We shall see...

am attempting to blog on  netbook that has taken me absolutely ages to set up to our wi-fi...

Thought it was about time I posted an update on the granny stripe blanket.  Had planned to do a colour everyday, that would be 2 rows.  It has nearly worked.  I have 30 colours so far so am only 3 stripes behind :)


Right, well this is a complete failure because you can't even hit the publish button...and copy and paste doesn't work...there is no option to insert a picture...


Right...back to my trusty Lavinia Laptop...

As you can see, it has grown a lot but it is still a very long way off finishing.

And, no, our rabbits have not turned into footballs.  Here they are

Mr C has put some stale fruit bread out for the birds and they were looking for bits under the bird table.  Samba would find some, Barley would spot she had it and so she would run off with it.  Every time Barley got close she grabbed her prize and ran off again.  She must have done several laps of the garden.  It is a wonder Barley is as portly as he is.

And I completely forgot to even mention all the snow we have had.  Well, not a lot if you live in Canada, but quite a lot for us.  No snow day though so all school pupils and teachers in this house (all of us) has to trudge through the snow.  Poor Mr C had the furthest to go and his bike has now bitten the dust.  Bike no. 3 is now with us.

I have also started a cardigan and a hexagon blanket but more of those another day.

Thanks for sticking with me...sorry for being a little rubbish.......................

Today....

has not exactly been marvelous.  It started well enough. Mr C was back to school today so I got up at 7...I always feel bad if he is leaving to go to work and we are all snoring away.  I got some of my granny stripe done....boys woke up and played nicely.  I could tell they were playing with Lego because I could hear the rumble of it in the boxes from the back room.  Then it was tome fore breakfast...downhill from there really.  Mr Chops decided to microwave a roll to warm it up......30 seconds calls me through to the kitchen.  I should have checked that he had heard me.  About 4 minutes I think.....another 30 secs and the kitchen would have been on fire.  The smell was horrendous and is still here over 6 hours later.  That would have done for me...can't have too much excitement in one day but no...never leave it there...I decided to wash B's trainers.  Walking past the washing machine to light a candle to rid us of the smell of the near housefire......I noticed that foam was pouring out of the washing machine.   The light was flashing to say the door was ready to open so I just assumed there was only foam in the drum....NEVER assume.


er....brief break as I cold smell burning.  I forgot eh lemons I put on to boil...the pan is now black and the kitchen now smells of burn lemons...I a off to cry!

New Year...New intentions.....??

...maybe.

Blogging has gone by the wayside and this is not good.  The thing is that I have started to write an actually real paper and pen diary and so this blog has been neglected.  I have also been continuing my crochet obsession so there has been no time.
Cue photos of things I have made and remembered to take a picture of...many I have forgotten too :(

Mum's birthday cushion...have made 3 of these now and still not one for me :(

Hat in progress from ravelry...must find the link.

One of the many brooches I sell

My Attic24 wreath...not sure if I am finished yet.

Close up of the flowers and stars

The beginnings of my granny stripe blanket

Day 3 of the granny stripe

Something for someone.......can't say

Close up...love this DROPS merino yarn

Nice :)

I don't know if it is just my ineptitude but I am not liking Blogger at the moment.  I don't seem to be able to put 2 pictures next to each other, even if I make the small.  I haven't a clue how you make one of those 9 or 12 photo montages.  It is just quite frustrating.

But...I did get this is the post today.....

...so who cares about technology...off to make coffee and browse :)

Was just about to....

hop off to bed...because it's the middle of the week  and it's gone 9 o'clock but then I though I should post...today of all days...because today is the day I turn....

40 

(apparently Blogger doesn't want me to make that statement any bigger or bolder so it will have to do!)


There...that's all for today.....

Stampin'Up!

Here the link to my Stampin' Up! blog...very much in the early stages but it is getting there....

lucystampedthis.blogspot.com

Please have a look.  I know there is only a couple of things on there at the moment but I am having a Stampin' Up! party on friday and hoping to start a cardmaking/papercraft group later this month :)
I need to add loads of things on the sidebar and change the header but this morning the computer has driven me mad so it is going off for the rest of the day

The Paralympics

Don't know where to start really...such an amazingly fantastically inspirational day (not to mention that I managed to get the 2 boys, on my own, across London to meet Mr C).  We left from here and parked at Snaresbrook to gt the underground into London.  Mr C got off at Stratford to collect the tickets and the boys and myself had to get to the Natural History Museum.  No problem...you'd think.  But, given Mr Chops' propensity for 'quirky' behaviour and my downright worrying bordering on really annoying, I was completely dreading it, not the least because we had to actually change trains.  Mr C did say after the even that it had occurred to him that even he hadn't taken both of them across London on his own...did he think that hadn't occurred to me?????  I there is something to worry about, I will worry about it...and I wonder where Mr Chops gets it from?!!!!!  Mr B takes everything in his stride so that was kind of something less to worry about.  But I needn't have.  Despite getting on the wrong train, not being able to get tickets at the outset and then not knowing what tickets we needed, Mr Chops came up trumps.  While on the wrong train he heard that the next stop could be for people changing to the district line....we duly got off, asked a guard and...hey presto...lots of prayers later we were at the NHM.  We even managed to find Mr C, eat at Bella Italia and get the tube tot eh Olympic village.  A few minor 'blips' in between but they were of no consequence in the end.


We did get seperated at the enterance but Mr B and I forged on through security...stopping to be frisked because I had left my phone in my pocket and then my bags searched where and they discovered a crochet needle...whoops.  The security woman thought it didn't pose much of a threat as it was blunt...but I offered to hand it in anyway...unfortunately she wasn't up for any impromptu crafting so let me keep it...I tried!

A few things struck me about the place.  There is absolutely no litter....anywhere.  ALL the games makers (these people are heroes) and so helpful and cheerful, even when we were leaving at 10pm and they must have been on the go for hours.  The armed police were very discreet and not at all alarming...the last time I encountered armed police was in Chicago airport at 3 in the morning and they did not make me feel at all safe!  There was hardly a queue for the toilets....it was not a warm day so I think there would have been had we been drinking loads of water.  The food wasn't the cheapest and we couldn't be bothered to queue for Maccy D's...the coffee was vile though!

BUT we saw Hannah Cockcroft win gold and saw her medal ceremony...very moving.  When she was racing we, along with 80,000 other people, were yelling our heads off.  The atmosphere, even for athletes who finished way behind everyone else, was wonderful.  We weren't there on the day that an athlete got a 7 minute standing ovation while he ran the rest of the race to the finish ion his own but we were there to see David Weir win his heat...the noise was mind blowing.  One of the athletes in this heat was about 300m behind everyone else and the cheer to the finish line for him followed him all round the stadium.

Last summer, during the riots, I was utterly ashamed of my country and the people that behaved like that.  they made us look bad to the rest of the world.  This year, I couldn't have been prouder.  Disability or not, it didn't matter, we were there to support the athletes and that is what we did...in style and with bells on.  It is so hard not to sound patronising, and I don't want to, but the athletes competing were truly inspiring.  The things that many, if not all, of them had overcome to get too where they were, would be to many of us, insurmountable.  If I had had my legs blown off either fighting for someone else's war or simply sitting on the tube, I really can't see that I would have to drive to turn it into something positive.  If I was born blind, the last thing I would want to do would be to run as fast as I possibly could in some direction trusting someone else. 

And it inspired my children too...they saw that whatever circumstances you are in, you can be awesome :)

Amazing seats.  The whole place felt huge but also very intimate

I was enjoying myself...I am just naturally miserable looking and I appear to have a double chin!!!

 

A picture says a thousand words...

Well, I hope it does because there are many thousands that have not been written here over the last few weeks.  A completely hectic end of term that involved the summer garden party, jubilee celebrations, school Olympics, new school open evening, various other PTA commitments...and a hundred and one other things that I can't remember.  Plus, I developed tenosynovytus (SP?) sitting and knitting a bag to be felted one afternoon and then promptly burnt the fingers of my left hand (I am a lefty) the next weekend, so there was a point when I had 2 hands out of action.  Plus finishing some things for a wedding commision, a holiday, school holidays and you can quickly see why Mrs Blog has been sadly neglected :( 

Now, if blogger and my computer are going to play nicely I shall upload various photos of things we/I have been going.....

 

It's still a work in progress...

but I have a new website

www.lucymadethis.org.uk

I am quite chuffed and Mr C has taken it on as his 'project' so I still get  to make and not do websitey things :)

Cake pops....

...need no words!!!

Please ignore my kitchen...words cannot describe how hideous it is.....it isn't even cheered up by these on the windowsill...

Oh dear me....

classy to brassy in 10 mins flat....'know when to stop' I tell Mr C but him and the boys just don't know when that is.....

Jubilee bunting....

Probably not my finest crafting hours but ours is the only handmade bunting in the street.  I have nothing against mass produced plastic...but it's just not for me.  Mr C has made a marvellous job of making a 'patchwork' union flag in the upstairs window but I shall have to photograph it tomorrow along with the little felt and ribbon flags I have made to go on the window sill in my milk bottles.  I wouldn't say I was a rampant royalist but I think the jubilee should be celebrated and I think the Queen, certainly after standing in the freezing rain for 3 hours yesterday, should be applauded.  She certainly can't have an off day like the rest of us and I think she is amazing :)  Street party tomorrow as well as.....

Mr Chop's 11th birthday.  We had a family bbq 'eat indoors' yesterday and he will have to have an extended birthday present giving because a certain internet firm, who has always been fab in the past, have let me down and 'express delivery' does not appear to do what it says on the tin. I made lots of these cakes, while Mr C decorated them....

Don't know why Mr B isn't in this one but here is Chopsie with his cousins.

And here are the 'boys' having breakfast....bonding :)

Too cute...although the eagle eyed among you will have spotted that patch of bunny wee!!  Stern looks were given.

Sunday afternoon

And some secret crocheting for Mr Chops' birthday next week.....

All finished now except the arms which I will do tonight.

It's been so hot here today.  Oscar found a shady spot though

He's not looking very impressed - probably thinks I might steal his spot.  Why he thinks I would lie under the picnic table is anyone's guess, but then I am not a cat...who can fathom their minds!!!!!

Also finally got round to putting pva on the back of my funky flower wall hanging thing, pattern, of course, courtesy of Lucy at Attic 24 :)

Of course, that's the back view but it is still drying.  May even get it finished and put on the wall by next weekend :)  We shall see.

Found it...

And this is what naughtiness looks like!!!  They bit through the fence and there's another wire one around the pear tree which Samba dug under to.  Honestly, look at her, she has no shame!!!!

Here's a better picture of my little creature from 'Crochet Bakemono' (got it in hobby craft). I did change a couple of things but it is essentially the same.  Then I got to thinking, 'How difficult can this be?'

So I made this one.....well, here's the start.  I actually took the mouth off in the end because it was wonky but not enough to look like it was supposed to be.  She also has red arms now to match her bottom.  No name yet but I am toying with Phylis...what do you think??

I'll take another photo of her in all her glory later - it is far too hot to go out at the moment.

Ta-ra