Nice Surprises

It's been the time for a few nice surprises since we returned from our last holiday so I thought I'd share them with you......... especially as there's a severe lack of my stitching progress to show at the moment! I guess my mojo is still away on holiday *sigh*.

The first surprise was one we had on the Saturday we returned home. We unloaded everything from the car and took some of it upstairs, where we noticed the little bedroom door was shut. Unusual, as it's nearly always left ajar.... so we opened it........ and found that not only had DS cleared out the rest of the stuff in there but had also: dismantled and got rid of the cabin bed; taken down all the shelving, cleaned it and stored it elsewhere; stripped off all the wallpaper and sugar soaped it (these with the help of our friend Alex, for which we're extremely grateful) and painted the lot! It's gone from Thomas Tank wallpaper to this:


It's Dulux Gentle Lavender on the walls. They are all the same colour - the shadows are making one wall look darker. This is the back corner of the room which (at least on my screen) is more true to the colour:


You can just see a little of the ceiling which is white. The woodwork and radiator are all in Jasmine White:


That's the new curtain track we bought from Wilko's on Saturday, which is yet to go up. The window and UPVC all need a really good clean first though - with it being the junk room it was impossible to get to the window so the grot has built up over the years. :0( DS did all the painting himself and made a really good job of it. It was a fantastic surprise to come home to and I'm so excited that having my Craft Room is so much closer...... I told DS he was a little beauty! LOL

We spent some of Sunday looking round the DIY stores at laminate flooring and ceiling lights - we didn't find a suitable light but did get the flooring, a nice light oak colour. DH plans on running a couple of cables and doing a few repairs to some damaged floorboards before putting that down - hopefully over the next weekend. :0)

We're also on the hunt for a new computer desk as the one I'm currently using is very basic and very grotty. I'm after one that has room to put not only the monitor and keyboard on it but also has dedicated spaces for the tower, printer/scanner and laminator. So far we've spotted two possibles........ watch this space. :0)

A lovely surprise that arrived this week was my giveaway win from Lisa. I was really pleased to have won a cute Santa chart but when the envelope arrived here's what I found inside:


Yup, not only the chart but a great postcard and also the fabric and the Weeks Dye Works threads to stitch the piece. I have to say my jaw dropped when I saw everything as it is amazingly generous. Thank you again Lisa - it really did make my day. :0) So when do you want to start the SAL? LOL

And last, but not least, was the gift of a stitching magazine from Alex:


She doubled up on the magazine when her subscription kicked in earlier than anticipated, so thought I'd enjoy the magazine. Aren't those little felt booties adorable? The biscornu is a tad tempting too. I haven't had a good browse through this yet - am saving it for another day, as I've been a bit busy sorting other things out and been out and about a bit lately too. DH and I attended a Complimentary Health event last night (Monday), which I've written a bit about on my other blog and I'm out at my newly restarted Development Circle tonight (Tuesday). Now that I have really been looking forward to: there's a new group of ladies going to this, one of whom I met last night, and it definitely feels more like the right time for this to go ahead. I'll do a write up about that on my other blog at some point too. :0)

Meantime the sort out has continued and binders full of two part works magazines have been re-homed via Freecycle. One lot of them was to do with all aspects of fishing and DS decided to offer them to a guy for his three grandsons to use: the guy was delighted and the grandchildren even more so. It was good to know they were going to be well loved and appreciated...... much better than sitting on a shelf gathering dust! I have to continue with the sort out: some of the boxes of stuff that were in the little bedroom are now scattered around mine and DH's bedroom - not conducive to restful sleep, so they've gotta go. LOL A few more ornaments from my chicken collection have gone in a bag, ready to go to the Hospice shop and another bag full of clothes, the old set of curtains from the little bedroom and a set of bedding was collected last Thursday - another bag is to go to my DSis's next time we see her. The wardrobe now only has clothes in that fit me or are only slightly big on me...... that shop for trousers is now desperately needed. I've yet to go through my t-shirt drawers but if I turf too many of those out it'll be a struggle to find anything to wear! LOL

I've also been having a bit of a sort through some of my stash. I've added some of the charts from kits I've stitched to my Webshots Trade album (I rarely stitch things twice, so there's no point in keeping them), along with a few other charts. Since then I've had another ferret and found a few more things I know I'm not likely to stitch now, due to my tastes changing, but can't add them to the album yet...... the printer/scanner developed a fault so is currently in electronic hospital, otherwise known as CRAM Computers shop. They seem to be taking their own sweet time about it too, so will have to ask DH to ring them up and chivvy them along some. :0) There's limited space in the Craft Room and things need to be organised for going in there, so it's the best time to wheedle out those things that are no longer needed and find new homes for them. At least, that's the theory....... unfortunately I seem to have developed a bit of an eBay habit in the last couple of weeks. Will share pics another time. ;0)

Thank you all for taking the time to visit and for all the lovely comments you leave - they're very much appreciated. Hope you're all having a good week. :0)