Sunday 23 March 2014

Rainbows and Gifties

Over at the Our Beautiful World blog, the word prompt this week is RAINBOW. They are magical things, and I don't know anybody who doesn't ooh and aah over a beautiful rainbow.

I took these rainbow pictures at our cottage in France, when the rainbow spanned the whole of the valley below us -





If you look very carefully, you can see a faint second rainbow above the main one.

These photos make me homesick, I can't wait to get back to France and our little cottage ( which you can just see in the last photo ).

And now, confession time. I am sooooo bad at remembering dates. Birthday dates to be precise. I have them written down in my Bloggy address book, but of course I forget to check it regularly. Now, my darling friend Dorthe knows this and puts up with it, and instead of sending birthday presents, we send gifts when, well, when gift sending pops into our minds. On Saturday, I received the most wonderful 'non-birthday giftie' from Dorthe. I could hug that beautiful woman forever, she is such a wonderful person. Here are my gorgeous gifts from her -

Always so prettily wrapped -


Beautiful skeleton leaves -

Stunning collage -





Another little package held all these fabulous pieces of ephemera -


Yet another package held this oh so pretty tag -




And the last package, oh my goodness, it was wrapped in the loveliest paper and was decorated with these dainty and delicate dried little flowers. Amazing that they survived the journey totally intact -


They now live permanently in my beautiful nest from Vicki -

Inside the package, this exquisite heart -



Everything so very beautiful, sigh.



Big big hugs to this amazing lady, wonderful friend and constant inspiration.

After showing you all these beautiful things again, all I want to do is fondle all the amazing creations I have received from friends over the years. They are all around me, so even while I get on with the tedious task of listing stuff on Etsy now, I can see them and smile at them, so all is well with my Sunday evening.

I wish you all a great week. Toodlepip xxx


Tuesday 18 March 2014

GREEN and Bits n Pieces

The world prompt over at the Our Beautiful World blog this week is GREEN. Yesterday was a beautiful day, blue skies, sunshine, and the new growth on the bushes and trees was the most delightful fresh green. But I didn't have my camera with me on our short walk in the Firehills. Today I was prepared, but it was overcast and grey and not right for pics. Sod's law, lol. So I decided to go with a photo I took a few years ago of a brocante find in France -


I couldn't bear to part with this beautiful vase, so it is still gracing the kitchen window sill in our cottage in France.

I keep making simple little tags to go with customer orders, it gives me much pleasure. Here are a few of them -







And a couple of tag which have gone to friends -






Thank you for all the lovely messages re my poorly back. It is much better, I can walk and sit again, woohoo. 

Also, a big hello and welcome hug to the lovely people who have recently become followers and/or left comments. It is such a shame that this - noreply-comment@blogger.comcomes up so often and prevents me from saying hello personally. Please consider changing it, it is so nice to communicate with fellow bloggers.

Toodlepip xxx


Thursday 13 March 2014

Aaah, such beauty!

When we got back from France last week, my son handed me a package. A package from Australia! That could only mean that this was a gift from my very dear friend Suzy, from Suziqu's Threadworks. I didn't open it that evening, as we had too much unpacking etc to do, but there was no way I could wait until my birthday. So the next morning I did the naughty deed, lol. You all know Suzy's incredible work, so you can imagine how excited I was. I was pretty much speechless then, and I am not going to say much now either, I'll let the photos speak for themselves -

The tag, which was the first thing I saw -



The beautiful clutch, so perfect for little keepsakes -



Hidden away in the clutch were these two gorgeous pieces -

This beautiful quilted piece with locks from her 'girls', lace, ribbons -



I am a very lucky girl to be the recipient of such beautiful gifts. I was over the moon with them.

But...

that wasn't all.

There was also this -







Even the back of the heart is so beautifully finished -

I can't tell you in words how much these exquisite pieces mean to me. I can feel the friendship and love which have gone into making them and I feel as if Suzy is right here by my side when I hold these treasures in my hands. I am truly blessed to be able to call her my friend.

It has been over week since I opened the package and I only just managed to take some photographs. Why? I did my back in last Wednesday, no idea how, but it had crippled me for a week, I could hardly move. I can get around again, but can't sit for very long, so computer time is very limited. Still, the sun is shining, Spring has sprung and life is good.

I wish you all beautiful Spring/Autumn days, toodlepip xxx