My Wish List

The thing that has always kept me going after failed IVF attempts and realising that we won't be able to have children is to focus on the things that we can do and the reasons we are lucky. I have an amazing husband who is my best friend, a lovely house, a fantastic job which I love and a little dog who isn't a substitute for a child (as some people think!) but he does really enhance my life and I am so glad we have him.

We spent a lot of energy and time, putting our life on hold waiting to find out if we could have IVF, then having 2 attempts at it, in fact after we got married nearly 7 years ago it had dominated our lives.

This week we have just finished turning the room that was being saved to be turned into a child's bedroom into a craft room for me,and actually it feels great to be doing things that I really like.

I may not have children but I am going to have an amazing life I have compiled a list of all the things I've always wanted to do and I hope to do its not a bucket list because I don't want to focus on things to do before I die but it's more a ' to do' list its not going to have a limit because I want to keep adding to it. It will have a smaller things as well as bigger things otherwise I'd be bankrupt!

1. Do a walking challenge 
2. Skydive
3. Ride in a hot air balloon
4. Sell some of my crafts 
5. Take a helicopter ride 
6. Go to New York
7. Go to Italy
8. Visit a Greek island and Athens
9. Go to the Christmas markets in Germany.
10. Go to Hawaii
11. Go to Barcelona
12. Watch a formula 1 race live
13. Try horse riding
14. Learn to knit cables
15. Learn to knit fair isle
16. Build a campfire and make s'mores
17. Visit Sark
18. Make a recipe book of family favourites 
19. Make a photo book of each year me and Matthew have been together
20. Watch the sunrise
21. Learn to make cocktails
22. Go wild swimming
23. Have a proper picnic
24. Grow my own food
25. Fly a kite
26. Make a dress for myself
27. See the northern lights
28. Do a painting  to go up in my house
29. See a film at an open air cinema
30. Walk behind a waterfall
31. Visit Olympic Park in London
32. Go to London with Matthew
33. Ride an elephant
34. Visit an far east country
35. Ride on a dog sled
36. Visit the Giants causeway, Ireland
37. Visit Portmerion
38. Try skiing

I have already started to plan for some starting with booking flights to Berlin for the weekend before Christmas to see the German Christmas market, one thing we wouldn't have been able to plan so far in advance before now and it feels good to be able to now.

I will keep you informed on how I get on.
Thanks for reading!
xxx

Beautiful Wales

On Easter weekend, we went to Pwhelli in Wales a stones throw from Snowdonia national park.You can see the mountains from the beach at the holiday park where we stayed and it was like being in a Nordic country or looking at the alps. It was beautiful.

 Originally we were going to walk up Mount Snowdon but true to its name it was covered in snow, there had been news stories about people falling and having to be rescued. Although we have the walking gear, cleats for our shoes and walking sticks, its still not worth risking it. We will be going back in the summer so we'll do it then.

We still wanted to do a good walk so I found this one on the Snowdonia National Park that starts from a beautiful place called Beddgelert, it was a 6 mile hard leisure walk.
Fisherman's Path & Cwm Bychan
It was a really good walk that had a bit of everything, first walking along by the side of the crystal clear River Glaslyn, then through woodland and then a walk through a valley and ascending the hill to see beautiful views of the surrounding mountains and down to the coast, where we had a picnic then descending down to a lake and back around to Beddgelert.

River Glaslyn

Cwm Bychan

Matthew and Max at the highest point of the walk with views of  Snowdon in the background.

and me and Max enjoying the views!

Easter party and egg hunt.

My sister, Christiana and I decided to do a party for our nephews, Joshua, 7, Thomas, 3 and Edward, 9 months. I would do the food and she would do the egg hunt clues. 

It was a simple lunch of egg sandwiches which have to be enjoyed with salt and vinegar crisps- it's the law! Apart from we had the lovely salt and vinegar kettle chips and the children had Pom bear crisps! I made marble chocolate and vanilla easter cupcakes and a nice pot of tea for the adults to wash it down! 

My recipe for Easter marble cupcakes

Makes 24                                                      

Vanilla cupcake mixture	Chocolate cupcake mixture
125g Self raising flour.	100g Self raising flour
125g butter	125g butter
125g sugar	125g sugar
2 eggs	2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract	25g cocoa

To decorate : 

Mini Malteaster bunnies, Mini Eggs, Cadbury's Flake

Chocolate butter cream 

150g butter and 350g icing sugar and about a dessert spoon of cocoa. 

1. Line 2 muffin tins with cupcake cases 

2. Mix the vanilla mixture first in the electric mixer. Mix until light and smooth consistency, scrape the mixture into a bowl. 

3. Next put the chocolate cupcake ingredients into the mixer and mix to same consistency.

4. Then layer a tsp of vanilla mixture then a tsp of chocolate and so on into each cupcake case until they are all filled and both mixtures have been used up.

5. Using a cocktail stick gently swirl the two mixtures together in each case.

6. Bake in the oven at 200C for about 13 mins, take out and leave to cool on a wire rack

7. Now to decorate, mix the ingredients of the buttercream in a bowl with a hand held mixer, it is important not to over mix it as it will begin to separate. It needs to be just combined and quite firm. 

8. Holding the cupcake in your left hand, get a dollop of buttercream on your palate knife and smooth it over the top of the cupcake. Scrape any excess mixture off the knife, now lay the rounded tip of the knife just touching the buttercream and carefully scrape some away in a spiral motion.

9.Put a Malteaster bunny or a few Mini Eggs on top to decorate and sprinkle smashed up pieces of flake around it. 

10. Place on a lovely cupcake stand and enjoy! 

The Easter egg hunt went really well apart from a little blip at the start when Josh spotted one of the clues but he was very good and he didn't tell the others.

Christiana wrote some really good clues and I hid them, my favourites were; 

" What a handsome pooch but where is his name? 

Look underneath to continue this game"

So I craftily folded the clue and put it in between the buckle of Max's collar! 

And..

" Take one if your feeling sneezy or sad, 

Not as good as your sleeve but it makes Mum less mad!" 

Which is of course hiding in the tissue box! Genius! Lol!

Christiana hates this picture because it looks like she's trying to enhance her bosoms but it is a really good photo of Joshua aka Spider-Man and Thomas working together to find the next clue!

And here's one of Christiana covering her modesty with Edward.

The boys went home with bellies and buckets full of easter treats. I do it for myself as much as them I love having the family together and  I'm a big kid at heart. 

Thanks for reading,

Easter crafts

http://blog.makezine.com/craft/craft_pattern_spring_bunny/

I found the link for this free crochet pattern for these gorgeous little bunnies on a blog I follow called 1500 free amigurumi patterns. It's so cute I just had to give it a go, my idea was to make some as easter presents but I started doing it too late really and because I'm new to the world of amigurumi I was very slow. It took me a day and a half doing it nearly none stop! Here is my attempt, I didn't have any safety eyes so I stitched on the eyes instead, I think it's pretty cute!

 

I have noticed that some of the people that I follow on Instagram have done there own versions using the same pattern and its great to see how unique they all are. My 9 month old nephew Edward took a shine to this one so  it went home with him, I'm glad my bunny has gone to a good home.

My second attempt at amigurumi and I'm beginning to get better, this time I got my idea from a book 'Cute and easy crochet' by Nikki Trench I recommend this book to anyone starting out at crocheting it was my first crochet book and I still refer back to it. 

I've been wanting to make these really cute egg cosies for ages.

I thought it would be good to make my own with a twist. I followed the pattern to make the egg cosy bit but then made up my own bit to make it look like a chick! I was so proud of myself it's my first crochet design, I think it is pretty cute! 

Mother's Day crafts

When my grandad died it was the first time me and my 4 sisters and I had lost someone close to us, at the funeral we were all upset my mum tried to comfort us in a group hug and said a line which I will never forget, "At times like this I wish I was an octopus" it made us all laugh out loud through the tears and we all felt loved.

For my Mother's Day card for my mum this year I made it, it's a picture of an octopus holding 8 hearts, on each arm has all her daughters and 3 grandchildren's names.

For my Mother in laws card I did cross stitch Happy Mother's Day and felt flowers.

Another weekend, another walk.

This was our longest yet, it started from Hope in Derbyshire and then across fields up a hill then walk along the ridge from Lose hill onto Back Tor, then Hollins Cross then up to the summit of Mam Tor and down into Castleton and finally back to Hope. The walk was about 9 miles.
I have been to Castleton many times when I was younger, the last time I went there was when me and Matthew first started dating almost 11 years ago, it's a beautiful little village, there is a castle, Peveril Castle, which sits nestled on the side of the hill in the middle of the town, there is a picturesque little stream that runs through the town, plenty of pubs and very lovely shops and cafes, there are also about 5 different caves/mines that you can go on tours around. I have always loved it there but despite the stunning scenery I have never ever thought of going for a walk around there and up onto the hills but I am so glad we did it was amazing and so nice to see another part of this area I never knew existed.
The weather was beautiful but we thought we had better layer up because it would be much colder and windier at the top of the hill, by the time we got up to the first hill, lose hill I had taken my coat and fleece off I was boiling, the sun felt so nice on my face but I had my thermal leggings on under my trousers because they were only thin, I felt quite hot! At the top we recovered from the strenuous walk uphill and had our picnic, what a lovely place it was to eat, you could see for miles. Sitting still had meant that I cooled quite quickly so I put my coat back on. From here you could see the walk along the ridge to Mam Tor and we excitedly carried on our walk, next it was a slight descent then up to Back Tor, this is amazing when you get to the top, there is a sheer drop but you don't appreciate it until you start to go back down then look back, the walk along from Back Tor to Hollins cross and up to Mam Tor is along a very uneven path with steps and despite the warm weather there was still quite deep snow in some areas so we had to be careful. The trek up to Mam Tor was hard work the sun was shining in our eyes and it was quite slippery but it was worth it for the view. We made this our second stop, having the rest of the coffee in the flask and a homemade Nutella cookie, you could see people hang gliding over us from another hill. We then walked down to Castleton and had a drink outside 'the George' pub beneath Peveril castle before walking around back to the car park at Hope.
It was a perfect day out especially for a day in February, it really felt like spring was on its way.
We hope to come back to the Peak District soon for more walks and maybe camping in the summer!

Half term :)

What a busy week off I have had, almost as busy as a working week.

On Monday I looked after my nephew, Joshua for a while we made some valentines cupcakes, took Max for a walk and watched 'Ratatouille' then I had a lovely catch up with my sister and his mum Susanna.

On Tuesday It was pancake day so I had my mum around for tea I made a lovely minced beef pie then for afters we did pancakes, some with lemon and sugar and some with Nutella. I always enjoy pancakes and wonder why we don't have them all the time! Afterwards it was art class and this week we had instructions to draw out a picture ready to paint. We had to paint it using the 3 primary colours and mixing and blending the colours. It didn't turn at all like what I thought it would but I learned a lot about shades. I'm pleased with it technically but I'm not sure I like it, I don't know it something about the colours it's very dark and I'm not really a dark colours kind of girl but see what you think?

On Wednesday it's Matthews half day so we had planned to go out to the cinema and watch 'Les miserable' ( i still haven't watched it!) and out for a meal but it had been snowing since 6am and it was getting deep by the time Matthew got home from work, so we decided not to go out and we got a chippy tea instead and when we took Max out for his walk we went sledging again.

On Thursday I went for a walk with Max around Entwistle reservoir with Sandra and Kimberley from work and Kimberley's dog Finbar. It was dry and cold but because of all the snow melting on the hills the reservoir was very high and in some places it had flooded and we had to wade through luckily we all had our wellies on. We went up to have a drink and something to eat at 'the strawberry duck' last time we went there Max barked so much we had to sit outside to eat, but this time he was much better. We had a lovely time. It was also mine and Matthew's 11th valentines day together, I made Matthew a card and made him some heart shaped Nutella biscuits (his favourite) and he got me a card and some Guylian chocolates (my favourites)

On Friday I went with mum to Cafe create, a cafe that is set up in the hall of Claremont church in Bolton town centre it is open every Friday for people to get together and learn new crafts, meet new people and eat cake and drink tea! They have a gallery where they sell crafts that people have made. We sat crocheting hearts and teaching some of mums friends to crochet it was great I really enjoyed it. I took some of the felt keyrings that I had made to show them and they said they would like to sell some I just need to think of a name and put some business cards with them. I had such a good time I wish they did it on a weeknight or weekend because I'll only get to go at holidays otherwise.