Merry Christmas 2009

If there is still anybody out there looking on my blog I'm sorry for the lack of material. Its been so heck tic over the last 2 months with our holiday in November in Spain and getting the shop ready for Christmas. In the evening Iv decorated the house in stages, a couple of Friday nights at church we have been making wreaths only for personal use and the variety of different designs were very interesting. We decorated the church which took all day!!! My sister and family didn't even get the chance to visit so we all met in Derbyshire when we went to Roberts parents. There was a great carol service in the Doncaster Minster with J John preaching and our own Christmas service in our church were great. We had a church night out at Hooton Pagnall club a meal and the quiz but many didn't manage it, it was bitterly cold and people get busy but those who were there enjoyed it. At the shop we were very busy the last week an early start at 7 o'clock till 7pm and one night 10pm, and with the cold spell and icy roads getting to work and back was a bit scary.

The wreath I made for our door, made nicer with the snow on it.

I know for a lot of people snow is nothing to get excited about but over the later years we have not had much so when we get more than a light covering its quite fun,(except if you have to travel on the untreated roads). My garden.Scampi our westy seems to like the snow, but not so keen wearing one of her many coats. She doesn't look so white against the snow.

Fallon and her friend Ty made this amazing snow lady mostly in the dark two days earlier still doing well.

Here are a few photo's of our decorated house.

Scampi knows where the best place it curl up and sleep

I love my rusty tree and wreath not everybody's cup of tea but I like to have different things.The rusty advent buckets go with the tree's as we have no small children the treats are for the three dogs who know as we turn off the TV at the end of the night and before we get to turn out the lights they are standing waiting with Tom telling us with gentle woofs, "don't forget our treat" The decorations in the kitchen, at one time they adorned the living room, now recycled to the kitchen.This bowl of collected things minus some that the mice have taken bites out off is also relegated to the top of the stairsThis was one of the gifts I gave Robert for Christmas a canvas frame of some of his favourite things in his life Tippy and Tommy.

Two competitions

In September I entered a few flower competitions and had some success, its difficult to get good photo's but here are just a few.

I got a second place for this brides bouquet, I covered the polystyrene holder with layers of sineco gray leaves and used lovely roses, hydrangea, pearls and silver decorative wire. It is held in the palm of your hand.

This is an arrangement for a top table, for a winter wedding and won a second place. The wood sticks were on Roberts bonfire cut from the apple tree and were a lovely colour with the lichen and moss. Red roses, protia, hypericum berries and calla lilies.

We were asked to design a funeral posy and name the person who it was for. I made up a name and his trade was a chair weaver and added the rope etc and used lovely green roses, carnation and hydrangeas and got another second place.

We were asked to design an accessory for a young girl going to the prom. I made a hair fasinator with a frosted pale mauve colored wire and orchid and got a first prize. Its hard to make out the design from the photo. I also made a wrist corsarge out of a fine silver wire making petals and used pearls I thought it was the better of the two but it only got me a second prize. The hair fascinator

The wrist corsarge

This wedding top table arrangement got me a third prize.

The next few photo's are from a different show a much bigger show and I didn't get any placement but to get something is a bonus, I really just enjoy entering and getting the chance to do something different.

In this competition we were asked to design an arrangement for the relaunch of a magazine. I chose a cake magazine and made all these cakes out of coloured foam and little flowers.

The brides bouquet was to be designed for bride on a budget £75.00 or less. I made the wire holder and the construction was made from snake grass, red roses and a few hypericam berries, finished off with a hand made red wire heart.

The title of this section was preserve the season. I wanted to do something different from the dried plant material so chose this arrangements preserving the season by painting the flowers a living picture. I got a 4Th prize.

This was a rather radical design. The title was the meandering river and everybody used water and plenty of foliage. The two frames were made from lots of silver wire on a slate tile, silver wool, shaped white melinola sticks and shaped calla lilies representing the meandering river. It got me a unexpected forth prize. I was very pleased with all my work and enjoyed nit very much although it is heard work setting up and taking down.

Harvest Festival 09

It was our church harvest festival the other Sunday and although we don't hand out food parcels to the older people in the community we ask for dry or tin food which we send to an organized charity called M 25 (Mathew chapter 25). They provide meals for the homeless and poor. I sent letters to 5 of the major supermarkets asking for a donation which some have in the past and this year not one person reply ed.

Hi

Chatsworth house one of the places we visited on our holiday

I never intentionally meant to keep away this long, but the time just got away. The holiday Robert and I had was wonderful and the weather was fab after the dull summer, work was busy and entered a few floral competitions and time spent outside after work before the dark nights set in. Talking of dark nights the clocks go back this week so it will be dark when i leave work at 5pm and as i go for a early swim before work it will be dark in the mornings. I wouldn't mind the colder weather so much if it wasn't so dark. But we are off again on the 9th November for a week not to our usual beloved Scotland but a cultural coach tour through France to Spain, watch this space. Back at the shop the Christmas goods are arriving every day. I really don't like putting out the stock to early and not before bonfire night the 5th November, but the major stores and garden centers are ready set for Xmas and I have even seen an advert on the tv, so you get swept along with it all.

Castle Howard

On the very rare Saturday that I get off from work Robert and I made the most of it and visited Castle Howard. It wasn't our original destination, but once again the traffic around York was so bad and slow when we saw the road sign for Castle Howard we decided to go there instead. We only wanted to go round the grounds and half an hour into our visit the heavens opened. As it was nearly lunch time we went back to the car and sat like an old couple eating our picnic. It wasn't long before the rain was over the clouds blown away (it was very windy). To be on the safe side I took my rain mack and ended up carrying the rest of the day as the rain kept away and the sun shone.

There are lots of lovely stone garden ornaments.

This house is in the walled garden so we believe this may have been the gardeners cottage.

Sweet face

There were lots of fish in the pond some very big

The long borders looked as if they were past there best but the agapanthus were still in full bloom

This box hedging was in great condition and the bussie Lizzie was doing well considering all the wet weather.

There are a lot of yew hedges it must take an age to cut.

Back in the day of these large grand houses they wanted to extend the grounds into the surrounding countryside, with the cows and sheep but didn't want them to mess up the formal gardens. The photo of the steps looks out into the fields ( the trees would not have been so overgrown) but there is a hidden ditch so the cows look like they are just at the edge of the grounds but cant get past the wall. These walls became know as ha ha walls.

The water features are all man made enhancing the grandeur of the estate. The bridge doesn't go any where. The 1,000 acres are dotted with lakes, fountains, temples and statues.

This pillar standing in the middle of the reservoir had lovely detail on the base which looks like from the water mark as if its covered up most of the time.

This was a lovely place to sit at the end of the day over looking the lake. It had a cafe but there was only sandwiches and drinks no main meals which seemed a shame as it was so much nicer in my option than the main eating places. But I was a bit shocked at the price of the drinks we had, two small bottles of pop cost £3.50 I guess if your thirsty they know you will pay it. I felt sorry for the families with children as the playground was situated here also the ice cream van very tempting for children.

Not bad for the back door

and the view from the back door