Angel Jem's City Cottage

I will be so happy looking at two weeks of late nights, lie ins and long sessions reading in bed. And no work to do except housework. Gentle pootling.

A few years ago I remember Jane or Posy setting herself the challenge of crocheting a blanket in a month before Christmas. I like the idea of time limited tasks, so this year I have invested in two craft kits for my two younger children. For Him a workshop that cuts balsa wood. The kit contains instructions for a castle and a ship. He has a dream of buildings walls and bridges for Warhammer. For Her a Tatty Ted latch rug kit. She really gets into challenges. This will be done long before Christmas but I predict another kit will soon be on her wishlist.

After all these years of regarding blogging as a static activity, tied to a computer, I have finally gone mobile! Will this mean more but shorter posts? I don't know! Watch and see!

Life of The Perpetual Student was seeking anybody who could say they had One True Filofax . At the time, I couldn't believe that anyone could have just One filofax that they loved and used almost exclusively. I can now. I have tried the pocket Pennybridge as a purse; the A5 fantastic but oh-so-in-your-face- Bette Davis chameleon as my planner; I have a zipped Holborn as my teacher planner which works for me for now, but I keep coming back to my baby. Crimson. Lovely. Large enough but small enough.  My Malden keeps coming back to hand, finding space in all my bags. I cannot live without my Malden. I need him in my life. This is my OTF. OMG, I need to drop LPS a line and let her know. I have a true love, my handsome hunk of a file. Some of the photos show my set up a month ago; organised by alphabetical black tabs that came with a filofax, using cotton cream paper and Swedish-Danish diary. Everything was filed behind the appropriate letter; Christmas under C, Holi...

I will be working again in September for at least a half term, hopefully longer. My nice little agency man fixed me up with an interview. I turned up, liked the school who liked me and.... In September I am the reception teacher at a  school 10 minutes away from the house. So happy. So my summer holidays will be a delightful mix of spending time with my three best people, washing and packing for hols and getting as ready as I can. My to do list is three sides of A4 already..... I will post when I get the chance, but that won't be often.

My Princess has a cousin only 5 weeks younger than her. It's good, it stops her being the eternal baby of the family and means that, whatever happens, she will always have a bezzie mate. It helps that her mother is my old best friend who married my brother! The bag is Primark... Keep Calm and Carry On Shopping! We visited Chester a couple of weekends ago, just to shop, and buy some stickers, browse for bags (for them, not me) and to have lunch and then tea in comfy tea rooms with tablecloths and pretty crockery. It helps that they both drink tea. Afternoon tea with Coke just isn't the same. Tearooms; Lunch was at the cafe in Chesters visitor centre near to the ampitheatre. Lovely red dotty oilcloth and a good choice of paninis, baguettes or wraps. Unfortunately the photos I took are on my phone... posted to facebook, not the blog. Afternoon tea at Mad Hatters, on the top Rows of Bridge Street. Look at the slate cake stand! It cost a little extra to have the ca...

I love Cath Kidston style, especially the red dotty look or the roses on a dark background. And her large zip purses are very useable; so big they take every card I own and slim enough to slide in most handbags. I got mine last summer and, barring a short interlude in a small Radley purse when I was having a Radley phase, I have used it pretty constantly since. But now... well, I had Bette taking up space in my bag, and when I had a smaller bag I was paperless, no notes, no diary. But carrying a smaller (pocket) FF and a purse just seemed so.... extraneous. I needed a cross over. I needed a Filofax purse system that would work. Using a Filofax as a purse is a popular idea.... Cat tried it, Jarfm got a Journey which could be one, and even Steve admits to swapping between styles in search of the answer but it is very hard. Proper Filofaxes just don't have the coin space, but can hack the cards and so many are not available in red (I have a red thing going on) but when I ...

Under the red is a shade of deep green... imagine the clash. I only had a very knackered old bean bag and a floor cushion with a leak in green. Green. In my living room? No way. I covered it with a red throw, secured temporarily with safety pins and 5 years later still looked at the pins, wondering if I could pass them off as a post-ironic homage to punk. No, it was sheer laziness and the thought of handsewing the seams. The Johnny Rotten approach The cushions did not impress, did not inspire usage and had to be hidden away when company came, negating any possible use as additional seating. Enough! my brain screamed (my brain got quite loud and assertive this year) and I set to work. This is the inside. Green again. 1 metre of furnishing fabric (this was from Dunhelm Mill at approx £25 per metre) 1 metre of interlining fabric. (this was from my mother; costs nothing) Stuffing (this was from the cushion and beanbag combined; again a free item) The beans went in OK...

We hadn't decorated our living room for 10 years. I know winter sun washes out colour, but, really.... 10 years. Not since we moved in, when I was seven months pregnant and we had to pay a decorator to do it because my mother threatened to kill me if I lifted my arms above my head at any time during the whole nine months. Books! And more books!  It has been slowly fading all that time, collecting the dust, grubbing up with the fingermarks of three children and a parent who paints and bakes. Christmas decorations... look at that pale yellow... And last Christmas I had had enough. I sat and looked around and thought the time had come. Fortunately I am not (never will be again) preggers so a decorator wasn't necessary this time. I got to work. This is after painting... there is an absence of handprints here Painting, check. The display cabinet moved into the living room. Furniture moving, check. The cat isn't real. I love him, though. Cush...

No, not some incredibly worthy diatribe on how we teach children so much but a quick post on a cold, wet day to say that I really enjoy teaching my eldest boy about classic films. This  this  and this. I could be good at this cinematic education business.

Madness on the roof of the palace? Amazing! I love the idea that the Queen brought her own ear plugs. I don't blame her. Anyway, enough flim flam. Today's post; how I made individualised dividers for my A5 Filofax . I made this one using the keep-calm-o-matic generator. I love using pictures as dividers and if anyone has ever had a Filofax, the plain dividers are just too.... plain. I agree that if I was a business man or woman I would probably prefer to show the world a clean, cream, crisp divider when I opened my Filofax, but I am a mother of three, crafting and teaching my way through life. Plain doesn't stay plain even if I preferred it, so I needed to get to work. I am unutterably lazy, so even if I could be bothered measuring, cutting and covering card with stamps, decoupage, painting etc I don't think it's worth it when I know that I will want to change them again, so I took the cowards way out. It took me a couple of hours on the computer and a few ...