frayed at the edge

Shadow Shot Sunday

 

This week's shadows are closer to home .....

 

shadows from the glazing bars on my Indonesian chair

 

the sun is getting lower and my shadow longer on my morning walks

 

straw bale shadows .....

 

..... and hay bale shadows

 

I saw the baler deposit these ones last week!

 

a shadow/reflection shot - the kitchen window reflected on my laptop

 

and just for fun, it's 'twinkle toes' Malcolm!!!

 

As always, Tracy has a wonderful montage of shots from last Sunday and the link to this week's participants - do pop over and have a look. 

There's a fairy at the bottom of my garden .....

..... or there will be, once she's finished!  Yes, I know, I should be finishing all those WIPs, but yesterday I delved into my stash for something to take to patch'nchat.

 

I've only had this kit for four years (I bought it when we went to Melbourne for our very special holiday when Malcolm 'retired'), so perhaps there were other projects further up the queue, but who could resist such a cute little doll!!

 

By the end of the afternoon I had cut out most of the pieces, aided by the other two Annes, as the fabric supplied with the kit was only just big enough!  (except for the net for the overskirt - I was able to cut a second layer!)  Of course with all that hard work, I had to be fortified with not one, but two pieces of cake.

 

The sponge is another light-as-air offering from Annette, and the ginger cake is from Anne S., who has started baking again, now that she has a wonderful new oven!

 

This afternoon, I was out in the studio, sewing away at my Woodland Fairy

 

You can see the two layers of net skirt and her pretty underskirt

 

The body parts stitched and turned through, with the aid of my trusty bodkin!

 

She needs a face!!

 

I'll do her make-up later

 

No stuffing, so I'll shred this wadding

 

I ironed her underskirt using my mini-iron - less chance of burning my fingers!

 

only velvet is good enough for this fairy's jacket!

 

The next decision is her hair - the kit came with dried moss (front left), which I don't really like, so there is a choice of two colours of doll's hair at the back, or dressing gown cord, (front right) which unravels to make cute blonde dolls' hair!

 

Tomorrow, of course, it's a day out at the Woolgathering, so hopefully you will get to see the finished fairy on Monday, but here she is today, perched on the sewing machine

(don't forget to come back tomorrow to see Shadow Shot Sunday)

 

ps - for those of you who liked my pink knife, you can get a similar one from Lakeland .

Weekword

This week's word is DETOUR.  At the start of the week I had a few vague ideas, but then yesterday I saw contrails crossing in the sky and a story started to form in my head, then when I got home, Harry Chapin's Cat's in the Cradle was playing on the radio, and the story was complete ...

  

I pictured a plane full of stressed business men, all busy working on their laptops, writing reports, scheduling meetings, doing all those things that business men do when travelling, and like the Dad in Harry's song, never having time to spend with their children.  That's the first contrail.  Then the business men rise up as one and say 'enough, there are more important things in life than the constant pursuit of money.  Pilot, we want to make a DETOUR to go home to see our families'  And that's the second contrail .....

 

To see more of this week's players, go over to Aimee.

 

Have a lovely weekend, love, Anne 

Something from (almost) nothing

We have been watching a new series on BBC2, Economy Gastronomy.  It's quite simple - each week they look at a family who spend an ENORMOUS amount on food, mostly convenience food and takeaways.  They then give them advice on how to shop (!) and then how to cook simple, healthy food on a budget.  We end up shouting at the tv (I have to say that's a common occurence in our house)!!  It's all too easy to say that cooking is no longer taught in schools, but such dishes that I learned to cook at school  I never cooked again, and Malcolm certainly wasn't taught to cook at school!!  Although our mothers never formally taught us to cook, Malcolm and I picked up the basics from them, as Stuart learned from us, and of course now there is an unending supply of cooking programmes, books and magazines.  And as for producing cheap meals, perhaps the BBC could show what I did with these ingredients!

 

A leftover piece of feta cheese, the end of a cucumber, a tomato, some thinly sliced red onion (leftover from the previous night's dinner), some basil (from the 69p pot of supermarket basil that has been flourishing on the kitchen windowsill all summer) and in the bowl at the back, some foraged (free!!) raspberries and blackcurrants.

First I made a starter - thinly slicing the tomato (for Malcolm) and the cucumber (for me), cutting the feta into small cubes and chopping the onion.  This was then arranged on plates, along with basil leaves.

 

I then seasoned them with rock salt and coarsely ground black pepper, and drizzled them with olive oil

 

The result - two tasty starters from bits and bobs!!

 

 

Next was the fruit - I decided to make a coulis.  After cleaning the fruit, I put it in a plastic sieve (don't use a metal one, it can discolour the fruit) and pushed it through using my very high-tech gadget

 

Ok, it's not high tech - it looks like a darning egg!  I saw Delia using one some time ago - it is just much easier than using a wooden spoon.  After squeezing every last drop out of the fruit, I added a dessertspoon of icing sugar to both sweeten and thicken the coulis

 

mmmmm - yum, yum!!  So what did we have with the coulis?  The fruit bowl provided the ingredients for a fresh fruit salad - a quick, easy and economic pudding!

 

Reading this over, I guess it sounds like a bit of a rant and I know that a lot of people say they don't have time to cook ..... but for me, cooking comes first, then other things get done in the remaining time.

 

I've got off my soap box, and thought that I would end by showing you my little salt bowl and spoon, which you caught a glimpse of earlier in the post

Meandering

I'm in shock!!  I've been checking my stats over the last couple of days (yes, I know it's sad!!) and I seem to have acquired a lot more readers!! (and it has caused an outbreak of exclamation marks!)  So no pressure then to write another intelligent and witty post!!  Oh well, here goes.....

Although it's only the middle of August and is supposedly still summer, autumn is creeping in, as can be seen in these two adjacent fields

 

a late summer cut of hay

 

and autumm harvest

 

then there are summer flowers still blooming in the verge

 

 and autumn seedheads

I'm still walking three miles Monday to Friday (got to get the legs fit for Sydney!).  Getting up at 6.30 to go out walking means not too much time is spent looking glamorous (I just about manage to brush my hair), but I don't think that I look so bad that these horses need blinkers on!

 

Do you remember the recent post about the goose making a great racket when I was taking photos of the Jacob's sheep?  Well, it wasn't a goose, it was a gander, and he belongs to my neighbour, Marion, who breeds Jacob's sheep (as we live in the country, a neighbour is anyone who lives within a two mile radius!).  The reason he was making such a fuss, is that he is in love with one of the lambs!  I took the next photo another morning, when Marion had just let the lambs out

 

It's that quiet time of year for news, so as usual the stories of large cats prowling the countryside are back  - so I was slightly worried to see this ahead of me in the road

 

So what was it - a panther or some other large beastie, escaped perhaps from a zoo?

 

it was just a very large domestic cat!!

I was at the dentist this morning for a very long and painful scaling of my teeth - and I have to go back on Monday to have a tooth out.  I kept telling the dentist that the tooth hurts when I eat, and finally today, yet another x-ray showed that it is cracked beyond saving.  When I got back home, Malcolm took me out for lunch to cheer me up, but there was a slight delay on the way - a country-style traffic jam!

 

ps Stuart's big fish (last Wednesday's post) is a red gibbicep plecostomus (you probably knew that!)

 

Tuesday Treasures

Having recently mentioned my Dad on TuesdayTreasures, I thought I had better mention my Mum!  It's hard to believe, but it is almost fourteen years since she died.  So let's start with Mum as a young woman, before the Second World War.

 

she could give Victoria Beckham lessons on how to pose!!

 

Mum and Dad going to a wedding in 1946 (I love her coat!)

 

me and my Mum (oh, I'm so cute!!)

 

she lived in this house all her married life

 

I regularly gave her a shampoo and set!

 

celebrating one of her last Christmases with us .....

....... my Mum, one of my greatest treasures.

 

 

The nice things that people say .....

...... can really make your day!  First it was Sarah on Thursday - when I said that I couldn't believe that Stuart is 31 next month, she said I must have been very young when I had him!  Then on Friday at chat'n'patch, Anne said that I had made her ears sore, I had talked so much.  Why did that make me happy?  Because finally the latest medication is helping with my sore face, and it no longer hurts to talk!!

I was also happy when the post arrived this morning - first there was this invitation to Lindsay's Woolgathering on Sunday

 

Lindsay makes wonderful envelopes from magazine pages - an excellent idea for recycling!

 

Isn't this a wonderful fabric picture!  It is actually part of a booklet that was sent to Malcolm, trying to persuade him to buy a new Golf Plus!! .....

 

..... the booklet is stitched together - I think they are targetting women to buy the new Golf (I should add here that it's my car, in case you think Malcolm drives a girly car!!)

We went into Hawick this morning for some shopping and of course went for a cuppa

 

It's a quirky cafe tucked up a side street in Hawick - but worth the effort to find, especially if you like second-hand books!

That was all a lot more pleasant than it had been first thing this morning when I went out for my walk

 

The photo looks out of focus - but it was just very wet, with a lot of low cloud over the hills.  However my feet were warm and dry, as I had on my trusty walking shoes and a pair of my handknitted socks

 

although as it was so miserable, perhaps I should have had my 'Happy' socks on!!

 

Why 'Happy' socks - simply because that is what the bamboo yarn is called (although I have been less than happy about the way the socks have washed - my wool ones wash much better!)

So now that the new medication is helping, I am just about back to my normal happy self (although when I said to Malcom I was back to normal, he groaned and said 'oh no'!!!!)

 

Shadow Shot Sunday

 

Today's Shadow Shots are courtesy of the town of Falkirk in Stirlingshire - if you scroll back to Wednesday's 'trip down memory lane' you can read about my visit there.  The photos were taken just before and just after the wonderful bacon roll!!

 

dented railings

 

ornate edging round a bed of trees and shrubs

 

a rather smart motorbike

 

not an alien - a lamppost with hanging baskets!

 

a bench in the pedestrian precinct

 

the window of a shop selling school and other uniforms

 

curved railings

 

supermarket trolleys

To see more of today's shadow shots, do pop over to Hey Harriet, where Tracy also has wonderful collages of last week's photos. 

So much to tell you ....

... that I had better dive right in!

After all the excitement of Sarah and Andy's visit, there was even  more excitement yesterday when the post arrived.

 

This is the prize I won in the lovely Anne's recent giveaway 

 

she had stamped the envelope

 

stamped the tissue paper and made this beautiful gift tag

 

all that loveliness - and there was still the prize to see!

 

A set of wonderful stamps, complete with little sparkly decorations

 

my card isn't quite as good as Anne's wonderful work!

 

but of course it's the thought that counts

 

I obviously need a bit more practice!  I won't post this to Anne, but I will be sending her a little something else!!

Then of course it was off to chat'n'patch, where Chris was working on a lovely scrappy cushion cover

 

the fabric behind it will be the back of the cushion

 

and of course there was cake - strawberry pavlova - yum, yum, yum!!

 

I am sure you have all been fretting overnight to know if it stayed dry for Jim the farmer to get his hay baled.  Well, I am delighted to tell you that even as I write this they are busy baling it

 

after the tractor and baler have gone so far.....

 

..... out pops the hay bale!!

 

meanwhile, the other tractor driver had fun creating a circle!

 

fuchsia flowers remind me of ballet dancers

 

a butterfly on the buddleia

 

I took this photo yesterday when I was out for my walk - the colour of the hydrangea is wonderful

 

it was sad to see this butterfly dead on the road, but the colours were still strong!

 

the grass was greener on the other side for this lamb!

I'm sorry these last photos are out of order - I just had so much to squeeze into today's post I forgot to start with them!!

 

 

Weekword

Today's word is WANDERLUST, which is a perfect word for me, as I love to travel, and have been very, very fortunate over the last few years to visit lots of lovely places.  I was going to look at photos of my travels, but then I remembered I have a collection of postcards (one day I am going to put them in an album!!)  So here, in no particular order, are some of the places I have visited

 

beautiful watercolours from Indonesia

 

you can tell from the top card when we went to Western Australia!

 

I love silly cards like these

 

the Petronas Towers

 

wonderful views of Singapore

 

the Lone Star State

 

the amazing South of France

 

Scheveningin in The Netherlands

 

I want to go back to Santa Monica!!

 

another trip to Houston!

 

a strange postcard?  the next photo explains!

 

(yes, I did use the facilities!)

 

I not only brought home the card, I also have two of the beautiful wine glasses!!

 

saving the best for last ..... I am so excited, because at the end of the month, we are going to Sydney and Singapore - courtesy of some of the vast amount of airmiles (frequent flier miles) that Malcolm accumulated through flying here, there and everywhere for his job!!

So yes, I definitely have the wanderlust bug!  To see other interpretations of the word, have a look here.

Have a super weekend - the sun is still shining here - hopefully it will shine all weekend so that our neighbour can get his hay baled!  Love, Anne