WOYWW 538

WHERE DID YOU COME FROM, WHERE DID YOU GO,
WHERE DID YOU COME FROM, COTTON EYE JOE?

Another mad week in the life of this Welsh gal!  Mostly taken up with cooking, arranging, setting up and attending of the WI Barn Dance :-) As well as making chocolate brownies for 80 people (and I'm on a diet, that was tough!) I was tasked with sorting out the raffle.

Hence why my desk looked like this last Friday:

I'm a great believer in a few quality prizes and it never hurts to gussy them up a bit. This seemed to involve getting everything out onto the workdesk!

Neet, this lot of ribbons that you passed on at the last Crop has been invaluable - thank you!

All ready to go.....

The WI Committee got together (with their other half in tow) and set up the hall on Saturday afternoon:

The bunting I made looked very pretty draped across the hall and was complemented by the gingham table decor the other girls had done. It's a lovely village hall, I spent a lot of time here in my youth up in the library where my mum was librarian and at youth club. Both my brothers played a lot of snooker here too!

View from the stage.

Mary is exceptionally good at set dressing!

It set the scene perfectly!!

After a really good feast (the girls excelled themselves) the dancing began, to the lovely music of Coppercaillie, a seven piece band.

Everyone joined in through the night, it was brilliant fun and even better when things went wrong :-D  The chap in the white and blue stripey polo shirt is my brother Steve who was down for the weekend - we danced every single dance!

The caller was fantastic and we did all sorts of different dances....

Here's Steve in the middle with other chaps being Angry Rams, would you believe - this dance had us all in stitches.

We just laughed all night, it was a really lovely way to raise money for our WI. And people have already asked if we're doing another one!!

Have a happy crafting week xxxx


WOYWW 537

WE ARE SAILING STORMY WATERS
TO BE NEAR YOU, TO BE FREE.

Firstly, I must apologise for the complete lack of commenting last week - it was just mad with too much in the diary and other things came first. I'll do better this time!

The desk:
This was the desk on Sunday when I just had to sit down and have 30 mins to myself. Elizabeth (Silverscrapper) had very kindly sent me this lovely nautical fabric and I knew that I had just the lining for it. It seemed a shame to cut it up for glasses cases, the dimensions were perfect to make a tote (which I haven't done for some time).

Happy sewing ensued - it was one of the projects that almost made itself, if you know what I mean, rather than cursing and muttering and unpicking seams!

I shared the finished article on FB to show Elizabeth what I'd done and the gorgeous Debbie Rock asked if she could buy it! Brilliant, said I, it was in the post on Monday and all the money will go towards RNLI funds.  Thank you both, wonderful ladies, I really do appreciate your thoughtfulness and kindness.

I also had a play with some of my new fabric, just seeing which lining I preferred:
They all looked good but the purple wins by a head for me!

Saturday was a very special day when I was invited with 200 other folk to attend the dedication,naming and handing over of the new Atlantic 85 boat and the official opening of the new boathouse. It was the most glorious warm day and was a wonderful way to celebrate the achievements of the crew and fundraisers.

It was looking very festive down the harbour...

The boats were both outside so that the ceremony could be held in the boat hall.

Both boats, their trailers and tractor units can all be stored safely in there, whereas previously, they'd been in a few sheds.

We were entertained by the Burry Port Male Voice Choir - the National Anthems were astounding, the acoustics in there were brilliant. I know several of these gentlemen as my dad sang for 35 years with them before he passed away. I did shed a tear.....

The speeches were good, it was marvellous to see so many people appreciating what is done in the community. Even though the boat was being officially named, it had already been out on 17 shouts (or missions) and saved 19 people. Altogether this year, there have been 63 shouts with a total of 72 rescued. That is some achievement.

Then there was a parade of the two inshore boats from Burry Port with the Trent class boats (the big ones!) from Mumbles and Tenby. Even the Air/Sea Rescue helicopter got in on the act as well!

The Mumbles boat came into the harbour, having waited for a sufficient depth of water - it was massive and very impressive. If you were in trouble stuck out in the Bristol Channel you'd be happy to see one of these coming into view!  You can see that the weather was beautiful here but the true bravery of those volunteers is heading out whatever the conditions.

I'm very proud to be helping in my own small way xx

Ok, off for a haircut and then we've got a kitchen designer coming this afternoon - as if the mayhem of the bathroom wasn't enough, lol!! 

Have a great week xx




WOYWW 536

IF YOU LIVE ANOTHER DAY IN THIS HAPPY LITTLE HOUSE....

Thank you for all the lovely comments last week, I know we're a supportive bunch but sometimes it really hits you what a great community we have online! As you may know, I'm a great one for reading my blog stats page and it shows which blogs have read yours. There was one address that at first I thought was spam but it carried on for a while so I had a look and found that it is the blog of a lady from Turkey! It tickles me that I have a follower there so a special mention and wave to pelinpembesi-buket.blogspot

Talking of lovely folk, I've had two lots of happy mail recently. Shaz sent me some cards to colour and as it happened, I needed a New Home card for my niece.

I got my Arteza pens out - I like them as they have a brush tip - they're things I use fairly regularly.

And then I dug out some paper and bits - et voila. Not exactly the most complicated card but I enjoyed doing it and hopefully my niece will like it.  I'll enjoy colouring in the other houses another time.

Then Elizabeth sent me these!

Lovely happy fabrics, perfect for making stuff to sell for the RNLI - thank you so much, you wonderful gal, it's much appreciated xxx  The card and postcard made me happy too, they're on the shelves in the JanCave at the moment!

Short and sweet this week - I may be late in returning comments as Son No 1 has come to stay and we're off out.  I shall leave you with some pics we took in the garden:

I know it's been a Painted Lady year as swarms of them migrated here but it still gladdens my heart to see them. That purple flower is a perennial wallflower, it has bloomed solidly for four months! What good value and it's brilliant for pollinators too.

I like the colours in this one too - that Rudbeckia has been amazing. In fact all the plants in my garden were chosen as they're good for all sorts of pollinators and it's really paid off. Simple things but it makes me happy.

Talking of which, G and I have been married 37 years today - I don't know who deserves the gold medal more...... ;-)

Have a great week!!

WOYWW 535

ALL YOU CAN DO IS STEP BACK IN TIME..

I spent a very happy morning having a big sort-out this week...before the JanCave could be reassembled, there needed to be some hole filling, painting and a good deal of hoovering.

And sorting.....


And did I have a good clear out! All those bits and pieces I kept just-in-case, they've all gone to recycling and did that feel great!

Two hours later....

Back and ready to play nicely - woohoo!!

I enjoyed putting my bits and bobs back on the shelves, tidying up the boxes, folding all the lining fabrics so I can see them and just generally faffing!!

I may have succumbed to some new fabric - it was in the sale, honest.

I've set the ironing board up to its highest position and it's fab for cutting out, no bending over at an awkward angle (I don't find cutting out whilst sitting down comfy at all)

And I've got a pile of bits ready for fusing the fleece onto - all the items I've made to sell in the cafe are going like hotcakes, so I need to make some to have in reserve. The bank holiday weekend was mad apparently, so Laura the cafe owner was telling me, and I've broken £200 with my RNLI sales. *happy dance*

The importance of funding the RNLI was emphasised to me when last Saturday, I had to make a 999 call to the coastguard as G and I saw a kayaker in distress just outside the harbour. It was a ferocious 9.3m tide and the guy was in the water, just hanging onto his boat. 8 minutes after my call, he was being hauled out of the sea by the lifeboat crew - I understand that he was hypothermic, in shock and the crew called an ambulance.  I'm not telling you this to big myself up, please understand this, it's just that it could happen to anyone and it's made my fundraising even more important to me.

And Finally.....thanks must go to the And Finally girl herself, Shaz Silverwolf! I'd commented on her blog about some really fab cottage/house stamps and look what the lovely lady sent me:

Complete with sentiments to run up some cards! I love 'em Shaz, thank you so much and will have an awesome time colouring/painting them xxx

Hope you have a wonderful week - enjoy your crafting!

WOYWW 769

 WE'LL MEET AGAIN.... I'm going to take a break from blogging for a while - please don't worry, all is ok! - think I just need a...