Saturday 22 March 2014

What is life, if full of care, we have no time to stand and stare?

The first quarter of the year has had a new, slower pace, with a more domestic feel to it. I really like it, just being at home, doing the small things.

I made another dress. A 70s sheet, and a modified 70s pattern (McCalls 4535), yet somehow I've ended up with a 50s style dress. I felt a dirndl style skirt would suit the fabric better. Plus it hides my tummy. I have no core muscles, and am allergic to any exercises which would give me some, so after a nice meal I have a tummy like a teddy bear.
These two patterns represent 66% of my success at the charity shops this year.  I've been doing the stats for the annual report at work. Everything is percentages at the moment.

The bedroom is coming together, but still no doors for the wardrobe. I don't mind because I actually love to see all my colourful clothes on display.  


You see that neon pink mirror? I pimped that op! Op to the max. I got it at a flea market when I very first came to Nottingham in 1989. It was gilt with plasterwork, albeit somewhat damaged. 25 years in the same outfit? It was well overdue a facelift.

I spray painted it pink, added some pompom braid from Walsall market and then, for good measure a couple of plastic roses.

Good taste and subtlety? Sorry, I don't understand. Please afford me an interpreter, my good man.


I seem to have been inundated with book loans recently. I need to take to my bed with some salty snacks and a glass of wine and get reading. I have almost the entire back catalogue of Montalbano to get through!
That bedside table is a little dolly washer I bought at the same flea market and the covering is a beautifully hand stiched embroidery which I got for £1 at Newark Antique's Fair donkey's years ago.


We've been going to the park lots, watching the earth come awake. We've seen the waves of snowdrops, crocus, daffodils, and, slowly unfurling now, hyacinths.

For us, there's going to be dahlias this year. Big, blowsy, look-at-me ones.

























Tonight it's homemade carrot and coriander soup with cheddar cheese and jalapeno bread. And plenty of wine. Tomorrow I have to be up at the crack of dawn (OK, 8am) to go and run a mile for Sports Relief. Wish me luck!
In case you were wondering, this little Romanian jug constitutes the remaining 33% of my success at chazzas in the first quarter of 2014. Bet you'd love to read the reports I do for work, wouldn't you?