Pocket of Time

It has been raining all night, it's still raining now, softly. 

I woke early, lit the kitchen fire, fed the cats and made a cup of coffee. 

I grabbed a pocket of time this morning,  and  began making a doll for Niche.

Yesterday the wool stuffing I had ordered arrived, a large impressively taped up parcel that once opened exploded with wool, soft, creamy white.
New hair yarn too, soft fluffy mohair.

A dear sweet little doll head has been made.

My work table is tidy and inviting, waiting for more little people to come to life.

Niche is only four weeks away. 

There will be many dollies made. 

I feel well set up with all the ingredients to indulge myself in an intense period of  making.

Oh, and July's shop update has been postponed until we get our full internet service back as uploading photos is impossible at the moment.
I will be updating the Red Umbrella and my Etsy shop on 6th August.

We are in that other  world of su-oooooooo-per slooooooow internet at the moment due to far too many episodes of  Griff Rhys Jones programmes being watched on iView, and then rewatched because someone missed out.

Our monthly allowance has been used up and anything to do with pictures takes sooooooo long to load you can clean the house from top to bottom and the poor old computer is still slooooowly unrolling the same picture on to the screen ( a slight exaggeration there).
You get the idea.

Lucky I have so much to do this weekend that I will have no time for such dilly dallying, I will be busy in other places.

Kate's birthday on Sunday requires an afternoon tea of prettiness and yumminess  and  much planning and baking and icing and tasting has to be done.

I did manage to find presents for the birthday girl including THE most magnificent set of 72 Derwent pencils in a beautiful wooden box all made in the UK , a half price bargain which meant I could get the size I really wanted rather than a smaller number of pencils  in a tin.

  I also found a Moleskine unlined notebook for her ( her first) so she can doodle in that, in colour of course.

So today Andy has a day off school because he has finished his exams, a day of sloth I should imagine.

I have a day of cleaning and baking and I am sure I will manage some sloth time too,

I am so tired after all that shopping.

Went shopping  today for Kate's 13th birthday.

Goodness me, I found nothing.

She gave me a long list so that I had lots of possibilities but nothing jumped out at me and said 'buy me , buy me'

Oh I did find some gloves, lovely possum and merino gloves in a midnight blue. 

Very soft and very warm.

No perfect presents jumped out but my mum did or rather I jumped out at her when I spied her browsing in a shoe shop and we went to have a coffee together which was nice and so the day wasn't wasted.

I also picked up my library books, the Peter Cuffley book about Australian houses in the 40s and 50s and a Kingsley Amis book, 'Take a Girl like You' .

Have you read it?

I have only read one of his books, ' Lucky Jim', which I read years ago and enjoyed.

I decided on this book because I was trying to remember a television show that I thought was called 'Lipstick on your Collar' which of course was the Dennis Potter series which starred Ewan McGregor in his first ever acting job. 

I was trying to remember the girl in the show but the girl in the Dennis Potter wasn't the right one.

(By the way which is your favourite Dennis Potter television play? I think mine is 'The Singing Detective')

I remembered that someone called Rupert was the leading man which lead me to Rupert Graves which lead me to 'Take a Girl like You'. 

I don't think it was a particularly great show but I liked the girl and her clothes.

Then I found out that the book was also made into a film in 1970 and the girl was played by the lovely Hayley Mills. 

And the original idea for the show and movie came from the Kingsley Amis book... 

so it goes, round and round and an hour spent on the computer and a book ordered from the library.

The girl who played  the Jenny Bunn character reminds me of a younger Betty Draper from Mad Men  which of course has just started its fourth season on US television  and here in Australia we have only seen Season 1 ( though I have seen all three seasons but only with some effort)

- now how is that fair????

And so the marvellous mad mind of Jenny goes round and round and round and round...

Watch a little bit of the lovely baby faced Ewan, it will take your mind off my mind.

Oh and by the way I had my hair cut very short today - just love it!

Pretty wool

 This lovely pretty wool arrived yesterday all the way from Georgia, USA from Mama Jude in fact.

The colours are so soft but vibrant it's hard to believe she has used only plant dyes.

How clever.

I'm sure this wool will make some lovely dolly dresses and jumpers and cardigans and hats.

Housekeeping

Just a couple more pictures of this little guy, Arti because he is so cute and because he is heading off today to join Oli who with the rest of his family is about to go on an overseas  adventure.

How exciting!

Now a little housekeeping.

I have had a few emails and comments asking for details of how I organise my day.

If you go to this post you can read what I wrote a couple of years ago about this very topic.

Nothing much has changed.

You might also like to read  A Day in My Life posts where I journal my day on the 14th of the month for a whole year. 

Lots of other people joined in each month and there are links to their posts too.
The very first one is here  and the first list of people who joined in is here.

And my advice is to not get too caught up in how other people organise their time, it's interesting but everyone is different, our lives, our families, our homes.

You have to work out what suits you best and be aware that different stages of your life mean different priorities so use your common sense and just get on with it.