Juneathon Day 4

I have decided that my "walk around the village" will be as daily an occurrence as I can manage. There are obviously going to be days where the weather will scupper an outing, other days when I'll go for a run instead and of course times when I have an early appointment.  It will be interesting to see whether I can get round faster at the end of the month than I did on Day 2!

This morning's weather was a bit spit-spot, and it would have been easy to just drop Missy off at school and turn back for home, but this challenge gave me the motivation to "just do it"!

Luckily I missed the heavy showers - they came later - and I burnt off a few more calories afterwards trying to get the house back into a decent state after rather neglecting it last week over half term.

Juneathon Day 3

After this morning's walk around the village, I took myself upstairs to my sewing room to continue with sewing some bunting I have been asked to make by the PTA at Little Miss H's school. I made good progress and I should be able to finish - and therefore post a picture - tomorrow.  I also completed a couple of quilt blocks for a sewing Bee I am part of.

My exercise for the day was to power walk the 3k round trip to the Post Office!

As my Little Miss had been in pain with her foot all day, we decided to nip back to the hospital for the x-ray. Luckily nothing is broken, so we just need to make sure that she rests it enough so that it heals quickly.

Juneathon Day 2 - Late and Uncompleted

Never mind falling at the first hurdle, I managed to trip up at the second, all thanks to my Little Miss!

After school she decided to mess about in the garden. Lately she has been trying to complete a cartwheel with limited success, so decided to move on to handstands. "Oh no!" I can hear you all cry. Yup, you guessed it. She crashed down in a heap with her left foot hitting the ground first and being landed on by the rest of her.

So as a precautionary measure, as it was bruised and swollen almost instantly, off we trundled to the Minor Injuries Unit at the local hospital. Three and a half hours later - they got a bit busy! - we were seen by a lovely male nurse who diagnosed soft tissue damage. He was unsure whether there were any broken/cracked bones and as x-ray closed hours before he couldn't get it checked anyway!

We were sent home with instructions to keep it up, iced, rested (no PE this week) and to manage any pain with Calpol etc. If it gets worse within the next few days we can go back to get it x-rayed and as he'll leave a note on file, we will at least this time, jump to the head of the queue!

So that scuppered my plans for a run before dinner, so this morning I power-walked the 2.5k circuit of the village (in 28 mins) after school drop off.  I will be back later with today's - hopefully less dramatic - highlights.

Juneathon - A Chance for a New Start!

I came across an event called Juneathon that involves undertaking some exercise and blogging about it every day in June.

After a couple of years of sadly neglecting my blog, I have decided to take the bull by the horns, pull myself up the bootstraps, etc. etc. and use this as an opportunity to resurrect it.

I aim to include in my posts, some highlights of what I have been up to since the start of the year, plus what is happening day to day with regard to both my sewing and daily life. 

So what happened on Day 1? 

It was a lovely sunny day today here in South Oxfordshire. The aim was to go out for a family walk at some point, but as the paddling pool was dug out of the deep dark recesses of the garage, that didn't happen!

So in the end, as dinner was being cooked by Mr D, Little Miss H and I grabbed our bikes and headed out. We cycled a leisurely 4.5k which is not a bad start to the month!

See you all tomorrow

How long??

I can't quite believe how long it has been since I last posted!

All I want to say today is Merry Christmas and I promise to be back after the New Year celebtrations.

Happy Holidays xx

The Wanderer Returns!

Whatever happened to my New Year's Resolutions? It seems like they took a 6 month holiday. Well enough is enough!

I have just celebrated my 44th birthday - and if I don't give my life a kick up the backside NOW ......

So as with the start of a new year, I have made a list of "improvements" I am GOING to make.

1) Lose weight

2) Get Fit

3) Be a better wife, mother, daughter, sister, crafter etc

4) Blog more

5) Blow my own trumpet more

6) Grow my "business"

7) ENJOY LIFE!!

There have been some highlights since the start of the year.

After 6 long stressful months, my hubby has got a new job. "Yeah!" I hear you all cry. And yes it is fabulous news - but the downside is that we have to relocate from Shropshire to Yorkshire. "Boo!" I here you all cry. Not, I should clarify that Yorkshire is a horrid place to live, it's just the rigmarole of selling the house and uprooting Little Miss H from school etc.

So if anyone wants to buy a 5 bedroom detached house in Newport - just let me know!

Another piece of good news was that my son passed his A'Levels and secured a place at York St Johns University to read Media Studies. He has got himself a tiny little flat to rent that he will be sharing with his girlfriend who will be training to be a Primary School Teacher.

The lovely ladies of my Modern Quilting Bee provided the blocks to make a quilt to take with them. I just need to get it backed, quilted and bound in the next fortnight!

It has been the year of "big" birthdays. My son and 2 of my nieces turned 18, so here is the quilt I made for one of the girls.

My Mum turned 65 (and got engaged), so I used the same pattern as above - and with the help of my Quilting NewBEEs Bee Ladies - made the top of a quilt for her that will be professionally quilted as it is just too big for my little machine to cope with.

And as my youngest sister - who has just turned 40 - has taken up surfing, I decided that she had to have her own Camper Van!

I have joined in the new obsession with "Mug Rugs", and joined in a couple of swaps.

I've also kept my participation in the Flickr Doll Quilt Swaps going. Although it is always stressful trying to make something that you hope a total stranger will like, it does make me think "outside the box".

And last but not least, is my continued enjoyment of all things Retro, that can be turned into mini quilts made up of tiny squares instead of Pixels!

I'm still a member of a couple of quilting Bees, so I shall be keeping you more up-to-date with what I sew for them and all the other gubbings I get up to.

Talk soon

Leah x

I went a little swap mad!

At the start of the year I signed up to participate in 4 swaps - eek! 2 were due on Feb 14th - double eek! But as both my partners and I have received our respective parcels, I can now tell you about them.

The first swap was Round 5 of the Placemat Quilt Swap. My partner was Isaacsmama, and we decided to make placemats for each other's children.

Her little boy likes robots, and when I saw a pattern for one that's in Dare to Be Square Quilting I knew it would translate well into a placemat. I kept the colours bright and the quilting simple and was chuffed how well it turned out!

In return, I received a fabulous little birdie placemat

that has the word "tweet" quilted over it!

The second swap was a new one for me and it enabled me to join in with the new craze of making Mug Rugs. "What's a mug rug?" I hear you ask. A mug rug is an oversized coaster for your mug/cup/glass with room for a treat on the side! So with great excitement I joined the Scrappy Mug Rug Swap.

In this swap, participants only know who they are making for, and I got Ljs742.

After having a look in her Flickr favourites, I decided upon a Union Jack pattern made using citrus colours.

I had so much fun making it that I am making another one in different fabrics to hopefully sell!

A few days after I sent my rug off I received a package from SleepytimeSewing filled with gorgeous goodies!

She had had a crisis of confidence with the linen rug (the one on the left), so made me another! She also sent some charm squares in my favourite colour - purple. I am one lucky lady!

I'll keep you updated with the happenings in other 2 swaps.