From The Field!

Hi Blogettes, here I am blogging from the field, yes the campsite we are staying on has WiFi and so hey presto! I can blog  - it actually feels sooooo much more relaxed than when trying to find time at home in a busy week!  Hubby and I have escaped for a few days to Herefordshire - which borders Wales for some R and R. 

 and here I am to prove it!!!! Hammer is for a loose tent peg not to keep hubby in check!!!

Those ducks can hear you break a piece of bread from fifty paces!

Today we went to the Wye Valley which is a beautiful part of the UK and took a river boat ride

It was sooo cute and decorated with flowers and inside you could order a drink or a snack as you cruised along

There were lots of canoeists - and I have to confess I was glad we were not among them - I have very vivid memories of canoeing down the Ardeche river in France for hours......and hours.....and hours - but I will tell you that tale another time!!

It has been lovely so far just the two of us "chillin"  and relaxing and we have heard that youngest Kimbles is getting on just fine in the USA so all is well.

Coffee by the river

Strawberry tart as an afternoon treat

I have also started a little "hookiness" we decided that the camper teapot needs a "cosy"

So I have decided to make one up - what this space as to whether it is successful or not!

I am using two colours at once and it is a small project so hopefully wont hurt my hands too much.  I haven't given up on my Granny Stripe blanket - I just have to do it sloooooowly!

I am kind of making it up as I go along, but it is making quite a nice ribbed pattern

I can't tell you how cock-a-hoop I am with doing some crochet again!!! Its good for the soul!  I felt sooooo sad when my hands were really sore - however I am very aware not to overdo it - gawd the ageing process aint nice is it?  Adapt, adapt, thats what I have to do - slowly, slowly.

I hope you are all well - guess what - it hasn't rained on us yet!  lol


Speak soon xx

Wibbly Wobbly Week

Well, here I am back again, a Friday evening blogging and the week has disappeared again!  As the title suggests - it has been a Wibbly Wobbly Week for me.  I mentioned in my last post about youngest Kimbles heading off to the USA on a dream trip - so this week has been "Mum - have you seen my Ipod cable", "Mum have you seen that T Shirt - you know, the one I mean", and finally "Mum, I thought I could print off my air ticket - but we have to dash  to the Travel Agents to collect it"  Then there was the checking and double checking of the itinerary and so on.  This culminated in "The Farewell" and "The Farewell" was at the crack of dawn at Terminal 4 Heathrow on Thursday morning - don't you just hate farewells - I had given myself a good talking to - he is going on holiday, he has saved for a year, its his dream. I know, I know, I know - but you know that awful choking in the throat when trying to say goodbye and not cry........... after the deed was done myself a Little Kimbles who had accompanied me needed a strong coffee!

So all day yesterday I was Wobbly thinking about the very looooong flight, the transfer and another flight after that - then the waiting for the call to say " Im here mum"  Well I waited for quite a long time and to add to it all Mr K was flying home from Aberdeen and he was delayed so

 
I sat by the computer watching programmes on iplayer and waited for the Skype call.  Of course to keep occupied I tried some crochet.  I am really loving the pattern that Kate The Garden Bell is doing at the moment there is a link to the pattern on her blog. 

I like it because it has "texture".  I played about with a view to making it into a sort of flowerish square

Pretty isn't it?

Oh, to finish the travel story - I got the Skype call at 1.45 am this morning but I could hear youngest Kimbles but he couldn't hear me! but at least I know he is ok and my Wibble Wobbles are calming down a little. Mr K didn't arrive back until 2.15 so by the time I had given him the update we didn't get to bed until 2.45am.

After this square I made another experiment using the lovely colours of the Rico cotton which I ordered as a result of Lucy

I changed the outside edge, and I quite like using the one colour in the middle -seems to make the textured "spokes" stand out - don't know if you agree. It was quite frustratingly "splitty" to use and I don't think there is enough for a blanket but I do like the pattern. 

Well I am pooped! after two nights with not enough sleep - I think an early one is in order!  I will try to post from the "field" next week as we will be camping some of the time - I really like the thought of posting from the field - although it didn't work last time I tried - so here is hoping for wifi!

Oh, I'm so tired I nearly forgot - I have guest posted on the SIBOL Archive about one of the squares I made for this worthy project - if by any small chance you haven't heard about the lovely Mrs Twins and the SIBOL project please check it out here.

Speak soon xx

Goooood Moooorning!!!!!!!!

Hello!!! everyone, what a week it was last week.  Things got really stressy here and in the end I completely gave up even thinking about blogging - sometimes you have to know when to give in don't you.  The heating system in our house was completely changed last week - so the guys were here for the whole week - and although they were very nice guys - its the UPHEAVAL !  dust, pipes, more dust, one minute no power,the next no water, but all of these things were to be expected and to be honest there was NO WAY we were going to put up with another winter with barely any heat!!! 

As you can see, where the old boiler was, lots of boxing in of pipes to be done and decorating,

and LOOK (I know you are thinking gawd a piccie of radiator - what is she thinking of)  but this is in MY office/craft room Yayyyyy! so it will be cosy Kimbles this winter.

Of course, on top of all of this, my computer had to be replaced which caused me lots of anguish - could they recover the data etc and I had quite a lot of work to catch up with which had to be put on hold until the end of the week.  Trying to catch up in blogland on an old veeeerrrry slow laptop was just crazy and time consuming - trying to leave very slow comments and then them not being accepted all of the time - so in the end I GAVE UP!

Snatching some sanity back in the garden with a cuppa and possibly some hookiness?

Well on that front - I have to tell you that I have been trying to "rest my hands"   its not really working so Iam trying to do a little crochet.

I have made a grandad square for the SIBOL project

Hope you like - its in that zig zag pattern which I found somewhere and can't remember for the life of me where. So I have played around and I think this is how the pattern goes.  Its a small enough project that I can do and hopefully not too much hand pain.  I am trying not to go "hell for leather" with the crocheting because if I had to give it up completely I would be DEVASTATED!!!! really devastated.

Its so good to chat to you all again, I will try my best to catch up with everyone and leave a comment - may take a while but bear with me. 

The other BIG thing on the go this week is my baby boy - (he's 19 really) is going off to the USA on his own to join a trek across America, so there will be a very early start later on this week as I take him to Heathrow - hubby will be away so myself and Little Kimbles will wave farewell to youngest Kimbles off on a big adventure mustn't forget my hankie!!

Speak soon xx

Another Hiccup!

Hi dear friends - I'm not sure if any of you are dipping in here any more - and I don't really blame you. I am looooooonnnnnnggging to get back to "normal".  I am missing my blogging sooooo very much. To add to my woes - (hands etc) on Thursday of last week we had rather high winds here in the south which triggered power cuts in our village - but these went off and on, off and on and carried on like this for some time.  Unfortunately the computer was "on" when the power went "off" and when it came "on" again, I switched my computer back "on" and then the power promptly went "off" again.  The upshot of this sorry saga is, my rather old tired computer said "I've had enough of this" and is now to put it politely "knackered"  completely and utterly - I took it to the computer hospital and it is still undergoing surgery!!!!!!!  This afternoon after ringing them twice I gave up until tomorrow for an update!! I am distraught, how much can  a girl take? - having to stop the crochet for what seems like eons and now the computer is swept from under my feet.  I have just managed to get this old laptop to work and even that has been difficult because the heating installers have arrived for the whole of this week to install a completely new heating system for us and first stop has been my little office/workroom and I haven't been able to retrieve this old laptop until this evening.

Anyway, I just wanted to have a rant to you all about it, and I know it is nothing MAJOR in the overall scheme of things, but I do enjoy my creating and blogging and it is something for ME just me and I can say what I like and crochet what I like and others seem to appreciate my efforts,  and this feels like a double whammy!!!! He ho chin up Kimbles chin up. 

Please keep your fingers crossed that the computer is fixed tomorrow - pretty please!!!!  In the meantime I do hope you are all well - I am just off to have a look at all the blogs and news I have missed out on the last few days, slowly veerrryyy slowly! 

Speak soon (hopefully) xx

Festival Memories and "Stuff"

Hello everyone, just popping in to catch up with you all.  You may remember me mentioning that I went to my first Festival a couple of weekends ago.  Hubby and I went with friends and we camped for two days and sat in the blazing sunshine watching various bands.  I have to tell you, dear friends, that I agreed to this with slight trepidation - I mean it had seemed like a GREAt idea after a couple of glasses of wine, but then of course lots of things do!!!!

We went to Kent, the garden of England, not too far from us for the two day event and it was at the Hop Farm.

The massive stage and screen were brilliant and on the Friday which was the first day, look how very civilised it all was - very genteel, lounging around in the sunshine drinking the odd glass of wine - I was enjoying it much more that I anticipated.

On the Saturday there the crowd increased by about sixfold so it was much busier and more standing up was needed.

Another very pleasant surprise was that lo and behold we certainly weren't the oldest there by a looooong way.  Every age group was there and it was huge fun. 

This is Debbie Harry in action with Blondie, she is in her sixties now and was really good bless her and didn't mind having the camera close up at all.  Lots of the younger bands were excellent too, however the two headline acts - Van Morrison on Friday and Bob Dylan on Saturday - in my opinion were a little - how can I say, disappointing -  I mean no matter how big a STAR you are, you shouldn't forget its the fans who keep you there - for us to have sat in the sun from midday to ten at night and neither of them even spoke to the audience - well I can't be bothered with that attitude!!!

There was a sea of little "pop up" tents, and I honesty do not know how anyone found their way back to the right one, because they all looked the same to me!!!  We were in the campervan field - much better, if a little cosy!

Did we rock and roll? not too much at eleven at night we trudged back to the camper dying for a cup of tea, which I did say to the security guard, who thought it rather funny.  However after the tea, we headed back to watch another band and didn't get back til two in the morning wooohooo!!  OMG we were tired on the Sunday morning when it was time to pack up - as we queued to leave the site, we were quite happy we had enjoyed out first Festival, we were sober, hadn't got sunburnt - how jolly sensible!!!!!!!!!!!

A quick update on the crochet front - only two rows attempted of my granny stripe at the weekend and it was proving still quite painful.  I have to admit, typing is the other key problem area too, hence I haven't blogged much or left too many comments (please accept my apologies - I do try to catch up and read the blogs too).  So there you have it, I need to employ a cleaner, a typist, a therapist and a crafter and just give out my orders!!!!!

Must just show you my one purchase from the Hampton Court Palace flower show

I just couldn't resist this beauty

The Rico cotton, waiting to be used  doh....................... those lovely colours singing out,  "please make something with me!!!"

Talking of colour - I couldn't resist these either, some of them will be put to good use in the Camper - a great little buy from IKEA

Thank you so much for dropping by - I am sorry I seem to have rambled on about nothing much in particular, the joys of blogging. 

Speak soon xx

Hampton Court Flower Show

Hello dear Blogettes, Friday again already and its been quite a week.  Yesterday I went to Hampton Court Flower Show, which for those of you not in the UK is an annual event - set in massive grounds of Hampton Court Palace (I think Henry VIII lived there), right by the side of the River Thames.  My friend and I set off early on the Train and then took a water bus to the entrance, and the weather was really hot!!!  Of course there were thousands of people there, and I don't know about you, but I am not too good when it gets really crowded, I get tired, hate to queue for the Loos, drinks, food etc, but yesterday although so many people, we didn't really queue much at all which was a relief!  Anyway without further ado, here are some of the highlights

this was the lego garden!

This was the Pansy Project Garden and behind where the pink tap is represents "A Matter of Urgency" for those with overactive bladder!!!!!!!!!!!! cripes just lookin at it made me want to dash and join the loo queue!!!

There were some absolutely scrumptious stands to buy "stuff" and some of this "stuff" I would love if I had spare pennies

I would love a little greenhouse with a walk up to it like this - my friend and I were drooling over this and the sales lady said "everything erected and included - twelve fifty"  "That's good said my friend, the ones I've looked at like that have been at least two thousand"  the sales lady looked a bit disdainfully at us " its twelve thousand and fifty"  "Oh quite" we said and sidled away!!!!!!!

Strolling round was really lovely though and such a variety - I particularly loved the veg gardens and the scrappy looking gardens and the sunflowers

Then there was how to grow your "five a day" in willow decorated containers - a really pretty veg garden

And this lovely collections of Alliums

aren't they stunning! 

Of course when one is wafting round a show like Hampton Court one can often bump into people one isn't expecting to .................. a gentleman gently ushered us to one side ........ someone was coming through....

Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall (wonder if she had to queue for the loo!)

Well worth the day out - lots of inspiration, and rested my hands!  

PS Going to try a SIBOL square this weekend - see how the handies hold up!!

Thank you to all my new followers, I hope to get back to my making and showing soon!

Have a lovely sunny weekend

Speak soon xx

Overwhelmed!

Overwhelmed, and a little teary when I read all of your lovely messages to me about my pesky sore wrists and congratulations to Little Kimbles.  Many many thanks from the bottom of my heart!  Lots of good advice too which I am trying to stick to.  Still no hookiness but hopefully a little more rest and it will all be ok.  Tomorrow I am off to Hampton Court Flower Show, which will be very nice and not too much hand useage!! 

A lovely Lily from me to you!

Speak soon xx