More Wonderful Gifts

This time I had to share with you a pic of the very lovely amber and silver brooch which was my main gift from my DH:

We spotted this whilst in one of our favourite shops: The Rainbow Room, in Market Rasen. It makes me think of the Tree of Life when I look at it and amber is considered to be protective and is often referred to as the Witch's Stone. I love the different colours of amber on it and am now waiting for the right opportunity to wear it. :0)

My Aunt and Uncle, knowing that we wouldn't be able to eat the biscuits and chocolate liqueurs they usually give us, gave DS cash (always useful), DH some whisky and these were for me:

Aunty D knows I'm a Pagan, so she chose something that was sure to appeal. I shall enjoy reading them and finding out more about Feng Shui and about labyrinths - especially the latter, as we have a very old turf cut labyrinth in Alkborough called Julian's Bower. The pic on that site is a little old: the labyrinth has been recut several times since then, so it sits much lower in the ground; the view out over the rivers has changed too, as they are now returning the farmland to floodplain, making pools and adding reed beds for the plentiful bird life and it's true - on a clear day you can see York Minster in the distance. We love visiting this place and whilst there I also love to indulge in a little game of "Spot my fellow Pagan". LOL

Earlier in the year I signed up and paid for Jayne's special hand dyed Christmas Stash Pack and, unusually for me, saved it to open with my other gifts. A gift from me, to me - to guarantee that I'd have some stash to open. LOL Here are all the lovely goodies that were inside:

This year the theme was Panto Time and all the colours have been dyed with that in mind. Very appropriate for this time of year and with DS being in the LTC Pantomime. :0) The fabrics are Count On Me Dick Whittington, Streets of Gold and Polstitches Cinderella and Prince Charming - reckon you can work out which is which in the pic. LOL All the threads are named for various panto characters and make a gorgeous rainbow. I'll enjoy using them, eventually....... for now it's just nice to admire them in my stash. :0)

Just in case you were wondering, the festive season wasn't all about sitting on our bottoms in front of the TV or doing jobs: we took some time out to hit the Sales, though not the usual ones. Nope, I opted for the craft stash sale at Brigg Garden Centre. LMAO. Here are the bargain goodies I came away with:

The Fiskars pieces are a shape cutter and some circle templates to be used with it. Those will make cutting out circles much easier - though I do need some smaller circle templates for them to be any use for making ornies. I shall use all of these at some point except the vellums, as they are intended as part of my PenPal Maggie's birthday gift, which is later in the year.

Today I've been a busy bee, getting up early to do all the prep for a venison stew to go in the slow cooker. The diced venison packs we got from The Pink Pig (another trip out while DH was on holiday) and the veg are a bit of a hotch potch, as it was a case of wanting to use up things before they spoilt. The last of the red onions, the second fennel bulb (finely chopped) and some leeks from the organic veg box went in there, along with some fine beans I found in the pantry and a couple of cauli, broccoli and baby carrot mixed packs DH grabbed from the Tesco Express (no stew packs so he got them instead). Added some hot veg stock, a good handful of pearl barley, a bay leaf and a sprinkling of other herbs and voila: one venison stew. No idea what on earth it'll turn out like but I had fun making it (I find chopping veggies whilst listening to chill-out music very therapeutic), the smells wafting from the kitchen are Mmmmmm and I guess we'll be finding out later. ;0) I stripped our bed and the bedding is in the washer, the Dyson has had an outing upstairs, the bin and recycling box are on the front, ready for emptying tomorrow, the bird feeders are filled, the tumble dryer emptied and the clothes put away/on the ironing pile and all the pots done. I reckon that's enough of the virtuous housewife bit for today, don't you? LMAO

I finished a small stitched card last night (my second finish of 2009) but I shall leave pics of those for another post - yep, I totally forgot it was UFO Night, despite spotting the reminder on the forum earlier in the day. Doh! Guess what I'll be doing tonight, then! Meanwhile I've made a start on the blog reading/commenting catch-up but it's going to take a while for me to get around everyone's blog - boy, have you lot been busy! ;0)

Rachael: it's sort of a table under the deer that I took the pics on. It's a really small one (17" high x 15" wide, side to side) with an inlaid surface and when you lift the top up there's a little storage inside and it's musical, so plays a tune when it's wound up. My DBro gave it to me years ago - he bought it whilst on a foreign holiday (can't remember where), back in the days when he was young, free and single and could afford to do things like that. LOL It certainly comes in real useful for taking stitchy pics.

Many thanks for visiting and especially for all the lovely comments - they are very much appreciated. :0)