winter sun

It's a bit hectic at the moment, Danny booked a very last minute holiday last week (without telling me!) and so I'm busy packing, checking everything at least 4 times, and tying up loose ends before we leave home on tuesday evening to drop Lily off at Mum and Dad's, stay the night and leave for the airport at 4am wednesday morning, oh the joys of airport check in times!

I will try and get hold of an internet connection while we're away, but in the meantime please forgive me for my lack of communication recently, I will be back home next thursday to visit all of your blogs and catch up with what you've all been up to.

You can still order from the website while I'm away, but unfortunately, I will not be able to dispatch your order until 7th Feb when I get back.

Reasons to be happy........

My most recent bargain buy...
7 of these beautiful bowls for £1.50!




My first bunch of spring flowers this year...




Turning a selection of vintage embroideries into cushions for the website.....



Being awarded this by Steph @ Curlew Country



Thanks, Steph I'm dead chuffed, and now I'm supposed to tell you 7 weird things about me, so here it goes......

1) I hate just doing a bodge job, whether I'm cooking a meal, decorating, sewing, making a picnic, I like to do everything properly, and get annoyed if I can't. It's all or nothing for me unless I've had a drink, then I'm a bit more chilled out!

2) Despite my slightly perfectionist tendencies, I still have millions of unfinished projects on the go, and I hate hoovering, ironing, and dusting, (I keep telling myself I have better things to do, like blogging, sewing, cooking, shopping, working) I tend to let things build up and have a major blitz every month, I have to be cross to tidy!

3) Although I love magazines, I have never bought a OK, Hello, Heat, or any of the many fortnightly magazines (can't think of any more titles), I'm not remotely interested in how thin, or how much weight a 'celeb' has put on, or what their wedding was like.

4) Before I started blogging, I thought that I was a bit strange, enjoying sewing, charity shops, stroking beautiful fabrics, cooking and baking, but now I found so many new blogging chums who enjoy the same things, and I can share my lastest bargain or project with, thank you!

5) 6 years ago I think everyone who knew me would have never believed I would have had a baby at 20, I was never a great fan of babies and children, and I was always thought of as one of the 'clever' ones. But it was a bit of a surprise when it happened, and although it wasn't the best time in my life to have a child, it was with someone I had a loving relation with, and we were already engaged, so I decided to become a mother, and though it's difficult at times (being a young mother, and having no previous career as such after college) it was probably one of the best decisions I've made.

6) I hate doughnuts filled with jam or custard, although I like the little ones with holes you get freshly made at the seaside.

7)I love and have a very diverse taste in music, and when I was younger I knew the words to all the songs. But after having a baby, my ability to remember lyrics has been stilted, and I often get them wrong when I'm singing along, like my mum does, which make my sister giggle. You truly do lose part of your brain when you have a baby!

Well now it's my turn to nominate 7 other bloggers for the award, so I have to find some of you that haven't already won it.

Katy @ I'm A Ginger Monkey
Mia @ Mias Landliv
Zia @ Ziakoko
Gisela @ Titel
Outi @ White Country
Kelly @ Notes From My Nest
Jo @ French Knots

Not a good start (do not read if you have weak stomach)

Today didn't start very nicely.

I came downstairs this morning to find Lily (the dog) vomiting all over the place, and when I phoned Danny (he gets up earlier than me and leaves for work at 6.30) he told me that when he came down in the morning there was a trail of vomit all the way from the back door to the cupboard under the stairs (where he keeps his mucky work clothes) which he had cleared up.
So at 9am, when she was still being sick (no food just slimey yellow bile and specks of blood, yuk!) I decided to ring the vet, (mainly because I was worried that she might have eaten a dead poisoned rat, which she has done before, and I have had a couple of rat sightings in the garden in the last couple of months, and so have the neighbours) the vets told me I should bring her in for an examination, just to be on the safe side.

So I bundle her into the car, with a couple of towels for emergency mopping up, and her looking mournful on the front seat. But when we arrive at the vets she seems to have perked up, wagging her tail at everyone that she sees, and barking at any dogs that growl at her. Vet looks her over and everything looks ok, but he gives her a couple of injections for anti sickness, and some pills to go home with, and gives me a £42 bill, thanks Lily, thats my weekend up the spout!

Now she keeps looking at me, as if to say, 'you know.....I'm feeling rather peckish now'. But I'm not risking it, she's on a 24 fast, I'm sick of clearing up sick today!

I was going to show you some pictures of my lastest thrifted treasures, but I've been held up by a poorly dog, and I need to get back to work, so maybe I get round to it this weekend. Hope you all have a lovely weekend, Jessx

Bon Bon Delight

Look what I got for £3.25 in habitat sale last week, it's white glass, and I managed to refrain from buy eight of them, which is my usual quantity for crockery and glassware (the most people I can squash round the table in the dining room), which would have made it less of a frivolous bargain, and more of an extravagant splurge, plus I haven't got any room in the cupboards to keep them in!
When I saw it, I could just imagine it filled with pastel coloured ice cream or french macarons, but I couldn't find any pastel coloured maracons, and ice cream doesn't last long, so bon-bons from the old fashioned sweet shop in town it was. Now everytime I walk pass it, it makes me smile.

Happy New Year, make it a good one....

Where to start......???

New Years Resolution No.1 - Be a better blogger

Well first up, over december I've been a really crap blogger, only 2 posts!! I can also see that quite a few of you are back up and running after the christmas period, and I've got a lot of catching up to do, reading properly about what you've all been up to and not just skimming and looking at pretty pictures!

I'm feeling a bit reluctant to dip my toe back into normal life, although I'm sure I'll be ok soon, Ella's back to nursery tomorrow and Dan's back to work on monday (I really find it hard to get the normal day-to-day stuff done when Danny is off work during the week, he annoys me, even if he's doing the washing up!)





After a quick glimpse I can see that most of you had a lovely christmas, and so did we. We spent the week at my parents house, from christmas eve to friday, and had a fantastic time, christmas lunch for twenty-two, two turkeys, which my grandmother cooked and brought up to mum's along with her christmas pud, my cousin brought a ham, an aunt brought the cheese, I did trifle, and mum did all the vegetables and trimmings. I managed to get a snap of the dining room before everyone arrived.







We got some lovely presents too including the eagerly awaited "pink trainers" from Father Christmas, and my CK Roberts DAB radio from M&D, favourite station button set to radio 4. (I've said Danny can only use it to listen to talk sport when he has a bath)



I got a CK address book and polka dot purse from my brother, and my sister Libby made me an extra special screen printed tea towel that she designed using a picture of me when I was a little girl, which I absolutely adore. Although I don't think I'll ever use it as a tea towel, maybe I'll make in into a cushion or put it on to a canvas. She also screen printed Ella a set of four tops including this design too. How cute is the print, I think she should go into production!



Like a lot of parents with young children, New Years Eve for us was a stay-in affair, and frankly I think it is probably the worst night of the year to go out, if you can get someone to babysit, then it's expensive, the cab fare is double, you have buy a ticket to get in anywhere, or pay over the odds for your meal, I think the only thing worth doing is having a couple of friends over for dinner, or going round to someone-elses if you can stay the night.
So bottle of wine, film, and nice food was our evening, and I went to bed at 11pm, got woken up at 12 though with all the fireworks, I thought I was in a war zone!

By tuesday, I'd had enough of the tree, it's always a bit in the way, and it was starting to look a bit limp, so after carefully packing away the decs into their box and tucking them in with tissue paper, I dragged the shoe cupboard in from dining room where it had been banished to for the christmas period, and put things back to normal, if a bit more tidier.
I decided to put my new tooled metal candlesticks (another pressie) on it with a few of the vintage glass ones, and then I displayed the white miniature cups and saucers that where supposed to go onto the website this week, but I think that I might keep them now, well for a little bit anyway.



Oh yes, and I bought the white china rose from a charity shop on sunday for £1.50, I think it's handmade looking at the back, but it's beautifully done, it's a bit the like the candle holder ones that you can get at the moment, only no candle holder, completely useless dust collector I know, but pretty.



Goodnight everyone, and tomorrow will I wake to a dusting of snow?? We shall see, hopefully there will be plenty of winter wonderland photo opportunities for us here in the UK, I'm looking forward to seeing what all your cameras have captured.

Festive fun

First of all, I would like to thank everyone who has ordered from my new shop, I hope that your orders reached you ok, and you are happy with them.

As my last sewing order has been delivered, I can now chill out a bit and enjoy the run up to christmas without feeling guilty that I should be working instead of having fun.

So in the last couple of days, I've been doing a bit of crafting for myself and Ella, which is nice to get back to, because although I love sewing, and love that it's part of my work, it does tend to get a bit repeatative, when your doing the same thing over and over.

On Sunday my sister came home from uni, and I went over to Mum and Dad's to 'Do The Decs'. So Libby, Mum and I, with a little help from Ella got the christmas music going and set to work on decorating the tree. You'll never guess, all the lights worked! Hurrah, this was a good christmas sign, and apart from a little bit of gold bead untangling, and dad complaining after realising that mum had given me their pale duck egg blue baubles, because they match my living room, things went quite smoothly.

For lunch we had homemade chicken soup made from the roast chicken that we had the night before, which was very yummy, and Danny who finally made an appearance (he watched the boxing that night or should I say morning) took Ella to see his dad, so that left me child free for the rest of the afternoon, so Mum, Libs, and I set to work on make some mince pies, and I could be a daughter, rather than a mother for a while. I don't know about you, but sometimes I like to revert to my childhood, when life was much simpler, and the only worry I had was bickering with my siblings!

My aim in life for Ella is to try and recreate some of those moments in my childhood, that I remember with fondness, like baking, and making things with Mum, days out on my own with Dad doing 'grown-up' things, like going to his favourite antiques shop in Hertford, and getting a special treat for behaving nicely.

So with that idea in mind and my most pressing jobs all done, I wanted to spend this week doing some 'nice' things with Ella, and give her some memories to look back on, except things don't always go according to plan do they!

Tuesday morning we set about constructing the 'flat-pack' gingerbread house that I bought from Ikea, and it was a bit of a messy start to say the least.

It said on the box to stick it together with melted sugar, ok, I thought, I can do that, so, sugar in the saucpan, melted, ok, right, how to get it on gingerbread from pan, knife maybe? Lets try, mmm.., bit messy, - by the time the melted sugar went from pan to cold knife to gingerbread it had already set so wouldn't stick the two bits together. Ok, plan B, dip edges in pan and stick together swiftly, yes, that seems to work, ohhh, until you get to the last corner, what next, how about..., ahh yes this wooden kebab stick, so about an hour later, and with sploges and stringy bits of harden melted sugar all over me, the hob and the worksurfaces, eventually the house was complete.

However all this time, Ella has been standing next to me on her stool, saying 'can I do some', 'when can I help', etc and me saying, and getting more stressed, but trying to stay calm, 'In a minute' (my favourite sentence) 'careful darling, this sugar is very hot!', 'I'm nearly finished, and then you can help me decorate it with sweets', and finally resorting to 'why don't I put cbeebies on for a bit while I finish putting this together'.

Next step, the decorating of the house, this went slighty better, as I iced, I got her to stick the sweeties on, working well, good, this is fun, that is until Danny arrives home early from work, and for Ella, all things gingerbread go out the window, while she cuddles and plays with Daddy, Oh well, never mind, I had fun finishing it off anyway, it even has a curly-wurly fence, and it smells absolutely delicious!

Yesterday, I finally got round to getting the tree, and in the morning, before nursery, Ella and I decorated it, after a half and hour of moving all the furniture around, and struggling with the stand to try and get the bloody thing to stand straight!
I'm not that happy with it this year, when I got it home and in the stand it looks a bit lopsided from some angles, but I suppose thats just the way with a real tree.
I always have trouble with the tree, because we don't really have a good spot for it, no corners available, due to the fact we have a corner sofa, and two many doors! so it has to go on a table, against a wall, not ideal, but I have to have one.

The glass star baubles are my new purchase for this year, not cheap at £2.99 each, but I limited myself to three.

The other day I got an urge to make a pomander so I spent the evening on the sofa sticking cloves into and orange, with Danny looking at me funnily, here's how the conversation went:
'what are you doing'
'making a pomander'
'what's that then'
'it's an orange with cloves stuck in it, it smells all lovely and christmassy'
'bit of a waste of an orange isn't it'

Mmmm...., men just don't understand, well mine doesn't anyway.

Hope the run up to christmas is going well, or as best as it can for you lot, Good Luck!!!

Website Open for Business, well just about!

Good morning everyone, it's a lovely morning here. Thanks to all of you who entered the giveway to celebrate the opening of my online shop during the week. Sorry I haven't had time to take any photo's of the draw, but Ella picked out three names from the cake tin to win £5 off their first order from my website.
And the winners are.................

::::::::::::Mollycupcakes:::::::::::::

:::::::::::::::::::Katy:::::::::::::::::::::

::::::::::::::::::Tonya::::::::::::::::::::

Congratulations guys! To receive your discount, when you order use the payment option for cheques and then I'll send you a paypal invoice with the £5 discounted from your order.

Sorry to everyone who didn't win, but I have plenty of vintage bargains on my website, so pop over to The White Verandah and have a browse.

The Last order date for christmas delivery is 13th December (for UK delivery and Paypal, Credit & Debit card payments only (Sorry it's too late to post overseas!)
For payments by made by cheque: cheques will need to be recieved by me by 6th Dec at the lastest to allow it clear in time for despatch. So I recommend paypal just to be on the safe side.

As today's post title suggests, it's not completely finished, I have a few descriptions to complete in the vintage glass section, and a three more pairs of glass candlesticks and a couple more cake stands to add. I'm also yet to receive two more eiderdowns which are still in transit, so remember to check back on sunday or monday. Also the handmade section isn't very full, cause I've been busy with another customers order for the last couple of weeks.

Let me know if you have any constructive feedback, it all helps, and I should think that there might be a few teething problems! But remember to let me know if you have any problems or questions and I will try to sort them out asap.

and the winner is............ (and another giveaway)

Congratulations to Steph from Curlew Country for winning last weeks giveaway, your cake stand will be winging it's way to you asap!

Sorry to everyone else who entered and didn't win, but all is not lost. As I promised last week I am holding another giveaway to celebrate the launch of my new website on the Saturday 1st December. Three lucky people picked at random will each win £5 off their first order. (see the second from last post for a sneak preview of what's will be on offer).
All you need to do to enter the draw is leave a comment on this post before 9pm this friday.
Good luck everyone, and don't forget to visit on saturday morning to see who's won. xxx

The Belated Giveaway & A New Arrival

So finally it's here, I have given up on making something for the giveaway and instead have opted for this pretty little cake stand. It was going to go on the website, but unfortunately what I thought was dirt when I bought it, has turned out to be ash inside the glass, I shall have to look more carefully next time!

Apart from it's little fault, (and lets be honest, we all have them!) it is so pretty, and I thought that one of you would give it a good home and a chance to fulfill it's 'christmas destiny' by displaying mince pies or tealights.
To enter the giveaway you will need to leave a comment on this post before next monday morning - when the winner will be picked at random by Ella, everyone is welcome to join in, even if you haven't commented before.
I seem to remember that I also promised you a peek of what is going to be in my new online shop, I hope to have it up and running for the the start of December, a little bit late for christmas, I know, I'm going as fast as I can, but the website is taking a bit of a backseat due to other commitments.
When I finally launch it I will hold another giveway, with '£5 off your first order' for 3 people picked at random, so be sure to come back then.
In the meantime here is a glimpse of what will be on offer.

Aren't these pressed glass candlesticks beautiful, I'm in two minds whether to keep them all for myself! These are priced between £3-£8 a pair

I have managed to collect a good selection of cake stands that are perfect for creating christmas centre-pieces, or for displaying mince pies or christmas cake. Priced between £8-£12

This is a close-up of the Ditsy Rose Double Eiderdown I have for sale, I have two more eiderdowns winging their way to me as well in Pale Green Paisley and Pink Paisley all priced between £65-£80 each.

This 1930's heavily beaded purse would be perfect for the party season

I've found some lovely pieces of china including this cute rose bowl which is £3

I've managed to collect some lovely kitchenalia, but for some reason it all seems to be green!

This beautiful filigree brooch is sterling silver and would make a lovely christmas present. Brooches range from £3-£12 each.


With reference to the new arrival, no, it isn't a baby, but my parcel from MacCulloch & Wallis Who since 1902 have 'supplied the fashion trade with fine fabrics and trimmings from the same central London premises between Oxford Street and Bond Street in the heart of Mayfair'. They have a great selection of bias bindings including florals, checks, ginghams, velvet, needle cord, and are really good for special things like the vintage laces that I ordered.

this pink gingham bias binding is going to be for the edge of a patchwork quilt that I've started for Ella, I'm guessing it's going to be a while before it's finish though. The buttons are shell printed with roses.


Oh and one last thing, I managed to finish covering and painting my freecyle office/sewing chair after being inspired by one that my sister-in-law did. The fabric is Laura Ashley's 'Clarice'

Big Knit the movie