Birthday and I Won a Giveaway

Thank you so much for all the wonderful birthday wishes, it was so lovely to read them all, you really are my blogland friends. Thank you as well for the comments on my grand baby scan picture, it's good to be able to share my excitement.

I had a lovely birthday, spent it the best way possible, with my amazing husband and children. We watched a film in the afternoon, it was on TV over Christmas and I'd asked for the dvd for my birthday. It's very rare that we buy a dvd, but we both enjoyed it so much - Ethel and Ernest.

Here's the bit of blurb from Amazon

"Roger Mainwood writes and directs this hand-drawn animation featuring the voice talents of Jim Broadbent, Brenda Blethyn, Pam Ferris and Virginia McKenna. Based on the autobiographical novel by Raymond Briggs, the story follows four decades in the lives of an ordinary couple living in London. Beginning at their first meeting in 1928, events that fill Ethel (voice of Blethyn) and Ernest (Broadbent)'s days include the Great Depression, World War II, the invention of the television and the birth of their son, Raymond (Harry Collett/Luke Treadaway).

I suppose it's a love story really, but it had me in tears, definitely one to watch with a box of tissues and I can't recommend it highly enough.

When Adam arrived after work, we sat down to a birthday tea partly made by Imogen. Ham and pickle or cheese and cucumber sandwiches sausage rolls, crisps and lots of tea. Followed by a lovely birthday cake.

All in all, a thoroughly enjoyable day. I'll have to show you some of the lovely goodies I received another day.


The day after my birthday, I received this lovely parcel through the post, a giveaway from the very kind and talented Jenny at Winnibriggs House

The card was lovely, the heart decoration on the front was flocked.

Jenny had made herself a lovely warm and cosy headband to keep her ears warm in this cold weather. As well as kindly giving a tutorial in how to make one, she also offered some lovely fleece for us to make it with.

As well as the lovely soft fleece, Jenny included 2 little surprises... 2 beautiful brooches. A stunning vintage brooch...

and a very cute dog, how cute!

Thank you for stopping by

Take care
xxx

2 Little Lost Girls

We are almost in December, everybody seems to be getting busier and the traffic on the roads is definitely getting heavier. I'm trying to be organised, have written a Christmas card list, as good as finished our present shopping and have dispatched hubby to the post office to send my 12 days of Christmas Swap parcel (it's on it's way Jo, should be with you soon).

Last week wasn't a good week, we had some bad news on Tuesday regarding our son, but he turned what could have been an awful situation right around. It turned from a bad week to celebrating at the weekend, life really can change so much in 24 hours!

The Christmas lights were turned on in the city centre on Thursday evening and the shops stayed open for the first evening of late night shopping. The atmosphere was lovely, Christmas was definitely in the air and children were excited to see their first sighting of the year of Father Christmas when he arrived on his sleigh (I do miss have little ones around). We took Imogen to choose a couple of charms for her Pandora bracelet, one from us and one from her grandparents. Andrew also bought me an early Christmas present, a Queen Bee with flowers. I'm very lucky, it's a beautiful Christmas present and I love bees.

Earlier this week I also found these 2 little girls in a charity shop, don't you think they have the prettiest little faces.

 As some of you may know, I have a weakness for dolls. I have some Blythe dolls and some other collectible ball jointed dolls. I picked these 2 up and ummed and arrrred over them for a while. They are apparently Dutch, I don't know anything else about them, just that they are quite old. At first I was just going to get the darker haired one as I liked her face best, and the blonde one is missing a boot, but how could I separate them?

They are so wide eyed and innocent, they looked like 2 little lost girls sitting on the shelf, I had to give them a good home to go to!

I also found a couple of jumpers. It's so hard to find jumpers or cardigans that have a high wool content, so many things nowadays are made with acrylic. I can spend ages going through the charity shops looking at all the tags in the clothes to establish the wool content, I'm sure the people there must wonder what on earth I'm doing!

I'm so pleased with the colours of these 2, dark green and 'sand' for my beach! I also slipped some marzipan in for Andrew, really don't like it myself, but he loves it.

That's about it for me, not much happening here, Imogen is late at school every night madly rehearsing for a play. I thought I'd end with a couple of pictures of our beautiful babies.

This is Sassy

Cheeky Alfie

Bit timid, but heart of a wolf, Gary

My beautiful girl, Honey

I think she knows how gorgeous she is

Take care
xxx

My Dressing Table

Here's a little corner of my house. I thought I'd show you my little corner in our bedroom, I say little corner, but really I think my bits and bobs end up all over the place. I'm afraid I do like 'my stuff' and I can also be a bit of a clutter bug, no minimalist clear surfaces in this house!

The trouble with having lots of bit and pieces is that it means there's more to clean, more to dust and wipe over. So as I put everything back after a good wipe down, I took some photos.

My little musical box, it plays 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow'

Handy for my hair slides and grips.

Simple and pretty, makes me smile when it plays.

I only bought this last year and I love it. It means I can see all my ear rings at once. A gentle spin and it's easy to choose which pair I want. You can see my little Chihuahua ear rings that my husband bought me last Christmas, they look just like our little Gary.

It means I don't keep just wearing the same few over and over, and looks pretty too.

My radio with it's handy docking station for my iPod.

A cute little Dachshund to look after my rings

He looks a bit laden down, I tend to wear chunky jewellery when I wear it.

I use this to store my tubes and bottles in, foundations, BB creams, mascaras.

It's a pretty and functional item, looks much nicer than seeing my half used bottles and potions laying around.

Another ring holder, I've had this one quite a while, it came from a charity shop originally.

Oh dear, more things going back on the dressing table. Everything has it's own use though

It isn't a big space, but I have everything to hand and everything on it gives me cause to smile.

A drawer for more creams and lotions.

This little cutie pie sits (or crawls) on the shelf above the dressing table, don't you just love that little kiss curl!

The cross stitch picture behind is one I did nearly 20 years ago.

This is the top if a narrow chest of drawers next to my dressing table

My storage for nail varnish and other paraphernalia that goes with them. It's a cake stand I found in Laura Ashley and is such a practical way to keep nail polish.

Especially when you have quite a few! I used to keep them in a box, but I think this looks so much nicer.

So there you go,a little glimpse into my bedroom and my dressing table corner. As a self confessed clutter bug, I'm sure you can imagine there's much more in our bedroom. It's had a good tidy this afternoon and I now need to get the hoover out, perhaps I can show you another corner of the house another time. I love to have a nosey round other people's homes, I'm always looking for new ideas, inspiration for storage too and I hope you enjoyed your peep into ours.

Take care
xxx

I had a Birthday!

It was over a week ago now... where do the weeks fly to... what am I saying... where do the years go?

I had a lovely birthday with my family. Adam  came round after work, then Andy and Adam made a lovely Mexican meal to celebrate the day. Unfortunately no photos were taken, but I can still show you some of my lovely presents.

This is so sweet, and plays Over the Rainbow, from my thoughtful husband.

Beautiful flowers as a lovely surprise from my beautiful sister and her family (not the best photo, the colours are gorgeous and vibrant). Just right to go in my new jug :)

I was so excited by this, a Sharp Crochet Hook. Andy bought it from America especially, my wonderful husband! It comes with a handy little book with ideas and patterns and means I can crochet borders onto everything without having the fuss of having to pierce holes first.

 They have a website and facebook page full of ideas too.

Also, here are some of the lovely books...

Hmmm... not sure if Andy's trying to tell me something here...

I do love the Amazon wishlist...

It's so nice having a grown up son too, Adam bought me some lovely jewellery

and thoroughly spoilt me with lots of bits and pieces, including some cds of The Drifters and this one here

Imogen knows the way to her mum's heart and treated me to a big box of milk chocolates... yum! Just right for munching through while watching a good film.

Take Care
xxx