A Loooonnngg one!

Hi guys! :)

Goodness it's been rather a while after my wee rant about the boiler breakdown. Thank you all for your kind comments,the Bearded Wonder is fine and well again :)

As usual, time ran away, dragging me along behind it lol

Last Saturday was my birthday, so i celebrated in a quiet, civilized fashion, with a cappuccino and a croissant :)

I got the most lovely necklace from a friend at knit and natter, the picture doesn't do it justice at all!

It's so pretty  and gently shimmers in the light

I also got a little jar of sea glass from another knitter, aren't they gorgeous? I could stare at them all day :)

In the post i received some lovely yarn from Amy at Love Made My Home, as i volunteered to do a little crochet pattern testing

(I love the card Amy, it so sweet! it's sitting on my desk :)  )

The pattern was a little sunflower, which is pinned up on my noteboard in the kitchen :)

I'm also foraying into the world of home brew through the post! 

Well, if you can call brewing ginger beer in a butter tub home brewing haha :D

The lovely Fast - SOS sent me a little package through containing a ginger beer plant (like a factory, not the leafy variety) with instruction to feed it every day for 7 days (feeling rather like Little Shop Of Horrors! Will it want my blood soon? hahaha)

This is the link to the Instructions, which will explain much better than I

I've got to feed it until next Monday by which time hopefully it will be ready for the next step :D I'm so exited!

This bit is rather picture heavy, but this is so much fun to do, and the possibilities are endless!

Remember the whole bullet journalling thing i've been doing, to help me plan better? Well, it didn't quite work. I just had too much to write in on some days!

So, last week i found this for the grand total of £1.50

It's a patent leather pocket Filofax.

It didn't come with any inserts so, in true Sophie style i made my own! (those things are expensive!) 

I also made some cute little ribboned paper clips (just because) 

The good thing about this project is t helps me work on my hand lettering , which desperately needs tuning up (i'm left handed )

I'm quite pleased with this one :) 

The week on two page layout was made by using some old index cards the hubby unearthed from a dusty box 

All they needed were the edges trimming off and hole punched, which is so old only one side of the punch works,and it doesn't always punch the whole way through so you have to wiggle it a bit lol,  not ideal but i'm investing in a new one next week!

The edges are being put to good use as a little shopping list at the front of the planner.

And some nice little white ones as a notepad

Again, practising hand lettering and giving myself a little positivity :)

This week, drawing on my own layout (what a pain! get one day wrong you have to start all over again, so now i'm extra careful and vigilant)

I also made some wee dividers, which may or may not change soon, as i'm awaiting some wallpaper samples, so i may make more in different colours :) 

April is a reminder to use a ruler, as you can see my hand writing is skew whiff 

There weren't quite enough pink index cards, so i'm also using green, yellow and blue.

Pink for Valentines

Green and Yellow for spring months

and Blue for summer 

I must find some other colours for Autumn and Winter :)

And lastly, i've used more of the leftovers as a little birthday list :)

I LOVE drawing and giving birthday (and Christmas) cards, so if you like, you can let me know when your birthday is and i'll happily send you one :)

You can email me at : myempireofdirtgarden@gmail.com

Thank to Freecycle i also have a nice little computer desk with a cupboard below as extra (desperately needed ) storage

And my lovely highland cow Lucy has found a permanent home (after almost two years lol)

She was gifted in return for one of my paintings a few years ago 

Isn't she sweet?