Another 60th Birthday

Last weekend saw my DH reach the same milestone as me, his 60th birthday.

In true family tradition our children hired a cottage in the New Forest that was big enough to accommodate our dynasty of 20!



We were welcomed with an amazing banner made by DD1 and her family.



Fortunately the cottage had been an old Estate bothy and the huge Victorian greenhouse had been converted into an enormous dining room, just perfect for all of us to have wonderful family meals.





The children had great fun making a den in the large garden as well as playing football, as we now have enough grandchildren to make up our own team :-)



Being right in the heart of the Forest we had plenty of opportunity for lovely walks and for my DH to play on his improvised seesaw. I always said that inside every man there's a five year old boy trying to get out.



On Saturday evening our DD3 gave a lovely reading from a 'this is your life' book that she compiled for her Dad with many hilarious anecdotes, some of which had been long forgotten and lovingly remembered. And of course a lovely tribute to a wonderful Father and husband.



Later that evening we let off some Chinese lanterns that our SIL 1 had got specially for the occasion and we all made our wishes as we sent them into the sky.



On Sunday, my DH's birthday, we had a traditional Sunday lunch and afterwards had the Birthday cake, his favourite chocolate gateaux.



And our youngest grandchild seemed to think it was his favourite too when he stuffed the biggest piece of chocolate icing in his mouth that he could manage.



And finally to his present. Of course it couldn't possibly have been anything else, as he's such a keen carp fisherman, it had to be the best and the biggest bed chair on the market :-)





So all in all it was a wonderful weekend, my DH said it was the best birthday he's ever had, so not a bad way to start your third age.

It was a great privilege to once again be treated to an amazing weekend by our wonderful children and their partners, we're both very proud of them and feel extremely blessed to have such a wonderful family.

Christmas and beyond

I can't believe it's been nearly a month since I posted, but then again that Christmas thing does seem to take over.

I suddenly got very busy making things with my latest new toy, which seems to have taken up a lot of my time since I bought it, the embroidery unit that is.



I made little bags for all the grown up girls in the family with computerised designs on them while I discovered some of the machine's previously hidden secrets. It took me 7 designs and much help and encouragement from the Bernina Central forum but at last I achieved a near perfect stitched design. Unfortunately I was in such a rush to wrap the Christmas presents I forgot to take pics, so no creative stuff from me this post.

Christmas was a wonderful family affair this year with a lovely Christmas day meal hosted by DD3 in her new house. No detail was overlooked in the lunch preparation, we all had beautiful place settings and even personal favors.





Of course us girls set to with the veg prep and used the the time for a good catch up.


L-R DD3 our DIL and me.

Meanwhile the men were on baby watch.



Or maybe not, "........now if she just lets go I'll be off then"



We had a great day and it was lovely not to have the responsibility of lunch, thanks to all who made it possible.


Granddad, youngest GS and big brother and Nanny, all shattered after a hectic day.

Boxing Day was busy too with a lovely party hosted by DD2, and we had a great Christmas tea with DD3 on the day before Christmas Eve, so the only cooking I did was on Christmas Eve for our DS and our lovely DIL.

And so to the snow, hmmmm......... it's getting extremely tedious now and seems to have prolonged that horrible flat feeling you get when Christmas is over. I can't seem to shake myself out of creative lethargy, I feel 'winter tired'.

But it has to be said, when the sun's on it, it really does look like a magical wonderland. Here's some pics of the forest around our home, where we've been marooned for a week.

















Happy New year to everyone, hope it 's a successful and creative one.

Crafty stuff and socks

We had our annual craft Fayre at My DH's work place on Tuesday, so I was quite busy getting my contribution ready for it all last week.

I belong to the knitting group and our challenge was to make miniature stockings just big enough for a chocolate. I managed 4, which doesn't sound very many, but they take about 2 hrs each by the time you've sewn them up and made the hanger.



For my own table I made a patchwork cushion with the patchwork packs that I've been selling on my Etsy shop.





It worked well as I sold 3 packs when people realised that they could make a whole cushion front with the 25 squares, relatively easily, and it was nice to see them get excited about having a simple, pleasing textile project to get their teeth into.

I also made a couple of small FME pieces, having been inspired by the Talking Threads program that's been on Sky TV recently.


Too much watching Meerkat Manor on TV



And a couple more pieces went off for Chrismas presents too, which was nice.





At last!! I finished my socks!!

Creative weekend

This weekend my 3 DD's and myself treated ourselves to a creative retreat as my DH was off on a boys w/e at an RSPB reserve.

The girls all had lovely ideas for things to make and had been looking forward to the w/e for several weeks.

My DD1 wanted to make an advent calendar like the one I made for them when they were young, and this is the gorgeous result she came up with.





I know her children will just love it tomorrow.

My DD3 decided that it was time her little son had something more than a feather duster to ride around the house on after he'd been watching the horses pass by their window every day.





I think he'll be one happy little chap on Christmas day, don't you? He's also got some lovely bunting and bags for his new bedroom.



My DD2 decided to take a well earned break from fabrics and join her Mum and Grandmother in our passion for knitting.



We were all ready for a lovely feast on Saturday evening and started the meal with this baked camembert.



My DD's work extremely hard juggling work commitments with caring for their families and it was lovely to be able to spoil them a little bit over the w/e and see their wonderful creative talents blossom.
Thanks for making it sooo..... special, can't wait for the next one.

Alice Holt Artists Christmas show 09

It's that time of year again!
I can't beleive we've just staged our annual Christmas art show agian. Doesn't time fly.

As usual my DH Mike, myself and our friend Shirley, whose web site is in the making, had a great show at the Forestry Commission, for the third year running.


I was pleased to have put together 18 pieces most of which were new work, and some were pieces that I'd completed on my C&G.


As ever Mike had plenty of work to show and a lovely selection of his African pictures, which proved very popular.


Shirley's Lino prints looked beautiful and I'm rather hoping I might get her lovely Heron, in the foreground, in my Christmas stocking :-)

I was pleased to sell my first mini quilt, especially as I was told it was a Christmas present for an interior designer.



The punk on the left was also a Christmas present for someone's brother.



The lizard was a new lino print, the inspiration for which came from our African safari, so it was particularly satisfying to sell it, as I have decided to return to my lino printing after being very inspired by Shirley'e lovely work.



It was also nice to sell African inspirations, on the left, as I'm planning to make my quilt for the FOQ 2010 on this theme.



It was lovely to meet up with lots of people and have the chance to display some new work, to an enthusiastic audience.

2 thank yous

First of all I'd like to say a big thank you to all those lovely people who sent messages of comfort to us, on the parting of our lovely old dog. We are still missing him hugely, but are coming to terms with it and trying to remember the fun times we had together.

I had meant to post about our lovely w/e with our DS and DW, in Cardiff on 31st.

We arrived with them after they finished work on the Friday and had a lovely meal of Vegetable Wellington, followed by Pecan pie, cooked by our DIL, after her hard days work, it was a great treat, and very much appreciated

The following morning I started my day in perfect fashion, with a swim and spa (part of their complex facilities) and then of course we had to make our pilgrimage to Craft in the Bay where we all had yummy cakes and coffee.



I spotted this wonderful embroidery by Louise Gardiner , one day when I'm very rich I'd like to have a series of her pieces, they'd make me smile every day.



After that we went off to Roath Park for a lovely walk around the lake, which is huge for a town lake.


And here's the happy couple.


The Autumn colour was brilliant.


And how about this for shear textural magic.


And pattern.......

After we'd had our fill of the gardens we had a look at the new shopping centre in Cardiff, John Lewis is amazing, can't wait for another visit.

Then on the way back I spotted this amazing shoe shop, sadly too old for most of these now.



For our evening entertainment our DS had spotted a 'Light up the night" extravaganza at Dyffryn gardens, but what we hadn't expected was lots of very excited children all dressed up waiting to be spooked on Halloween. It was brilliant, lots of shrieks and blood curdling screams from witches and ghouls, plus the amazing spectacle of the garden lit up at night.







And then on the back to the car we spotted this!



We finished off the evening with a lovely meal at Penarth and were lucky enough to have table with a sea view.



I started Sunday the same way as Saturday and we both felt really chilled out and thoroughly spoilt when we left for Redditch to pick up my CHF exhibition piece.

So a belated thanks to you both for a stunning w/e.