I adore this print. My great aunt gave it to Mum and it’s been in my room since I was a girl. Now it will pass to my daughter. Margaret W Tarrant (1888-1959) was mainly a children’s book illustrator drawing animals, fairies, children and storybook characters.

More TILT love at Flickr here.

Mini kitties
These little guys arrived this morning from Oz. They’re about 10mm and really made me laugh! Bought at Made in Japan by a dear friend for my birthday.

More Things We Love here

Unfortunately, I don’t have the time nor the inclination to write 34 things about me. A 9 week old doesn’t leave you with much time to do anything too taxing. Anyway, I am incredibly grateful and thankful to my family and my husband. The last 18 months have been very hard on us and I am so very lucky to have such a beautiful, healthy daughter, who brings me so much joy. A girlfriend of mine wrote in my birthday card that birthdays take on a new meaning once you have a baby and they should be more about the mother. So, she will be thinking of my Mum pushing me out 34 years ago! It’s so true, isn’t it?

I also share this day with the lovely Noo at Spitting Yarn, so head on over and send her some good wishes too!

Here’s the little lady in the bouncy chair a friend of mine gave me, which I re-covered last week. I used the leftover curtain fabric and we had just enough to make it work with a few sneaky bits of piecing here and there. It’s been a real hit!

I love my bump!

The purpose of my blog is more of a craft diary for myself and not something I wish to use for personal stuff and I have my reasons for that. However, I thought I’d share this with you. I love being pregnant but I am enormous and so my answer to the question of ‘How long do you have to go?’ is……soon. This is something that is constantly being asked of me, mostly by shop assistants, so I choose to be vague. All women are different, some carry small and I carry in a big way! And, no, it’s not twins! Thank God for that. Anyway, we, the bump and I are doing well and enjoying each other’s company.

More TILT lovers here.

This is a belated TILT because we’re suffering with colds and hayfever here and the computer hasn’t been feeling too good either of late!

I never cease to be amazed at how quick the growing season here is in England. I planted this lettuce seed on Friday 21st April. I didn’t expect any of it to come up because most of it was out of date! But thought, I’d give it a bash anyway - what a bonus if anything actually appears. So, here we have some oriental lettuces - mizuna & red giant mustard. Shots are taken after one week then today at three weeks. Just incredible. I think the warmer weather interspersed with rain has helped enormously. I love watching things grow, especially things you can eat!

I love my Christmas Roses! I only have three in my garden, two at the front and one at the back but I will be sorry to see them go for another year. They’ve made a beautiful display, especially the ‘Harrington Speckled’ (above). This has been in since November 2003 and has grown with very little attention but loves the morning sun.

This Helleborus Corniscus has green flowers. Several people have commented on how unusual this one is.

The Helleborus Orientalis didn’t cope too well with the winter and think it’s a been a bit too wet for its liking. But I trimmed back the damaged leaves last month and it seems to be doing ok. It was only planted last autumn when we redeveloped the end of the garden. Our new neighbour decided to cut down half our willow tree and replace the fence without telling us! Anyway, despite lots of grumpiness at the time, we are very pleased with the result and gave me a new excuse to buy more plants!

Here is another set of matryoshka dolls that we love - The Former Soviet Leaders. In size order we have: Yeltsin, Gorbachev, Brezhnev, Stalin and Lenin. Quite clearly there were many more leaders but these are the most recongnisable, I suppose for the tourist market. The set was a gift from a friend of my husband’s, who was doing a University language exchange to St. Petersburg in the early 90’s. They’re a miserable looking bunch but I like them anyway!

Other lovers of Things they love on a Thursday - here

I love everything about my Russian lady - her rosy cheeks and rosebud lips, her glittering gold and beautiful finish. She was brought back from a trip by a dear, dear friend and I will always cherish her.

The tradition of Pearly Kings and Queens of London goes back to the 1800’s. I shot this guy posing with families by the horse guards near Trafalgar Square last year. More here about them. I love this tradition as much as I love buttons!

There is a constant debate in our house re: Vegemite vs. Marmite. Any Aussie living with a Brit will probably have the same debate over and over and over again. Anyway, I do like Marmite and there is a place for it’s sticky, sweetness but I always go back to Vegemite as my spread of choice for breakfast. If you’re not sure what it is, it’s a yeast extract spread that is mostly used for spreading on toast or bread but I also use it like stock for chili or spaghetti bolognese. It’s also a good source of folic acid. 10 years ago it was harder to find but most of the UK leading supermarkets keep it now, yay for me!