If its Sunday then it must be ........cleaning out the fridge and tidying the store cupboard.

Well - someone has to !!

Today was a sewing workshop in Lincoln - as I said yesterday, this was a much wanted workshop on sewing hardanger embroidery -although we are only at the beginners stage.  Next time we will be cutting holes in the fabric!!

My aim was to complete this small square:-

and I managed this:-

not too much to do - I left 30 mins early to avoid traffic from the county show.

As Sewingbuddy indicated in her comments yesterday. the real danger of today was the food - they do lovely cakes, lunches and puds - everything is included in the price of the workshop.  I could have refused it of course - but didn't.  Instead the lovely lady sent me home with my cake and pud - ready for an after weigh in treat tomorrow (its a small plate - the pieces are tiny!!)  Lunch was a little more tricky so I ended up with salmon and dill quiche (I took the pastry off and have sinned the double cream that I suspect was in it), salad leaves (the other salads had dressings and non sw things like dates in them) and new potatoes which, fortunately, had no butter on them - phew!

So, I am now home and ready to get going with my weekly cleaning task whilst my tea of pork and veg is cooking before ending the day finishing the embroidery and continuing with my Lynette Anderson work -ah the life!

It's Saturday so it must be bed changing day!

Clearly I would change the bedding anyway (although I have taken the opportunity to change into my new 4tog feather duvet from IKEA - let's hope that the night time temperature doesn't drop too much!!) but my journal has allocated today to change the bedding and then tidy the bedside table and dressing table.  I am finding that doing little and often is better than an all out attack!

Today is a little more overcast than previous days - just right to resume the painting of the she cave.  BIG MISTAKE!!  Reaching above my head to paint the roof has resulted in some aching muscles!  However I persevered - until the paint ran out!  Ah well!  I would like to say that I am nearly there but no such luck!

After the obligatory dog walk (which then resulted in two floppy tired out pooches), a quick local shop for provisions ( I am having a slimming world meal tonight - 5 spice pork - which smells wonderful but a tad different!) and the afore mentioned bed change I ventured upstairs to the guest bedroom ........ to make up the bed!  As each day passes it is looking increasingly likely that Mum and Dad will have to spend a few days / weeks here in between moving out of one house and into the next so I am starting to get the room ready.  My only complaint is that they favour two sheets and blankets - it's days like today that I really appreciate the ease of duvets!

After some more weeding of the gravel area, mowing the lawn (did I mention my super duper new mower?) it was then time to make some mini victoria sandwiches to take round to the church hall - they are having an afternoon tea tomorrow.  Sadly I will miss it (although that may be a wise move dieting wise) due to a sewing workshop in Lincoln.  I have always wanted to learn how to sew hardanger embroidery - in fact, if I had a bucket list then it would be on it - and am therefore looking forward to starting the challenge tomorrow.

It's friday ........ so it must be mopping floors day!

Or so my bullet journal says!  That, plus wiping down the kitchen doors and door frame (Daisy leaves such muddy marks when she jumps up at the door!) is making a real difference.









Having tidied around it was then time to set to with some crafting - I have been remiss of late.  The first task was to finish the quilting of my Tuesday night project.  It is now ready to be trimmed and bound.

Whilst I had my walking foot on, I then finished the quilting on a table runner.  This has been folded up in a corner after I ran out of thread at Scamblesby in the middle of a row so it felt really good to get this sorted.  The next step is to sort all the loose ends, trim and then bind.  I have now put my workshop machine in the conservatory and so can enjoy the nice weather (its cloudy here but not too cold) and the dogs can come and go as they please in the garden.





Of course, being in one room for some time you then start to see all the jobs that need doing. So the conservatory has now been tidied and hoovered, the ironing board set up and the ironing completed and put away.

After walking the dogs (which took me past the 300 miles mark on my 1000 miles in 2017 mark - wey hey) I then spent some time in the garden weeding the weeds which have come through my weed barrier - grrr - before heading off for my swim ( a record 120 widths!!! which equals 1.44km!!)

All in all this has been a fun day where lots of jobs have been completed and targets met - even the scales are joining in the fun - they have dropped slightly!!  Even the swimming, which could sound quite dull going back and forth, was great since I caught up with a number of friends who also go at that time.  This evening I plan to curl up with my Lynette Anderson applique and my usual treat - a 15g bar of Green and Black's chocolate - whilst watching the Masterchef final - my vote goes to Steve for what it is worth.  Hope that this is not the kiss of death for him.

Those darned black spots!

Waking up to another lovely sunny and warm day I bounded out of bed - ready to check the old Bullet Journal and check today's activities.  They had suggested a cleaning schedule (not my forte as you know) and Thursday had been allocated to the bathroom.  Oh the power of colouring in a square - I cleaned everywhere - even the shower screen!  I changed the towels and washed the bath mats -get me!

With the arrival of an email containing vouchers from the local garden centre, I thought that I would pop there, use the vouchers, and pick up some plants to pot up.  Unfortunately the centre is in a 3G / 4G blackspot and so they could not read my voucher from my iphone - I need to print it off !!  Sadly that didn't stop me buying some lovely plants and coming home and spending some me time on the garden.  On the east coast we get a nice breeze off the sea, and it was a more chilly dog walk, but the garden is quite protected so it was a lovely relaxing time.  All I have todo now is to remember towater them regularly!

I also had a visit from the plumbers - when Mum and Dad were last visiting they managed to "break" the shower!  It's a saniflow system and the last time I had it replaced it cost over £300 so I wasn't too happy at that news! Since they may have to stay here in between their moves I thought that I ought to get it mended again.  Imagine my surprise when the plumbers informed me that someone had turned the system off (I didn't know that you could!).  When I phoned Mum and Dad, Dad blamed the dog and Mum blamed Dad - who knows?  At least I have saved that money!

The sun has got his hat on .............

At last - a day of lovely sunshine and warm breeze!!!  I even swept outside and got the tables and chairs sorted - so it's my fault if it pours with rain tomorrow - ok?  I took this photo through the foliage of my turnip plants which are rampant! I have even spotted the first strawberry growing!









Last night we got cracking on a wall hanging at the sewing class and I made good progress.  With any luck I will finish the quilting tonight / tomorrow morning and then trim it and add the binding / hanging sleeve.  With one more lesson to go on this topic I also want to do an owl wall hanging using the same background fabric.  They are, however, quick to run up and complete- it's a Gail Lawther pattern if you are interested.



So, apart from my ventures in the garden this morning, I also did the church accounts ready for a meeting tomorrow evening.  Simple task you would thinking given that there is a spreadsheet already started -or should I say was!!! When the old computer crashed it took somethings with it - and that was one victim.  Cue a couple of hours going over everything and starting again!

After a lovely lunch of my SW pork and egg pie with some salad, it was then off for a swim (I did a massive 104 widths -1.248km!!) before settling down with my new toy - a bullet journal.  I did do one of these when I was working but haven't bothered since.  As you can see from the video its a personalised diary / organise / tracker / sketch pad etc etc. Every one is different and its fun to do (not that i will be doing much sketching!!) -and you know me by now, I am a list maker at heart!!  This way I get to make lists and colour in - such fun!

Tonight?  Well I suspect some more colouring in but, if possible,I will start to applique the shapes to the Lynette Anderson inner part of the scissor case.

Brrrrrrr - when will it ever warm up?

So, as I so often do, let's start with last night.  I am cracking on with the Lynette Anderson Scissor case and have almost finished the outside - just some bird features and the top of the jar to go.  Next stop - the three larger applique shapes inside and then I can start to put it all together.

Today was the Senior Screen and we went to see Jackie. I am not quite sure what to say about it - other than I don't agree with the rave reviews.  Slow?  Yes?  Bad? No.  Good?  Not sure.  Ah well, we have seen it now so will chalk it up and move on.

Next up was a visit to Tesco's for the weekly shop.  Jean had some questions re Slimming World and so I hope that I was able to sort her out and put her on the right pathway.  I have to say that we are still suffering, on the east coast, with this cold weather (I even thought about putting my coat over my knees in the cinema!) and so braving the weather to walk the dogs should win me a medal!!  However it's nice to get out and have some fresh air - not to mention the exercise.

By the time I got home it was time to get ready for tonight's sewing class.  I have sorted out the front panel and the backing but needed to "patchwork" together the wadding.  Sadly my joining tape ran out and so had to resort to the zigzag stitch method, but, hey, I didn't need to go out and buy anymore so have saved a few pennies!

It was so worth it!

As usual, on a Monday, my day started with the textile group where we continued to grapple with the pencil case pattern.  Having been shown an easier one by Sewingbuddy I opted for this pattern but Ev soldiered on and mastered the pattern.






Meanwhile Carine proudly showed her skills off and finished her design,





and Jean persevered, breaking her needle in the process so I took the opportunity to give her machine a clean out.







Back home, it was a quick tidy around and wadding ironing - don't ask, I had to use some fusible tape to create a patchwork of wadding for my sewing class tomorrow night - before heading off to Slimming World to face the music.  Quite frankly, if I didn't lose this week - after another week completely on plan - then heads would roll.  However the good news is that I lost 3 1/2 pounds - making it 24 pounds in total and 46 to go before the first week in November.  How am I celebrating?  well, Louise's birthday cake is still in the fridge and will emerge after tea!!

Tonight my plan is to try and finish the front of the Lynette Anderson scissor case - it's looking good but the fiddly bits are still ahead of me!  Hopefully I will be able to show you tomorrow.