ride 'em, cowboy

I've had this post saved in my drafts folder for aaaaages, but just haven't found the time to edit the pictures to go with it. An evening with a surprisingly smooth double bedtime, and only X-Factor on the TV (not telly that requires the greatest amount of concentration) meant that tonight I finally managed it. *Air punch*

A while back, I wrote a book review as a guest poster on the lovely Kat's blog, where I raved over a DIY vintage cowboy chest of drawers. Ever since, I've been bordering on obsessed with finding old cowboy annuals, and this post by Lucy over at Lulastic really didn't help matters (nor did this one. Or this...) One day, I managed to strike it lucky on eBay, and won not one, not two, but three vintage cowboy annuals. Hurrah!

The pictures inside were just what I was after - good old Roy Rogers yeee-hawing around on his horse, pop-up cowboys going about their day and even the odd illustrated map or two just begging to be popped up on the wall.

John, I hope you enjoyed your Christmas in 1954

I thought about doing some tins covered in pictures, and then realised that actually, I didn't have anything to put in them. Then I thought about doing some sort of collage, and decided that honestly, all that glueing and mod-podging was a bit too much effort for a project that I wanted to get finished pretty quickly. In the end I hit upon the idea of doing some sort of garland, by cutting out the pictures and then attaching them to a crochet band. Yarn saves the day again!

Several chains, double crochet stitches and a yarn colour change later, and the crochet cowboy garland was born. Drum roll please..... drrrrrr......

To be completely honest, Benjamin was pretty underwhelmed. "Oh," he said, "and what is it?" Humph. Still, I'm pretty pleased with it, and I think it looks just right above his postcard display thingy (the Diginet system from IKEA - a great way of having a picture display without having to knock a load of holes in the wall. Essential when you rent like we do..). Plus, hurrah for upcycled-recycled-thrifty-DIY-goodness.

Linking up with all the other magpies as usual over on Magpie Monday. High five for thriftiness!

ecover zero

Regular readers will know that I have an on-off relationship with everything eco-friendly, and while I'm incredibly enthusiastic and willing to try most things, I usually just end up in a massive muddle. (A good example is the mental tussle I have over supermarkets and shopping - I've considered box schemes (too expensive for us), and have driven miles to buy our fruit and veg from a farmers market with two kiddos in the back (incredibly stressful. Do not try it), but still we find ourselves buying stuff from Waitrose or *insert generic supermarket here.*) However, I'll attempt anything once, so when I was offered the chance to road test the new range of Ecover cleaning supplies, I said a very enthusiastic 'yes'.

 Ecover are marvelous, and I really, really like them. We already use their washing up liquid and laundry stuff (when we can afford to - like most ethical things, it's a bit more pricey than supermarket own brand, and as much as I love the environment and our beautiful planet, I'm not prepared to starve for it!), and they're all superb - a particular favourite is the Grapefruit and Green Tea washing up liquid. The new Zero range contains all the usual ethical wonderful-ness, but has been designed specifically for people with allergies, and is completely fragrance free. As a sufferer of extremely sensitive skin, and the mother to a child prone to eczema, I thought it sounded right up our street.

The pack I received contained non-bio laundry liquid and fabric conditioner, washing up liquid, a dishcloth, tea towel and a handy little tote bag, perfect for taking to the market on fruit and veg day. Lovely!

The cleaning was superb. I gave the laundry liquid and conditioner a rigorous testing on a white load which contained, amongst other things, my dressing gown (robe? What do people even call these things these days?) which was covered in baby sick (erk), toddler breakfast and make up. Mornings are a messy business in our house. Also in there was a tea towel, and a baby-gro. Both suitably mucky. They came out gleaming.

Don't judge me on my creased tea towel....

The washing up liquid also proved its worth and performed excellently - clean dishes all the way. The only issue I had with it was a personal one - I'm a big fan of smells. I like the smell of clean laundry, and fruity dishwashing liquid, which is why I wouldn't personally swap to the Zero range. I think if we had more severe allergies, I would do it in a heartbeat, but Benjamin's eczema is under control, and I can avoid skin irritation simply by wearing rubber gloves. On the whole, though, it's a superb idea, and I highly recommend Ecover as a brand, and the Zero range as well.

Head over to the Ecover website for more information, products and much more.

(Note: Although I received the cleaning products for free, I wasn't paid for this post and all opinions are my own. If I'd thought it was pants, I would have said so!)

ain't no better den than a homemade den

One of the things my boy loves more than anything is making a little hidey hole for himself - crawling under blankets, making forts and nests out of cushions.... give the kid a secret spot of his own and he is one happy camper. When he was younger he had a Thomas the Tank Engine pop-up house thingy, which he a) hardly ever played with and b) has since grown out of - Thomas used to get shunned on a daily basis in favour of a blanket and two chairs. What can I say? He's inherited my make-do attitude and love of homemade. Lucky really, since for about 29 days of the month we are skint-o.

 I've got a board on Pinterest which I started when I wanted to collect ideas for being outdoors in the Summer (stupidly, I thought we might have more than a couple of weeks of sun, and imagined us spending endless lazy days lying on beaches and in fields. Epic weather fail) called Outdoor Adventures, where I pinned heaps of pictures of tents, dens and tepees. I found loads of A-Frame tutorials, like this one here, and really though about actually doing it - but when it came down to it, an old quilt cover and seven bamboo canes did the job just fine. While it might not have been as sturdy (I'm going to sew some tapes on the bottom to make it more secure for next time), it served us well for the afternoon, and didn't take long to put up (it would have taken far less time if I'd had someone to hold the bamboo canes and hadn't got in a complete tent-related rage with them every time they fell over...). So without further ado, here is my short tutorial for a DIY tent (I'd just like to point out that I am in no way claiming this idea as my own - I'm sure others out there in blogland have been making garden accessory dens for yonks. This is just how I did it):


You will need:

Single quilt cover that you don't mind cutting up
7 extra long garden canes (the ones that are about 6 or 7ft are ideal
String (I actually used DK crochet cotton which worked really well)
Pegs

1. Take quilt cover. Cut down the stitched short side, and one of the long sides. You could always unpick it if you want the finish to be a bit neater, which is what I did.
2. Turn under to make a hem, and stitch in place.
3. Take two garden canes and lie them flat on the floor (I made the mistake of trying to lean them against the fence to do this. Don't try it. Just trust me. You'll end up incandescent with rage), in a 'V' shape. Overlap them at the top. Tie together with string.
4. Repeat again for the other end.
5. This is really where you need a second person - I managed to get Benjamin to stand still long enough to hold one of the 'V' shapes while I held the other one, and fixed the roof support cane on top.
6. Push the ends of the canes into the lawn so it stands up, then tie the last cane to one end to make a sort of tripod. I didn't think I'd need to do this, but it just makes the whole structure a bit more secure.
7. Drape quilt cover over and peg in place.
8. Get cross and swear at pegs every time one pings off.
9. Manage to secure all four sides of the quilt cover and feel smug.
10. Add a flag and some bunting.
11. Find your most comfy cushions and blankets, and furnish your new abode.
12. Carry every single toy in the house outside and try to squash them all inside (err, that might just apply to us...).

That's pretty much it. I'm sure there are more technical ways of doing this, but if you like a good shortcut, it worked fine for us. Happy camping!

PS: I played around with the fab Picmonkey for the photos on this post - waaaaaay better than Picnic used to be!

Proving that vintage scarves have multiple uses

the best little charity shop in the world

I might not have had a lot of time to blog lately, but I have managed to squeeze in a bit of thrifting time (seriously, I'd have to be unable to move completely to keep away from the charity shops), and had some huuuuge successes in my favourite spot of all time - the Salvation Army shop in Portsmouth.

I've been searching for absolutely aaaaaages for a vintage magazine rack, and when I saw this little beauty for a teeny tiny £4, I snapped it up sharpish. At the moment it's sitting in the corner of our lounge, holding several half-finished crochet projects and a jumper I've started to unravel - definitely a worthwhile buy.

I had a bit of pyrex luck as well - three of these lovely plates for a single English pound - and found the glass jug with orange flowers nestled among a load of dull tumblers. I always tend to umm and ahhh a bit over glassware - I just think unless it's got a really fantastic print on it, it's a bit blah. Plus, there are always sooooo many old Wilkinsons glasses and souvenir shot glasses to sift through before you get to the good stuff.

Yes, that is a chamberpot - basically, an old ceramic lav. I've got grand plans for the Spring (I'm thinking ahead - totally not a Winter person...), which include a marvelous display of flowers and shrubs planted in these little beauties. Look at the flowers! It fits right in with my hippy-natural-eco-self-sufficient style garden perfectly. Can. Not. Wait.

This little darling actually wasn't thrifted, but gifted - my Mother-In-Law gave me this amaaaaazing tailors dummy for absolutely nowt, nil, nada. It came packaged up in a bin bag, and I actually squealed when I unwrapped it (her? Should I name her? I quite like Tallulah...) - paisley is my absolute favourite print, along with retro florals, and any plans I had of dressing her up in my vintage dresses have been completely and utterly scuppered. How could I cover her up?!

Teaming up, as usual, with Missie Lizzie and all of the other magpies over on Magpie Monday. Come along and show us your wares!

strawberry fields

Good Lord, it's been three long weeks since I last had the chance to write a post, mostly because our three-year old has decided that bedtime is, like, soooo last year. Seriously, the little beggar hasn't been going to sleep until gone 9pm every night, which doesn't leave much time for, well, anything. Bah.

A couple of weeks ago, we went off to Petersfield market to buy our fruit and veg (more on that later) and took the scenic route home, through the winding roads and little villages nearby. The kiddos were asleep in the back of the car, the sun poured through the windows, and the radio played quietly in the background. Bliss.

It's times like these that remind me that actually, living where we do is pretty good. We're half an hour from a  superbly clean, sandy beach in one direction, the countryside in another, and surrounded by little shops and markets all over. We're not quite up there with London, but we don't do badly down on the South Coast, and I really and truly couldn't imagine living anywhere else.

Aaaaanyway, as we headed back towards home, we passed a sign that told us a PYO farm was up ahead - never one to miss a food related opportunity, we lurched round the corner and up the hill. The sight that greeted us was spectacular - rolling hills for as far as the eye could see, flanked by an abundence of leafy trees and topped by the deepest blue sky.

Rolling hills and rows of fruit bushes.

Durleigh Marsh Farm, on the Hampshire/ Sussex border, is immense. Fact. The landscape itself is beeeyootiful, and the staff are really friendly and helpful, particularly with fruit picking novices like myself. We ended up with blueberries, strawberries and raspberries, and there was a small incident involving a spade and some rhubarb related confusion. Ahem. It was incredibly satisfying to watch our trugs slowly fill up, and to later on sit and munch our way through the haul - you can't get much fresher than 'picked that day' berries. Nom, nom, nom.

They also sold the most beautiful flowers and plants - check out those geraniums.

Strawberries, nom.

Well, if you insist.

Little blueberries for little hands.

It was so hot that I had to scrabble about in the car for something to cover up my bonce. Sunstroke is not a good look.....

Raspberries galore.

The other Scarecrow was wearing a GAP jumper. Enough to frighten anything away.

ship shape studio

I met Emily of Shipshape Studio a year or so ago on Twitter (the same way I've met tonnes of loverly peeps throughout my blogging time), and then bought a card from her at the Shalford Vintage Fair a few months later, waaaay back when she was working under the Handmade by Emily label. Since then, Shipshape Studio has been born, and now they've launched the online store as well. To celebrate, there's an online party that runs from 9am Thursday 9th August (yes, yes, I know it's tomorrow, but it does last for twelve hours...) until 9am the following day. Expect fun things aplenty - see you there!

on plain packaging

When I was sixteen, I smoked my first cigarette. It was one of the most stupid decisions I have ever made (and believe me, there have been plenty), and I went on to smoke off and on for the following ten years. I tried quitting heaps of times, but somehow it always seemed easier to just give in - it wasn't until we were trying to have Benjamin that I actually managed it. There was suddenly something that was much more appealing to me than spending ridiculous amounts of money to stick dried up leaves in my mouth and set fire to them.

I wish I'd never started. Thinking about the amount of money I wasted, the impact I would have had on the environment and the detrimental effect to my own health (even if you quit, you're still at an increased risk of cancer and other smoking related diseases) does my absolute box in, and I just pray that neither of my two ever decide to 'dabble' like I did. Children and young adults are, let's face it, easily influenced, which is why I'm forcefully backing the Plain Packaging campaign, which aims to make cigarette and tobacco packets far less attractive to young people. If locked in place, regulations would mean that all brands are forced to use the same typeface, in the same colour and size - not only would the whole thing be far less eyecatching, but the health warnings could take up a whopping 75% of the pack front. It's hard to ignore the facts when they're staring you straight in the face....

Protect our children. Visit the Plain Packaging Campaign for more information and to pledge your support.