Fancy a Swap?

The very lovely Betty from Betty the Wood Fairy is hosting a From My Home to Yours swap, where you send 4 items (at least one of them must be handmade) to your swap partner reverent to your country, county or town

There is still time time sign up as partners will be listed on the 20th June. So if you fancy receiving some gorgeous goodies in the post from another part of the world then pop over to Betty's blog and leave a comment.

What I am focusing on - Blog Hop

I really want to get back into regular blogging and what better way than taking part in a blog hop. I haven't done many of these and always find it hard to write about myself but my friend Joy from Daisy Row nominated me and I thought this would be an ideal way to get the ball rolling. You can read all about Joy and her answers to the blog hop questions here.

For those of you who have been following my blog for some time will know a bit about me, but for those of you that are new to my blog I am a wife and mum (to 2 teenagers, Rachel 16 and Jack 14, and our wonderful surprise number three Tomas aged 6). I began crafting on a regular basis when I broke my elbow quite badly and had a lot of time on my hands there was also a cross stitch shop just around the corner so this became my favourite haunt and a way to while away the time in between operations. My one sewing machine and small box of fabrics and cross stitch kits has grown in my nearly 20 years of marriage and I now have my own workroom in the garden where I store/hoard fabric, yarn and buttons and create handmade goodies on one of my four sewing machines!!

So, into the blog hop questions ;

What am I focusing/working on now?

Right now I am focusing on working through my huge "to do" list without getting sidetracked by new projects, ideas and fabrics. This I find very hard indeed. I have become very busy lately with both orders on my facebook page and with all the wonderful talents swaps I am taking part in and although I am really enjoying the challenges this brings I need to make sure I balance my sewing time with my other pastimes (mainly my photography) and spending time with my hubby who is now at home after taking early retirement. I'm really lucky that we both have hobbies that are based at home ( he keeps canaries) so we get to spend time together but because I have been so busy lately it has meant I have been sewing almost every day and sometimes in the evenings.

How does my work differ from others of its kind?

I'm not really sure my work is different from others of its kind as I don't have a unique style or create one particular thing. In fact I get bored really quickly and love that one day I can be making cushions and then next superhero capes. I am inspired by the creations on Pinterest and try to put my own spin on the things I make and generally I find that the things I make grow during their making process so I don't often start with a set idea. I know this may sound silly but my fabrics tend to end up as a particular thing not through planning but often through last minute brainwaves and their ability to letting me know what they want to be. I have had fabrics sitting on my shelves for years waiting to be made into some such project and they have been discarded for others only for them to suddenly be the perfect piece for something completely different.

Why do I create what I do?

When my hubby worked shift work I cross stitched to fill the time I was at home alone especially night shifts. I then sewed to create things for our home and eventually for our children. I then made a couple of bags and gave them as presents and that was the beginning of Mad About Bags. Since starting my blog I have taken part in lots of swaps and I really love choosing the right project to make for my swap partner depending on their likes and dislikes. This has grown then where I tend to make mostly bespoke items on my facebook page and I relish a fabric hunt looking for the perfect fabric to create something that is personal to the recipient.

How does my writing/creating process work?

My creating process begins with an order or a swap and then I try to find out as much as I can about the wants and likes of who the project is for and then look into fabrics and designs using Pinterest as a way of gauging the persons style etc. then fabric choice is one of my favourite pastimes and I have been know to order fabrics from Japan and France to make sure I have the right piece. Fabrics then, as I said before, tend to let me know what they want to be or not be! (I can't help it I'm wierd!)
I can be a great proscratinator and I have been know to leave projects till the last minute because they just don't feel right and I definitely am at my most productive when under pressure. It still amazes me that things that I make are all over the world and are in people's homes. It's satisfying to know that what I have made has been perfect for the person it was intended for.

Okay so that is enough about my weird and wonderful crafting antics so now all I have to do is introduce you to the three bloggers that I have nominated to continue the blog hop. I have been following all three of these bloggers for sometime and am always inspired by their makes and their blog posts about their lives. I have also been involved in swaps with all three of these lovely ladies.

First up is

Kimberley from Creative Chaos.

Kimberley may live half way around the world but we share lots of common interests and are penfriends too, although I am slightly rubbish at regular correspondence. We also send each other happy mail parcels of tea bags and toiletries!

Here is a little about Kimberley

Married to Stephen for 18 years. Three boys Joshua (15), Kieran (13) and Ryan (10). Was a stay at home mum for 12 years before getting back into working at school libraries. Am a qualified and professionally registered librarian working at an awesome school in one of NZ's poorest areas. Have lived in the UK and Australia and not much would stop me from moving countries again! Love to travel, take photos, write letters (Have had penfriends for decades and always looking for more!), scrapbook, garden, blog. Biggest love would be knitting and wool (corner of bedroom looks like a wool shop!). Always knitting something and always knitting socks! And dishcloths lately too. A wool hoarder. :) Sew occasionally. Have an obscene amount of stationery/writing cards/paper, but that does not stop me buying more. Love tea, magazines, pottering, being at home a bit, doing laundry (yes!), baking, road trips, bookshops, shoes, New Zealand made products, autumn, spicy food, op shopping (but never find much) and blog swaps! Have picked up part time university study again this year (aiming to do 4 papers this year!), which is good, but motivation is my big thing (or rather lack of). A pretty busy life, working, studying and running around after boys!

Gem from Gem's Country Life Dream

Gem and I live on the outskirts of the same city and I have had the pleasure of meeting her in person. I have been following Gem's blog for some time and am inspired by her zest for learning new crafts and I love reading how Gem and James are creating their first home together as they begin their life journey together.

Soon to be married Gem, 26 years old living with fiancé James on the outskirts of a small village just outside of Chelmsford city centre. We have always dreamed of living our life in the country, in a typical little English cottage surrounded by land with our own small holding. We are currently getting a small taste of what life for us could be like, living in a beautiful little bungalow situated on an old apple orchard. This is our first home together and I have loved nothing more than making little bits and pieces for our first home together. I've taught myself the majority of the crafts I partake in including sewing, knitting and cross stitch but have had lessons in flower arranging and completed workshops in felting and upholstery. I'm very hands on and like to give anything a try. I've no idea where my fondness of crafts has come from as I don't really remember crafting a great deal as a child and no one else in my family is very creative in a textiles sense, although I shan't grumble, it is a lifestyle I am quite taken with and intend it to stay that way.

Emma from My Red Wellies

The thing I love about blogging is you find people from all over the world who share common interests. I have enjoyed reading about Emma's life as a mum to two small children and again how her and her partner have created their own little haven in rural Scotland. We share a passion for photography and family life.

I'm a Mum to two, Iona (2) and Ian (5). I live in rural Scottish countryside, next to an old kirkyard.
I garden - or at least try to, I sew, bake, cook, crochet and generally run around after the two small people.
I take far too many photographs and am getting back into blogging properly again.

Phew! I shall just manage to post this before midnight meaning that it is still Monday!!

Thank you to Joy for nominating me and don't forget to pop along to Kimberley's, Gem's and Emma's blogs to find out more about them and to read their blog hop post next Monday xx




- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Share Your Country Swap

Back in January (it really can't have been that long ago!) Kimberley over at Creative Chaos organised a 

Share your country Swap

with the idea being to send 5 things that symbolise the country you live in / were born in.

Something to eat; something hand made by you that represents your country;  a tourist nick nack; a stationery item ie notecards,postcards, a pen; a souvenir tea towel. 

I was paired with the very lovely New Zealander

 Elaina from A Little Bit Country

Now Elaina made it very easy for me as her About Me page on her blog is very informative

and having decided that as we are both excessive tea drinkers, a tea is so very English, that this would have to be one of the themes along with London as this is where Elaina met her husband and fell in love, not only with an Englishman, but with the city.

You can read about Elaina's London story here 

Before I show you what I sent to Elaina here is the wonderful package that Elaina put together for me.

some very tasty sweets that I ate in hiding in my workroom as I didn't want to share 

(is that mean of me?)

These sweet little bags (I am growing quite a collection of these from my new Zealand swaps) and some Manuka honey soap

Some delicious teas - which I'm looking forward to trying

a very bright and cheerful New Zealand bird tea towel

a handmade necklace showing the islands of New Zealand and a New Zealand magnet

a New Zealand themed tea pot shaped tea bag/spoon rest

some postcards of Elaina's favourite beach and a gorgeous summer magazine which i am going to enjoy reading now that the sun has come out here in England.

And here is what I sent Elaina, 

everything either had a tea, London or red, white and blue theme.

I found this fabulous red, white and blue London, tea pot fabric 

which I made into a quilted mug rug

and these cute lavender filled tea bags

because I thought Elaina might want to make something for herself from the fabrics I added a little bundle of them

along with this London ribbon

I have an old map book in my stash and used this London part to make a felt heart

and I found these super wartime London tea themed stickers on ebay.

I know that Elaina loves to collect china and I was really lucky on one of my charity shop hunts to find this little trinket box

And finally I sent some teabags 

 and some shortbread

Thank you to Kimberley for organising such a wonderful swap and thank you to Elaina for putting together such a lovely swap parcel.

The month of May.......

The month of May has been a busy one for us and this had left little time for blogging but I'm hoping that as things settle down I will have more time to write.

May started with a big celebration as our daughter Rachel celebrated her 16th birthday on the 1st.

Followed by a tea party and fun in the garden the next day 

before heading off to youth group with her friends. 

Tomas needed an explorer jacket for a jungle day at school so I made this reversible jacket with some fabric that I had originally intended to use for Jack's safari themed bedroom and never got round to!!!

He is now nearly 15 so I don't think it will get used.

The following week was Rachel's last day at school as she went on study leave before her exams started. This is a big day at her school and it is tradition to arrive in some sort of fancy dress and strange transportation. It also meant I had to make three alien headbands.

I went along and watched as flash cars, buses, land trains, skateboards, bikes and even a steam engine arrived, cheered on by the rest of the school and watched by us parents.

Rachel's group of friends decided on a Toy Story theme as Buzz Lightyear had been their mascot since year 7. The school then put on a Leaver's Breakfast for the students where old photos are shown and both teachers and students perform on stage and certificates are handed out. It was all over by midday and then it was off to Pizza Hut for a celebratory lunch before getting back home to crack on with revision as exams started on the Monday!

Rachel has been working hard and is already half way through her exams as I write but it does mean she has monopoly of the computer and blog writing on my phone isn't great.

Probably like the rest of the country we did get a glimpse of the sun and had a lovely few days where we even had the sprinkler out

but unfortunately this half term week has been quite grey and miserable so there have been lots of lazy days at home although we did enjoy feeding the ducks at Writtle yesterday.

For some unknown reason a man at the pond decided to catch and pick up one of the ducks and the big goose at the top of my photos tried to protect it and all the ducklings on the grass, served him right as it just seemed like a senseless thing to do!

After a good feed, of breads, rolls and croissants, this duck decided it was time for a bath.

It was a lovely way to spend a hour and gave Rachel a bit of peace and quiet at home for her revision.

Jack has had a nasty cough this week and paired with the bad weather this has meant quite a bit of time has been spent talking to and playing with friends on the playstation. For those of you with teenage boys how do you balance the time spent on these games? I'm not a big fan so have a tendency to call time on it but I do appreciate that these games aren't a quick thing either???

Finally, it's not often you find photos of me here on my blog and after about 100 attempts at a selfie (!!**???) I think I finally managed it.

Here is me sporting my new hair do. 

Simple Pleasures

I'm trying to get back into regular blogging again and not just about my makes so I thought I would share our simple pleasures moment on Bank Holiday Monday.

It's easy to forget

when you are caught up in everyday life

the simple pleasures 

and sometimes 

you just need to sit down

and make daisy chains

for no other reason than

- it's a fun thing to do.

Happy Easter

Just popping in to wish you all a happy Easter weekend.

I promise to get back to regular posting very soon. xx

Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Sew Sweet Swap

Back in January (wow! I can't believe it was that long ago) I signed up for the Sew Sweet Swap over at Catalina's Cottage. The idea being that you send your swap partner a zippered pouch (or similar), some sweets or chocolates and anything else you fancied popping in as well.

I was partnered with the lovely Treena-Marie of Creative Mama in New Zealand

(I'm really loving finding all these new blogs). 

I read the original blog post wrong as I thought it said it WAS a secret swap, therefore I didn't contact Treena-Marie, which I realise now was very rude of me and I must apologise to Treena-Marie. Sorry Treena-Marie I really must learn to read things properly lol!

Luckily we had each filled out a questionnaire from Cat so armed with all my new found knowledge of Treena-Marie I sent about putting together her swap parcel.

But before I show you what I made here is what Treea-Marie sent to me.....

A super cute fox applique zippered pouch, 

I love foxes and I love this pouch.

Inside were some delicious treats - 

Cadbury's mini creme eggs,

a bar of dairy milk, 

and very excitedly I had the chance to try some Whittakers chocolate. 

Those of you that follow some of the blogs from New Zealand will know that Whittakers is the favoured chocolate of many of the bloggers!

and also some New Zealand Earl Grey tea bags, 

which I am now completely addicted to and have had to  resort to bribing people to send me large quantities over from New Zealand (more about that soon!)

as you can see by the photos, the children were at school when this swap parcel arrived and I was able to enjoy eating my sweet goodies in peace.

Thank You Treena-Marie

xxxxxx

For Treena-Marie's swap parcel I decided to make one of my little japanese grab bags in some of the bright colours that Treena-Marie had said she liked.

Inside I popped some fabric squares

a pack of note cards

a pocket mirror

some hot chocolate sachets

and finally some chocolate 

This was a very delicious swap, thanks to Cat for organising and thank you to Treena-Marie for a brilliant swap parcel.