Victorian Flowers on Blissful Whites Wednesday plus a couple of TT tags and EIM inchies

When we came back to the UK after our summer in France, I managed to catch one of the last outdoor boot fairs of the year, and to my delight, one of my favourite sellers was there. I had bought a number of Victorian scraps from this lovely gentleman over the past few years on the rare occasions he had a stall at the boot fair. This time round, I bought a small bag full of delightful pieces rescued from a Victorian scrap book. To me they look like they have been very carefully cut from greeting cards. For this BLISSFUL WHITES WEDNESDAY, I picked a few scraps featuring gorgeous WHITE flowers -

Soooo sweet!

I am also trying to get catch up with all the tags and inchies challenges I have missed over the last couple of months. Haven't gotten very far yet, lol, but I made a couple of inchies and a couple of tags. 

This is one of the catch-up tags, theme was EGYPT -

For the background I used a panel of hieroglyphics, cut out Egyptian columns, and the bust of Nefertiti. What a beauty! Instead of using tassels, I finished off the bottom of the tag with an Egyptian gold ornament.

This week's tag theme was PROVERBS. I chose 'An Englishman's home is his castle' for the tag. The background on this tag is is Warkworth Castle in Northcumberland, reputedly haunted, as any good castle should be of course. I just added a smart looking Victorian gentleman, a few bits of greenery and of course the proverb itself -

Gosh, I missed so many inchies as well. I have only made two catch-up ones so far, SONG -

Thats all for today. As always, its great to see you here! Toodlepip xxx

Grey Dey Thursdey music illustrations

I have this gorgeous bound collection of sheet music, called Romance. French, of course, dated 1859 on the spine of the book and stamped with the name of the owner on the front. It has the most beautiful illustrations, and I thought for this Grey Dey Thursdey I'll show you some of them -

Hop over to Petite Michelle Louise's blog for the GREY DEY THURSDEY party and check out all the other beautiful grey posts! I have to get back to packing, we are driving back to the UK tomorrow morning!

As always, thank you gals so much for stopping by. Toodlepip xxx

A bit of cosy snuggly whiteness

Well, perhaps thats getting a bit ahead of myself, lol. I have only just started on another snuggle blanket. When the days get shorter and the temperature drops, I need woolly goodness, I have to find something to crochet or knit. I am a very basic knitter only, and crocheting, well, if its not too complicated, I can do it. But my favourite thing to do is crocheting granny squares. Because they are small, they are quick to complete and thus give you a sense of achievement really quickly. It is so nice to see a stack of squares growing steadily.

I had some odd balls of wool from a charity shop in a soft off white and very light beige and a few other balls I acquired a couple of years ago. So I started making very basic granny squares. I also found some quite thick ( recycled from an Arran sweater? ) wool in a local charity shop and thought I would use that wool as well for plain stripes to alternate with granny square stripes. Haven't gotten that far yet though, but here are the pics of what I have made so far -

Not sure you can tell the slightly different shades in the photos, they are quite subtle.

I am linking this post to Becky's Blissful Whites Wednesday over at her TIMEWASHED blog.

Only a couple more days at the cottage in France, we are going back to the UK on the weekend. It is always hard leaving here, but at least I will be back in my craftroom before long, woohoo!

Toodlepip xxx

White and Grey

Well here we are in France at the cottage, trying to cram all sorts of things into the two weeks. Our tree surgeon son is with us and working on our trees, felling where necessary, reducing others. The felling is comparatively quick, its the clearing up of all the branches and log cutting afterwards which takes up soooooo much time. Today was a rather wet day though, so this afternoon DH and I went to a brocante shop so that I could try and find a few little bits and pieces for Blissful Whites Wednesday and Grey Dey Thursdey. I hope you don't mind me doing one post for both, the pieces look kinda nice together -

See the bunches of grapes? This piece is so perfect for where we live, in beautiful Bourgogne, famous for their wines -

Pewter wine tasting cups, such a lovely shade of grey -

Grey steel antique window fittings -

More grey pewter, this time in the shape of candlesticks -

Got to love the ornate detail -

I am linking this post to Becky's Blissful Whites Wednesday and Petite Michelle Louise's Grey Dey Thursdey linky parties. 

Hopefully tomorrow the weather will be better so that we can carry on outside. Fingers crossed. 

Hugs to you all, toodlepip xxx

Christmas Tag Swap

I know that since getting back from France, I have missed loads of weekly challenge tags over at the Tag Tuesday blog. I didn't feel very crafty at all. But when Carolyn announced the 2013 Christmas Tag Swap, I just couldn't resist it. It was just what I needed to get my creativity going again. This is what I came up with -

I went with a gold and white theme this year. The background is a glittered soft, almost fabricy paper, which I overlaid with some gold netting. I embellished the white braid at the bottom with glass beads and glass pearls rescued from a broken vintage necklace. The sweet little winter angel is standing on snow, which I covered in vintage 'glittering Christmas frost'. I had that little packet since the late 70s, I am sure. A few silver and white stars and snowflakes and that was it really.

Grey Dey Thursdey - WIP

I know it is Friday, but I have been busy getting ready to go to the cottage in France! So I am late. Again. LOL. I won't have room in the car to take my crafty suitcase this time, and we are only going for two weeks, but I can't go without at least a tiny little project to keep my hands busy in the evenings. I have put together a little grey needle book kit for me to complete at the cottage -

I'll let you know how I get on with it! I think I will also take a bit of knitting or crocheting with me. There is nothing more cosy than having something woolly on my lap, sitting by the open fire, on those cold autumn/winter evenings.

You can find plenty more gorgeous greys on Petite Michelle Louise's Grey Dey Thursdey post HERE.

Toodlepip xxx