My First Mandala

Hello Lovelies,

yesterday was a rainy day. The world was drippy wet..........

It was lovely weather for Ducks..........

and baby Coots...........

When I got home from my usual weekly shop it was nice to spend a little time with a hook and some colourful yarn.........

I'm sure most of you will know of Lucy's Mandala project for Yarndale this year.....

I've never really been tempted to make one before, but knowing how lovely it was to contribute to the Yarndale Bunting LAST YEAR, I thought I would give Lucy's gorgeous pattern a try.

As always it's a super well written and easy to follow photo tutorial. Find it HERE. 

I already had a big of yarn colours sitting waiting for me........do you like them?

After my woodland walk on Saturday.....with images fresh in my mind....I came home and put together this selection of the colours I had seen.

It was such a perfect sight and I thought I would try and recreate mother natures beautiful colour scheme in my next blanket.............

I'm still not sure what pattern I will use for my blanket but it seemed natural to use these colours for my first mandala.

Working the rounds I tried my best to recreate the feeling and sights of my beautiful Bluebell walk again .

In the centre is a lovely pink " Red Campion" flower, surrounded by fresh shades of green.

Dotted among the green you can spy beautiful bluebells between the dark of the tree trunks.

The new leaves on the trees are so bright and fresh.

Cow Parsley and Hawthorn blossom add touches of frothy white beauty and between the trees you can see the clear blue sky.

The woodland in May is such a special place to be and if you are lucky you will come across a carpet of blue, with a ribbon of dainty pink flowers to frame it's beauty.

Oh how I loved making this sweet Woodland Walk Mandala..............

It might sound daft but I feel like it's captured a special moment in time for me to keep.

I'm not sure If I'll be sending this one to Yarndale......I might not be able to let it go.......but I'm hooked on this circular crochet at the moment.......so I'm sure there will be others flying off my hook very soon.
I love the other patterns in Lucy's post .

Searching google images THIS one caught my attention too (but I'm not sure how big it is )

Have you been bitten by the Mandala bug yet lovelies?

Jacquie x

p.s. thank you so much for the kind comments on my previous post.....yay for Vintage Camper Van love :0)

Also Last Week.........

Hello Lovelies,

once again I seem to have lots of pictures left over from last week that I meant to share with you all, so here's a mish-mash of things that made me happy.

On Wednesday I was looking out at the gloom and wondering when I would get good light to photograph my latest drawing....even holding it up to the window didn't do the trick, but I still like this photo.........

Thank you to Chel who suggested this banner would be nice as a button you all could use and join on with this series of posts.........I'll certainly try and figure this out and anybody is welcome to join me in writing some "Celebrating Home" posts this year ( with or without the button )

Also on Wednesday morning, I went for a walk in the rain, it wasn't heavy and I notice different things on days like this. 

I've walked down this road many times , but this was the first time I had seen this lovely roof with it's huge chimneys and  cute  little window. It made me wonder what it would be like to sleep in that bedroom under the eaves .........

The grey weather continued into the afternoon and I decided to pop into the gallery in town to take a look at some artwork ..........I love these colourful mixed media works.......

And the Tulips on the tables were a sweet touch.

They are made by using collage, paint and machine stitching and they really are gorgeous........

This one was called "the north wind doth blow" and it seemed like a beautiful celebration of winter.

The artist is the talented Helen Hallows . She has a blog and THIS post shows some of her other works that I loved.


January seems to flying by and I'm actually surprising myself by quite enjoying winter ( so far) this year. The weather has not been too severe yet and we have seen a reasonable amount of sun between the downpours.
Even on a dull January day this village still looked  pretty..........

On Thursday I did my usual weekly shop and was happy to find the lovely Lucy in print on Morrisons magazine shelves.....so exciting :0)

we love Lucy's crochet blankets too.....don't we lovelies.

Mum came over in the afternoon and brought her calendar to show me ( she knows I love them ).
 It's of old railway posters and  I particularly love January as we have just booked a summer holiday on the  North Wales coast ........

I've never been to  the Lleyn peninsula before and I'm really looking forward to exploring somewhere new.


On Friday I was at work and when I got home I noticed how much my Amaryllis had grown. This one also has a second flower stem emerging.......I've never had one with this happy bonus before......

out of my kitchen window I also noticed  a lovely full moon so I took my tripod into the garden to try and see if I could capture it's beauty. There were clouds swirling around it and this time I managed to capture them in the photo, I like this picture a lot despite the very blurry moon.......

And I zoomed right in with my little compact camera , once again I was thrilled to get a clear image of the moon........wow.........

using a tripod makes a big difference.

THIS is the camera I'm currently using. It has it's flaws ( it struggles with contrast like my old IXUS) but I love the big zoom .

On Saturday I was zooming in again , this time to capture Mr Blackbird enjoying my latest Coconut feeder.........

And also cheeky Mr Squirrel...........

He looks so pleased with himself, don't you think.

Later that morning I walked with Eldest to the shops. In my LYS I bought some chunky yarn in a gorgeous teal colour...........

Ideal for my latest, super speedy, project .

In the afternoon we headed into the City for a short visit. There were lots of these Elephants dotted about, all decorated differently. They made me smile.........

In years gone by I would have been too interested in what I could buy in the shops to notice the beautiful architecture. These days shopping does not have the same appeal and I look at the city with new eyes..........

As we left, the setting sun emerged momentarily from behind the clouds.  The view from the fourth floor of the multi-story car park made me gasp at the beauty of it.

 The fabulous golden light made the buildings glow and the cloudy sky turned brilliant blue.
 I think it looks like I have edited this photo to enhance the colours, but I really haven't....mother nature did it.........I was totally gorgeous...........

I hope you lovelies are finding time to notice the changing light and the small things that make you happy.
Jacquie x

Yarndale 2013 :: the final part

Hello Lovelies,

the weather really was gorgeous on Saturday afternoon and with just under two hours still to enjoy before it was time to leave I happily headed out to explore . I took a different route through the park.........

Enjoying the solitude and dappled shade under the trees......

My Daffodil was wilting a bit by now but it had been a brilliant ice-breaker and I felt so happy to have met up with so many like minded lovelies.

It was wonderfully calm under the huge old  trees........

But I love to climb a hill and take in the view so I headed for the nearest one......

Gorgeous........

Back down the hill in the park the low autumn sun was lighting up the yarnwalk beautifully.....

This reminded me of a stained glass window.

I headed towards the canal and admired Lucy's duck on the waves once more....I just loved everything about this.........

I wandered along the side of the canal absorbing all the little details..........

Like the blue sky and the sunlight on the old stone buildings..........

The boat owners pottering about enjoying the warm weather and the smell of wood smoke in the air from a boat's chimney........

The interesting lettering skillfully hand painted on the side of the boats..........

the sound of narrow boats chugging past and the ripples they made in the water........

The wonderful golden light and the dancing reflections.........

The ice cream boat :0)

When I managed to tear myself away from the canal I was delighted to spot the Yarndale bus. This original London Transport bus took visitors from the train station up to the auction mart and back....look it's got bunting ! .....

and it says Yarndale on the side :0)

Further into town the market was in full swing and everywhere seemed very busy........

I headed for a little covered area of shops that Lucy introduced me to last year...........

There are some lovely shops here and I drooled over this dresser of gorgeousness.........

But the force was strong and I resisted ....it wasn't easy.

There is so much to see here that it was easy to distract myself. The castle is just at the top of the high street.....

This is the view from the entrance....you can just see the white roofs of the market stalls........

I turned up the hill looking for the back of the castle and ended up in the  castle woods. It's timeless natural  place is just minutes from the bustling high street ....amazing.......

I LOVED the dry stone wall covered in moss.

and the glimpses of the hills you could see over it.........

on the other side of the path was a pretty scary vertical drop.....

It was getting close to the time I had arranged to meet up with mum by now and I looked for a safe way down as I thought it would be the shortest route. Eventually I found some steps...steep steps

In the valley bottom it almost felt like the land that time forgot, with pools of water and prehistoric ferns .....

I was sorry to have to rush past most of it , just snapping a few pictures as I went........

Eventually I reached somewhere I recognized behind the castle........

There it is.........

I hurry along the canal-side and am again thrilled by the light and the reflections.........

I look at my watch...five minutes to spare, just time to have a super quick look at the puppet festival which is also in town. I loved this "Theatre" made out of a vintage caravan........

And this colourful tent..........

All too soon it was time to say goodbye to this lovely corner of the world.....

It really was a magical day I will treasure and remember for a long time.
Thank you Yarndale and all the lovely people I met.
Thank you to the weather gods for smiling on us.
and thank you lovelies for coming along for the journey :0)

Jacquie x