Tidy study!!

I'm still amazed that we got so much done yesterday - all the expenses are now up to date, lots of washing was done and the whole of the study was tidied and cleaned. I didn't get a before shot of the study as we were keen to get stuck in and get it sorted! Here it is afterwards though :)

This is as you are looking in from the doorway - if you want to see more details of any of these pictures (with notes - you know you can't resist!!) then head over to my Flickr.

This is over towards the window which looks out right over the park.

This is the computer area :) With even more bookcases.

Looking towards the area with the games consoles set up and the pile of stuff that needs to stay in the study but we have no where else to put it pile!

And back round to the doorway!

And the reason it got tidied so quickly is that we moved a lot of the stuff that is crafty stuff through to my craft room next door which now looks like this.

Under that big pile of crap (although you won't believe me) is a sofa bed!! Which is eventually going to my sister so that I can have a worktable for my sewing machine to live on as it currently lives in the dining room :) My aim is to move the stuff back into the study (yes really) so that I can sort through it all and put it away in the right places. The sofa bed will be coming out and I'm hoping to get to Ikea at some stage to get a worktabley thing! Exciting things are happening Chez Swirly!

I'm not fat!!

I wasn't going to post today (too much tidying!) but I had to when I saw this fabulous picture over on Mrs Kwitty's blog.

LOL - I can relate to this :)

Cakes and a treasury!

We made some cakes today to celebrate Anya getting another star cushion from school! This time for sitting beautifully on the carpet :) Tara helped and you can see her little hands itching to get stuck in!

As these were baking I was perusing Twitter and spotted that the Etsy Treasuries were opening in a few minutes. So I grabbed one - featuring cakes and sweet treats no less! Please click and give it some love :)

Right off to put the lasagne in the oven - one I made earlier. I'm feeling all domestic goddessy today :)

Charity shop finds

Not many from my trip into town yesterday as I didn't visit all the shops (only 4) but here are some pics of what I found.

Yep - I think this jumper is genuine muppet fur!! Just kidding - it's really knitted with that very fluffy wool. I will wear this at least once and then I will gauge the reaction to it. I couldn't leave it in the shop though as it was too fluffy and had to come home with me. You can see in the picture below that it is blue and pink.

I got these trousers too for Tara although to be honest I think they will fit Anya as they are rather large.

They have these strange buckles round the bottom of the legs that will come off (but I will keep them to re-use on something!)

And this is partly why I bought them although I'd spotted them from the other side of the room and was attracted to their colour before I saw the brand.

I also bought a French dress for Anya that proved to difficult to photograph and a new toy for Tara - it's a baby Tad that plays classical music to her as she falls asleep. She had one but it was ruined by the amount of dust that the plumbers generated - and the 'new' one was only £1 so we couldn't really refuse!!

I also got this book - I spotted the illustrations first but then the title sucked me in too. Who could resist 50 million sausages???



Right - I'm off to tidy the kitchen and utility room this morning and try and sort out all the crap that has accumulated in both rooms. Wish me luck!!

What I'm wearing Wednesday

I'm cheating too like Cam at Curly Pops although I am a day late and she posted the outfit she wore on Tuesday. Good job it's not taken too seriously!

Please excuse the pose - this was right after I had pretended to be an Egyptian and a little teapot! Don't ask :) Now to the outfit. The dress I nick name my Bet Lynch dress as it is leopard print and can flash a bit of cleavage if I want it to. It came from a charity shop (although originally Next) as did the rest of the outfit. The green cardigan is originally New Look but came from a charity shop in Doncaster and the shoes (which are brown) are originally from Clarkes but I found them in a charity shop still with the labels on for £6 - bargain! I have no idea where the bracelet came from and the belt was another charity shop find. The brooch (which you can see details of on Flickr) is again from a charity shop (see a pattern here?!) but I bought it when I was in my early teens and honestly don't know where. Below is my outside outfit.

This coat was a bargain. It came from the annual jumble sale I go to back where my parents live and on the Saturday they do a fill a black bag for £2. This was one of the things I grabbed and it works out that I paid about 20p for it :) It's a fabulous Windmoor granny style coat and has fabulous leather detailing round the collar, pockets and sleeves. The scarf also came from a charity shop :) So I'm 100% Thrifted today too which is great as I haven't participated for a while.

I am going to from next week be joining in the My Creative Space that Kirsty is starting on her blog - I can't this week as I physically can't get into my craft room because of all the junk piling up in it. I'm hoping to get cracking with tidying and sorting it this weekend but we will see how sorting the rest of the house goes.......

This is......

.....mainly what our holiday consisted of - lots of walking and enjoying each others company. Oh and lots of tea and standing by the woodburning stove in the below freezing temperatures!

Crafts 2008

Here's a quick roundup of some of my crafty endeavours from 2008. Hopefully 2009 will hold much more crafting time!

And I was very pleased to see that 16 out of the 25 used recycled/repurposed materials! Expect to see more in 2009 :)

Hallelujah!

For those of you who aren't yet sick of all the versions of Hallelujah here are a couple more from the very very funny Amateur Transplants (who have a sideline in being very clever doctors).





If you want more from them (and trust me you do want to have a look) then search for Amateur Transplants on You Tube - be warned though as most have swearing. Look for their version of James Blunt's Beautiful - much better than the rubbish original version :)

It's all about me!!

Yep another meme!

Things you've already done: bold
Things you want to do: italicize
Things you haven't done and don't want to - leave in plain font

1. started your own blog

2. slept under the stars

3. played in a band

4. visited hawaii

5. watched a meteor shower

6. given more than you can afford to charity

7. been to disneyland/world - just got back in fact from Paris!

8. climbed a mountain - Ben Nevis with my father in law

9. held a praying mantis

10. sang a solo

11. bungee jumped – would love to do this!!

12. visited paris- went for our honeymoon and we are planning to go back for our 10th anniversary this year!

13. watched a lightning storm at sea – I hate the water so this wouldn't be good for me!

14. taught yourself an art from scratch

15. adopted a child

16. had food poisoning – can’t imagine anyone italicizing this!

17. walked to the top of the statue of liberty

18. grown your own vegetables- tomato plants don’t really like Burnley though as it’s too wet!

19. seen the mona lisa in france

20. slept on an overnight train

21. had a pillow fight

22. hitch hiked

23. taken a sick day when you’re not ill

24. built a snow fort

25. held a lamb

26. gone skinny dipping

27. run a marathon

28. ridden a gondola in venice

29. seen a total eclipse – on said honeymoon in Paris 10 years ago

30. watched a sunrise or sunset – in Hawaii, it was beautiful

31. hit a home run

32. been on a cruise – not for me

33. seen niagara falls in person

34. visited the birthplace of your ancestors

35. seen an amish community

36. taught yourself a new language

37. had enough money to be truly satisfied

38. seen the leaning tower of pisa in person – purely so I can do the ‘Look I’m holding it up’ photo op!

39. gone rock climbing – loved it!

40. seen michelangelo's david in person

41. sung karaoke – can’t think of anything worse as my singing voice is awful

42. seen old faithful geyser erupt

43. bought a stranger a meal in a restaurant

44. visited africa

45. walked on a beach by moonlight – twice. Once in Goa and once in Hawaii.

46. been transported in an ambulance

47. had your portrait painted

48. gone deep sea fishing

49. seen the sistene chapel in person

50. been to the top of the eiffel tower in paris – need to persuade Matt to do this as he doesn’t like heights!

51. gone scuba diving or snorkelling

52. kissed in the rain

53. played in the mud

54. gone to a drive-in theatre

55. been in a movie

56. visited the great wall of china

57. started a business

58. taken a martial arts class

59. visited russia

60. served at a soup kitchen – I would like to do this at Christmas once the girls have left home

61. sold girl scout cookies.

62. gone whale watching

63. gotten flowers for no reason

64. donated blood – I’m a big believer in this

65. gone sky diving

66. visited a nazi concentration camp

67. bounced a cheque – never but I did put a pin mark through the numbers on the bottom to delay a cheque once. It won’t go through the automatic reader apparently and has to go through by hand!

68. flown in a helicopter

69. saved a favorite childhood toy – I still have Pink Ted

70. visited the lincoln memorial

71. eaten caviar – nope but I eaten snails

72. pieced a quilt – working on it!

73. stood in times square - and said Yatta as a hommage to Hiro from Heroes!

74. toured the everglades

75. been fired from a job

76. seen the changing of the guard in london

77. broken a bone

78. been on a speeding motorcycle

79. seen the grand canyon in person

80. published a book

81. visited the vatican

82. bought a brand new car – my first car, a little Saxo

83. walked in jerusalem

84. had your picture in the newspaper

85. read the entire bible – does the childrens bible count? LOL

86. visited the white house

87. killed and prepared an animal for eating

88. had chickenpox

89. saved someone’s life

90. sat on a jury

91. met someone famous

92. joined a book club

93. lost a loved one - my Nana

94. had a baby- x2

95. seen the alamo in person.

96. swum in the great salt lake.

97. been involved in a law suit

98. owned a cell phone

99. been stung by a bee – it hurt a lot!

I pinched this from Nikkishell and if you decide to play along then please do and let me know so i can see what you have done/want to do!

New Years Resolutions

For the past 10 years or so I have always made New Years Resolutions and they have fallen by the wayside a couple of weeks into the New Year so I'm finally going to set some New Years Resolutions I can stick to (and not daft ones like lose 14 stone or run a Marathon!)

1. The first one is going to be very easy for me to stick too - do more shopping in the charity shops! Yep, less new stuff for me, and lots of second hand goodies. I really think this is something I can stick to!! Down with the new stuff and roll on second hand!

2. The second should be fairly easy to stick to as well. Spend more time on me! By this I mean things like painting my toenails and finding time to do my hair properly etc. I grew up when Grunge music was popular and I adopted that way of dressing (although mixed up with my own very individual style!) and I never learnt to apply make up properly (and still never wear it) or to do feminine things like that. I also have a dislike of going to the hairdressers - they make me feel very inadequate so this should be an interesting resolution to stick too!

3. Finally sort out my tip of a house! I'm saying this now and please do understand that I have a whole year to do this! We need to de-clutter A LOT and we have already started so hopefully by the end of the year (or maybe sooner) I will have a house I can show off :)

So there are my 3 fairly easy to stick to resolutions (especially the first 1!). I think I might go and shave my legs now and paint my toenails........