A game of wish miss and hope

My life at the mo seems to be all work and no play which is all a bit pants (but I really shouldn't moan) and whilst I have five minutes to spare I thought I would do a little list of wishes and misses and hopings...just for silliness and because even I'm sick to death of seeing those blessed lupins!

Ok the game...pretty simple for simple minds like mine!

I really wish I hadn't just left that highlighting bleach on my hair for quite so long..YIKES! Tart alert!

I miss blogging and I soooo want to have more time to do it but I hope to do more in the winter

I wish you didn't have to nag at teenage boys so much. Nag, nag, NAG

I really miss my Mondays at home,I don't think my house has been this messy since we moved in!

hmmm .. I hope Harry's revising for those GCSE's..

I wish they wouldn't miss the laundry basket when their dirty washing gets launched across the landing at random moments. IT IS NOT RUGBY GEORGE!!

I hope that's not a cat being sick I can hear..why do they have to come inside to be sick???Is it to show me their latest meal of grass or fur? how nice of them to do so.

I wish teenage boys wouldn't leave the washing up for me to do.Baked beans at lunchtime don't half stink the house out when they are left in the sink in a saucepan all afternoon.YUK!

I miss being that bit thinner and that gorgeous top from Coast not fitting me(and half of my wardrobe for that matter!)

I hope one day I will be thinner so I can wear all those clothes again!!

but I really wish I didn't like cake quite so much...

I miss gardening with firemen (phwoar)

I hope my old truck passes its MOT this month

I wish those noisy magpies wouldn't cackle right outside my bedroom window at 5 in the morning...ooh spiteful birds they are, beautiful in their tux's but what meanies..

I wish I could finish all those niggly little jobs in the house,they'll be in their hundreds soon!

I miss the coaltits and would love them to come back soon

(but I hope the kitties dont eat them when they do)

I wish I hadn't started revamping the vintage deckchairs someone gave me

I'll miss the old fabric already!

but I hope I can find some just as nice

I wish it wasn't going to rain tomorrow.

I do miss having 3 sisters around to do girlie stuff with

I hope my big sister does come and stay really soon HINT, HINT BIG SIS.

I wish the chickens didn't make dust-bath craters everywhere in the garden

I'll miss Harry when he goes off this month with his best buddy on holiday for two weeks

but I hope he has a nice time in France and gets to visit his Grannie and Grandpa who live there.

I wish I could think of more misses and I really hope you're not too bored!

I wish that I hadn't missed the vintage and handmade fair and hope to go to the next one (it looked so much fun!)

I wish I'd charged more for that job on Saturday..what a nightmare,it cost more to do than I earnt! I miss those expensive tree loppers and I hope the new ones last a bit longer!

I wish I could go to Canada have tea with Lisa and see my little brother that I miss, but I hope to see him in September over here yay!

You may have gathered from the date (its actually the 15th of July today not the 5th of June!) I wrote this a while ago, I've been loitering around blogland, reading other blogs and pondering whether to continue with my own..it really isn't very exciting here in the land of Vintage Pretty and shabby at the mo!

Oh and if you are wondering.. Harry did revise and I am missing him whilst hes on his trip, it was the cat being sick, my truck failed its MOT for the first time in 18 years (booo) and had to have its bottom welded (sounds painful) and I did paint and re-cover the deckchairs and funily enough they do look ok.. so no more comedy acts of falling through old fabric in the garden... but that's a whole 'nother post hopefully not as far apart as this one and maybe a little bit more exciting ( with maybe even actual photos of exciting stuff!)

x

A rare day out..

You may remember last year we were lucky enough to be given some free tickets to the Malvern Spring gardening show by a lovely neighbour.I was only watching Gardeners world and thinking how good it looked again last night and a pity that our nice neighbours had moved, when stinky George produced an envelope with two tickets in for the show." from 'thingy' " he says, "who used to live next door, they called round yesterday" (they have since moved to a new house but still own the house next door)
WHOOPEE !
So off Pete and I trundled in my old truck to visit the show only 10 minutes from our home.
There was definately a bit of a vintage/reclamation theme going on this year if you ask me, maybe I'm wrong,but there were more sellers with antique gardinalia and vintage garden bits and bobs and more lovely show gardens featuring old tools and vintage sheds than last year.Lots of alliums, which I always admire, and plenty of themed colourful gardens, I love the combination of dusky dark leaves and vivid oranges that seemed to be used this year...(sorry,the photos are a bit blurry,oops!)

but then again, I love purple flowers and circles used in the garden too, whether its alliums or box balls..or stone balls!But you can't beat a bit of vintage in my eyes, I just love this cute potting shed, with it's old tin signs and antique tools..This lovely greenhouse was just my cup of tea too!I did manage to get some nice old bits and bobs, only a few plants as I thought they were a bit pricey to be honest.Some much needed planters for my lollipop Bays; which have been crammed into their original pots for far too long and fell over if you sneezed near them! an old enamel bucket in the most delicious shade of blue and some Camassias to plant in them, this bargain of a big galvanised trough (£7!) which will weather down nicelyand yet another bargain item, a rusty metal obelisk for my clematis to climb up.It certainly pays to make an offer to the sellers, especially on the last day! last but not least I had to visit The Allotment shop again where I found this little packet of replica gardening ephemera.. It's just fab! I have no idea what I'll do with it all yet, but what a cute and interesting collection of vintage papers, pamphlets,cigarette cards, posters and seed packets.There's all sorts of bits and bobs in there!

You may like to check out the company that makes them...

www.mempackcompany.com

(I think I might get the seaside holiday one aswell)
So anyway that was a rare day out for us and a really good one, so for now, if you'll excuse me I have some balls of my own to trim...(box ones of course)

Somebody...

SOMEBODY is in my bad books. No names mentioned but he's furry, rather old and ginger..(and rapidly using up his nine lives)
He had every test going at the Vets because he was looking ill, not eating,depressed and scruffier than usual.
£180 later...(£180 !!!) one puss cat is returned home with a clean bill of health from the vets.

The reason?
turns out SOMEBODY didn't like the new cat food.
and if he thinks he's having that 'sachet ' cat food for posh spoilt Princess cats every day of the week, he can think again.
hmmmm pesky cat.
Still love him to bits though.x

Life begins..

..as they say, when you hit 40. Yep, I've hit forty today.. FORTY..ooh scary! But if life begins, then that's all right with me and I'm quite looking forward to it..although the 'middle age spread' can hold off for a bit longer and I'm not quite ready for the 'Tena ladies'..just yet.
The filled wooden flower box in the photo above was a birthday gift from my lovely boss at the shop...how gorgeous are they? I just adore them. And I've had a lovely suprise from my sisters and brother..but more about that another time, I think this post should really be a grovelling apology to all those people who sent me messages! I've been madly busy, had a computer virus that had something to do with emails and still seems to crash or play up each time a new email arrives (grrrr) and we've been decorating That room again. Lack of time is a horrid thing, I have ten million jobs to do, the gardening to do and finish decorating something I now wish I hadn't started! Even Easter came and went in the blink of an eye.
I've also had some sad news that knocked the wind out of me a bit when a friend who I had only seen a few days previously, died unexpectedly.I shall miss him and it hasn't really sunk in yet.
I've also missed blogging.I really must find more time from somewhere or other to catch up, either that or employ a chef and cleaner as well as a general gardener,and decorator. So I'm very sorry if I didnt get back to your messages, I felt terribly guilty when I couldn't because of the virus frustrating me to the point of the computer being launched out the window or just not having the time.Just how do you full-time workers find time to blog? Hopefully I'm going to be more organised, pull my finger out and get back to normality soon-ish.I did manage to paint the hen house last weekend..much to the annoyance of the ladies, who made so much noise the footballers playing on the park peeped over the front hedge to see what was going on.(I think Betty must have wanted blue instead of green as she seemed to be making the most noise)
That room (the dining room) is still in chaos, but this time I think I might just like it when it's finished as we have a different table and swapped about the furniture. I'll do a grand unveiling later where you can tell me you prefered it before!
We had to pick up the new old table from Bath and on the way back we called in at Cafe no.9, owned by the lovely Anna at All things lovely. I must admit I was really nervous saying hello..but her cake is to die for ( just dont smile after you've eaten the poppy seed as you get poppy-seed-polka-dotted teeth) the cafe is lovely like Anna and you must check it out if your passing that way.
So that's it for a bit..nothing exciting to report really, George is much, much better..and I'm still plodding on.
Enjoy your week and please forgive me if I fall silent for a while! xx

and now for some jolly stuff..

Righty oh, we've had far too much doom and gloom on this little blog of mine lately so I think it's time for a little bit of jolliness.

George is mending slowly but surely (although I think the psychological damage might take a bit longer) We still have lots of appointments to go to and forms to fill out ..yawn. The stress of it all hits you later when you think about all those 'what if's?'.
Thankyou so much for all those messages too, I've been a little bit like a loon this last week not knowing 'my arse from my elbow' as my lovely husband puts so eloquantly, so sorry if I didn't manage to get back to you. All this car crash malarky was great timing for that new job of mine too, third week in and I don't turn up, just a hastily written note pushed through the door at 5am.. hmm great impression I must have made. Oh well it couldn't be helped.Those stinky boys always come first.
Talking of jobs, we got some advice about Pete being laid off, turns out they couldn't just lay him off like they did, so it's definately worth going to the Citizens Advice Bureau if you're in a similar situation to us. So, that's the first bit of good news..band around some legal jargon at work and your job magically gets reinstated. Hooray.
(and you know what that means..my spending of some spondoolies got reinstated..double hooray!...)

Ok enough waffle onto some nice stuff...

SPRING...I just LOVE the Spring. cheery little birds in the garden,my favourites being the chubby little coal tits and their 'tea-cher, tea-cher' tune, pretty little flowers appearing almost daily and filling out my borders and gorgeous pots of colour coming home with me from the garden centre to fill my window boxes and buckets.
CAKE....
When I'm stressed out ( which, as you may have realised by now, is quite often) I either paint or bake.The week before last I thoroughly cleaned and painted the kitchen..(boy don't small kitchens get filthy quickly?!) that was in between running up and down the stairs for his lordship and his leg..and I made cake. LOTS of cake.
Now, I can't cook to save my life but I can make a nice, if a bit basic, cake.. Lemon drizzle cake, chocolate cake, carrot cake..yum, I dont think I'll ever be really thin. Ever. Not when cake's involved.I'd never made a carrot cake before and one of my elderly gardening ladies gave me this recipe,(she's nearlly 80 so it's all in imperial measurements) it was so easy peasy I thought I would share it with you,I hope you can read my scrawl..click and enlarge the photo or send me an email if not and I'll send you the recipe) if I can make it, believe me, anyone can.(by the way I made up the topping part myself..you can't have carrot cake without the cream cheese topping!)


VINTAGE PRETTY EMBROIDERED STUFF..
Did you see these two gorgeous vintage embroidered tablecloths on eBay recently?..they went for over £200 each! £200!! The needlework on them was beautiful though, I hope the seller wont mind me borrowing her photos to show you..
I had a bit of a brainwave (yes,a rare one) about those two embroidered cushion covers that were for sale in my blogshop a while back, they were sold and then they weren't, in the end I decided to keep them, I was almost selling them for what I had paid for them really and I did like them, so it seemed a bit desperate to let them go. Anyway they were a funny size, a bit big, so I cut them down into circular ones made an envelope back and added some buttons, they are so much more useable now..although they don't really match the bedding this time round!
I have a few vintage embroideries abount, I really think they are so pretty. I've some pictures, mainly of gardens,a gorgeous tea cosy with vintage green blanket stitched edges,and lots of doileys and tablecloths that my mum made for her trousseau, or 'bottom drawer' as it was called in the 1950's for when she got married and became a housewife..those were the days!

GARDENING...
The season has started up again good and proper and I love to do the first mow of the year on this lawn, it belongs to a sweet old fashioned garden that I've been keeping tidy for nine years now. Although it looks quite plain now it's stunning in the Summer, full of colour and flowers. There's something very English about stripey lawns, they remind me of cricket, cream teas and the long days of summer (hopefully) lying ahead.

PETS..
I couldn't be without my hoards of creatures, even when they do things where they shouldn't, cost me a fortune, make muddy kitty paw prints on freshly cleaned sheets or floors and even pick my sofa..which has the arms covered in sellotape to prevent it ..(how attractive) They just entertain me constantly. Forgeting to pop their tongues back in after having a wash or pulling a funny face. Spring makes them slightly more crazy. And a sunny windy day even more so (I wonder why?)
I love that they give their love unconditionally..just look at these two, the bestest of buddies when in theory really they shouldn't be, inseperable..kitty/dog love..Red and Ethel, or Red and his convenient cushion who happens to be a rather fat cat called Ethel.

POLKA DOTS..
I know, I'm forever harping on about spotty stuff and how much I love spotty things,they even make spotty dishcloths now, so when this went in the sale recently at our brilliant cookshop in town , I just had to have it..even if I've never made a casserole and really can't cook. Er-hum, moving on swiftly..

BLOG LOVE..
I'm not very good at updating my blog on a regular basis,nor checking my favourites and leaving a comment or returning the lovely messages as I think you must have gathered by now, but one thing I did manage to say thankyou for was this lovely brooch that Viv made me ages ago when I was really down in the dumps.How lovely is that? I'd meant to post about it for Valentines day but no doubt some disaster or another must have got me sidetracked! What nice people there are out there.Viv's blog is called Hensteeth and her detailed mixed media work is utterly gorgeous..do check it out if you have time to.

So there you go. A few things that have cheered me up lately.I meant to be painting the hen house whilst this lovely weather is around, but no I'm off to eat cake and drink yet more tea...I'm sure the ladies wont mind they've all gone broody and are far too busy bickering over eggs, hiding eggs or laying eggs.

Have a lovely week
x