scary looking swimmers

Ok they're a little scary at the moment but they are awaiting hair, and hair is the problem, I just cannot decide what to do about it.  I know I don't want wool, I have thought about swimming caps but they would still need a little bit of hair.  If anyone out there has any ideas I would be grateful as I am thinking about doll hair morning, noon and night now!

I should add that these girls are inspired by the 'Battery rocks swimmers', a small (unsurprisingly) number of all year round sea swimmers who swim from Battery rocks.  At the moment I can only dream of ever being hardy enough to belong to this elite group!

St Ives

It's a funny thing, St Ives is so close, only a few miles away, but we rarely go there, so yesterday when a friend needed his surfboard taking over we visited.  It does get unbelievably busy over late spring, summer and autumn and everything does cost 25% more than Penzance but it's just beautiful when the sun's out

This was someone's yard that we sneakily took a picture of while they had nipped indoors.  I just love those battered chairs and all those plants in pots and old sinks

doors on the back streets

pink flowers in the memorial gardens

Porthmeor beach, looking up to the Tate (and the cafe where milkshakes cost £3.50!)

So we ate pasties and ice creams and fudge and sauntered around the shops, sat on the beach and watched the sea (too rough for swimming) and the surfers and felt like holiday makers for the day.  Sometimes it's just the right place to be.

and the winner of the replay is...

You could get tired of seeing this photo, who knew a giveaway could be so complicated!  I decided to redraw as I have no contact details for the original winner and they haven't been in touch, so the new winner is...

...Colleen who recommended yankeequilter.com.  I will email you and hopefully this purse will be winging its way to you soon!

Sadly I was a little ahead of myself yesterday and today was just toooooooooo cold for a swim but you never know, tomorrow might always be better

in the sea

Today is a special day, my first official (or unofficial) sea swim of the year.  I don't have a wetsuit hence the photo of lovely ladies in their swimsuits (you didn't think I would put one of me up here did you?). 

I have a plan, it is only a plan, nothing concrete, to swim in the sea every day until...(the original plan began on the 1st of May but I was weak).

Of course it's easy to have a plan on an evening that feels so hot I thought the radiators had come on, so I won't be too hard on myself if I fail occasionally.  But I keep hearing how good it is for you, my children swim in the sea all the time and they are very healthy so I intend to do it, most days, hopefully.  Anyone out there up for a challenge?  There are rivers and lakes out there too.  Anyone???

The weekend in yellow

sun, sand and sea, everything seems brighter in May.  A lovely weekend spent by and in the sea.

There's a little problem with my giveaway, the winner had no email address and has not been in contact so I will give it a couple more days and then redraw from the list.

Folksy Friday

Just a quick post today, after my french dictionary post and before my first french session today my theme this week is Paris


Just click on the items and they should take you to the folksy shops they come from

AND THE WINNER IS!

Dawn Till Dusk, Kelly Eklund

congratulations

please could you get in touch with your address

Thankyou for all the lovely comments and piles and piles of blogs to read

I'll never need to be bored again

A little bit of crazy french

I am about to run a french session at our home education group so I searched out some old french books and found this crazy(well used and grubby) book that I actually learned a lot of french from, I think it's doctor seuss

I have always remembered this particular phrase, after all who knows when you might need to speak to a cat, Alice needed to!

I do wonder what kind of a travelling child this book was meant for

and although I have never been trapped in a freezer I am safe in the knowledge that I can tell people how cold it is if I ever do get stuck in one, but my favourite is this...

another phrase I always remember but sadly I don't have a sailboat to sink.

Do you know of more fun language books because I'm sure my love of languages all started with this book. 

a most beautiful and lovely blog

this is one of the blogs that was recommended more than once and it is simply gorgeous
dottie angel It is so whimsical and I am utterly envious of her thrift finds.  There are many many more to look at and I thoroughly recommend going through all the comments to find new exciting things to read. 

wonderful giveaways and some folksy updates

I can't believe how many responses I have had to my little giveaway, I was worried that I might not get any but now I wish I could make as many purses to give away as I have had responses. I have started looking through the lovely blogs but as there are quite a few there and I have got lost in many of them it's taking a little time. I will post on the best ones soon.
I have also had a little time to make and upload a few things onto my folksy shop, this sweet little pixie is on a little padded coin purse, although my daughter's mp3 player fits into it too

and another patchwork phone cosy or maybe glasses case for reading glasses, I love doing log cabin patches, messing with colours and patterns and (hmm I may have mentioned this before) I love wild thyme fabric. I've also uploaded a first aid pouch like the one I made for myself and blogged about a week or so ago.

Well, back to my reading now and thankyou for all your lovely comments on the giveaway.

Sew mama sew giveaway

This is my first ever give away and it's part of the Sew Mama Sew May Giveaway Day http://sewmamasew.com/index.php
It's a zip purse, about 7'' wide with patches of wild thyme flowers fabric on the front and back. I love all the wild thyme fabrics.

Please leave a comment recommending a new blog for me to read, it can be yours or someonelse's that you enjoy and I will pick the winner randomly. I'm open to anything new to read. The giveaway is open until 9pm UK time May the 20th. I can ship internationally. Could you please leave email contact information for me.

time to get the barbecue out

A cruiser in Penzance harbour (or almost, I don't think it's actually deep enough)
flowers in our rather damp yard

and a patch of blue sky peeping through washing actually drying on the line outside

summer's here and we're off to the beach for a barbecue

folksy friday

My first ever folksy fridayHopefully if you click the images they will take you to the pages for these gorgeous items.

accidents will happen

I've discovered recently (despite having had children for nearly seventeen years now) that if children do a lot of this sort of thing...
then accidents tend to happen. Such as the splinter Annis got deep in her finger last week. When she showed me it I realised that if I had had a pair of tweezers on me I could have helped. Instead she had to wait until she got home. So finally, after seventeen years I have made a pouch for injuries while adventuring

It is based on Amy Karol's Bend the rules pouch but I have changed the dimensions

and it is very clearly for medical emergencies. Now all I have to do is fill it with tweezers and plasters... let's hope that doesn't take another seventeen years.

Bella and Emily

Bella and Emily, originally uploaded by glassmountain.

I have been sewing rabbits recently, making their skirts and ears out of worn out old clothes and left over scraps of fabric. I hand embroidered their faces and their arms and legs are made of string. But now I have a new challenge, a boy rabbit for my son. I think he will need to wear shorts, a bit more complicated than a skirt but I'm ready to have a go. I have just put these two rabbits onto my folksy shop.

I just love this picture, it's from easter (seems so long ago now!). I have used it to apply my new computer skills to making a banner for my blog. I'm sure most of you out there already use things like picnik (which is what I used) but for me it's a new experience. My handy teenage photoshop user is almost never available for more than five minutes these days so I have had to learn for myself. And for those of you who haven't used this kind of thing, I recommend picnik and about an hour of your time.

My favourite craft books

Ok, this post should really be called 'look I've learned how to make a photograph mosaic and how to put clickable photographs on your blog' because they are all clickable!!! Admittedly they do all take you to Amazon because that's where the books are sold but this is huge progress for me.



These are my absolute favourite craft books, most especially 'bend the rules' which I am using now to teach my nine year old daughter to sew with. The projects are simple but still useful and the instructions are pretty fool proof (there are some errata on the 'bend the rules' flickr group.Alabama stitch book is where I have learned to hand sew, I love love love this book and I truly do want the new studio book too.The glove knitting book has every type of glove you could ever wish for, it really is beautiful and I have made many pairs of gloves from it.I just love the way Suzuko Koseki puts prints and colours together in patchwork style, the log cabin quilt is just so cool, I couldn't have imagined log cabin ever looking so clean and modern.Poppy Treffry's stuff is just fun and gorgeous and makes lovely presents for people (when I can get my machine to perform properly)And finally sewing clothes for children just has fabulous patterns that can be messed with according to how your child wants their clothes to look, frills, ribbons and patches or sober, cool and modern.No doubt over the next couple of days I will find more reasons to create more mosaics, the main one being folksy friday, so look out for more mosaics.And here is where I found out how to do this http://craftbloguk.blogspot.com/2010/03/blog-treasury-template-haptree-mini.htmlI'd love to hear about your favourite craft books too.