49 and a half shades of grey

Before you ask....nope this isn't about THAT shade of Grey!

It's not very exciting stuff I'm afraid, what we've been up to really, something and nothing.
 I'd love to tell you we'd won the lottery and had buggered off to see the Grand Canyon in a convertible dining on nothing but sticky buns but alas, it's just been the normal boring stuff. Although, saying that....

Stinky littlest boy joined the Royal Air Force.He looks soooo grown up in his uniform, it's quite scary.

We went away 'oop North' and got to see the seaside on a stunningly beautiful but chillllllllly day where Bella unfortunately got poked in the eye with a stick (she's ok by the way) and Red got wooshed over by a big wave. We've also been doing a spot of decorating which has taken FOREVER but for no reason other than I can't be bothered with it all... oh and lack of funds to do it all in one go.Yep it's still not quite finished but I'll show you some sneaky peeks..

Cyril..who smells like old socks. Nice.

One job always ends up turning into 5 million more in this house,which I may have said already before.
The simple task of decorating the lounge, just a lick of paint so we thought but bigger cupboards had to be made either side of the fireplace and that in turn made the plaster fall off...you know how it goes in old houses..urgh.
One.  Big.  Money.  Pit.
 I must admit I ended up sneaking off and making cups of tea or getting sidetracked by a magazine instead of getting on with stuff like the hideous chore of sanding.

 I'm turning into a right lazy tart in my old age.

paint;F&B Downpipe, Pavillion gray

Our 10 year old sofa had split at the seams and was becoming more than a bit uncomfortable, It was embarrassingly bad. Unable to afford the feather filled sofa of our dreams just yet, a trip to the 'Dodgy Furniture Store' surprisingly came up trumps with a simple grey velvet number (the never ending sale price and interest free credit for 400 years not surprisingly swung it). The evil twins Olive and Flo decided to pee on the our other one too, right through all the scatter cushions, seat cushions and base, not once but twice. 

 Library sign from 3potato4, a pressie from my little brother.

  They also did it on me when I was asleep in bed.Yuk! Now that was a seriously eeeeeevil thing to do at 3am I can tell you! I believe it was my punishment for having them spayed and keeping them holed up at home with a litter tray. It made the 'requiring of a new sofa' decision much easier though.
The not-so-little kitty gits will be banished from the lounge unsupervised from now on though.Grrrr.


Anyway, I've done a complete turn around in my ideas for this room, I'm not sure whether it works or not but we'll see. After about 10 pots of  tester paint we decided to go with the warm grey walls that stinky George's room was painted with. It was just right with the grey sofa and some charcoal roman blinds which will eventually be made from some bargain £25 linen-look curtains purchased from Ikea.(the shutters I long for are also on hold due to lack of funds).

shop letter via ebay from France

For someone that suffers with bouts of depression like me, it could be a dangerous step to go grey all the way, not to worry though, there's a bit of frivolous nonsense too..like Cyril, the stuffed finch, a large French metal shop letter, a painted pigeon hole cupboard and some kitsch 60s stuff thrown in for good measure.

Cyril came from ebay, glass dome £4 (bargain!)Homesense, housedust..free

 I was amazed to read in Homes and Antiques last month about vintage taxidermy as I had purchased the exact same butterfly on the cover and 'Cyril' only days before its publication. Fancy that hey?!

We bought some picture frames too from Ikea, a whole bunch of them half price for £4 each and filled them with some lovely butterfly prints from the wonderful emporium named Rockett St.George  (one of my very favourite online haunts)

 The lacy-but-industrial-looking rusty metal lampshade came from there too. It makes a lovely pattern around the room when you use the right kind of lightbulb!

 I usually hate any sort of change, become a grumpy mare and have sleepless nights worrying if it looks right or not but this time it was nice to go for something a bit trendier or colours I like but wouldn't normally consider. Luckily at this time of year you get lots of discounts, free postage and offers to tempt you, so lots was done quite cheaply.

Wooden stag Rocket&Rye, they sent the lovely snowflakes in my parcel as a pressie!

It's all looking appropriately wintery and festive now that we've begun 'Christmassing' up the house too.
One thing I do like is that by having plainer basic stuff, we can ring the seasonal changes with cushions
( yay for CUSHIONS!!!)

Velvet cushions cox &cox, vintage barkcloth cushion, ebay.

 
And if I do find it all too depressing and grey, there's always plenty more paint in the garage...

Cheerio for now. x

That Christmassy thing

 

I made my first ever Christmas New years cake (with a little help from Delia)

 So off it goes, yet another year whizzing by, taking the craziness of Christmas with it.
I have big plans for this year as I feel I completely wasted the last one. Faffing about,fretting and missing opportunities because of  having the curse of  zero confidence making me not go for a job I really, really would have liked (like, since I was 5 would have liked) arrgh! I could slap myself with a big wet fish sometimes. I should have a degree in procrastinating.

the kitschness tree

Anyway, back to Christmas, I got to choose my own stuff this year, with Pete working away so much it was a case of oooh look what Father Christmas bought me, isn't she he clever knowing exactly what I like?!

My manifesto for 2012, a present from myself!

Everything was covered in pine needles this year too, Harry and I bought what ended up to be the worst tree in the world, 5 minutes before the garden centre closed on the worst, most rainiest day in the wrong car (the little white car instead of the big beasty truck)
Bella ate most of the plastic or wooden baubles at her eye level, producing sparkly, polystyrene dotted poo the following day (she is currently on a mission to eat as many different things as possible, including my spectacles!) Every time we shut the door, drew the curtains, the wind from wagging dogs' tails (and possibly the wind from dogs bottoms for all I know, too) seemed to make a mass of needles drop off it..heaps of  the things! The dogs, cats, presents, floor, us..we all got covered in prickly needles. I even found some in my knickers for goodness sake!
The poor, sad tree was a bunch of brown twigs by New Years Eve.
We have bought a pretend tree for next year in the sale, a bargain at £30 instead of £100 (crikey aren't fake ones expensive?)
I shall really miss the smell of a real tree because to me that is the smell of Christmas. Never mind.

Basil got in touch with his feminine side and helped me wrap presents

Before Christmas, whilst out on a jolly but insisting he wasn't drunk (yeh right, do kids forget we were 19 once?) George tripped off the curb and badly hurt his ankle.He was whisked off to hospital in an ambulance and the first we new of  it was him waking us up at 4am trying to get up the stairs on crutches. His ankle was 3 times its size and bruised up to his knee but wasn't broken like the paramedics thought. He said the pain was worse than when he broke his collarbone...or his hand (3 times)..or his other ankle...or nose or his finger for that matter...and he couldn't put any weight on it at all for 2 weeks. He was due to start a new job fitting solar panels to roofs the following Monday.  Talk about unlucky!!
So once again I have been the 'fetcher of things' for his lordship.

The boys asked for strange things for Christmas, George asked 'Santa' for "a bed that wasn't someone else's or that some granny might have died in"
George doesn't 'get ' the vintage thing.

Okay then, looked like a trip to Ikea for Santa (with George and his crutches in tow). His room has been revamped, it's all grey and white and retro-modern and parents are banned from it. My only imput was the Orla Kiely bedding which really looks rather nice and was very much approved of  by stinky George and stinky, furry pesky Bella.We moved some metal locker cupboards from Harry's old room and swapped the shabby vintage linen blinds for some smart white wooden ones.
  George bought a chair and the bed and Santa bought the side cupboards, funky plastic lampshade and various other bits and bobs. Ikea beds are HUGE..even the little ones are huge!
Are Swedish people all really tall as well as gorgeous?

The ouchy looking outline of Lady Luck

Harry asked for some money towards a tattoo, sounding like a complete hypocrite I begged him not to have one, gave him the lecture of  'its for life'  but he went ahead anyway. He likes vintage things like we do, old cars, pinups and polka dots and often I hear old 50s tunes coming from his ipod. He's 18, doesn't live at home anymore and as much as I protested I didn't really have much of a say in the end.
It's just as scary when your kids grow up y'know...

I was given a lovely woolly pompom hat and scarf from George..

my new woolly hat!(and rather dusty mirrors!)

 and Harry and his girlfriend gave me some lovely vintagey type things like a large green metal number 2 and an I grew up in the 80s CD..he thought it was hilarious that I new the words to most of the songs....bring on the disco!!

Well this month, like probably the rest of the UK, has been incredibly tight money wise, so imagine my utter delight when I won a phone in competition on the radio this morning to have a bill paid....a £99 and 44p bill to be precise!!
I must have sounded like a dithering, dribbling, gibbering wreck, and their pronunciation of my supposedly  German sounding double-barrelled surname was hilarious, still, who cares? They could have called me Mrs Mashed-Potato for all I'm bothered!
A good start to the New Year and hopefully how 2012 will go on.
Pete's mouth is all okay too, yay! Although the lovely Italian mouth specialist actually made me snort with laughter at his demonstration of how the saliva glands work..yep we can see from 4 foot away that bald blokes work properly, hmm, thanks Pete! (she says wiping a shot of saliva from her eyes)

Happy, Happy New year to you all...cheerio for now.  x

Bella, Bunting and the Bucket List....

Thanks for all the Bella and Colin love on the last post. x

Bella actually belongs to George which means I get called 'Granny'....can't say I'm too chuffed about that! Colin is still as mad as ever, he flew right down the garden the other day, crash landing in a bush so it looks like I'll be getting the scissors out to clip his wing feathers again soon.
See, I told you he was a bit of a berk.
Bella (or 'The Belly' as she is known, typical Labrador- stomach on legs) is learning all the good habits from my lovely old black Labrador, Red, who is in turn learning a few naughty habits from his new little sister. You should here the racket Colin makes when they play together in the garden, who new Turkeys made such good referees?

Bella and Red

I quite like having another girl around, it means 'Granny' gets to buy pretty Cath Kidston flowery dog beds and leads and butterfly shaped pink dog toys!

Anyway,I'm trying my hardest to get into the Christmassy spirit thing.

It feels a bit weird to be thinking about Christmas just yet, I feel like this year has just flown by, the weather has got me out of sorts too, one minute it's mild and I'm wearing a t-shirt to garden in and the next it's blowing a gale..last year at this time we were deep in snow! I know it will creep up on me far too quickly, I'll be disorganised and probably skint as usual..especially as we have just had to have a new all singing all dancing economical combi boiler fitted...yikes (I'm sat here sweating cobs and now realise just how bad our old boiler was, I think I need to adjust something to make the house cooler! phewwww )

dotcomgiftshop

Recently I got sent some of this gorgeous Christmas Bunting from the DotComGiftShop 
If you dont know this website already, click the pink link you will discover a whole heap of kitsch and pretty loveliness at your fingertips...Christmas or otherwise. Now I can't wait to string them up. Jolly little houses and snow scenes, I think they have the same sort of look as a certain Mrs Kidston.
I'm going to get some kitsch flocked reindeer lights this year too as they are just my cup of tea..kitsch and 50s looking but without the dodgy vintage wiring!


















I think a certain Bald bloke would like a cup of tea in this mug

and I'm so in love with this framed doggy print.

It was always my job to go to the post Office when I was younger to purchase the 13p dog licence when it used to be 'required by law'.

That'll definitely be on my wish list...pretty please Father Christmas!

Pete and I have been away 'oop north' again for our annual trip to Northumberland to see amazing fireworks, puppy worship (two of my sisters have puppies too) drink far to much frothy coffee and eat waaaay too much cake, oh and to tick something off my Bucket List.

I'm very lucky to have a great family, who mean everything to me.
I adore my 3 sisters and my little brother who I just don't see often enough.

photo:Google

My brother-in-law whom I've known since I was 4, ( he and my eldest sister were childhood sweethearts) treated me to something I've wanted to experience in a long time, an Opera.

photo:Google

OOOOOH posh stuff!! It was at the amazing Newcastle Theatre Grand , a beautiful Victorian place which has recently had a 5 million pound facelift (pity about the new chairs though, they had to be THE most uncomfortable chairs ever in the world..fidget, fidget, fidget)

I went to see Puccini's Madama Butterfly.

 photo: Google

Set in the 1940's, in the hills above Nagasaki, it was beautiful, very moving and you don't need to be fluent in Italian to understand the story of Lieutenant Pinkerton of the US Navy the and his 15 year old Geisha bride to be. The singing was incredible and the parts you recognised musically gave you goosebumps.
Wonderful stuff.
Big TICK of the list that one.

Of course when 'oop north', there is the obligatory shopping to do, especially in the Roman village of Corbridge which has Dickensian streets of stone houses and shops with Christmas windows that might even make old Scrooge smile. I spent some hard earned pennies in one of my most favourite shops.. RE
Giant paper snowflakes to hang in the big window in the dining room, architectural shop letters that will eventually light up and various other bits and bobs came home with us.

Inspired by a local coffee house, I'm going to make a cushion out of (yet another) tea towel, this time from a vintage French map of Britain.
If only you could smell these gorgeous French soaps!

Perfect colours for our 1930s bathroom.

They have some really great, quirky stuff there, far more than on the website.

Unfortunately,November also saw both my stinky boys loose their jobs, so we have been a bit pre-occupied here, I worry myself silly about things and if I'm not careful I get a bout of Shingles or the dreaded Migraines. This month its been the latter. Great.
December is lurking around the corner which as you know,is one of my less favoured months, already we have hospital visits lined up, (lifting heavy mowers into trucks does you no favours ladies!...get doing those pelvic floor exercises!!) and the dentist found something odd in bald blokes mouth which requires a biopsy.Scary stuff. Keep your fingers crossed for him pretty please...he's my rock. x

Cheerio for now x

p.s
Xxx's....for Lynn for her lovely Harry....

things I'm liking at work today...

Thankyou so much for all your encouraging words and emails,it's really scary for us at the moment..you forget about it all for a minute and then your tummy flips over like you have driven over a hump-backed bridge and reality creeps back in, yuk.. but I'm sure things will work out ok...they have to. It's the law and I wont have it any other way, but yes, thankyou you lovely bunch, it means ever such a lot, it really does. xx

Anyway I thought you may like to see some nice jolly things that have come in at work recently. It 's great to unpack parcels when they are filled with lovely exciting things like these and it is currently filling the void of my (now banned) eBay obsession!
You can buy some of these things online too as the gift shop I work in for two days a week has now got a little website, this is just a bit of stuff..there's tons more!

We sell goodies for;

Cath fans...This is one of the best hand creams I have ever tried! (and that's something coming from a gardener with hands as rough as a badgers backside!)MASSIVE mugs of prettiness.

Lovely cute things for babies...

I so love this little velvety soft owl .He looks like someone has just pinched his bottom!

For girlies...

you can't beat a bit of posh soap! oooh which is my favourite?

This one?

or this one?

polka dots?

hmmmm... eeny meeny miny mo

I'll decide whilst I'm soaking in a bath of these..

For that weekend away...

I love this quirky bag, (just need the weekend away now..ooh and Bruce Willis to whisk me away there!)

For ladies that need to save their pennies

err-hum moving swiftly along...

for stinky boys....

Fab cartoon mugs for hot chocolate...

nail through the finger joke? or maybe a fly in an ice cube..boys, now you can get back at that annoying auntie who always wants a kiss at Christmas

then she can get you back at a game of cards!

For playing tricks on grandma...

ok she may have her own inbuilt whoopee cushion but it's still highly amusing..

Hope you liked this little selection of jolly stuff, there's always new things being added to the website (or we could add it especially if you ask nicely!)
x

The Blue 'oeuf' and the kindness of strangers

Not only were we excited by the tiny amount of snow but Violet our little grey hen who has seemed very fidgety lately,was so excited she popped out her first blue egg. Followed the next day by another in the most perfect shade of eau de nil. I much prefer the French word for egg 'oeuf' it at least shows some of the chickens' effort at laying it in the word.."ooooooo-ff"
So now she officially becomes a 'Hen', no longer a chicken.I've been in a jolly mood all week as the dreaded court case was thrown out..helps to show up if you want to accuse someone of something (what idiots) and I've been doing a spot of sewing, had a really nice Christmas and things are looking ok..not fantastic, just ok but that'll do me.

I have to show you something that Faye at Country Chic sent me,this was a really,really nice surprise, it arrived just before Christmas and was my only present on Christmas morning, (apart from some nice smelling deodorant from Harry,very practical..!) so not only did Faye make my day, she certainly cheered Pete up as he was feeling a bit bad that he wasn't able to get me a pressie. The box that arrived was full of lovely things, a copy of The English home, my favourite magazine which I had recently had to cancel my subscription to, a rose scented bar of soap all wrapped up in fabric and ribbons to go in your knicker drawer but far to nice to hide away, posh chocolate and this gorgeous toadstool that Faye sells in her beautiful online shop...'The country chic home'I do like spotty toadstools! Isn't that so very nice of her? What a lovely lady. I sent her a whole heap of good karma in return!
I was dreading this Christmas and it turned out to be one of our better ones, the things we had, we really loved and because there weren't many, we appreciated them far more. George got his Banksy poster, his much hankered over DVDs of some crazy bloke doing crazy things, Harry got his replacement bike helmet so that at least I can sleep at night when I find out he does stunts like this .. Pete got his electric jigsaw (many little jobs involving wood and possibly 'Stanley the dog' shaped cutting planned for him) and I got a pair of the prettiest Cath Kidston red slippers from my mother-in-law (she is just the best mother in law)..already looking well used ..and part pompom-less thanks to one of the cats..pests! As well a few other little Cath Kidston bits and bobs from my sisters which were lovely too.
In fact it made us realise and remember what it's all about really, sometimes it's very easy to get lost in the commercialisation of it all.
This morning I made a couple of London Underground cushions , thanks to a tutorial by this lady in Australia..so easy peasy, infact I cheated and didn't even have to put a zip in as I just made an envelope opening so you just fold it and sew down the two sides.
Thanks for the tutorial Kathryn!I love things like this..making something different out of something run of the mill like a tea towel. I'd like to cover Georges boring drum shades with a map of the underground but I'm not getting very far with the pestering (maybe I should just do it whilst he's at college!)I'm going to make some more cushions for my little shop too, the Kate Forman ones I made for Christmas presents went down really well, so I'm aiming for a few more union jack ones and some flowery ones too..(well that's the plan)
Have a great weekend..and keep warm! x