Happy Halloween!

October

Home alone and watching a scary East Enders (which I don't usually watch) so I thought I would quickly say hello to the blog. I do not seem to have the inclination to write posts at the minute, not sure why. I have had a good October, and am now fifty, which I find a little hard to believe. Andy took me to Devon for my birthday which was lovely. We stayed in an inn right on the sea with a balcony on the flat roof outside. It was beautiful and relaxing. In other news I have been continuing to work full time at the school up the road and have agreed to stay there for the year with some part time work next term. Not sure what made me change my mind apart from the kids being great and a feeling of 'this is mine' after all the hard work I have done. I have been trying to get lots of crochet done as I am doing a craft fair with my Dad really soon-not sure but I think it may be next weekend. Anyway, below are a few pictures of the last few weeks.

 This is Alexandra Palace where I went three weeks ago for the Knit and Stitch show. I went with Joan, my Dad's wife, as her friend couldn't go because her husband had had a fall. I really enjoyed the day, and unfortunately was tempted by quite a lot of crafty things.

 Giant crocheted flamingo on the Toft stall.

 Pretty face.

 Amazing exhibit of a knitted and crocheted fish stall.

 A crocheted black sheep I made because my friend couldn't buy one anywhere for her nephew's birthday.

 The beautiful part of Devon where we were staying. It is a place called Babbacombe, just outside Torquay. This is the view along the beach from where we stayed.

 The pub we were staying at is the white building on the left of the picture with the red roof. 

Andy on the path. It looks a bit dangerous in the picture. It is fine for adults but I would not take young children along there unless they were tied to me!

This made me think the fairies would appear at any minute. 

 You can walk along the path to the next little cove where there are beach huts, a good cafe (which has only just been rebuilt after being washed away by the sea) and a funicular railway which saves the legs.

 We went for a walk through the little village of St Marychurch which is quaint in the extreme. I loved this shop front.

 And this proud looking dragon on a gate post.

 Back along the path I saw this crow. He posed for a few pictures. 

 This is on the side of the toilet in the car park near the pub. The place is at the bottom of an extremely steep hill which we walked up and down about three times. Cars go into the car park to get a bit of a run up at the first part of the hill.

 Free to take away.  

 A lovely iron S on the sea wall. Not sure what for. 

 This was on Wednesday. The one day I have devoted to craft this week. (I spent three days working and still didn't finish everything. It can wait till next week now) I was making Christmas cards. Cassie wanted my chair as it was very sunny.

 Yesterday in Greenwich market with my friend. This dragon head is huge. I love this man's stall. He always has very interesting and tempting things.

Right, back to the crochet. Hope all your weeks/months have been fun!

Etsy and Out and About

Since I opened my Etsy shop as Circles of Rain I have had seven sales. I have not made much money but I enjoy thinking how to wrap the parcel when I sell something. Here are the three most recent. Noddy's car. So I printed out a Noddy and made him into a little standing figure, along with his friend Big Ears. I also made a Noddy themed card. 

This little doll with her beautiful beaded dress was wrapped in some lovely Nigerian wax fabric. I have lots of pieces of this fabric left over from displays at school. It is coming in handy again at the moment. I love the bold colours and simple repeating patterns. 

 

The tiny pastoral scene with trees and sheep was a problem to wrap nicely. I didn't want to just throw them into a cellophane packet so I sewed them to a card.

It has been sunny for a week and back to sun and showers this week. This is the display of sunflowers in the allotment over the road from us. Lovely!

 This is a shop at Blackheath Standard near where we live. It is a really old fashioned and sweet card shop that has been there for years. I don't know how much longer it will be there so I took a photo.

  This is a road near the local shop. I was waiting for Andy in the car and noticed for the first time how beautiful the door arches are. This is the best one as it has not been painted. 

 This is the state of my next door neighbour's garden. They bought the house from Joe, our neighbour who lived there for years, and their builders have been doing it up since about May. They were supposed to be finished by September. I would say Christmas at the rate they are going. I keep telling myself it will be over soon! As well as the week days, they  arrive early on a Saturday morning, sometimes even a Sunday. The other day I came home for my lunch and there were builders in the garden as they needed to get onto our flat roof. The cats were all looking very perturbed. There are a lot of them. Some more friendly than others. I overhear some very interesting and often not particularly pleasant conversations. They make noise, shake our china and glass with their drilling, and are generally annoying. The builders building the house on the other side were nice at least. They had just about finished when this lot turned up!

 Sainsbury's sign against a dramatic sky. 

 A little cat that is not Cassie but looks very like her. Andy took this. He sees this cat quite a lot and my friend who lives in the next road is convinced she has seen Cassie, but I think it is this one.

Crochet, Buses and Faces

September has gone in a flash and now it is the month of my birthday when I am going to be fifty. How did that happen?! I genuinely can't believe I am that old but that old I am. Luckily the children at school keep me young or something like that. I am enjoying my six week stint as a long term teacher. The children are lovely and the staff I work with are great too. Our work this term has been based on a book called 'The Naughty Bus' which is a great photo story book about a bus given as a present to a small child, and its adventures. Added to that I have been crocheting various small things, trying to make Christmas cards, possibly for a craft fair in November (slow progress though) and painting faces. Today I helped Andy to set up his new work computer on the internet, and added our printer to it. Yesterday I set up said printer,  as our other one gave up working last week. I have also gone through the process of setting up a Tivo box (the cable tv box) and new router which, although meant to be easy,  wasn't. I am some kind of technological genius at the moment. I have also been getting to grips with the new iPad assessment system at work. Will it never end?!

 Back to more simple things... a rose, and two hedgehog friends made from tinsel wool, my new yarn obsession. I might make some of these for the craft fair.

 Below, the hedgehogs have formed a stunt team.

  A fluffy giant snowman has moved into the village of Little Hoarding. He is happy there.

 This little creature came about as I was trying out the yarn for her hair. I made a little circle and it looked like hair, so I had to make a person to go with it. The hoop is made out of curved metal beads which make a good circle.

 This little doll now has a shiny new skirt. 

 This is a hedgehog I made for my friend's birthday. He has been named Hartley. 

 And onto the naughty bus. I have been having lots of fun setting up small world scenarios from the story.

 I had less fun making ten large laminated buses to use for maths. I got the bus line drawing online, then proceeded  to colour them all in with various media. Then I decided that they did not look defined enough so outlined them all in black felt tip. Then I drew the numbers and the characters. Bus number one was a doddle, only the driver on there. By bus number ten I was a bit tired of drawing all of them over and over again! I like the results though so it was worth the time.

 Faces...

 This one represents my morning on that day. There was a frog on the steps that Lily jumped straight over without seeing. She was more bothered by the large honking geese that flew overhead.