Gone in 60 seconds

That’s how long it took for a bag of carrots and a packet of Polo mints to disappear.
I took a little trip back up to Paws Animal Sanctuary to see how the abandoned pony was doing. It was dumped last Sunday in Findon village. If you follow the link above to Paws Facebook page you’ll get the full story.
What a difference a week makes. Thanks to the intensive love and care he’s been given he looks an altogether different pony from the one I saw last week. He’s been named Elvis by the way!

Elvis has a lot of eating to catch up on

I can actually see his lovely big eyes now.
Elvis got just a few carrots, they have to be careful with his feed as suddenly going from not having anything to eat to big meals can do a lot of harm.
The rest of the carrots and a packet of Polo mints got shared out amongst these reprobates!

Princess Snowdrop

Jasper

and Pixie

Stacey who runs PAWS (along with Sheila) with Princess Snowdrop and Jasper

And not forgetting the rescue chickens who become your new best friend when they spot you eating cake.



Linda xx

Ginger Lily

My name is Lily and I’m a 9 year old lady ginger cat.


I like to keep busy and I have loads of hobbies and interests such as

Camping


Trekking


Climbing


Listening to music


Water Divining

I am quite house proud too and like to do laundry

I always like to read the labels on things when I go shopping

I am quite strict in the house and make sure there is plenty of discipline

But I do take time off to party hard

But I’m a PussyCat really


You leave your laptop open for 5 minutes and suddenly you have a cat blogging away on it! Is nothing sacred?
Linda xx

The Hardy Hellebore

I went to my favourite public gardens today to have a look at their Hellebore displays. There were massive clumps of them all around in the herbaceous borders. It’s a bit of a rigmarole getting a decent picture of them as their flowers tend to look down at the ground and you have to get on your hands and knees to look up at them! In fact most of the flowers out today were very close to the ground and I spent a lot of time down there with them this morning.

A chorus line of Hellebores

 

Growing in ascending order!

Then I had a bit of a crawl around and found these Snowdrops. All the other plants had straight leaves but these seemed to have a bit of a swirl about them

Vibrant colour with these Crocuses

Standing up (eventually) produced these

and the sun filtering through the peeling bark of the Paperbark Maple

When I see scenes like these, for me the countdown to Spring blooms and gorgeous light has started!

L xx

All You Need is Love

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few magic moments I’ve been privileged to witness over the years!

Happy Valentine’s Day xx

It will soon be that time again!

I am trying to convince myself that it’ll be Spring soon. I am thinking back to last Spring when I worked at a wildlife hospital looking after anything and everything that came through it’s doors.

I have to say my favourite little creature was the Magpie. Somebody brought in a nest of little birds, they were so tiny and ugly, but they had loads of personality. They would be quiet as you approached their cage but once they saw you they would all chirp and stretch their little necks up to be fed. We fed them little chunks of wet cat food about every 30mins at the beginning. As they gained more strength they would take turns to hop on your hand to be fed. They were very messy little things and it would take ages to clean out their cage, but worthwhile to see them warm and safe.

Eventually when they were old enough they progressed on to the outside aviary to get flying practice in and stretch their wings. By now they were feeding themselves but when you went into see them they would revert to helpless little bird mode and jump around to be fed as you can see below

Every single one from that nest fledged and although it was sad to see my ‘babies’ go it was great to see these brave little things become gorgeous independent adults

 

We also had more than our fair share of baby hedgehogs to look after. They were wriggly little things and getting a pipette of liquidised food into them was a full time job. More food went over their little faces than actually down their throats! But again, wonderful to see them grow up fit and healthy.

I have the pipettes and towels at the ready now for this year’s intake!

Fabric Find

These are the lovely fabrics I bought at the Curtain Factory Outlet in London.

I had despaired of finding a curtain fabric retailer at reasonable prices. Went there a couple of Sundays ago on a recommendation from a lady over at The Sewing Forum. I didn’t really expect much, but when I got there I found this HUGE warehouse jam packed with fabric. I was like a kid in a sweetshop, which ones do I buy? So much choice. You could have locked me in there for days and I would still have been happy. Classic, vintage, modern – it was all there.

Eventually decided on the sequinned fabrics and the Scottie Dog and Vintage Rose ones. (I found the Scottie Dog fabric a couple of days later on sale in my local fabric shop for £5 more a metre!)

The staff there were all very helpful and carried the heavy bolts to the cutting table for me.

The icing on the cupcake is that there is a Waitrose next door with a big free car park. So parking isn’t a problem and you can spend the money you save on a nice bottle of wine or probably a couple of weeks’ groceries!!

I love finding places like this, it just makes crafting spends a bit more reasonable and at the same time giving you a bigger and better choice and that elusive and excellent customer service. I should point out I’m not related to anyone there and they didn’t pay me to write this either with money or fabric!!

And this is Jasmine asleep but not asleep!

L xx

Nostalgia for Old Black and White Films

If anyone had said to me that I would actually go to the cinema in 2012 to watch a silent film, thoroughly enjoy it and leave in a warm happy fuzzy frame of mind I would have said they were bonkers and look for the gin bottle they were obviously hiding about their person. By now you’ve probably guessed the film I’m talking about is The Artist.  It was cleverly done, funny and had a cute dog who most definitely deserves an Animal Oscar. I reckon little Uggie was probably the hardest worker on set!

But getting back to black and white films, I love them! They’re fantastic to watch on cold wet winter afternoons or when you’re a bit under the weather and tucked up under a warm duvet on the sofa.

I’ll watch anything with Margaret Rutherford, she was one of the funniest comic actresses of her time and to me she will always be THE Miss Marple, no other actress has come close in my opinion.

Spookily, she also starred in one of my absolutely favourite old British films Passport to Pimlico.

When anyone mentions Ealing Comedies this is the film that comes to mind. I think it was one of their very best productions. Nothing beats the British sense of humour!

And last but not least the incomparable Alec Guinness in Kind Hearts and Coronets

and the school I always wished I could go to ……St Trinians

 

 

L xx