Winner, winner.........!!!!

Well I almost forgot about my giveaway....eeeek!

I was babysitting my granddaughter yesterday and I was so exhausted when I got home I completely forgot:)

Anyway not to worry....the names where written down, placed in my special red tin.

 I then had my wonderful son draw a name.

MARY ANNE !!!! from Magpie's Mumblings

Congratulations:) I've sent you an email.

I wish everyone who entered could be a winner but there's always the next time.

Take care.

Some news........and, a giveaway....

A short while ago I was very fortunate to win a giveaway from a lovely blog called Middle of Nowhere belonging to the wonderful Gretel Parker.

Gretel is a professional children's illustrator, toymaker and a wonderfully talented needle felter.  She is currently featured in a new book called Mollie Makes Feathered Friends. She had a giveaway for a copy of the book and I won:)

I received the book from the publisher yesterday:):):):):):)  So many lovely projects. I can't wait to try some of them out.

 Other news........

I also have a copy of a delightful new cross stitch book called What Delilah Did presents Storyland Cross Stitch

Go here to Delilah's blog to see more about the book and better pictures:)

It's a lovely little book full of really adorable and fun cross stitch projects. At the back of the book there is also a little freebie gift.

I love the table of contents.....Projects for beginners, Practice makes perfect and my favourite...Projects for the brave & determined...:) That's me.

Now you are all probably saying to yourselves...So what!!!

I have TWO copies of the book. Well I don't need two books the same do I? No I don't:)

So I will just have to give one away and share my good luck. Right?

In order to win all I ask is that you leave a comment on this blog post and that I can get in touch with you via email. Easy peasy.

I'll leave this open until August 10th and then I'll pick a winner.  Good luck everyone!!!

Take care:)

What is with all this rain Canada?

We'll Calgary and surrounds had their rain last month and now it's our turn here....not as bad so far but yesterday was not a good day for some Toronto area commuters. I  don't know who took these pictures so I can't give credit.....

The above picture is the Don Valley Parkway which runs along the Don River....a lot of rain and of course it flows over it's banks right onto the road. It got worse.

Are these people nuts?

A Go train was stranded by the high water and 1400 commuters had to be ferried off by small dinghies. It's a good thing the trains have an upstairs level as that's where most of the passengers waited.

Our power went out at 6:15 p.m. and came back at 11:00 p.m. About 300,000 homes were without power. I checked TV when the power came back to see what was happening and at that point they had only managed to rescue half of the passengers....long night for them:(

Here's a video to show you how much water was in the storm drains downtown. We have had so much rain lately that they were already at capacity.  Toronto is actually built in an ancient sea bed so all water naturally goes downhill towards Lake Ontario.

We had 100 mm plus in rain yesterday in some parts of the city. We are high up so we were very lucky in our neighborhood. There was a bit of a stream running past our back steps and the road was flowing but downhill and our storm drains managed the flow. 

Some of our neighbours who have underground garages will have flooding. Here's some more video of downtown T.O.

And guess what....it's starting to rain again!

Some Garden Pics....

My son took some pictures in our garden that I thought I'd share:)

With all the rain we have been having lately the garden is going crazy....

 The roses are a bit battered by the rain but still beautiful...

The bees just love the St. John's wort....look at how much pollen that bee is carrying. Sheesh.

Our weather is so unpredictable these days...one moment your sweltering and the next your cold.

This is my granddaughter wearing my sweater to keep warm.......it's a bit big for her....LOL

Some things are more interesting than flowers....specially cats named Deva:)

Have a good day:)

Where's Daniel Boone When You Need Him???

My son took some pictures last night through the kitchen window. I guess Rocky doesn't know he's nocturnal because he keeps showing up before it's dark.

He's very cute but boy what a pain. He dug up some of my flowers:(

He's stealing my worms!!!!

BUSTED!!!!!

He has just noticed us.....

He gave us a dirty look and then waddled away..... not a care in the world.

This could be you Rocky!!!!

Only kidding:)

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Soggibottom Giveaway!!!!!

My friend Soggibottom is having a giveaway of two of her adorable Dartmoor Hares......

Picture stolen from Soggibottom

The giveaway it up until June 1st, 2013 so go over and take a wee peek:)

I've also put a button on my sidebar just as a reminder.

Take care:)

Chuckie is back:)

I'm very happy to see my old friend Chuckie the woodchuck back again this year.

He does such an excellent job eating up all the fruit that those nasty squirrels pick and drop from our apple and pear trees.

Here he is visiting our next door neighbour's garden today. As you can see he's not much bothered by the fact that four people are standing there looking at him......he's keeping an eye on us though:)

He's about the size of our female cat Deva but a lot more heavier I'm sure. 

Spring must be here finally:)

Here's a really lovely black and white picture my son took of Deva recently.....she is a diva.

Take care.

Another Giveaway Win.....

I mentioned a while back that I had won another blog giveaway and it arrived today!!!!!

It's from Alix who has a lovely blog called "Used-to-Bees". 

I love redwork embroidery and when I saw this giveaway I had to put my name down.


A lovely little pocket sized book full of simple easy motifs...very sweet:)

A French needlecraft magazine full of some absolutely gorgeous projects for cross stitch and embroidery......it has charts, patterns and even full size iron on transfers inside.

 

And, as an extra special surprise treat......the most adorable needle case made by the very talented Alix......it is so lovely:)

Big Ben. the London Eye and a London double decker bus:)

The front is a piece of very fine linen and look at the fabric she used on the back.....I love it:)

 

Am I lucky or what?...and spoiled....LOL

I must go make myself a cup of tea now and take a good look at my new magazine:)

Take care. 

Happy Mother's Day!

To all of my Bloggy friends who celebrate Mother's Day today:)

I have only two or three pictures of me and my mum.  I think I'm about 2 1/2  in this picture. It  was taken in Streatham, London, England.

I always wore red shoes when I was little:)

My mum lived to be 90 and passed away very suddenly on December 30, 2003. I wonder what she would have thought about blogging. I know she would have loved Pinterest:)

Take care.

I Won A Giveaway.....

I was very lucky to win some lovely hand dyed threads from Lorraine Stobie over at Creative Daily,

I used my Ott-Lite to take a picture as it is bucketing rain here at the moment:)

way too dark:(

I really couldn't get a good picture of the colour mixes....go over here...you can really see the lovely colours much better.

This was a very timely win as I'm just starting to learn how to do Crazy Quilting and I'm also taking a course with Sharon Boggon of Pintangle.com called "Sumptuous Surface Embroidery".

The thing is though.....they are so pretty so I may just look at them for awhile before I use them....LOL

I'm really having a lucky streak at the moment. I also won another lovely giveaway but I'll save that for another day:)

Take care. 

I bought a new book....

I've decided that I know absolutely zero about crazy quilting. I have looked at various blogs and videos and such but I still think that maybe I need a bit more help...so I bought this.....

Allie Aller's "Crazy Quilting"

Amazon.ca

Specially if I was going to do this doll any justice......

Source

I have moved bits of fabric around here and there and yuck....I have definitely missed the plot somewhere...LOL  I hate wasting lovely fabrics so I decided that before I do it anymore I needed to get more help.

I had seen Allie's work in the past and liked what I saw and then I found her blog......Allie's In Stitches.

It would be fun to take a workshop with her but the book looks pretty good too.

It arrived today:)

It's a very wet day....April showers....a perfect day to cuddle up with a lovely new book.

WIP.....

I have just finished this bed for a doll class I'm taking called The Princess and the Pea.......

Now to make the Princess.

Take care:)

Hello!!!!!

I know.......I haven't been here for awhile.  I have been busy making dolls though.

I managed to get this ridiculous flu/cold thingy that went on and on and on. I have finally stopped coughing most of the time. I've gone for a couple of days now without much hacking and I'm sleeping again at night.

I emailed someone recently and she wanted to know why I was sending her mail at 3 o'clock in the morning. Well if you cough and cough and can't sleep what else is there to do?

Silly woman.....sheesh.

So......hello again and some news:)

Recently I was looking for some fabric to make this doll for an on line class called "Abundance" with the talented Angela Jarecki. As you can see she has a crazy quilted jacket....that's actually what attracted me most. I've always enjoyed embroidery and I've wanted to try crazy quilting so I figured why not:)

This is what I hope mine will look like......

Source: Whimsy Moon

So I went looking for fabric at various stores on Etsy and bought some from Dianem's Etsy Shop as she had some very nice crazy quilting bundles on sale that I thought I could use for this doll.

I'm also a follower of her blog and went over to see what was up and lo and behold she had a giveaway for a crazy quilting selection and guess what.......I won more FABRIC!!!!!!

I really couldn't believe it as I was the last person to put a comment.  I know I've said this before but I should really start buying lottery tickets.

So I received the package today and I thought maybe I'd share what I'd won......lots of pretties to play with........

That last piece is so beautifully crafted.......really lovely.

Take care:)