Spontaneous patchwork project!

I was up early this morning with Rose and was having a browse through Pinterest and came across this photo.

Source: lexilovesshop.wordpress.com via Ashley on Pinterest

I absolutely lovvvee this chair, the glossy colour.. the patchwork seat... Everything!

This got me thinking... last year when my Nan was visiting, we were at the tip getting rid of a load of garden waste (she helps me in the garden every time she visits - lucky me!) and she spotted a chair that someone had thrown away, it was quite nice and as we were short of furniture at the time,  it ended up coming home with us and is used as our computer chair. The chair looks pretty old fashioned but for some reason I've never thought to paint it or anything before.

So when Rose finally went back to sleep, instead of catching up on a little more sleep in my bed that was Definitely calling to me... I got myself organised and started choosing and cutting squares of fabric. I've asked for a cutting board and rotary cutter for my birthday but as I don't have these yet I was just having to roughly draw around them with a ruler before cutting them out with scissors, so it definitely doesn't look perfect but as I'm Extremely new to patchwork, I'm pretty pleased with the result.

In between taking Rose to baby gym at 11am and walking into town to buy sandpaper and a staple gun, I've been busy sewing my patchwork squares together and now I have finished attaching my patchwork to the seat and the chair has been sanded and painted with undercoat. I plan to go and buy my gorgeous coloured paint tomorrow and then get it painted early, I don't know what's got into me! I've never been this spontaneous and motivated at the same time before...ever!

For some unbeknown reason, I've also undertaken the task of baking the Christmas cake tomorrow. The dried fruit is busy soaking up the booze as we speak, so there's no going back now. I really hope Rose is cheery and happy all of tomorrow so I can get this all done! I think she has another tooth about to come through as she was completely unlike herself this afternoon when she woke from her nap and wouldn't stop crying.. Calpol just didn't seem to be helping!

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Here are my finished hand-warmers and a few other rambling's of mine...

Well here they are, I finished them the other morning and love them.

I think a big part of why I like them so much is to do with the fact that they are the knitting project that I learnt not only to knit with DPN's but also to knit cables! I can't quite believe I managed it. :-)

This is where I got the pattern from. xxx

I had a conversation with my auntie on the phone on Monday which then resulted in her coming to see us for the day on Tuesday. It was a lovely unexpected visit which I think made it all the more enjoyable, it's been really nice to see a lot more of my family over the past few weeks.

(Having a Very healthy lunch! Oops!) 

Ray, Rose and I were out for dinner this evening with some of our friends and their babies and Somehow!? I ended up with a chocolate brownie dessert in front of me.. I have No idea how it got there... and well, of course I couldn't not eat it, could I..! Haha. The healthy eating DOES start tomorrow though!!

We went to the shop 'The Eternal Maker' after we picked Lettie up from the station. I went there with Mum last week and I promised myself that I wouldn't go there and spend any money for at least a month! I didn't quite manage to keep to that promise though...

What with both Mum and Lettie visiting, I've been bought some really lovely fabric goodies. I really am lucky to have been spoilt just a Little bit...

(Thank you xxxx)

Also, Lettie has taught me how to sew foundation patchwork, so this now opens up a Whole new world of craftiness to me. So exciting!

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A very breezy time on the beach..

Today we met up with some of Ray's family in the afternoon and had a lovely (very unhealthy, I may have ended up with a Huge portion of banoffee pie. Back on the diet starting tomorrow!) lunch at a bustling cafe next to the beach...

...and we all had a lovely time walking it all off afterwards with a stroll next to the sea. I say a stroll... but it was more like a hike, what with getting the buggy past the stones to the sand. Ray's sister and I carried it between us and thank goodness Rose was on her Daddy's shoulders at the time, as she weighs an absolute ton these day's!

I had fun with my camera.

We bought it a little earlier than planned as I was desperate to be able to take some nice shots of Rose and also for photo's for my blog. But now all my money I get given for my birthday and Christmas will now go towards paying for it, this is fine obviously as I've wanted a good camera for aggess but it does take a little of the excitement out of wondering what you might get given! (Gosh, don't I sound spoilt!)

Rose had some time with her auntie, she's constantly wanting to be on her feet non-stop these day's! We had a couple day's of her being a bit grizzly (with teething I think) but thankfully she's now back to her smiley happy self.

Although, as she woke us up at 3am last night.. and Kept us awake I'll add... I'm betting that I'll have another early start tomorrow so I should probably head to bed now. I'll be taking my knitting with me though as I only have a tiny bit to go now and then I'll have finished the second mitt..! They are gorgeous and I love how soft they are but I wish I had made a slight alteration with them so I may give these away as a gift, I'll wait until I finish them to decide though.

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One down... one to go!

Well I've finished one of the fingerless gloves.

I was surprised at how easy I found knitting on DPN's, they always looked so scary to me and put me off. But once I got the first couple of rows out of the way I found it really enjoyable. It was even more addictive because the rounds were nice and quick, so I every time I went to put it down I though 'Oh just one more round then!'

It did help that I was up and awake at 4:30am with a wide-awake Rose for nearly 2 hours, so I got quite a bit done then. She's got into the habit of waking up around that time every day now and I know she's not hungry so maybe I should try leave her to settle herself...    Oh I don't know..!?

And look! Cables! I cannot believe it, I've actually mange to knit cables. I know it's a relatively simple cable knit pattern but I'm chuffed that I managed it anyhow..! :-)

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Back to normal.

Hi everybody,

I hope your all well and getting used to the nippy weather?! I swear I feel the cold more than I should at my age... Even though we have the heating on intermittently I'm having to layer up with cardigans and big fluffy socks, inside the house and my fingers are still freezing cold!

I love Autumn, even with the cold weather because everything feels much more cosy and I've got my birthday to look forward to next month. I also do get rather excited about Christmas and look forward to when we can put the tree up and make the house look all festive.

We did put the tree up a little early last year... it wasn't even officially December! We went to buy our tree just to be prepared (it's an artificial one) and then when we got home we just could resist and up it went..! I think we'll wait a little longer this year though... haha. I don't even know if it's stay standing now that we have Rose to contend with, she's got a habit at the moment of pulling things over. If it's not chairs, then it's the clothes airer or the ironing board. She's terrible! I've constantly got my heart in my mouth at the moment, she has so many toys to play with but she just seems to find normal every day objects much more appealing!

I've decided to bite the bullet and I'm Attempting to knit with Double pointed needles. I'm knitting a pair of hand-warmers, the picture on the pattern looks gorgeous and I just Had to have them. I'm a little worried though as the pattern also includes cable knitting, another thing that I've never tried before. Trust me to bite off more than I can chew! But I've sat down armed with a load of youtube tutorials to get me through whilst Rose is having a sleep upstairs. Wish me luck!

(The yarn is Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran in Pale pink and is sooo soft and squishy.)

I haven't been in blogland much over the last few day's as we had my Mum to stay. It was so so lovely to see her again, as she lives right down in Cornwall and it was really good for her to spend some good quality time with Rose. I think Rose will be missing all of the constant cuddles and attention she was getting whilst Mum was here..!

In the evenings she was crocheting her blanket and I managed to finish one Christmas present. Just a few more to go still though...

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Edited to add: I just wanted to thank everyone who left me a comment on my last post. I was feeling quite down but every one of the lovely comments that you left helped to make me feel back to my normal self. I've been feeling much more positive this week and have had a friend round for lunch one day as well as my usual baby groups, so I feel like I'm making much more of an effort on the friends front. Just thought I'd let you all know that I'm feeling a lot happier now... xxx

Feeling a little out of sorts...

Rose has finally gone down for her nap and instead of doing the ironing and putting away the washing like I should be doing, I've made myself a nice cup of coffee and am taking some time out to write this post.

For some reason I'm just feeling a bit down today and just need a bit of 'me' time whilst she's sleeping upstairs...

I suppose this blog is a kind of diary for me, not just about the things I make and do, or of how Rose is getting along but it should be about how I'm feeling.. good or bad. So I'm not going to feel guilty about subjecting you to a little doom and gloom! (By the way the photo's are from our walk yesterday, I will chat about that too.)

I don't know what's got into me today, most day's I'm fairly cheery and happy... it must be the hormones!?

Rose and I went out to her baby gym class this morning, it's basically just a whole load of mums with babies that aren't at walking stage yet, lots of songs are sung and toys are played with. An excuse for mums to get out the house and socialise really...!

For some reason today I just found it quite hard to start up conversations with the other women, I just felt a bit awkward and found myself looking at a lot of the others and thinking how a lot of them looked like they were really good friends and had loads to chat about.

I have a really great group of friends from school and home, and speak to them regularly and they come to visit. But we moved here last year because of Ray's work and I was kind of 'chucked in at the deep end' so to speak and didn't know Anyone! Luckily I met a lovely group of women through my NCT antenatal classes and we meet up fairly often. I also know a nice group of women that I see at a weekly baby/toddler group that I really enjoy but I don't have any great friends that just pop round for a coffee and a natter.

I think maybe some of it is to do with the fact I know we'll be moving back nearer Dorset in a couple of years time so don't feel 100% settled here... I love it here at the moment but know I wouldn't want to live here forever if you know what I mean...

I think I just miss those regular chats you have with your best friends about all sorts of silly things, all this rambling on has probably bored you to death if you've stuck with me and carried on reading! If so, thank you for being patient..! 

Yesterday Ray had some time off so we got out of the house and went for a really great long walk. Sometimes it's just too easy to stay inside and get on with housework, it can always be done the next day instead! :-)

We took a short drive up the road and walked up a huggggee hill, the last time we did the same walk I was about 39 weeks pregnant and Massive, so was desperate to give things a kick-start. Sadly this didn't work and it wasn't meant to be, as my waters broke on my due date a week or so later. We kept meaning to go back again and again but other things always seemed to crop up, it was lovely though as this time it was Ray that was carrying the weight of Rose up the hill!

We definitely don't do enough exercise though because today my shins have been aching like crazy. At least I might have burnt off the chocolate brownies I baked the other evening...

I hope everyone has been having a good week, sorry for boring you and thank you for all the comments that people have left on my blog recently. It means to much to receive them and puts a smile on my face when reading them.

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Rose's capped sleeve cardigan.

I'm in the mood to finish things at the moment and was happy to cast off on this cardigan and sew it all together. It was a really quick knit from some wool that my Mum gave to me as a gift (mentioned here) but it actually took me from August til now to finish it as I just kept getting distracted by other little projects. Nothing new there then!

It's a pretty cardigan that can either be worn over dresses or can be worn over long sleeves to add another layer. I found the free pattern on Ravelry, if your interested in it then you can find it here. It's really lovely and soft but is knitted for 12-18 months so Rose will have to wait a few months to wear it. Although I quickly popped it on here to see how big it was and I don't think it'll be long before she can wear it.

I bought the buttons a couple months ago from myfabrichouse and I love them. I think they look perfect on this cardigan but I still have a load more of them, so I look forward to using them to prettify something in the future...

I know I said I was finishing things off at the moment but I'm actually just about to start hooking up Another blanket for Rose. She can never have too many... one for every day of the week! (Well that's what I tell myself anyway!)

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Birthday cake success!

It was Ray's birthday yesterday and this year I wanted to try and make him a 'proper' birthday cake, well a decorated one anyway. I want to make Rose a really great cake for her 1 st birthday in January so this was the perfect way to practise. Also as a little present for Ray too of course..!

As usual, I left it all til rather last-minute and only decided on what I was going to do a few day's before his birthday! So I panic-bought the icing I needed off the internet and asked for next-day delivery and thankfully it arrived on time and I hadn't made any drastic mistakes with the amount of icing I bought.

So I got to work whilst Rose jumped up and down in her tigger bouncer (I only have about 20 minutes and then she gets bored and starts yelling)... I would have thought with all the exercise she's doing these day's that she'd burn off some of her fat reserves but nope, she still has triple rolls on her thighs! haha

For something that looks so simple, my inexperienced cake-decorating hands took Forever to figure how to make the right shapes. It was definitely a big relief when I finished! Inside is a lemon madeira cake with a filling of jam and a cream and mascerpone cheese filling. Yum!

He looks a rather chilled out doctor I have to say, he started out upright but gradually reclined back...

Ahh well, it went down well with his family and tasted pretty good too... I just need to eat salad for a week now to make up for all the cake and icing I have consumed! :-)

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First family holiday abroad with some holiday snaps...

It's taken me a little while to get around to writing this post, but here it is! I said I'd show you a few of our holiday pics.. probably of not much interest to anyone but I'll ramble on anyway! :-)

I managed to pack everything we needed and didn't forget anything important, although I tend to leave all that side of things to Ray as then I can't be blamed for forgetting anything! Much more relaxing for both parties I think...

I was pretty nervous about the the flights, not knowing how Rose would cope.. but I breastfed her when going up and she didn't seem to have any discomfort in her ears. Well if she did, she did a good job of not showing it as she spent most of the flight trying to clamber up over me and grinning at the poor people behind us. I was especially nervous about her making any noise, as the 'interesting' chap next to us had confided to Ray that he really was Not a 'baby-person'... maybe he just wanted us to be sure that we'd keep her as far away from him as possible to leave him in peace to drink his countless cans of Stella...

I was more worried about the flight back as it was at 8:30pm and I was worried that she wouldn't sleep in my arms and we'd be dealing with a cranky baby the whole flight back. But our prayers were answered as she slept for the WHOLE flight and didn't even stir when we had a bumpy landing. I'm sure people were wondering if I had drugged her up on something before the flight..!

Plenty of time was spent by the pool... I'm not Actually nude, as I appear to look in this photo by the way!

Day's out were had...

I Attempted to sunbathe whilst Rose (who has now mastered crawling) clambered all over me!

To be fair I did have a fair bit of time to myself in the sun, it's quite fortunate that my husband is more of a shade-lover than a sun worshipper, as he was quite happy to take her inside the villa to give me little breaks. :-)

Dinner's were eaten 'al-fresco' style on the rooftop, this particular evening it was fajitas on the menu... I didn't stick to the healthy-eating plan but Very surprisingly only put on half a pound!

We were very snap-happy and came home with over 300+ photo's, when we got home a Lot of editing was needed. We seemed to have about 10 of each photo, or very similar photo's anyway...

We only made it to the beach on one day and even then only stayed for the morning. Rose is just that little bit too small to enjoy the beach, we tried paddling but she was just too scared of the waves and preferred to try and eat her own body-weight in sand... It got Everywhere! We coped until a nappy-change was needed and then it just got too much and we gave up and returned to the pool, I swear I was finding bits of sand on her for day's!

Since we've been back it's all been non-stop really but it was nice to get back to normality and get back into our normal routine. Rose is now crawling at speeds I didn't know were possible, is pulling herself up to standing on Any available object she can grab onto and the other day I caught her having climbed up the staircase, only 1 step mind you but time to get a bottom stair-gate sorted I think!

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Quilted wall hanging for Lettie

It was my Auntie Lettie's birthday on the 18th of September and I wanted to make her something special.

 I would have shown you sooner what I made but I didn't want to spoil the surprise and then we went away and things so I just haven't gotten around to it.

I'm half way through sewing my first quilt for Rose and I wanted to practise my quilting skills... I say skills, but I kind of just took a whack at it!

Lettie had shown me quickly how to do free hand quilting whilst I was in Dorset but I found it quite tricky on my own sewing machine so there are plenty of mistakes to be seen!

I thought I'd make her a mini quilt to hang on her wall... well I hoped it would turn out okay and be something she wouldn't mind on her wall anyway..

I took inspiration from a lovely quilting book and various images from Pinterest and made up the picture by using applique to attatch the material shapes to the backing fabric.  I used zig-zag stitch to go around the fabric shapes and then sandwiched wadding between the front and back pieces of fabric. I then embroidered a few flowers and added some buttons, then I used a free-motion foot to quilt over the whole thing. It took me agggess as I'm only a beginner, but apparently she really likes it so it was all worth it..! :-)

The binding is a bit of a bodge-job, I just could not for the life of me get it right!

I hope I manage to do the binding okay on Rose's quilt... although I'm sure I'll struggle just as much with it then.

Sooo.... this is the finished object..!

Not bad for a first attempt I thought! Although I notice so many mistakes when looking at it...

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