Month: October 2020

Sunday Postcard #11 25.10.20

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Hello there, just popping in for a quick one this week. It’s been a bit of a non-event as far as nice pictures are concerned. Mix moving house with Tier 3 restrictions and it leaves you a bit stumped for interesting things going on!

I do hope you have had a good week wherever you are and however the latest restrictions are affecting you. It’s a funny old time we’re living through isn’t it?

Here’s a very brief Sunday Postcard….

A walk through the leaves 🍁

Last Sunday, before we went into Tier 3 and were still allowed to cross over into rural Cheshire from suburban Manchester, we headed out for an autumnal walk. As you can see, we didn’t come into contact with many people, and those we did see were from a distance! I do love this part of the world so much. I used to dream of living here once upon a time, but although I would love it, I’m not sure the Little Postcards would appreciate the lack of people and amenities!!

Autumn colour on the school run

There is a stunningly bright red Japanese Maple in a garden on our walking route to school. We have watched as the leaves have changed from dark red to crimson before falling to the pavement and mixing with the yellow leaves from a nearby tree out on the road. Every morning as we pass it, I think ‘I really should take a photo of that before it disappears’ but we always seem to be in a bit of a rush! I never seem to walk home along the same route so keep forgetting to snap a photo of it. On Friday, we managed to return along the same route that we head out in the morning and I took this photo.

It’s just as well we did that as schools here broke up for half term on Friday and as we are moving house next week we won’t automatically be passing that tree. I think I may need to make an occasional detour to see it next Autumn.

Fungi overload

There’s a lot of fungi at the moment in this neck of the woods. This clump is in our rental front garden, and they have cousins growing out of garden walls and pavements along our road too! No idea what they are mind. Possibly deadly poisonous… I won’t be going near them!

Flat-pack–tastic

This week, my lovely Dad and I have done away with the paint brushes and rollers of the last few weeks and switched our tool of choice to the Allen key & screwdriver! The house is taking shape slowly!

Crochet diversion

There’s not much spare time at the moment for fun things like crochet with our impending move. But I have managed to almost complete Part 1 of the Crochet Sanctuary Christmas Blanket CAL. It does require quite a bit of counting and concentration so there have been a few rows which have needed unraveling and starting again with more focus…

Check out the wonky bobble!

That’s all I have to offer this week. Next week is our big move so I can’t imagine next week’s photos will be up to much. If I escape the unpacking long enough, I’ll be back again next week!!

I hope you have a good week, until next time, bye for now!

Lindsay x

Sunday Postcard #10 18.10.20

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Hello there, there wasn’t a postcard last week because there was nothing to report. Just lots of painting and box shuffling, so thought I’d leave it until today. I hope all is well in your world…..

Making progress

Last week, preparations for our move into our own place stepped up a gear with the arrival of paint & rollers! I had had three bedrooms to sort out, the above one was the first with a change from Manga cartoons to turquoise. Another had one glittery wall and a pink wall which required neutralizing for a young man and another which was a simple wallop over.

Sunshine on a rainy day…

We’ve had a very mixed bag of autumnal weather lately. Lots of grey skies and showers with bright sunny skies in between. We have had rainbows on a few occasions, one was in the morning (above) before from school. There’s something about a rainbow which just lifts my spirits.

Happy Post!

So this was the happy post I received last week, it’s the yarn pack for the latest CAL from the Crochet Sanctuary ladies; Lynda-Rose & Lisa. I chose the ‘Christmas Eve’ colourway for this special Christmas blanket CAL. It should go well in our new dining room, although seeing this photo near to the paint job above I might need to be careful it doesn’t disappear into a young man’s bedroom to match his new wall!!

I won’t be starting the CAL until I have finished at least one of my many ongoing WIPs….. so there has been a flurry of A Trip to the Seaside activity of late!

Nothing to see here… just a trio of dinky buckets & spades!!

Embracing autumn

When we lived in Gibraltar, I really missed autumn. The weather doesn’t change as much there and the trees don’t tend to drop their leaves the same way either. I did wonder whether I would find the end of summer and the nights drawing in a bit difficult, but thankfully, so far, it’s going ok. That might be down to some of the beautiful colours we’re being treated to.

Some mornings (when it’s dry) I meet up with a friend for a walk after the school drop off. Seeing as we can’t go to each other’s homes for a coffee because of the Covid restrictions, we walk the streets near our homes at a socially acceptable distance and have a good old chin wag. It sets us both up for the day and when we get home we’re raring to go with the jobs we have in store for us. These beautiful leaves form a very pretty backdrop to our chats.

Birds on the wing

While returning from one of those walks on Friday morning, as we stood saying our goodbyes at the garden gate, we were downed out by a load of very noisy geese above! They were fascinating to watch as they shuffled their positions in the v formations above us.

It’s finished!

Ta-dah! It’s finished, my Little Box of Crochet ‘A Trip to the Seaside’ wreath is finished – this was my summer project. It was delivered to my parents home when we were still living in Gibraltar so that I would have something to make while all my crafty bits and bobs were in transit from our old home to Manchester where we are now. I thought it would all be finished well before the end of the summer but I underestimated how little time I would have for crochet over the past 3 months. The last few bits were finished off last night.

I’m really pleased with it, and now need to find somewhere for it to go in our new home when we move there during the next few weeks. I can now begin the Crochet Sanctuary Christmas CAL with a clear conscience!

Podcast news

This week’s podcast episode was all about crochet and community and featured the lovely Jill from Gum Leaf Crochet who came to crochet after a period of ill health and injury. Jill has created an amazing online community of crocheters who offer support and inspiration to each other. You can listen to the episode by searching for Making Stitches on your favourite podcast app or here.

That’s it for this week, I hope you’ve had a good week and where ever you are and whatever you’re up to, it’s not being weighed down with Covid restrictions too much.

Thanks for stopping by, see you next week!

Lindsay x

Sunday Postcard #009 4.10.20

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Hello there! How has your week been? The weather has turned a bit more autumnal of late where we are but I guess that’s to be expected given that it’s now October!

Here’s my Sunday Postcard for this week:

Buzzard overhead

Now I know that I’ve just said the weather had turned autumnal, but here’s a picture of the glorious sunny sky we enjoyed last Sunday. Can you spot the buzzard to the left of the sun? I was sitting out back when I spotted this large bird circling overhead. It’s not the first time I’ve seen a large bird of prey in the skies over Manchester, I thought the days of watching big birds pass by had ended with our move from Gibraltar- I was wrong. Admittedly I don’t think vultures and eagles are quite as common up here as down where we once were!!

Beginning the week on a high

On Monday something very exciting happened… we got the keys to our new ‘forever’ home! After a few months of living in our rented place surrounded by loads of moving boxes, we can now begin our process to settling in our new home. I have a few small decorating jobs to do before we move in a few weeks’ time (like turning a pink glittery bedroom slightly more masculine) but we are super giddy about our next move!

Misty morning

We had a rather misty school run one morning this week, Littlest was rather disappointed when he heard the answer to his question about whether school would be closed because it was misty. He’s going to find this first winter ‘up North’ interesting!

Isolation cookies

Squishing cookie dough with a glass

You may remember if you read last week’s Postcard that I have one offspring at home isolating as one of his school bubble tested positive for Covid. Thankfully he hasn’t developed any symptoms and all being well will return to school tomorrow. It’s been a tad intense few days cracking the whip with at home school work, so we had a break one day and made some rather tasty cookies. He researched the recipe online and found one which needed just 3 ingredients, flour, one egg and some chocolate spread. Seeing as there was no butter in the recipe I’m assuming they are fat free….

Podcast news

This week I released another episode of the Making Stitches Podcast – this time with bag maker extraordinaire Samantha Hussey (aka Mrs H) and Carole Rennison from Yarndale. You can listen here.

And that brings this week’s postcard to an end, I hope it’s been a good one for you. The forecast for me for next week is looking a rather painterly one with lots of coats of emulsion and perhaps a few boxes to be unpacked! Have a great week!

Lindsay x