Turned Out Nice Again

Yesterday here was a scorcher and it looks as though it may be the same today.

The sky was a lovely blue littered with fluffy clouds

The children splashed about in Little L's padding pool

 while I sat on a blanket to finish these napkins and crochet Little L some more facecloths. She has developed a nasty little habit of throwing things down the toilet. Anything she can get her little hands on, facecloths being one of them.

The chicks had their first experience of being outside and Fluff, one of our bunnies was taking cover where ever he could find a bit shade. Fluff usually has the run of the garden all day as the first thing Little L does when she steps outside is open up his hutch. Its a good job he is very tame and easy to catch.

I'm off now to hunt out more washing and take advantage of this glorious drying weather because being where I am you never know when the sun will make another appearance like this.

The One Eyed Monster

I must say that I'm not really into watching the TV, I find it a bit boring. Given the choice between owning either a television or stereo, I'd pick the stereo any day. I think its because I don't watch reality shows, talent shows or soaps so it really doesn't leave much besides the odd series which takes my fancy. What I do like watching though is food programmes. Some of my old favourites are Jamie Oliver and River Cottage programmes and lately I've found some great new ones.

One which all the family enjoy to watch is Choccywoccydoodah. Filmed at a Brighton based cake shop, all the cakes are decorated entirely with chocolate. Its amazing what can be created just using chocolate. My youngest lad now says he wants to be a chocolatier when he leaves school. I have bought chocolate as gifts for people from their web site and they have said it was gorgeous.

Another one which the family like to watch is Diners, Drive ins and Dives with Guy Fieri. I always feel like eating when I watch this though. Some of the recipes featured in the show can be found here.

I stumbled upon Grow Your Own Drugs last week. This programme shows how to make beauty treatments and natural remedies. After watching this I tried one of the recipes shown, Goji Berry Chicken Soup. This one is to help fight colds. Not that there was a sign of any sniffles in the house, I just thought it looked yummy and it was too. My husband said it was a very flavoursome soup so I'll definitely be making it again. I'd make larger quantities up if I knew it was fine to freeze it. Here's a very steaming photo of how it turned out.

Feeling Stitching Stitchalong

The stitchalong on feeling stitching for this month is to sew a free pattern of your own choice. Looking round, there are absolutely loads of free patterns. Some I have downloaded to use at a later date. I chose two small patterns which have both been featured on the feeling stitchy blog.

This one of cute knitting mushrooms can be found on the Water Penny blog

and this sugar cube one is from Wild Olive. I did start the jellybean one Wild Olive but my crayon tinting didn't quite go to plan. Both these blogs have other free patterns and tutorials and Wild Olive has some lovely printables.

Chicks First Week

The chicks have been with us a week today and I think they have grown quite a bit in that short space of time. They are losing some of their fluffiness and grown a few proper feathers on their wings. Little L's chick ( the black/yellow one ) has feathers which curl up away from its body so I hope it is a frizzle, They are really fluffy looking and remind me of feather dusters. One batch of eggs we bought were mixed with some frizzle eggs in it. The smallest one looked like it had been pecked at by the others so my sis told me to hang an old CD inside their house to distract them and it seems to have done the trick.

We usually get the chicks out after tea time then the boys and Little L can have a quick hold of them and the chicks get used to being handled. They don't seem scared at all as when I put my hand in with them they come straight over. Maybe chickens are just naturally nosey.

More Bookmarks

I started these a few months ago and only finished them today. I am useless when it comes to finishing off things which I have made. I pop things in a bag to complete another day then the bag will just get moved from spot to spot in the house until the day in which I stumble upon it and it does get finished off. This can be years in some cases. I have actually opened a bag of knitted or crocheted bits and not had a clue as to what they were destined to be. Any how I found these bookmarks which I started months ago which only needed the ends sewing up so I sat outside with Little L and finished them.

The designs used for these are from Aimee Ray's books, Doodle Stitching and Doodle Stitching :The Motif Collection

New Family Members

To add to the excitement of Little L's birthday yesterday we also acquired some new additions to the family. These cute tiny balls of fluff.

A bit of a family discussion had taken place not so long ago as to whether to have either goats or chickens in the garden. I personally have wanted some goats for years and goats did get more family votes but chickens won in the end as they seemed easier to look after and I know the children will soon lose interest and it will be left to me and hubbie to look after them. 

Anyway a chicken coop was purchased then it was a phone call to my own chicken expert, my sis, for her advice on what kind of breed would be best for us. Jay recommended Pekin Bantams as they are very tame and also small enough for Little L pick up. I started looking at local breeders for Pekins which were already old enough to lay eggs but didn't find any for sale. Jay had a look around her neck of the woods then rang me to say she thought that they were expensive compared to what she pays for her chickens. My brother in law said that if I wouldn't mind having them from chicks that I could buy some hatching eggs instead and he would hatch them in one of his incubators ( he is incubating his pheasants eggs at the moment). We ended up with 4 chicks out of 12 eggs, which isn't very good and I hope that none of these are cockerels as we can only have hens here as it is a residential area ( my sis said she could take any cockerels ).

I really hope that this one is a hen as Little L has chosen it as hers already and named it Chicken Little.

Birthday Girl

My lovely little girl celebrated her 3rd birthday today.

Here she is enjoying her new slide. It wasn't the baby brother that she asked me for as her birthday present but she loved it all the same. She had lots of visitors and lovely gifts including a work bench and drill set from one set of grandparents ( Little L isn't always a girly girl ).

Lots of food was eaten followed by even more cake. Little L really enjoyed her day and is shattered now so I'm off to get her ready for bed. Too be honest so am I and could quite happily trot off to bed myself and its not even 9pm yet.

Aches & Pains

I haven't been up to much craft wise lately because my right arm doesn't seem to want to let me. I have been having pains in it for years but only went to the doctors about it last year when it was getting too much.  I was then send to physio , who discharged me as they didn't actually know what was wrong. Then over Christmas my thumb started to hurt a little which I thought would go away on its own accord. It didn't and my hand started to swell. I still didn't go to see the doctors until a joint on my left thumb started to feel a bit weird ( it doesn't actually hurt, just doesn't feel right ) and that hand also began to swell. So I thought I had left things for long enough and paid the doctor a visit. He send me for blood tests ( which I'm having done this afternoon ) to test for arthritis. I don't know anything about arthritis but if it is that, I think its a bit odd to just start from nowhere. My hands were fine before Christmas and now its awkward to try and hold a needle. Anyway I should soon find out what the problem is.

These felt magnets were made this week to spruce up our fridge.

I hope we continue with the lovely weather we have here at the moment in the UK and hope you all have a great weekend x