To the Regiment - I wish I was there!

Oooh it's rainy and horrible today, isn't it? I can't grumble about the rain because we need it, but this cold wind - I do NOT enjoy! I do have a few cheering things to think about though, and the weekend is nearly here with lots of fun things planned.

This week has been good blog-wise because I've been the recipient of two blog awards! So now I'm going to share the love and share some links.

Chris from Sycamore Stitches very sweetly nominated me for the Liebster - which goes to blogs with fewer than 200 followers. I'm meant to nominate 5 others and while I'm not sure how many followers each of these have, these are all fab blogs you should definitely check out!

Rehanon's blog Miss Demeanour is On The Make was brought to my attention by So, Zo and it's capital F Fabulous. Rehanon has some brilliant makes under her belt for one so new to sewing, and her turn of phrase is brilliant too. Follow her on Twitter (@mink_deville) for some major lols too - this is a woman who was busting moves to Prince so hard that she broke her shoe. That's dedication to funk right there.

(just to break this up with pictures, I'm adding in some rando phone photos from the last few weeks, mmkay?)

 Nick and Nora - a wee detail of Clackett Towers

Jill from The Sewalongs commented on one of my posts about Florida to recommend I visit The White Wolf Cafe, where she used to work. So I'll always be grateful for that recommendation, because that place was brilliant. She has some gorgeous makes on her blog, and I can't wait to see what she does with all that beautiful fabric she picked up in Cape Town.

Emma of Ol Green Eyes has the most beautiful photographs on her blog. I am seriously in envy of her perfect Irish rose looks, and I love how thoughtful each of her blog posts are. 

 

Nic and I visited a graveyard in Winter Park and it was full of these creepy weeping angel things

Cat of Tea and Feathers mixes up style posts with really thoughtful writing. She knits and sews, she has some fabulous birds, and she's always good value on Twitter as well (@koshkajean)

How cool is Joanne of Stitch and Witter? More than once this lady has made me totally re-evaulate my initial thoughts on a pattern - her amazing Colette Violets have had me swooning every single time.

Gillian of Crafting a Rainbow nominated me for a Versatile Blogger award. 

I was particularly touched that she said she liked the fact that I talked about my sewing disasters, too! Sometimes I worry that if you've come to my blog for a sewing blog you'll be disappointed, and if you come for any other reason sewing talk will be boring to you, so it was nice to hear that the ragbag approach I take appeals to some. I'm to tell you 7 facts about myself, but before I do that here are a few more Versatile Bloggers that rock my Google Reader....

Roobeedoo - I avidly read everything Roobeedoo writes, but I'm often a bit too shy to comment! Sorry, Roo! She's one of those bloggers who can make me really laugh out loud. I admire her style and her near-perpetual motion, and I love love love her knitting projects even though I am quite a crap knitter myself. 

 Hornsea Heirloom teapot in Autumn Brown. After looking for one of these for years in this colour, I found one last week in a charity shop for £2.50!

I had the absolute pleasure of meeting Handmade Jane at the Bombshell meetup in October and we got on like a house on fire. Many of you will know who she is anyway because she's such a star, but I couldn't not give her a shout-out here. 

Louise of The Princess Prudence Diaries is the epitome of Versatile Blogging - she sews, she collects, she photographs,she runs BeBopaLouLou Vintage, and she can eat nachos like nobody's business. 

What I wore to work yesterday - before all this rain, of course

It makes my day when Megan of The Fashionable Bureaucrat posts. For one thing, she is Canadian, and I love all things Canadian. For another, her shoe collection is nothing short of fabulous, and for yet another, she has this dress. 

I love Arlene of Dress Junkie, she's an absolute doll. She's another one whose photos are amazing. As well as gorgeous style shots and beauty reviews she blogs about her life and she's inspiring and riotously funny to boot.

Lauren LLADYBIRD - I have a confession to make. I totally have a blogger crush on you. Lauren is funny, talented and awesome. She sews cracking dresses and, having only just learned to knit, is sporting the most adorable hand-knitted cardigan. I'm in awe of her energy, and her blog posts make me snort with laughter every single time.

I don't have time to list all of the bloggers I love but I do have a blogroll on the right, should the fancy ever take you!

Okay, now seven things about me....

I have a terrible memory for some things, but an amazing memory for the lyrics of TV theme tunes. Lyrics in general, but for some reason TV theme tune ones stick the most. My favourites (if you're interested)are New Tricks, Pugwall's Summer, James Bond Junior and The Wire. I also like to make up lyrics to those that don't have lyrics like The X Files and Fringe. So, yeah.

 I'm not going to lie. I still love Pugwall's Summer

I'd like a dressmakers dummy because I know that they're totally practical and everything, but the idea of having a headless, limbless torso on a stand in my house makes me feel really uncomfortable. I might feel differently if I lived in a bigger place and could put it somewhere that wasn't either my living room or my bedroom but yeah - they do freak me out a bit.

Perhaps related to the last point - and I might have raised this before on here - but I find serial killers really interesting. Less so now than when I was younger, but when I was a teenager I was constantly reading books about people like Peter Sutcliffe and Fred West. My mum and my grandma are the same, so I blame them a wee bit. When I was at home over Christmas and I was reading a boring book, my mum gave me a book to read about Fred West instead. FESTIVE.

 Look Janet, there's Robbo

I have a really stupid sense of humour. Like, it's not at all sophisticated. Nic and I nicknamed a character in a TV programme Robbo for no reason, and now every time he comes on screen all it takes is for one of us to say Robbo and the other one dissolves into tears of mirth. Yeah, I laugh at smart comedy too but fart jokes get me every time. I love grafitti as well - the worse and stupider it is, the more it will make me laugh:

 My shitty journey to work on Cross Country trains

 Gifs absolutely slay me, particularly this one:

Seeing tender father-daughter moments on the TV make me properly weep. I'm very close to both of my parents, and this always makes me feel homesick. So, Denise going into labour in The Royle Family? PASS THE TISSUES (although my dad is nothing like Jim Royle) Melanie joking around with Ken in Early Doors?TISSUES PLEASE.

Related to the stupid sense of humour point above, I can very easily waste hours by watching funny videos relating to Star Trek: The Next Generation on youtube. I'm not a Trekkie, not really - I love The Next Generation but have no interest in the show outside of that, but show me a video that someone has made compiling all of the times when Worf has been denied, and you'll see someone gasping for breath because they are laughing that hard. Ditto evil Picard playing his flute.

And that's only six because I can't think of any more, and there's a glass of wine waiting for me. Thanks again, Gillian and Chris!