Time Out ....

..... in Bath.

To celebrate being best friends forever (or BFF as my goddaughter would say), Catherine and I escaped from our families and spent a wonderful weekend in Bath. We managed to find a great place to stay, the Astor Guest House which was only few minutes walk from the city centre (or a long drive when the sat nav let us down!).

We had a great time, we did a bit of sightseeing (planned which house in Royal Crescent we will be moving in to!), a lot of shopping and far too much eating and drinking. I love Bath, it really is a beautiful city and I would dearly love to live there. But, for now, I'll have to settle for the occasional visit.

Back at home, we're trying to grow more this year. Our garden is rather small so we don't have room for a "proper vegetable plot so normally we just manage a couple of tomato plants or some peas .... but so far this year we've planted:

• potatoes (in our old dustbin and also in five huge pots)
• cucumbers
  
• a mix of salad leaves
• rocket
• peas
• chillis
• tomatoes
• spring onions
• coriander
  
• bay
• sweet bay
• lemon thyme
• lemon grass
• and loads more chillis
  

Fingers crossed that it all grows and that the birds don't pinch too much - they are my prime suspects in the case of the scotch bonnet thefts!

Almost a month ....

is far too long between blogs. I keep meaning to blog, I really do, but there is always something else I could finish and write about, or another photograph that I could take .... I'm bad at blogging, too busy making and seeing and doing.

Anyway, since my last blog my first baby turned twenty .... how did that happen? The GCSEs were bad enough, starting college was awful and the first voting slip nearly killed me (I was sure it was a mistake and, at the time, felt I should wirte a letter of complaint!). Now, he would be mortified if I posted baby pictures and, tempting as that is, I won't. But here he is now all grown up ....


This past week I've shopped for England, splashing out on everything from new shoes to self cover buttons. I've also managed to visit each and every thrift shop in Salisbury (what a great morning that was!). I've been inspired by a book I found in one of these thrift shops - Vintage Fabric Style by Sylvie Simmons and Lucinda Ganderton. It's a wonderful book, full of great ideas and, best of all, it only cost me £1.50 ... it's my new favourite bedtime read!

I'm really trying this year not to buy ready made presents but to make my own and, if I can't, then to buy handcrafted from someone else. With this in mind, I invested in some more books which will go a long way to help me.

Really Jazzy Jars by Marie Browning has some great ideas for dressing up jars as gift containers, candle holders or memory keepers. It has some great patterns and recipes ....


The other one was Bags, Tags, Boxes and Cards by Karen Delquado ... again some excellent projects - my favourite being a build your own snowman kit. I must confess, that wanting to make this kit has left me a little disappointed that Christmas isn't a bit nearer, but bought some ear warmers today just to be ready!

So, too much reading and not really enough making - still, I'm sure I can make up for it over the long Bank Holiday weekend ....