Moan,moan,moan

Sorry - I'll warn you that all I'm going to do in this post is moan so go away now if you don't like moaning minny's :)

When you plan to get some work done in an evening why oh why does something happen to stop it? This evening it was Tara screaming blue murder for an hour after I had put her to bed. I'd been up 5 times by the end (we believe in controlled crying in this house) but it wasn't working tonight. In the end I snuggled her until she fell asleep and patted her back when she woke up when I put her down. I then did the mummy shuffle out of her bedroom wincing with every step of our creaky Victorian floorboards! Luckily her crying didn't wake her sister up.

Does anyone else suffer from too much stuff syndrome? I took a (very full) black bag of toys to the charity shop yesterday and none of the stuff has been missed yet. We must have taken about 10 black bags to the charity shop over the past month and we still have stuff coming out of our ears! I've given 2 big bags of stuff to Ruth, a huge bag of wool to Alex and have a great big pile of stuff to sell. Speaking of which the craft room is looking fabulous (it should as it took me 4 bloody weeks to get it sorted!) but I don't have pictures yet. Tara walked in the other day after I had hoovered it and promptly told me that she could see floor! Well I should think so!

I think I need a weekend (preferable long) with no children so that I can tidy up without the usual shouts of 'She's doing........' from Anya or frustrated cries from Tara when she can't get something she wants! Anyone want to offer themselves up for the job?? They are good really!

Sorry no pictures as I can't be arsed to look on Flickr to sort one out!

EDITED - to add that the evening got better as I managed to get some more things listed on Etsy! And here's a piccie of one of the things!

Another mention and 2 outfits

I've been mentioned on another blog - when it rains etc etc :) One of my Flickr photo's of some sheep cards has been featured on Soapbox. It's a blog that finds random things on Flickr - with other bits thrown in too!

I think it might be going into my blog reader this evening taking me back up to 300 blogs I read.

And the two outfits in the title - well these are some of the outfits I have been wearing over the pat couple of days. The first one I wore to Lancaster on Saturday when it looked nasty but the weather was actually gorgeous and I was very hot!

From the side view you can see why it was a bit of a problem to sit in the car! I had to wear the sash/scarf as the dress made me look pregnant - even more so than it does with the sash ;)

This outfit I wore to go out for lunch on Mon as it was my brother in law's birthday. The tights are purple although it's a bit tricky to see the colour.

And this outfit was 100% thrifted too - the granny shoes I bought on Sat in Lancaster.

And of course I wasn't allowed to have a photoshoot by myself!

And yes - my hair does seem to come out of the ponytail it is always in :)

Etsy front page!!!!!!!

Well I was going to do a different post but that will have to wait until tomorrow now because I have just found out that a treasury I am in was featured on the front page of Etsy - whoooooooooo hoooooooooooo :) :) :)

There I am at the bottom right with my stegosaurus notecards! It was only up for about an hour (a new Etsy thing - the front page used to be up for about 12 hours) but I got 143 views on that 1 item - very pleased :)

Oh and checking through the treasuries I am also in another one too - I could get used to this!

I don't think this one has been on the front page but someone did comment that my bandit chicken was a unique doorstop - too right it is :) All this treasury love is from becoming one of the newer members of the Eco Etsy Street Team - here is the blog and if you use the search term teamecoetsy when searching in tags on Etsy you will find that there are quite a lot of us!

I'm going to celebrate with some wine now :)

New things on Etsy..

...and a sneaky peek of things to come! I spent most of yesterday making and taking photographs of tags (in among attending to my family you understand!). I have a new set of tags up on Etsy at the moment.

Little alien ink blot tags - I love making these as they are all individual and each is a little personality of it's own! The ink blot alien disco ACEO's are going up to Etsy soon too.

Some other new things I have added to Etsy are these recycled cuffs - made from the cuffs of jumpers and vintage buttons!


Again I enjoyed making these and it uses up lots of the vintage buttons I have in my crafty room.

And the sneaky peek of things coming up on Etsy soon - some Lego tags that I made using Matt's old Lego box. He came through after he had sorted the Lego out into a big plastic box and asked if I wanted it - I nearly bit his hand off!!


Cool eh? Hopefully up on Etsy soon - the photo's are ready to go thanks to a new uploader that Matt found for me but just have to find the time!

Press!

I love it when I write about people on Cuteable and they write to thank me and they talk about it making their day etc - well I got that exact same feeling this week, not once but twice!

First up was the lovely Jenny from Indie Quarter who wrote a very nice article about me and my love of recycling/repurposing.

And second was the lovely Colorada from DD Skies blog who wrote about my second love after recycling - chickens!!

I have lots of things to blog about but not enough time at the moment so I will be back soon!

Post coming soon!

I promise but I'm having issues with Flickr and the uploading of photographs! It's taken me 2 hours to upload 45 pictures!! So I will be posting as soon as these damn things upload!

Diary of a strop and poorly wrists

Well all that gardening the other day really did for my wrists - ouch. My family has dodgy wrists and ankles at the best of times so chopping a hedge down for an hour and a half probably wasn't the best thing I could do on Tuesday! They are getting better but still aren't right so I'm trying not to type too much as that hurts it. Lifting the girls isn't easy either! I must leave the heavy gardening work to Matt - sounds good to me!

Anyway, I put the girls in the bath before tea on Tuesday and once I'd got them out I went downstairs to get a vest for Tara. I came back up to a naked Tara in wellies - it was quite amusing as you might gather! I'm not going to put the photo on here but if you are in my friends and family group on Flickr then you can see it there. Anyway, the point to that story is that I had the camera with me and witnessed a Tara strop when I found her trying to draw on the walls (she didn't because I got there just in time!) So here is the diary of a strop!

She's helping Anya so she won't see what I'm doing!

Ah, she caught me. Quick, throw the pen on the floor and look innocent!

But Mummy, I'm cute - don't shout at me!

I was only being creative!

But Mummmmmmmy!

She just doesn't understand - I'm creative!

I need a cuddle now!

Bless her, she was very tired and we hadn't even had tea! It's what being out in the fresh air does for you. I do have crafty things to show but I can't until the weekend as I can't take pictures of my own wrists! And I have a new toy!! I'm going to show one of the things to my friend Ruth tomorrow and get her opinion and if she likes (which she'd better!) then I will show you all. Anya's school is closed today as it's used as a polling station for the local elections, so we are going to try to get the craft room finished - hahahaha!

Decadence is.......

..........having children in bed by 6.30 and being in your own pajama's too with a cup of fruity tea by your side (a new indulgence!) reading blogs! Perfect :) I hasten to add that blog reading is work for me of course (searching out new things for Cuteable) just so you all don't think I'm slacking! And speaking of slacking I haven't done any crafting at all today. We have been out in the garden all afternoon because the weather has just been perfect. The girls played in the sandpit.

I have turned this very top heavy hedge

into this (don't look at the shrubs on the right!)

And removed these little blighters from the guttering at the back of the house.

I also got 1 and a bit loads of washing dry - fabulous! I love it when it's nice outside although I have caught the sun today and my forehead is a bit sore.

Oh and in other news I received a lovely card yesterday from Crafty Jan on the forum to say thank you for the swirls I sent to her. I love how she has used the swirls here.

Don't you just love Freecycle?

I do because you can get rid of the things you don't need that are too big to go to the charity shops and you can look out for things that people are getting rid of that will be perfect for you! I went to pick up some things this morning that a lady advertised - knitting needles and wool (which are for a friend) and some crochet hooks and buttons for me! Here's the box of buttons.

And these teal ones (they are teal I promise - the light here is terrible today!) are perfect for my current sewing project.

And I bet you can't guess what these are going to become??

And before I forget here is the website for Freecycle - see if there is one in your area and you can stop needless things going to the tip/landfill.

Blurgh!

I think I have been doing too much today as I am sat here exhausted - the craft room and my kitchen are looking much better though and there is less craft stuff all over the house! So I'm having a relaxing evening of blog reading and writing. I've been promising the button brooches for a while and here they are - and I have plans to make many more. They are fairly quick to make and can be picked up and put down at a moments notice - which is helpful when crafting with young children running around!


One is called Coffee and Cream and the other is Chocolate Buttons! I also made one with black buttons but I've kept that one for myself :) They will be listed in my Etsy shop soon.

And I haven't forgotten the ATC competition. I got Matt to shout out a number between 1 and 11 and he shouted out number 7 so it goes to Karen of Crystal Velvet. Well done!! I will contact you shortly :) And sorry Fearful Penguin - you were too late!