frayed at the edge

Snowdrops, snowdrops ....

..... and a little yellow flower

 

I'm glad I noticed these peeping through the moss and dead leaves,when I went for a walk after lunch, but I had no problems spotting the snowdrops

in the verge

 

 under some trees

 

under a rhododendron

 

It was cold and slightly foggy, as you can see in this view over the valley

 

I think perhaps the collapse of this wall was caused by the unusually hard winter that we've had

 

It was eerie in the trees

 

Back home, this little robin was tucking into peanuts on the bird table!

Much as I enjoyed my walk, it was good to get back indoors and have a mug of hot chocolate .... but then I had to do the ironing!
 

 
 
 
 
 
 

A delicious sandwich .....

...... but I forgot to take a photo of it!!  But let me start at the beginning!  Regular readers know that we often go out for lunch on a Wednesday (oh, ok, we go every Wednesday!)  So today we headed back to Jedburgh

 

 

to have lunch at the Abbey Bridge Tollhouse coffee shop, where we also had lunch last week

 

 

I had beautiful china with my pot of tea .....

 

 

...... but I forgot to take a photo of my lovely cheese savoury sandwich (Malcolm had egg mayo).

After lunch, we had a look at this wonderful wall on the river bank behind the coffee shop

 

 

and this matching seat

 

 

this tree, stuck on the weir, is probably about twelve feet long!

 

 

before we headed back to the car, I had to stop to take another photo of the Abbey

 

Don't be fooled by the blue sky - it was still very cold!!

 

 

  

 

Love was in the air!

Yesterday  was Valentine's Day ........ so of course I got up and made a special breakfast for Malcolm.  Unfortunately as I was still half asleep, I forgot to take a photo, but I can tell you that it was scrambled egg, smoked salmon and brioche!  As he was rather full after that, he didn't make a start on his special box of chocolates .....

 

 

As I am in full 'oh no, I have to fit into my swimsuit soon' mode, I was very happy to be given roses instead of chocolates ....... especially these beautiful peach coloured ones .....

 

 

I have to admit that I didn't spend the whole day with Malcolm, as Lindsay had organised one of her wonderful Woolgatherings.  But in keeping with the day, she had baked delicious heart-shaped scones - they were still warm from the oven and there was butter too!

 

 

When I got home, Malcolm had made a wonderful Sunday dinner ...... roast pork with sll the trimmings ..... and guess what - I forgot to take a photo!

I hope you all had a special day too with your loved ones.

 

 

 

A tale of two birds

I started the day's photos with this little finch in the front garden

 

yes - we've had more snow!

 

Later in the morning, we headed to Jedburgh for some shopping and a spot of lunch (soup for Malcolm, a sandwich for me).  Although it was very cold and there was even more snow there, that didn't stop me from taking photos ....

 

part of Jedburgh Abbey

 

 

another view of the Abbey

 

 

another pillar box for my collection - this one is Victorian

 

 

a view of the Eildons on the way home

 

 

I took this one from the car!

 

When we got home, I headed out for a walk, and for a change I turned down the hill, instead of my usual walk up past the church

 

this horse was tucking into its hay .....

 

 

......while this one looked as if he was going to play with the garden toys!

 

Before I show you the last photo, I have some news for you.  My friend Ali has opened a shop on Folksy - you can see it here.  She has only just started putting her stock into the shop, so do visit her again over the coming weeks, as she adds more.  I already have a chef's mat and a towel loop - the quality is excellent and they look great in my kitchen!

And now for the last photo - which of course is of the other bird in today's title ...... this little robin was sitting on the fence when I came back from my walk

 

 

 

A new neighbour?

Last week Malcolm bought a little birdhouse, which he put up on the back garden fence.  As it isn't quite spring yet (no matter how much I try to convince myself it is!), we were really surprised to see a pair of tits checking it out yesterday .... I wonder if they'll move in

 

 

When the tits finally finished inspecting the premises and flew off, we headed off up the A68 to Lauder, to one of our favourite places, The Flat Cat Gallery

As usual I had a pot of tea and Malcolm a cup of coffee .... and apple pie might have been eaten too!

 

 

The tables in the coffee shop are beautiful .... this is a detail of the inlay on our table

 

 

Since I started taking photos for the blog, I have paid far more attention to my surroundings, including looking up ... and in Lauder there were several things that I would have missed if I had only looked around and not up ....

 

this magnificent eagle, painted on the hotel

 

 

the sign outside a butcher's shop

 

 

what do you think this hotel is called?

 

 

we don't know what this sign is - the name of the building perhaps

 

There was something at eye level which caught my attention - a sign for an old post box

 

 

Which brings me to today's last photo.  When Sarah visited last summer, she brought me a wonderful needle-felted pillar box, then she sent me a set of stamps, featuring post boxes, for my birthday.  I recently got myself organised and took them into the picture framers in Hawick, along with a card showing all sorts of pillar boxes, which was included with the set of stamps.  I am thrilled with my picture, which we now have hanging in the lounge

 

 

More chat than patch!

As usual, I went to Borderland Fabrics this afternoon for patch'n'chat, but there was decidedly more of the latter!  I was working on the last stage of the Linus quilt - handstitching the binding on the back of the quilt

 

 

I quilted it with sunflowers - which you can see more clearly on the back of the quilt

 

 

Of course, Fridays at patch'n'chat means cake - this week it was one of Annette's wonderful sponges - they are so light they almost float off the plate!!

 

 

I thought I would give you an update on my efforts to ....

 

I keep my shoes on a shelf in the bottom of the wardrobe, but for some reason several pairs were still in their boxes, which obviously took up a lot of space, so ......

The shoes are now on the shelf, with space left over and the boxes and paper have gone in the recycle.

This is the bed in our guest bedroom.  The log cabin quilt is one of the first quilts I made, and the pink and grey one you can just see at the bottom of the photo is one I made for my Mum many years ago.  Do you like my Winnie the Pooh?  It is actually a hot water bottle - Malcolm gave him to me for Christmas years ago!  He is sitting on a quillow that I made for Malcom's Mum - also many years ago - if you look closely you can see it is made with the same fabrics as my Mum's!!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!  Love, Anne

 

  

It's Wednesday, so it must be .....

 

porridge - our Wednesday breakfast!

 

a long soak in the bath

 

going out for lunch wearing my new scarf

 

a warming bowl of soup with delicious bread

 

But there is another little story to tell ...... I was deciding which perfume to put on

Flower by Kenzo on the left, or Flower by Kenzo Oriental on the right (that's  not as extravagant as it seems - the Oriental is almost finished!!).  But putting the perfume on reminded me of when Malcolm first bought me Flower for my birthday.  He had been working abroad for months on end, often coming home late on Friday night and leaving again on Sunday morning, so that year my birthday presents came from Marseilles Airport!!  First there was the perfume, then .......

a set of lavender bags

a lovely bag of herbes de Provence

a beautiful pashmina .....

so, they may have been an odd collection of presents, but it must be five or six years since that birthday ..... and it's still my favourite perfume, I still use the lavender bags in the airing cupboard (they just need a squeeze now and then!), I still use the bag to keep herbs in (the original ones were used long ago) and I still wear the pashmina!!
 
 

 

 

 
 
 
 

 

Saving the best until last

I went out for a walk after lunch, although it was rather chilly and the sun had vanished behind rather a lot of grey cloud!  I have had a horrible cold and cough since Christmas, so it was good to have a long walk after the enforced inactivity of recent weeks, to clear my head. Of course I took the camera with me, but I wish I could also have taken something to capture the wonderful smell .... the hedges were being cut by a man in a rather large tractor

 

 

Although the snow has almost gone, there is still some on the Minto Hills

 

 

and on Ruberslaw

 

 

However, there was this little sign that spring (hopefully) isn't too far away

 

 

Although these horses still have their winter coats on

 

 

I don't know what has made a home in this moss - it is about three feet off the ground, in  a hedge, and you can see the entrance

 

 

I also found this old metal can in the verge - I wonder if there is anything living in it

 

 

And now - the best photos!!  I was jumping up and down for joy when I saw ..... lambs!!  Yes - some of our neighbour's Jacobs sheep have had their lambs (I took this next photo while hiding behind the gate, in case I frightened them)

 

 

However, they were quite happy to pose for photos!

 

 

 

Are you smiling and going 'aaaaah'?

  
  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oh no - I think I'm boring!!

 

 

 

I had a lovely surprise yesterday ..... Mattenylou of On Larch Lane has given me an award!!  I am delighted to accept.  I have mentioned before that we have a connection - Mattenylou's Granny was born in Hawick!  There are three conditions attached to the award:-

1st  I have to say who gave me the award and put in a link to her blog (done)

2nd  Pass the award on to seven other bloggers, putting in links to them.  (Will do so in a minute)

3rd  Tell you seven interesting things about myself - oh dear, I am struggling to think of seven things!!  Oh well here goes ....

 

1.  I was born and brought up in Scotland - indeed I have spent most of my life here, and if you ask me my nationality I will say Scottish ..... but my Mum was English, my Great Granny was Welsh, and if you go a bit further back in the family tree, there's a bit of Irish as well, so really I'm British!!

2. When I was at primary school, there were another three Annes in my class.  At secondary school, there were yet another three Annes, and when I started work - yes, you've guessed, there were another three Annes.  And now I have two friends called Anne, so I need to find another one!

3. I love to read.  As a child I worked my way through the childrens' section of the library, then started borrowing my Mum's card to take out adult books ... and no one ever stopped me!

4. I like dogs, but I don't like cats (they give me shivers).

5. Brad Pitt just doesn't do anything for me (but as for George Clooney .....).

6. Oh dear - now I'm struggling to think of another two things, does this mean I'm boring!  OK, it's embarrassing to admit this, but I like country music - anything from Hank Williams to Sugarland via Dolly Parton.

7. Last one - I can do this!!  When I was at school, I fractured the knuckle on my ring finger when I was playing badminton!  This was back in the days of wooden rackets.  I was running backwards to play a backhand shot and had my left hand out to keep my balance.  I managed to hit myself!!  My poor knuckle has never been the same - there is a very slight bump on it! 

Now for passing on the award.  First I will repeat what Mattenylou wrote to me - if you want to accept the award, but don't want to do the seven things list and pass it on to seven other bloggers, then that's fine with me - I appreciate that people don't always have time to take part in these things.  It was hard to decide whom to pass it on to, so here, in no particular order, are seven blogs which I have found inspiration from

Sarah of Circles of Rain.  Sarah's many interests always make me want to try new things, and of course we met in the summer and spent a wonderful day together.  It was through her blog that I found the next two recipients

Anairam of fra(a)iing .  When I saw the name of this blog on Sarah's sidebar, of course I had to click on it because of the similarity of blog names, and I'm really glad that I did, as Anairam's journal pages and drawings have encouraged me to draw more

Tracy of Hey Harriet.  Tracy of course is the tireless organiser of Shadow Shot Sunday.  I have had so much fun looking for shadow shots, and I look around me much more when I'm out and about, as shadows appear in the most unlikely places

Helen of  Busy bee Studio.  Helen has a cornucopia of gorgeousness on her blog, and I try to emulate her style - though not her cushion addiction!

Tracy of Pink Purl.  Tracy is an American transplanted to Norway.  She now has three blogs, with gorgeous goodies, beautiful photos and her latest venture - delicious food!

Sally of Sal's Snippets.  I've only recently discovered Sally blog, but I'm hooked!  She makes all sorts of wonderful things - it's amazing what she can produce in twenty minutes!

 Shannon of Free Spirit Knits.  Again, I've only recently discovered Shannon's blog, but her 'reduce clutter, create space' has really inspired me to sort out the clutter in my studio (and in my head!)

 

Of course, now that I have done the list, I've started thinking, oh I should have included ......... maybe I'll create my own award to give to my favourits bloggers!!

 

After all that typing, I think we need a photo!  I took this one when we were on our way home from visiting Jennifer today ...

 

Sadly, we didn't see any elves!

 

ps, is there anyone out there who is also on Typepad, who can tell me how to add my award to my sidebar ...... I've been trying to add things to the sidebars, but it all ends in failure!!

 

  

 

 

A tale of two cakes

I haven't been very organised as far as tonight's post is concerned!!  I only have one photo from today .....of course it is the Friday afternoon cake from patch'n'chat

 

it was absoutely delicious, full of apple ..... yum, yum!

 

I've had a trawl through the archives, and I've found another cake.  This one is amazing ..... it was made for me by my amazingly talented friend Lorraine (remember her wonderful marzipan fruits on our Christmas cake).  She made it for a party I had to celebrate the finishing of my studio ......

 

The cake was so beautiful, it was a shame to eat it!!  All the decorations were made from icing - Lorraine must have spent hours making them.  The silver tube that you can just see in the top corner of the cake was an indoor firework - it looked amazing when the cake was brought in ..... but unfortunately it set off the smoke detectors!!

 

As promised, I have chosen the winner of the octopus giveaway - in the end it was an easy decision, as all but one of the people who commented on the drawings had won something in previous giveaways .... so the winner is Charlene!  This is where the disorganisation appears again, as I forgot to take a photo of the prize - I'll show you on Monday!

 

Several people have asked about the stuffed aubergine recipe .... I'll post it on Monday, when I'm also going to tell you about the meal we will be having with our visitors on Sunday.

 

I hope you all have a good weekend, love, Anne