Generally Gemma

Fields of happy

Whole fields of cheerfulness!

I got lost in them! I felt a bit like Alice in Wonderland!

They think it's all over ... it is now

Bought: 12:03

Home: 12:17

Started 12:46

Finished: 07:53

Wonderful, marvellous. I laughed, I cried and all the cliches that go with it. I just can't believe that it is over.

Best laugh of the night. The cashier asking for my surname to find my reserved copy. The shock when I handed my card over to pay and he realised that my surname actually is Potter!

Best moment of the night/morning. Sitting on the patio and reading the final few chapters as the sun came up.

It's been a wonderful journey.

Thank-you

There are many things I love about Blog land and one is how supportive it is. The comments I got to the previous post were lovely to receive and a real boost to my self-esteem. The last few days whenever I've had an ugly moment G has pointed out that Bloggers don't lie!!

Another thing is the generosity. I got a parcel from Zoe over at AtoZ this week. I had purchased one of her gorgeous sunglasses pouches and in with it were some sunflower seeds! She'd read my post from a few days ago and put some in for me. Little black nuggets of sunshine to grow all of my own! Thanks so much Zoe!

My other gift as you can see from the picture came all the way from Australia! I've never had post from Australia before so terribly exciting there! A little while ago Helen had a give away on her blog to celebrate her blogiversary and I won! Something else that never happens!

Yummy yarn and tea and a beautiful card with even more kind words inside! It's a sock yarn called Watermelon, very fitting and very me. I am even considering breaking out of standard knit socks to do something special with it. Possibly even Monkey socks as an homage to the lovely lady herself.

As for the tea, well, I have plans for drinking that on Friday night/Saturday morning during a very exciting but terribly long night! But more about that another day!

Blankie and me

To end the week of blogging I present Blankie!

Blankie is made from a pattern that BellaDia posted ages ago! I finished it a few weeks ago and it has been in use ever since. It's double bed sized and slightly wider than normal as I am a blanket hog and G normally ends up with nothing! I love it and I think G does too, he says it is like being wrapped in a big Gemma cuddle.

It's perfect for Summer when I don't want to have the duvet on and I am so terribly proud it is silly. I sit some evenings and just stroke it. It's made up of mainly acrylic yarn as there is no way that I could have afforded to make it out of anything else I shudder to think of how much it has cost me as it is! It is the biggest project I have ever attempted and I can't believe that I actually saw it through to the bitter end.

Much like my week of blogging which is now over! The pressure of trying to think of something to post everyday was quite heavy on my shoulders. I have come to the conclusion that I actually live a pretty dull life. Which is actually how I like it! However, it doesn't make for terribly interesting blogging material, especially when I am so slow at things that I have no progress on projects to show. (At the moment I am desperately trying to finish up socks, I had plenty of them waiting for mates that I never even started!) I hope that I haven't bored anyone with my nonsensical wittering.

G pointed out the other day that there isn't a single picture of me here at Generally Gemma land! He's right, I hate having my picture taken which is why I try to be the one that is always behind the camera. I always come out in pictures with far too many chins and looking like some sort of a special kind of species that Darwin would have encouraged to die out. That coupled with a terribly low self esteem, bad skin and more padding than I like to think about isn't a good combination. So I avoid cameras like the plague. Yesterday though G convinced me to step in front of the camera. I don't like to think what our neighbours must have thought about our impromptu photo shoot, I think they are all of the opinion that I'm nuts anyway!

So, after many pictures and quite some time, we came up with this,

Arrrggghhh! How long do you think I can last before I take it down in a fit of humiliation!

Thanks for sticking with me this week folks and now I am back into the swing of it I promise to be here far more, although it most certainly won't be every day!

Nearly there

Only one more post after this and I will have stuck with my promise! I don't know how some of you everyday bloggers do it!

This time next week it will all be over, purchased, read and finished. On the one hand I am unbearably excited and on the other I am really quite sad that it is all nearly over.

Umbrella view

Somehow even the rain doesn't seem so bad when viewed from underneath my new umbrella.

Especially when I am so despairingly sad that I have a matching bag. I must look a fright!

Unfinished business

It really shouldn't take nearly twenty years to finish off a project now should it! But that is how long this has taken me. I started this just before my tenth birthday I think. I remember sitting in my Aunt's lounge struggling with understanding daisy stitch and M shouting at me to keep my thread short because she wasn't going to be continually untangling it! (Bless her patience!)

M brought it over with her when she visited a few weeks ago and I finally finished it. Nearly twenty years for a tray cloth has to be some sort of a record I think!

Which makes me shudder to think how long something like this would take me.

I shall have to take back what I said about never finding anything good in charity shops!

Pieces of sunshine

When I first left Spain to go to University whenever I was dropped off at the airport M would give me a fake sunflower. In a choked up little voice she would say, here is a little piece of sunshine to take back with you. Whenever I looked at them I would feel instantly cheered by basking in the glow of their happy little faces.

Even real ones still work their magic ten years later.

Life is a bowl of cherries

I went pick your owning at the weekend with a friend. Stacks and stacks of fruit. Fruit that actually tasted like fruit! Fruit as I remember it tasting. Not watery stuff that doesn't smell right.

Raspberries, cherries, blackcurrants, strawberries, courgettes, broad beans oh my!

There was something incredibly relaxing about meandering through the raspberry canes. Quite peaceful in spite of the children running around. You could almost forget that you were in the middle of England and pretend you were instead somewhere quite different.

Somehow, I hadn't expected it to be quite this big!

I will absolutely be going back again. I can't wait until G has a licence and a car and we can do things like this all the time instead of relying on the kindness of others to ferry us about.

Excellent place!

I felt all virtuous as my food miles were virtually nil! I am beginning to think that that might be more important than organic. When I do buy organic and I see that it has come from somewhere far afield it somehow seems tainted. I am still at the confused stage as to what is best in this area. To eat and support local businesses and farms or is it more important to eat organically? I am trying to eat in season which I am sure helps. But which is most beneficial? Or is one beneficial to me and one to the environment? See my befuddlement still reigns supreme!

All of which is besides the point of what was most enjoyable about Saturday. Stained juicy fingers, the smell of the leaves, the explosion of cherry juice in my mouth. Ecstasy.

Routine, pattern, promise

"Success is following the pattern of life one enjoys most."

Al Capp 1909-1979

I need routine and when it is removed from me I get antsy, restless, befuddled and moody. The last few weeks of rain have confirmed all of these things for me.

I had turned into my Summer routine and I did not like being removed from it one little bit.

I missed my stroll to work in the early morning sun, coming home in the evening and having my tea on the patio in the dying rays whilst contemplating what to have for dinner. Then my evening constitutional round the flower pots with the watering can.

My meal plans were thrown out of whack. Salads didn't feel quite right when it was dismal outside. So, I have eaten a lot of rubbish. I must eat better. More of what is inside the bowl than is outside of it.

What I have discovered is what I knew already. Pattern is important. Without pattern in my life I fall to pieces. I must and need to remember that.

With which I am going to have a goal this week. I shall post to my blog once a day. It may only be a line, it may only be a picture. But I need to get back to the routine of it. I won't let it slide, I don't want to let it slide and the last few weeks I have been dangerously close to that.

I love my blog and I need it to know that. So even if I don't post paragraphs of meanderings I need to give it some TLC. So blog TLC week here I come. Routine and pattern welcome back.