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Friday, 23 September 2011

Birthday Stash

It's been a busy week here, back to school means back to running my Toddler Group and Road Safety Club.  I also had a couple of appointment including a haircut!  So here we are, nearly a week after my Birthday and I still haven't posted pics.  In fact it is the Large Boy's Birthday today.  He was due on 28th August, then they changed the date to 11th September and he finally arrived on 23rd September, weighing in at 8lbs 3oz.  So 9 years ago to this minute I was puffing and panting having "an active birth".  He arrived at 12.50 lunchtime.

Back to the stash!  This is just a selection of what arrived on/before my Birthday.  The Just Nan is from the large boy, he chose it from my Wishlist on SewandSo's website, great idea, I select half adozen charts I'd like and he chooses one so I still get a surprise.
The charms are the small boy from an Ebay company called Ang's Attic, only 99p to £1.39 for a bag of 10.  Now there was some confusion here as some of the bags are mixed (the nautical and Christmas ones) and some said you could choose from a selection.  I picked and chose thinking I was getting 2 witches, 2 crows, 2 pumkins etc when actually I was getting 2 PACKS of each!  Luckily Ang was very understanding and deleted the extra packages for me, refunding the money.  It does mean I have rather alot of Hallowe'en charms so will be popping some into any stitching parcels I send out!
The books are from my brother, apparently werewolves are the new vampires.  He also gave me the Twilight plasters (band-aid to Americans), the way to wear them is on your neck to suggest you have been nibbled by a vampire!



My parents are paying for Bluebeard's Mermaid to be framed, so my brother chose mermaid themed wrapping paper for his presents, he cuts the tags out from the paper itself so they co-ordinate.  The paper is too lovely to throw away!

Here is my cake, it is a fruit cake with hard icing and marzipan, my favourite cake.  We used food-colouring pens to write on the cake.  The large boy decided we should use all my names and did the writing for me (except "daughter" and "sister" which I did).  The red splodges are icing sugar which I put too much food-colouring in, it looked great and tasted vile, glad we didn't do the whole cake!

My in-laws gave me money and I treated myself to a grab-bag from The Crafty Kitten (four random pieces of 9x12 fabric) and this chart: light-and-shadow-firewing-designs  Four silhouette dragons which fit perfectly onto the grab-bag fabrics!  Dawn has a small range of charts with a discount available if you buy the fabric at the same time.  She is testing to see what is popular and is very open to suggestions.  Particularly mine, which is why there are a number of Firewing Designs, I can't find them anywhere else in the UK.

I also have some fabric on order from Sparklies' sale which will hopefully arrive soon.  Hubby is paying for the frames for my Just Nan Seasons and also anything random I added to the credit card in September!

I almost forgot to add some stitching pics (blush):

Tree of Stitches:
 Gazette 94's Autumn Heart
 Joan Elliott Green Goddess:
 Periphaeria Star SAL:
These are all WIPS so I will talk more about them later, fabric, threads, links etc.

And finally, this week's random question (no prize!) is : 
Which are you:
a. Team Edward
b. Team Jacob
c. Haven't a clue what you're on about.

27 comments:

cucki said...

hello dear, so glad that you had a lovely birthday..
very lovely gifts..i love them so much..and the cake is so looking so yummyyyy too..
your stitching is looking so lovely..goddess is coming along so nicely..keep it up dear
happy friday and have a lovely day xx

Caitlin @ Naughts Cross Stitches said...

happy birthday :D such lovely gifts!

I'm team Edward because Jacob is an idiot for still trying. But I think Jacob is hotter.

Wagapapa said...

Wow! You got a lot of presents! The cake looks yummy.

Love how your stitching looks like :D

Don't know what you are talking about, who are Edwar & Jacob?

Have a good weekend!

Stitchabilities said...

Woah what a stash haul, you lucky thing, Stitching is so pretty I love all of them, especially that tree of stitches.

I have been reading alot of Werewolf,etc books as there are only so many vampire series!! lol

I am Team Edward, although I wouldn't turn away Jacob either LOL. My niece loves Twilight where are this eplasters from, do you know?

Mouse said...

oooo lovely stash ... had to giggle at the plasters :) and cake looked yummy too ... as to the question .. know what you are going on about ... just not read or watched ..lol soooo i choose the chap who took his top off in the trailer for the latest movie hehehehe ;) love mouse xxxx

Susan said...

Happy birthday! Great and thoughtful gifts. Your stitching is beautiful. I'm sure you've said, but what thread are you using on TOS?

I know what you're talking about but I've not read the series so team neither.

Jo who can't think of a clever nickname said...

Susan, I can't reply via email as you don't have one attached to your profile, but the thread is a simple DMC variegated number 51. It's really lovely one of the best ones of the early numbers. Generally I prefer the 4000 variegateds. I'll explain about how I'm stitching with it in my next post xx

Kate said...

Wow, great pics of your stash and cake. WIPS are looking good, I particularly like Autumn Heart.
I am on Team Edward.

Giovanna said...

Great presents, and glad you had a happy birthday. Tree of Stitches is looking awesome, I really must start mine too...

Adrienne said...

Wonderful presents! Lucky you! I'm loving the firewing designs!! If I had some spare change I would be ordering them this instant!!

In answer to your question: When I read the books, I was Team Edward. But for the movies, I am totally Team Jacob!!

Hannah - City Stitcher said...

Great presents, and great start on Tree of Stitches, I think I'm going to start this one when I'm back from hols.

Edward is a weird creepy stalker, and Jacob has a weird prediliction for a very young girl. He is much hotter though :)

Bec said...

What a great birthday haul!

I love the Tree of Stitches. Very nice :)

Oh, definitely Team Jacob. I like my men muscular and warm, Not sparkly. LOL
Love the twilight band-aids!

Jo who can't think of a clever nickname said...

Now Hannah - don't malign Jacob, in the books he's younger than Bella! Not sure if that's made clear in the films.
One of the other wolves has a "fiancee" who is just a young child though...

Lesleyanne said...

Happy belated birthday. Lovely gifts received. Love the idea of the plasters. Your stitching is looking grea. My answer would have to be (c) haven't a clue what you are talking about lol.

wendy111 said...

Firstly - belated Happy Birthday Jo. Sounds like you had a lovely day. I am amused by the plasters!

I love the colours you are using for TOS. I enjoyed doing this so much. Mine has just returned from being framed.

Love all your other stitching too.

Team Edward - from reading the books!

Anne said...

Happy Birthday Jo!!! Loads of great gifts from your family. That cake looks great and so personalized. How sweet!!

Great progress on your stitching and as always, I love the Tree of Stitches.

Team Edward...cause I tend to like the lithe tall types (my hubby) and Edward is all broody and dark...yummmm!!!

Sally said...

Happy Belated Birthday Jo. You got some lovely gifts and I love your cake! Happy Birthday to your DS too.

Lovely progress on all your pieces.

I have to say neither to your question! Lol! I do know what you're talking about but have never read the books or seen the films!

Topcho said...

It's sounds like you had awesome birthday! The cake is really cool :D And great progress on the wips. The Autumn TOS is beautiful, and the Autumn Heart too!
On the question, since I'm not a Twilight fan, I vote for TEAM JARETH, lol! Because the Goblin King sparkled first XD Mmm I think that if I can only find the Labyrinth dvd, I'll watch it tonight :)

Joysze said...

Ooooh, awesome gifts and loving your WIPs.

Not a Twilight fan, so I chosed D. Neither. ROFL!!!

sarams1987a said...

verry nics cake en work you have

Blu said...

Wonderful gifts! That wrapping paper is quite cute!

Not a Twilight fan, so count me for Team Neither.

Christine said...

Great stitching, and I love the fabric you've used for the Peripheria design.
Definitely Team Jacob. Real vampires don't sparkle!

Aurelia Eglantine said...

Wow! What a wonderful birthday you've had :) I love urban fantasy, and the two Patricia Briggs' you've got are the first novels in her amazing Alpha and Omega series. Her Mercy Thompson series, about a coyote shifter living next to werewolves and friends to a vampire and very old Fae, is awesome too! Kim Harrison's The Hollows novels (you've got the first one) are spectacular reads as well; they're the first Urban Fantasy series I ever read, and I fell in love with her world. Warning: both authors are incredibly addicting, as is the entire Urban Fantasy genre :)

Re: Twilight, I'm with Joyze and Blue ;)

Maureen said...

that's a nice lot of pressies you got there - you have trained the family well lol!

No team for me - the whole thing just doesn't do it for me...

P. G. said...

The firewing pattern is awesome! Thanks for sharing, happy birthday!

I'm for team Edward

pamgrouette at gmail dot com

geeky Heather said...

I saw a funny T-shirt that said, "I'm Team Edward unless Jacob's shirt is off"! I suppose I'm Team Edward in the books and Team Jacob in the movies. And I am probably the only female in existence who only read the books because her HUSBAND read them first (and liked them)!!

Anonymous said...

I'm not really a Twilight fan, but if forced to choose, I'd pick hunky Jacob over Emo Edward any day of the week and twice on Sundays - LOL! ;)