And we cut back through the churchyard at Bradwell Village.

This was almost the same walk recorded here, when there was snow on the ground.


Here is the church with the plum tree (I am guessing at that, but I am not sure what else this fruit can be) on the left hand side.


The birds were feasting on these golden baubles.

But look at that same tree now - just a few weeks later!

Now this first one probably needs a bit of explanation.

You might recall that from time to time I exhibit with two other stitchers in Milton Keynes under the banner of Mix3d Stitch.

This year we are planning a couple of outings under the Mix3d Stitch banner.

The first one is "Shape and Form - Textiles Inspired by Architecture":




And pattern using squares.

I have not done any test prints yet with these. That will be the next step.

As I mentioned here, I have a bit of an Instagram habit.

I don't know about you,  but after the highs of the sales at the back end of November and early December (I wrote about them here and here ) and then the whole Christmas thing (plus very full on in the day job) I just did not manage to get into the studio in December.

Added to that my studio is cold and not welcoming on a dark winter's evening (It is in a conservatory off my bedroom).

So, come January and I was rather out of the habit.

Also, it looked as though a bomb had hit it.

I was reading the blog of my good friend Sheila in Idaho and in one post written after Christmas, she put a very positive spin on tidying!

So last weekend I put 'tidy the studio' on the to do list and, with a radio play on in the background, gave it a bit of a spring clean.

And it was a very worthwhile exercise - it somehow feels less overwhelming, with a bit of order redeemed from the chaos.

So this week I have managed to get back in there - nothing too strenuous just playing in a little sketch book. This is the one I have reserved for flowers and leaves so you have seen some pages before.

But here is a bit of limbering up with the new ones (this is a bit like sharing my daily workout with you - which I don't do by the way, unless you count the 10,000 on step dog walk I achieve most days)



A bit of doodling on top with a black pen - but the colours are very dark on this page.


So I invested in a white pen - but with moderate success. What do you use for a white pen in sketch books or journals?


The finished page. The variation in colour is down to the different light and cameras used - both by phone in the studio under electric light and my camera in the dining room under different light.

But you get the drift.

 And here is another page with the bottom photo after simple highlighting with the pen. But the pen is not working too well on the ink. I think it is because the ink is not permanent so the pen activates it again and all you get is a lighter version of the colour underneath.

I have treated my blog to a little bit of tlc. I think the new look is rather lovely, but I would be very interested to know what you think.



On a phone it does not look so different, but on my iPad or on a normal laptop the presentation looks much cleaner and more modern - well in my view anyway.

But none of this is my doing. I had a bit (ok, well a lot!) of help.

I was feeling the need to give my  poor old blog a bit of love. I have not posted quite so regularly of late (2017 was not the greatest of years in some ways- understatement!) and I thought to help me get back into it I should adopt the mantra 'new year- new look'.

But where to start?

I was perusing some of my usual blogs, the ones I follow on a regular basis, and one I really do admire, because it is so lovely to look at, is Junkaholique, the blog of Isle of Wight resident and jeweller Artemis Russell.

This lovely lady and her husband take the most beautiful photographs. I mean really beautiful. In fact I think Artemis did study photography at art college, so I should not beat myself up too much.

Now, just before Christmas I noticed that her blog had changed style; it had a new look. And I scrolled down the page and lo - at the bottom it credited 'Design by FCD'. So, thinking this was going to be some trendy London design studio and with a somewhat heavy heart  (how was I ever going to be able to afford that!) I clicked on the link - and just look where it took me! 

Now I don't know much about Fearne Creative Design - except that it is run by Eve, not Fearne. And I think she is in Bulgaria. But what I do know is this - Eve has some lovely designs and you can buy them either from her website here or from her Etsy shop here. And they are cheap!

In fact, my biggest problem once I had landed on her website and realised this was well within my budget, wasn't to decide whether I should do this, but rather to decide which design I should go with.

I settled on 'Maeve', or rather I thought I had until, on closer inspection, I found one or two little features which weren't quite 'me' (on the face of it the designs all look very similar, but you need to look closely at the details).  So that put me in a bit of a dither. But I persisted and settled on an alternative that suited my purposes.

Then I fretted for how the hell would I be able to install a template?

But lo - it turns out that for the modest fee that Eve charges for the template she will, if you are like me and a bit of a computer dunce, do it for you! You just have to give her admin permissions.

The whole process only took a few days and a couple of email exchanges. And then it was all shiny and new.

Because over the last year or so I have been creating more lampshades (three dimensional embroideries) and because I have an Instagram account (oh, what a wonderful way to waste time), I have found that more and more my Instagram feed is filling with pictures of the most luscious interiors.

Now, I did not really think that I was an interiors kind of person (just plonk that bit of furniture anywhere) but I now find I am drooling over pictures of sofas, footstools, fabrics and all things interior.

There seem to be two distinct themes - those lovely clean, white, minimalist scandi interiors and, in complete contrast, rather maximalist dark cluttered interiors. I love the former, but I am a realist and I am drawn to the latter.

So I thought I should share some of my favourites with you so you too can share a bit of the eye candy.

First up is The Girl with a Green Sofa.

If you pop back to this blog from time to time you might have spotted that I have a bit of a complicated life - or rather its a bit complicated to explain where I live!

To cut to the chase - I spend most of my time in Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire (it's where the day job is) but I vote in Gosport, Hampshire. It's for this reason that I can participate in both Buckinghamshire and Hampshire Open Studios (though to be fair most creativity happens in Buckinghamshire).

Recently I shared a walk around a wintery Milton Keynes here, so to balance things out a bit I thought I should also show you a bit of my other home. So on a very wet New Years Eve we sallied forth to take a little walk around Old Portsmouth.

Now, I live in Gosport but it is very close to Portsmouth. I should give you a bit of context.



As the ferry approaches Portsmouth you see a wonderful view of HMS Warrior.  This is the oldest iron hulled battle ship. You can visit it and hire it for weddings etc.


You can see the dockyard from the ferry too.


As you approach the Portsmouth side there is a fabulous new bus station, though it is somewhat overshadowed by a rather derelict building, and the rail station (just to the right of this picture) could do with a bit of a facelift too.


The Bridge Tavern sits right on the Camber Dock. It dates from the late 1600s.


Now it is rather overshadowed by the back of the BAR Ben Ainslie building.


Being New Years Eve the Camber was full of fishing boats.


And feathered visitors. Is this a cormorant of a shag?


But the main purpose of our visit was to have a look at the Hotwalls.

The Hotwalls date back to the 15th Century and were previously an artillery barracks.  But it is very difficult to envisage how this might have looked. I simply knew it as the fortified sea wall next to the Sally Port - a gap in the wall with access to a very small stony beach.

A Sally Port is apparently a fortified entrance, and this makes sense. The Portsmouth sea walls are certainly substantial and you get the impression that when Portsmouth was a completely walled town it would have been pretty impregnable.

The arches in the Hotwalls were, well, rather dilapidated and always seemed to smell of urine.  Luckily someone in Portsmouth Council had a vision and the old smelly arches have been turned into 13 arts studios.  And they are fabulous!




We visited when most were shut (I don't blame them - even artists need a break) but you still get a sense of the fabulous new spaces that have been created.

Apparently, when the proposals were first published there were a lot of people who objected to the rejuvenation of the Hotwalls.  It really does make you question the logic of some people!

Most were shut. We had to peer through the windows.


Including the window of Emma Nicol.



After peering through the windows of the studio spaces we then meandered down the lanes towards Spice Island.




And at that point the heavens really did open, hastening us back to the Ferry and Gosport.

But on the way we did manage to stop and examine a wall with holes where the bricks used to be!