This week

Hello..........

This week I enjoyed joining in with the World Wildlife Funds 'Earth hour' on Saturday evening it was lovely to turn off the lights and electrical appliances and spend a hour without, great to step away from the screens, this year I played my mandolin for a bit,

Then spent the rest of the hour relaxing, in the soothing darkness, with just a few candles burning.

It was lovely to watch the patterns cast by my butterfly candle.

For the last few weeks I have been trying to follow Dr Walhs diet, of eating 9 cups of fruit and veg a day, it's surprisingly hard to fit it all in, three cups of greens, three cups of colourful and three cups sulphurous veg.

In the hope it might improve some of my symptoms, my blood sugar levels seem to be happier for it, although so far I'm not feeling any better with my energy levels and pain.

This week I was skippy happy to discover this beauty in the summerhouse border, super frilly double daffodils

I also spent time earlier in the week re pinning my Springtime wreath ready for the Equinox last Sunday.  I love how ever year I add something new to the wreath so it's always slightly different.

It's been up all week waiting for the Easter decorations to join in.

Talking of which I finished putting them up today, a bit of a dizzy making job for me as standing with my arms above my head tends to make my POTS so much worse, so it took a while to hang up the eggs.

Here's a closer look at some of the decorations, the tiny crocheted pieces were a Easter gift from a friend, who got them from a very talented crafter me thinks. It was also good to see my Attic24 chicks again.

Happy Hoppy Easter

Clare xx

Five on a Friday Easter

Hello and a Happy Hoppy Easter  to you, I love this time of year, it all about the Spring time, I think I like Easter even more than Christmas.

All those pretty Spring colours, we always do a bit of decorating for Easter here at the Summerhouse, from the Blossom lights, with it's pastel shades and Easter Llama.

Here's a closer look at my little Easter Llama, when I spotted them in Mollie Makes a few years ago I just knew I have to make one, you can read more about my little Easter Llama 'here'

One of my favourite decorations is a hand painted egg from Austria, it has a violets on it and reminds me of my lovely Nan, they were one of her favourite flowers and I managed to get this painted egg all the way back from Austria as a gift for her, without breaking it.

It's lovely to see it every Easter, her birthday used to fall on Easter quite often so it a great way to remember her.

The lounge also gets decorated, with chicks and eggs

There are some new chicks joining in this year

Plus I'm skippy happy that the Springtime wreath is back in town, with a few new additions, it was a wonderful to spend some time this morning repinning it and just in the nick of time for Easter.

Happy Crafting

Clare xx

Magnolia Blossom Tutorial

Hello...... I'm back in wreath making mode at the moment, making a few additions to my Springtime Wreath.

So today I thought I'd share with you a quick tutorial, of these Magnolia Buds, which all happened quite by accident the other day.

You see I had a few of these flowers lying around the place, not knowing what to do with them, I'd hooked them up when I was trying to find a flower for my Waltz of the Flowers Bunting.

 I found the pattern for these cute little flowers 'here over on Mrs T's blog but in the end decided not to use them on my bunting, so what to do with them.......

As my energy levels are low at the moment I was looking at them the other day thinking would it be possible to used them on the wreath in some way.

They were a little too large to use flat on the wreath, but after a bit of playing around I managed to make one of them up into a blossom. 

 So if you fancy making some too, first up you need to pop over to Mrs Thomasina Tittlemouses wonderful blog and hook up some flowers, then pop back here and I'll show you the rest...........

So here's how I did it,  first up I folded the flower in half (well just under, as you can see from the picture)

I then folded the flower in half again, and arranged the petals, before simply stitching up the sides with some cream yarn.

I then made some little stamens by making four yarn loops, by stitching through from the back, and leaving a little loop each time.

Once I had four loops I fastened off and then snipped through the loops to make the Stamens, trimming them to the desired length.

Ta-Dah  

 Magnolia buds, 

As I used the flowers I already had, my flowers have several colours but I kind I like how some of the colours show through the layers of petals

They did proved quite tricky to photograph, due to there bud like shape, but I can't wait to try them out on the wreath, so pretty, yay for Springtime.

A big thank you to the very talented Mrs T for the original flower pattern, I hope she doesn't mind too much that I've have morphed mine into Magnolia Buds

Happy Crafting

Clare xx

Grow your Blog..........

Hello and Welcome to the Summerhouse by the Sea.

This is the first time I've taken part in the 'Grown your blog 'party held by  2 Bags Full and to be totally honest with you I only remembered in the nick of time that it's running today, oops never mind.

 

So my names Clare and I've been blogging for a couple of years now at the Summerhouse by the Sea here in the UK.  Above is a picture of my lovely Old  I mean vintage Summerhouse which is home to my crafting and is affectionately know around these parts as the shed.

Where I love to create all sorts of things from crochet to arts and crafts, there is always something going on here and a ever growing pile of WIP's

Since I've been blogging and crocheting I've been making seasonal wreaths and last year saw me complete the set with my Summer and Autumn Wreaths and I was lucky enough to have a picture of my Summertime wreath published in Crafts Beautiful magazine, (such a wonderful surprise)

I'm in blanket making mode at the moment, working on a couple of Attic 24 Cosy Blankets and also a granny blanket. I'm a bit of a one for starting new projects.

As well as working on getting things finished for a local craft exhibition due to start at the end of February with themes of The Owl and the Pussycat, Fantasia, Egypt and Masks (still in the planning stage eek).

So what else goes on here at the Summerhouse, well a lots of resting too as I suffer with quite severe ME/Lyme disease and spend most of my time stuck in bed, but a positive of this is it's led me to discover my creative side, as regular readers will know I had a bit of a tough time with my health over the last twelve months and my blog and all the other lovely like minded people you meet in blogland have helped cheer me on through the tough times so I very grateful for that.

 One last thing you all should know about the Summerhouse is that it stands in a garden full of beautiful flowers and I quite often like to share mosaic's of what's going on out in the garden.

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you have enjoyed you're visit. I've recently set up a Facebook page for the blog which you can find 'here'  feel free to have a look around the blog archive too.

You can also follow me on Bloglovin or Google if you'd like to

Happy Crafting

Clare xx

 

Five seconds

Hello........Just a quick post today as I have quite a surprise to share with you

Yesterday evening a friend wrote on Facbook that my Summertime wreath was in Crafts Beautiful magazine (Aug) on the 'Your Space page' !!!

Wow really!! was my response, so off I went to find my copy that had also arrived yesterday. I'd resisted opening my magazine as I was saving it to take to the hospital today.

What a surprise, after the initial shock wore off I was over the moon, to see my little make in a magazine, happy, happy. My five seconds of crafty fame !!

Here's my wreath hanging in our lounge this morning,  the magazine says it was made in a weekend!! which maybe possible for someone it full health, but mine took me a few weeks to put together making some new roses and using some of the flowers from my Spring and Winter version of the wreath.

 I'm cockahoop and over the moon that they featured my make,  been smiling all day, despite the fact I'm off to see the Cardiologist for the first time this afternoon, to see if as well as ME/Lyme I have POTS.

The Internet is a amazing thing really, that someone crafting from there bed while ill can end up with a photo of there make in a magazine, so keep crafting everyone, you never know !!

Happy Crafting

Clare xxx

Quick question before I go is anyone else having trouble with there blogger reading list, mines only showing one blog, the latest one to published, that I follow I can't see the others, so I'm sorry of I miss you're post.

Summertime Wreath Ta-Dah

Hello......... So it Ta-Dah time

First off before we get to the full on Ta-Dah, I'm going to take you on a little tour around the wreath. 

 Here's the bottom left. 

then the left side of the wreath, 

as you can see this ring of Roses includes several of different Rose patterns

Then we get to the top, 

the centre rose is Stylecraft Special DK Pomegranate, and is not as bright red as it appears in the photos (I always seem to have trouble photographing reds!!)

Here's the top right, Roses Blossoms Anemones and Butterflies, I think the finishing touches are added by placing a pretty bead between the pins and some of the flowers

Then the bottom left with glitter Butterfly, well you always need a bit of Sparkle

Here's the lower part of the wreath

So it looks like we are there, it still amazes me how quickly this one came together, are you ready..... so exciting.

Ta-Dah

My Summertime Wreath

I hope you like it ? it's not as fancy as the Wintertime one with all it's Sparkle or the Springtime one with it's variety of blooms but I do love the Roses and colours seem to fit well together.

So welcome to Summertime here at the Summerhouse by the Sea.

It's official even if the sun has not got his hat this morning.

Linking up with Ginny'sYarn along

Happy Crafting

Clare x

 

Summertime Wreath: Putting it all together

Hello..... It amazes me but I've got there much quicker than I thought possible with this new wreath. To tell you the truth this is mostly because I have used flowers from both my Springtime and Wintertime wreaths

From Springtime I've borrowed Roses

and Little Flowers (both patterns from the wonderful Attic 24 )

Butterflies too

and Anemones (which are flowering in the Summerhouse garden at the moment.)

You can find the tutorial for them 'here'

From winter I've borrowed Little blossoms

and more Roses.

So in the end I only had to make make seven Roses to complete the wreath. I made most of them using a pattern from Nicki Trents 'Cute and Easy crochet with flowers' book

Choosing a Summery palette of Reds, Pinks Lilacs Blues and Purples mostly Stylecrafts Special DK and all from my stash which is a bonus.

I'm using the same wreath as my base with it's green knitted cover, you can read more about how I covered the wreath 'here' As I said in my last post I love using the one wreath base that changes with the Seasons, (only Autumn to do now !!)

As always I'm using the little trick of a stitch marker to hang my wreath by.

So we are already there, time for the pinning of my Summertime wreath, it's hard to believe that it's has all come together in less than two weeks, flowers, beads pins, ribbon and sparkle all at the ready.

See you next time for the big Ta-Dah

Clare xx