Please excuse Kim for being a bad blogger....

Because the dog ate her computer.

She then accidentally washed her blog in her trouser pocket and had to wait for it to dry out.

Er, she was also kidnapped by aliens.

Plus, she has also been making eight miniature handbags as party gifts for her daughters birthday party, which seemed like a good idea at the time but now not so much .....

Only one of the above is true: You decide!!

All the right answers will be put in a hat on the 23rd October to celebrate half term, and the teachers pet responsible will win a bag in:

Kim's Grovelling Giveaway!

I've also been sewing, a bit - but you already knew that, right?

Big up to you all!

Well hello there, I trust all are well? This has most definitely been a strange week - on Monday Anna started school, and I started my new life as Kim: woman with two school age children. No more Wonder pets at 10am (well, unless I get an uncontrollable urge, that is), and Mondays and Tuesdays have now changed their landscape completely. I know that in a few weeks time I will see these days as opportunities: but this week, I am letting myself feel a little bit sad about that part of my life that has just passed. Clearly, I express almost every emotion on my palatte via the medium of fabric!

There have been some amazing fabrics released on to the market in the last few months, and I've been lucky enough to get my hands on some before they sell out - very hot property! I'm going to do a post on them later this week - but before I go I want to big up another crafter, Funky Cinderella that I came across on Folksy. I treated myself to this new pin dish, which when it arrived far exceeded my expectations - it is so beautiful, so cleverly executed and for all its delicate appearance, is robust and I know will be a feature of my sewing room for a long time to come! If you get chance, check her out at:

http://www.folksy.com/shops/funkycinderella

This bowl only cost seven pounds which I think is a real bargain for a one off dish, and she has several other in her shop at the moment in autumn colours for between £4.50 - £9, which for a hand crafted item and an utterly unique gift is nothing.

Beyond words.

Starting school for the first time soon.

Shoes,

uniform,

lunch box.

Who will help me clean on my days off and take me to the garden centre cafe??

Good job the seasons are changing, and there are autumn bags to be dreamed up.

Playing catch up

It's still the summer holidays people - and this one feels like they did when we were kids, going on and on and on.....

Not that that is a bad thing, especially as on the whole the weather has been good. We've managed trips to the beach, which we rarely do to say that it is shamefully close, cinema outings and more. This year we're not having a summer holiday during the long break as hub started a new job after 3 months notice with his old firm, we couldn't quite fit it in.

In the short time since the schools closed for summer, Autumn has begun its approach, I can feel it in the calm cool morning air - without the fizz of summer growth. I think I love autumn the most, all the changing colours and air that feels like a millpond, calm and still.

We have however, had a little drama. Do you remember my tree, of unknown species? Well - for this story, lets call it 'a million and one caterpillars', and you can call me Cruela De Kim. I noticed that the spiky leaves (and they are leaves, not needles as they appear) were getting shorted and brown around the edges, I was worried it had some sort of virus or fungi that was killing it off, and day after day I watched it get more ragged.

You know those pictures that can be two things at once- a frog and a horses head say - and you look and look but just don't see it until - bingo! Then you can see nothing else but the second image. Well, it was like that with the tree, I looked and looked and then two weekends ago I saw a little green Caterpillar - and then another, and then - hundreds! How had I not noticed that it was covered in them?

We've spent the last two weeks picking them gently off, at first fondly, then towards the end - if you don't get off my tree I'm going to feed you to the birds! Hence the Cruela. You will be pleased to note, however, that no caterpillars were harmed in the making of this blog post, and were in fact deposited in juicy bushes a hundred yards away.

Oh yes, and a little stitchery. No summer holiday story is complete without stitchery!

Back to the first picture - have any of you, as children, read Piggly plays truant? It was my mums book originally and I adored the water colour pictures of stones on a beach in it when I was a child. I'm always on the look out for Piggly, when we visit the coast!

Stitchery Pokery - Or: JK Rowling, we salute you!

Since we went to see the latest Harry Potter film a couple of weekends ago, my lot have yet again been HP mad.(OK, so the loose term 'my lot' actually includes us adults too, if I am honest.) As a result, and as the weather hasn't been too crash hot, we've immersed ourselves in the world of HP. Films, (I love any of the films with Gary Oldman) and games, Alex as Harry, Anna as Hermione - and I in a very star trek -'unnamed officer who will shuffle off at the end of this episode' kind of way as a 'teacher'. Robes on, wands out!

I don't mind admitting that I feel sad that the Harry Potter express will soon come to an end. My journey with Harry began with the Philosophers Stone while I was pregnant with Alex in 1999 / 2000. Alex must have absorbed my addiction, and asked Father Christmas for the lego Howgarts Castle for Christmas in 2003; Andy spent the whole morning putting it together and then as we were getting ready for lunch Alex thought 'putting the bits to one side' meant breaking up what they'd built over the previous three hours, much to the horror of my normally placid husband!

Xmas 2004 saw Anna with us. 3 months old, she slept through the entire day - for hours on Boxing Day (aided by liberal quantities of Gin) Alex, my sister, mum and I acted out scenes from the film with my mum's haunting harreeeeee......from the train scene getting steadily more dramatic. Ok, we were probably quite merry - but it is a day we will always remember, with much laughter.

As Anna learned to talk she insisted on calling Hermione Merhione, much to Alex's exasperation, and despite his many attempts to correct her - she simply couldn't hear the difference between the two words.

"Anna, it's not Merhione, it's Hermione" to which she replied - "Alex, that's what I said, Merhione!"

Over the years there has been a veritable tonne of lego, the frisson of giddy excitment (for me) as the books were released - especially for the last two; on the day they were delivered I shut myself away in the back room, lay on the sofa and read..............................and read...................................and read.

I simply adore the world JKR has created - the lovely, loving, unconventional families that we all should aspire to. Who wouldn't want to be a Weesley?? I can't help it, I firmly believe that somewhere they all do exist, believe that the day on the train when JK had the idea for the first book, she plugged in to a reality somewhere parallel to our own. OK, so I'm nutty as a nutty thing, I don't care! I can't speak for anyone else, but Harry Potter has brought joy to my little family in so many ways and I will miss it very much when the last film has played out. I'll probably cry. A lot. (Alex will be 11, Anna 7 -and very embarassed by mummy.) Haven't we been lucky to be a part of it though?

So, Ms JK Rowling, I salute you! And I tell you, if I ever bump in to her, that lady can consider herself in free bags for as long as I am able to make them.

Ok, ok, sorry people! Just needed to share; now would you like to share what I have been up to whilst off my foot? Here's a little snippet....

Normal services will resume, after a short break. Harreeee..........................................

I think we're going to need a bigger basket......

I don't know about anyone else, but all of a sudden our little vege patch has exploded in to action! It is probably a combination of the rain and sun we've had, and seasonal temperatures that are keeping the soil nice and warm. All the same, wow! I've been making soup like it is going out of fashion, and had to buy some freezer bags yesterday for all the different varieties of beans that we have grown. What satisfaction!

I've not been able to spend much time down there the last two weeks as I'm still walking rather like Quasimodo on my painful foot, but spent a good hour down there on Tuesday gathering this little lot. I also need to think about sacks for potatoes...........

However, as you can see - if I can't walk, can't weed - can sew! When needs must, I've been getting round my sewing room on my knees, cutting out sitting at the dining table, sewing with my foot up on a box - anything but daytime TV!!

My only problem now, is how to get them all photographed! By the time I'm properly on my feet, I'll have over twenty new bags to list, four of them from brand new patterns. It's funny when inspiration strikes, isn't it.

So, have you seen the latest Harry Potter film yet? I think it is probably my favorite so far, I both love and am terrified of Fenrir Greyback, it is truly amazing what they can achieve with contact lenses and stick on fur! Let me know what you guys thought, those of you who have seen it.

Pride comes before a fall.

Well, that's not strictly true - in my case it wasn't so much pride, as a pile of scooters just outside our front door. What followed the fall which was not caused by pride so much as a pile of scooters, was four hours in A&E watching the good people of Hull in all their technicolour glory. (There are no photos illustrating the accident as my toenails need doing. Nuff said.)

So, today you find me stranded on the couch with a laptop going nowhere fast (me, not the laptop)- because as it turns out, me plus a pair of crutches equals dangerously uncoordinated.

Today I am going to offer you a feast of images (frankly, the words are a little shy as I have had a lovely, lovely pain killer. If my mum ever gets bored of retirement she could have quite a profitable career peddling co-codamol)

Anyway, let me rewind back to last weekend when I mostly managed to travel on two feet without danger to pets or breakables, and was blissfully unaware that scooters could be used as mantraps.

On Sunday our little foursome travelled over to see my mum and dad, and then the whole gaggle of us traipsed further to Walkers Nursery in Blaxton for lunch and a wander. We've been going to Walkers since my sister and I were kids, and even back then the grounds were fairytale pretty for children with fertile imaginations and energy to burn. The landscaping is stunning and very architectural - a veritable feast of colour, texture and pine scents.

After lunch we wandered amiably round the garden centre and grounds, my two always off ahead, enjoying the winding paths opening up to explorable nooks, crannies and tree caves. The garden centre part is one of the best stockists of unusual trees that I have ever seen, and we invariably come away with some addition to our pine tree collection.

As I walked round I couldn't help but feel supremely content that it is small moments like these, as an adult, that give me such inner peace and happiness. Together with my family, reveling in such a beautiful, peaceful place. Smug, much?
In a past life I must have been Catholic (either that or I have absorbed some Catholic guilt from Andy in some osmotic way) because I felt a touch guilty for being so happy (and smug). I gave myself a little talking to - what nonsense - then two days later I fell over a scooter (hark - is that a distant clap of thunder??) So, perhaps pride does come before a fall. A couple of days before, infact.
I have some sewing to show you, in a couple of days - if I don't have a freak tragic accident with my stitch ripper in the meantime. I just can't seem to balance on one leg and take a photograph at the same time.......