Weekend Roundup!

Another Sunday evening is upon us and it's back to work tomorrow but a great weekend has been had

Friday evening it was spent having drinks with work colleagues and Saturday a night out with Kelly, her first leaving the little one at home. It was great to enjoy a meal together followed by a party and a drive home via McDonalds for Oreo McFlurrys!

Today a shopping list of odds and ends took me into town with my friend Ben who surprised me with a belated birthday gift which needed framing

We refuelled in Pizza Hut

And I purchased some yarn for my next knitting project

Last few hours of freedom

It's my last few hours of freedom of what has been my laid back Bank Holiday weekend

My friend left after lunch so I was able to pick up the knitting needles

I'm quite pleased that I remembered what I was doing quite easily!

Shortly I'll be running myself a bath and then off to bed by candlelight from one of my home made candles 

Candle Making!

Today I finally had the energy and enthusiasm to complete a few tasks round the home, the most noteworthy being some candle making

A few weeks ago I had a free weekend and decided to tackle some crafts and whilst this did not happen I had purchased all the supplies now sitting around waiting for me

This tutorial  made teacup candle making look so simple and they were not wrong! 

It really is as simple as weighing the wax, popping in the microwave to melt and pouring the liquid into whatever container you have to hand, in my case teacups

All I can smell is lemongrass (my fragrance of choice) on my hands! 

If you fancy trying this yourself my supplies were ordered from WhicksnWhacks

Approx 200grams of wax + 20mls of fragrance will make one teacup candle 

This evening I'll be watching Scott & Bailey the new ITV detective drama series and preparing for a friend coming to lunch tomorrow. It's time for another appearance of my roast chicken!

For those of you interested in my film choice last night I'd wait for it to come on TV!

My First Scrapbook Layout

A few years ago when struggling for Christmas gift ideas for my nan Kelly suggested making her a scrapbook

This is the first page I completed with Kelly’s assistance

It was the perfect gift for my nan and now she is no longer with us the scrapbooks that I made her (I created one each year following the initial one) are truly treasured

Once my craft room is up and running I can't wait to start scrapbooking booking more memories

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

I’m so glad that slowly the UK is catching on to the spirit (ha ha!) of Halloween as it can be so much fun and almost as good as Christmas I think

Usually I would be planning to take my youngest cousin Trick or Treating like last year


Sadly this year he’s on holiday with his parents so our traditional tour of the streets will not happen (we did think about taking Brody but thought people would be suspicious about a 1 year olds desire for so many sweets!!!)

William was very upset at missing out this year and asked me if I would get him some sweets. I put a bag of sweets and Halloween treats together, even making a coffin treat box for his sweets following a tutorial from Martha Stewart you can find here

My parents are celebrating my uncle’s birthday and whilst my cousin and I could’ve joined them for dinner we decided to leave them to it and go and see this at the cinema


Tell me, what do you have planned for this ghoulish day?

Sew Proud

Finally my sewing machine has been taken out of its box!!

It was a gift from my Nan for my birthday back in April, which sadly she was unable to see me open. For the past 5 months it has sat in its box waiting for the time to spend playing with it properly

A couple of weeks ago I found myself with a few hours spare and decided to take the plunge! I grabbed my CK threads tin and set up my sewing table in the dining room

I actually made a cushion

It was only a practice run with one of my mum’s old shirts to see how the process works but it went better than expected and I don’t feel any fear now to try other things

With that in mind today I’ve booked a day off from work as I have a project in mind which I’ll be practicing (with old sheets) before tackling with the good fabric. Unfortunately I cannot divulge what the project is as I’m hoping it will be good enough to surprise this little lady with

Knitting Memories

With my new found love of knitting I couldn’t resist these pattern booklets on eBay recently, especially as I remember them from my childhood

My mum knitted many of the clothes for my Sindy dolls and my brothers Action Man so I look forward to seeing how I get on with them!

Calorie Free Cakes!

I took a spare copy of Martha Stewart Living to work yesterday for a like minded colleague and we started chatting about knitting and my lesson last Saturday, even discussing setting up a knitting group!)

Today she surprised me with this wonderful knitted cupcake as a thank you

How kind and what a talented lady!

Hopefully this will inspire me to make something similar in the future

Success!

Yes ladies this is a bootie knitted by me!

I'm so proud... filled with confidence following yesterday's lesson at Prick Your Finger I followed my first pattern from Knitty Gritty and I did it!!!!

I'm so proud of myself

I can't wait to tackle another project but for now it's off to bed

Fun with Friends

I have 2 fun days out with friends to tell you all about, I hope you are sitting comfortably!

Wednesday Rose & I went to see Family Fortunes being recorded (every so often I go through a phase of applying for tickets and this time I was lucky!)

The lovely (and rather nice looking!) host Vernon Kay even showed the audience photos of his newborn daughter

We saw 2 recordings of the show featuring Sean Maguire Vs Leila Rouass and Vanessa Feltz Vs Lucy Speed

It was a late night but well worth all the laughter (esp between “takes”)

Our tickets came from SRO Audiences if you’re interested in applying for any shows

Today my friend Kelly & I went for our knitting lesson at Prick Your Finger

Here’s my practice work with a copy of Knitty Gritty I purchased

It was just Kelly & I in our lesson and our teacher was fantastic helping us both learn in our different ways. We were extremely proud when she told us we were great students and had learnt a lot during our session

We both left confident in our new abilities (I have always had problems casting on and our teacher refused to let me leave until I got it!!) and ready to tackle some small knitting projects (scarves probably!!!)

If you want to learn knitting I’d highly recommend giving the girls at Prick Your Finger a call

I hope you have been having fun with friends and family this week