2011 ~ looking back

2011 has certainly been a busy old year for us here in our little family!

There has been so much crammed into this past year, and I thought that it would be fun to look back over the Button Tree Crafts archives and relive some of the lovely memories that 2011 has created ~


January 2011 ~ I loved this beautiful pink hyacinth which brightened up my days and my kitchen::


February 2011 ~ Banana and chocolate muffins, made from my new Nigella recipe book ~ very yummy they were too!


March 2011 ~ Brightly coloured Rico creative cotton and a lovely new needlepoint kit to keep me busy::


May 2011 ~ We revisited Disneyland in Paris and had an absolutely wonderful time::


May 2011 ~ We also had a lovely day in Paris and saw all the famous sights::


June 2011 ~ After a very long wait, we finally sold our little house and moved back to my childhood hometown near the seaside::


July 2011 ~ we had some lovely summery days and spent lots of time exploring and rediscovering our wonderful new surroundings::

September 2011 ~ I finally finished my colourful Rico stripey peg bag::


October 2011 ~ We found this fabulous Halloween decoration in a little village just along the coast::


November 2011 ~ The autumn weather was glorious and I had some lovely autumny walks amongst all the crisp piles of leaves::


December 2011 ~ I made a start on a cozy blue Granny Striped blanket for my boy::

I had such fun looking back over my little blog ~ I have never done a looking back post before and it was really lovely reliving the bits that made 2011 such a special year for me and my family. I love the fact that blogging allows me to keep all these special memories and that they are there for my children to look back on when they are older. Thank you all so much for sharing this little journey back in time with me ~ I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did!

Wishing you all a very Happy New Year when it comes ~ and I'll hopefully see you all next year :O)xx

Bloggy Break

Goodness me!

That was a much longer bloggy break than even I anticipated having ~ but I'm really happy to be back in the land of Blog again. I'm hoping that I'll still have some of my lovely readers left! And although I haven't actually been blogging myself I have still been checking in regularly with everyone's blogs and have enjoyed reading about all your Summer Holiday exploits.


During the long bloggy break the BIG MOVE has finally taken place and after a very long eighteen months our little house was sold in June. We have now taken up residence in this modest three bed roomed semi detached house in my childhood hometown ~ which is by the seaside ~ and I am absolutely thrilled to be back home. Back near the beach and more importantly just a short two minute walk from my Mum's house ~ what could be better?


We have already spent a fair bit of time walking on the beach looking for treasures, paddling in the sea and taking in all the wonderful seasidey views ~ It makes me feel so lucky to be able to have my children spend some of their childhood by the seaside and experience the same pleasures that I had growing up in such a wonderful place.


As I've been so busy with the new house there hasn't been much time to spend on any hooky stuff ~ although I have been tying up some loose ends on my Rico Creative Cotton project ~ which I hope to be able to share with you sometime soon.


It really is good to be back! I'm off now to do a very quick food shop before heading off on the school run to collect a small boy. I hope that you all have a fabby weekend and I'll see you all sometime next week :O)x

Waiting.....

Why didn't anybody tell me that this house selling malarkey was such hard work?



I have to admit that I am beginning to think that the bright pink FOR SALE sign that is very prominently sticking out from the middle of the garden hedge is invisible!

Our little house has been up for sale for 3 months now and so far there has been almost no interest in it at all. I suppose that on hindsight putting it on the market at the end of October was probably not the best timing ~ with Christmas and a new year looming ahead ~ but I just can't stand all the waiting about that is involved!

We thought that it would be a good idea to have our viewing by appointment and also to have open viewing on a Sunday afternoon. Sunday mornings involve running about like mad people doing all manner of household chores imaginable ~ washing, ironing, cleaning, dusting, hoovering, hiding things in cupboards etc......... And then Sunday afternoon we sit about WAITING for prospective buyers to knock on the door. We sit and we WAIT and we WAIT and so far not one person has viewed the house on a Sunday.

The estate agents phoned us on Monday morning to arrange a viewing for last night ~ and we got ourselves all excited ~ only to get another phone call from the estate agents to say that the viewing had been cancelled :o(

Now it's back to playing the WAITING game again!


Playing along with this game is the Raspberry Ripple scarf ~ which is patiently WAITING to be finished ~ it was supposed to be finished in time for Christmas but that just didn't happen!


Also playing along is this rather lovely pile of woolly colourfulness just WAITING for me to find some inspiration to turn it into some hooky goodness. But I'm not quite sure where my inspiration has gone right now as it seems to have got lost somewhere along the way too. Maybe I accidentally hid it in the cupboard when I was tidying up the house! :O)

Getting there

We are getting there! It has been busy...busy...busy! An absolute hive of activity in fact! Workmen have been coming and going at an alarming rate! But ......walls have been painted, patio windows have been repaired, kitchen sink has been replaced, carpets have been laid and everything is starting to look very lovely indeed. We still have quite a bit of work to do, but our little house is almost ready to be put up for sale.



I am getting there with my very colourful crochet cushion cover too. Both sides have now been completed and I just have to join them together now which I will do by using this method here from the very lovely Lucy over at Attic 24. All going well I should be able to show you the finished cushion cover sometime very soon.


I am also almost getting there with two amigurumi figures that I have been making. A cute little pink birdie and a sweet little grey rabbit. They still need a few finishing touches done to them ~ such as sewing in of ends ~ but I am fairly pleased at how they have turned out.

I am really looking forward to this weekend as we have a Friday and Monday holiday from work and school. I am taking myself off on Saturday with my very best friend for a little Girly Shopping Trip and I really do intend to make the most of the day out. It is such a treat to be able to go out shopping without having to have eyes in the back of your head whilst keeping watch on two wandering small children. It is also such a treat to be able to stop for coffee and cakes and a lovely lunch when you want to....... instead of listening to cries of 'I'm hungry' or another favourite 'I’m bored’!!

I hope that everyone has a very lovely weekend and I will ‘see’ you all sometime next week :O)

Moving House

Arrgghh!!

Things have been very hectic around here for the last week or so! Earlier on in the year you may remember this post when we had decided to build an extension onto our house. However, following a week full of meetings with the bank and estate agents we have now decided that moving house would be a much better idea.

I have been under very strict instructions from my lovely husband that I must de clutter the house in order to get it ready to put up for sale. Who is he trying to kid? I am a hoarder at heart and find it very difficult to get rid of things ~ quite traumatic in fact!! I like to squirrel things away ‘just in case’ they may be useful later! However, I have been a good girl and have been sorting out and sending bags of stuff to charity shops and putting lots of things in the bin and although I hate to admit it, the house does look a lot better with less clutter.

We have been ~ or should I say my lovely husband has been ~ very busy ripping up carpets and doing lots of painting and the house is starting to look very lovely indeed. So lovely in fact, that if we really didn’t need some extra space I would be changing my mind about moving altogether!



Whilst my lovely husband was painting last weekend I was sent on a little shopping trip to buy some new lampshades and blinds and other bits and pieces to make the house look pretty. As this only took me a couple of hours and I had been sent out of the way for the whole day I decided to have a little look in the wool shop! It was only a little look and as you can see I only bought a few balls of that very lovely Rowan Pure Wool DK. At last I can now finish my colourful crochet cushion cover and have plans to maybe start on a blanket too :O)