Super days

I just had to show you all this lovely picture of our cousin Peter - this is the first day out with this little boat this year - for a long time we didn't think he would be doing this ever again - he has been so poorly.



Now! this man should know better than going up the childrens climbing wall! but 007 will not be beaten by anyone or anything! He even asked our son-in-law Gary if the beam across the top of the swings would hold his weight if he crawled across it (as he has seen Joshua do!) to the little house at the other end! he was told very firmly that he should come down NOW!



We went to see the grandchildren at the weekend and Emily and her daddy Gary are showing us the carrot seeds that Joshua is growing - they are just coming through the ground. Gary made the raised bed for Joshua and now has to make another for Emily!

Joshua decided (even after all the over night rain we had) that his carrot seedlings needed watering!

Painful hands

I hope to have the 'Bears' quilt top finished by the end of this afternoon. The applique pieces are all prepared and 007 is out this afternoon so I can just sew.........I have some housework to do but that can wait till tomorrow - the laundry is upto date and downstairs is clean.......to h**l with upstairs!!

I had hoped to finish hand quilting the other quilt that has been on the go for such a long time now, but my fingers have been really painful this weekend, and I have been feeling poorly too - headachy.....not a full blown migrain but that sort of headache, with nausea and flashing lights! I may have started it off myself by doing some weeding, bending over and pulling up dandelions etc - I know it always makes me feel giddy and makes the top of my head feel sore and throbby, I know I should kneel to weed.......but ......... I don't always do what I should!
Ah well - I will finish the tea I have just had brought to me and I will start sewing this morning - too wet to go into the garden today.

Photos will follow - promise!

10:45pm

Promise kept with the photo but I didn't quite finish the top - the borders are now cut but not attached yet. The last bear block was done by 2:30 pm and I managed to get all the blocks together before 007 came home for his supper. The last Teddy does still need eyes and nose and the bees in his block have no faces yet either! I couldn't wait to see how they all looked together. Not a good photo, as the sky was overcast and it was raining heavily so the light in the room was poor. But I think you can see what it will look like eventually.

Plants and the bears again!

Now don't laugh! but I found this plant growing in a hedgerow in America a couple of years ago and I didn't recognise it.....I took some seeds from it and brought them home in a screw of tissue hankie! Last Autumn I planted them - only three germinated , 007 knoked over the original pot and broke it, so they had to be re-potted. I have guarded them with my life since then, even stopping GGS James from smelling it last weekend in case he broke it! now the flower is out.....one guess only to name it ...........!!! Rape!! Why didn't I know what it was while in America? is it because it was where I didn't expect to see it? I don't know!

As you can see two of the trays of Saga seeds have germinated - this time I do know what I have sown! VBG ! the Cosmos and the Asters are growing well, but so far the Echinaceous has still to show.......

I have at last given these teddies their faces, now they have a character.......that is eight done and two to do - then I can put the top together!

I am looking forward to quilting this quilt - I think it will be a lot of fun.

Not a lot will be done this weekend though, first we have Emily's birthday party to go to and then we are going to the New Forest, where we took the caravan last Wednesday, we are going to stay a couple of days then bring it home. No. 2 son and his daughter Charlotte have been down there having a few days holiday. So far they have been crabbing on Avon Beach, Charlotte says she caught 14 quite big crabs......at least 5 inches across.......but of course they all went back into the water at the end of the day! Yesterday they went to Poole Pottery where she painted a pot - and then they were going to Highcliffe Castle, I hope she has enjoyed herself.

Happy Easter

I thought I would show you some of the blocks I have finished for the quilt I am making for Emily.
So far I have made 9 of the ten blocks. but I have only given eyes and noses to these four. I had thought that I would have finished the whole quilt by now but the hassles we have been having with the telephone company really put me off my stride!

Emily has a birthday on the 18th of this month but I don't think I will be anywhere near finished so I will have to go and buy her a girlie pressie - she will be four, so something pretty to wear or something girlie to play with .

To day we are all (the whole family) are going to dinner at our Sarah's (Emily and Joshua's Mummy) - she is cooking lamb..mmmmmm. I am looking forward to seeing everyone together again - there are so many of us that it only happens on big occasions now. Must remeber to take the camera with me.

My daughter in law Sarah had a fright on Thursday evening - she was up in London at Kings Cross with a lot of her medical friends when she was attacked from behind and her handbag was snatched while the guy held a knife to her throat. As you can guess she was very distressed and the thing is that it happened so quickly that none of the others realised! the bag was thrown to another guy who was waiting and then to another - the police say that there had been similar muggings in the area that evening . She lost a very expensive Mulberry handbag, two phones (one is her NHS one) her wallet (yes - all her credit/debit cards), her keys, a memory stick with a lot of private info on it and her filofax! She is terrified that they will have so much info on her that they could clone her identitiy! The police say that the muggers were only after money.........time will tell! but she has changed her bank account and stopped all her cards. She has also had different locks put on the front door and has bought a Crooklock for her lovely little Mazda convertable! Through all of this Kevin was in Switzerland skiing! he has been worried sick about her, the phones must have been redhot with all the calls they have made to each other of the weekend! At least he is home now to give her the kind of support she needs.

April comes with flowers

April already? I don't believe it!

Lots of daffodils in the garden and other things are blooming (weeds!) too, the garden is showing promise of things to come.

I went to the garden center yesterday and bought some 'little' things in modules and then spent the afternoon planing them in to flower pots. White Geraniums and red and white Petunias for my pots and hanging baskets.

The three tomato plants that I bought last week are still in their pots and are going to go into hte prepared bed in the greenhouse later today. An Alicante, an Ailsa Craig and another I cna't remember the name of at the moment. Three plants will give enough toms for just the two of us and as I can pick them as I want them they won't rot in the fridge! as the shop bought ones do......

I have also planted some of the seeds that SAGA magazine sent as a thank you for renewing our subscription. they are under the little closhes in the green house. Echinacea, aster and Cosmos so far and there are three more packets that need to go directly in to the ground later in May.

I have been doing some sewing too this last week, still hand quilting on the Houses and Heart strings quilt. I have made more of the panels on the Teddy bears day out quilt too. Just have two more of those to make then I can put the top together - then I will show you what I have done.

We have had to accept that Virgin cannot find our old telephone number - it has got lost between Sky, BT and Virgin - after nearly three months we have a new phone number.....the family are not happy. As our Son-in-law said 'how am I supposed to get the old number out of my head!' If he is having trouble just imagin the trouble we are having! We had the old number over forty years! and we have lost it just because someone in this house wanted to have Sky TV! ......he is not flavour of the month and is doing all sorts of things to try and make it up to me......flowers, choccies, meals out.......

Quilt finished

This morning I have taken pictures of the second Caterpiller quilt I have made and a bag from a pattern in McCall's Quilting magazine. I should have phoned Asdings for some Pellon, then it would not be so wobbly when standing on it's own - but I didn't because i wanted to make 'then' while I was between big projects! It was such an easy fun bag to make that I will probably make more........

March - and nearly over already!

Since the last posting we lost our internet connection and our phoneline!!! Why? how? WELL!
himself decided that he would like to have the same facilities with the TV that our younger son Stuart has - a Sky + box that allows you to pause, rewind, record, playback and a lot of other things.......while we are going to Sky for their TV we may as well have the package that includes cheaper phone and broadband!!! OH how I wish we hadn't even started all of this.......we could have had a similar box from our original service provider! Virgin also do a +box! and I had been reserching it on line and had told him about it - problem ?- Sky was cheaper......Virgins was a £5 a month.......Sky's you bought for a one off payment of £49 !
The Sky dish was installed, the +box connected to the TV, then we had to order our Sky Talk and Broadband.......their phone system is dreadful! too many options and no one answering.....but we got through eventually (India?) - told them we wanted to transport our phone number over and were told 'that's Ok, no problem ' - I then went down with the flu! didn't read the mail from Sky till I was up and about again - only to find that they were installing the phone the next day BUT with a different number! Back on the phone to them again and got the assurance that they would change it as soon as possible - three weeks later we cancelled Sky and now a month later we have a tempory phone number from Virgin as Sky have mislaid the number! Only one fly in the ointment - Sky have not acknowledged our cancellation letter......have they had it - is it still sitting in their intray with the other three letters we have written? Who knows - but after over 5 hours of calls to them and the letters, and being told that once we have our own number it will be ANOTHER two weeks before I can have broadband back again! we have now written to the Telecomuncations Ombudsman! and are happily back with Virgin........ who installed the broadband and tempory phone with-in three days of contacting them!

I suppose that having no internet has been good for me for a while - I have done quite a lot of sewing and knitting, but I have watched far too much TV!
I have made another caterpiller quilt and a large bag from a pattern in a magazine, from the lovely pack of Moda charm sqares that my good friend gave me for my birthday last year. I have no pictures yet - I will take some later ......

Today is lovely and warm (14c) and I have actually been in the garden doing a bit of tidying up....I always leave the seedheads on my plants so that the little birds have some extra seeds for the winter and something to shelter under. The stalks and dead heads have now been removed from the border nearest the house and when I feel like it I will do one of the others......I should really dig the borders over too but the ground is so wet......now I have cleared the rubbish perhaps the sun will dry it a bit - then it wont be so heavy to dig.