A little bit of sewing

New purse and pouch

I am so happy that I managed to squeeze in a little sewing this week. For some reason I'm not finding the time to craft at the moment but the creativity that this offers is very important to me so I've really been missing it.

Growing up a little at a time.

Organised pastries

My youngest son seems to be growing up in leaps and bounds. But every now and then he does something to remind me that he's still my baby. Look at the image above, it makes me smile. He was asked by his grandmother to arrange the pastries on the plate. He looked at the plate and very quickly established that there simply was not enough room (he can be quite analytical). So he stacked them in a tower.

Still my little boy.

Plant markers

Slate markers seen at Stourhead Gardens

Earlier this year I noted the slate markers at Stourhead and thought that they were a great idea for community gardens.

Feeling frustrated

Muddy, claggy field

I'm doing okay with my 20 miles in January goal... but I wish that I was doing better. This is not down to me for a change but due to the saturated landscape. There is a limit as to where I can walk from the house, at the moment each route I take is pretty much identical and I'm beginning to get bored with looking at the river, wonderful though it is. But I'm not ready to give up, just wishing that the land would get a chance to dry for a week or two. Fingers are crossed.

Spring cleaning.

Garlic cloves in modules

Okay, it isn't yet spring but the sun shone for a bit. I had a busy day getting started on the garden. When I say getting started I mean doing what I could without having to step too often onto our still water saturated land. So the shed it was then.

My 2013 Christmas decorations: stars

Each year I make a few new decorations for the tree. This year, inspired by some that I saw in a Haskins garden centre, I'm making stars. Very simply made, a pile of stars using a cream calico fabric. Lightly stuffed with the contents of an old, lumpy pillow and embroidered around the edge with blanket stitch in bright colours. They still looked a little plain so I added a dorset button to the middle of each. I like them.

If I were to be picky I wouldn't use the large buttons again, the smaller ones look best. But as these are for my tree I'm keeping them as they are.

Dorset buttons are a type of button that used to be produced within Dorset. Mine are based on the blandford cartwheel and made using whatever rings I had around (I think one was the plastic bit left around the top of drinks bottle, not ideal) and embroidery thread. Looking up a tutorial to share I saw noticed several names used to describe the cartwheel design, I have no idea which is correct. All I can say is that the old ladies who taught me when I was a girl called it the blandford cartwheel and that name has stuck with me.