Sophie Ellis-Bextor in the Sunday Times

Not only is Sophie Ellis Bextor a fabulously talented singer/songwriter, beauty and fashion icon but the Times on Sunday last week also revealed that she has an utterly drools-worthy house! Oh yes, this house is everything I adore, filled with a mixture of mid-century modern and antique furniture and kitsch ornaments.  I am not going to lie to you, I didn't read the words, but the pictures were beautiful:

I have a bit of a girly crush now I have to admit.

Polyvore Fashion designer

One of my pupils showed me this really cool website today polyvore where you can put together all sorts of outfits and feel like a total magazine fashion page editor or something, I am loving it a lot so expect lots more of these posts to come!

Mori Girl 1 by serendipitychild featuring clutch handbags

Miss Selfridge sequin dress
28 GBP - missselfridge.com

Forever21 gladiator sandal
$19 - forever21.com

Mar Y Sol clutch handbag
$95 - calypsostbarth.com

ASOS flower ring
10 GBP - asos.com

ASOS friendship bracelet
6 GBP - asos.com

Dorothy Perkins long gold necklace
8.50 GBP - dorothyperkins.com

Gerard Darel panama hat
80 EUR - gerarddarel.com

Cool song

http://youtu.be/-WybvhRu9KU

Grandad's 90th

A little while ago Paul's Granddad turned 90.  There were no plans for a party so I decided that the day should not pass un-noticed and so I took it upon myself to create a little portable party to take to his house for the big day including "Happy Birthday" bunting, a home-made birthday cake, a home-made steak and ale pie and a 90 badge, all made by me.  We also took a few mini bottles of sparkling white and rose wine and I took a few of my 1940's and 1950's cds including "Hits from the Blitz", "Songs that won the war" and "lemon popsicles and strawberry milkshakes". We had a really lovely day and Paul's Granddad really enjoyed it, he kept saying I have never had anything like this" it was so sweet.  Here are some photos from the big day:

Notice the badge on the right? That's the one I made!

Signature bunting,

 Not bad for a first attempt at icing a cake with roll out icing,

Shame it got damaged in transit.

Enjoying a choc ice!

After the sparkling wine!

Happy 90th Granddad!

Up-cycled Lampshade Tutorial

Over the Easter holidays I did a few little DIY projects around the house, just things I have been meaning to do for some time and not yet got round to. This is one of the.  We has these two lampshades, one in the hall and one on the landing.  I didn't like them much and wanted to change them but we couldn't work out how to get them down from the ceiling! Sounds stupid but they were wired it and it seemed like an awful lot of hassle to change them and even to take them down to repaint them.  So I decided to re-spray them whilst still attached to the ceiling. I figured that even though they weren't my favourite lampshades at least in white they would have a bird cage feel to them rather than looking like some Victorian oil lamp wannabe.  
So here is how I did it:

Take out the glass and give it a good clean if it as dusty as mine (blushes).

 Take a black plastic bin bag and cut along one of the long sides, tape it with masking tape around the light with some newspaper at the top to protect the ceiling.

Spray back and forth with the spray paint to avoid drips, build up the layers gradually. Move the plastic around toe do he whole of the lamp. 

Much better I think.

Downloading Fonts tutorial

There are many many awesome fonts out there that you can download really easily and totally free, I have struggled in the past with how to do it, but have had a go a few times now and think I have the hang of it.  To save you time trawling the internet for how-to's I thought I would do a little tutorial of how to do it so you can have a go yourself easily and quickly. (click on the image to see it bigger)

1. First find a website to download fonts from, I use dafont because it has a lot of new and really funky fonts.

2.  Choose the font you want from one of the menus by clicking download to the right of the font,

3. Click to open the file (on google crome a tab appears at the bottom of the window, click on the arrow and select "open") and this screen should pop open:

4. Highlight the two windows files and click "extract to",

5. A box should pop up on your screen that looks like this:

6. Double click "my computer" then "local disk (C:), then scroll down and double click on WINDOWS, scroll down again till you find the folder titled FONTS:

7. Highlight the folder then click "ok".

Easter Sunday

Yes I know it was quite a while ago now, but haven't yet shared with you my photos from the day, so here I am showing off my new haircut and dress.

Yum, 

 View over Rhossili beach

 Some of my lovely family.  I love how we are all lined up in height order from my dad, how cute does he look in his hat?

Did you ever see anything like this?

 Showing off my hair and dress, do you like?

GIVEAWAY WINNER

Rather strange happenings with blogger has stopped me posting for the last couple of days, now I am finally able to announce the winner of my 100 followers giveaway, not many entries this time so lucky for those who entered, they have more chance of winning!
So the winner this time is the lovely Bethany from Sweet Bee Buzzing.  Well done Bethany, you just need to let me know what you want your bunting to say (pleeeeease not supercalifragolisticepialidocious!)

Hope everyone is having a lovely weekend, I have a cold which is a bit rubbish.

ttfn
xxx

100 Followers Giveaway - (new posts will appear below)

I am so thrilled and thankful to now have 100 wonderful followers and as a thank you to you all for your constant support, encouragement and kind words I am doing a fabulous give away.  This time I will be sending the lucky winner a string of personalised, custom made bunting just like the ones pictured.  You can have the word of your choice (within reason please!) appliquéd to the white cotton flags and the bunting posted to your door anywhere in the world.  All you have to do to enter this give away is to leave a comment after this post with your email address telling my what your favourite posts are on my blog.  For newbies to my blog you get an extra entry if you become a follower, just make sure you leave a link to your blog reel, you can get yet another entry if you "grab my button" and add it to your blog, just remember to leave a note with a link to your blog so I can check it out.

Blogging really has changed my life and I can honestly say it wouldn't be the same without all of you.  When you leave your lovely comments it really does bring a smile to my face and makes blogging even more worthwhile. I will announce the winner on Thursday 12th May.  Good luck everyone!

NEW POSTS WILL APPEAR BELOW THIS ONE!

Beautiful Bird Painting

Added a new painting to the shop today, this is the one I created with my lovely friend Hannah a while back.
I would reeeeeally love to sell one of my paintings to someone out there in the world (hint hint!) This is what I truly want to do in my life and I so want it to be a success, it all feels a bit futile at the moment.  Anyway, none of this "woe is me" nonsense, here is my painting, I hope you like it.

My First Craft Fair

Hi Everyone,

Just wanted to really quickly share with you a couple of photos I took today at my very first craft fair.  I had a really great day, networking and meeting lots of really lovely artists and crafters.  I didn't make much in the way of money, the the experience alone was worth much more than the £12.50 I paid for the stand. I was really pleased with the layout of my table, and I have learnt a lot that will help me improve if I do any more craft fairs.  Here are some pics from the day:

1950's Swansea Bay Museum

Hubby had been wanting to go the the 1940's Swansea Bay museum for some time so as we were in Swansea over the Easter weekend we suggested it to my mum and dad and they agreed it would be a fun thing to do after visiting The Tower,
We didn't know what to expect, it was poorly signposted and seemed like we were going to the wrong place, it looked more like we were headed for an industrial estate than towards a museum, but then we saw a 1940's Land rover kit car and a partially buried bomb and we realised it must be the right place.
It seemed a bit shabby when we went in but the man at the desk was really friendly and it turned out he had funded and curated the whole museum himself.  It was a funny sort of place, dusty, with marks on the wall and ceiling where water had been leaking through and stuff piled up in corners covered in blankets, the mannequins were dated and it all looked a little unloved,  it was a little like they didn't quite have enough room for everything there, and they clearly couldn't fund a cleaner. However all of this did nothing to detract from the charm of the place, in fact, it added to it.
What was best was that you were free to touch everything, the furniture, kitchenware and you could even try on some original 1940's clothes, what could be better?  Part of the exhibition included an area where you walked through a re-creation of a Swansea street with shops and houses and a pub, you could sit in the living room and stand at the bar listening to "hits from the blitz" or news programmes from the time, you could really fantasise that you were back in the war.
I would really recommend a visit, it was a very lovely place that felt very interactive and welcoming.  Here are some pics:

 How lovely is this hat?

How cute to my dad and husband look in their WWII helmets? Not even sunglasses can make these look cool!

My mum, bless her, trying on a WWII gas mask,

 Now this in one classy radio talky lady!

 This poster, which was pinned up in a replica air raid shelter, really moved me, the words were lovely, I wish people could act a bit more like this nowadays.  Click on the images to view the poster larger so you can read the words.

 Thought the poster said some really helpful things for Christians, about listening to God, and writing down your thought from Him.  

Hop you all have a really lovely weekend.

The Tower, Swansea

Yippee!!   I have a new charger cable for the lap top...Hello World!!!!

Now I can share the rest of my photos from the Easter Weekend with you, and an update of some DIY craft projects I have done round the house over the last couple of weeks, soooooo much to share, plus, I will be doing an fabulous 100 FOLLOWERS GIVEAWAY probably on Monday to give people more chance to enter.  

So on the Saturday before Easter we travelled across to my parents in Wales and went out for lunch in an imaginatively titled building in the Swansea Bay area called "The Tower", it is the highest building in Swansea and is fairly new, with a restaurant at the top, I think it was called "The Olive Bar".  The lunch was delicious, but even more amazing were the views all across Swansea. Here are some pics:

Pretty cool huh?

So call back soon to find out more about the GIVEAWAY!!

p.s. I have missed you all sooooo much since I haven't had my charger cable, so glad to have it back!