Mixed Bag!

I could not decide what to do a blog on this week so thought I would just waffle on about nothing in particular for a bit in the hope you might be interested enough to read on!  Where are the weeks going?  Here we are half way through July already, not long to Christmas now! I have been getting bits and pieces of work done for the Home spun Fair, I think my stand will be small but interesting!!!! 

We went here last week, Golitha falls on Bodmin Moor, it was raining (when hasnt it been the last couple of weeks!) and it was very gloomy and green and romantically creepy.  We got soaked but it was worth it, such a beautiful place.

This was the first time that we have been up onto the Moor, we will definitely go back but not till the autumn when there are not so many tourists around.  Now the summer holidays have started there are places that are no-go areas till September, it is like there are two Cornwalls, our Cornwall in the winter with wild empty beaches and then summer Cornwall when villages are full and beaches packed.  Not that I am complaining as I know how much we all rely on tourist trade for our livings but of the two I much prefer the quiet times.  

I have just been mad on sewing this week with my new/old machine zig-zagging away happily.  This piece based around this lovely photo is called 'What are little girls made of?'  I used bits of a torn quilt that Christine gave me, the colours in it are beautiful it must have been gorgeous when new and its faded to lovely subtle tones. I love all the torn edges and the bit in the bottom left hand corner was worn and torn and worked as a little pocket to put some vintage millinery flowers in, sweet.

This is my sewing table, a bit untidy after finishing 'Sail Away' which is all red, white and blue. I keep all my favourite old photos, scraps of lace, ribbon, buttons and fabric on here and try and only use it for planing and layering up new pieces.  I only recently made this area for sewing stuff and its nice to be able to leave it all out like this.  

Thought I would bung in a pic of some little things in a little old cigar box that has sweet little flowers on, I love old cigar boxes. 

The sun came out this afternoon!!!!  So this is where we were at 3 o'clock, where were you, and was the sun shining?  Hope the sun shines on you this weekend, have a good one.

birthday outing.

It was my birthday on Thursday and I had wanted to do this post that evening, but after the thunderstorms of Wednesday night we were left without our phone until Saturday and then I had my birthday dinner to organise so I have not got round to it till today!  

It was not a good start to the day weather wise with torrential rain and thunder rumbling round the hills but being ever the optimists we set out to our first destination of the day Trevarno Gardens near Helston.  With virtual rivers of rain water swooshing down the roads we gloomily drove on in the hope of it getting better and luck was on our side as by the time we arrived it had stopped and the sun was trying, not too successfully to emerge.  You can take dogs into Trevarno so Midge was with us so we set out first to wander round the lovely grounds.

First stop at the lookout deck with a lovely view over part of the garden and the potting shed, wouldnt you just love to have that as a studio!

I just love this little garden that runs along the back of the walled garden, it is such a romantic fairy tale little space and the peacocks make it more so, there are loads of them wandering around.

Another romantic view of the lake and the boathouse, nice and moody with the slightly mistiness. On the bank there was a family of ducks mummy and babies and I managed to get really close to the little darlings, sweet!

This waterfall feeds down to the lake.

It is a beautiful garden to wander around with over a mile of paths through woods and other little formal gardens, I love this place as its not too tidy and has a slight wildness to it and one minute your in the woods then you find a gate and you are in a little rose garden.  

Then when you have had a good old ramble round you can go and look round the three museums. 

This is the gardening museum, with all sorts of tools and things garden related beautifully displayed. No thats not Midge digging in the display!

Lovely watering cans.

Love those wire pot holders.

There are lots of gardening toys too.  Look at the sweet little wheelbarrow.

The embroidered bag is divine. 

I would give anything to have these two seed display cases on my walls!

After drinking in all the delights in here, next door more to gloat over in the little toy museum.

Isn't that little drapers shop a treat?

There is also a small soap museum that I forgot to put the pictures of on here and you know how hard it is to stick pictures in where you want them so I will show you them another time. It is another little gem and in all if you are ever in Cornwall do visit this garden, not only beautiful gardens but you can get a Vintage fix at the same time!

Next wizz back home to drop Midge off and then on to The Headland Garden at Polruan near Fowey.  Ian has wanted to go there since he saw it in a book years ago but its a private garden thats not open a lot and we were lucky it was open on Thursday.  Its right on the cliffs with lots of little paths and stunning views, unfortunately I was wearing the wrong shoes (not good grip) to explore many of the slippery little steep paths but enjoyed the views and the sub tropical plants.

They have there own little beach too!

In all a lovely, even though it was a bit damp, birthday outing.

Then when we got home I finished off this new bit of work that I have been really enjoying doing, based on the poem 'Sweet stay at home'.  My birthday present was a sewing machine, my last one died on me, it was really old and had been given to me years ago and never that brilliant. Now I have a second hand singer that goes a treat and even does zig- zag stitch!  I know thats probably not exciting to you all but I have never had a machine new enough to do that before so now I am mad on zig-zagging!!

THE WINNER IS.......

I was really thrilled with all the comments left on my last post!  Reading all your memories bought back so many more of my own, I was surprised how many of you had similar times to us and in Cornwall, I wonder if I met any of you on a beach back in the 60's!  It has been really, really hard to choose a winner and in the end I narrowed it down to my favoutite seven and then got Mr Crow to do a lucky dip with his eyes shut as I could not decide.  Some of my faves were the buying of 'adventure supplies', waiters using pool water to put out a fire, coconut ice and fudge for breakfast and of course 'Sandy Balls'! Do have a read of them all.  But out of them all the one I related to totally was a little girl who was squashed into the car with only a little bit of window to see out of the whole journey and that little girl is LYN.  So Lyn all the goodies will be on their way to you soon.  Email me from my profile page and let me know your address.  I know what its like to be squashed in a car for long journeys I always had to sit on my sisters lap but spent the whole time stood up behind my dads seat with my nose to the little bit of window I was allowed to have open feeling car sick and sometimes being sick down my dads neck!! 

Hope you enjoy your prize Lyn.

MORE NEWS ON HOME SPUN FAIR..........You can now look on the blog for the fair by clicking on the link in my side bar.  Stall holders are being listed and more info and pics of the location will be on there in a bit as I am popping over to do a post now.  Come and have a look!

TRIP DOWN MEMORY LANE AND A GIVEAWAY!

I have not been able to do a blog all week as Mr Crow has been on a little holiday on his own and took the camera.  This is my 50th post so I thought I would have a bit of a giveaway.  Routing round my studio I have put together a little collection of bits of my work, scroll on down to find out more. 

I have been taking a trip down memory lane, as a child my whole being revolved around holidays.  We lived in Finchley, North London and I can never remember a time I did not hate living in the city.  My dad was in the police force and worked damned hard for his family, having seven children was not easy and he moonlighted as a decorator too!  Working lots of late turns dad always managed to get a good number of weeks off in the year and we would pack up our caravan, stick a couple of canoes on the roofrack squeeze us all into the car and off we would go to some wild place in the countryside. We used to go to certificate location caravan sites that only took five caravans usually on a farm and always by water, be it sea, lake or river. It must have seemed to the other campers that the circus had arrived when we pitched up!  Within half an hour there would be caravan with awning, tent up and ready and us lot running about probably squealing with delight and of course mum cooking Caravan Stew, a delightful concoction of tinned mince and tinned potatoes and sometimes baked beans, a recipe that would never have reached the table at home!  I can hardly ever remember it raining, they are always golden days in my memory and the delight of having dad on tap so to speak was always grand!    

This was in Cornwall in about 1966 thats me in the red cardigan with my twin brothers and elder sister, my eldest brother is lying on the camp bed behind us reading, thats all I remember him doing!  My sister thought she was so cool in those sunglasses. How did we all fit in that caravan for dinners?!

I never liked having my photo taken!  Me with my little sister Lesley looking so cute in that hat, sitting in one of our 'boats'  traveling who knows where, we did have some amazing journeys in them.

On a rock at Loch Tummel in Scotland, another favourite holiday destination.

Back to Cornwall (the pics got muddled up).  I loved my Jakaree!  Is that how you spelt it?

We were never happier than when we were jumping in and out of a hole!  And that blue jumper, I loved it so much it got all baggy and saggy with holes in but it was oh so comfy.  This was on Bedruthan Steps,  when we went there there were no steps or national trust cafe or anything.  We stayed at the farm and walked along the cliffs to the beach, the farmhouse is now a national trust holiday house, well I suppose it was 40 years ago, yipes!

Well this brings me onto my giveaway, if you would like to win it leave me a comment with a little holiday memory and I will choose my favourite one to win!

Here is my giveaway,  two paintings, three blank cards of my paintings for you to use and also two mugs with my paintings on.  Well as you can see you will have to like my work to bother  leaving a comment, hope you will.  I will choose the winer next Monday 29th. 

My next post will be the list of exhibitors taking part at the Home Spun Fair.  All the spaces are taken now and we have a great line up so I hope you will come if you can it will be A Grand Day Out!

Car boot loot!

This afternoon I spent wandering round in the sun in a huge field near Falmouth having a great time buying stuff at a car boot.  And it was a very good one for me today.  Look at all the lovely stuff I got!

I absolutely love  the old photo of the young 1930s girl her dress is so pretty.  The old print of the victorian ladies is French the mount is a bit marked but hopefully will clean up a bit.  Little tins, always a fave of mine.

I dont know if this basket is supposed to be for a picnic or just storage as it has no handles and no sign there ever was any?  But its lovely with all its different colours of plastic woven in.

My best haul today was old childrens books. I love em and only usually find one or two but today was brill and these are just a few of them!  The illustrations inside are great.

This little collection of old cards was another gem.

Home spun News...... Preparations are in full swing now and we only have a few spaces left so if you are at all interested get in touch ASAP. I will be putting up the list of stall holders as soon as the last places are taken and giving final details to you all.  Christine is on her yearly holiday on the Scillies this week so we will not get the posters and postcards printed for a week or so, but in the meantime if all you who are coming and any one who wants to could paste the poster from my side panel onto their blogs please do.  Also if you can distribute postcards and put up posters let me know so we have an idea of how many to get printed.  

We are getting a lot of positive feedback about the fair and it will we hope be a great day.

Have a good week everyone.