Skip to main content

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? 






Comments

  1. Lovely to catch up with you and your news. Happy Birthday!!!! Glad that you had a good time! xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you Amy, i had a lovely day, nice and [peaceful for a change haha :) xx

      Delete
  2. Glad to see you back! It's been so long we were just about to email and check you were ok.

    GREAT idea using the butter tub, If I'd thought of that I wouldn't have had to use up all the mason jars in the house! I've got another super easy home brew project that I'll post up next week, have a great weekend
    Fast-SoS

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Aww thank you for your concern :) i do have a bad habit of going off and forgetting to blog every now and then haha
      I'm the mistress of improvisation, we always buy the huge tubs of butter for baking, so i keep them handy for use as biscuit tins etc

      oohh i'm looking forward to seeing the next project :D x

      Delete
  3. Happy belated birthday wishes your gifts all look lovely. The ginger beer plant sounds very interesting and I will be keen to see what happens :-) Got to love a little Filofax. Have a lovely weekend, dee x

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you Delia :) i also was spoiled by the Bearded Wonder with a new book and a Tablet thingabob is on it's way as my phone died not long back (more technology to get to grips with lol)
      I'm looking forward to drinking the ginger beer! I still have another week and a half to wait! boo!
      xx

      Delete
  4. Belated Birthday Wishes xx
    I do love the purple filofax I must get one instead of having notebooks everywhere.
    Good to see you are using Freecycle, my craft desk came from there as well xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you Marlene :)
      i love it too, i wasn't terribly keen on the purple to start with but i've grown to love it :)
      xx

      Delete
  5. Happy belated birthday. Oh no...you've fallen in to the world of Filofax, there's no hope for you. You got a great deal though. Do you know about Philofaxy? It's a blog about all things Filofax, I like the Web Finds posts.
    http://philofaxy.blogspot.co.uk/
    It's a while since I've done any posts about my Filofaxes but this is one I did a while ago showing how I use it if you're interested.
    http://jo-throughthekeyhole.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/a-tour-of-my-filofax-crimson-malden.html

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank yo Jo :)
      oh i know, i've completely immersed in all things Filofax this week! My goodness there's loads! haha :)

      I adore your Malden, what gorgeous colour, and so well nicely put together :)
      I've recently discovered erasable pens! what fantastic invention they are, they've e so many times in such a short while lol xx

      Delete
  6. Your highland cow is very sweet, she will smile at you each time you see her. I have not had a filofax for years, but I don't keep much pf a diary these days.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you Marlene, i adore her, the technique used is called Encaustic art, which is melted beeswax with added colour pigments, so she smells delicious too lol :)
      xx

      Delete
  7. Belated Happy Birthday! Glad to hear you are ok after you wee break :). The ginger beer sounds intriguing.....

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you :D i'm so impatient for this ginger beer, but i still have a week and a bit to wait :( i shall be keeping myself busy lol xx

      Delete

Post a Comment

Thank you for your comments, they are always appreciated :) <3

Popular posts from this blog

Our Speaker Today

Hi guys :)  I am part of a community growers group, and over the next year or so we are going try and make our village look nicer and have an edible garden and flower beds.  Co Durham council are going to stop planting flowers in the flower beds on our main street, due to budget cuts, so we got the idea of putting things in the beds ourselves, including lots of herbs, and fruit bushes along the green. We want to really bring the community together and get them involved in growing things and generally making the village look nicer.  Yesterday, me and a two other members (and friends of course!) went on a wee jolly to Durham, for the Food Durham Annual Gathering. It is a marvellous initiative called The County Durham Food partnership.More info  here "Launched in May last year, the purpose is to work together for a more equitable,sustainable, fairer food system for County Durham providing access to food that is healthy for people and the planet." Doe...

Socks and Simple Pleasures

 Hi guys :) How do you like the blogs' new look and layout?  I fancied a change :) The socks on double pointed needles are going well! After a few hiccups with turning the heel (it got ripped out about 5 times!) it is finally beginning to take the shape of a sock! I must admit i am starting to get thoroughly sick of the colour brown! I tried it on after turning the heel but as the needles are straight they wouldn't fit over the instep so i had to quickly transfer them to a long circular.  It turns out knitting with DPN's is easier than it looks once you get into the rhythm of it :)    Today is looking gloomy and miserable, so no chance of putting the washing out. So i thought i'd share some sunnier pictures from the past few weeks This is the view about 1 mile from the house, i often wander down there to get some peace on nice days  On the way home i saw these beautiful horses, they saw me and started running and playing :...

Warm In Winter and Baking Day

Hi guys :) (Yes, I've changed the blog again, it desperately needed a refresh- variety is the spice of life, right?) Well, the snow is here, in case you haven't guessed by looking out of your own windows ;) I had to dive out in the snow this morning to rescue my poor leeks!  As you can see from the photo these were the only ones I managed to save :( I think the  others had decided to go to seed as they hadn't grown any more. Never mind. At least I've grown something rather than nothing :) I really don't like snow that much. It looks pretty, but it's a pain to walk in, as we live at the bottom of a hill, and the shop is on the other side of it! Luckily, we went food shopping yesterday and got everything we'd need for the fortnight, and got last bits and pieces today, so we won't need to leave  the house at all :)   I'll admit it does look very pretty Yesterday i dug out the thick duvet and added an extra blanket as well a...