The Festive Season has started!

It's been a mad mad week but oh I am enjoying this so much! And with this I mean the December festivities. It is the best time of year for family fun, friends get together, school plays, fairs etc and we had all that this last week. And I am thoroughly enjoying myself writing this all down, listening to Take That (booked my tickets last week, yippee), drinking a lovely cup of tea, gazing at my Christmas tree and warming myself by the fire. It can't get any better (take note Mr Betsy!). 

So what exactly happened this last week that I couldn't get to my computer? Well for starters I had the lovely little ones from the arts and crafts club round to learn about Matisse. We did 'drawing with scissors'. We looked at some of the Fauve paintings but then focussed on his later life and we tried to interpret this into our own works. The children made fabulous 'Under Sea' versions, gardens, pink snowmen. It was fabulous. 

Then as I was making dinner, guess what happened? We heard a knock on the door and when we opened there was a huge bag of presents from St Nicholas. We believe possibly left by one of his helpers. The monkeys were thrilled to bits. And so were Mr Betsy and I, there were some yummy treats for us too. 

The rest of the week seems a little blur. Every day we had either a school play, school concert or a school fair. One of the things girl monkey did this week was to play a tornado in the Wizard of Oz, I was a little puzzled by what this might entail but she showed us some great choreography. 

Today I was finally able to sit down for a little while and enjoy the tree. Every year I say we will get it closer to Christmas but as soon as St Nicholas has been the monkeys get so excited over Christmas that I can't resist. It was a very special treat to do the decorating after school yesterday. In between all the commitments this week I have been very busy to get the house very homely. Even though this is a temporary home for us I need it to feel like home, especially at this time of the year. Mr Betsy got us some new book cases last week and since I rearranged all the furniture and put up a lot of the Christmas decorations it feels like we are in a new and very cosy home. 

Today was the one but last school fair. I added some more colours to the bead ball necklaces. As you might know purple was never my favourite colour but since it is growing on me I have even added this shade to my range!

Being in a homely spirit, I got myself some lovely lavender water and ironed these gingerbread gift bags that I sewed this morning with it. All nicely smelling for the fair. The last one tomorrow and then I can relax for a few weeks (well whatever that means in my book!).

Sunny Manchester

What a fabulous day this was! Glorious sunshine, not something we see every day in Manchester. I started off so well today making some more necklaces to take with me on Thursday when I will have a stall at an event at one of the local tennis clubs. But I found myself gazing out of my window..... As you can see I am not much of a gardener, either having lived in places for a very short time or not having a garden at all prevented me from getting green fingers but I am very proud of the monkey's sunflowers and other plants we have growing at the moment.

After having made just three bead balls I had the intention to make loads of Suffolk puffs. Just about all my accessories are decorated with them, I just love making them and love the shape and they are so versatile but I didn't get any further than just this teeny weeny blue denim one :

Hmmm.... I made myself my favorite morning drink. I made my smoothie of the day with 1 cup of Greek yoghurt, 1 medium size banana, juice of one lemon and a handful of red grapes. Very refreshing. 

I am now going to curl up with my book. I am reading a hilarious novel called The Ivy Chronicles by Karen Quinn. It's about a woman who had it all but loses her job and finds her husband cheating on the same day. She reinvents herself as a private school admissions adviser and it is just so funny, can't stop reading it! 

Busy Betsy starts blogging

After a lot of persuasion I am finally starting a blog!! I am very excited about this and hope to share a lot of fun things with you all. Just to let you know what I might be blogging about: my crafts, my hundreds of ideas that never get put into practice, my WIPs and UFOs, plenty of those but I am hoping this blog will help me getting my act together. There might be some news regarding the little monkeys (a boy and a girl), the absent but soon to return husband (working crazy hours, many miles away, bless him), books I am reading, things that caught my eye, life in the north and the odd recipe.

It is getting a little late and dark to put toget

her black bead-ball necklaces but I just managed to make one for my artist friend Rosana. She is a fabulous painter of women and I am thrilled that she really liked my necklaces. Here are some in other colours that I sell (my Etsy shop should be up and running soon too, I am getting there in cyberspace!).

Admire the works on her website www.rosanaibarrola.co.uk. I won't make any more today but will have to tomorrow. I have a long list of things to make and take to the stall I booked on Thursday. I did finish a wall hanging though today. The theme is Under the Sea (photo to follow) and was created for an exhibition organised by the Embroiderers Guild earlier this year. My girl monkey made the design and gave me a list of objects she wanted in the hanging. As I was misinformed about the required measurements it ended up as a 4 panel piece but I have now finally mounted them on a backing. I hope she'll be pleased. 

Another reason to start this blog is that I need a tidy house. Many blogging friends show lovely pictures of their homes and I always feel rather embarrassed. There is too much stuffer everywhere. EVERYWHERE! Though I have never had a problem with living in organised chaos now that I am nearly hitting the big FOUR O I am fed up with the mess everywhere. The monkeys are big helpers at the moment. A few days ago a friend came round to buy some cards and told me about the Housefairy. Apparently she comes and checks the children's rooms and if they are tidy she leaves a surprise and if not just some fairy dust. Apart from the fact that the monkeys wake up very early every morning to see if she has been I am thrilled with this recommendation. You can find this fairy of fairies on www.thehousefairy.org. Obviously I need to so some work as well to keep up with the kids so my task for tomorrow will be to tidy this up: 

In case you are wondering what this is it is the kitchen cabinets. On it are my useful paper shredder (just out of sight), a retired bread making machine, an unused 'pass the parcel' from my boy monkey's pirate party about a month ago, some monkey drawings an other art work, a picture frame in progress, diva lights from a wedding we went to about 6 weeks ago and a bottle of Moet & Chandon (don't ask!). I hope to show you the difference soon. However I have to hand in my final assignment for a "Working with children - arts & crafts" course tomorrow, crazy-craft for the stall this week and take the monkeys swimming. Luckily I will be able to keep them entertained when we get home with cornflour paste. I made this today as a little science project for them and they liked it so much they want to play with this again tomorrow. I didn't measure what I used but it was about a cup of cornflour, a couple of table spoons water and some food colouring, it should be a pva like consistency. Mix it in a low container (baby plate, tray) and it makes a fabulous paste that feels really sticky but the good thing is it isn't. If it drops on the floor it dries immediately and you are able to brush it up. The monkeys loved creating patterns that disappeared immediately.