Miaou

We have been very busy this week making stuff. I have been working on my fish blanket. It is now all sewn together and I am in the process of adding a crocheted border. But you are not seeing a sneak preview, you will just have to wait for the unveiling! However you can see what the children have been up to:

Eilish made a door plaque and a pompom peacock:

Caitlin made a photo frame and a note holder in her favourite colours:

… and Euan tried to get in on the action!

Have a great Easter, and don’t eat too many eggs

… but bear it in mind for next year

We have the obligatory chocolate advent calendars in our house, but decided it would be fun to have a colourful homemade version to go on the wall. So we made advent calendar bunting!

(the effect is rather ruined by the fact that I haven’t finished decorating!)

Firstly, create your templates. We made an angel, a christmas tree, a santa, a bell, a snowman and a cracker. Each one was made from an A5 piece of card.

Secondly, draw round your templates on coloured paper or card, cut out and decorate.

Using a craft knife, cut a door in the middle of each picture and write a number on the front.

Next, the inserts (the wee pictures inside). Now if you are clever like me, you save last year’s christmas cards and glue small sections behind the doors to create the surprise pictures. If you are even cleverer than me, you will remember where you put said pictures last year. Alternatively if you lost don’t have any pictures, just create your own (or get your kids to do them!).

Assemble the pictures, then pin ribbon to the wall and paperclip each one to the ribbon. (I did this bit so that the kids don’t know which picture is behind which door, so a bit of a surprise each day!)

We made three swags with the ribbon and clipped eight to each swag, and made a star for no. 25.

Sit back and enjoy!

I can’t wait to get going with this!

Yummy …

These colours are going to make up a stole (as in church vestment) - I think it will look stunning!

And this I picked up as a remnant for a song from my fabby fabric shop - I am going to make a beeeyoootiful bag from it I think!

I spend a lot of time on Google images looking for inspiration when it comes to designing things. I might have an idea, but I’m not good at just drawing from my imagination. It’s a technique my dad taught me when I was a child - he told me that it was perfectly acceptable to copy a head from one source and a body from another, to make a third - and unique - picture of my own. It’s a philosophy I have followed religiously since then

Anyhoo, I have an idea for a bag and I am researching colours and shapes prior to doing some sketching … and I came across this site , full of the most wonderful finds! I especially like this:

And these:

And this is just fabulous!

When I have lots of money to burn spend, I am going to get one of those! (Still at the drawing stage with the design though so I’m not giving any clues away just yet!)

In other news, for those of you who are fans of MonkeeMaker - she is back, after a sabbatical! With a new website and a great giveaway - see here . Take a look!

Look what I bagged from my lovely local charity shop - for the grand total of £1.35!

Two sets of circular needles, some brand new 2.25mm needles, a set of five 3.75mm needles (well, I hope so anyway, though I think the one on the left might be a 4mm one), a ball of yarn in rather nice variegated colours, and six (yes, six!) packets of vintage bias binding!!! I was also very tempted by a wonderful vintage book called “how to sew”, circa 1950s, but I really don’t need any more “stuff”. (erm, so just ignore the picture above …)

And since it’s such a lovely day today, I took two of the children out and we took some pics round our estate. This has got to be one of the nicest council estates I have ever been to, and I live in it! I am so lucky. I see this from my kitchen window:

And this is just at the back of my house:

Some close ups (there are seven of these in all)

And here is my favourite wall - it’s wavy!

Each “wave” has either a stone seat or flowers planted in it, and they are lined with plaques created by local children (as is the wall and paving round the stone seat). They look lovely all year round but particularly delightful at this time of year when all the flowers are in bloom.

Edit: I think I tired Calum out walking around taking pictures - as I loaded up this blog post he took himself off for a nap!

Oooh, we had fun doing this I’ve never done a giveaway before!

First we wrote down all the names:

Then we had the tricky decision of who was going to do the draw. Both Caitlin and Eilish wanted to draw the winner, so a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors decided for them. Here is Eilish striking the winning rock blow to Caitlin’s scissors:

Eilish (the victor) then selected the winner from the pasta bowl:

And the winner is …

Can you read that:

expatinscotland congratulations!!

I will be emailing you shortly to find where to send your prize!

Well, there is the song, of course - that always brings a smile to my face - but here are some images that cheer me up too!

I love love love rainbow colours - the brighter the better. These pictures make my heart sing. I hope you like them too.

Giant Multi-coloured Button Necklace by Itsalovelycake

Colourful files by Marie Eve K.A.

Big-hearted Rainbow - a Beaded Suncatcher by Sneddonia

Waldorf Stars by Pictures by Ann

Rainbow Scarf by Chelly-Egg

Close-up knitting by C Gail Designs

I’ve been given my first awards! Here they are:

They are from the fabulous Chloe at Mee Crafty , awarded to the Mumsnet Crafters, in honour of the amount of gossiping friendship and support we offer each other! Proud to receive and display it Chloe, thank you

… but we had a great time!

And finally I will show you the outfit I made myself for the wedding. It’s not the best picture, but hey, I hate having my photo taken!

This one shows the jacket better.

Caitlin and Eilish just before we left for the wedding (we were staying in wigwams by the way, I recommend them, they were great!)

Caitlin at the reception. She doesn’t do girl clothes but I think she looks just fab in this suit! She chose the tie herself; the colour was a nice feminine touch I think.

The wedding cake was fantastic - I love a cake with a sense of humour! The bride and groom love hillwalking so this was a very fitting tribute to their hobby.

Calum had a wonderful time trotting round the garden where the wedding and reception was held.

Sadly I forgot to take any photos of Nick looking very resplendent in his Jacobite kilt!

The following day we went to Blair Drummond Safari Park. Definitely worth a visit if you are near Stirling on holiday. Quite a few wild animals there though

I was thinking about this whilst we were there - we are all so familiar with bears, giraffes, elephants and the like, but how often do we see them in real life? Nick managed to get some great close-ups.

And then the following day we broke our journey home (270 miles!) with a four-hour stop at Landmark, just south of Inverness:

Where there were lots of activities for the older children to do, plus a lovely treetop walk with the chance of seeing red squirrels (though they were all hiding the day we went!)

Phew! A very photo-heavy post. Next time I will post a glimpse of what I started making whilst we were away!

All computers need one. And all houses need one I reckon! People often ask me “how do you manage to keep up with everything with four kids?” This is the answer!