To celebrate the Harvest Moon a moon feather heralding a storm.

 I've moved all the loose pots and plants in the garden into the greenhouse ready for the gale force winds tonight and tomorrow. 

My son and I got the ladder and picked as many apples as we could before they fall and bruise tonight.

Likewise the fig tree stripped bare of its beautifully ripe baubles before they scattered as a sacrifice to wasps.

Pumpkins and courgettes lie low with their heads bowed in preparation.

Tonight the season turns with the gale and the moon. The leaves are in a hurry to fertilise the soil this year and put the ground to bed.

The fruits prepare to grow new trees.

And we move to the next decade since another fall...

Thanks for The Manx

This has been one of the most beautiful Autumn weeks that I can remember. The low lying mist and turning leaves have been such a stunning reminder of the glory of nature. These trees are in public parkland across from my house. It's Common Land so I have every right to graze my flock of sheep upon it...

...if I only had one. For now I don't - too impractical in The West Midlands...

...they'd only be trouble...

...we'll have to make do with the guinea pigs.

Tonight a little workshop on folded Manx log cabin blocks. You can see the sample here. This is all hand sewn but no stitches show. I have a mind to use a lovely jelly roll to make a quilt when we go to Devon. It's a great travelling project. I know that once more, instead of packing tomorrow I'll be cutting a quilt. God I always seem to do that, the day before going away, instead of organising our suitcases! Looks like I'll be up until midnight again!

Quilts In The Garden

I had such a lovely day today. The weather was beautiful and I drove up to Trentham Gardens, near Stoke, with my lovely mother-in-law and partner in crime Angie, for the Quilts In The Garden Exhibition. I bought lots of goodies including some supplies for a piece called "Autumn Glory" which is in the back of my brain somewhere and will eventually emerge for our embroidery show with my local Embroiderer's Guild.
The fabric here is a lovely African print form The African Fabric Shop. I could have bought the whole stall - it really made my mouth water!
I am also hoping to play with printing this Easter and bought a little lino cutting set to get mucky with.














I plan to overprint the African fabric with leaf designs and machine and hand embroider.

I also have another idea floating around in my imagination for these lovely Japanese style indigos (I think they are called Shwe-Shwe).

I was so tempted by lots of other things like ditsy prints and some ribbon from Tilda as well as books and threads. However I was lured by some Brusho paints and a set of rubbing plates and a couple of Markall paintsticks.

Never mind it's a lot of fun - but where will I start with it all?


The children are on the Easter holiday break now so I bought them a nice set of watercolour Koh-I-Noor paints each and we can dabble together!





Here is Isabel's Easter bonnet - it went down a storm at school!



Now we have plans to plant up the potatoes, broad beans, cabbages and start off loads more seeds and we're going to be lovely and busy and messy. No deadlines!



Hooray for Spring!