Well hello!

That was a longer break than expected! Though fear not I have been busy… Here are some of the fruits of my labours:

75 Wedding invitations - a bit of a group effort!

• Designed by Leonie, graphic designer at D’s firm.
• Chopped glued and beribboned by me, Duncan and my mother-in-law-elect.
• Written by my sister, Judith (aided by my brother-in-law watching the kids!).
• Folded, and stuffed into envelopes by me and Duncan
• Then a collective gathering of addresses to send them all out.. the last two are sat waiting to go tomorrow morning..

While I haven’t been blogging, I’ve still been receiving lots of lovely blogs to add to my list of sewing and craft blogs. It currently stands at 205 and is steadily growing. It’s amazing to see the increase in traffic from being mentioned by another blog - I’ve become a bit addicted to Google Analytics!

I’ve gotten further with my knitting:

this is how it was - it now goes all the way around my neck (just!)

I finally did my TIF challenge for February, which will get it’s own post..

But for the most part we’ve been concentrating on the wedding planning, we have one major decision left to make - the first dance! Any suggestions would be very welcome! I’m not sure my dancing skills are up to doing something like this. Make sure you watch until at least 45 seconds.. I promise it is worth it

I recently finished reading The friday night knitting club for the second time since Christmas - not something I do very often with a book, but I really enjoyed it. Interestingly opinions seem to be divided over at Amazon - so I guess read it and see or wait for the up coming film with Julia Roberts (who knits in real life) playing the lead character Georgia.

I for one was inspired to pick up some needles after 18 years and re-learn to knit:

and I have to say, so far, I’m doing a lot better than the square I knitted when I was in Guides - it was a holey mis-shapen thing, that my family have not let me forget!!

I’m starting simple and making a (quite wide!) scarf in garter stitch.. What do you think so far? Would I be able to hold my head up in a knitting circle??

I just spent the most tense half hour - pressing refresh on the BBC Live text commentary and watching Sky Sports News.

and they did it! Super Reds (Barnsley) beat Liverpool at Anfield to knock them out of the FA Cup! Our new Goal keeper Luke Steele had the most amazing debut and kept Liverpool out and Brian Howard got the winner in the 90th minute!

As you can imagine I’m over the moon! I’m off up to Barnsley tomorrow for some wedding planning and now it looks like general celebration!

I have a big cheesy smile this evening!

So last week I said I was going to launch Suzical the online shop. Step one was tell people, and well - it works! I got a commission right off and a couple of other leads..

A colleague asked my to make an anniversary card for her husband - it was a tricky one, she asked for a picture of a mole. It turns out moles are mainly black fur(!) so I went for an out line.. Please excuse the cheesy line, I couldn’t resist!

I have also ordered mini moo cards to use as business cards and stickers because they’re fun!!

I am still weighing up the pros and cons of Google checkout vs. an Etsy store.

Google seems to have the better rate in terms of fees, but with the shop on my site I’d have to start drumming traffic up. Etsy has a ready made audience and it’s searchable by subject, but there’s lots of direct competition.. For set up Etsy is easier as the template is already there, but as my fiance who’s a web developer, will be building the google checkout - it’s not a deal breaker!

On the other hand with Google checkout I’d have freedom to design the layout how I prefer and any traffic I drum up to my store would be building the Suzical brand rather than Etsy’s..

Let me know what you have used and what (if anything) you’d do different??

Will stumbled upon the animation below over at Crafty Daisies, showing how a bobbin in a sewing machine works! Isn’t it hypnotic!!

I’ll be computerless and home alone for the next couple of days - so I should have lots to report when Duncan returns from his business trip..

I’m hesitant to announce this, in case I don’t quite pull it off, but I figure if I tell people I really have to stop dreaming and get on with things! So here goes - I’m planning on opening an online store in the next few weeks. I’ve been designing cards this weekend and am planning on making up some ipod socks tomorrow - so wish me luck!!

I’ll keep you posted on my progress!

I met a good friend of mine for a cup of tea last night after work. We had a lovely half hour wondering round the foodhall at Fortnum and Mason Then tea and biscuits in the cafe and a browse around the big Waterstones near Picadilly circus and more excitingly she gave me a fab Christmas present:

buttons, which she got from the couture exhibition at the V&A, sewing related things to embellish with, some Christmas decorations and a Morrocan scarf..

HAppy Christmas one and all!

The build up to Christmas got just too hectic - and I’m afraid once again it was the blog that fell by the wayside - I feel a New Years’ resolution coming on there! Has anyone else thought that far ahead yet??

We went down to Eastbourne, on the South coast, for a very festive wedding on Saturday and then a long haul up to Harrogate on Sunday for Christmas with Duncan’s parents. I love Christmas and I adore hearing about family traditions - no two families are the same are they? I just got time to sit down with the computer and spotted this post over at Busywork about their family traditions and it struck me that breakfast was actually a big one for Christmas day - my family has always had bacon sandwiches, Duncan’s have porkpie and mustard and when we have Delaney Christmas (a second Christmas day with D’s old flatmates) we have scrambled eggs with smoked salmon and bucks fizz.

We off to my parents tomorrow and will stay there until New Years Day - so I’ll be without internet access for another week.

So have a Happy New Year and I’ll be back in 2008!

Our post is still recovering from the bad bad postal strike over here (I may have mentioned this!), so mail is still quite a rarity. I got home on Tuesday to:

Stitch magazine, full of lots of fab Christmas ideas for me to read about and never get round to!

A letter from Thameswater saying they owe us £40

and a lovely letter from a lady I sent a bookmark to in a recent swap and she sent me this lovely mini quilt as a thank you! Unfortunately I can’t read her blog address in the letter she sent.. so if it’s you, please leave a comment!!

Randomly in my favourite blue

So there you go a happy mail day!

Today I got a phone bill - I’ll open it tomorrow!

Hectic couple of weeks!

We’ve been waiting for a new white box to arrive before photographing anything new - so I have lots stored up to share! We currently have one of these which is great, but takes up lots of room - in a 1 bed flat space saving is essential!

I’ve been up in Barnsley wedding planning - under 7 months now!!

Rehearsing for Trial by Jury Supersized which is this Thursday!!

Had a very good guild meeting on Saturday - photos to follow when we get the tent thing!!

And I finally got my copy of amy butler’s In Stitches!

There is football on TV to occupy Duncan and I just discovered lots of eye candy over at the In Stitches Flickr group! Looks like a good night of drooling

Well I was a busy bee this week, making full use of my wrist feeling better! I did a bit more work on my Jacobean piece, I should finish this one pretty soon..

I finally made up a new bag for Duncan:

I’m really pleased with it - this is the first pattern I’ve made up from scratch, and after two days it’s still not fallen apart

I made cards - this is the one for my sister’s anniversary that I mentioned a couple of weeks ago: A birthday card for Will, I find making cards for boys a bit harder - you can’t really get away with flowers and butterflies Luckily Will’s a big basketball fan, and I used my fool proof inspiration plan - Clip art!! I often do a quick inspiration search on a lunch time at work and email the results to Duncan for printing.. I had to ring Hev to find out the right colour shorts and number..

This card was for a sick friend - the flower is detachable and can be used as a brooch ..

and finally, some coasters from my nephew - he’s 4 next week, starting early! He made them for all the family.

A flower for me and a hockey stick and ball for Duncan..