is in pretty short supply so I read just what I like, mainly medieval romances that I can curl up on the sofa with and get completely lost in. I feel a bit ashamed not to have ever read a Jane Austen and perhaps one day I will .

6) I wish I enjoyed cooking more but if I'm honest I get a bit bored. I do try hard, the boys get rather healthy stuff and I cook a mean roast chicken with roast veg and nice soups but I can't bake and I've only recently mastered a cheese sauce! (opps, bit embarrassing). I do love food shopping though (especially farmer's markets) and eating it, but I've got simple tastes. If I read a magazine recipe that requires anything vaguely exotic (like lemongrass) I turn over! The thought of planning a five-course dinner party and experimenting with dishes fills me with dread. I admit I'm a lot more interested in the eating part.

7) At school I was in the synchronised swimming team (ok enough laughing now). I swam three times a day plus competitions - obviously these were the days before I seriously discovered chocolate. All down hill from then on!

8) I'm rubbish at putting clothes away. Takes me two weeks to get up the nerve to plough through the ironing basket then I leave it in piles in rooms for days until they're creased again. Could I annoy myself anymore? And lets not even mention the pile of clothes I've already worn!

So there we go, hope that wasn't too boring... thanks for sticking with it if you did!

Little donkey, little donkey...

For the curious, (especially Sue & Marie!) here's the day-old donkey at Chatsworth Farm - how sweet is this! I think it was a girl but it has no name yet.

Altogether now...ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Round 2 - finds of the week.

My new favourite things (until the Oxfam shop opens again after its refit!)

No. 1 - this beautiful vanity dish was an ebay bargain for just £0.99. I can't believe that no-one else bid for it, its a good size and the embroidered lid is the prettiest thing.

No. 2 - I confess that I bought his as much for me as for Archie. Isn't he adorable, although one leg is already hanging by a thread so another job for the repairs basket, along with my favourite fluffy socks which just have to be saved in time for autumn.

N0. 3 - going through a bit of an Enid Blyton nostalgia trip at the moment and have added this centenary Famous 5 edition to my teeny collection. I love the picture and harbour secret dreams that the boys will one day discover them in the bookcase and be engrossed (although I know they'll probably be glued to the latest techy entertainment device won't they so I'm doing my best to shove things under their noses from an early age!). I couldn't resist the Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady (75p!) which has the loveliest drawings of seasonal plants and flowers. I know a fair few but great to be able to turn to the month and actually name what's growing in the hedgerows as I walk by.

No 4 - shocking picture sorry but I so wanted to share this - the most beautiful, hand-painted enamel brooch that I picked up for just a £1. Mum has something very similar given to her by the wonderful Mrs Hemming who we lived next door to when I was little. She was a true Edwardian and a school teacher spinster so didn't marry until she retired and therefore never had any children. She was like a favoured aunt and a truly elegant lady with an extraordinary past, she'd been a suffragette in her day and even swam The Channel.

I loved her beautiful house, full of pieces of huge oak furniture she'd carved herself. I remember she always wore a house coat and the daintiest, prettiest hair slide in her short, white bob. Her kitchen chairs (which she let us stand on - gulp!) were bought by her father at the Great Exhibition in 1851 and I was amazed by the Houses of Parliament Christmas Cards she received from no less than 3 MPs every year. (I thought she was so very important, rather like the Queen!). A really wonderful lady. Anyway... gosh sorry went right off track there, I coveted that beautiful brooch and am so thrilled to find one of my own. I shall wear it and remember the fascinating Mrs H often.

Looking forward to the Bank Holiday weekend and summer's last hurrah.

Hope the sun shines on everyone.

2 for the price of 1!

Barney's favourite phrase at the moment, in relation to just about anything, so in the spirit of things I'm going to get two posts on here whilst I've got a chance.

First thing though I want to say a huge thank you for all the lovely comments I've been receiving. Its so lovely to hear such nice things from lovely people. This is way over the top but blogging and discovering more about some truly fab people on their gorgeous blogs has brought a real ray of sunshine into my life (soppy enough yet?). I've discovered a whole new obsession (ebaying for vintage treasures and even though I don't pay a lot, I've bought so many things this summer they're beginning to mount up - eek!), enjoyed a myriad of visual treats and realised that I am not the only 30-something woman spending her evenings staying up until all hours glueing snippets of magazines into scrapbooks or rearranging flowers, jugs, trinkets - you name it - so they look just right for a snap and drooling over wonderful interiors on glorious blogs.

Thanks for coming to my rescue...

(Thanks too to Waitrose for the loveliest, easily eatable cake for a little one who's just mastering chomping. 'Fraid my domestic goddess points ran out after buying and wrapping presents, putting up bunting, farm trip etc so I failed miserably and had to buy a cake but I have faithfully promised to revive the hedgehog birthday cake tradition for next year. Does this put me back in credit?)

(paper - brill, my favourite thing)
The Birthday - thanks for all the lovely wishes. The weather was glorious and everyone was on tremendous form - phew. Plenty of sweet animals including a day-old donkey foal (the cuteness of which you will never have seen the like before), an age spent in the brilliant adventure playground which has the shallowest, clearest stream perfect for paddling and dam-building and ice lollies a-go-go.

(The Archers 2012 - otherwise known as Lily, Thomas & Barney)

Thanks to my lovely, smashing friend Helen for coming along too and sharing a special day.xx

Part 2 next...