back door photo 15 Sept + others

I had taken the back door photo on Tuesday but then forgot to post it due to the 30 year thing. Here it is now along with a few others I've taken outside this week.



Sunflower on Tuesday …



… and the same sunflower on Wednesday - what a difference a day makes!



And, as usual, Rosie came outside with me to see what I was doing. She wouldn't smile for the camera but you can see by the fuzzyness that she's wagging her tail!

making do and mending

First of all, let me say thanks for all the congratulatory comments on our 30th wedding anniversary. Douglas was quite touched by my blog post - silly old bear! :oD So thanks again. I really appreciate you taking the time to comment.

This afternoon I did some making do and mending.

First of all I'd bought what I thought was a long scarf in Asda's only to find when I got it home it wasn't a scarf but a big square. I decided to cut the square in half and then sew the 2 short edges together to make a scarf. I made the join a French seam so there'd be no exposed edges to annoy the back of my neck. I'm really pleased with the way it turned out!

My other mending job was to sort a pair of trousers which were too big for me. Since I've been swimming, I've lost size on my bum - unfortunately not a lot of weight has gone but I'll take loss of size, thanks! So I took the back seam of these trousers in by 3"!! Yep, THREE inches!! Go me!!

it was 30 years ago today …

… that 2 young people stood in front of a congregation of family and friends and promised to love each other forever.



30 years on and we're still going strong.

I love you, Douglas. Here's to the next 30 years! I wonder if I'll blog about that one! :oD

Museum of Scottish Rural Life

Today we went to the Museum of Scottish Rural Life in East Kilbride. We were shown around the farm by a very knowledgeable guide who took us right up to the animals and told us stories about how they got there and stuff like that. Fascinating.

We then wandered around the farmhouse and after a while, walked down the farm paths to the exhibition part. I took some photos whilst we were there. I think they say it all. :o)

First off, here are some photos of the vegetable garden:



A gorgeous fuchsia bush:



The hedges are full of rosehips this year:



And, best of all, the animals:

Black-faced sheep:





Tamworth pigs - sunbathing!



A Clydesdale horse:



A Highland cow - way under that tree!



The dairy cows:



And my absolute favourite - Nora Louise. Isn't she gorgeous?



We had a good day.

AND - it didn't rain! Wooohoooooooo!! :o)

what happened to Anastasia?

In case you were wondering what had happened to the little Russian dolly called Anastasia, here's what I did with her.



Here's a slightly closer view to show off her face. I did just use coloured pencils. Not perfect, by any means, but she'll do.



Jo loved the bag and has already taken it home with her!

And whilst I'm showing off photos, here's what the sunflower looks like today:



The others are still to flower but, if they all come out, we're going to get quite a show. If you look at the flower at the bottom right, that's our very first gladioli/gladiolus if we're being pernickety! It's very pale yellow and quite hard to see but we're very proud of it!

I met a man today …

It's nearly 10 years since we moved back here from Inverness. For the last 5 years that we lived there, I worked in a fabric shop. There were several reps who came in regularly to try to sell their wares.

One of them - Ken - was always a bundle of laughs when he came in. He would always have a funny tale to tell or a joke to crack. No matter the weather or how bad the day felt, it was always better when Ken came in.

Well today, Jo and I were in our local fabric shop and who should be in the dress fabric department? Yep - Ken! It was amazing to see him after so many years. And he was the same as he'd always been. Daft! :oD

He told me I didn't look any different than I did when I worked in Inverness. I said he looked the same as well to which he replied "It's the drink!". Yep, as daft as ever.

I don't know why I remember this joke but I know it was Ken who told it to me.

Did you hear about the cannibal who came back from his holiday with half a leg missing? He'd gone self-catering.

It still makes me giggle! :oD

meet Anastasia

Jo took some photos as I was sewing today so here's the story line of what I made today.

I started with these pieces of fabric:

Sewed the pink circle on first:

Then the brown followed by the yellow:

Then I pinned on the red:

and sewed it on:

Next the white:

Next I cut the blue ribbon:

and attached it:

Then I decided to fancy up the white bit:

And here's what we ended up with - meet Anastasia!

I know she doesn't have a face yet. I'm still trying to figure out how I'll do it. I'm tempted just to use coloured pencils to draw on some eyes and a mouth. Ooooh, or I could use some more of the fancy stitches on my sewing machine. Food for thought!

To finish, when I look at photos on the web of other people's sewing rooms I always think things like "I'm so jealous - I would love a sewing room like that". Well, Jo took this photo of my sewing room - I want one like that!! :oD

keep calm and carry on

As you saw from yesterday's post, I bought a wee book called "Keep Calm and Carry On". Its subtitle is "Good Advice for Hard Times". It's just full of little ditties and sayings meant to help us keep calm in the world we're living in today.

I haven't read through them all yet but one of my favourites so far is assigned to Jean Kerr. (I have no idea who Jean Kerr is. I wonder if she's famous somewhere and if it's only me who is unaware of her famousness? Probably!) Anyway, here's her ditty -

"If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs, it's just possible you haven't grasped the situation."

And this one reminds me of when we were about to venture into the new century. Do you remember all the warnings that computers would stop working at the stroke of midnight Dec 31, 1999 - Jan 1, 2000? Don't fly or try to move your money online just in case life as we know it comes to an end? All seems a bit daft now - mind you, it seemed daft to me at the time as well. This ditty sort of says it all.

"Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia."

It's assigned to Charles M Schulz - Snoopy's dad! :oD

lovely reading

Jo and I went to Dundee today - about 30 miles away. We always park in the car park at Borders and then have some morning snack there (yum) before tackling the book stacks.

This is what I bought today.



I've looked through all the books again and don't regret buying any of them. You know - a book looks fab in the shop but when you get it home you wonder what you were thinking. Not this time.

The patchwork book is especially exciting. There are patterns in it for all kinds of patchworky things which would - if I ever get round to making any of them - make a big hole in the pile of patchwork fabrics I have.

Or I could just look at the pictures and dream.

By the way, the wee creamy coloured things on the left are a salt and pepper set. I didn't get those in Borders! :oD

back door photo 1 September

I don't know if you can see it very clearly but our neighbours on the right as you look at this photo, cut their hedge down last weekend to half the height it used to be. I'm sure it was done to let more light into their garden but it's had the same effect on ours. Well, maybe not letting light in but it does feel less hemmed in out there, if that makes any sense!

I also took the opportunity of the brief dry spell to take this photo of one of the sunflowers Douglas grew from seed. (I first typed "sewed" and then realised that was the wrong type of sewing so I changed it to "sowed". That didn't look right either - think "pigs" - so I changed it to "grew from seed"! :oD)

Hopefully, it will be in flower soon.

By the way, I did say it was a brief dry spell, didn't I? It's now all of 5 minutes since I took those photos and it's pouring rain again! *sigh*