Wandering and wondering

Happy New Year.....yes a bit belated I know, but I got there in the end.
We've had a lovely lazy time in our house before the kids had to go back to school. No sewing though, I must dust off the old sewing machine and get making!

Despite horrible colds, we went for a lovely wander on New Years Day to the lovely little town of Sandwich very near to us.  It was very cold, but just what the Doctor ordered a walk to blow the cobwebs away and contemplate a new year of opportunites.

We thought this flint wall in Sandwich was quite amazing....how old it must be!

The New Year also brought some relatives back in the country after a few years living in Europe. It is so nice to have them on the hometurf again including a new addition - they brought back a gorgeous Cocker Spaniel too who we all fell in love with! We enjoyed a lovely sunshiny walk with them and their lovely dog.

January 7th was also my beautiful little girls 6th birthday. What a little lady she is too! She is 6 going on 16! We took her, her best friend and brother to the cinema to see Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chip Wrecked, no Toy Story but the kids loved it!
Her day ended with her 'boyfriend' from school George coming round and serenading her some lines from a Bruno Mars song (I think I want to marry you!!) on the doorstep! She was equally shocked, delighted and embarrased bless her!!!

Such high standards at the age of  6 though! What is she going to be expecting boys to do by the time she is 16!! Lets hope she sticks with George and he keeps up the romantic gestures!

See you next year...

December seems to have passed in a flash.

As I haven't posted in ages, I won't bore you with what we have been up to but I will just leave you with some pictures of our December and Christmas, which was very enjoyable and full of presents, food, drink, games and family.

Who knows what 2012 has in store for us all but I will settle for all my friends and family to have a happy and healthy 2012.

Wishing you a very Happy New Year.

(I had to include this picture of the school Father Christms - he did try very hard but sadly his costume wasn't up to much and he didn't fool the kids! See how much better my 8 year old looks!!)

Inspiration

It's been a busy couple of weeks for us with 91st birthdays...

and a brilliant Hen party for the lovely Vicki...

But whilst I haven't been eating cake and drinking far too much I've been getting all inspired by these gorgeous books that were rescued by the Taking the Plunge ladies from a local boot fair and are on display in the shop.

Such beautiful and amazing collage illustrations.

I think this girl with her umbrella is my favourite!

What's been inspiring you lately?

Scar update and neighbourly gifts

I was rubbing Bio-oil into F's scar the other day (which we have been doing religiously everyday after bath time) and I realised how amazingly brilliant his scar looks now - especially compared to how horrific it all looked back in June when he had the horrible accident.

I thought it was time for a little scar update!

The Bio-Oil has definitely made the scar tissue smoother and less raised and considering it only happened 3 months ago, we think it is healing really well. I still feel a bit sick looking back at the pictures with the stitches (Little Stitches post). Fingers crossed we don't have to go through that again!

From scars to fruit!  We are hugely lucky that my In-Laws have an apple and pear tree in their garden  - look at the huge bags of apples and pears they brought round the other day - the second lot we have had! They are so delicous and have kept us in fruit for the last few weeks. Any good recipies anyone can suggest?

It has been a week of gifts from gardens as our neighbours gifted me this huge sack full of lavender! Last year I caught them just as they were cutting back their huge lavender sack and although they thought I was a bit bonkers when I asked if I could have it all, they happily obliged and this year I didn't need to ask - they left this bag on the doorstep!

Thank you kind neighbours and sorry husband as I am going to stink the shed out now as that is where it is going to be hung up and dried - ready for some new lavender makes!

Summery days

My kids were back to school today.
I have to confess, much as I was looking forward to a little bit of peace...I really missed the noisy little monkeys!! I managed to keep myself busy by giving the house a HUGE clean up - I only managed to do upstairs as well, which of course meant a sneaky clear out and tidy of their bedrooms. I'm sure it will only be a matter of time before they realise something they haven't played with or read for the last year is suddenly missing!

Tomorrow I tackle downstairs and I am hoping some time this week to put some sewing ideas into practice as I hardly seemed to have anytime to sew over the summer holiday. We did have lots of family fun together, which is what it is all about.

The photos in this post were all taken at Ramsgate (best ever fish & chips from Peter's Fish Factory - yum!) and Joss Bay where we went for the day in the last week of the holidays.

We finished the day off back home in Whitstable with another gorgeous sunset.

I'll hopefully dust of the old sewing machine this week and have some new bits and pieces for show and tell!

Whitstable Oyster Festival

I haven't blogged for ages, mainly with all the madness of plays, sports days and fairs that come with the end of the summer term at school. Plus we have had lots of family staying here in Whitstable -  Aunties, Grandparents and cousins who all came along for a little holiday during the Oyster Festival. So it has been an exciting start to the holidays.

The Whitstable Oyster Festival is a week long celebration where we have all sorts of weird and wonderful events, performances, workshops and traditions.

It all kicks off with the landing of the Oysters - which are brought ashore in an old boat and blessed by the local vicar.

The harbour had a fabulous food market - but it was too jam packed to even attempt to take a picture! We did manage to stroke these lovely Newfoundland dogs - although they were a tad smelly!

There was a parade through the town with crazy and very tall aliens (who took a shine to my son!) the local Samba band who are impossible not to dance to!

There has been pavement art...

Beach picnics with cousins....

and seaside walks in the sunshine.

It has been lovely.

I have been making a little a couple of orders for some cushions and bags - but of course, I forgot to photograph them! I still haven't attempted to start the chair from the last post, but thank you for the advice I was given. I think it is going to involve using the cover I have anyway!

I hope the sun is shining wherever you may be!

Nothing Compares 2 U

Ok first I must apologise for a very self-indulgent post, feel free to leave if you have no interest in Prince!. On Sunday, me and my other half had a rare child-free day out as we went to the Hop Farm Festival in Paddock Wood.  In my late teens I was a huge Prince fan and to this day I still think he is a musical genius.  I went to see him perform when I was about 16 and again in 2007 when he did 21 nights in a row at the O2 in London - live he is pretty incredible.

So it was a bit of a shock back in May when Prince was annouced as the headline act on the third day of the Hop Farm Festival - a fairly small festival only in it's 4th year. Prince hadn't played in the UK since 2007 and had never peformed at a Festival here. And now he was going to be playing in a field in the middle of Kent! It was so bizarre that well, we had to get tickets and my lovely husband spent a morning  ringing up and managed to get us a couple.

So with the children left at the Grandparents we headed off. I am so glad we did, we had a really amazing day with the other artists Alo Blacc, Eliza Doolittle, Imelda May, Larry Graham and Tinie Tempah on before Prince and who all helped build a great atmosphere.

We also had amazing weather, with gorgeous sunshine all day - not a muddy welly boot in sight!

We thoroughly enjoyed lazying in the sunshine and L especially liked these mobile beer men, who came and filled up your glass so you didn't even need to queue up at one of the bars!

 Finally, a little bit late,  Prince came on and peformed for a solid 2 and a 1/4 hour set. L has never 'got' him before, finding him too weird but Prince has certainly mellowed in his old (53) age.

It was discovering that he has a sense of humour that sold it to L though. After peforming a beautiful version of 'Nothing compares 2 U' Prince joked that is wasn't his song but Sinead O'Connors, to which the audience all booed and jeered. Prince smirked and said 'Hey I brought me a house with that song'! He is certainly a bit more normal - still not quite your average 53 year old though!

He can sing and dance like a 20 year old and my god the man can play a guitar!

 It was so brilliant to be up close and actually be able to see him peform in the flesh and not just on the screen. I am so glad for whatever reason he did decided to do this little Festival (it is totally independent and not sponsored which I think was part of the attraction sold by Vince Power the organiser) as it was such a different experience to seeing someone so famous somewhere like the O2, where you are so far away.

There was no pre-rehearsal so the critics have all said it was much more like one of his after show parties as he started with a soundcheck (a jam!) and was constantly yelling out instructions for lights and musicians so it all felt a bit less regimented.  It was a beautiful  night and one that I will remember forever.  I am so glad L got to experience seeing him live and loved it as much as me and I got to be there with him. See L, sometimes I really am right!

Ok, indulgent post over - I promise not to do it again!!!!!

Little stitches

Thanks so much for all the comments in the last post. It really meant a lot, so thank you.

Just a quick post after all your nice comments I thought I would update on F's cut.

So after the horrible accident and the horrific trip to hospital, he didn't complain once all week about the tape and stitches on his face and thankfully the cut didn't seem to hurt him at all - must be my pain threshold obviously, and not my husbands!

He had one nice day off of school letting the cut heal a bit and setting a train set up in the garden and settling himself down to watch it go round and round.

Then he was back to school and totally fine. The white butterfly stitches fell off on Sunday revealing the cut and other stitches underneath, which looked pretty scary to me. I was dreading the stitches coming out, which happened yesterday.

But my little boy amazed me again. Thanks to Nurse Viv, who was lovely and a true expert she managed to get them out without a whimper.

There was a bit of a scab half hanging off this morning, but the boy has far more patience than me as I would have been picking at it non-stop, but he has left it totally alone!

The Doctor did a lovely job sewing up (her hand sewing if far better than mine!) and I do think he will only have a small scar. 

Once it has healed a little more I was thinking of getting some Bio-oil for it - unless anyone out there has any other creams/ointments they can reccommend to fade facial scars?

Thanks again - hopefully my next post will be something a bit more cheery!

Ps Totaly unrelated but I couldn't resist putting it in, the picture below shows D dressed up for her space day at school - she decided she had to go as an Alien!