More hours......please

Anyone know the secret :-) Just another 4 or so in the day would do me just fine.

I don't know if it because I haven't made anything in such a long while or what but my brain is on fire with ideas. At the moment just an odd word or picture can set me of on a whirlwind of "I can make that"

Some are plants, some are sculpts and some are things I want to do to this house.

I actually have notebooks I write everything down in. The theory being I can get them out of my head but not forget them. But they keep on coming and I had to get up at 2am this morning when an idea struck me in my sleep lol.

My workroom is almost done. Mick put some neat shelves up over my desk last weekend. This clears up a lot of my working space and allows me to have things I want to do out on display. More inspiration lol.

Hopefully by next week I can start working on some plants and a sculpt. The sculpt will be different to anything I've thought about before...definitely more fantasy oriented. It is an idea I've had for a long, long time and this one is knock, knock, knockin' right at the front of my skull. I just need to find a rock so I can start planning it.

In them meantime I'll keep plodding along, unpacking my workroom and house stuff, trying to keep on top of all your blogs, painting cupboards, moving furniture, draught proofing doors, cleaning up the mess the previous contractors left behind...oh and then there's all that good wife stuff...you know, preparing dinner, vacuuming and all that :-)

For My Mom

He would have been 75 today.

Every year on his birthday thousands of fans visit Graceland for a big celebration. With a wind chill factor of only 5 F (-15c) degrees I feel for those die hard fans that are gathered outside there today.

Here is a clip of Elvis at his very best...in my opinion :-)

My Mom fell out with her best friend over the Love Me tender movie.

It was 1956 and she had just turned 13. Banned from seeing the movie, yet requiring a parent to accompany them, my Mom managed to talk her way into becoming the' daughter' of a stranger in line. Her friend did not and never forgave her.

And on that note, I am going to put BBC radio on and listen to Elvis all day. Mick will sure be glad he isn't working from home today :-)

For Sale

Well after battling my way around Front Page trying to add these to my website for a couple of hours I gave up.

I can use FP and can find my way around html but not fluently and ,although I get there in the end, it takes me a while.

After a bit the 20c etsy listings became more and more attractive so I put them on there :-)

New flowers ....at last

Gosh it has been too long since I posted some mini flowers.

Actually, these were made at the back end of last year. I wanted to get a collection together to put up for sale. Then we decided to move and you know how that went.

So, into a box they went...until today.

I'm not sure whether to put these up for sale on eBay, etsy or just on my website. I've been doing commission work so so long it's been ages since I've actually made something for general sale. What do you all think ?

Anyhow, enough blabbering...here are the new flowers.

I actually made these gargoyle and dead flower statues ages ago but they must have got packed away by mistake as I only found them when we moved this time :-)

Another year, another decade....

Another decade gone. It doesn't seem like 5 minutes ago I was partying like it was 1999. It is certainly true what they say about time going quicker as you get older.

I have had some HUGE life changes over this last decade.

I was married. I got divorced. 

I met Mick again after 14 years and got married again.

I sold a house, rented 4 more and bought another house.

I moved from England to California to Minnesota and back to California.

I abandoned all of my earthly possessions and had to start again.

I left my family and my friends.

I left my career as a head hunter.

I became a stay at home wife and had to learn how to cook and clean.

I visited 44 US states and saw some of the most wondrous sights this country has to offer.

I started making dollhouse miniatures.

I started to learn how to sculpt.


I started a blog and got a website.

My favorite part of the last 10 years….making my Mom’s dreams come true and taking her to Graceland. She is a huge Elvis fan and never thought she’d get to visit there because she was terrified of flying. She has traveled all over Europe by motorcycle, car or boat…but she had never flown and swore she never would.  Until 2007 when Mick flew back to England to fetch her. We knew that she’d never get on a plane by herself so Mick went back to fly with her.

We surprised her with the gold suite at the heartbreak hotel and a VIP pass to visit Graceland as many times as she wanted during our stay in Memphis.

And of course we added in Sun Studios and his birth place in Tupelo, Mississippi.

We drove south  from MN and went all the way down to FL and back up the east coast so they got to visit 16 states in that road trip.

It was a trip of a lifetime and I am so very grateful to Mick for making it possible.

I wonder what the next 10 years will bring. I’m not even going to venture a guess. In 1999, if you’d have told me I’d have done all of  this in the next 10 years I’d have laughed my socks off. Who knows that the future holds for any of us.

I wish each and everyone of you a Happy new Year and 

I hope that 2010 brings you everything you are dreaming of.

So here it is.....Merry Christmas

I am guessing most of you won't be around much over the next week or so, so I thought I'd say

 Merry Christmas

to you all now.

I have to confess to not loving Christmas much these days.  I used to be really into it but since I  moved here, so far away from my family and friends,  I just don't enjoy it anymore. If I could I'd just fast forward straight through to next year :-(

I truly envy those of you who have kiddies at home....the whole belief in Father Christmas is just so much fun.

When Aydn was little I'd wait till he went to bed and hang out of my bedroom window ringing bells. Within minutes he'd be in my room yelling 'Mom, Mom can you hear him' 

I would dip my shoes in flour and leave footprints up the stairs and in the hallway to be discovered next morning. Aydn was so little it never occured to him that there wasn't any snow outside :-)

One year my Mom, who lived 2 doors away, stuck an inflatable Santa on a long pole and started tapping it on the outside Aydn's bedroom window. Goodness knows what the neighbors thought seeing her walking though the streets with Santa on a pole lol.

I do miss those days....they aren't little long enough. Not that I plan on starting again mind you :-)

Our new neighborhood is beautiful at this time of year. Everyone's houses are decorated inside and out.  Except ours...I feel like the resident Grinch but really don't have the money to buy something as frivolous as as tree this year.

And then I'd have to buy ornaments. What I really want is a tree with old ornaments. Going out and buying brand new just doesn't seem right to me...far too sterile. I want old ones with history and character...not some plastic made in China junk. Oh well...maybe I'll see if I can organize and old ornament swap next year and have a tree after all.

Anyhow, enough from Tallulah the sad old drama queen.....I'll leave you with this clip to listen to. You Brits are probably sick of it now but to all you others...It just ain't Christmas in England till you hear ol' Noddy singing.

Merry Christmas everybody xxx

Some house pics.

I have finally managed to set up a new blog to journal the new house.

All I have up so far are 2 posts showing the outside of the house and the gardens but if you'd like to take a look just click on the photo below.

If anyone of you have more of a clue about gardening or home decorating than I do (and I am sure that is all of you ) I'd love you to follow me over there as well. I need all the help I can get :-)

Getting there....

Slowly but surely :-)

I have finished painting my workroom, my main overhead light has gone up and I have my own computer (and all my files) back...whhheeee.

As you can see from the photos there is still a looong way to go yet but at least the basics are done.

I wanted adjustable closet shelving in the closet but after looking at the price I decided my old plastic shelving will suffice :-) 

I will put shelves of some kind up on the spare wall to the right of the closet. I'd prefer open shelving and it seems insane that I can buy flat pack bookcases cheaper than I can buy shelves and brackets. But I'll be needing somewhere to display all the flowers and sculpts I'll be making soon :-)

The workroom is at the side of the house and doesn't have a very nice view. I toyed with the idea of using the other bedroom, which looks out onto the back garden, but thought I'd save the nicest view for the guest bedroom. Besides, when I am in here I ought to be working not gazing out of the window. I'll plant something along the fence to make it somewhat prettier and I'll add some bird feeders out there.

The room would ideally be another 6 inches bigger all the way round as the desks only just fit ( they are pulled away from the wall at the moment) but I am grateful to have a room of my own so am not complaining.

The sewing machine won't be a permanent fixture....I am in the middle of making drapes for the front room.

At least once this room is finished I can move some of the boxes that are filling up the other rooms.  Then we can worry about what to do with the rest of the house and garden...something I am NOT looking forward to at all.

Well I best get cracking and start emptying some of these boxes. I thought you might like to see what has been eating my time up of late.

Two steps forward.....

and six steps back. Isn't that how it goes :-)

I decided to paint my workroom before unpacking everything. It was perfectly clean and freshly painted but in a very bland cream color.

Having spent the last 5 years renting, and dreaming of the day I wouldn't have to live with white walls, I planned on painting my workroom.

After moving in and realizing there was so much else to do it seemed really frivolous to paint a perfectly OK room. But that is all it was ... OK. So, knowing that once everything was unpacked I'd never find the inclination to empty everything out again, I decided to go ahead and paint it.

Now, I have a tendency for very dark, medieval, Gothic kind of colors. My last house was painted this way but that wouldn't work in my workroom where I need the light.

So...I went with a periwinkle on the bottom and french country blue on the top split by a white chair rail. I still have a ways to go and I can't say I am loving it much but I am not going to start again.

I have discovered that a decorator I am not. How hard is it to paint a clean line between wall and ceiling or wall and trim. How can I make such detailed flowers that are smaller than a penny but not be able to paint a straight line lol.

Anyhow, at the beginning of the week I ended up with an extremely sore right shoulder. I assumed I'd sprained it with all the painting I'd been doing but, when it got to the point I could barely lift my arm, off to the docs I went.

She thought I'd torn or stretched a ligament so sent me off for X-Rays. Turns out I have arthritis in my shoulder...oh the joys of getting older. Doesn't seem like 5 minutes ago I was dancing on bars with the best of them. OK so it was 5 years ago not 5 minutes but even so, I am only 42 !!! Too young to be falling apart like this lol.

So the painting has had to take a break while I let the ligaments heal up. And that is why I appeared to have come back to blogland only to have vanished again. It hurt to use the computer too much :-(

My shoulder has been giving me jip for a couple of years and I just put it down to the position I sat when I was making my flowers. Hopefully it won't affect me making flowers or sculpting in the future.

Hopefully within a couple of weeks things should be a little straighter round here, I'll have my own computer back and can get back into the swing off things.

Toodle Pip for a bit

xxx

HAPPY THANKSGIVING.....

....to all my American friends....I hope you all have a wonderful day.


Sorry to have been MIA for so long...silly me thought I'd be back to blogging a week after we'd moved in....now I am rolling around in laughter at the thought of my naivety :-)

We have been working none stop to try and get this place sorted...forget the fun things like hanging art or setting up our workrooms. So far it has been dealing with leaks, replacing faucets, showers, waste disposal units and the like.

Oh and dealing with an ex- landlady who pays no attention to the law and has withheld a chunk of our security deposit...guess we'll be seeing her in court shortly.

I have spent the last 3 weeks doing nothing but scrubbing the kitchen cupboards to within an inch of their life and priming, painting, and lining the interiors. It has taken this long because they were so gross and whatever they are made of required a minimum of 4 coats of paint. I am about halfway there now and I don't' even want to think of what we'll do with the exteriors.

Once the cupboards are clean enough to put things into, then I'll think about my workroom.

I know I promised pics and you'll get them soon. I'll likely start a new house blog to keep as a journal...just need to think of a name for it :-)

Anyhow, thought I'd fly by to wish you all a great Thanksgiving.

xxx