Counting The Good Things

There have been some very sad, heart breaking events in the past week or so. Things I am not able to talk about here because they concern others. Although I have cried, life with small people has to carry on in as normal a fashion as we are able.

I am trying to count the good things.

Fresh baked scones in my new cake stand;


A new wall, although the delight was not in having a wall but watching my big and littlest man 'work';



Finding pretty mosaics when stuck in Oldham waiting for Simon on a work mission;



And baking chocolate cake for our friend's 12th birthday, happy birthday Lily;


Daisie xxx

ooooh, we've had a busy week this week, with Simon back at work and no major works going on I have been able to take the children out and not feel guilty about him working hard at home.

We've had two trips to the cinema, a marathon cake/scone baking session, a food shop (boring), a trip to Ikea for birthday meatballs and yesterday we walked in the sun through the woods over the road and had a fabulous, if a little muddy, time;






There has been some enbriodery, of sorts, and some other crafting going on, we have friends coming tomorrow and a new window for the dining room is being fitted, busy busy busy!!

Daisie xxx

Happy Birthday!!

My beautiful baby girl is ten today.

Where did that time go??!

It seems like only yesterday and a whole life time ago since I held a tiny bundle to my chest and was so proud and so thankful that my daughter had arrived safely. After several years and several miscarriages I had feared I would never have my own child and here she was, small and perfect.

I love her a little more everyday.

She has taught me more than anyone else I have ever known.

She taught me to be the mother I am.

She teaches me something everyday.

I love her so much, my beautiful, big girl, Elizabeth;


Here she is last year, the year before and the year before that!

Big Boys And Pizza Packaging (Sketchbook Challenge)

After the disaster that was potato printing I have been keeping my eyes out for other print block making materials. I have even eyed up lino blocks and cutting tools online, I used to love lino printing at school, the danger of the sharp little diggy-outy tool and the fact that it never quite cut how you planned but looked cool anyway. I think I may invest in some bits for Christmas card making...... a plan is forming.....

Anyway, with eating in the bedroom we have gone for things that make little mess that can be eaten with fingers and kitchen roll. The other night the children had pizza and salad. I folded the bases in half to a satisfying pop as they snapped and then thought, oh, I wonder;


They were big enough for me to draw my images on with the wrong end of a paint brush;


I covered them in some whispers ink from my stash and printed away;



I quite like the look, I think that the base was a bit soft and flimsy and the ink didn't cover as well as it should but I like the textured look of the prints.

I also managed to enlarge the images of my boys;


Something went wrong with Sebastian's lip, don't know what happened, I redrew it a few times, went back to my tracing and checked the small squares, went back to my original image to double double check. It seems he was pouting all along but I didn't notice until he was 'big'.

I mixed some water colours and made two new shades (tints?) of purple and mixed some grey tones for their background;


Simon is back at work today so the renovations will slow down now, we're going to do some washing, do a food shop, see if a friend's in for a play and get back to 'ordinary' life.

What are you doing today??

Daisie xxx

Some Creating And A Winner!!

I was gifted some pink net and an idea formed in my head;


To hang on a bedroom door or a Christmas tree (apologies, I said it now). Quite pleased with how they turned out.

But this netty madeness planted the seed of an idea in Francesca's head and a while later with some off cuts of the net and a pair of last years' school socks;


She has some funky rock-chickie fingerless gloves;





*turns to hubby and says "pick a number from one to four"*

The reply is TWO so Little Blue Mouse please email me a snail mail address and I'll send you a little Daisie Davies something, just as soon as I've decided what!!

Daisie xxx

All the rubble has gone!! Ceiling, walls, assorted stuff, all carried out of the house and into a big skip. The lead and copper piping has been removed by FIL to be weighed in for scrap. The plasterboard and battoning has arrived to build the new walls. The chimney has been dug out. I have vacced and mopped about a bazillion times which has enabled us to get the table up;


And allowed room for dancing after tea;


But the feet are still dirty;


I'll be mopping a bit more today and pulling nails from the ceiling joists and later this evening I'll be picking a winner for my giveaway.

Daisie xxx

601!! A Little Giveaway

Ooooh, it was the 600th post last time and I've only just realised, how rubbish am I??! If you leave me a comment on this post I will pick a winner some time this weekend and send you some rubble!! Well, not rubble but I haven't decided what yet. It'll be a suprise!!

Yesterday was beautifully sunny so me and the small people set off to the park to meet some chums, have a picnic and play some ball. Sebastian walked lots but really didn't like any of the four legged friends we saw, he leapt into Elizabeth's arms at the sight of a furry tail;



Francesca found the tiniest acorn I have ever seen;


And we saw the oldest tree in Burnley, I'll tell you the story another time;


We had a great time and I'm so glad I decided to escape as today is really rainy and grey (again) but no matter as I'm at work today. Simon demolished alot more of the chimney breast and has dropped something on his foot, I fear he has broken a toe so a day for me to be in work couldn't have been better timed. They are off to get Elizabeth her birthday present and then I suspect they'll make popcorn and have a lazy afternoon with a movie in my bed (as long as there's no crumbs!!).

Daisie x

Dust And Stuff

Even though I have duct taped the doors to within an inch of their lives;


The dust is still billowing through;


Only the walls down so far, I think it'll be a lot dirtier tomorrow when the ceiling comes down!!

The highlight of the walls coming off was finding this amazing bit of wall paper around the fireplace;


The low point was when it was revealed that there was no pretty arch in this room like in the frontroom;


Gutted doesn't do it justice!! I was so disappointed it ruined my whole day :(

Simon and his genius brain (the size of a small planet) has come up with a brilliant solution that has made me smile from ear to ear since he told me this afternoon, it's better than a pretty arch!! I'm not going to say anymore about that now and wait until it's done for a grand reveal!!

I have managed to take two nice picture of all the children together, now pick yourself up from the floor and look: on the window sill before we taped Daddy in;


And tonight eating tea on my bed;


Not a great place to eat steak pie, new potatoes, peas and carrots but needs must. The first evening was lovely and warm, Simon and Nathaniel had gone to Manchester to see the football, the rest of us sat in the garden and ate McMummy's and played hopscotch until bedtime. The second evening it was a bit dull and grey but dry, we donned cardigans and ate meatballs and spaghetti with spicy sauce. Since then it has rained and rained and rained. We are living upstairs. I leave the front of the house in the morning in my pyjamas and wellies and troop round the back to the kitchen and come back later with coffee and breakfast.

It's a glamorous life we lead!!

Daisie xxx

Sketchbook Challenge #2 (Well, #3 Really)

Well the printing was a disaster, either it was the potatoes I was using, the ink or paints I was using, the papers I was using or just me. It didn't work one little bit. I was most disappointed as I spent ages chopping with my very tiny very sharp knife. When I have an idea of what else I could use around the house to cut a printable image with I'll come back to it.

The enlarging was fun, I did as Gina suggested and used L frames rather than a window;


I focused on the front of the children's faces;


I have, so far only enlarged the girls;


Mainly because I used L frames my windows were a little wonky and weren't a regular number of any measurement (metric or not) and it made my brain ache to enlarge the squares when I had divided them up!! There are lots of other factors that have made my brain ache this week but I'll come back to that later!!

I used a pink/purple again for Francesca as she is a bit of a pink princess on the sly;


And added some blue to the mix with some white (sorry to have called this a shade last time Gina, I have read your teaching words and now know that adding white is a tint and adding black is a shade!) for a more blue/purple look;



I am really rather proud of myself and think they look fabulous *blowing own trumpet* and will do the boys as soon as my brain recovers!!

Daisie xxx

A Bit More Demolition

Well, here we are entering the final stage of our house demolition/re-build. The dining room, living room, train track making space, crafting space, you name it space. This is going to be hard. Very hard. It's the heart of our home, the hallway/stairs hallway of last summer was hard as wherever you wanted to be in the house meant passing through the mess. Now there will be no passing through.






I took these pictures yesterday when we had half emptied the room (yes, it IS half empty). Now it is completely empty. Tomorrow the walls start coming down. Tomorrow the mess and stress begins. We will be living upstairs and going out the front door and around the house to go in the kitchen to prepare meals etc. I am keeping my fingers crossed that the weather stays fine and we can eat in the garden.

I can't wait for it all to be finished, the dining room will match the front and our home will be so beautiful. Francesca is especially excited about planning our fabulous Christmas party. This year is going to be amazing; a proper sized tree and sorted house without tool boxes and bits of plasterboard everywhere for people to trip over!

Hopefully the time living upstairs will enable me to tidy and sort my den come stash room enough for me to continue making and creating.

Anyhoo, am off to enlarge part of my sketchbook!

Daisie xxx

Sketchbook Update

Pictures wrong way round again, need to have a play when I get some time as it's infuriating me now!! I must also apologise for the two pictures of my clingfilm wrapped pages, they were pretty but not so sure you needed to see them twice!!

Anyhoo, I was pleased with how the boys looked and wanted to extend the images to make them actually kiss. I drew Nathaniel again and again removing detail each time, it became like a visual echo. My plan was to do the same with Sebastian but I thought it would make the page look busy and spoil the effect I had already achieved.

I then mixed some children's add-water-paint-block in a luverly shade of purple and painted his full face, I then mixed in a little white each time to lighten the colour on each of his echo phases (that sounds a bit poncey but my words are not working well this morning). I painted the girls too, adding some magenta to the mix for Francecsa and a little blue for Elizabeth; that picture has disappeared all together!!


We haven't had a go at printing yet, am trying to think of something other than a potato to print with.......? And we are once again packing our life into boxes and retreating to part of the house while the last section of the house is demolished and rebuilt by Simon. I'll explain more in another post......

Oh, and one question, where has the sunshine gone? Have you got it? Want to share??

Daisie xxx