It never rains but it pours.

A bit of a blogging break  for a few weeks. My 88 year old mum has fallen and is in hospital.  Thankfully she is alright but it means a trip to England for me to help get her sorted out.

One eyed Mr Owl will have to wait!

On and on and on with the owl.

I've been looking at some lovely photos of the long-eared owl to give me some inspiration and I discovered they don't all look the same!

                                                       I liked the look of the eyes on this one.

I started making this owl back in June  here and here - then it got stuffed in a bag over the summer and I got lazy!
Just lately I started working on him again,  putting in some running stitches where his eyes will go. I've been pulling out threads from this curtain material. It has a sheen to it and I'm using the natural colour trying to get a 'feathery' look. There's a golden thread there too that I thought would be good for his eyes.

So when I was stitching the eye I was thinking, 'That would make a lovely embroidered dandelion!  

Birthdays!

The Radio Times is 90 years old. Its been around for as long as I remember, it's been part of my growing up. My mum always bought the Radio Times and since I left home, got married, had children, I carried on the tradition.
My family laugh at me.  My husband says, "Why do you bother wasting your money on that? Use the TV Guide on the remote."  It infuriates him that I still buy it!
Well it's been my coffee table reading for as long as I remember and I'm not giving it up now.

Shame about the cover.

I love watching Strictly but I think it could have been a nicer cover for the Anniversary issue.

This June I had my 60th birthday, there's a picture of the Coronation issue below.

Yesterday it was my youngest son's birthday. He's a child of the 80's.

When he was little he did read children's books -  but he liked the Radio Times better!

From quite a young age he loved looking up the days and the times of his favourite programmes.

                                                   We had a Birthday Cake to celebrate!                                                    

                                      I wonder will the Radio Times make it to its 100th birthday?

Mine's a Babycham!

I like a trawl round the charity shops, mostly to look at the bric-a-brac, and I'm always on the hunt for old sewing books. I like a car boot sale too.
Over at heyhomewrecker I loved seeing the little Babycham glass, bought at a car boot sale. Can you still buy Babycham? I used to love it! There's a wee jingle going through my head.
I wish I had the courage to decorate and put stuff together in a 'retro' way.
Wait a minute, I was in the 60's & 70's, I've got some of that stuff lurking in my cupboards, I don't need to go looking for it! My house is already full of teak.

These are the two wine glasses I bought recently, £3.99  for the pair. They've got a very fine stem, I'm sure I'll break them!

Nowadays I think the charity shops are too manicured, all clean and tidy - they've become less fun.
It's that Mary Portas, I blame her!

There's a charity shop I go to in Saintfield - I like it the best because it's more like how they used to be, choc-a-bloc with stuff and you have to poke about a bit. I bought the two Edith Holden books there and they gave me lots of inspiration for the fabric book I made last spring.
I bought the two crochet doilies with the intention of dyeing them and cutting them up to add to my fabric book. Then I thought about the person who made them and how much work must have gone in to making them, I think that's Irish crochet, so I kept them as they were.

I just bought the three stamps in Ballymena last Saturday, 99p.

I'm not so keen on stamping but my little 4yr old grand-daughter loves to have a go.

I remembered the Babycham ad.

Babycham? I'd love a Babycham.

The Genuine champagne perry.

Doagh Island, Donegal.

                     This is Doagh Island on Inishowen. The sky was grey last Sunday morning.

We were here earlier this year and it was springtime.

The water is clear and flowing fast. I'm looking over to the Five Finger Strand.

"Flying, Daddy, we're flying!"

  My daredevil son drove on the beach all the way round to Ballyliffin.

I wouldn't recommend it......

A group of swimmers were in the water.

                                                                               *****    

   On the way home we stopped at a stone circle. It wasn't old, my son said it was made for a film set.
        The weather was getting better. I love the Donegal landscape and its ever-changing light.

  I came home with quite a pile of shells - already thinking of our 2014 craft group exhibition,
 'The World Is Your Oyster.'

  What could I do with these, I wonder?

Derry/ Londonderry and the Artists' Garden.

We were at Ebrington Square. Which way should we go? So much to see. We were going to St. Columb's Park with the grandchildren.
Maybe we'll just go and look at the Guildhall first.

We walked over the Peace Bridge to get to it.

        The Guildhall has just been re-opened after major restoration in 2012 and it's looking good.

The kids love the water fountains!

Back over the Peace Bridge and we were heading for the 'Artists' Garden', a project

at a former military building.

The Cunningham building.

 This is a temporary art instillation at Ebrington and the facade of the building has been covered with germinated grass seed on a clay base.

I liked this and would have been tempted to cut in to it... a door knob, curtains etc. It was a bit flat.
I think it will get more interesting as it dies and the colour changes.
Anyway, the boys were getting restless to get on over to the park and play on horizontal grass.

Autumn Fair.

I LOVE THIS!  The Autumn Fair in Botanic Gardens.
Today there was a bonus because we got to walk through the lower level of the Tropical Ravine.
Instead of looking down on the plants I was looking up through the canopy.

I was able to walk along the winding paths, it was like I was in the jungle.

It was mostly greenery but this was blooming...

....and there was this plant with nicely patterned leaves.

It's always been a kind of secret place.

                                                                      ************

 This lady made me up a wild boar burger, I could have had a crocodile burger. How exotic.

In the show tent there were exhibits of enormous vegetables & fruit, prize blooms, bonsai, alpines, honey, cakes, biscuits, scones, confectionary, wines & liqueurs, handicrafts - so much to look at.

Huge onions!

Pumpkins so big they were splitting.

Creamy cauliflowers.

Perfect Dahlias.

*****

This was an exhibit in the Flower Arranging section.

I thought it looked like the background was made of woven leaves.

Of all the things I saw today, this impressed me the most. I could see the amount of work and thought that had gone in to making it. It was lovely, like something I could transfer to stitch.

This is the whole piece.

**********

Lords - and - Ladies.

Arum maculatum to be precise.
Down on the Lagan tow path and I've been keeping an eye on the the Lords - and - Ladies waiting for their poisonous red berries to appear.

I  knew where they were growing and I was hoping to get a 'group' photograph.

I was too late as most of them had flopped - sure you know how hard it is to get everyone together for a family photograph! 

Never mind,  I saw this lovely heron on my way home.