Bits & Pieces

Hi friends, midweek already, and what lovely spring sunshine we're enjoying this week. 

A few bits and pieces to share today.  Sadly, one of our local quilting shops has just closed last weekend. I got quite a shock to read their email newsletter earlier in the month about the closure so made sure I went along to pick up a few necessities :)

I'll really miss being able to pop by to pick up fabrics, etc.  I quite often stopped by during my lunch break.  Very sad :(

On a cheerier note, I found this very cute Mollie Makes book in our local bookshop yesterday.

Includes 20 little Christmas crafts including this cute grocery tote

and my favourite from the book, a Santa Kit :)

It's filled with lots of other sweet projects including knitting, paper craft and felt craft. Well worth the $18.00 NZ.

I finally remembered to take a photo of our new greenhouse that Glenn has been working on over the past few months.  It's now at the stage ready for the windows to go in and then he'll make up some shelves for our seed trays and pots so we can get some growing underway.

Our little vegetable garden has been supplying us with a few goodies  - broccoli, cabbage, spring onions, leeks and a bumper crop of parsley. Soon I'll plant the first of our summer lettuces and tomatoes.

Have a lovely day x

Weekend Happenings

Happy Monday everyone, and it's off to a chilly start here - we've woken to a very white, and crunchy, lol, frost this morning, the first of many to come for the winter I'm sure.

Firstly, many thanks for the book recommendations - there were some great ones suggested, some I've already enjoyed but several to add to my list for the coming months. I've pre-ordered another Kindle read over the weekend, The Shoemaker's Wife by Adriana Trigiani, as I've heard good reviews about it so I'm looking forward to being released on the 24th.

I spent the day at work on Saturday helping out with a gardening project so yesterday was a very low key day at home, just pottering around while DH tried to reinstall some outside spouting on the new extension of our house. Hannah was having a great time in the hole, digging around in the mud!

I was also able to catch up with one of my best friends over the weekend, who was in town with her family for a few days visiting her parents. My friend recently had a baby girl so I got to have my first cuddle with eight week old Louisa.

I knitted up a couple of pairs of booties recently for Louisa using snuggly double knit wool and a pattern I found here:

Another recent knitting finish is some new hand warmers for my cousin Donna, the pattern I found on Ravelry, Strappy Stella Gloves.

I stitched a little bit more on my Mystery Sampler:

The latest Mollie Makes magazine arrived from Sew Pretty, the little mice are so cute!  Love the teeny knitted jumper!

I also did a bit of stash diving. I was on the look out for a design to stitch for my Mum's 60th birthday in August so I've decided on Blackbird Design's Something Sweet. I'd bought this a few years ago with my Mum in mind.  I also came across Country Cottage Needlework's Garden Girl which I'm going to stitch as a birth sampler for baby Louisa sometime in the near future.

I'd completely forgotten about sharing a photo of this little bunny pincushion, a finish from way back in early April.  This cutie pie design was generously shared by Bronwyn Hayes from Red Brolly.

I'm now counting down the days until Thursday, when I start a week's long service leave. My Mum and I are heading away for a few days for a girls' weekend to stay with our relatives in Palmerston North. We both can't wait - lots of shopping, going out for dinner, etc.  I've got a bit of sewing planned for the rest of my break, some gardening if the weather co-operates and I'm looking forward to trying out some recipes in our new slow cooker.  There'll be plenty of stitching happening too :)

See you soon xx

Sew Pretty Mollie Makes Giveaway WINNER

Thanks to everyone that entered the generous giveaway from Kirsty at Sew Pretty.

Hannah helped to pick out a lucky person last night and the winner is:

Congratulations Michy, please let me know your mailing information.  Thanks to all for joining in, and many thanks to Kirsty for offering the prize! 

Making Up and Shopping!

Happy mid week to you all. Over the last few days we have had more heavy rain and wind, right over all of New Zealand, and there's also been bad flooding in some parts. I've been wearing winter boots to work this week, and my coat too, very strange for this time of the year. Our daylight savings hours end in a few weekends time so I guess the dreary weather will really set in then.

Anyways, onto something brighter  - I have some sewing finishes and shopping purchases to share, two of my favourite past times, hee hee.

These little Easter stitches were actually done last year, I just didn't get time to make them up. I've had the cute bunny fabric in my stash for awhile, just waiting to find the right project to match it to.

This little design is  freebie by Alexandrina and can be found here,as well as lots of other sweet bunny freebie designs.

And some more spotty fabric used on this cutie pie Lizzie Kate design, Sampling Easter Quick-It. I love the Weeks Dye Works periwinkle thread used to stitch the alphabet.

Now for the new goodies - our local knitting store has started to get in their new winter stock and pattern books. I picked up the supplies to knit the pink design for Hannah - I was told by the store owner that this knits up really quick, just what I need, lol.

Earlier in the month I went to a training course held out of town so it was a good opportunity to stop by one of our bigger craft stores.  I picked up a few balls of wool for some Easter crochet projects, that may or may not get done in time :)

These were too pretty to resist:

And so were these scrummy colours:

The latest Mollie Makes issue to arrive in NZ also turned up recently, once again filled with lots of pretty ideas and inspiration! I'm purchasing these from Sew Pretty, an online fabric store based in Christchurch.

Well, that's it for today. Many thanks for stopping by, and its great to see some new people are visiting and taking the time to leave me a message.

See you soon xx