Where's the time going to?

I've no idea where the days are going to recently. It only seems a couple of days since I was at Dainty Supplies and yet, tomorrow, I'm off to Leeds, to Samuel Taylor's for another Saturday of teaching and demonstrating. I'm sure some sort of time warp is going on, it's the only explanation! Mind you, being busy does make the time go by more quickly of course, and I have been up to my eyes with one thing and another all week. I haven't had a lot of time to make the best of the sunshine in the garden, but I have managed to do a bit of tying Sweet Peas to netting, some of the dreaded weeding and making up a few extra pots with the very last of the plants that I grew from seed.

I've just added another painting, a little scarecrow, to my Etsy shop after putting the finishing touches to it this evening. I'm very partial to scarecrows, ever since primary school when our teacher used to read the Worzel Gummidge stories to us, although I never watched the TV series....it didn't fit the pictures that were in my head! Here's a little peek of the painting anyway....

.....it's done with watercolours and fine pens for the extra details.

I spent this morning with Heather and Graham and one of the tasks was to help Heather to get past her mental block about using her sewing machine....she's had it for aaages and not even threaded it yet! Anyway, it was all very simple so she's all set now to start adding stitching to journal pages etc now. We had a good look through some old photos that has us laughing one moment and then cringing with embarrassment the next. We also wondered why we spent so much time when we were teenagers worrying about our weight and our looks - we both looked very slim and rather gorgeous! Lol! 

While we were rifling through bits of fabric for Heather to practice on we found some little pieces of Aida fabric and I said that I sometimes get the urge to do some cross stitching or tapestry. No sooner said than done and Heather nipped upstairs and came down with this tapestry kit that she'd had for years and never done. 

Not sure when I'll get chance to work on it, but I'm looking forward to getting started and it will be something different to do. Thanks Heather!

When Heather dropped me back here the sun had begun blazing down and Thomas and Tara both came out to enjoy the warmth. Here's Thomas on one of the gate posts, purring away as usual and thinking how lucky he is to be here and not back on the city streets as he was when he adopted us....

 Or maybe he's just admiring the flowers! Oh, don't look too closely at my lawn which is really overgrown again until I get a lawnmower sorted! Tara was, as ever, thinking about her tummy and chomping on grass.....

 Talking of chomping, I had some more of my home grown produce tonight. I made a version of Singapore Vermicelli......I do mean a version! Here's my "recipe"....I fried some chopped onion in a pan and added a few teaspoons of Madras paste and a bit of crumbled vegetable stock cube. Next I added some leftover chopped up chicken and a little bit of chopped Spam....yes, I know, it sounds awful, but I only use a bit and it adds an extra flavour that just works. I poured in a whisked up egg and broke it up in the pan as it set. Next came my freshly picked vegetables which I chopped and added - they need hardly any cooking. Finally, a bag of "ready to wok" fine, vermicelli rice noodles added to the mix and tossed through with some Soy sauce to taste. Eh voila....oh, that's French, not Singalese!

Here are the veg immediately after I picked them......

 .....my first courgette, some more French beans and, at the top, leaves picked from my three Rainbow Chard plants. They were absolutely delicious!

That's a bit of a round up of some of what I've been up to. Next week is going to be madly busy getting ready for my day at Colemans Craft warehouse on the 29th June, as well as several duties at St Chads that I'm taking on for the first time whilst the Verger is on holiday. 

Well, have a great weekend everyone and enjoy the official start of Summer!