Catching up with a few things…

So what did I do with my precious few days of snow freedom? Time from work was spent productively I managed to get all my assignments done for this half term, planned my 1:1 for my ESOL student and still had time to do a few things for me! Some of them were WIP’s that I could finally finish off, some of them were things that I’ve had in my mind for a while and haven’t had time to do. The first was this hanging candle holder which will eventually be going into my eBay shop once I have the time to photograph it properly.

The second was this book bag, using the same concept as the last one that I’d made; fleece for the body of the bag which is stretchy and all cushiony, elastic to wrap round the book and keep the top flap closed and the book all snug and protected.

This one’s a bit wider than the last one and so will hold either thicker or taller books. I love the last one I made and use it all the time. I permanently carry a book round with me for waiting in the hospital or doctors, for the odd quiet minute during breaks or even for waiting in the queues at the post office! In fact the post office clerk laughs at me for taking a book in with me to read in the queue, but it has been known to queue for as long as three quarters of an hours in there!

I roughly sewed a piece of flower trim as a decoration because I thought it went with the blue of the fleece design and I added a yellow bead and matching embroidery thread to pick out the yellow from the flowers. It kind of gives it a handmade look.

Then feeling the need for a little more prettiness in my life, I finally got around to using some beads I bought ages ago, and incorporating them with some other beads from a necklace that broke ages ago.

The black and white of the dotty beads perfectly complimented the black and white in the flowered beads. I added some red glass beads for spacers to pick out the red in the flowers too and also some black and white spacers too. I love this necklace, the red really makes it pop!

I also found my new favourite way of beading; with my beading square laid over the keyboard  whilst I watch something on my laptop. The beading square I use is a very textured fuzzy fabric which stops the beads rolling about.

Okay, so I was on a roll then and reconstructed another necklace which I also now adore. Do you do that with jewellery? Reconstruct it when you’re bored of it?

This one has these cute millefiore flowered beads in black and white, with some Indian mirrored tube beads and some filigree antiqued metal beads. So now I have another couple of new favourite necklaces to wear; ho hum, where can I wear them to?

What else have I been doing? Well I’ve been making tassels. These will eventually go onto a tribal belt which is definitely a WIP and is currently a pile of tassels and a fabric strip, so I’ll show you more pictures when it’s a little complete.

I gave my 1:1 lesson yesterday to my ESOL student. It’s part of my TESOL requirements and I thought it went really well. I decided to concentrate on definite and indefinite articles as my student is a Farsi speaker and Farsi doesn’t have articles, it’s something I noticed she was weak in. At first I thought I’d pitched it too simply but then it became apparent that it was okay, she was confused about the whole articles business and she really learnt from the lesson. Hurray! Now to evaluate and document it all. I’ll have plenty of time though as I’m now on half term! Double hurray! A week off!

I just thought I’d show you what M gave me this morning – a dozen red roses! Aren’t they lovely? We’ll be popping out later for our Valentines outing which will be a romantic trip ice-skating! Um..did I say romantic? Is falling on your arse romantic? Probably not, but it’ll be great fun and we’ll have a romantic candlelit meal later on tonight. I promised to cook him steak and chips as his Valentines gift. That’s definitely the way to M’s heart! I must be mad though, ice-skating in this weather? All we really need to do is to try walking on the footpaths round here which are about two inches of compacted ice and absolutely treacherous! We walked my friend home last night and nearly went over numerous times! It seems that England is nearly out of road grit and so is not bothering with non-essential roads, nor footpaths. The long term reports predicted a mild winter, so most councils didn’t stock up enough. This cold snap from Siberia has caught everyone on the hop!

I hope your Valentines day brings you romance and fun!