Blackwork

 I have a joy of craft work and this is something I did a few years ago.  Called blackwork, pictures are built up with any coloured silk, with a different stitch to represent different areas.  The stitches offer dimension making a 2d effect.

Blackwork is worked on aida, any count, using one strand of cross stitch silk.  Different colours can be used, such as red, or even worked into the same picture

Here is a blow up to give you some idea of the type of stitches used.  It is very satisfying and not as hard on the eyes as cross stitch

I'm home....

Hi all, I am home after a wonderful week with Dreamer.  We had a lovely time, mooching around charity shops and learning new craft skills.  I learned to do quilting and spent Friday doing crazy Victorian quilting.  I love quilting so a new monster has been born LOL.

I did quilts for my 2 youngest grand daughters, a quilted pillow case for my eldest grand daughter and a quilted football cushion for my grand son.  They all loved their presents and the 2 youngest were pretending to go to bed on the floor with theirs. 

My eldest grand daughter has asked me to do her a quilt for her bed and a friend has ordered one for her grand daughter.  Great fun.

Dreamer made my OH and son some scones before I came home.  None for me as they are made with ordinary flour not GF.  They have made huge inroads into the scones so I decided to make some GF ones for myself.  They will never be the same as they dry out so quickly and the mixture cracks in the oven.  However, I have sampled them and they taste OK with plum jam.  All very naughty, but the rest are in the freezer for a treat when I want one.  Unfortunately they don't last very long in the freezer.

A Quilting Fest

I am having a great time with Dreamer, eating totally GF, little walks with our fury friend, Jake, and learning new skills....Quilting.  I have 4 to make, two quilts for my youngest 2 granddaughters, a football orientated pillow for my grandson and a pillow of some sort for my eldest granddaughter.

QUILT ONE - LAURA'S

 I bought this tea towel pannel which cost me a pound.  It has farm animals, in an abstract form, which should appeal to Laura. 

 I rummaged through Dreamers material stache and picked colours which were on the tea towel, red, blue, green and white.  Another new skill learned, cut 3" lengths, sew them together, lengthwise, then cut strips 3" wide widthwise.  Hey presto....3" squares all sewn together.  Clever or what.

 This what it looks like once the square lengths are added to form a border.  I added wadding to the back, 2" bigger than the quilt and added a contrasting blue backing.  I sewed around the outside of the squares with the animals in and then on the inner squares. 

 This is the finished article.  All I had to do was to turn over the wadding and backing together to form a border and sew it.  Quilt NO 1 finished.  What a lovely experience and I am humbled to think that I have produced it.  I know that Laura will love it.











QUILT 2 - SOPHIE'S

 This is Sophie's quilt which has been created using a piece of fabric with pictures of fishes, flags and a ships wheel.  

 I added a border of contrasting colours, red, blue and lemon/orange.  I backed the quilt with white with pink polkadots and quilted around the fishes and wavy border.  I then quilted around the inside of the border.

 You can see the results of the quilting on the back with the 3 fishes shown within the square.  It gives a great affect.  That's NO 2 quilt completed.  I have 2 pillowcases to complete now.

Week with my friend Dreamer

Hi folks...

I am with Dreamer for the next week...recharging my batteries, crafting, walking and generally chilling out.  I love the easy pace of life here and the way that eating GF isn't an issue as it is at home.  There are 3 of us at home, me, OH and number 2 son.  OH and I will eat anything, so long as it is GF, but N2S can be a little fussy with foodstuffs such as fish.   As OH does most of the cooking it can be repetative as he admits he has no menu imagination.  I have to plan the meals and it has to be something he has cooked before. 

Eating with Dreamer is so much easier.  She was a chef in another life, enjoys feeding people and GF isn't daunting for her as it is with the OH.  Last night we had ham shank with 3 different vegetables, which was really filling.  OH thinks we should have spuds with every main meal LOL.  Don't get me wrong, he is a God send as, due to my other conditions, I find it difficult to stand long enough to cook a meal.  I have difficulty holding, peeling vegetables and dishing up meals in general.  I can't hold heavy pans, so I am really grateful for all he does for me.  Disability is a curse.

I think that my week with Dreamer is good for him as well as it relieves him of all the duties and he can have some normality for a week, bless his cotton socks..............what would I do without him

Take care x x 

Whatever next.....

I had my visit to the dietician on Wednesday which proved to be interesting.  I don't take milk due the effects it has on me as well as the gluten.  I am also trying to reduce the amount of bread I am eating as GF bread is unpalatable and falls to pieces when you try to butter it.  Not only that, whenever I eat bread I always feel hungry a hour or so later and end up grazing.  Not good at all and due to my other conditions I need to lose weight which is not easy on a GF diet no matter what the celebs think.  Bread and pasta are made from potato flour and starch and a small slice of bread has 99 calories in it.  When you take into account that a large slice of brown bread has 101 calories, that is very worrying.

The dietician has also asked that I keep off cheese for a few weeks to see if my symptoms get any better but anything can set me off.  On a GF diet, once my body is used to it, the symptoms should settle down but I am still having some days in a month when I can't keep off the loo.  She and I am worried about my calcium levels but luckily my good friend has told me that there is calcium in plenty of other foods besides dairy.  I also have a vitamin D deficiency but I take a suppliment for that.

So, I am restricted on what I can eat and everything needs to be cooked from fresh.  I am eating eggs for breakfast, boiled, scrambled, and now Spanish omellettes.  I did an omelette for breakfast this morning and, as it was so big, I saved half for lunch with a salad.  I am going to make fritatas and freeze portions, just to make life easy.

I am now being referred to the gastro dietician, who can liase directly with my specialist, which should be fun.  The specialist has informed me that there is nothing wrong with me and that I should eat lots of fruit and veg, which will give me more loo time.....but that's fine.......God help us..............

I Love My Garden

In April I was finished from my job due to incapacity.  I have a gambit full of long standing long term illnesses but it was the gluten sensitivity which was the last straw.  My body can't cope with anything anymore, besides the usual toilet and nausea issues associated with NCGS (non coeliac gluten sensitivity) I have poor energy and mobility issues.  I tire so quickly, such as going upstairs and putting my coat on.  Showering and getting into the bath are a mammoth effort as is standing to cook a meal.  So with these issues, my heart condition, fibromyalgia, under active thyroid and asthma, it is no wonder I also suffer from depression.

I can no longer mow my lawns or do any of the heavy work within the garden.  Luckily I have a gardener who is very reasonable and a real gem.  He and his brother attack the weeds, cut the hedges etc.  Thank goodness.  Being off work has made my depression worse, so I started growing my own veg the year before last, (not last year as I was so poorly) and this year I started not only the veg but fruit also.  I am growing potatoes, gherkins, cucumbers, tomatoes, patti pan squashes, peas, mange tout, broad beans, runner beans, wax beans, carrots, turnips, onions and garlic, all in containers or raised beds and gooseberries, strawberries, blueberries and raspberries again in containers and raised beds.  My hubby bought me a greenhouse last Christmas so I am really utilising it.

So now you know why I love my garden and having fresh fruit and veg to pick from the garden is helping me to manage my gluten problem.  

Take care folks....

Cold Few Days

The weather has been cold and rainy here the last few days but it has done the plants a world of good.  The soft rains have fallen onto dry soil so the gardens have been in desperate need of it.  I have been watering regularly but tap water isn't as good as rain water, especially for the fruit bushes.

My fruit and vegetables have been invaded by ants and I couldn't understand why.  They were hanging out around black spots on the broad beans as well as running up and down the fruit bushes.  Thank goodness for Goggle.....I found out that my bushes and veggies were infested with aphids and that the ants were feeding on them.  What to do.  I don't like to use chemicals, especially as we will be eating the produce, so I decided to use warter with a small amount of detergent.  I mixed it up in my spray bottle and gave the little beggers a good drowning.  Apparently they breath through their bodies, so if they get soaking they drown.  Other recipes include olive oil added to the mixture but I remember my gran pouring the contents of her washing up bowl on her roses.  If it was good enough for her I'm sure it will do the trick.  I need to spray them every other day to get the eggs when they have hatched. 

What methods do you use to see off the aphids?