Coat Hangers

How on earth did I end up with over ninety coat hangers with nothing on them?!?  I have got rid of a lot of clothes but I'm sure it wasn't ninety items.  So where did this lot come from........



They must have been in our wardrobes but I don't know what was hanging on them.  What do you do with coat hangers when you no longer need them I wonder.  I looked through the list of things we are allowed to recycle but coat hangers wasn't on it.  So they'll just have to be thrown away.  The council list of what to recycle made me realise how few things are on it.  I think we have single-handedly restocked one of the local charity shops though.  A little table we donated was outside the shop today with the price of £19.99 on it, hope it sells for that price, charities like this need all the help they can get just now.

Our sitting room is nearly cleared of all the stuff from the bedroom and we still have a bit of spare storage, partly due to getting rid of stuff and having more shelves.  One thing that is going to be difficult is sorting out the photographs we've taken this last 43 years.  Plus the photographs that belonged to my MIL.  It's going to be tough deciding what to get rid of and what to keep.  But we can't keep them all.

Bedroom So Far

It took the fitter five and a half days to fit the wardrobes, it was a long week!  It's going to take just as long to put everything back, deciding what not to put back is hard too.  There has been stuff stored in there for years, so - what's the point of keeping it if it's not used, I'm sure we've all asked ourselves that over the years.

Here are a couple of before and after pictures.  The before ones show the room stripped out and ready for fitting....

Then the same view as it is now...



At the opposite end of the room..............

And now..........

Because of the way the room is now designed it feels a lot bigger.  Before it was very mismatched with odd pieces of furniture that just never looked tidy.  We've still got the decorating to do, that will probably take another week and then we'll probably have a carpet fitted, the wood floor got quite scratched and dented so a carpet will just finish the room off nicely.  By the end of March it should be completely finished.

That's Better

After spending all that time reorganising and cleaning in my craft room yesterday, I think that it looks much better.  I sorted out a couple of shelves and managed to free one up for all my storage jars.

Then I tackled all my wadding, plastic bags and cardboard boxes that were spilling out all over the place.  I tied up the plastic bags and have them stored in a bin under my table.  Some of the cardboard was recycled into our recycling bin ready for collection by the council.  I was glad that I'd kept the tall box that I'd had some flowers delivered in (from my DS &DIL for my birthday) because I was able to use it for all the small bags/pieces of wadding that were always sliding out of that corner.

Now doesn't that look neat and tidy!!!

There are still areas that need sorting out but at least some of it's done.  The trouble is I can't motivate myself to do any crafting today, I just want to admire the tidyness!  Something I have done today though, is start off some sour dough.  I've never tried this before but when I read Melissa's really easy instructions, I just had to try it.  When I finish this blog post I'm going to make a Walnut, Date & Honey cake from my new recipe book.

Driving Myself Crazy - Again!

Today I decided to tidy my craft room.  I wanted to put things away that I'd used recently and give it a good dust.  It's amazing how much dust is created in here.  I've got two tables, one for sewing and general use and a small one where my guillotine stands, ready for when I'm card making.  The first thing I did was move everything from the small table and put it onto my work table.

Now I've got places where I keep all the tools and that will be easy enough to tidy up.  BUT - where shall I keep all the fancy storage jars and other decorative stuff?  That set me off and I started to get downhearted.  I'm sick of shuffling everything around to try and get some order in here.  I gave away a load of crafty items just before Christmas and now I concentrate just on sewing and card making.  There still isn't enough room in here.  One corner in particular always gets out of hand

It's where I keep all my wadding. for some reason it keeps escaping (because I rummage around under there looking for things).  I keep telling my DH that I need three craft rooms but he disagrees every time and refuses to let me turn all three bedrooms into craft rooms - the old meany!!!  No, he's very patient really and tries to help me sort it out.  We have different ideas about what 'sorting out' means.  To me it is to have everything in it's place and readily accessible.  To him it is to put everything away - full stop.  And why do I always want to keep cardboard boxes and plastic bags?  Well they might come in useful, won't they?  Oh well, I'll spend another hour in here then have a cup of tea.

The Parlour

I can call our dining room the parlour now!!!  The sofa arrived yesterday and I'm so pleased with it.  I was worried that it would look too small and too cheap.  I ordered it on Sunday and it arrived Wednesday.  Not so long ago everything used to take weeks to arrive and not so long ago I would never have got this sofa for £139.  In the past, when I've made a purchase like this, I've woken up in the mornings feeling guilty and thinking that I'm being extravagant and that I've bought something we didn't really need but at that price I can enjoy it!!!

I was reading an article in the newspaper about a woman that started a cupcake making business and saved her family from bankruptcy.  I get a bit annoyed when I read articles like that.  Well done to the woman for taking the chance on doing this but I think there is more to it than just making the cakes, turning up and selling them.  These articles never tell the story of how they actually came up with their strategy, how they chose what venue to try.  I suppose I must feel a bit envious after my disappointing attempts last year, to sell my sewing at a fair that is put on regularly in a village near where I live.  I probably chose the wrong venue so this year, if I decide to have another go, I will try somewhere else.

Spring Cleaning

There hasn't been any sewing or crafting going on here for a couple of days now.  I had a sudden, unexpected urge to do housework.  Now that is unusual these days I have to admit.  It wasn't the rush round with the vacuum and duster type housework either.  It was the 'I'm sick of the clutter' type housework.  I've got a big cabinet in my dining room that belonged to my grandmother.

It is crammed full of 'stuff', including video tapes of television programmes from the mid 1990s.  They will never be watched and I needed space for my DVDs, so the videos were thrown out.  What a satisfying feeling that was!

I also use my dining room to watch tv and have two small easy chairs in there that just do not match the other furniture.  They are going and I've ordered a small sofa that is more in keeping with the look I want, which is sort of Victorian, or at least eclectic Victorian/Edwardian/other.  I'd love it to look like a parlour.  The only time we really use this room for dining is when we have guests, which isn't very often these days, and I have a table in the kitchen that we can use.

I was discussing all this with two friends, one of whom was asking about stain removal.  If anyone has a way of removing a stain from carpet we'd love to hear.  It's one of those stains that has been cleaned but has left a discoloured patch that just will not come out.  I hate carpet and just have rugs in my house because of this reason.  When you have pets carpets are just not practical and I do love the look of wood floors with rugs.

My Stitching Chair

This is where I sit and stitch.  I spend a lot of time in this chair, stitching and messing around on my computer.  I love my computer and would miss having one.  It's like having a huge library, anything I want to know about I can find somewhere on the web.  I feel lucky that I have a whole room to keep all my crafty stuff in, though I could do with a room twice the size!  I recently got rid of loads of stuff I knew I didn't want to do any more.  Now I'm just down to stitching, sewing, card making and maybe, if I feel like it a bit of watercolour painting.  I used to do quite a bit of painting but not very well.  When I had my clear out I threw loads of my art away and didn't feel a thing!  I could still do with a bit more organization in here, I'd love to have cupboards for everything so that it looks tidy all the time.

Best Friends

The other day I mentioned that I had a photo album of my dogs but I also have lots of pictures not in albums.  The pictures here were taken about fourteen years ago.  Jack the Manchester terrier (deceased), Doobry toy apricot poodle and Perkins a blotched tabby cat (deceased).  They all got on really well and would often sit together - the cat was in charge of course.

We would often end up all sitting together like this, Perkins always had first choice of where to sit, then Jack, then Doobry.  I had no choice!!!

If I wasn't available to sit on these two would lie on the floor.

I have lots of pictures of my first two dogs that I will show another day.

While I was looking at these pictures it reminded me of how much work we were doing on the house at that time.

Graham working on the kitchen, what a mess!  It nearly drove us round the bend.

Me cutting out the wall to make a doorway for the new, upstairs, bathroom.

The stud wall we built when we converted part of a bedroom for the bathroom.  Apart from plumbing we did all this sort of work ourselves.

The house is now nothing like it was when we first lived here.  We've done a lot of work on it.  It was built in 1908 so takes quite a bit of maintenance.  When we moved here it had been 'modernized' quite badly so needed a lot of work doing.  We put the bathroom upstairs and changed the downstairs bathroom to a wc and laundry room and moved an internal wall so that there is an annexe to the kitchen for my fridge/freezer and further storage cupboards, replaced all the windows and external doors, replaced the floor boards in the main bedroom and built fitted cupboards and wardrobes, installed central heating, replaced the roof and did tons of other stuff.  I still don't count it as finished though.  Currently we have a problem with a leak over the bay window, I think rain is getting between the rendering and the bricks (why it was rendered I'll never understand).  What attracted me to this particular house was that it had a proper entrance hall, the kitchen was big compared to a lot of houses of this type and the size of the garden.  The garden is one of those really long, narrow types, it's split into several sections, the back door patio then a gravelled area where my greenhouse is, a slabbed patio, a lawned area with flower borders and old apple tree, the shed and garage area, then my veg plot area.  Also it is a few minutes walk from a fairly decent shopping area and our doctor is about two minutes walk away.  There is a very good bus service too.  All in all it's a great place to live.

Home Styles

In one of the cupboards in my bedroom I have a lot of home decorating/style books.  I don't think I've ever really made up my mind what my style is.  Most of the walls in my house are pale and my bedroom has pale walls and soft furnishings.  Since fleece blankets became easily available I've done away with duvet quilts.  I hate duvets because they are impossible to wash in my washing machine so was always buying new ones.  I wash things a lot.  Now my bed looks much neater with sheets, fleece blankets and a nice bedspread.  

Hanging off the lamp in this picture is a necklace, one of those sort that you can buy in the supermarkets these days.  Unfortunately I can't wear jewellery that has nickel in it but I love jewellery so use it to just hang around the bedroom.

The other side of the bed has a chest of drawers next to it.  The two flower pictures you see are embroidered.  The orange one is of cross-stitched pansies, I think done with one strand, I didn't stitch it.  The other picture is a bouquet of flowers done in normal embroidery, I did stitch this one.  I'm never happy with how I display things.  I would like one of those wooden free standing mirrors on this chest of drawers so will be on the look out for one.

If I could afford it I think I would have a new look in each room every year.  Recently I've admired the shabby chic look, I'd have to buy the furniture ready done though, I haven't got the energy for all the work needed to shabby-up furniture!

De-cluttering

I'm in the process of getting rid of stuff in the craft room that I don't use. It's been a very difficult time! When I retired (I left work in 1999 but wasn't officially a pensioner until 2006) I wanted to 'do crafts'. So, I tried just about everything and bought tons of stuff. Now I realise that my favourites are hand embroidery, using my sewing machine and making cards. This means that I have to get rid of everything else. There are two reasons I want to get all the above mess sorted out, one is I will actually be able to use the room properly and the other is I really, really want to move house. I want a bungalow and I want to be nearer to my son and his wife. Graham being so ill this last two months has made me realise how alone we would be if anything happened to either of us. Yes, we have friends nearby but it would be unfair to expect them to do much for us when I have a perfectly good son and daughter in law!!! The picture above shows my craft room at it's worst, whenever I sort anything out it always gets worse before it gets better, I'm sure you find that too.