good weekend

It has been a lovely weekend. We cleaned and DUSTED the house on Saturday ready for friends coming round today.

This was the view from our bedroom window on Saturday morning. This is the same view I usually take photos of at sunrise. As you can see the sun was shining and the sky was blue. We worked very hard on the cleaning and I did some baking.

In the past few years we have had some friends around on a Sunday before Christmas and we have mince pies and mulled wine.

They caught me out this year though as we have not put up our Christmas decorations. We have a lovely real tree standing bare in the corner so I need to get it dressed!

I made some Father Christmas dust for the children. Porridge oats and glitter in a sparkly bag with instructions to sprinkle onto the path outside on Christmas Eve to attract the reindeer and Father Christmas.
It was a lovely relaxing day.

After we had worked so hard yesterday Hubby treated me to a night out last night. We went to Hebden Bridge. The Christmas lights are up (sorry about the blurry photos!) We had fish and chips and a cup of tea.

We ended up here....

and went to see Bright Star. What a beautifully made film. A slow and quiet film with exquisite photography and costumes.

A pause in Advent

The second candle to be lit in Advent is for Peace.

I am not naive enough to think this world will ever be in total peace but there is an inner peace we can all aim for.

In amongst this hustle and bustle everyone should take time to stop, reflect and find some peace.

As you can see, Lucy has it down to a fine art.

December...

...is such a busy month for everyone. At school we have concerts, pantomimes, Church service and parties to organise. The children are already hyper!

I did make this angel for the school Christmas tree today. I sort of adapted Val's tutorial but I think hers is a lot more cute. Mine I think is along the more traditional lines.

and I was dared by my hubby to post this photo-

This is in our bedroom and I was making a point about the cleaning!
he said, "I bet you don't post a photo of that!"
so I did!
See not every house in blog land is a spotless, tidy, show home!

Goodbye November...

Hello December.

As November finishes cold and frosty I think back and remember the very grey month we have had.

There was a sparkle of sunshine, but not much. As you can see though, Grey can sometimes be beautiful!

~This is what I should be doing~

I bought a lovely book from the second hand book shop in Uppermill on Saturday. This is the front cover.

and this is one of the patterns inside.

It is full of little stuffed toys to make with some lovely ideas. I just don't know when I will find the time to make any.

I didn't do anything creative on Sunday as I hoped to. I was creative with some ironing-I hid it in the cupboard!!!

A pause in Advent

I am joining Floss in A pause in Advent.

The first candle to be lit at Advent is for HOPE.

Now I have to say I am an eternal Optimist and I hope that one day my time on this earth will be for some good use. I have hope that one day soon we will open our eyes to what we do with this planet and the people, animals and places on and in it. I hope that future generations will see more clearly what needs to be done and as I light my candles today I hope to stay forever hopeful for a bright future.

Owletes and outings

Owlets and outings.....

::Diane (from Heart Shaped) and I were going to meet up tomorrow but her son is poorly so we have postponed it till the new year. Hope he feels better soon. So tomorrow seems to be a different day to the planned one and I hope to do something creative with it.

I have finished my secret project, do you remember this post?


And I talked about my secret project. well I can show you what it was now.




I was making these owlets to give to a local Bird sanctuary. The Three Owls bird sanctuary in Norden near Rochdale is in desperate need of funds and they sent an appeal out.

The children at our school raised nearly £100 pounds and the school fund matched it and so one Friday I took three children to the sanctuary to give them the cheque for £200.
I made these little owlets for them to sell in their little shop.


They are ever so easy to make and the very lovely Brie from Roman Sock let me use her pattern and when I started I just couldn't stop. I made about 16 in the end and hope to do some more for them in the new year as they need all the help they can get fund raising to keep open.

These two ducks are best friends and can not be separated. The mandarin duck only has one eye and the Aylesbury duck has a bad wing. They will live out the rest of their lives together at the sanctuary. It's only a small place but they do such a wonderful job.

I couldn't show you sooner as I had made some as gifts, that's why it was a secret!

::Anyway last Sunday Hubby and I braved the wind and rain and went for a walk to blow the cobwebs away.


The gales in the week had stripped the trees bare but we caught a weak bit of sunshine as we left the house and walked up the footpath behind the house.

We walked through the woods on the hill opposite Millbank then as we climbed up the hill from the village the heavens opened and we got soaked!


It was nice to be out though, rain or not, the past few months Hubby has been studying and we missed out on our walks when we had all that lovely Autumn weather.

It was dark by the time we arrived back home. Wet, cold, muddy but happy!

I wish we were in Montserrat with Shan who is over there visiting her Dad for Christmas. If she emails me a lovely photo of the beautiful island I will post it on my blog to make us all jealous!


I know her and her dad are reading this-Have fun Shan!





::I bought these two kitties from the Cats Protection Christmas fair last week. They are for our two nieces who are 1 and 3 on the 7th December.


Today we went Christmas shopping in Uppermill. I forgot to take my camera so couldn't take good photos of the lovely Christmas window displays. I tried to take some on my camera on my phone but it wasn't very good. I am going to try and go back and remember to take my camera next time!

Thanksgiving

Today is Thanksgiving over the pond. I wish you all well on this day.

I am thankful for a kind, generous and loving hubby who bought me these beautiful flowers to (in his words) make me smile.

I am also grateful for my bloggy friends. I got a lovely parcel in the post today from Dolly.

It was my Christmas Stocking swap. The beautiful knitted stocking was full of lovely things.

Sweets, a pencil, a beautifully embroidered bag, a tiny book of cat quotes,

a snowman card holder, a little wooden Father Christmas,

some borders to use in scrap booking, a gingham heart with ribbon embroidery,

and my favourite thing most of all, a brooch with teeny tiny blue hips painted on.

Lucy even got a present.

Which she played with under the dining table for ages!

I love it all, Thank you Dolly!

So you see, we all have a lot to be thankful for in this house.