A big thank you to Carrie, who sent me this fab pincushion for the pincushion swap.

Mind you, I've not had chance to use the pincushion as DD has been totally converted to sewing by this pincushion and has played (carefully) with it practically permanently since it arrived. Carrie also sent a huge selection of wonderful sewing stuff (oh and some chocolate, tragically long gone :)).

I took part in Open Yours Too trade 10 and had my first swapping calamity!

Camilla had sent me a wonderful package (you can see the photos here). But the horrible postage system lost it! I am still gutted about this and rather hoping it'll turn up sometime. It looks amazing, and obviously so much work went into it.

But then, this lovely bar of chocolate turned up from Mari, who was Camilla's swap partner...


And then a second parcel from Camilla. What a star you are, Camilla! So many lovely things. I feel incredibly spoiled, thank you, both of you.

Thank you to the lovely Ali for sending me a Christmas organiser.

I immediately proved how much I needed it by losing it! Thankfully I found it shortly afterwards and I think it'll get a lot of use this year. It's a really simple but fab idea using interlocking envelopes, and is really beautifully put together.

I think it might be like the Oscars this week, I've got so many people to say thank you to, some a bit belatedly. Taking photos is much harder now it's pretty much only light when I'm at work...

DH did an amazing job for my birthday. He even took up blackwork embroidery to make me a picture (and his embroidery is better than mine's ever likely to be so we'll draw a curtain over that...). Thanks honey :)

Just for Wendy, the teapot DD painted for DH.

Pottery cafes are quite trendy now, but the advantage of living in the ceramics centre of the western world is there are loads to choose from. I love Emma Bridgewater's designs and their pottery cafe is brilliant. They have lots of sponge stamps so it's dead easy for a five year old to create a Emma Bridgewater-style design.

T is for... 12 of 12


10:12am, bedside table. Actually I'd been up since half eight but this was a mid-morning moment of peace as I got dressed.



10:27am, living room. DD getting ready to go swimming.



12:34pm, on the way out of the village. I had to work this weekend, one of my duty management weekends. Thankfully the museum's closed Sunday morning.



12:36pm. Who needs to go to New England? We do autumn beautifully in old England too.



12:53pm, the view from my office door. Yup, that's three stories of galleries. Vertigo's not in my job description.



2:14pm, the ladies. One day I'm going to research and write some interpretation for these tiles. They are definitely a museum piece.



2:15pm, the top tea room (staff room). You can see all the car parks for miles around.



2:19pm, on the stairs back to my office. The sounds-nicer-than-it-tastes creamichoc from the staff room machine.



2:20pm, the view from my office window. I get a lot of westerly sun so the stained glass is functional.



4:19pm, getting in the car to go home. The sign fools no one, yesterday the car park was completely full of random shoppers.



4:33pm, petrol station. For my american friends, 83.9p is about a dollar fifty and a litre is about a quarter of a gallon (so that makes it $6 a gallon...).



4:35pm, on the road, nearly home.

DH has gone all civilised.

He requested a teapot for his birthday in order to facilitate this transformation and DD did a brilliant job creating one for him at the Emma Bridgewater Pottery Cafe.

Now Emma Bridgewater makes her teapots a very generous size. Poor DH would have had to drink 6 cups in half an hour to still have warm tea... I'm not actually sure the tea cosy I made will keep it that much warmer, but it does give the impression of taking tea with a Totoro.