AWOL or MIA?

Last seen lost under a mountain of crochet squares and flying tail ends......

Just thought I should explain my absence both here and at yours. All is well in the nest, my happy bubble has not burst although I am a little discombobulated at present. I made a pact with myself that I would not spend so much time on t'internet till Mini's blanket is completed. I'm too stubborn to break my pact with my self. Fool. Wally. Prat. Plonker etc...

xxx

☆☆☆Stars☆☆☆

When I had a "real" job I had to do one of those psychometric testy whatsits. I've forgotten most of what it said, however I have remembered one thing (probably because I disagreed with it at the time). It said I am a "completer-Finisher". When I took this test I was not a "completer-finisher" but I wasn't at all comfortable with the fact that I gave things up sometimes. Funny thing is that now I am older and know myself better I only start things I know I will finish...one day. Yes it might take me years to get back to something but I know that I will eventualy finish what I have started. I am now definately a completer-finisher and it feels good.

Did you think I'd forgotten about these?

I bet you did! Another WiP never to be seen again.

Nah! I just got distracted for a little while. As you do, as I do all too often.

This is my way of blocking little bits and bobs. A cork floor tile.

Don't they look sweet. Like crochet confetti.

They have been blocked and stacked patiently waiting for me to get my arse in gear and string them up in Mini's room

bit blurry, soz.

Lots of lovely little stars made from Ellen Bloom's pattern in embroidery thread.

I hung them up using invisible thread so they look like they are floating.

The photo's aren't great as the battery conked out. And it was yet another gloomy day here.

Some of the stars are twisting a bit so I need to put my thinking cap on and work out how to straighten them out.

Now before I go any further I must thank a couple of girls for their help with my banner issues. Thank you Wendy for the photobucket idea and thank you Nicole for telling me about Fotoflexer. Now I have a banner that is the perfect size and I'm feeling a little more confident about doing a proper banner make over...although I'm not very good with change.

In other news, I have been bestowed a few more bloggy awards so I'll do each in turn over the next couple of posts. I'm still delighted to receive these as it's such a compliment. I love blogging and I love having Bloddies (Blog Buddies) and I rather like doing the "facts" part of the award.  So a big thank you to Jo from Pickle-Lily. I know her in real life as we go to Knit Club at The Wool Sanctuary, we have only met once or twice as I'm new to the group but we are getting to know each other through our blogs. How 21st century of us! Jo is relatively new to blogging, she only started in February but there's plenty to read already. 

So now that I've linked to Jo which is part of the rules, I have to reveal seven facts about myself and pass this award on. I'm supposed to send it on to seven blogs but I think this particular award has already done the rounds quite a bit. Therefore I'll choose the requisite seven blogs but I honestly do not expect them to play along.

Here are my utterly riveting facts:

1. I'm not good with change, I find it unsettling more than invigorating. It takes me a while to make any big changes, I'm usually glad when I have, but I get a little anxious. I find comfort and security in routine. I know that makes me sound boring.

2.I know all the words to Eminem's "Go Crazy" and there is a video of me performing it in a traffic jam with pants on my head whilst pregnant with Big.

3. Those word verification things get on my wick. I find them a time eating faff. I can understand why popular blogs with oodles of followers would need them to protect against spam, but the likes of me? I've turned mine off. I will only turn it back on when/if I ever get any spam. However sometimes the words are funny. I had buncelip the other day. I know someone in real life who reads this who is going to crack up over that one (you know who you are!)

4. I have a milky coffee everyday. I nuke the milk in a mug in the microwave for two minutes. During this time I play the Two Minute Challenge. I set myself a task and see if I can complete it in two minutes going at warp speed. It's amazing how quickly I can fold washing/wash up/sweep the floor/clean the loo/put my make up on. Word of warning, don't try emptying the dishwasher at warp speed, not if you are a clumsy one.

5. I L♡VE spoonerisms. My best ones ever are Twasta Pists (pasta twists) and tiny shites (shiney tights) I didn't really need to translate them did I?! I still chuckle when I remember the lady's face in M&S when I asked her where I could find some tiny shites!! Please tell me your favourite ones, give me a laugh.

6. I hate being late. I'm nearly always late these days. I have set my watch ten minutes fast but I'm still late even though I have conditioned myself into thinking my watch is telling the correct time. Maybe the problem lies in the fact that it has the date on it and that is 2 days behind. As I'm typng this it's occurring to me that having a watch telling the wrong date and time is ridiculous. I've now corrected it.

7. I think part of my love of crochet comes from the fact that I often spell it wrong. The amount of times I have almost published a post that's going on about my obsession with 'crotch'. Oh dear, I just made my self laugh out loud again at that. What a wally! Honestly, any reference to crotch or fart etc... and I go all silly.

I'll pass this on to a few blogs I enjoy. Some I have only very recently come across. A couple are new blogs from people I know in real life:

Meme Rose
RubyRed
crejjtion
quietlystitching
Made From Scratch
Bubble and Life
Busy Bee

Please don't feel obliged, just join in if you like.


Lastly, any one got any good advice about camera's? I have a snap happy one that I'm pleased with and take everywhere with me. But I'd like one that takes the nice photo's where the stuff in the background is blurry, like in my Strawberry Jam post. I use Mr C's SLR ('micro 4 thirds' I've just been told) for these and it's great. I aim and fire and it takes a great photo. Thing is I don't want to take his camera out and about with me as it was rather pricey. I know this because I bought it for him a couple of Christmas's ago. I did Jamie at Home parties and Pampered Chef shows for two months and earned enough money to buy him a present with my very own money and I got all of his Mum's cinefilms (20 of them) put onto disks as surprise. I had lots of late nights and yucky picky customers but it was worth it. Every autumn I go on an Earning My Own Money Mission so I can buy him a present with money he hasn't earned. Last year I was pregnant so I couldn't do it. How shall I earn money this year? It has to fit around the children...I'll think of something.

Weekly round up...

(Warning. Rambley post.)

I've been a bit odd for a few days, my mind is all disjointed. I'm a bit at sixes and sevens. I keep picking things up, moving them around and not achieving anything. I can't focus. The feng shui must be all wrong! Actually I KNOW the Feng Shui must be all wrong since I don't have a clue about it. I'm just tired. The baby wakes once a night and then there's the weirdy womb waking me this week too. But luckily that does seem to be ok most of the time now so hopefully things will settle back into their old routine shortly. Anyway, I'm weary and a bit wired, too many things I want to do, too many distractions, too much MESS everywhere. I should go to bed earlier but I find that by the time I've battled through the afternoon/early evening slump I'm wired with adrenalin and could then carry on pottering all night. 

Necklace is top right. Aquamarine stone in a fine chain, very delicate.

One of the highlights of the week was receiving this necklace I have been dreaming of for some time. I had to collect it from the post office as I missed the postie. If I'd known what was in there I'd have grabbed by camera. Instead I ripped it open with a squeal right outside the post office. 

Ok so I had to give the Mr a bit of a hint! Oh all right, a rather big hint, but the subtle ones weren't working and I felt it only right that Mini was celebrated like his brothers were. An eternity ring when Big arrived as is tradition and earrings when Little was born.

I went to visit Bee on Thursday last week and it was so lovely. A real tonic. We did our usual silly face pulling thing, I must have thousands of photo's of us looking silly. Gosh I was having a Very Bad Hair day!

A photo of a photo.

I think this may be one of only six photo's where we both look nice, shame it's so faded now but it is 14 years old so that's no surprise. Every other photo has either one or both of us pulling a face. It's a compulsion. We are so immature when we are together. I love it, so does she. Our husbands? They despair (we don't care).

We got her blog set up, she hasn't had a lot of time to write posts yet but she's keen to create a blog that will be a wonderful memento for her children in years to come. It'll be a great outlet for her too. She has one of those crazy, complicated minds that is prone to over analysing and never relaxing. So her blog can be a place to brain dump too. I think she'll love it.

Look at the size of that baby! He is 16lbs 15oz now. What a whopper! He's gone up a centile too in spite of feeding less than the charts recommend. Yet he's still not sleeping through, the monkey. I know he can do it as he has done so several times, just not for weeks now. Zzzzzzzzzzzz

Talking about funny faces, I think Little may be a chip off the old block. He stuck eye ball stickers on himself and his brother. 

I laughed so hard at them, they looked hilarious in real life, especially when they were blinking. It was like the sticker eyes were rolling. The photo's set me off every time I see them. I don't know that they are funny to anyone else not having seen them in action, all wibbly like, like... like aliens!

I started and finished a little crochet project for Mr C as it was Fathers Day on Sunday. Mr C had bought me a crochet animal book for mothers day. He seemed quite taken with the concept of crocheted animals so I made him a goat. It's a little joke of ours from Catherine Tate "It were a curry made of goauuurt!" (Thank you Helen for finding the perfect link. Be warned people Catherine Tate is not politically correct.)

Yes that is a pair of stripy under crackers and Mr C is making goat noises. Scary.

And that is a star sticker in Big's hair.

And this is supposed to be a goat, the head is a strange shape.

Mr C was chuffed with his gift from the little fella's (me). He had a nice(ish) Fathers Day despite really not being that bothered about it. He went to karate in the morning, and then we went to our neighbours for a housewarming, then he developed a bit of a migraine and went to bed till the boys were in bed.

Now get ready for the horror which is my home. I tidy..they mess it all up again and again and again. This is why I have very little to show for my time this week.

The playroom "Tip it up, tip it up" they chanted

"This is our boat, Mummy!"

Big's ransacked bedroom, it gets worse...

...much worse. I have some industrial polyfilling to do.

A small mess in Little's room

More destruction

It's not all down to the boys though. 

My crafting mess in the spare room

I've made a right old mess trying to start and finish (over optimistically) a number of projects.

The dust came from underneath the door when the tiles were being drilled out

We had the builders in to sort out the drains in the utility room (tilly woom as Big calls it), it's part of the old house with the old drainage system. I think it was once an out building that got badly incorporated into the main body of the house. I'm sure a female builder would have put something across the bottom of the door to stop the crap from billowing through. The whole of the downstairs was covered in a layer of red brick dust. Grrrrrrrrrr. But at least there's no eggy smell floating up from the drains now.

The AGA has been broken since April 2010. I have been very patient, very, very and finally we are getting it mended and converted from oil to electric so it can be programmed to come on and go off like the heating and water. To get it mended the granite had to be removed. The builder pulled it off after he'd fixed the drains but the AGA people aren't coming till August so I'll live with the mess for a while longer.

Of course all the gubbins from the utility had to come out and be scattered amongst the kitchen while work was carried out, it has had a knock on effect to the whole house and I still haven't got things back to normal! Not helped by the fact that my mind isn't functioning properly, I'm so flummoxed by things.

The diet continues, I've lost a stone. Just half to go. Gosh it is SOOOOOOOO BORING!

I tried to jazz up my salad with edible flowers but it was still salad. Lucky for me that I enjoy salad, fruit and veg.

I also have chocolate everyday too, just a few squares, enough to satisfy the cravings. Sometimes I'll eat nothing but salad for lunch and supper and then I'll have a Snickers bar. Mr C rolls his eyes when I do this but I have way more than my 5 a day so where's the harm!

This was one of my birthday cards from the gal who spent the Royal Wedding with us. We have both said on more than one occasion that there should be a screen available at weigh ins so those who want to can weigh in in the rudey nudey! Not that I go to weigh in's anymore, I do it at home on my own for free.

xxx

ps. Don't tell Bee but next time I go to her house I'm nicking these cups!

Oh yes I am! Ha!

Strawberry Jam

(Please excuse the look of my blog, I'm having problems with blogger, see end of post...)

I'm a hopeless gardener. I've never even managed to grow a decent crop of strawberries. Everyone can grow strawberries. Not me. I grew one once. Yes a strawberry actually grew on a strawberry plant I had planted. It was tiny and green but a strawberry none the less. Big Cuckoo was almost a year old and he scrabbled along to the lonesome strawberry and plucked it off. Gone.

This week I wanted strawberries of the home grown variety...

...so I made some

 

...several actually

They are filled with lavender.

So sweet!

 Some will go in my drawers to keep the moths at bay

Some will hang in my wardrobe

Some will be tied on to wrapped gifts

I plan to make many more as they are adorable and I'd like to have a strawberry garland on my plate rack. I have seen this, some time last year I think, on one of the blogs I read. The lady had been rearranging her treasures and added some little strawberries she'd made. It was a pine dresser. I want to give credit to the person who has inspired me. I think it was a follower of mine. Was it you? Please say and leave a link so I can edit this. (edit: it was Ruby Red!)

I enjoyed making  these strawberries a lot as once I'd got to the stuffed and stitched stage they were very portable and I missed my quilt. I missed stitching. So I took them about with me to have their hats popped on.  Terribly relaxing, maybe it was the lavender. Well whatever it was I have had a calm week. Except for after school today when I opened the car door in the village and it seemed the entire contents of my car spilled out into the very full and wet gutter. Books bags, crochet bag, diary (yes my posh one that was a special gift), the nappy bag and Big's lunchbox and half eaten contents. I swore. Then I sniffed a strawberry and all was well.

I have now started more so this jar will b

You may recognise these little dearies from this months Mollie Makes Magazine...

I'm so delighted with Mollie Makes. Mollie Makes me feel inspired, excited, happy, like I belong to this crafty world. I just feel chuffed with every page.  Even the advert you can see here is right up my street. It'll be no big surprise that I have signed up for the subscription. Actually I went for the 3 for a fiver offer before I'd even seen a copy in real life! I was going demented trying to get the trial edition, you know the one with The Apple Cosy. I felt I needed this magazine. That it would make me happy happy happy. Then one arrived in my letter box from gorgeous Vanessa who had heard of my search. Gawd bless her and this blog world we inhabit.

Enjoy your weekend where ever you are. Ours is going to be jam (pun intentional in light of all the strawbs) packed. I prefer them to be slow quiet ones where we just pootle about. I'm sure it'll whizz by in a flash. Time is running too fast lately. I go to bed each day wishing to start it all over again. The boys are fun bundles these days and the baby is such a sunny little chap. I'm loving this chapter of my life. I feel happy. I feel....steady, normal.... I'm feeling well. My state of mind is good. I do not take this for granted believe me.

xxx

ps. I just tried cropping my banner photo as I feel it's too long, and blogger said I can't because I've exceeded my picassa web album upload quota and I need to purchase more storage. What's that all about? I'm hoping I can upload pics to my posts still! I'll try now....

pps. (a bit later)  So I can upload photos to my blog posts and to my side bar using URLs and from my computer but not to my banner. And now Blogger has lost my old banner photo all together even though I did not click save changes! 

I have opened a flickr account but it keeps saying the URL is invalid (it says this when I try to upload from there for my posts or photo's in my sidebar too) So flickr is not helping me.  

I can upload a banner photo from existing photo's on my blog using the URL but of course they aren't the correct width, same if I upload from elsewhere on the net. 

Now this techy stuff makes my head burst. One minute my banner was there and the next it is gone. I didn't "save changes" when I was editing so it should still be there.  I've deleted photo's from my blog but there's still not enough space. Is this one of those Blogger gremlins that is going around? Honestly, I get so frustrated by this stuff. I have such a small blog I can't see how I can have ran out of space already.   It's this sort of thing that will stop me from blogging. I'm feeling RAGE!!!!  I need a lavender strawberry.

ppps.(the next day) Phew, I have a banner again! But now it's a bit wide....So weird how I managed to upload a photo and now it's not uploading again so I can't alter the size. But at least there's something there.