The journey starts here...

Tompom started pre-school on Wednesday and he has been so excited about starting school just like his big brother and sister.

This is him heading off to school in the morning.



He had a brilliant time and only got a little tearful once, his tears soon dried after he enjoyed a street party snack time outside and lots of outside games and fun.
For Paul and I it was the longest 3 hours with Paul phoning at half ten just to check he was okay!!! And sending me off far to early for the drive to pick him up, which meant that I had a little time for some photography and I just had to share this photo of these topiary rabbits that were in the gardens of the lovely country home that is across the road from Tompom's pre-school.

How fab of they!!!!

Fancy A Button Swap?

You do!! I knew you would, us girls can't resist buttons can we!!!

Lucey over at Lemonade Kitty is organizing a fantastic button swap

here's what you have to do

Just send your partner at least 5 items which could include,

a button tin, box or bag,

some really nice/pretty buttons either on cards or loose,

handmade (if you're able) or bought gifts with buttons on, could anything from a single button to all buttons,

a lavender bag,

and to keep us smiling, something edible!!

 so if you fancy joining in then just click on the picture below which will take you over to Lucey's blog where you can find out more

Easter Egg Hunt Part 2

Those of you with older children will know that at Easter no matter how old they are they still enjoy taking part in Easter Egg Hunts and especially enjoy getting chocolate at the end, the only difficulty is finding an Easter Egg Hunt that is a little more taxing for them and isn't over in five minutes!!!
Last year we did
"Who Kidnapped the Easter Bunny?"I had to make up lots of rhyming clues and the kids had a whale of a time!!

So this year I wanted to do something a little different, okay I admit it I'd left it to the very last minute (I'd bought the eggs and rabbits ages ago but hadn't thought about what we would actually do!) so last night after hours of searching on the Internet I found an idea I quite liked the look of.

This...

As you can see It involved those blank wooden jigsaws that you can buy from most craft shops (luckily I had several in my workshop - never was too sure what I was going to do with them!!!)
So I painted one yellow and one pink and then added a rhyming clue (unfortunately I didn't have one of those fancy 3d pens so ours are a little more homemade as I just used a permanent marker).

I then hid the jigsaw pieces all over the back garden and hid the chocolate in the front as I didn't want them finding the eggs before all the jigsaw pieces!!!



Off they went to hunt for their 28 (yes 28!!!) jigsaw pieces, some were hidden together some on their own so it was a bit of a test to see if they would work together are not, and work together they did handing over pieces to each other and pointing out places to search...

 

some up high



some down low



counting how many pieces

working together

getting warmer!!!

yes!!! we found them

one more here



finding the corners

 

piecing together



have you got all the pieces

well perhaps not all

I must have hidden some of the pieces really well as we couldn't find them all but it didn't stop the fun as the kids worked out where they needed to look to find their chocolate stash.

only one missing - but we do have the clue

rugby posts for Jack

arched window for Rachel

three happy children with chocolate to share!!!!

Easter Egg Hunt Part 1

This year we held two Easter Egg Hunts, one for Tompom and another much harder one for Rachel and Jack.

Tompom had to hunt for foil covered chocolate eggs that were dotted around the garden.



He had lots of fun searching for them and popping them in his basket.

The best bit was once you had found them all you could start eating them.

HAPPY EASTER!!

What did we do before......

we had the Internet!!!!

Our computer crashed a few days ago and had to be carted off to the computer hospital.
It made me realise how much we all need and use the computer and the Internet but also how much time I spend wittering away the hours searching for this, buying that, researching, blogging, reading, facebooking. I've managed to complete several more rows of my ripple blanket and have spent almost all day in the garden achieving much more than usual as I haven't had to pop indoors for a cup of tea and a quick browse!!!!
I glad to say though that my trusty machine is now back and I couldn't wait to catch up on all that I have missed these past couple of days!!!and blog about my dilemma, I even had to pop into the library today to use their computer as I desperately needed someones details from my emails and wasn't sure if my computer was going to be revived at all.

One big thing I have realised is that I can't keep putting off backing up all the thousands of photos that I have so I feel a trip to the shops is on the cards tomorrow to buy a large capacity external hard drive!!!!

A quick Catch Up...

Probably like many of you we have had some very changable weather these past few days....
last weekend we had the most amazing hot sunny days which resulted in lots of outdoor activities including a spot of gardening for me and bubbles for Tompom


Needless to say this beautiful weather and all that playing took its toll on Tompom and this was the result on Sunday afternoon!!!

Paul came home from the garden centre with a few new trees and shrubs which I planted up (forgot to take photos though) and I moved some of the existing plants to new homes to see if they would thrive. The photo below shows the area outside the outhouse which we revamped last year. I left the original shrubs in place as they have been there for many years. Tompom and I moved lots of topsoil to build up this area and then I added the pot and the clematis, hopefully as this site is more sunny than it's last home I'm hoping that the clematis should be a bit happier.

Monday was a strange day as Rachel was off on a school trip to Austria (music concert tour) and as she wasn't leaving until 3pm it felt like the longest day ever!!! We've had several updates from her, the coach broke down in Calais, someone was sick, the driver was given the wrong postcode for the hostel and the journey took 27 hours instead of 20!!! It's snowing and she seems to be having lots of fun and spending all her money!!!

Tuesday was chilly to say the least and we met up with friends in the park with us adults huddled under a blanket to keep warm and the kids running around to keep warm.

In the evening my friend Ruth came over as we have started getting together once a week to craft as we both just don't have the time during the day, the first time we met up we did more chatting than crafting but this time we both managed to complete what we started, Ruth made these gorgeous felt hearts on sticks and I made a plastic carrier bag holder for the kitchen.( I shall take a photo and add it later).

Wednesday was another chilly day and Paul and Jack went off with one of Jack's friends to Tilbury Fort, unfortunately we didn't check the opening times and it was closed!!?? so they had a walk along the Thames before heading off to Coalhouse Fort, but this too was closed for restoration works but the park was open and they had a great time on the death slide before coming home to play on the playstation, Jack is back into Pirates of the Caribbean as the new film is out next month and he can't wait to see it.

With the big boys out for the day Tompom and I headed out into the garden where we had lots of fun telling the time with dandelion clocks...

I carried on where I had left off at the weekend moving logs from one part of the garden to another.....

This is the tree

we had taken down over 2 years ago the logs have been piled beside the outhouse since then and I got stuck in moving some of them and burning all the small pieces.

And this is what I created for the kids (it's not quite finished yet!) not sure if it's a fairy ring/pixie ring or a campfire circle but all I do know is that I was in bed by 9.30pm completely exhausted and aching all over after my day in the garden!!!

Today we're off to see my Nan so should be a little more relaxing....

I hope you're all having a lovely time over the Easter break and that the weather is not putting too much of a dampener on things for you!!!

One of my bags is featured........

in a charity auction.

I have donated one of my Easter Mini Bags to help raise funds for a brachycephaly helmet for Enes.



Here's what it says over on Emma's (Enes' Mum) Facebook page.....

My name is Emma, my son Enes was born on the 9th october 2010 and is now 5 months old.Enes has just been diagnosed with severe Brachycephaly commonly known as flat head syndrome.

Enes needs a specially fitted helmet that he will wear 23 hours a day which will help to correct this problem.This helmet is molded to Ene's head leaving a space around the flattened area so that any growth is channeled into the area.Unfortunately the NHS will not fund treatment and this costs £1950.00 privately. The results once children have been wearing these helmets are fantastic,Enes has had his first consultation and 3-D scan in preparation for his helmet.

Please help us with this worthy cause and help to highlight this problem and so aid other children like Enes.

Any money donated over £1950 will go to the charity headstart4babies who aim to help families on low income provide helmets for their babies.

Enes is the most beautiful and happy little boy so please help us to make a difference, Many Thanks.

Want to find out more????

Pop over to Emma's Facebook page - Enes Brachycephaly Helmet Appeal have a look at all the wonderful items that have been donated for her auction.

Like her page and don't forget to share it with your friends.

Bid on an item that takes your fancy.

I'm sure this won't be Emma's last auction so if you fancy donating an item just pop over to the discussion board on her page and leave a message - that's what I did.....

All the items in this current auction finish TOMORROW (MONDAY).

Spring Makes Me Sing Swap Goodies

Still seem to be blipping rather than blogging at the moment but I was thrilled with every one's comments on my up cycled bookcase and I love the fact that you were all interested in my little window, we have two of these windows, one in the hall and one in the downstairs loo, and I feel that i shall have to post some more pictures soon to show all the little character parts of our home as well as finally posting some pictures of the kitchen, especially as it's the turn of the bathroom makeover next so I'd better get a move on......

Right back to swap goodies......

I was partnered with the lovely Country Girl over at My Life on the East Coast for the

 Spring Makes me Sing Swap organized by Jackie at Sew Special Bears.

 Country Girl and I have been partners before in another swap and amazingly as neither of us are any good at email housekeeping we still had each others contact details from the last swap so that made things nice and easy. After a couple of emails to find out what makes each of us sing about Spring we were off putting together our swap parcels.

Below is a collage of what Country Girl put together for me and it definitely made me sing!!!!

You can click on the photo for a larger image.

All the packages were wrapped in yellow and green tissue and crepe papers and tied with ribbons, what I love about this is that it's all part of the swap and its a gift in its self as it can all be recycled sometime in the future.

The pretty tin containing the chocolate buttons (obviously the buttons have now all been eaten) is going to be put to good use in my workshop/sewing room and it's definitely going on display as its far to pretty for hidden storage!

The red chicken ribbon has prompted me to buy the same red chicken fabric on ebay (which has been in my watch list for ages) and I shall make something chickeny for my kitchen.

The daisy magnetic pegs have been hidden from my daughter as I know that she would have grabbed those as soon as she saw them and again they will be put to good use in my workshop.

I can see now how easy it is to become a CK fan as the hand cream smell delicious and the buttons are just so pretty and well presented.

I am trying to be a bit more green fingered this year and was wanting to get the children more involved and these sunflower seeds will come in very handy for our sunflower growing competition.

I just love the crochet purse, the green is just the right shade and the flowers so bright and cheerful. I am in the process of making myself a new bag to hold my camera and purse etc and will use the crochet purse as extra storage when it's finished.

So now it just leaves me to say a big thank you to Country Girl for being a fantastic swap partner I've been thoroughly spoiled (again) and another big thank you to Jackie for organizing the swap.

Thanks girls!!!!!