Housey Pics

See, I told you I wouldn't leave it so long!
Thought I would just share with you a few photos of my dining room - although it is downstairs (our lounge is on the first floor) I like to trim up in there, so its nice and festive for christmas dinner. I usually have a second tree in there, but since I borrowed it for the shop window this year, I am making do with this little white tree and a few decorated twigs.

The table centrepiece is from Next - I have it on the table all year round, but with a few silver pinecones and baubles thrown in, it looks kinda festive don't you think?

I think I am more or less organised for christmas now - my big food shop is being delivered on Sunday, and Im finding it really handy being able to keep 'logging on' and adding to my basket when I think of another 'essential' I've forgotten!
Hope you enjoy the pics, I'm loving looking at all your christmassy rooms

Finally! - Bo Bo's Bedroom

Finally, after a couple of months, Bo Bo's room is finally finished - well, I say finished - I still have to put a few pictures on the wall, but I always find that bit the hardest and it seems to take the longest.

The lamp I made by glueing all different scraps of fabric (cut with pinking shears) onto an old white shade, then finished off the edge with a pom pom trim

And here is a little unit that is above her cot

All in all I'm really pleased with how it has turned out, the wallpaper on the chimney breast wall is 'Summer Palace' by Laura Ashley, as is the Roman Blind. I am going to have a picture of Bo Bo with her brothers blown up and made into a canvas to go above the 'fireplace'.
I must add however that a fair few toys have to be removed from the room prior to photographing for the sake of 'styling' which included a bright pink plastic motorbike, a bright pink little tikes car and a bright yellow mini plastic patio chair, which I'm sure you will agree you would never see in an ideal home spread!
Moving on, last night we were fed up of being in the house and decided to go down to the harbour at Scarborough for a wander around - that's the beauty of living by the sea, a ten minute car journey and you almost feel like you are on holiday yourself

This first picture was taken of the harbour as we arrived, you might just be able to see the castle up on the hill

But it wasn't long before it became dark, and this is the harbour again at night time. We headed back to the bright lights for some Harry Ramsdens fish and chips, a couple of pounds worth of 2p's played on the slots and a ride on the merry-go-round

Not quite the Saturday nights of old - but still sounds like a great night out to me!
Natalie x
P.S. - If anyone is wondering, we always refer to Georgia as 'Bo Bo' - Bo is her middle name (as in Bo Derek) but since the day she could talk she has always called herself Bo Bo and boy has it stuck!

Corners of My Home

Not a long post today, just wanted to show you a little corner of my home - in this case my lounge, and the lovely lilies I bought yesterday.
My lounge is on the first floor and looks out across Filey's bowling green (on the right) and the tennis courts (on the left) - We have a window seat built into the bay window and whenever we have anyone round, they always seem to want to perch on the window seat so they can enjoy the view outside.

Finally, I keep forgetting that I have been nominated for the Brilliante award 3 times (not that I want to brag or anything!) I know the rules are that I should pass the award onto other bloggers, but to be truthful, I think this one has been doing the rounds for a while, and most of the blogs I read have already had it! Hope I don't offend anyone.
Have a good weekend everyone

Natalie x

Random lovliness

Well so far I'm doing ok in my efforts to blog more often, suddenly it seems I have loads to talk about and loads to show you!


First off is the drawer in my 'new' dressing table - although I intend painting it up, I couldn't resist using it straight away. The plastic box with my earrings in, is an organiser I bought from hobbycraft, its supposed to be for storing embroidery threads, but its ideal for jewellery too.

Next up is these gorgeous glass draw knobs I wanted to show you which are going to go on the said dressing table - the picture frame is also a new purchase, just £1.99 from Ebay - I just need to find a piccie to put in it now!

Third up is these goodies which I received in the post from Faye
I saw the glass 'violets' bottle and thought it would also look lovely on my dressing table (hmmm this dressing table is starting to look not so much of a bargain!) and the little pink cushion at the back is a little something Faye popped in the package and it smells lovely. I can't show you what is in the other 2 packages as they will be winging their way into someones christmas pressie this year and i can't risk spoiling the surprise, but just look how beautifully Faye has wrapped them.
Last and not least was the little surprise I received in the post from Jessica - A lovely handmade birthday card and some pink floral fabric which I'm sure to find a use for - Thank you Jess!


Well, my next post won't be too far away as I've been busy working on Rachel Rabbits 'Cupcake and Tea' swap, so I'll show you some piccies of what will be winging its way to Australia soon
Natalie x

Shabby Chic?

On Saturday morning I got word about someone who lived a couple of streets away who had to move house soon and needed to get rid of a load of furniture quickly - We are not short of furniture, but not being one to feel I've missed out on a bargain I hot footed it straight round there with hubby's words of 'you better not come back with a load of crap' still ringing in my ears!

Then imagine the predicament I found myself in, when I saw this



'Its kind of distressed' said the lady who was selling it.
'My hubby will be, when I come home with this' I replied.

So 10am Sunday morning and I spy the nice lady's husband and son in law carting the huge dressing table down the street towards our house. All credit to Tim, he didn't say what he thought until the 2 blokes had left with their £20 (yes, just twenty quid!)

'Its shabby chic' I said
'More like shabby sh*t' said Tim

So I'm hoping you ladies out there will appreciate this fine piece of furniture, you have to look past the fact that it has been painted rather haphazardly without the handles being removed, and ignore the paint all round the mirror, because after some TLC I can see it looking very nice. And it really is huge with lovely big drawers to put all my girly stuff in - I must admit, Tim seemed won over when I told him this meant he could even reclaim his paltry shelf in the bathroom cabinet that I had begun to take over. Later on Sunday evening, I was flicking through my 'Shabby Chic' book by Rachel Ashwell and what should I see but an almost identical dressing table right there!

Please ignore the horrible combination of salmon walls, plum curtains and green woodwork in my bedroom, I told you the colour schemes we had inherited were hideous - which leads me on to our hall and stairs.

Here are a couple of pics, although its really difficult to get a good picture for some reason



All the tongue and groove on the left hand side of the picture was a real 'orangey' pine and the walls and cieling were a tangerine colour with the mustard spindles and red carpet that Im sure you'll never forget!



I bought loads of the IKEA white 'ribba' frames as I want to do a gallery up the stairs, but I am struggling to find little bits in duck egg blue and beige to sit on my shelves which were green (shown in an earlier post) but are now white. We covered up the ugly radiators with radiator covers and that is another place for me to accessorise, but I always find that bit the hardest!

Anyway enough from me, and let me know what you think of my dressing table! - Natalie x

Corners of my home

I have to be honest, and say that at present there aren't many corners of my home that I would want to share with anyone! - However, a couple of you have shown an interest, and so I thought I would do a weekly 'Corners of my Home' feature. We moved to this house in December 2006 and lets just say that I think the previous owner had been watching too much 'Changing Rooms' in the early 1990's - Our house is a myriad of terracotta, purple, green and aquamarine (sometimes used altogether!) - We do however always sit down as a family for every meal, and the dining room colour scheme was putting us off our food, so this was the first room we tackled - The shelves you can see on the picture are one of my favourite spots, as they hold lots of different family pics, none of the frames match, but they kind of all go together. We painted the fireplace white, which turned out really well, and above it, there is a large venetian mirror - you can just see in the reflection, that we have a black and white canvas of me and Hubby - the photograph is one taken in Summer 2006 by a professional photographer, when I appeared in a 7 page feature in 'Pregnancy and Birth' magazine. I hope you have enjoyed this peek inside my home - as I love looking at all your homes!



I have spent the morning wallpapering today (more about that in my next post), so this evening I will be taking it easy, with my feet up, doing a spot of knitting. I am making this jacket for myself - On the pattern it is fastened with a kilt pin, and the lady in the wool shop had made one with little beads dangling from it which was quite pretty, but I have another idea for fastening this jacket - hopefully it won't take me long to finish it - We are having a weeks holiday at the end of May, and I want to have it finished for then - my mum is probably laughing at this, as my knitting usually takes ages, not because I'm slow, but because I usually put it down and forget about it for ages, usually, if its something I am knitting Georgia, by the time I pick it up again, it no longer fits!

Hope you have all had a good weekend - Natalie x

Well, this was the site that met me when I came home from work today! - Hubby had decided to take all the plaster off one of the walls in the room we are decorating for Georgia and as a result, the whole house looks like the aftermath of 9/11. There is a thick coating of dust and soot (from the chimney we've opened up) on everything! On the plus side, the ceiling and one of the walls you can't see have been skimmed and by tomorrow all the plastering should be done - looks like Hubby is in for a late night as he wanted to insulate the wall before he puts new plasterboards on - I get impatient with this bit and just want to get on with the nice stuff, such as this lovely pom pom trim that arrived today and is to go on the bottom of the roman blind I'm making for her room. It's been a quiet day today, I've popped bunny in the post to Vanessa at 'Just Originals' - I do hope she likes it! - I've also half made some bunting to go in my shop window, which I'll change this weekend, I'm going for a floral, fresh, springy theme this time - I love window dressing, and its nice to hear all the lovely comments about my window as people walk past. 

Natalie x