Flower Bombs - Guerrilla Gardening

For the last couple of years the kids and I have been doing a bit of guerrilla gardening around our village.  On the first year we planted sunflowers in random places - this wasn't very successful as we had a very dry Spring so most of the sunflowers didn't survive.  Last year we pop seeds around with variable success.  This year I came across the idea of flower bombs via a blog (sorry I can't remember the blog name :-() and had to give it a go :-)

 I had a rummage in the children's art cupboard for any old paper that wasn't very useful ....

I popped it into a blender with some water and blended it up.  My Mum popped over to visit at this point and did look slightly concerned that little Sweetpeas wakings were finally getting to me until I explained what I was doing :-)

We squeezed the wet paper out so it was damp rather than soaking and then mixed the seeds in (a mixture of seeds I collected from our flowers last year).  We then made them into little balls and left them to dry naturally overnight.  They did fall apart slightly so I may try making the compost and clay version next year.

 We then went for a walk round the village .....

and flower bombed random areas :-)  I will be going round with the children and planting cosmos in random places in a month or two, these plants seem perfectly happy if not watered and look so lovely.  I hope the bombs work and we see flowers popping up around the village :-)

We will plant these later in the year.

Also last week we were very excited to receive our caterpillar delivery for the pre-school.  We love watching them grow each year and turning into butterflies.

On the chick front, I am afraid to say that poor Bubbles at the front of the photo passed away :-(  Bubbles hadn't been too well for some time and I am glad he/she went of their own accord rather than Mr Sweetpea having to put him/her out of their misery.  Tiny is doing very well and is still happily chirping away thank goodness.

xxx

We have been busy bees here in the Sweetpea household.  What with bugs (mainly me suffering from those) , birthdays, chics and tendonitis it has meant hardly any time to blog or comment on blogs :-(

I am still suffering from tendonitis but after a 2 hour wait in physio I am finally getting some real help.  I was fed up with being popped on one painkiller after another - I want this fixed not glossed over !  After the lovely Harmony and Rosie sharing the advice she was given with me I went back to the doctors armed with my advice ammo :-)  After a lot of persuading (and even being told 'why do you need physio when you have a copy of your friends excersises'  pah!) I was referred to physio and now have wrist splints and advice on how to go forward.  I really want this fixed as it has been moving up my arms to my shoulders and it is stopping me hand sewing and being on here :-(   Those wrist splints look sexy don't they lol .

Whilst I have been away middle Sweetpea (top piccy) turned 10!  Goodness me, it only seems like yesterday she was a little baba :-(  She wanted a little piggy cake at first but then watched Hairy Bikers and decided she fancied Black Forest Gateau.  I followed their recipe but ended up having to make four layers rather than two which could be cut in half as they didn't rise very well.  Needless to say my hips are now a bit bigger :-) 

She decided to have a sleepover for her party and somehow caught me out by getting me to agree!  They had an easter egg hunt, watched films whilst eating popcorn in bed and had a take out Pizza (a first in the Sweetpea household - goodness they are expensive).  They weren't too bad but did all look like Zombies (as did I) the next day :-)

As the day progressed one of the eggs Mr Sweetpea had popped in the incubator (this man is addicted to having animals in our household!) started to hatch :-)

Tiny the Dutch Bantam  hatched the next day, it took him/her quite some time to get out.  Here he/she is at the front with Bubbles (can you tell the kids named them) his/her sibling.   After popping photos of the hatching in progress on facebook they have quite a lot of fans now and have had visitors popping in to see them :-)

This is how tiny they are, they are standing in front of our Easter tree....

Poor little Bubbles doesn't look too well at the moment, we are not sure how long he/she is going to live for :-(  We are giving them lots of cuddles (especially poor Bubbles) which they love.

There have been some other new additions in our village too, just take a look at these cute lambs.  They are soooo sweet, it always makes want a pet lamb again .....

My Dad used to take on quite a few waifs and strays and Daisy was an orphaned lamb.  Oh how we loved her!  Loving my crazy hair in this photo and my sisters huge cheeky grin :-)  She had to go back to the farm when she was big enough and we used to visit her there.

What else have we been up to, sorry if you are falling asleep at this point :-)

Well we went to a Charity shop and got the most wonderful bargains.  For some time now I have been wanting to make little Sweetpea and middle Sweetpea a cooker out of a bedside cabinet.  I asked on freecycle if anyone had an old cabinet they didn't want and someone kindly told me that she had seen one at our local Open Door charity shop.  We drove there last week and low and behold there was a mini wooden cooker, it cost me a whole £2!  It needed some tlc but that made it even better.

Little sweetpea washed it all ready for me to sand and paint it, I have nearly finished it now so will share the after photos soon :-)

Eldest Sweetpea was very happy too as he found a chemistry set in there, which had never been opened, for £2!   He busied himself later that day creating chemical reactions - hhmm not sure that is a good thing in the dining room but it kept him happy.  I am so glad he found this actually as I am not too impressed with his science lessons at Secondary School, this is just what he needed to spark his imagination and interest in it again :-)

We have also been down our new allotment a lot too.  Late last year I planted a spiral of daffodil bulbs which started to pop up.  I am going to extend it every year as the children already enjoy  going round the spiral :-)

We are also lucky enough to be next to a friends allotment and she created this wonderful willow wigwam a couple of years back.

What with these two items and our little trampoline the kids are kept busy so we can concentrate on planting and weeding :-)

Look she can levitate :-)

I had better be off now as you have probably all dozed off :-)  Take care and sorry again for not being able to comment as much as I used to on your blogs - I will soon be better and hopefully then normal service can resume :-) xxx

Happy Easter

Just popping in for a very short and sweet Happy Easter to you all.  Will try and get here for a proper blog very soon. Hope you have/had a wonderful weekend xxx

Long time no see ....

I have been swept away by time yet again - reading back at this time last year I seemed to have the same issue with time running away.  Mind you I do seem to feel it all of the time at the moment :-(

I have good excuses though, honest!  Not only have I been in the garden with my camera (dreaming of the days I can walk/bike for miles, just me and my camera :-)) taking photos of my beloved Hellebores but I have also been searching for vintage floral fabric.  And look what I found ....

Oh my goodness I had childhood flashbacks when I saw these in separate shops.  In fact I did talk myself out of the purple one whilst out shopping with BearsFootprints.  I had only got the pink one days before so decided I didn't NEED another one ..... boy was I wrong!  I couldn't sleep with ideas for the left behind sheet swirling in my head .... I went to work and told my work mate all about it (luckily she knows me very well now and humours my mad chats :-)) .... then first thing Monday morning I had to go back and buy it as I did NEED it afterall :-)   I have dreams of them being turned into a vintage teepee for the children - only time will tell !

Little Sweetpea just keeps growing so I had to create her a new skirt as she had outgrown the other two I made her.  She loves it and I had an order for one to make for another little girl which was lovely to do.

Bunny had a new dress made for her.  After lots of cutting and making of mock up dresses she now has her perfect little outfit :-)  I have also been making some new hairclips but as my tendonitis is still playing up I am trying to stick to either machine stitching or other creative outlets so I created this out of a lovely antique brass bobby pin and a pebble from our favourite beach in Mallorca.

I love wearing it as it reminds me if here ....

We have also been busy in the garden , the chickens have started to lay well again, we never tire of the excitement of finding eggs in the chicken run :-)

I have also been helping at the pre-school allotment every other week - the children are really enjoying going there.  In fact I enjoyed it down there so much we have moved our allotment to the same plot.  This one seems to have so much more life, there are chickens, turkeys, ducks and a horse there plus you usually get to have a chat with a fellow allotment holder each time you go there.  Our other allotment just seemed a bit lifeless and always had issues with water but this one has a bore water well :-)

My birthday was whilst I was away and of course that called for me to make a meringue :-)  The children made me some lovely handmade gifts, Mr Sweetpea got me a diamond ring which was lovely (nothing too huge but perfect for my dainty fingers) and my sis got me a 'Keep calm and have a cupcake' sign and a lovely box to hold buttons or threads in.  The lovely Bearsfootprints made me a wonderful Bee keyring, she machine embroidered it herself - it is adorable (I will post a piccy next time).  I was also given some money from everyone else to spend at some point - my Mother-in-Law joked that I may have spent it by my next birthday :-)  I think after years of saving and paying our mortgage I am not really sure how to spend properly any more.

Ooh and before I go, here is Nibbles.  This was middle Sweetpeas Christmas present.  She was so happy to get him and is now even more happy as he has finally let her hold him and cuddle him!  He is such a cutie. 

Winners .......

Well it is wine time here so time to announce the winners of my recent giveaway :-)

The winner of these gorgeous earrings created by Becky Pearce Designs is ................ Country Rose :-)  Please contact me via my contact info with your address.

A big thank you to Becky for creating these gorgeous earrings , do pop to her website above or her facebook page for more gorgeous creations or to buy these very reasonably priced earings above.

The winner of the £35 worth of Small Print vouchers is ...... Kathryn :-)

Well done to you both and sorry I didn't have enough to give to all of you.

I hope you all have a fantastic weekend.

Take care


Zoe
x

Some very loved bunnies :-)

Hello everyone, I hope you are all well.  I haven't blogged for a while properly due to several viruses knocking us out here :-(  I had a day off work a couple of weeks back only to wake with a lovely flu/sickness like virus which made me stay in bed for 2 days - I don't think I have ever had to do that in my whole life.  Then Mr Sweetpea got it , all over half term week - great timing :-)  Little Sweetpea has also had to be on antibiotics due to a chest infection which made her feel really unwell for 3 weeks.  The joys of winter :-)

This week I thought I was share you what I created out of all those pieces I had hidden in my sock drawer some time ago :-)

I recently treated myself to Helen Phillips book, Simply Sewn Gifts and just had to make some of these cute little rabbits for the Sweetpea girls.  If you don't know Helen then pop over to her gorgeous blog.  There is also a link to her book below.

I was a bit worried about creating these as I am very new to sewing but then I thought, nothing ventured, nothing gained and gave it a go :-)  I contacted Helen a few times whilst creating these bunnies and she was so lovely and helpful (thanks Helen :-)).

I cut out all the pieces from some Linen trousers that I had worn whilst I was pregnant with Little Sweetpea and sewed them together ..... Each rabbit had different coloured ears so we knew whose was whose :-)

The book said to sew the legs to the side of the body (I may have interpreted it wrong though lol).  This would be great for an ornamental rabbit but I hoped these would be well loved so I took the legs off and sewed them in to the body instead so they were floppy legs :-)   I felt rather bad doing this to poor bunny!

I then created their litttle faces and tried to make them some girly clothes.  Helen's book does have a lovely dungaree pattern but I wanted more girly outfits for them.  This was harder said than done by a novice like myself so I ended up creating a skirt and very unflattering dress :-)  (oohh don't you just love family life, trying to type this blog and middle Sweetpea manages to knock hot chocolate all over the dining table and the laptop - and breath - no wonder writing a blog takes me so long - gggrrrr).

Luckily Nanny Casey is a good knitter so she created them some cute little cardigans, the pattern can be found here  (I found this via the lovely blogger Millefeuilles :-))

So after lots of sneaky sewing whilst the children were finally all in bed the girl Sweetpeas opened these bunnies on Christmas morning.  They are loved very much indeed which makes my heart swell with pride and joy :-)

Little Sweetpea takes hers to bed every night and then Millie/Bunny/Jessica (her name changes every now and again) comes down stairs every morning.

She even gets to go out on trips to places like Music Hayhem (as little Sweetpea calls it, it is really called Music Mayhem - a kiddies music group little Sweetpea goes to).

I am so glad I pushed my insecurities and tried to make these bunnies, they came out way better than I thought they would :-) 

 

Oh before I go I wanted to say a big thank you to the lovely 'The Vintage Hobby House' - pop over to her blog for some great blog reading.  I won a lovely giveaway she was having a few weeks back and she sent me the items below:

Aren't they all lovely, oohh I will be having posh cups of coffee in that cup and will be framing the cross stitch (or even make a cushion from it).  Sorry I have borrowed your photo Manda - I haven't had a chance to photograph the items and didn't want to leave it any longer to say thanks on here :-)

Love to you all and I hope the bugs keep away from you x