New York Here We Come........................

Well on Monday I will be on a plane to here.

And I need your help!!!

Please can you wonderful people give me your top tips, favourite places to visit & eat.

I haven't been for 10 years and things must have changed!!!

Big thanks, Have a great rest of the week.

Luv

P.S I'm hoping to get some nice goodies for a NY inspired giveaway on my return to share my holiday with you all xxxxxxx

Eye Candy for your wall's........

Hello Lovely people.

I have been inspired again today by an email I received.

I love to know what is going on in the world  of retail, and I have to say when this popped into my inbox today it really did brighten my mood.

The email was from Notonthehighstreet.com, they have the best goodies on their site and it's great for personalised gifts. Many a wedding present has been bought by me from here.

& I know that there are some lovely bloggers who sell here too.

So what was on said email.....

Some beautiful eye candy for your bedroom walls.

You know from my previous post Beautiful Boidoir that I have a thing for pretty wall paper, so these were right up my street. 

Beautiful Bird Houses, soo pretty I would love this paper,

Stunning Vintage China Plates all over the wall, how fab would this be in a dining room!

Now this Ribbon Wallpaper would be a great feature wall in any sewing or craft room.

And lastly this vintage lady wallpaper would be fab in a bathroom, I think a canyfloss colour bathroom suit would be a must with it.

So this is what has inspired me today.

What has inspired you today?

Thanks for the slipper love, I have them on my feet now and they are super cosy, the cold is still at bay for the time being so I will keep taking the medicine.

Luv

Time for Slippers.........

A belated Happy National Cupcake Week to you all.

We celebrated at work with a Cupcake Wednesday, with all the money going to charity (The Body Shop Foundation & Children on the Edge). I made Lemon Cupcakes with a twist, I added a dollop of Lemon Curd to each Cupcake, which gave them a sticky bottom! They went down well along with Vanilla Cupcakes with Marshmallow frosting, Sorry no photos, they all vanished so quickly off the table I didn't get a chance. We raised £68.00, not bad really.

I'd better show you the meaning of my title now.

I got some new Slippers,as it's getting cold and now we have wood floors I can't walk around bare foot!

They are really cosy, I saw them and just had to have them the velvet bows just said BUY ME.

I have been wearing them all weekend as I have been relaxing trying to fight off a cold that is trying to come out and render me useless!

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend.

Luv

To join the WI or not to join the WI, that is the Question.....

Tonight I went on a little mission to my local WI group!!!

I have to say I was a little nervous about what to expect.

I have been interested in joining the WI for a while & I have looked the WI up on the Internet before to find a local group, but there never seemed to be a date, place or time to go along. So when our local area news letter came through the door a couple of weeks ago with a piece in the What On section I thought I would give it a go.

I get ready tonight, and said good buy to Gav with no idea what time I would be home or what I was really letting myself into!

I arrived at the local village hall, to a lovely welcome from a WI member Jean.

We all took our seats and the president banged a gravel on the desk and called order.

Yes you guessed it we then sang Jerusalem!!

Well I don't know the words so I stood and listened.

Well what more can I say, there is always a speaker and we have tea, a raffle and a mini exhibition of some sort. There are clubs I can join, book club, craft club, badminton & the Specials.

I think I will be going next month as I think it could be quite a giggle.

Oh last thing to say I was I was the youngest in the room!!!

Luv

Capsule Collection

I was inspired today by an email I received today from Joules.

It had these Tweed Jackets featured on it.

I have to say I have been thinking a bout it all day & about how much I really like the look of Tweed.

Now Autumn is drawing in & I have managed to loose 19lbs I think I may deserve a few pieces to make an Autumn capsule collection.
Here are a few pieces I'm Loving at the moment.

We are off to New Your in less than a month, so I am saving myself for the shopping there!!!

But I really want a tweed blazer, I can't stretch to the Joules version so I had a thought.

I am going to get a Men's blazer from the CS and tweak and customise it.

Now I'm no seamstress so any ideas or tips let me know.
Luv

Beautiful Boudoir

Oh I just had to share this with you all.

(Image scanned from S Magazine)

My friend Barbie just sent me the most amazing clipping from yesterdays S Magazine, she said she thought of me when she saw it!

This is one of the images, I love the patchwork wall paper, such a cleaver idea for someone who just can't decide on one pattern, maybe I could re do my spare room??

I hope you enjoy the image as much as me.

Have a lovely week.

Luv  

PS. I have just found out that this beautiful image is from a wonderful stylist Selina Lake.

She has a beautiful Blog so if you want to see more loveliness pop over to her here. xxx

It's been a Pickle of a week....

Right then, the food shop is done, the washing is on so now I can Blog and himself can play war on his play station! (too be fair he had been building me beautiful shelves in a alcove all day)

I have been a busy bee this past week, work has been busy as usual especially with the BH Monday.

On BH Monday Gav and I went to our local Pick Your Own to see what they had left for the season and boy were we surprised. Raspberry's were still available so we had a punnet of them. The poor damsons had been all blown off the bushes except a few that were well hidden so I had a bag of them too now in the freezer waiting for a later date. Plums galore, I walked through the rows of trees picking different variety's and filling a huge bag. Then a spin round the farm shop for more goodies, and so reasonable too.

I was soo inspired by my morning out that I cam home and decided to make this.

I got a new toy last Sunday in Home Sense, a mandolin!!

They have always scared me before as you do hear horror stories about people chopping their fingers off with them.

But I bit the bullet and decided enough grating was enough, so now I can slice and shred as much as I like (with the finger guard obviously!!)

I pull the beetroot from the garden and still have some left in the ground to make another batch. Yummy.

On Wednesday my friend Alison from work brought me in 2 HUGE courgettes from her allotment.

I found a fab recipe for pickled courgette on the Internet and set to work Wednesday night with one courgette.

Here are the results.

They are thinly sliced with the mandolin along with shalotts from the farm shop & they are in a cider vinegar, mustard & chili solution.

On Thursday I found out that there are some apple trees in the grounds at work, so off I went scrumping in my lunch break!!!

I got a small haul as it looked like they had seen visitors recently.

Will be going back soon with a stick to get some of the higher fruit.

Friday evening I decided that the plums from the PYO really needed something doing to them so I decide to make Ruby Plum & Apple Chutney.

I started buy chopping & stoning all the plums.

Then I pealed & chopped all the apples from my scrumping mission.

I also added some figs that had been reduced in the super market, red onions, sultanas, garlic, ginger, spices, brown sugar & red wine vinegar and lastly some ruby port!!!

Oh my house smelt like Christmas.

My trusty preserving pan has had a busy week too.

I have to say I made my recipe up, and just let it cook for a really long time until it was thick enough to pot.

It thickened up really well, if I haven't made a certain type of pickle or chutney before I do use a recipe.

I used recipes for both the Beetroot & Courgette pickles.

I have loads more chutney & pickle recipes left to make.

I have decided to make all the Christmas Presents this year, be it hand cooked or handmade.

Friends & family seam really pleased with the idea.

I have some pickling onions in soak at the moment and I will pickle them tomorrow.

What are you pickling, Jamming or preserving at the moment??

Have a great week.

Luv

PS. Thanks for all the lovely comments on my hair cut xxx

Chaity Shop Withdrawal...............

I have had serious CS withdrawal this week as I didn't do my CS shift last weekend as my cousin was staying. So today I was super excited to get to work.

Now you might think this a bit odd but my favourite task in the CS (apart from dressing the window) is sorting in the clothes room. It can be a bit hideous when you get a yucky bag!!! Why oh why do people think we want their worn knickers I do not know!!! but when you get a good bag that you know you can hang almost everything in it, it's a fab feeling. 

Today I got some wonderful goodies.

Freda showed me this fab Le Creuset Cook Book Stand, I have been after a cookbook stand for ages so I knew this was going home with me today.

Especially as I also found this lurking on the book shelves in the shop.

Some yummy recipes in here, can't wait to try some out.

This lovely blue floral vintage biscuit tin had been put in the bin! so you guessed it it cam home with me too.

Looks nice on my kitchen shelf, don't you think?

My shopping didn't finish their, I also go 2 pairs of shoes.

These red ones are Spanish leather and soo soft and a perfect fit, we probably couldn't have sold them as there is quite a lot of wear on the soles.

These tan leather pumps also probably wouldn't have been sold as they have a slight mark on one shoe, and also have wear on the sole.

I know some people are funny about wearing other peoples shoes but I'm not.

I always give them a good clean and anti bac the insides, a little polish and voila.

I also fell in love with this beautiful pashmina, it's a green & gold paisley pattern.

I don't normally post pictures of myself but I thought you might like to see my new hair cut!!!

My final purchase was a white candlewick bed spread for my spare room.

So that when those naughty cats of mine manage to get in there for a snooze they won't leave hairs on the duvet cover. It s currently in the washing machine.

I hope you have had some lovely CS finds lately.

Luv

PS. I didn't get the Kenwood mixer on Ebay as it was broken!!!

So I'm still on the look out xxx