Nesting & Family ....

Hi, I hope you are all having a great week this week.  Thanks for all your comments on my last blog post, if you make pretty things and want to be featured on my blog, or even do a giveaway here then feel free to message me :-)

It was rather a strange week here in the Sweetpea household as my Mum had to go and have a heart operation last Friday.  hhhmm things like that do put your brain into a funny place, you think positively but then every now and again a scary thought pops up :-(  The operation didn't quite go to plan as the surgeon said she has a 'unique' heart - I could have told him that before he even started! :-)  I am happy to say that she is home safe and sound though, phew.

How I missed her on Friday, we always meet up Friday afternoon for a catch up and wine time :-)  Luckily I had Little Lambs with Sweetpea on Friday morning and the lovely Bear's Footprints came along for the first time.  It was lovely to see her and we chatted about craft stuff and the lovely Kathryn showed us a quick crochet demo at the end.  Then Friday evening a friend came to pick her daughter up and drop my son off (we did a kid swap, always works really well swapping kids lol) at about 6.30pm.  She stayed and chatted about thrifting & crafts and I did a quick lesson on how to use some functions on her camera, before we knew it it was past 8pm :-)  Distraction technique certainly is lovely!

More distraction was needed on Saturday as we were hoping Mum would be home mid morning but she had to wait for an echo cardiogram (or however you spell it) which didn't happen until 8pm :-( .  Time ticked by slowly so the girls and I made a carrot cake.  So scrummy and another good distraction :-)  I finally got to see Mum on Monday (as I work Sunday until late) - it was so lovely seeing her in the flesh.

Nesting

Well I don't know about you but this near year has really made me want to have a clear out and tidy up of my house.  Mr Sweetpea was panicking I was expecting another baby due to my nesting ways :-)

Sideboards have been tidied, cupboards and been cleared out, things have been put up in the loft and lots of bags have found their way to charity shops :-)  Does the house look any less messy or cluttered - nope !

One thing I really wanted to sort out was the kiddies art stuff.  We used to store it all in a cheap chest of drawers but then the drawers started to crack under the weight of it all.  Well that piece of furniture got shipped off to a friend and then everything was put into bags.

It took months to get our bums into gear and get some shelves for it all.  I hated having it all in bags, it was so limiting on how often we could create things as starting a project meant rummaging in bags for ages :-(  I got these shelves from Argos (I did want to go to Ikea but couldn't face the trip really) and then I got some wallpaper samples (cheeky I know :-o), measured them up and popped them behind the shelves.  I really love the way they have turned out:

Now all their art stuff is in one place and in full view.  I must remind myself not to buy any more art stuff as the shelves are packed!  I used old coffee jars, food containers and thrifted jars for storage of beads etc.

Then after seeing Sew Liberated's little one tidying away his playdough I just had to create something similar for little Sweetpea.   I popped to homebase and found some great little wicker baskets on sale,they are perfect for storing items for activities and I have taught little Sweetpea that she can get her playdough or writing basket out and do it whenever she wants.  All she then has to do is tidy it away afterwards :-)  She loves them and especially loves folding up the mat after she has finished.