Wool and food!

Over the weekend there was a wool festival and a food festival. 

So first we headed early on Saturday to a wool festival in Alnmouth. Festival may have been a slightly misleading word for it, it was a hall with about a dozen or so stalls related. It was worth the trip though there were some amazing wool crafts there 

I think felting must be popular at the moment as there was quite a bit of it there.

Amazing button stand, Nemo loved them (you can see his little hand in the photo!)

Nemo helped me pick these ones. 

Lots of lovely wool.

This is a stand for a local wool supplier who uses their own sheep and alpacas to make it. They live in a village 10 minutes from us. The lady said you can go and visit the animals so I think I will take the children one day.

I got this wool to make a fancy knitted scarf. I've started it but keep on getting stuck on one bit. Think I may save it until I see my Mum for help!

Couldn't get a good photo of this amazingly intricate piece of lace work. I can't imagine how long it took her. 

I loved this stand, she knitted shawls in a way which made them look like fish nets. It was very sea themed and impressive. 

We drove back home, picked up Poppy dog then walked to Berwick for the second half of the day. There was a food and beer festival being held. It was substantially bigger than the wool festival but I did have to pay £4 to get in. (I objected to this because there have been many many advertisements in Berwick for weeks about it and I have never seen any mention of paying for entry!) 

Anyway it had lots of lovely stalls and quite a lot of alcohol! One stand had a goat paddock next to it. We went to stroke the goat and it took a big liking to Nemo. The goat kept gently nudging his face against Nemo's face and licking him! Nemo was in hysterics I wish I had taken a video!

They had lots of amazing food stands with foods from all over the world. We had actually had lunch which was a bit of a shame! 

This was my favourite looking standing- what a lovely vehicle! 

We decided to get a crepe from a stand, me and my hubby had one each and we split one for the children. 

As you can see the children were pretty happy with the choice of Nutella and bananas crepe! 

We took the crepes to the middle of the stands where some ladies were dancing. 

What we didn't anticipate is that the children with their faces covered in chocolate became one of the main attractions at the festival. Nemo gobbled the crepe down at lightening speed and was quickly cleaned up but People found the sight of Pebble (who spent ages tucking into hers) adorable and kept looking at her and laughing. (The man to the very right of the photo above spent longing watching and laughing at Pebble's crepe eating then he did watching the dancing!) 

I think we must have had at least 10 different people smile and comment to us about it! 

On the way home whilst walking over the bridge we stumbled across this

We'd realise at the food festival that Pebble's shoes were missing but had decided she must have taken them off in the car because surely one of us would have noticed two shoes coming off? 

Evidently not- lucky for us someone hand kindly put them to one side!

Nemo at this point, still not sufficiently stimulated enough said that he wanted to go to the lighthouse. Feeling that the extra walk after the chocolate crepes might be a good idea we headed there. 

Bit much for Pebble who fell asleep- with crepe still clutched in her hand! 

How adorable! 

She woke up in time for the pier though.

Well anyway I will leave you with Saturday's happenings as there's quite a lot happening this week to blog about! 

Bake off and tantrums

This year I am trying to cook something from the bake off every week. 

First week- cake week I made a Victoria sandwich. 

This was specially for my hubby. When we first started going out I made a Victoria sandwich with fresh cream and strawberries. I feel that I may have given him a false expectation that he could expect this regularly throughout our entire relationship! 

 Nemo "helped" me bake this cake and has a innovative way of cracking eggs- just squeezing them until they broke in his hands!

This is my special teapot- probably the most silly thing I've ever bought but I love it.  The tea cup only holds 1-2 mouthfuls of tea but I don't care!

Second week-biscuit week I made lavender biscuits and double chocolate cookies

I chose the lavender ones because they seemed like a 'proper' biscuit. I made the chocolate cookies as well as the lavender as I knew Hubby wouldn't get very excited by the lavender ones!

Nemo helped me this week too!

I found myself when I got to more tricky bits putting the mixture in the fridge and telling Nemo to come back in a few minutes as he just wanted to do everything! 

I'm sure Bing's Dad Flop wouldn't do that! (If you have young children you'll know exactly what I'm talking about!) 

Broccoli/ cookie/ broccoli/ cookie- I think you can guess what she picked 

(Before I get parent judgement it doesn't count as bad parenting when it's bake off day!)

To prepare for our biscuit baking I had to buy 3/4 items from the supermarket. I stupidly thought I could just pop to the supermarket take a basket and NO trolley or pram. 

I periodically have moments where I get some image of me walking around with a basket whilst the children calmly follow me around and we are 15 minutes max. Oh no, of course first it was the battle over who held the basket. 

Pebble has a new found sense on independence and didn't want to hold a handle each on the basket with her brother. She threw herself on the floor and had a tantrum so I ended up carrying a screaming Pebble whilst Nemo carried the basket. Pebble calmed down and she had a turn of holding the basket and we had a brief period of calm

But of course Pebble was taking an age so I tried to help her and she again threw a massive tantrum! 

I think terrible twos are misleading. I used to think there is a difficult year of tantrums. So far I have found that it must be at least closer to two. 

I think tantrums evolve- with Nemo and Pebble at opposite ends:

Pebble is in the physical stage of tantruming- she is an expert at arching her back and making it nearly impossible to do anything with her- she is also very efficient at falling to the floor and rolling around in dramatic fashion. 

Pros are that you can diffuse most situations by letting her tantrum it out or putting her in a pram. Cons are that she is unable to communicate thus causing frustration on both parts and her screaming penetrates the very core of my brain and renders me useless.

Nemo is at the verbal stage of tantruming- he is very capable of telling you exactly what he wants and will do very frequently- he doesn't have any qualms in telling me how unfair I'm being after telling him I'm not reading him his 9th book!

Pros you can explain things to Nemo and diffuse most meltdowns by telling him what the consequence will be. Cons I feel that I am employed by a micro managing dictator who allows me no coffee breaks.

However I'm not trying to complain for every moment of stress there are so many wonderful moments- but I definately think I'm on a patience development crash course! 

Bank holiday weekend

My poor hubby has been unwell this weekend so we've not been too adventurous this weekend. We popped to Alnwick gardens on Saturday morning just as hubby was starting to feel not too great. We first stopped by a baby shop having a sale on and I found the most awesome bargain.

 We got these really cute shoes for £5 (usually £27.50) I wish I had grown up shoes like this! 

It was a really sunny day so the kids got into their swimming costumes to go in the fountains.

Unfortunately Hubby got really unwell on Saturday and had to go to hospital but luckily he was patched up and sent back after not too long! So staying in more I have gone a bit jersey mad and have been finishing off the clothes I'd planned for the children. 

So this week I have finished 2 pairs of leggings and 3 tops for Nemo and Pebble. 

Here are the fruits of this week's labour:

I love this material with the foxes and squirrels- so cute! They're made for Pebble but I think I could have also used this for Nemo.

These leggings I think are so cool for Nemo! 

Top for Pebble 

Fox top for Pebble (you can see it came after the light green top as its a bit neater!)

And finally... 

This time I did a little kangaroo pocket for Nemo

I think this is Nemo's favourite top 

Nemo is at a stage where if you ask him to smile he will give a very cheesy grin!!

And just for the laugh here are Nemo and Pebble in all the handmade glory! 

The star of the weekend has definately been Poppy who won 2nd prize for the happiest dog at a local dog fair! Here she is with her lovely rosette!

I have to show you this photo of Poppy- she always manages to find a patch on sun to lie in- she has always done this even before we got her at 8 weeks. 

This week saw me pick up a pencil for the first time in years. I drew a lot before children but sitting outside watching the children play and being unable to bring my sewing machine out I decided to draw a kingfisher instead. 

The lovely thing was when Nemo saw it he said it was "Beautiful" it was so sweet I said thank you to him and he said "your welcome"! Sometimes he is so grown up! In balance he's spent most of the weekend moaning but you take what you get from Nemo! 

This week's walks and sewing!

So this week I have continued by journey into jersey materials. I have 1m of several different stretch materials and worked out I could make a pair of leggings and a long sleeved top from each meter. So today I did my first long sleeved top for Nemo

It's nearly impossible to make Nemo stand still for photos and not pull any faces!

I'm actually pretty pleased with it. It would definately help to have an over locker (although would definately not help our purses!) I didn't buy any ribbed material for the neckline but managed to get away with the jersey material. 

This week I also made the apron

I love the lining but my husband can't get his head around having the plain material on the outside and the pretty material inside!

I ventured into embroidery for the first time and did my first little picture on my apron. I feel that my transformation into a proper housewife is nearly complete! :-p 

Actually having said that bake off starts this week and I'm endeavouring to complete a baked good for each week (I managed some weeks last year) so my stereotypical housewife points are stacking up!

We ventured to St Abbs on Friday for a local market they do. At one point whilst talking to someone Nemo and Pebble started moaning and got given free samples of biscuit from a stall lady which of course meant I had to buy them something! 

Also came out with some yummy local jam we've had before. 

Banana jam... You might think I'm mad but if you like banana on toast you'll see where they're going with it- it's surprisingly yummy. 

The weather wasn't amazing but St Abbs is still a gorgeous place to go.

We popped into Etal this weekend as well. We didn't actually go on the train ride which I've heard is amazing for children but instead went for a cup or tea in the tea rooms and a walk by the river. It absolutely tipped with rain during our walk but I actually love heavy rain and the children were pretty cosy!

Poor sheep!

These cute little birds were more like seagulls in their blatant scavenging crumbs from the floor!

When we got back we watched a murder mystery and I was very proud as Pebble popped herself onto the sofa to watch it with us!

Nemo reached a potty training milestone. 5 minutes into the service on a new church we hadn't been to before when the whole church was very quiet Nemo announced loudly "I need a wee wee"! 

Comical and embarrassing as it was it was great progress for Nemo who's potty training has been very slow and steady!! 

Sunday saw the end of Poppy's month of confinement whilst she has been on season. Now poppy actually escaped during the month but we're pretty confident (/hoping like mad) the patter of paws are not coming! Having commented how much Poppy would like the Etal river walk we went back there.

She's free!!

The children walked the first half of the walk (maybe just shy of 2 miles) and we walked back. Of course it took us over an hour to walk the first half and then about a third of the time to get back! Pebble is still finding it a novelty to walk by herself and had to stop every 10 seconds to pick up a leaf of stone which she would carry very briefly before proudly throwing it back on the floor! 

I'm going to try my hand at some more sewing as my lovely husband has kindly put the children to bed and has plonked himself by his Xbox! Bye!