A British Summer, Pac-a-Mac And All

We went to Exmouth today to visit the Crikey it's Vintage fair (more of that later) and stayed to enjoy the rain, clouds and plentiful available parking (unheard of in July especially right on the seafront).

Neon Love

Neon pink hand painted geometric note book - Les Miniboux 10 euros (£8.11)

Neon wooden salad bowls - Wind and Willow Home $64 (£42.28)

Neon light show glasses - Candy Coated Love $18 (£11.89)

Neon Blanket - Oh This Nose $230 (£151.94)

100 Neon parcel labels - Knot and Bow $19 (£12.55)

Neon pink geometric container - Waterstone Succulents $17 (£9.91)

I love neon.  Seriously, when I was young, very young I used to measure how 'cool' I was by how many items I owed that were neon, so when neon burst back on the scene I was over the moon!  The list above is a small collection of all the items I want to own.

Notepad: Les Miniboux
Salad bowls: Wind and Willow Home
Glasses: Candy Coated Love
Blanket: Oh This Nose
Labels: Knot and Bow
Container: Waterstone Succulents

Allotment Geekery

There was an Open Day at the allotment this weekend, it was supposed to be on Saturday but with Red Warnings for floods and already sodden ground it was postponed until Sunday.  There were a number of activities including a quiz, and as it turns out I got 100% in the quiz and won a bottle of wine!  Laura and I then worked on getting sloshed so the rest of the photos aren't the best quality, sorry about that.

The big job of the day was thinning out the leeks, if the packet says sew thinly you don't just chuck the whole pack in and hope for the best cos the little buggers grow.  Each leek has to be dropped into a hole and then watered, you don't fill with soil because they need room to fill the space.  I anticipate hating leeks by the end of the year having so many, but I've never grown them before so at this stage I'm still excited.  

The tomatoes are still growing but none of them are turning red, am I just being impatient?  Luckily though the courgettes are finally coming along quite nicely, the yellow variety are a winner and so sweet, definitely growing them again.

And finally there were several little bunches of flowers being sold, with everything from rosemary to sweetpeas in each bunch, they smell amazing and give me a good excuse to get my ice cream cone vase out.

Crikey It's All So Normal These Days.

Crikey.  Ever since, well after the wedding last year life has been, frankly dull.

I appreciate we're all going through the daily grind of getting up, going to work, coming home, doing the chores, eating, sleeping and repeating the whole process again and probably I shouldn't be complaining.  I have a job when others are struggling to get one, I have a lovely husband who has an ace moustache, and I'm lucky enough to have some acebag family and friends in my life, but crikey it's all so normal isn't it?

Here I have compiled a list of things to do over the next 6 months to perk things up a bit, feel free to comment or make suggestions!

1. Make one significant and productive (i.e. more than an hour and not just a tidying up) visit to the studio per week.
2. Get my ETSY business back up and running, one customer comment was "this is the best purchase I have ever made on ETSY" and I let my little online shop slide?  Crazy.
3. Do a giveaway on my blog, you lot read my nonsense I really should reward you for that.
4. Go on a daytrip once a month.  I need to rack up some more of those Middle-Age Postcards!
5. Give at least one of my Pinterest projects a try (yeah we've all said that, right?).  If you're not already reading Pintester then you really should be, a blog about messing up the projects found on Pinterest, this will be me, I will provide photographic evidence of the disaster...
6. Re-design my blog.
7. Cook up a storm, or at least try one new recipe a month.  I am the weirdest cook on the planet, if it can all be boiled up in one pot in less than 20 mins that is a win in my book, things need to change!
8. Adopt a rescue cat.  I miss Pigga, and I miss having a cat, and MozzyMr is concerned that when I'm left in the house on my own I will lure all the neighbourhood cats into our living room where I will make them have a tea party.
9. Celebrate my 31st Birthday in style or if not in style at least with fun!
10. Complete a charity event.

Perhaps not the most inspiring or crazy list ever but if it stops me being BORED that's all I ask for.

Life via the Medium of Rainbow

Allotment Geekery

Almost a month away from the allotment and the weeds are beyond a joke, on Saturday we spent three hours there.  Whilst MozzyMr was in the polytunnel tending to his tomatoes (seriously this is a preview of what he's going to be like as an old man, he'll be talking to those plants soon) I dug up two heaped wheelbarrows full of weeds and I still have half a plot to go!  To top it off because of the cool, damp weather the veg isn't really doing much, we're getting one or two courgettes but they're no thicker than your index finger, the peas have perked up a bit, and of course we have an abundance of tomatoes to come but they're still green, it has been weeks I was hoping for at least one to be ready by now, meh.

The lavender is doing well and I've let three of our spring onions go to flower because I love how they look.  Following such a hectic June we're not planning on doing much at all this July so it'll be lots of time on the allotment and hopefully some trips to the studio as well...

A Month of Reading

Yep, a month and I've only managed one book.  To be fair over the past month we have driven approximately 1,700 miles, seen most of our families attended two birthday parties, one funeral and a wedding.  Reading hasn't been high on the agenda, nevermind here we go!

1. The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

I don't usually read translations (originally Spanish) of novels, obviously you can never be 100% sure that you're reading exactly what the author intended you to read, however I needed a book for going on holiday and this one came to hand when I ran into the charity shop.  It took me a couple of chapters to get used to the flamboyant descriptions but that really is my only criticism, this is a great story full of suspense and interesting characters, at times quite bleak and genuinely scary in places but that's why I loved it.  I would recommend it to anyone, although perhaps not if you wanted a beach read.  

Hopefully next month I'll have a bit more time to chill out a read some books, I've got loads stacked up and read to go.