Long over due blog award thank you post!

Last year the lovely and super talented Wendy from The Butterfly Balcony (Check out her blog, it's totally darling!) awarded me with not one, but TWO blog awards! Can you believe it?! And this is my very long over due thank you to her - Wendy, you're wonderful and you really made my day, thank you :)

So following Wendy's example I will be passing both awards along at the same time to the following people -

Charlotte from Heart's Cottage
Emily from The Cute Octopus
Nikki from Multibeavo's world

Maria from When Life Gives You Lemons
Sue from Sweet Pea Family Blog

And now for the (probably very boring) 7 facts about me....

1. I don't watch television! I do own a TV but it is used for computer games and DVD/VHS watching only. I do watch some TV shows such as Big Bang Theory and Desperate Housewives but on online catch up or DVD. I also watch science documentaries on online catch up because I'm a nerd haha!

2. I work as a "seamstress". It is killing off my love of sewing. I do not do glamorous dresses or anything fun, I repair and alter work wear (boiler suits etc). On the plus side of things I have a far better control of a machine (domestic machines seem so slow compared to an industrial!) and can put a zip in blindfolded!

3. I am a crazy cat lady - how could I not be with this fluffy munchkin?!

4. I have started up my own charity crafting organisation Hearts and Crafts. I have only managed to do one project so far due to a combination of being so busy and it being so difficult to find places which would like something other than money. I keep at it though and hopefully a new project will appear soon!

5. Nobody has ever taught me any of my crafty skills. If I want to learn to do something, I just do it! I highly recommend that if you are interested in any crafty hobby, that you just get on and dive right in! There are so many wonderful blogs out there with helpful hints and tips, not to mention you tube videos and the vast resource of pinterest there really is no need to wait!

6. I have a pet coconut. His name is Colin. I have had him for around 4 years now and he has featured on the blog before. Sometimes he gets a little wild....

7. I have a major book fetish! In our house there are hundreds of books, non fiction, fiction, graphic novels, art books, coffee table books......lots and lots of books! We really need more book shelves but have no room :( I have tried and tried to come up with a way to squeeze more in but folks, it just aint happening! I prefer to read non fiction nowadays, I just can't get enough of learnin' stuff ha ha!

So that concludes seven boring facts about me, which has taken about two hours to come up with. Lame I know. Any way, further thank you's to Wendy and I hope you all check out her blog and the ones which I have passed on the awards to.

The Pledge

Sounds a bit ominous..... but thankfully I am talking about the Seamless Pledge - check out the funky button!
I stumbled upon this by chance from  a cute little blog I ended up at called Heart's Cottage and was intrigued. I will be honest, I don't really buy clothes very often, it stresses me out and my "particularness" means I rarely find anything I like enough to shell out for. I either make from scratch or upcycle existing clothes from my "uurgh, I am not feeling that anymore, I'll shove it in this box and get around to sorting it out later" pile. I will also have to exclude bras from this as I am on the hefty side of things so only NASA engineered over the shoulder boulder holders are good enough to stop my boobage from going wild! So other than the exclusion, perhaps the pledge is a little wasted on me. But I would like to join in anyhow so....

I, Lucy Lovell, take the Seamless Pledge, and vow not to buy any new clothes (except bras) and stick to the rules laid out below, until I sort myself out and am wearing a UK size 12 clothes. Once I have dropped the 2 dress sizes necessary I will re-assess my pledge and set another target. I would like to be free from the tyranny of corporation and this pledge is one facet of a multi-sided endeavour to become self sufficient and stick it to the man.

The rules -

1. No buying new clothes for the duration of your pledge. By new, I mean any new mass-manufactured clothes.
2. You can buy second-hand manufactured clothes – so be prepared to get to know your local charity shops awfully well.
3. Vintage clothing is a-ok!
4. Anything you’ve made by hand is definitely allowed. Get your sewing machines and your kntting needles out, because handmade is definitely in!

So what are you waiting for? Get involved and be inspired!

Bloglovin'

Hello! It has been a while.... lets just say that 2012 was not my year, in addition to my nana passing away at the beginning of the year, my grandad also passed away in November.
It wasn't all doom and gloom though, I started a degree with the O.U. in Astronomy and Planetary Science - exciting stuff! My immediate plans relating to this involve teaching physics, but I would like to continue and get a masters and a phd... a dream that seems so far away now but I'm sure will be realised in no time at all! So any way, I have been struggling with time management and everything that was not involved in the daily routine of work, homework and sleep didn't get a look in. I have still been up to some crafting so there will be some previous projects popping up here to fill everyone in! I have my exam in the beginning of June so from then until October I will be FREEEEEEEE!!!!! to craft to my hearts content and hopefully get a good volley of posts up before I am a slave to the textbooks again :)

In the meantime, there is some google reader thing people in blogland have been talking about, I will admit that I don't really know what the implications are or really what will change but I have followed everyone and jumped ship to bloglovin', so my dear readers, I hope to see you there!


Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Pinterest Project - Strawberry Pincushions

I pinned the strawberry pincushion quite some time ago having seen the darling ones made over at nanacompany (pictured below). If you haven't visited the blog then you must! It is picture heavy though and if you are using a horrid chugging piece of crap like I do then you will simply have to be very patient!

Worth it though, you will be so jealous at  Amy's beautiful embroidery and hopefully a bit inspired too :)

Source

So anyway, at some point in time after pinning those beauts I saw this photo tutorial for the strawberries and it looked easy so I made some. Not as good as Amy's, or those in the tutorial pictures, but they are first attempts so I will make better ones next time.

Source

The best bit is that these use up so little fabric you can make a whole army of them!

I embellished with white pearlescent flower sequins and gold beads found in my stash, and I only used scraps of fabric for the strawbs so didn't involve any monies jumping outta my purse!

I have pinned a tutorial from purlbee for some strawberry cushions, basically the same as these but huge! When I get around to buying the fabric I will post them up with a size comparison!

Pinterest Project - Socktopus

I saw these cuties on Pinterest and just had to! I mean, how could you not when they are so simple?

Source

All you do is hunt out those old/odd socks, long ones work better, snip the foot part of the sock off (unless you are using tube socks or even old tights), turn it inside out and sew a running stitch along the top and pull closed (secure it with a few stitches through the middle). Stuff with scrap fabric, toy stuffing or even carrier bags. Sew closed and snip the rest of the sock into 8 strips for the legs! Add facial features and any other embellishments and you are good to go!
Took about 20 minutes each (I was not hurrying, you could probably do them quicker) and now I want to cut up all of my socks!
You could take it further with the embellishments and use a plain sock to decorate.

Not bad hey?!

Chocolate Cupcakes

Everyone needs a chocolate cupcake hit every once in a while, especially when the chocolate cupcake is from the ultimate chocolate cake recipe! I have made many recipes for chocolate cake but this one wins for me hands down EVERY FRICKIN' TIME! Sourced from the Good Housekeeping Simple and Stunning Cakes book by Greg and Max. For some unknown reason this is the only recipe I have made from this book, maybe I subconsciously thought it was the magnificent octopus (Magnus opus for those who don't get the Blackadder reference!) of the book and the rest would pale in comparison, who knows?

They were decorated with chocolate fudge icing, marshmallows dipped in the coloured sugar I previously posted about and a few store bought sugar butterflies.

I prefer to use chocolate ganache to frost my chocolate cupcakes with but as I stupidly delayed making these the bloody cream went out of date and it was too late to go get some more.

Anyway, these tasted awesome and maybe one day I will share my recipe.... when I have a better one to remain the supreme chocolate cake maker of the universe mwahahaha!

Dessert...

Looks pretty healthy here... Bananas and juicy strawbs....

But hidden in the bowl are marshmallows, chocolate, and a waffle....
...Which means STRAWBERRY AND BANANA S'MORE WAFFLES!!!!!

Yeah, I was pretty pleased with this invention ;)