fly away birdie

i spent yesterday and today restoring this delightful little side table/sewing box. it's such a sweetie and will be on ebay soonly.


before...

after...

when the lid is closed it can be used as a normal coffee table, but then boom! open it up to find a compartment for all things you need to sew. i have altered the underside of the lid so it can be used as a giant pin cushion, so no pretty little pins get lost, and you can't really see it that well, but into the cushion part i've sewn the silhouette of a bird.

inside the little drawer they is a metal bar that is used for keeping all your cotton reels on, so they stay all neat and untangled. 

x

fabulous fridays presents...

Hay On Wye
(a day late, sorry!)


friday really was rather fabulous, i spent a lovely day in sweet little Hay On Wye with my mother and the boyf. such a beauty of a town, if you've never been to Hay, i recommend it highly, it's tiny but is overflowing with secondhand bookshops. the bookshops themselves are amazing, the buildings are like rabbit warrens, i think you'd be able to find Narnia if you wandered far enough. the books spill over every surface and are piled high in every corner. so many stories collected over time and hidden away, only to be discovered and read all curled up on one of the wobbly wooden chairs placed by tiny windows overlooking winding streets.

view driving into Hay

this little shop is called 'murder and mayhem' and only sells books on this topic

my mother :)

oooooh i was just so excited as i peered into the shops

all this reading sure does make you hungry...what better to soothe that hunger than homemade tai sweet potato soup, crusty bread and blackcurrant and vanilla tea

...and then back to the books! come have a look...

yep, that's me with my nose in a Bob Dylan autobiography

we walked past this secondhand shop and i just had to take a picture of this strange beast...a stuffed cat with angel wings. i felt that it was both weirdly beautiful and disgusting all at the same time.

so then we found a gorgeous jigsaw puzzle and teddybear shop...

then once again...we were hungry. theres a lovely little cafe that does vegan food so i was a happy little bunny :) the cafe is beautiful, full of mismatched chairs and a log fire.

just had to share this amazing raw vegan chocolate with you, i'm not usually a fan of raw chocolate, but this stuff was rather lovely :)

on the way back there was just enough time to pop into the sweet shop, i just can't resist the smell of sugary goodness, especially when there's a sun setting all pink in the sky.

rhubarb and custard :)

me looking mighty happy after a wonderful day!

the sunset as we were driving home.

hope you all had a fabulous friday! x

wonderful wednesdays presents...

spicy vegetable soup


ingredients (makes about 4/5 portions)
1 medium-large red onion
3 medium cloves garlic


mixture of veg, as much as you want, i use- 
1 potato
2 carrots
1 small sweet potato
half small swede
handful of broccoli
handful of cauliflower 
handful of cabbage


200g red split lentils
half a glass (just a slosh) of tomato passata (optional-just makes it more tomatoey!)
1 teaspoon brown sugar
large pinch black pepper
pinch of salt
tin of baked beans
tin of mixed beans (optional)
2 teaspoons of  red chillies (fresh or from jar)
olive oil to cook onions and garlic.

1) chop the onion and garlic and fry it gently in a large saucepan until it goes all soft and see through.

2) whilst it's cooking, chop up all your chosen vegetables. sorry if i sounded vague in the ingredients, but it's simply because you really can add as much or as little veg as you like, thats the great thing about this soup! you can either go crazy with the healthy food and put every kind of vegetable you can think of in there, or if you only have a potato and some cabbage that needs using up it will be just as tasty! :)

once chopped, add all the veg to the onions and garlic, along with the red lentils and mixed beans. 

bang in the salt and then cover with water and simmer until the lentils are cooked. (they'll go all fluffy!)

3) once the lentils are cooked, add the tomato passata, the sugar and the pepper.

4) now simply add the baked beans and the chillies and stir it all up! 

simmer until the veg is cooked, then i usually blend half of it, so it's just the right amount of chunky :)

serve with crusty bread (or personally i like crackers!) in pretty bowls and enjoy! :)

x

lovebirds

hello hello hello! feel like i haven't been blogging as much as i would like, but i have been being a busy little bee and scribbling away on a little collection called 'boy meets girl'. 
i was thinking, what with v-day looming and love being all around and all that jazz, i may jump onto cupid and grab his bow for a little while. i'm sure he won't mind.
i am planning to get an online shop going sooooonly, so stay tuned. i wana fill it with pretty little things, cards and bags and cushions and drawings and jewellery and other bits and pieces... would this be something of interest to you lovely people? 
the collections i'm working on at the moment are 'freedom skies', 'boy meets girl' and 'kiss my teapot'.
heres some sweet little lovebirds...don't they make you just wana eat chocolate, watch mushy films and go for long walks where you can skip merrily through fields of long grass whilst the wind lifts your hair and you sing along with wild animals? or maybe thats just me...

loveeeeee x