Grey Skies

Well, the gloomy grey skies have conspired to keep me indoors this week. Although, true to the saying "Every cloud has a silver lining", this has meant that I finally sanded all my polymer clay lentil beads and can now start putting them into some actual jewellery. I managed to reward myself for all that work by making a couple of pieces and one is pictured below.


And there are other benefits. The on and off again sunshine and rain has made my garden go wild and, as long as none of us get swallowed by the knee high lawn and I continue to ignore the weeds elbowing their way in between the "proper" plants, I can smile every time I look out the window. The "Dig In" seeds (www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/digin) I managed to plant last month are growing well on my windowsill and I hope to get them out into the garden later this month. I'll certainly need to move the french beans before they get much more triffid-like. A little bit of clear weather will likely prompt a gardening frenzy and then I can leave it all to itself again for another wee while.

Speaking of time, there's not that much of it left until the summer holidays when, for six weeks, work takes a back seat to being a mum. Which means that I really should be filling every moment until then with getting as much done as possible. Ahhh, but all work and no play makes Jo a dull girl - so there might just have to be a little bit of fun in there somewhere, cue more experiments in polymer clay!

Sunshine and Splinters

It's amazing how inspiring a little bit of sun and warmer weather is. With a beautiful clear sky today turned into a bit of a work whirlwind, and about time since these school holidays have been terrible as far as getting any work done is concerned.



First on the list was photography, to make the most of the sunlight on my front windowsill. I got all my new pieces photographed and the picture above is a compilation image for one necklace (the "neck shot" was taken by hubby yesterday). Not content with the damage caused to my back by that exercise, I couldn't resist getting out in the sunshine to pull some weeds and trim back my climbers before they start shooting skyward again. As we have road works and a set of traffic lights virtually outside our front door at the moment, my tussles with overgrown plant life must have given the drivers some amusement while they waited to move on. Unfortunately, the plants weren't so amused and have left me with several scrapes (some self-inflicted as I dug fern splinters out of my fingers), an infected spot from a splinter I missed (will get out a needle to deal with it shortly) and a rather painful swelling on the back of my hand where I was caught by a rose thorn.

The moral of this story (as it is every time I get gung-ho in the garden) is to wear gloves when gardening. I'm sure it will also be the moral after my next bout of gardening, and the next, and the one after that ... I love to feel my garden, even when it bites me.