Butterflies, crochet & scarecrows!

What a lovely weekend it has been! The weather here was glorious, which meant that all those gardening jobs got done, washing dried nicely on the line and, best of all, we managed to have breakfast and lunch outside on both days!

The garden has been aflutter with butterflies (and not just Cabbage Whites, which have no doubt hatched from all the hungry caterpillars that have been eating my broccoli plants!).

As an alternative to one of the many buddleia flower spikes, this Peacock butterfly took a liking to a crochet flower on the shawl that was drying on the washing line!

My lovely neighbour, B, popped her head over the fence on Sunday morning to give us one of these:

A little something she had picked up during her visit to Kettlewell Scarecrow Festival on Saturday!

I managed to finish this cushion, which will go to the wool shop to promote the granny square workshop that I'm doing in September:

Here's the finished rag ruggy wall hanging piece, which will also go to the wool shop.

This is only a small (6" x 6") piece to demonstrate the technique but I'm really pleased with the finished result! I made it by prodding small strips of old t-shirt fabric into hessian, using a whittled down wooden peg, which is how I was taught to do it as a child growing up in Norfolk. It is so soft and plump- a bath mat made this way would be fabulous! It would be time consuming to make, but is a brilliant way of recycling old clothes and, with a bigger project, the design can be more detailed.

I also managed to complete one side of a circular crochet cushion cover for the living room, which I shall photograph when it's finished.

So, a good 'at home' kind of weekend was had...pottering about doing some of the things I love best...crocheting, gardening...oh, and a little bit of baking - blueberry muffin cake and lemon drizzle buns! Time for a cuppa I think.....

Back soon,

Rebecca

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Buttons and Flowers

When I'm busy making and creating I do tend to make rather a mess and spread myself far and wide all over the house!! So this week, as we're taking it easy, I've started sorting out my work space - no room of one's own here, I'm afraid, just an area of the dining room!!

My son says that his bedroom and the bathroom are the only rooms without any of "mum's stuff" in them! The sewing machine and badge making machine are set up and ready for action on the kitchen table, there are knitting needles, crochet hooks and baskets of wool in the lounge (well, I can't have idle hands when my legs stop moving, can I?), boxes of stock and materials are stored in our bedroom, lots of bits and bobs are stored in the top cupboards in my daughter's bedroom (well, she wouldn't have been able to reach them when I started using them!), I keep all my materials for children's craft workshops in the cellar, and...I can't even begin to say what I might have stashed away in the loft over the years!! So, hang on...that means the hall and the upstairs landing are free from my "stuff" too!

I'd love to hear where you work at home? Messy or tidy?

When I was tidying my boxes and tins, I came across...

these pretty terracotta buttons (with flowers on!) that I bought from the V&A Museum shop on a trip to London with my daughter just before Christmas! These are"for me" buttons, not to be used on bits and pieces to sell! Now I just need to think how I shall use them. I've decided that, during the summer holidays, I am going to try to do a bit of making and creating for just for me and for my home, which is something that I hardly ever get around to doing, always being too busy preparing for workshops, fairs, and making for other people and my little online shops.

I am working on a small wall hanging piece (a flower) using rag rugging techniques, which will be used to promote a rag rugging workshop that I'm doing later in the year. I'd not done any rag rugging for a while and had forgotten how much fabric it uses - this small piece, which measures 6" x 6" has used almost two t-shirts!! I put it down by this month's Country Living magazine...the colours are perfect!

Today is wet and miserable...quite cool too!... but I took this yesterday...

The gorgeous white buddleia with its enormous flower spikes is attracting all kinds of insects and quite a few butterflies - unfortunately, they always seem to flutter off before I've managed to capture them on camera!
Buttons and flowers...see...I just can't get away from them! And that's just how I like it!

Bye for now,

Rebecca
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