Nostalgia.

I have a few more days off and have chosen to spend them crafting. Yes, I should be cleaning or sorting or decorating, but to be honest after the few months I have had, crafting is what I wanted to do.
From a nostalgia point of view, I have long admired and known that my Granny and Aunts and Mum and those that came before them are very clever, thrifty and talented at making things, making them go round, making things out of nothing and also making things beautiful. I just sighed and looked on. Each year I have wanted to do more than sigh, but I just never 'got' it. I could only look at a piece of sewing and think wow how did you do it. I could only eat some gorgeous chutney and think wow, how did you grow it and how did you preserve it? All a big mystery. The last few years though of being a scrapbooker have helped so much. I have learned about craft, learned about colour and design and also about how things do not have to be perfect to be loved.

So, this week, despite my plans to just paper craft I had an overwhelming urge to stitch and quilt something and set about it.


If you are a crafter then you will hopefully be cheering me on and just ever-so-slightly shaking your head at how inept I am to be so thrilled with what I made.
Learning how to bias bind has been a real challenge, but I was determined as I love how it looks and to be able to make your own to match seemed like the very thing that would keep me interested in my projects and how they would look.
My mind has gone into overdrive as to what I might make!

I also wanted to talk about the phone, Kathi started it off and I immediately thought of our phones when she said and I have also been so interested in everyone's stories which are the same but different.

The first phone I remember being installed was on a party line and I remember picking up the receiver and hearing our next door neighbours the Slades on the line (and putting the handle down carefully so as not to disturb them).

My first mobile was in 1993 or 1994, I can't remember. However I know there was only two of us in our group that had them and that we felt very flash phoning each other across Portsmouth Dock. We both worked on the Cross-Channel Ferries and I would ring him when he was sailing out and vice versa. As soon as everyone had seen them and had been paid they got them too and that was my first social network. Best of all I can remember my dear departed Dad's chuckle when I used to ring him and tell him I was staying in Portsmouth to go out and would be home whenever. He always said are you ringing from the new phone?
I got him a mobile phone quite quickly as he was intrigued but even 10 years later as he was dying he didn't really know how to operate it. He knew enough to press the green answer button and there were several times that I was very glad he learned that and I was able to speak to him. Bless him.

It amuses me that my niece Lauren, that lives with me, has an iphone now (an early 16th birthday pressie from me and Mum) and that Louis (my eldest son) will inherit my iphone 4s when I get my new contract in a couple of months and Ali (my nine year old inherited an iPad) will all be able to iMessage each other for free and for easy. I am sure that I shouldn't embrace this development for all sorts of reasons, but, you know what, I adore it. Being out of the house for 11 hours a day it means that I can communicate with them on their terms. They hate to talk on the phone but will answer a message no probs. I also get photos and a 'flavour' of their life online that I don't get otherwise. (When I get home it is all sad faces about me making them do homework and clean up etc...borrriiiinnnngggg. for them and me.).







Night all xxx

Nostalgia.

I love Kathi's idea this week. 

I remember hoping that my hot choc treat would be made with all milk and not the dreaded half and half milk and water.

I also remember that I enjoyed it on a Tuesday evening after 5-a-side watching Cagney & Lacey at 9pm :-)

Tonight we had it and the hot choc was made with milk and topped with marshmallows, squirty cream and crumbled chocolate! It's a twice a season treat I hasten to add. 

Instead of watching tv? They photographed it and posted it to Instagram :-)

Silver Linings: Irresistible. Roasted Vegetable Lasagne & Raspberry Bakewell Slices

I have had another lovely day today, baking and cooking. I have also helped Mum start mending my patchwork quilt which has taken a battering over the past few years. I am not very good with a needle but she is, bless her for doing it for me.

I am settling down for a nice evening scrapbooking I think.

Silver Linings - Wednesday Warming Stew

Silver Linings: Irresistible

Well 'W' Wednesday is "W'arming beef stew day. It was yummy and I do love stew season :-)

I also was impressed withn aux oeufs and co-incidentally I was going to make a baked egg custard for my eldest son and so I used her recipe instead, so thanks Anne it was great.

It has been a fantastic first day of my holidays, I have had a shocking cold the past few days as well and today was the first day I have felt better and I can already feel the pressure of the past few months lifting. 

Thanks again for bearing with me. I knew I would be busy, I knew it would be stressful but I didn't realise how time-consuming it would be as when I have opened the superstores before there are more people to bear the load. Anyway, it is done now. I didn't leave until I was sure it was under control. Praise be, it will be so when I return, you are only as good as your day off and all that. 

It was a lovely feeling to look after my family today and catch up with blogland and cook and clean and watch tv and read. Just lovely normal things :-)

I have planned my meals for tomorrow so hopefully I will be back then.

October Neighbourhood View

Getting time to walk Minty again in the mornings and evenings has felt like a really nice piece of getting normal back. Mum is pleased that she gets a bit of help as well. She has been a real star, putting up with me and keeping the kids, dogs and house going.

It is lovely to have Autumn here, I adore the change of seasons, the thought that it is not for long means it is ok, although of course we did have the longest, coldest spring in forever this year so I may eat my words.

It has been nice to take some photos.

Nicknames.

Great challenge Anne =)

I am sorry to be so out of touch, it really has been an awfully busy few weeks to open the new shop. It is done now and I am having a sunday off! Most weeks myself and my deputy have worked 90 hour weeks, it has been nice to dial it back a bit this week to 10-12 hour days lol. Next week I am going to try desperately to do proper shifts. We will see. Anyway, apologies for being away, but any time I was home I just sat and cuddled my boys, dogs and slept!

Oh and this was the week that we had our new kitchen fitted, well started anyway, they are hopefully going to finish by next friday =) It is coming together nicely and I cannot wait for next sunday to be able to actually cook in it =) I am looking forward to catching up with all your blog posts today and tomorrow and seeing if Kathi's kitchen is done.

Nicknames, hmmm, well when I was little I was Jennie-Wren, Jenniefreckles and so on. My first so- lovely boyfriend was an amazing guy (should never have left him!) and it was around the time of The Fast Show which we adored and I think I am right in saying that they had an ongoing sketch where they would point to each other and say, "you look like..." and then would insert something random and funny. Well one morning when we woke up and my long hair was tangled he said you look like a scribble monster, I said what, and he said, you know like when you are a kid and draw a big scribble overlapping itself and then you colour it in and turn it into a monster. Well I knew what he was talking about with colouring in scribbles but I never turned them into monsters. Boys! 

Anyway, it was funny and it stuck. Hence why I am ScribbleMonster on UKS. I am also renowned for always writing something and always have a clipboard with very good paper on it and a pen so I can compile lists, notes etc.

I Keep Meaning To...

...Resurrect the blog from last year for my Lucky Snapping and here it is dragged out from the shadows, and given a good dusting.

I have missed Lucky Snapping blogging because of the company of course. So trying to join in quickly this week.

So a few snaps so far from this weekend and Monday. I purposely took some on my iPhone which I rarely do these days. 

 How very, very lovely.

 We chanced planting some runner beans late on and they are doing very well so far.

 This lily is new to me this year, I wasn't hopeful but it has been lovely.

 If you follow my other blog then you will have seen my Summer Bucket List which is all the things we want to do this summer. One of the things was geocaching. I will explain more about it on the other blog when I get round to it but here is the scrapping I did this weekend. The first 12x12 is showing Mum and Ali under the rare wych elms that the cache was hidden in.

 This was a close up of the cache in situ and a bit more journaling

 Then the left hand side of the divided page. More journaling and photos of Ali.

The other side of the divided protector. Mum had a great idea to dry the leaves and flower from the tree and so included it here. That gives you an idea of how long ago we actually went! 

Thanks Kathi for inspiring me to get blogging =)