Too cute!

I'm having a problem wih uploading images, due to computer internet problems! But.....I think this video could be better than what I was trying to post anyway!

Hugs, Sarah x

Still here............

Where oh where does the time go?

My big Sis slapped me on the hand for not having updated my blog for over a month. Not literally, she's nice like that.

My head has been filled lately with fireplaces, sofas, the chickens, the architrave.......the list goes on. I still don't have space in my head for bearmaking. I'm sure there will be a little nook or cranny in there at some point in the future. Where that point is in the future is debateable.

I have on offer with FREE delivery four copies of The UK Teddy Bear Guide 2010 priced at £5.95 each. A great resource for all those with a love of teddy bears, whether it be artist bears, antique bears, restoring etc. Photos, contact details and info of bear artists, dates and info for bear fairs etc. It includes inside, two FREE tickets to two teddy bear events, The Winter Bearfest - February 2010 and Teddies 2010 - September 2010. Both events are held in London, UK.

For more information, or to buy a copy, just drop me an email!

I'll be back soon with photos from our day out at Sacrewell Farm Park.

Kitty's 2nd Egg!

What a difference a few days make. Obviously in the few days Kitty didn't lay an egg she was deciding what colour her second one would be. It's a ladies perogative to change her mind isn't it? :)

First Blue Egg from Kitty!

I'm so pleased! Kitty one of our three new chickens laid her first egg today! A beautiful blue one!She got so distressed about where to lay it and in the end laid it in the hedge! Didn't help much that three of our first lot of five hens where stood outside the hedge looking in. Then to make matters worse she was chased off her 'nest' by one of the other hens (Dolly) and she got stuck in the hedge trying to get out! I managed to distract them all, so that she could lay in peace.

Here's her beautiful egg,with Monty, who wanted 'in' on the photo!

Parrot Sitting and New Chickens!

Here's Mable! She's 21 weeks of age now. She laid an egg two days on the trot when we first got her, then we've had nothing for a week! It's as if she was proving a point that she had started to lay and then thought she'd take a break! She's a no nonsense chicken and wouldn't be put in her place by the lower ranking chickens and stuck up for herself. She's settled in incredibly well with our other chickens.

This is Kitty! Her gorgeous neck colouring isn't showing up too well in the photo, but it's almost like glittering gold. She's also 21 weeks but is yet to lay. I await her eggs with much anticipation as she'll lay blue ones! She's a real sweetheart and does get picked on by our original chickens a bit.

This is Tippi! She's just a youngster at 16 weeks. You can see in the photo her comb and wattles are hardly there yet. Boy does she love her food! She tugs at your skin when you have a handful of corn. Ouchy! Also a sweetheart though and makes low honking noises when she's scared which can be quite often!

This is Tenner, who we looked after for the weekend just gone. She's 50! Here she is tucking into a dog chew! She really took to me and would come up to the bars for a fuss! She would shake when my partner Robert spoke to her. I felt highly honoured to be trusted so much.

I might be making a mini bear soon. I'm determined to get around to it! With my workroom being practically empty and bearmaking materials still boxed up I thought a mini bear would be better to make as there's less materials to have about!

It's my birthday on the 17th which I am looking forward to! I've made a little list of pressie ideas for my Robert!

Hugs, Sarah x

Darling Ducks and Absence

Feels like I've been 'gone' forever!

Well.................what with work on the house and looking after the animals and working, I've become very neglectant with my blog and also bearmaking. The bearmaking has ceased due to the fact that the room for my bearmaking isn't finished yet. By the time I've got home from my other job in the afternoon and got all the house chores done, seen to the animals, put on the washing machine etc, etc, there doesn't seem to be time for much else! Hopefully that will change.

We had a lovely weekend a couple of weeks ago at my sisters. I haven't visited for about a year and it was my other halfs first long journey driving (2 hours 15 mins). I thought the journey would seem to last forever, but the time soon went. I was really chuffed we managed to make it there and back without getting lost! It was lovely to see my elderly Mum who now lives with my sister. There were lots of tears when we left, mostly from me! It was so nice to be in my sisters lovely home, all beautifully decorated and tidy. Unlike ours, which still has boxes here and there and the mess left from rewiring the house!

While there my other half Robert took some snaps of my nieces call ducks. So cute! The second two photos are the 'babies' just a few months old! I was expecting them to be fluffy ducklings. Boy, do poultry grow quick! Their names are Parsley and Pepsi the babies, and left to right at the top, Phoebe, Philly and Puddles (Mallard drake!). Puddles was found wandering alone down the road as a duckling and my niece brought him home and of course he had to have some 'friends' didn't he!

Chicken news! We are getting three more hens Sunday! So we will then have eight! Will post pictures when they are settled in their new home!

Anyway, I sit here waiting for the electricians to arrive to correct a mistake they made. Grrr. Twice they have meant to arrive and didn't, hopefully its third time lucky. Grrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Hugs, Sarah x

Last Round!

Well I find out on the 10th August if I have made it through to the last round of the Bears and Buds Competition. If Bubba appears on the site, I have either won, 1st, 2nd or 3rd place. There's another round of voting to decide which I these I may have won! The last round of voting starts on the 10th August and carries on until the 10th September.

Thanks to anyone who voted! I really do appreciate it. Feel free to vote again for Bubba in the last round!

We are still busy with our house. Will be nice to have a workspace again, so I can get back to bearmaking! The chickens are keeping me busy though!

Hugs, Sarah x

URSA Voting Begins!

The online magazine 'Bears and Buds' Ursa awards voting has started! Bubba made it through to the first stage of voting! I'm so pleased! He is listed in category 12 'Animal Kingdom'. If you feel he deserves to win, I would be over the moon if you could pop along and visit this link http://cyberdendesigns.com/URSA2009/Category12.htm to cast your vote. A million thank you's!

Hugs, Sarah x

Mrs Percy

Couldn't resist snatching a few moments to photograph Mrs. Percy, my new poppy! Isn't she pretty?! I thought she was going to be pink, but I'll forgive her that.

So busy at the moment. I'm doing some graphic design work at the moment, producing some large display panels for an exhibition at my local museum. I'm having some very long, tiring days. I washed my hair in the shower a few days ago and had to have a long think as to whether, I'd washed my body! I will be pleased when normal service resumes and I can get all my plants planted out and some DIY done on the house. If all goes to plan today, I can chill out tomorrow!

Before I whizz off, a heartfelt thanks to those that left a comment on my post about the loss of our Ellie. I briefly forgot she was no longer with us yesterday and the realisation she wasn't stung a bit. I'm so grateful for our other five cats, that I can still have fluffy cuddles.

Hugs, Sarah x

Still here

I can't believe I've been absent from blogging for over a month, or I can believe it. The jury's out on that one. My blogging came to a halt when our much loved Ellie died (pictured above) at the age of 12. I think my blogging stopped because I felt I needed to mention it, but it hurt too much to even begin to write a post about it. My wounds are healing but it still makes me so sad when I think of her. Ellie was the one we thought we would have for many more years. She was a wonderful cat and never any trouble. She would now and again give you an impromptu face wash when you picked her up. She would chase sticks, leaves etc, round and round in the garden as you wiggled them, until she made herself giddy. She lays next to Lily in the garden and shares Lily's garden light. I'm sure Lily wouldn't mind one bit.

Long absent hugs, Sarah x

Rewired

Well, I came through the house rewiring just about sane. There's that much dust about, I'm expecting to find some in my navel some time soon.

When every room needs a good clean top to bottom, it's hard to make a start. Pass the jump leads over here please.

The silver linning to the rewiring means we can at least make a start at decorating. Though my mind is on the garden, mostly due to the glorious weather we are having. Did someone press a button to start summer? Though knowing the British weather we could have a hard frost next week and be told to protect our tender perenials. Anyhoo must stay positive. Summer is here (in Spring).

For a far more prettier photo that a room in chaos, here is our Monty.

Right, I'm off for a bite to eat, then some housework. Hmph.

Hugs, Sarah x

Happy Easter!

A little late in the day, but Happy Easter!

The highlight of my Easter so far has been buying grow bags and a lovely twisted hazel bush. I really have to reign myself in or I would almost buy everything. Oh and I bought some stock seeds. I adore their scent! Having seen one plant costing nearly £5, I thought I would buy a packet of seeds for £2.20! Oh and yesterday I bought some beetroot seeds and poppy seeds. Our new greenhouse is up and ready, but only has radish seeds planted in there so far!

We have decided that although I love seeing the chickens outside the conservatory or eyeing us up as we wash up the dishes etc, that I would like plants and not stumps of plants, which is what we would be getting if they continue having the whole garden to themselves. I had five lovely big clumps of bluebelles, them turned round to see Dotty chatting to me with a long bluebelle leaf hanging out of her beak. They had all devoured the lot!

They will have about a third of the garden, which, with our garden being 200 feet by 35 feet, isn't too bad a space for them. Thought I still feel wicked about fencing them in. I hope to plant up plants that I know they will leave alone, so it doesn't look a barren space. They will also have two apple trees in there, when we can decide which variety to buy! I'd also like some logs to pile up so they can clamber about on them. Anyway, I hope when the fencing is done, they will be happy. I shall so miss them 'helping' me do the gardening.

Anyway, before I chicken chat any longer, enjoy the rest of the Easter break everyone!

Hugs, Sarah x

William

Update: William has now been adopted. Thank you Lori!

Here is William, my latest bear! He is made from a powder soft faux fur in a kind of mink colour. I'm really pleased with how he's turned out. He will be my last bear for a little while as I shall be working on a re-design of my website. Plus, it's hard bear making with things in boxes and my workroom to be totally re-decorated soon! Floorboards to strip, artex skimmed over on the ceiling, etc, etc!

William will be available soon. I may be placing him on ebay.com. If I do, I will post the link to his auction. If you want any details, feel free to email me at sarahsbruins@aol.com.

Bye for now. Hope you are having sunshine where you are too!

Hugs, Sarah x

I've Cracked It!

I have at last found out how to get sharp pictures of 'the girls'! I have to put my camera on 'Sports' mode. Turns out our chickens are athletes. They certainly look like athletes when they are digging big craters in the gravel.

Don't get me started on the vast amount of poop they produce. Thankfully our garden is large enough to take it. No picnics on the lawn for us though.

Above is Dotty. Not the brightest of chickens, but a real sweetie. Hasn't her comb come on well?

Here are L-R, Sybil, whose comb out trumps Dotty's comb hands down (see first photo), Lettuce, the phantom feather pincher. All the other girls have slighlty bare botty's on the left. Seems Lettuce is a left handed chicken. Then the beautifully feathered Gracie. I think they should bring out her colour in a paint range. Gracie Grey, has a certain ring to it, don't you think?

Now off to torture my fingers sewing my latest bears nose. Ahhhh, I suffer for my art ;)

Hugs, Sarah x

Scrub, scrub

Yesterday I spent most of the day scrubbing away at the original quarry tiles in our 1920's house. This room is going to be our downstairs toilet, but in the house's youth was the larder, where food was kept cool. You can see in the photo where the little hatch was to open a vent and where the two big concrete brackets where that would be holding up a thick marble slab. On the floor there were two dark, practically black marks on it, which have driven me to distraction. Having spent £50 on 'specialist' floor cleaner products, it turns out that bleach, fine sandpaper and Cif do a better job!

Feeling absolutely shattered, I then realised that in days gone by, there would have been maids doing this probably on a weekly basis. I think I had it easy. It wasn't until 3 o'clock that I remembered that the television had been on and considering I couldn't see it from where I was and could only just make out what was going on, I decided I'd better turn it off. Well the walk into the living room would have had people questioning my sobriety. Seems scrubbing away at floors affects your ability to walk in a straight line.

Suffice to say, the stains are now gone. Robert came home and said I had a strong aroma of bleach about me. I suppose there could have been worse things to be smelling of.

Hugs, Sarah x

Sunshine and Sore Throats

We've had a lovely few days of sunshine here. Really uplifting for the soul.

I'm full of a head cold as I type. Icky. My head feels like it's in a vice, feels hot and my eyes feel like marbles. You get the idea. It took me a while to text my sister the other day, I think my brain has turned into candyfloss.

Although feeling out of sorts Saturday, I dragged on my coat and popped outside to take a photo of our snowdrops and crocus basking in the sunshine. The snowdrops are at the bottom of our silver birch tree and the crocus are at the bottom of our ornamental cherry tree. They have evaded the chickens scratting around in the earth. That's the downside to chicken keeping. They devoured the primroses, so much so that you can't even see they were there. We are planning to buy a greenhouse to bring on seedlings. I did enjoy sprinkling poppy seeds around I must admit. They would never see the light of day though with the chickens raking through the soil!

Well I'm now off to see what my befuddled brain can handle............

Hugs, Sarah x

Nuremburg

My big sister went to Nuremburg in Germany for a long weekend this weekend just gone. One of my nieces has been living and working there for a while so my brother-in-law and sister went to see her. She's there with her boyfriend and then in a weeks time they will be going to stay in his homeland of Australia for two months. Young, in love and travelling. Ahhhhhh.

Mum, who now lives with my sister, had three days with us as she needs looking after and I think she enjoyed her stay. I'm posting some of the lovely photos my sister took on her mini break.

This is a church doorway, which MUST be clicked on to see all the wonderful stone carving! It's amazing. I'd have needed a chair to sit on to take my time taking it all in.

This is the very adorable hotel they stayed in. I must also say that they went to a place that has a 'cocktail happy hour'! They got all the cocktails in in one go to make good use of the hour! Yummy!
I'm glad they had such a lovely time and also glad that I got to see the photos. A very good second best to seeing everything first hand.

Lastly thanks to all who commented on my 'Snow Queens' post. My girlies seem popular! They say 'Hi' to you all or maybe it's 'Bock, bock, cluck, bock, cluck'.

Hugs, Sarah x

Snow Queens

The chickens braced themselves and went out in the snow for the first time today. Instead of heading for the lawn at full speed as they usually do, they stopped short of the lawn and stayed on the patio at the far end of the garden. They then decided they'd follow me up the PATH and stay well away from the white stuff.

Lettuce (2nd picture) braved the snow tentatively and for some reason known only to her, did a bit of moonwalking. I guess she thought she could walk away from it. Dotty (one of the brown hens) thought 'well if its ok for her, its ok for me' and very slowly lifted one foot and placed it in the snow. Then, because Lettuce's moonwalking had un-earthed some green grass, they all stood around pecking the small patch they could see. Sybil thought the white stuff completely perplexing and looked around for something else to do.

In the end they thought they would concentrate on the biggest expanse of green they could see and set about devouring the privet hedge.

Today, the highlight of the chickens day has been snow. Tomorrow? Maybe more snow.......and a bit more hedge.

Hugs, Sarah x

Hoppity Hop

I am making another rabbit! Over at Teddy Talk Bubba a previous rabbit has proved popular and I've been itching to make another bunny for a while. I'm terribly distracted though and rather tired. Must stop watching the chickens busying themselves around the garden and get out the sewing machine.

I am sooooooo looking forward to when my workroom/study etc is all done. I'm tired (again!) of looking at boxes and everything in disarray. I need to be able to pack things away and get organized. I like to be organized and tidy. It's hard to be tidy when there's no way of being able to put things away. Well the heating will be done on the 2nd Feb, then there's the ceiling to redo and paint, the floor to strip, the wallpaper to come off and new put on and walls painted, the new boiler to be boxed in........Why did I decide to list it? Sigh. It will be done Sarah, it will be done.....

Uncovering the Past

Look what I found yesterday. We are getting close to making a start on our house soon. This was described as a 'cloakroom' in the house details, but when we had a viewing, it was much as we guessed it would be, toiletless! Our house was built in 1928 and has some wonderful windows remaining and an oak handrail up the stairs, plus some lovely skirting and all the original doors and doorknobs. Anyway, the 'cloakroom' would have been used for keeping things cool and would have had a big thick marble slab sat in there. I thought I would do some investigating as we are going to have a toilet put in there at the beginning of February. After some heaving up of the carpet AND vinyl, I found the original quarry tiles. I'm going to order something called Pro Clean to give them a lovely deep clean. I was planning on having a nice grey slate floor in there and follow it through to the kitchen and conservatory, but Robert thinks we'd be mad to cover it up. I agree, but it looks like I'll be deciding decor around the floor! Never mind!

Hugs, Sarah x

New Year, New Bear

Happy New Year! Where did Christmas go and can I have it back please? Did it actually happen?

As usual I am missing Christmas. I have a little momento of the front of the Radio Times stuck on my noticeboard with Wallace and Gromit staring back at me! I'm hoping a little of Nick Park's creative genius will rub off on me!

At long last I have managed to post a photo of my new bear, aptly called 'Winter' (brrrrrr). He's available for adoption and I'm hoping to add him to my website after leaving Blogland and going to Dreamweaver land. White bears are notoriously hard to photograph as are black bears. I would love to be all set up with a mini photo studio, but alas, I have to wait for good light levels outside.

This year we will be busy updating our house. We haven't been here a year yet, which is my excuse for still having the smallest bedroom stacked high with boxes! We are having our back boiler removed and our very unsightly electric fire (circa 1980 ish) removed also. It's utilitarian to say the least and we haven't even got a hearth! We will work our way through the house steadily and I can't wait to have my workroom set out and organised. It doesn't tend to do the creative mind much good when you don't know where things are and you can't fully unpack because everything will be leaving the room for heating engineers to get to radiators and install a boiler! Ah and the artex on the ceiling removed. Hoorah!

Well I must now head out and make sure all the chickens have tucked themselves up in bed. Wellies and warm coat and hat, here I come.............

Hugs, Sarah x