Eeeks too many posts..

Thank gods for Google Reader, although it isn't my favourite piece of programme at the moment. I have over 850 blogs to read but it is also telling me there are at least 3360 odd posts to get through..

Gods knows how I am going to do this and I do so want to read everyone's blogs. I think I shall have to take a whole day or two to read them all..

So please bear with me if I haven't read your blog or commented, I will read them all I promise - although I can't say I will comment on every single one, I will end up with writers cramp if I do :-)

Randomness...feed your mind and your blog.

Finish the Sentence




Fill in the blanks for meme....

1. I always wanted to ... go on a snow cruise (if they do one!)
2. I really hate it when ... someone can not tell you the truth to your face.
3. My best friend is ... N
4. In high school I was ... a loner.
5. My greatest fear is ... not being able to do everything I want to do before I die.
6. My dream job is ... oooh that's a hard one!
7. Some people really should ... think before they speak!
8. My favorite author is ... M.C. Beaton

till next time....

Finally movement on Mum's estate..

At long last we have some sort of movement regarding Mum's estate. I cannot believe it has been nearly 18mths and we are only just at the selling of Mum's house. But the good news is that the property has sold, obviously subject to contract. And it has gone for more than any of us even envisaged. The property above went for just under £40,000 more than myself or my stepbrother had guessed at..who would have believed it. I mean the house is falling down inside, and it also has major dry rot and damp. Hat's off to whoever has bought it as they are going to have to spend a good £20,000 on it, if not more.

Now onto finding out what happens next and that means I have to talk to the solicitor that is handling the estate - oh that should be fun NOT!! There is all Mum's furniture and belongings still to be disposed of, and I am not letting a total stranger near them. Mum would hate to think that a stranger is going through her personal bits.

Who knows by the time we get to the 2nd anniversary of Mum's death it might finally have all been sorted out..

The cat that has got the cream..

My darling geriatric cat, she's nearly 20, caught a mouse the other night. I couldn't believe it when I heard her outside doing that awful growling noise that cats do. I stood there in disbelief looking at her. Bless her though she did drop it at my feet, what on earth she thought I was going to do with it I have no idea. So I gave it a wee funeral, buried it in the garden and then stuck the birdbath on top of it. Well I didn't want the dogs digging it up.

And I will say that for two days I have wondered whether she got one of the harvest mice that are living in the compost heap. Although this morning I did see one of them eating the peanuts out the bird feeder, so one is alive. They just might only be a family of two now instead of three. :-(

I still can't believe that Baba caught it, I mean she is all bone and doesn't like going away from her warm radiator. Well it just goes to show she can show the younger ones in the household that she is still top cat..bless her.!!

And she has been walking around the house looking like she has got the cream, bless her!!

Ack I've been terribly remiss..

I can't believe it's been nearly a month since my last post - where has the time gone? Oh yep I know, I've been ill on and off. Maybe April will be a better month healthwise, it better be I have so much I need to do - housework, decorating (oh wait that's D's job!) and planting up my seeds for the garden.

I have been productive though. I have read Elizabeth Bunce's A Curse Dark As Gold. It arrived in the 9am post and I was still reading it at 2pm. I just couldn't put it down. I thought it was very well written and certainly had me gripped. It also helps that it is written by the lovely Greensleeves over at one of the stitching forums. Oooh I can say I know a real life author, even if it is through an online community forum :-) Hey it's better than nothing.

And if you haven't already read Curse, I sincerely suggest you get yourself over to Amazon and place an order for one.

March sunshine..

Oh how I love the spring. The weather outside is a glorious day - the sun is shining and the sky is as blue as can be. But boy is there a bite in the air..lol. I had to wear a scarf while I was doing various chores in town this morning. But it was lovely to see everyone's spirits were happy, it's almost as though the sorrows of winter had been wiped away from everyone in town today. I even found myself smiling to people and shock horrors I even got smiles returned, unheard of in this day and age in town..lol

I have freshly cut daffodils, from my garden, on the dining room table and washing blowing on the line in the garden. You couldn't ask for a more perfect day :-)

Cupcakes galore!!

I have been browsing the web the past few days and have found these wonderful pictures of cupcakes. Aren't they absolutely adorable? I didn't realise there were so many different variations - this is only a wee selection of cupcakes that I have found.

clickable

I have promised D that I would make him some cupcakes this week, so with the ingredients indoors I have decided to do lemon and blueberry cupcakes and also cherry cupcakes. Now all I have to find is the cake cases as stupid me forgot to buy some while shopping on Saturday..doh!!

A new way of life..

I think that the term "Shabby Chic" is definately a life I should have been born into. I have inadvertedly been doing my kitchen out in this way for a while. Specifically choosing the pink dotted dinner service and pink storage jars.

I have now found a gorgeous dish drainer from Next: clickable

Isn't it just adorable :-) I have also just discovered that Next also have some wonderful pink bits and bobs for the home. Oooh I am in heaven :-)

Gift of stitching is back..phew!!

I thought I was losing the plot, with this darn cold, when I tried to log into The Gift of Stitching to download the past two years magazines due to my hard drive dying on me. I kept getting this really weird site that was in way anything to do with Kirsten's site. Then I finally found this while checking through google. It is an article that I found posted on Independant Needlework News blog.

Hello everyone,

Well… this is very embarrassing and I’ve been up since 4am trying to fix the problem. Basically our domain thegiftofstitching.com has expired, we didn’t know it was going to and now we have to negotiate and buy it back from a parking domain business that likes to profit out of people wanting their expired domains back. OK, lesson learnt the hard way. Buy this domain back is going to take sometime - up to 2 weeks.

In the meantime we have bought www.thegiftofstitching.com.au and are currently working with the hosting company to get it attached to our account so we can get the website up and running again. This will take up to 72 hours to travel around the world and update all the servers. Hopefully most will see it in the next 48 hours. Keep coming back and press refresh to see if it has started to work.

Once the domain is working for me, I will be sending out extensive emails so all subscribers/retailers/designers so they know what is going on.

Thanks for your patience, I am really sorry this has happened. We are working as quick as possible to get this fixed.

Kind regards,
Kirsten
–
Kirsten Edwards
Editor
The Gift of Stitching
www.thegiftofstitching.com

Weird weather forecast..

Just checking the weather for our area and I seriously think the weather people have gone barmy. There is no way the "real feel of -17 this is correct..

Flowers of spring..

The spring flowers are in an abundance in the front garden - daffodils and crocuses aplenty. The red robin bush is almost in flower, it's absolutely full of new shoots and buds. And the pink rose bush is creating new shoots galore. Everything else is still a wee bit dormant, they take a little bit longer to come into life.

Here's a photo of the daffodils that I picked from the front garden, as well as in the corner of the picture my birthday pressie - a weather station gadget which I am absolutely smitten with. Oh and the meerkat ornament was D's birthday present as he is gaga over meerkats ever since he saw Meerkat Manor and The Lion King's Timon..lol



And here's the bouquet that D had sent to me on Monday - it's a bit squashed as it hadn't long been unpacked. It is in full bloom glory now on the dining table and smells gorgeous.



I think I might sit in the sun on the sofa, this afternoon, and do some stitching while watching a film on the t.v.

40 today..

Well I turn 40 today, an age I thought was a long time away when I was in my late twenties. You know it doesn't feel possible as I don't even feel 40. Wonder if this is how everyone feels when they reach this age.

Have had a lovely start to the day - DH spoilt me rotten as did my inlaws and D's relatives. I have also got an abundance of that 40 confetti everywhere in my house. I think D had a mad half hour and just put it anywhere. I have some on the bed, on the bedside table, in my card and in the present wrapper paper. I even found some in the bath!! And he has got me one of those age badges. Do you know I have never had a badge like that before, or not that I can remember. Isn't that sad!!

Just had the most special surprise delivered. My DH, who is not one for romantic gestures or gesture of anykind really, had arranged for a bouquet of flowers from M&S to be delivered to me.

What a surprise that was I can tell you, I bawled my eyes out and rung him to thank him and told him off for doing that.. What am I like..lol

Just goes to show even the most unromantic person can surprise you.. I mean my Dave is not tactile or anything, he even finds it difficult holding hands in public.. After 21 years of being together he can still surprise me. Ack I have just realised that we have been married for 19 years if we have been together 21 years..omg!!

The end of an institution..

It was a sad day on Wednesday when it was announced that the BBC is going to axe a childrens t.v. programme called Grange Hill. This programme was part of my childhood, I grew up watchng the likes of Tucker Jenkins, Tricia Yates and Benny Green getting up to who knows what while at school. For 3o years this programme has been going and now the powers to be have decided that our schools are too hard hitting and Grange Hill cannot cope with trying to show real life school dramas.

Click on link to find out all about Grange Hill

Ok I know in the scheme of things it isn't that major but hey to this 40year old *well nearly 40* it is the end of a childhood institution.

Yet on another note I have had a happy evening going through a lot of my old childhood programmes on You Tube. The likes of The Tomorrow People, The Ghosts of Motley Hall, Pipkins, Pinky and Perky and Animal Magic. Oh those were the days..

Shoot me now...

I don't believe it - ooh why does this sound like a Victor Meldrew (One Foot in the Grave) moment, hmm!!!

Well the third thing has happened - they say things happen in threes and this was a biggy. My 300gb external hard drive has died!! I don't know how as it was working last time I used it , one minute it was working happily and the next "dead".

As you can imagine I am not a happy bunny, especially as I had a lot of word documents and emails saved on there. I also had over 8gb of music which I had downloaded onto there.

But the most annoying thing is that I had over 2 years (2006 and 2007) worth of "The Gift of Stitching", which is really made me mad as I didn't burn them onto a cd at the end of each year. But I have just looked at their website and you can purchase a year's bundle of back issues for $18.00. So I shall have to buy the two years bundles - $36.00. And this time I will make sure I copy them onto a cd. So now I have to creep to D to see if he will let me borrow the CC, although I think he might be a bit hesitant especially as I have the laptop payment on there at the moment.. Oh well at least I can download the back issues as a whole bundle so that is something I suppose.

Is this it now - they say things happen in threes and this has certainly been the case recently.

I don't do things by half..

About a week or so ago I stupidly managed to damage all the nerves down the right side of my back.. And you will never guess how I did this? Well even I can't believe it - I got a pint of milk out the fridge and was putting it back and then voila! One gods awful scream later and I was in the most excruciating pain imaginable. I was in that much pain I had to get D to come home from work early and get my neigbour opposite to help me get dressed. I even thought I would have to go to A&E but after speaking to my lovely Dr and then D picking up some strong prescription painkillers I managed.

As you can imagine this laid me up for over a week and just as I was starting to get feeling back and able to do things, albeit in a limited way I go and get this bloody awful sickness and diarrhea bug that is going around the UK.

How I got it I have no idea but believe me I do not want it again. This is the same bug that D had back in end August/early September of last year. Now why I couldn't have got this then I don't know but nope I get it now. I haven't even been near anyone that has been ill so I have absolutely idea how I got it. But this has laid me up since Monday and I have managed to lose half a stone in weight since then.

Poor D has even had to cook his own dinner when he comes in from work at night, bless him he hasn't complained but it can't be any fun as he gets in from London at 7ish, then has to cook a full dinner for himself and then even has to walk the dogs at 9pm. Hopefully by next week he will be able to pass the cooking back over to me to do as per normal. Still saying that I haven't even felt like eating anything - I mean there are only so many Rich Tea biscuits one person can eat when that is all they can keep in. And I have lost count of how many glasses of water I have drunk,, and here's me who doesn't even like plain water..ugh!! That's how D knows I am not well as I am willingly drinking water.

I have just had a cup of tea with a smidgen of milk and right now I can feel my stomach starting to gripe. Oh well still not ready for tea just yet, or I should say milk/dairy products.

Fingers crossed that I am feeling better at the weekend as we are having dinner with D's parents and I'm not sure I could face sitting there with everyone else tucking into a lovely roast dinner and all I have is a couple of rich tea biscuits. :-(

Snow

This is what we are supposed to be getting but as of 2.30pm today bothing has materialised.

Had a strange experience today but in a good way..

I have to tell you all about this strange experience that I had today. It was a kind of surreal moment but it brought tears to my eyes in some way.

I was sitting on the sofa watching t.v. and I could see some birds playing in the rather bedraggled forsythia bush that is touching the front window. When all of a sudden I saw a flash of red. I looked closely and a beautiful robin came hopping out of the branches and sat on one of the outside branches and looked straight at me. This may not be a strange experience to some but it is when another robin suddenly comes from nowhere and sits right next to this robin. The proceeded to look in the living room window for a good 5 mins. Then with a bob of their heads they flew off. What really was strange is that we have a resident robin in the back garden but in all the years we have lived here we have never ever seen one robin round the front, let alone two.

Now me being me had a lovely thought when I saw these two robins, and I would like to think that they were possibly my mum and my nan come to let me know that they are looking over me and wanted to wish me Happy New Year! It may have been utter nonsense but I have a gut feeling about this and we do get strange things happen, for example seeing a squirrel in our garden for three days then totally disappearing when my cat Barney died a couple of years ago. Bearing in mind we have never seen a squirrel in our garden in the 14 years we have lived here, and have not seen a squirrel since.

I had a lovely warm feeling once the robins had gone, although I will admit I did have a wee cry to myself.

Who's a special little polar bear???

Knut, the polar bear that was born 5 November 2006 celebrates his first birthday today. He's a wonderful looking bear now, weighing in at a whopping 17 stone. It's so hard to believe that animal activists wanted him destroyed because Knut was going to be hand reared by his keeper. But because of world attention etc, Knut did indeed get hand reared by his owner and he has turned into a lovely polar bear, although he could do with a wash as he is definately not the lovely white fluffy baby he was once :)





And I promise there will be some stitching updates posted very soon, well once I have finished some stitching that is..lol

A pretty little plant..

I finally found out what this little plant is called - "Hoya Bella" I inherited it from Mum's while I was sorting her house out before the funeral. It's a really sweet little plant, but knowing my mum's penchance for the weird and wonderful I had no idea what it could be. Then it flowered, wow is all I could say..the flowers were wonderful. So armed with a picture of the flowers I then went to hunt it down in my mother in law's flower books, and this weekend I found it..woohoo!!

May I present the year old addition to our family:

One very old cat..

Pussywillow, a semi feral cat has reached the grand old age of 26yr old. She is still sharp in mind and eyes according to her owner Lin Brown. She survived a fox attack four years ago, and is still going strong.

Apparently a healthy cat can live to 18yr and some cats do live to 20yr but living to 26yr is almost unheard of. Pussywillow may have even reached the Guiness Book of Records by living this long.

What a lucky cat she is.

Full story can be found here: Pussywillow