REVIEWING THE PIE

Hello everyone

I get the feeling autumn has arrived a little earlier than expected.  Chilly, sunny, but very windy here today.   Such a shame as we have a family get-together next weekend and really need to be able to be able to spill out into the garden.  Never mind, it might have a to be a cosy get-together inside.

A busy week that ended in the really good news for me that I have found a refreshments provider for my Godalming Bazaar events for the rest of this year: The Pantry Tea Room.  I was beginning panic, but had a recommendation from a Streetlife member, contacted Julia and success, we have lift-off.  If you are not familiar with Streetlife, I really recommend you check it out.  I have been able to find lots of information and businesses on there that I was totally unaware of: I have had stallholders contact me via Streetlife, I have found a gardener, lots of information about things happening in my area and the surrounding areas.  Brilliant!

On Thursday of this week I took part in a pottery workshop my pottery tutor, Jean Tolkovsky, organised.  I and 7 of my fellow pottery students had a great day and our project was to make a figure similar to one
of Jean's models - as you can guess 'similar' had lots of different interpretations and here is mine:

The wire sticking out of his shoulders will be trimmed once the final firing has taken place.  I had a bit of an accident as I was tyring to remove the cocktail stick which had been placed through the body and upper arms prior to putting the wire through, his head fell off!!!  More disaster, his hat fell onto the floor and part of the brim fell off!  I managed to weld his head back on, but didn't have time to tweak the top of his hat, so it's not as smooth as I had planned.  Good fun really, and something I have never done before and I think I will have a go at making another one when our course begins in September.  I still cannot make decent lips and noses.nose -

If you would like to see what my model could have been (I wish) please check out my Friday Review - it is about my pottery tutor, Jean Tolkovsky.  I am sure you will agree her work is amazing.

About two months ago I applied to take part in a Craft Fair fairly local to me and was disappointed that four weeks after I applied they let me know it was full!!!  I had emailed them to find out the current situation because I was interested in another event that took place around the same time and I think that is the only reason they replied responded - I am not sure how much longer it would have taken them to reply.  They apologised for the delay, said it's summer and sorry, we are full.  I find the lack of professionalism in some businesses very disappointing.  Summer it may be, but surely that is no excuse for poor communication in a business?  Will they also blame winter?  Spring?  Autumn?

Another busy week looms: tomorrow I am lurking in a garden centre car park (as you do) to hand out flyers to my stallholders, then I am having lunch with a couple of friends (Lesley and Dawn - looking forward to seeing you both).  Every day this week has a meeting of one sort or another - Friday is a free day, although sadly that will be housework day to get everything ready for my family bash!  Housework is not the way to end a week.

Have a great week everyone - hard to believe next weekend is our last Bank Holiday until Christmas!  Mind you at the moment time seems to be whizzing by and I am not always too sure which week (or month) it is.  Don't forget to drop in on my fellow Handmade Monday bloggers, and I will 'see' you next week.

Jill

BLUE SKIES

Hello everyone

So nice to have sunshine, blue skies and a reasonable temperature.  I hope you all survived last week's dreadful weather?  We have some flooding around here, mainly where fields are flooding onto roads, some holes have appeared in a few roads and when I ventured out on Saturday morning I came across lots of trees, bushes and numerous other things scattered across the roads around Christmas Pie.  We survived Friday night's high winds without too much damage - things that resided on one side of the garden appear to have decided they preferred to be in other places and one of the windows to which an automatic vent is attached in our greenhouse was ripped off.  Some roof tiles parted company with the roof, but on the whole we have been very lucky and hope it remains that way.

A busy week mainly working on my new project.  Banners, bunting, balloons and flyers have been received and because I ordered a bulk quantity of flyers, I have also purchased some sticky labels with the date of each event.  I left a space on the flyers for these to be applied, so time will be spent this week un-peeling and sticking.  I have had  lots of enquiries from crafters who have seen my post about the events on Streetlife and I am pleased to say that several have already booked a place in some of the events.

It hasn't been all event organisation though, I made another ribbon-wrapped bangle.  This time the bangle is covered in white silky ribbon and then decorated in strips of black and white net flowers:

I have also been decorating more jute bags for stock.  Hard to believe, but this one (a work in progress)  is bright red on black - looks more orange than red.  I really must take some lessons in how to take decent photographs.

That, briefly, is my week.  Another busy one coming up, no pottery this week as it is half-term, so some extra time to do things.  I hope you have a great week and the weather is kind to all of us.  Don't forget to visit Handmade Monday - I have a feeling we might be seeing Easter things this week.

Jill

SUPER SUNSHINE

Hello everyone

What a fabulous day it has been here in Christmas Pie - sunshine, fairly mild and not a single drop of rain.  Ideal gardening weather - it's always surprising how much there is to do at the beginning of the season (well nearly the beginning) despite working very hard to put the garden to bed in autumn.  Lots of daffodils peeping above the ground and one has a very large bud about the burst.  We have had a rose flowering throughout winter and I still have beautiful dark pink cyclamen flowering in a pot just by our back door.  I know the forecast is still for heavy rain, but let's hope spring is not too far off.

I held the second of my card-making workshops this week at the Farncombe Day Centre and in addition to six of the regular centre users, I had a lovely lady, Jenny, join me who found me via Streetlife.  I don't know if you have discovered Streetlife yet, but a good description is that is is like a very local Twitter and Facebook.  Its a great way to catch up with what is happening where you live - because there are often thousands of tweets showing up in our timeline, it is easy to miss something of importance.  Streetlife is more tailored to where you live so have a look at it and see what you think.

You may remember that I wrote about my pot last week and what had happened to it?  I found out last week that someone (unknown) had dropped it and sadly didn't bother to own up to it.  I would like to be charitable and say these things happen, which I know they do, however, failure to own up to it annoyed me.  Very disheartened as it is the third piece of work that I have been really pleased with that has either been damaged or, in this case, broken.  I am now worrying that my cat plaque survives the first firing without any damage or breaks.

A post without pics of makes again, I am getting very behind as need to get some jute bags decorated for stock.  However, hopefully next week I will have photographs of what I have been working on - fingers crossed.  Don't forget to nip over the Handmade Monday and catch up with everyone.  Have a good week and I will be back next Sunday.

Jill