My trip to London to the Country Living Spring Show was great, came home with ideas and a bag full of goodies! It was good to see that the stalls that were selling the kind of things I make were busy.

Here's what caught my eye and came home with me...

A bag of dried lavender from The Long Barn, Winchester. I plan to use this in some craft projects; scented hearts, scented bags and maybe mixed in with some rice in my doorstops. I bought this 'chocolat au lait' hook rack in the most beautiful of blues. Have yet to 'agree' a place for it, but I'm thinking of hanging it in the utility room for our aprons to hang on. I couldn't resist this lovely striped lavender heart by Jan Constantine, I figure I need to learn from the people who do this well  and they sell into Harrods, Selfridges, Liberty, and Fortnum and Mason!.

I just had to buy these cute little letters by Jonny's Sister (plus a M and a C). I had very nearly ordered them via their internet site at Christmas but decided against it because of the postage, so when I saw them at the show I absolutely had to get them! I plan to take the ribbons off and maybe paint them. Seeing as it is Easter and I really couldn't go home without anything for the boys I bought them these two little wooden hares from The Angel Bill Trading Co. Made me think of the story 'Guess How Much I love You', one of my favourite childrens stories. The boys were delighted to have their own 'little nutbrown hares'! They also sold a larger one which I would have liked to have bought but I felt I'd already spent enough!

Ooh, I had my felt bag with me at the show and a couple of exhibitors asked me where I'd got it. Of course I was very proud to say that I had made it, one of them asked me to e-mail her about it.

As we walked back to the tube station at Highbury and Islington we passed lots of lovely shops including a florist called Dansk Flowers. The hand tied bouquets were beautiful, had to take a photo as I couldn't have the real thing.

More good stuff yesterday I spoke to a lady who is organising a Craft Fair and is trying to get 20 ladies on board who handmake things to sell. The idea is that 'we' (yes I'm the newest one) hold fairs on several saturdays during the year as a group 'Cornflower Country Crafts' to sell our handmade items. She has booked the village hall in Burley on the Saturday of the May Bank Holiday. Burley is a very popular little village in the New Forest and hopefully it will be busy with tourists as well as locals. Another is planned for a saturday in June. I'm hoping that this could be a very good little thing, but I guess we'll have to wait and see.

This has sent my head thinking about new items to make; fabric bags, lavender eye pillows, fabric covered notebooks, etc, etc. I spent ages on the internet last night looking at Amy Butler fabric. I finally ordered the fabric I spoke about in a previous post from the states, along with the Barcelona skirt pattern and other Amy Butler fabric.

Edited - Have just read Ali E's blog and she mentioned Amy Butler fabric, must be good stuff!

In other news, I took lots of photos of a squirrel at my parents house last week, this one is probably my favourite.

The boys had a go on my Dad's new ride on mower when we were over there on Sunday.

AND here's the 12 finished aprons I made for a girls birthday party.

Edited - Forgot to show you my latest sb layout. Tried something different (idea from Ali E); enlarged a photo of Chloe, our cat in one of her favourite places to sleep. Wrote onto the photo itself with an American Crafts Slick Writer pen, adding 7gypsies stickers, a piece of Hambly Overlay and some American Crafts thicker stickers. Ironically on the day I actually made this layout, Chloe was not in the window, nor under the duvet BUT shut in the airing cupboard. I had shut the cupboard door in the morning not realising she was in there and didn't find her until after the boys had gone to bed when I was putting some towels away, poor thing!

Have a good week.