Autumn Fruits

hi,

Firstly, sorry for the photos the colours are a bit bizarre but thought I'd post them anyway. Hey ho, it looks like Autumn has definately arrived, it's blustery here - good drying weather my mum would call it - a bit pointless though as I've not done any washing today - there always seems to be something far more interesting to do than laundry, and today me and neil have been busy with these:

Our lovely neighbour down the road has a friend who has a damson tree in her garden and shared her crop with us. So today we have carefully pricked through two pounds of damsons carefully with a fork and added to that....

gin!! well to be precise 2 bottles of gin and a bit of sugar. Then place in a rumtopf and leave for a minimum of 3 months!! Looks like we'll be having damson gin at Christmas. We still have another 2lbs of fruit left some of which we're going to turn into Jam and some we're going to freeze and then use for crumbles when it's a bit colder and wetter and miserable out and we're in need of a cheerful pudding. Yummy!!

Enjoy!!

Janette

x

Birthday celebrations

The weather on Jamie's birthday was awful so we ended up having a chilled out day with Jamies latest favourite film Harry Potter and the chamber of secrets - I know it's been out for ages but Jamies only started enjoying the stories and films over the last couple of months so its all a bit new to him.

Anyway we had a lovely day and celebrated his birthday just us together - me, Jamies dad and his grandma. We had all the required elements, presents:

cake:

Neil made the brill cake for Jamie - it's a chocolate cocacola cake courtesy of Nigella. It sounds disgusting but is really nice. I'll hunt out the receipe if I can in a couple of days...

and cards:

Isn't the card from Jamies Auntie Carol fab - she makes fantastic cards and other things - jewellery, altered art etc. If you like you can have a look at more of them on her blog http://carolands007.blogspot.com/. She's very talented.

Today the weather was much better (well it didn't rain!!) so we went with some of Jamies friends to the beach at Lytham st Annes. It's been a lovely day, we picniced, built sandcastles and had a wander up the sand to the waters edge - 25 minutes each way - the tide is so far out it's barmy!!

Anyway, collected a whole carriers bag full of samphire so that was a tad exciting - (We've bought samphire from Booths our local supermarket before and paid about £3 for a poxy little tray full - about 200gs such a shame I don't know a nice restaurant who would've bought the bag off me - I could've made a mint today).

More fun than that though was that as the beach is big and quite quiet we were able to fly our kite most of the afternoon - what fab fun, can't wait to go again for more of the same.

Tomorrow at my other sister in laws and nieces for a sleep over so that's going to be fun. After that it's the run down back to normal every day life I suppose, must get Jamies hair cut for school, buy new school uniform and spend the last couple of holiday days trying to get back into some sort of normal sleep routine. What a shame, I love the school holidays can't believe the six weeks has flown by so fast - soon be countdown to Christmas!!

take care

Jx

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JAMIE

My baby is nine tomorrow and he is soo excited. Isn't it great how kids look forward so much to their birthdays??? (once the countdown has got down to 'one more sleep' that is. When he's saying 'its my birthday in 237 sleeps it's not quite so exciting I have to say.



I love the way Jamie is completely convinced he'll wake up tomorrow so different from today - afterall nine is so much more grown up than 8 isn't it!!



Not got too much to say today as it's late and no doubt we'll be woken up early tomorrow, so I've posted just three photos of Jamie taken over the summer months. I really must keep up with photographing him as he changes so quickly and soon enough he'll be far to cool to have photos taken by his mum won't he. But in the meantime tomorrow will be Jamie's first day in the big adventurous life of a nine year old, I'm so glad he's still young enough to want to share it with us.




Take care

Janette
x



Just wanted to add that the picture above shows my attempt at being the ideal mum - home baked gingerbread biscuits which I decorated last night before bed - how good is that - just call me Nigella!!

Oh it's raining again...

Oh well it's been raining in Preston again today is the summer over I wonder?? Jamie and I decided to have a wonder up the canal this morning just for a bimble and so I took a couple of photos to show the different ideas people along here have for their gardens..

Jamie ready to set off - I do hope he grows out of the hoody hip hop phase he seems to be enjoying soon...

Our garden is one of the smallest on the canal and as you can see from the picture on my last post we have built a decking area leading to the water. Because neither of our neighbours on either side of us have done anything with their land at the bottom it feels really private and secluded when your sat down there. I love it and am often found down there daydreaming in my own little world. We have plans to put tubs of flowers on the decking next summer and perhaps having some fairy lights along the fence which I think will look magical in the evenings.

These gardens are sloping quite steeply down to the water and many people are lucky enough to own boats (we're don't). Can you see the pirate flag flying on one of the gardens. Quite a few of the gardens along the canal have gone for a beach or pirate theme and this one....

has gone the whole hog and done their garden as a beach bar. Each to their own but not my taste really but then if we were all the same it would be a strange world wouldn't it.

And then a bit further along another garden, this one has been left to it's own devices and looks a bit like a flower fairy forrest - it never seems to matter what time of year it is there always seems to be some bluebells happily growing amongst the trees - really pretty.

So that's it for today a quick bimble up part of the canal.

Hopefully the weather will be a bit more cheerful tomorrow, in the meantime I'm on the search for a good local Chimney sweep as we are looking at getting a real fire or a multi fuel burner put into our lounge talk about excited - if all goes to plan I'll be counting down the days till we can sit by a cosy fire...

Ah well that's all for now.

take care

Jx

Oh my word its been such a long long time....

oh dear, apologies first - I'm so sorry for deserting blogworld for a few months, I don't really know why it was for so long. I felt I had nothing to say for a couple of weeks and then I seemed to lose my crafting and blog mojo which turned into months and before you know we're into summer and a late summer at that. Sorry for bailing out - I have been lurking in the background of many of you but just couldn't think of anything worth saying, so please forgive me. Anyway, after a lovely holiday in Northumbria I've now heaved myself out of the chair at the bottom of our little garden and want to say hello again.

so HELLLLLLOOOOOO....

We've had a blur of a few months blurred because the weeks have just sort of merged into each other at a whizzy speed but at the same time not doing very much really. We have had a couple of camping trips - Eskdale in the Lakes in June - very very pretty and very very hot!! Callow top in Derbyshire with friends - very very pretty and very very giddy - basically down to me regressing back to childhood with my school friend. Abbey Farm near Parbold also in July - very pretty but very very stressed due to new camper being used for first time, along with towing for first ever time and getting lost on way - despite site only being 20 miles from home!! Then away in Cornwall for a family wedding - very very pretty but very very wet - complete mud bath by the time we packed up. But last week was easily the best we had a gorgeous gorgeous week in Northumberland camping near Bamburgh where the beach looked like this....

We've never been up north so far before and boy what a surprise. I had heard it was a lovely part of the country but I never expected it to be so beautiful. The countryside, the villages and the beaches all gorgeous. These beaches were spotless, the sand powdery white and the sea so clear absolutely fab. On top of this some of the best castles I've ever been too, although my favourite by miles was this one ..

Alnwick Castle - amazing castle and gardens, so much to see. We bought a combined 2 day ticket meaning we could take our time looking around. Obviously the fantastic weather helped but even so I'm sure it would be brilliant there even in the rain ......

One day last week we went to Lindesfarne, they say that if you visit that island you never come away the same as when you arrived there. I loved the modern celtic style art there that has been inspired by the Lindesfarne illuminated gospels, and for the first time in ages couldn't wait to get back to pick up my pens and paper, wool and crochet hook - yippee I'm back. Boy can you tell I've been smitten by the whole Northumbrian experience.

By the way I've also been reading the Dawn French book dear Fatty while we were away - (first book I've read in months too - what's been wrong with me I wonder), anyway what a fab book makes you laugh out loud!!

Anyway time to go and this time I promise to be back soon.

Janette

xx