More daylight, less sleep, it must be Spring

Well here we are at last - that magic weekend when the long days really seem to start.  I have various methods to kid myself that I'm not losing sleep, none of which really work but the payback is what I'm doing now.  In my garden in the bright afternoon sun, the bbq almost alight.  I've just had a refreshing cup of tea and iced the emergency back up cake for tomorrow night.

Raspberry and Vanilla Cake

Date Bread

The date bread was supposed to be tea bread but when I went into the pantry there was only a little bit of dried fruit and lots of dates.  I'd already made the tea so I thought I would give it a try.  I'll have to slice it tonight when it's cool to see if it looks like it should or if the dates have disappeared into a sticky toffee pudding.

The bbq has just caught alight and of course the wind has changed so that I have just had an eyeful of smoke.  Hey ho.


Beautiful Steph has just arrived back from a weekend away with her Mam and family to celebrate her Mam's 40th Birthday.  My next door neighbour is sitting in his garden watching Newcastle play football (3-0 to Newcastle).  The hens up the road are crowing away and there's lots of birds singing. There's rather a large mess in the kitchen though and I have the ironing to do later but for now everything is good.


Yesterday at The Crafts House Sandra took my hand and steered me back on to the path of colour righteousness.  I didn't feel as though my journal backgrounds were turning out the way I wanted them.  I'm trying to break out of my boundaries but I'm obviously not ready for that yet.  I'm trying to achieve the wild look but my boundaries are calling me back.  I think that's why I love patchwork so much, it's like maths - logical.  That doesn't mean you can't see the beauty just because there's logic.  Keats said Sir Isaac Newton had spoilt the beauty of the rainbow when he showed how the light splits into it's component colours - no I say, it just makes it even more beautiful.   "Go back to your pallet" Sandra said.

What good advice!   Soft muted tones - lush.  Maybe I'll break out another day.  I had a happy time yesterday afternoon doing my logo for Strawberry Patches.

I scanned it in and then I had a little play in Photoshop this morning (well over two hours and still couldn't get the background hidden.  John came down and did it in less than five minutes - watch and learn Brendie).  I did manage to get the text on though.....  Now I just need get my blog header sorted.


Sandra had some water colour blocks (Derwent Inktense) and I had a little play with them - much more my style than spray inks!

Roll on pay day that's what I say.

Well, I'm going to light the beer lamp.  Happy crafting everyone.