Monday, December 3, 2012

'tis one of life's mysteries

Ah success!!!
But it may be short lived, keep reading all revealed at the end of this post.

How are you all?

I've been missing my little blog, but have been travelling around Blogland visiting here and there, although less often than I used to.......
It's been busy here at Sweet Birdy Love, nothing out of the ordinary...sewing, gardening, work and more sewing.
It's also been very hot, last week in particular was a real scorcher with temps. nudging the high 30's.
 We came very close to 40deg...uggh!!
 ...
The air con was chugging away doing it's best, the garden was wilting under the unusually hot weather...it was technically still Spring, according to my calender.
Summer was announcing it's arrival in spades.

I had booked in to do a extra market in Beechworth last Saturday, Dec. 1st. so more tea cosies were needed.

People like their tea to be hot if not the weather!!
After making the same design 2 or 3 times, I'm ready for something new and obviously cooler weather was on my mind.




Daffodils, Tulips, Grape Hyacinths, I love them all....

A little row of cottages appealed to me and obviously someone else as it now has a new home.
I forgot to take my usual finished photos, so these are the work in progress pics...



A rather dark pic of my stall and the finished cosies......
Saturday bought some relief from the  high temps and the sun hid behind the clouds for most of the day, phew!!
There was a lovely breeze, a few drops of rain and lots of people out and about.
It was another great market, with lots of chatting and laughter taking place amongst stall holders and shoppers.
  

I made another 'Audrey' specifically for this market and was very pleased with how it turned out.
 Just before I wrapped it up, I realised there was a typo.....
a word missing and no, I couldn't hide it, fit it in or disguise it.....arrrrgh!!
Nothing for it but to start from scratch and here she is.

Actually, I am much happier with this one.
She didn't find a home this market, but will come to Bright with me in a fortnight.....



The first flush of roses have been beautiful and many bunches were picked and brought indoors.
The Camp David standards continue to flower their little heads off and I love them in with purple/blue Larkspurs and a sprig or two of Gypsophila/Baby's Breath.



After months of waiting the Globe Artichoke has finally opened up to reveal it's stunning purple centre.
They really are quite spectacular, though rather prickly scales surrounding it......
Next season I might use some of the flowers in the kitchen while they are still in the bud stage.....
Check out the grass, it's brown and crunchy, that's Summer.
 We live in the country and don't water the 'lawn'....it always greens up come the cooler weather and rain.





Lady of Megginch with more Larkspurs.
I picked this bunch before the hot weather arrived, I couldn't bear to see them fry in the heat.....they make me smile just looking at them. I love the colours....

I think someone was after some attention this morning!!
Couldn't lie beside the computer it had to be right on top of it.

Love ya Tigg mwah!!♥♥






Photos have uploaded.....success!!
Nothing terribly exciting girls, but like a lot of other bloggers recently.
 I have reached my storage limit and have to figure out what to do about it.
I don't want to pay for my storage, so have to keep my pics under a certain size apparently and go through my Picasa Web Album and delete double ups, which I have been doing.

It's all been a bit of a mystery to me, but hubby has been very helpful and although we haven't had time to sit down and get it sorted completely, I am working my way though it.

A big thank you to Alessandra and Trudy who have talked me through how they handled this issue, but if anyone else has some info on this I would appreciate hearing from you.
I blog on a MacBook, seems to be so many different brands of computers and each having slightly different ways of doing things.I will probably have to get some program to edit photo size, so any tips would be good.  If you don't see another blog post  for a while, you'll know why!!.....

On a completely different note...Have you seen

 'The Intouchables'?

Hubby and I went to see it Saturday night at the cinema.
What a wonderful movie.
 I haven't laughed so much for quite some time it was terrific.
It's  very touching based on a true story, it's in French so is subtitled, but don't let that put you off.
And if like me, you love the music of Earth Wind and Fire, you'll find it hard to sit still in your seat. 
Check out the trailer on Youtube and don't miss it if it's at a cinema near you......


Today is lovely and cool, well cooler, there is a beautiful breeze and I even had a blanket or two on during the night.
What a difference 10deg. makes......

Hope you are all well and not letting the Christmas Crazies get to you......thanks for stopping by to read my ramblings....

Take care,

Claire ♥♥





21 comments:

  1. I don't know how you cope with that heat. My coz (in Sydney) mentioned the heat there too. Your garden it lovely, what green fingers you have got. Hope you are not wilting too much.
    C

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  2. tea cozies, your stall, Audrey : all gorgeous!!!
    Your flowers : gorgeous, too!!!
    my help : if you need more, just ask!! I'm pleased you did appreciate my support!!!
    Have a good week, xxxx Ale

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  3. Your summer flowers are just gorgeous Claire and I love your tea cosies too. Your stall looks wonderful.
    Hope the weather is not too hot this week and you get photo problem fixed .I do pay for storage now as I have so many pictures on my blog. It only costs about £1.50 a month and I can upload as many pics as I want without worrying about it so I don't mind.
    Jacquie x

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  4. I marvel at your talents,Claire. 'Audrey' is simply beautiful - I'm sure she'll be snapped up at the next fair. It's been a treat to catch-up with your cheery and bright posts on this cold and dreary Monday morning - snow's here! Re the blogger issue, it seems to work with the uploading pics if you carry on deleting and making more space available on Picasa.
    Flowers are stunning - I've saved and dried out my globe artichokes from summer and will be spraying them gold for some sort of Xmas arrangement....when I get round to it.
    Always great to 'see' you. x

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  5. Hi Claire - beautiful work as ever! I love the little cottages expecially :) The garden is looking fab - I thought the globe artichoke was a giant thistle, hehe!!

    Sorry about your techie probs - my last e-mail to you bounced back to me, wasn't sure why? I reduce the size of my pics in my photo software, but really my laptop is beginning to creak and croak at the moment too - time for some computer housework - *groan* (I'm using a PC so maybe different again)

    Lovely weather there - we had frost this weekend!
    Alison x

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  6. Love your cottage tea cosy - very pretty!
    Liz @ Shortbread & Ginger

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  7. I am never surprised to hear that your work ends up in someone's home...it is always stunning and so detailed.
    We are heading for a few hot days here too...yuck!

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  8. Love the new tea cozy designs! You're right, though, tea must be HOT no matter what the temp outdoors.

    We bought an external hard drive for our pictures. It's great. You don't have to minimize the photos, just transfer them onto the drive (and physically it's small, about 6x4 inches) and they're all saved there forEVER. Then your computer's hard drive is freed up again. They run about $100 (Canadian). I don't know the capacity of it in bytes, but we've transfered several years' worth of photos on ours and there's still room on it for more. Hope that helps! Wendy

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  9. Audrey is amazing! I think I would have been very upset at missing the word out! :)

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  10. Hi Claire , wasn't the mini heat wave a shocker ! best place to be inside with the air-con and sewing machine....
    Good to hear the market went well and love your new designs, just an idea......do you make oven gloves or pot holders? for the people who don't use a tea cozy. They would look great hanging on a hook in the kitchen or over the handle of the oven door.......
    Putting up last nights post I received my warning on photo storage so will now be attempting to sort it all out ...erk !
    Cheers, Andrea X

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  11. We had that really hot spell too for a couple of days but then....yep, more snow on the mountains! Crazy place this Tassie. Love the flowers, plenty of tea cosy inspiration there huh? Loved the Austrliana bouquet in the last post too btw. Lots of love to you Claire and Tigg too x

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  12. If I ever happened to turn up at a craft fair where you had a stall, my purse would be emptied!!! I love your makes!
    Carly
    x

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  13. So many beautiful photos - those roses are luscious, and your tea cosies beautiful. The Globe Artichoke must be a cousin of the thistle... oh and Audrey is absolutely perfect.

    I have been uploading reduced-resolution (or do I mean reduced-size?) pics for a while now. At some point I'll have to grit my teeth and pay up for more storage but I'm putting it off as long as I can. It's nice to have higher-resolution photos on the blog but nothing is free I guess.

    Your spring is shaping up just like ours did ... somehow it seems all wrong to have out-of-season heat, doesn't it? (Although we complain about the cold enough here in Wisconsin you'd think we would enjoy all the heat we could get.)

    Stay cool! :)

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  14. I have to say I am so jealous about the weather. It is freezing in Leeds in the UK!!!! The Flowers look beautiful. Love the cosy's.

    Take it easy.
    Luv Jane xx

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  15. I have to say I am so jealous about the weather. It is freezing in Leeds in the UK!!!! The Flowers look beautiful. Love the cosy's.

    Take it easy.
    Luv Jane xx

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  16. Your artichoke is really amazing! Such a beautiful bloom! And all the tea cozies are lovely. Sorry about the mistake on Audrey. It must be very frustrating to have to do it all over again, after all your hard work. I don't envy you the hot weather. We are having quite a mild and pleasant autumn here. (with the exception of maybe one or two days)

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  17. Just loving those tea cosies and your flowers Claire. Stay cool.
    Anne xx

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  18. I have been doing exactly the same deleting photos this week through Picasa Web. It has taken so much time, and every so often I get it wrong, and then there is a black space on my blog for a while. I have even deleted some old posts. I still can't get the total down enough, so think I am going to have to reduce the quality of some of my photos. I too don't want to pay for extra storage, but have started to think it might be the only way, and I get so much pleasure from my blog, perhaps it would be worth it. Would be interested to know what you decide to do.

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  19. Loved all your items in your stall! Those owls are so sweet and those tea cozies, I've always wanted to make me one of those! :)

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  20. I'm not a huge tea drinker and when I do I so often take the easy option and *dunk a bag*, but your cosies are GORGEOUS and I just might have to dust off a teapot. Love the row of cottages cosie : -)

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  21. Oh my, your tea cosies with the plant pots and birds are absolutely gorgeous!
    I love the bunch of pink and purple flowers.
    I've had the same problem with my photos. I didn't even know my photos were in Picasa until I got the message saying I'd no more storage! I've been through and deleted duplicate photos which has given me a bit more space but like Ginx Craft^ I've also deleted some of the wrong ones, including the one that comes up when I leave a comment on blogs. I've no idea how to get that back on.

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