Now I am wondering, do they give yarn out on prescription???

Little Sweetpea loves nothing more than sitting at her little writing desk doodling and created lists so I thought it was about time she had her very own little pen pot.

After finishing the latest tin of scummy hot chocolate I decided to turn it into a pen pot for her.  It is such a simple project which I know will make her very happy when she returns from school later today :-)

I thought I would write a little tutorial so that if someone else wanted to make one they could, so here goes.

First wash the tin out so it doesn't cover the pencils in chocolate (although that would make them smell very lovely indeed).


Then measure around the tin and measure the length of the tin to determine the paper sizes needed.  Cut your pretty paper to the right width and length and stick around the tin.  I used double sided sticky tape (Blue Peter Stylee) do to that.  Then maybe add a border in the middle ....... get creative .....


Now take some pretty scissors and cut some ribbon or cute pom pom trim to give the tin some bling !


Loving the pom pom trim ....... reminds me of my Nan's vintage lamp shades :-)


Then add any other items you want, let your imagination run wild!  Now pop it on the table for your little one to find and watch the big smile on their face (this is the most important part of the project ..... those smiles are so precious :-) ) ..... or keep the tin for yourself :-)  You could even decopatch the tin, newspaper print would look pretty cool.


Happy creating.

We have been busy bees here in the Sweetpea household.  What with bugs (mainly me suffering from those) , birthdays, chics and tendonitis it has meant hardly any time to blog or comment on blogs :-(

I am still suffering from tendonitis but after a 2 hour wait in physio I am finally getting some real help.  I was fed up with being popped on one painkiller after another - I want this fixed not glossed over !  After the lovely Harmony and Rosie sharing the advice she was given with me I went back to the doctors armed with my advice ammo :-)  After a lot of persuading (and even being told 'why do you need physio when you have a copy of your friends excersises'  pah!) I was referred to physio and now have wrist splints and advice on how to go forward.  I really want this fixed as it has been moving up my arms to my shoulders and it is stopping me hand sewing and being on here :-(   Those wrist splints look sexy don't they lol .


Whilst I have been away middle Sweetpea (top piccy) turned 10!  Goodness me, it only seems like yesterday she was a little baba :-(  She wanted a little piggy cake at first but then watched Hairy Bikers and decided she fancied Black Forest Gateau.  I followed their recipe but ended up having to make four layers rather than two which could be cut in half as they didn't rise very well.  Needless to say my hips are now a bit bigger :-) 

She decided to have a sleepover for her party and somehow caught me out by getting me to agree!  They had an easter egg hunt, watched films whilst eating popcorn in bed and had a take out Pizza (a first in the Sweetpea household - goodness they are expensive).  They weren't too bad but did all look like Zombies (as did I) the next day :-)

As the day progressed one of the eggs Mr Sweetpea had popped in the incubator (this man is addicted to having animals in our household!) started to hatch :-)


Tiny the Dutch Bantam  hatched the next day, it took him/her quite some time to get out.  Here he/she is at the front with Bubbles (can you tell the kids named them) his/her sibling.   After popping photos of the hatching in progress on facebook they have quite a lot of fans now and have had visitors popping in to see them :-)



There have been some other new additions in our village too, just take a look at these cute lambs.  They are soooo sweet, it always makes want a pet lamb again .....


My Dad used to take on quite a few waifs and strays and Daisy was an orphaned lamb.  Oh how we loved her!  Loving my crazy hair in this photo and my sisters huge cheeky grin :-)  She had to go back to the farm when she was big enough and we used to visit her there.


What else have we been up to, sorry if you are falling asleep at this point :-)

Well we went to a Charity shop and got the most wonderful bargains.  For some time now I have been wanting to make little Sweetpea and middle Sweetpea a cooker out of a bedside cabinet.  I asked on freecycle if anyone had an old cabinet they didn't want and someone kindly told me that she had seen one at our local Open Door charity shop.  We drove there last week and low and behold there was a mini wooden cooker, it cost me a whole £2!  It needed some tlc but that made it even better.


Little sweetpea washed it all ready for me to sand and paint it, I have nearly finished it now so will share the after photos soon :-)




We have also been down our new allotment a lot too.  Late last year I planted a spiral of daffodil bulbs which started to pop up.  I am going to extend it every year as the children already enjoy  going round the spiral :-)


We are also lucky enough to be next to a friends allotment and she created this wonderful willow wigwam a couple of years back.


What with these two items and our little trampoline the kids are kept busy so we can concentrate on planting and weeding :-)

Look she can levitate :-)

I had better be off now as you have probably all dozed off :-)  Take care and sorry again for not being able to comment as much as I used to on your blogs - I will soon be better and hopefully then normal service can resume :-) xxx

Hello everyone, I hope you are all well.  I haven't blogged for a while properly due to several viruses knocking us out here :-(  I had a day off work a couple of weeks back only to wake with a lovely flu/sickness like virus which made me stay in bed for 2 days - I don't think I have ever had to do that in my whole life.  Then Mr Sweetpea got it , all over half term week - great timing :-)  Little Sweetpea has also had to be on antibiotics due to a chest infection which made her feel really unwell for 3 weeks.  The joys of winter :-)

This week I thought I was share you what I created out of all those pieces I had hidden in my sock drawer some time ago :-)


I recently treated myself to Helen Phillips book, Simply Sewn Gifts and just had to make some of these cute little rabbits for the Sweetpea girls.  If you don't know Helen then pop over to her gorgeous blog.  There is also a link to her book below.


I was a bit worried about creating these as I am very new to sewing but then I thought, nothing ventured, nothing gained and gave it a go :-)  I contacted Helen a few times whilst creating these bunnies and she was so lovely and helpful (thanks Helen :-)).


I cut out all the pieces from some Linen trousers that I had worn whilst I was pregnant with Little Sweetpea and sewed them together ..... Each rabbit had different coloured ears so we knew whose was whose :-)


The book said to sew the legs to the side of the body (I may have interpreted it wrong though lol).  This would be great for an ornamental rabbit but I hoped these would be well loved so I took the legs off and sewed them in to the body instead so they were floppy legs :-)   I felt rather bad doing this to poor bunny!

I then created their litttle faces and tried to make them some girly clothes.  Helen's book does have a lovely dungaree pattern but I wanted more girly outfits for them.  This was harder said than done by a novice like myself so I ended up creating a skirt and very unflattering dress :-)  (oohh don't you just love family life, trying to type this blog and middle Sweetpea manages to knock hot chocolate all over the dining table and the laptop - and breath - no wonder writing a blog takes me so long - gggrrrr).


Luckily Nanny Casey is a good knitter so she created them some cute little cardigans, the pattern can be found here  (I found this via the lovely blogger Millefeuilles :-))


So after lots of sneaky sewing whilst the children were finally all in bed the girl Sweetpeas opened these bunnies on Christmas morning.  They are loved very much indeed which makes my heart swell with pride and joy :-)


Little Sweetpea takes hers to bed every night and then Millie/Bunny/Jessica (her name changes every now and again) comes down stairs every morning.


She even gets to go out on trips to places like Music Hayhem (as little Sweetpea calls it, it is really called Music Mayhem - a kiddies music group little Sweetpea goes to).

I am so glad I pushed my insecurities and tried to make these bunnies, they came out way better than I thought they would :-) 

It is chilly here in the UK at the moment (well not as chilly as over in places like Russia or Canada but chilly for our standards :-)).  This week the temperatures have been going down to -10 degrees in some areas so I have been keeping the woodburner going non-stop and to save a few pennies I have been popping my kettle on top and enjoying waiting for the whistling sound to call me.

Now I don't usually like cold weather but I have been looking forward to some frosty weather so I can have a play with ice :-) 


Some time go I saw an idea for making your own ice art.   As soon as the icy weather was upon us I rummaged through the cupboard for a nice flat based dish and rummaged through the garden for some arty items :-)


I chose some lovely fennel seed heads and holly berries.  I popped them out over-night and waited until morning came to see if my creations had been created for me by Mother Nature.


They look so pretty swinging in the gentle wind - like rubies set in glass.


I love how they look against the sky and with the sparkle they create when the sun reflects off them.  Little Sweetpea has loved this experiment too, she has bought them in and sat then near the fire to see how they melt slowly.  She then popped bits of ice on her hand and is amazed by how it melts because of her body temperature.  She turned to me and told me how it was 'magic'  - she is right :-)   Obviously I told her why it was melting and how but I like the idea of it being magic.  PS if you are doing this with your children please be careful which berries you use, I was very careful to keep an eye on my little one as I didn't want her eating holly berries and being sick.


Another thing making me smile this week is Eldest Sweetpea running past the window with batons of wood.  What was he up to?  When I asked he told me he was making a bee hive.  He is hoping some of Mr Sweetpea's honey bees will see the new home he has made and move house :-)  I went out to the shed and this is what I found.  He has even carved an entrance hole out for them and put wire mesh on - oh how I love his DIY ways - it makes up for his hormonal outbursts :-)


Middle and little Sweetpea have been busy looking after the chickens.  The chickens are still enjoying pottering around the garden, I don't think my hellebore's are enjoying them being out though :-(  We had one chicken jump up at our dining room window yesterday, goodness knows how it got there as it is all locked off.  She was so happy to be re-united with her mates and they were very happy to see her too - you could hear them clucking about her arrival.

I had better be off , I am afraid I am not allowed on the pc as much at the moment due to being diagnosed with tendonitis :-(  I have been told to take ibuprofen 3 times a day and to limit things that exasperate it.  I will keep reading blogs and love reading your comments too but please forgive me if I don't respond or comment as much as usual. 

Take care
Zoe
xxxx