Needlebook

I made this little house in only two evenings, and it was a lot of fun. First time I've used my pinking scissors.
The little flowers were a great way to practice French knots, look here.
The pattern is published here, there are a lot of nice embroidery patterns to be discovered on this website, also free patterns.

Cottage

1. Mushroom House: Red, 2. weather house, 3. Baby's House, 4. somebody lovingly made this, 5. Fairytale cottage, 6. house bank, 7. Deco 20s Red Roof Cottage--Tally Card , 8. Gamekeeper's Cottage_1, 9. vintage tins, 10. Down the red brick path, 11. nans van leeuwen, 12. Tiny house, 13. House of Four Seasons 6, 14. 20s Vintage Cottage Illustration Playing Card Back, 15. Peter and the wolf, 16. leaning hill
There's a little project I've wanted to do for a long, long time. Tonight I will give it a try.
In the meanwhile, you can enjoy this mosaic. Where do you want to live?
Cottage number 5 is a real cutie...

Cat & mouse

Ooh, it has been a long time...
My laundry bag is finished, I use it for my stray socks (know the problem?).

I'm always stunned by the beauty of Mrs. Potter's watercolours, and I have quite a few projects in mind, featuring her characters.


From now on, I will post a monthly update of my cross-stitched cat. I want to use it for a pillow, when finished.

In the meanwhile, summer has arrived. I try to enjoy it as much as possible, although I have a lot of computer work at the moment.
And that means:
having tea and cake and cherries in the garden,

walking barefoot,

and admire the flowers from my garden.

Getting better

This must be the worst summer in years... been ill all week, sneezing and coughing.
I only managed to do a little bit of gardening,very, very slowly, I really have no energy. And the weeds are growing in abundance...
But the weather is changing, maybe we'll finally get a summer?

A dandelion is so fluffy and cute, if you look closely.

I planted this Solomon's seal (Polygonatum) last spring, and forgot completely about it. And here it is, what a nice surprise!

Monet's house & garden

Yesterday night, I returned from a short holiday in Giverny, France. Main goal of our visit: the house of Monet and his oh so famous garden and the waterlily pond.

We went there early in the morning, and I managed to take this picture of the entrance of the house. Half an hour later, the place was crowded with mostly American and Japanese tourists.

At this time of year, the garden is a lust for the eye. Such a pity you can't smell the peonies...


And then of course the pond... you just have to see it for yourself.


After our three hours visit, time to get a salad and coffee afterwards at Hotel Baudy, the place where all the artists (mostly Americans) would stay in Monet's time. Just lovely!



We had a room with a view at an old mill. Our stay for three days was too short... my husband wanted to paint a lot of the scenery there, but the weather wasn't so good.
If you want to have a look at his (wonderful) paintings, go here.

Potholder

Never tried this pattern before: a flower.

I didn't want to make it a long term project, so I turned the granny square into a potholder.

While crocheting the back of the potholder, I noticed the similarity with the dress I was wearing. It's all in the detail!

And here's a fine example of cat wisdom:

Blue sweater

Finished project last weekend: a light blue cotton sweater. If only the weather was good enough to wear it... I'm wearing all my winter clothes again.

A very simple pattern, with a bit of detail on the shoulders.


I found some knitting and crochet inspiration in the movies.
Wish I had the pattern for this sweater... Faye Dunaway in "Bonnie and Clyde". If you know a similar pattern somewhere, please let me know?

I would love to crochet this little vest. By the way, the costumes of this movie, "Bright Star",(about poet John Keats and Fanny Brawn) were fabulous! More information found here ( about creator Sophie Digard) and here.

And finally, these lovely vests,from "The Edge of Love", based on the love life of the poet Dylan Thomas. I haven't seen the movie yet, but the costumes look quite nice.

A new camera

I got a new camera for my birthday, a Nikon D3000. It's really great to discover and try new things.
First of all, I have to learn to get my pictures sharp...
Great models:
SPIPS

and her mother POOH

Today, my daughter showed me how to play with color balance. Crazy results, this will be fun!


And then back to crafting: I finished a cotton sweater for myself, still need to sew it up, the part of the job I really dislike...

Lily of the Valley

The sweet smell of a very tiny flower...

Beautiful embroidery idea, found in an old Marie Claire Idées.

Sad news

My son came home for the weekend and I had to tell him about our missing cat. He went looking for him and he found him fifteen minutes ago, under a rhododendron, not very far from our house. He walked straight at him, very strange... my husband and I walked past that very spot...

But Punt was always my son's cat, in a way.
It's very sad, but we comfort ourselves with the thought that he had a very good and long life. And he had been ill for quite some time.


I will miss his cute pink nose and his silly face.


Thanks a lot for all your sweet comments on my previous post. It's the first time that my children have to say goodbye to a pet.

I'm worried

...about Punt, our black and white cat. He's been gone since yesterday night, and he never, never has done that before.
He's old (17 years) and has been ill for 3 years, so now we wonder: did he go away to die somewhere in our garden? Because I've been told that cats do that sometimes.
I looked for him everywhere today...
And this is his latest picture, I took it last week.
I hope I will be back with good news, but I really have a bad feeling about this.