10 Years of ME; Happy Birthday, Mary!

I had a lovely weekend... away with my lovely husband!! His team that he supports (not premier league, but really local; does that count as the football equivalent of organic?) were playing in Gateshead. Well, I say Gateshead, I mean the International Athletics Stadium. Well, I say the International Athletics Stadium, I really mean the teams played on the pitch and all 300 supporters sat together in one small area of this 19,000 seater stadium. Such are the pleasures of supporting your local team (who happen to be the BIGGEST club in Knowsley; the perils of being too close to Liverpool) and while he watched the match, he said the best place to leave me was the Metro centre... well, I couldn't say no, could I?


So I have had a lovely weekend of shopping; Borders, Leeds on Friday night, Metro Centre on Saturday and York City Centre on Sunday. Spent money? You betcha!! But I had a really good time doing it, and I'm sworn off shops/shopping and portals of unlimited consumption until.... well, 10th February at the earliest.

And... I got my favourite magazine!! Yes, the Feb/March copy of Mary Engelbreit's Home Companion was in! I've been collecting this magazine for as long as I can (about 3 years now) and I love it. The magazine always has articles on craftspeople and their studios, features houses which have been decorated with love , care & a complete disregard for the less-is-more philosophy and always comes with a paper-doll to cut out and play with. What more could a girl want? My favourite article this month is about childrens' rooms and, yes, I know the space isn't there for Sarah's room to look like this, but I had to show you Hadley's room; a room for any 5 year old to lust after. I can feel a spring clean coming on... Sarah, do you like blue and red? Silly question, really. (apologies for the bad scan)

I spent Saturday when I wasn't shopping sat drinking coffee and reading through this and my other weekend treats, the American Country Living and a copy of The Idiot-proof Diet, recommended by the Daily Mail as the most readable diet book this year so far. OK, I'm game.


York had their residents weekend on, which meant, I think, that if you live there you got free entry into a lot of the local attractions. They had music and street entertainers, too. I thought it was a lovely idea, because there must be whole months in the summer when it's hard to walk down a street for the tourists, let alone have a visit to a major attraction. Somehow I find it hard to think of people living in such 'quaint' towns as Shrewsbury, York and Ludlow, and yet they do. I also bought some felt squares from a street stall and some wonderful dotted ribbon. I'm making some lavender hearts and these will be just perfect for the fronts!



And today? I'm at home with a James. He's not feeling 100%, poor thing, so it gives me a chance to do something... clear Sarah's room? make little hearts? re-arrange my kitchen cupboards? Or shall I snuggle up under his blanket with him and watch Spiderman, Power Rangers and all the rest of the brain rot TV? No contest, really, blanket here I come!