Birthday Treats

Good morning everyone, hope you have had a good week.

On Monday yours truly celebrated her birthday - one of those "in-between one BIG birthday and the next BIG birthday" if you know what I mean...;)

It was a work day, but I was truly spoiled by family, friends and colleagues.

My lovely DH and children clubbed together to buy me something I had long been wanting, an android tablet.  This means that when I am travelling I can upload Kindle books to it, videos, etc, then read/watch these on the plane/boat/in the hotel, etc.  Plus it is so much faster and easier than firing up the computer at home.  There is no temptation to check work emails or type reports as I haven't linked my work email to it, and it does not have Word or Excel on it.  In fact, it is purely all play and no work!  I have worked out how to blog on it, now I need to find out if I can link my camera by a cable to transfer photos so I can do this properly.  I can certainly use it to comment on your blogs which is fab.  DH has also upgraded my phone, which I am hoping to pick up today.

I had perfume, and lots of lovely things for the bath, some of which are travel size which is very handy. 

I received this from my bestest friend, Sue, the fungi are hand made by her in lampworked glass, and the log is actually made from the remnants of one of my favourite autumnal things...isn't it wonderful?

She also made me this wonderful card, reflecting my love of Islamic architecture...

Moonstruck indeed...

This will be on permanent display I think!

And these lovely chocs...

 

And a pot of hyacynths...

 



 

AND a brand new, shiny 20 Euro note for my next European adventure!  Thank you so, so much Sue, you have really spoiled me!

 

I got lots of lovely cards...

 

 

and flowers...

 

 

And of course DD put on her apron and made a scrumptious cake...

 

 

 

 

What a wonderful day! I am very blessed to have such fabulous family and friends, I really do appreciate how fortunate I am.

 

Then on Thursday it was Best Brother's birthday, so we went to visit him with presents and of course DD sprang back into action...

 

 

He loves coffee so this was a Tiramasu inspired cake with chocolate coffee beans on top...

 

 

And on Tuesday, it was the fourth Anniversary of the start of this blog - four years: where has that gone?  Of course, it was Sue who got me into this lark - and how grateful I am that she did as I have made some wonderful friends and learned so much from all over the world.

 

Have a great weekend!

 

Helenxx





A Birthday and a Bloggiversary!

Hello everyone, hope you had a great weekend.

I certainly did as it was my birthday yesterday (btw thank you so much to all of you who sent very kind greetings).  I had a lovely day being totally spoiled by my loved ones.

I ate this (made by Darling Daughter, oh my word it was a scrummy confection!)

spent a lovely day at home, surrounded by cards, flowers, candles

got lots of lovely gifts, and managed to get some of this done:

DH cooked us a fantastic meal, and I even had a visit from a dear bloggy friend!  All in all a wonderful day.

And, today it is the 3rd Birthday of this little blog!!!  I cant believe that I have been blogging three years, my goodness, where does the time go??

Will be back later this week to update re the crochet blanket challenge, it is going quite well at the moment I have to say.

Have a lovely evening, Helenxx

A Birthday, a Bloggiversary and 52 Weeks of Happy 3/52 :)

Good morning everyone, and what a chilly one it is too!  Just an icing-sugar type dusting of snow on the roofs and gardens around here.  But the sky looks very very foreboding, so a bit more of the white stuff might make its presence felt later...time will tell...

Well, what a busy time it has been!  Back to work with a vengeance on Monday, boy was I shattered by Friday night!  So on to the happy things...
I had a lovely late afternoon early evening shopping trip out with my bestest friend Sue on Friday, as a lead in to yesterday which was my birthday!

I had a lovely day being totally spoiled at home.  Lots of lovely presents including a new all singing all dancing top of the range MP3 player to replace the old one which got stolen from my desk at work this week.  Luckily I have most of the music backed up on various hard drives etc so spent an hour yesterday loading up the new one. 

So linking in to 52 weeks of happy etc let me present the lovely cake my wonderful daughter made for me

It was so light and fluffy and so darn chocolatey!!

This is what is left this morning...

Yum!!  That's elevenses sorted then...

Another thing that has made me happy is this lovely cheerful daffodil on my kitchen windowsill

I bought a pot on my first day back at work, the flowers were in tight bud but came out in time for my birthday!

And here we go with yet more happy...Sue from @home bought me a lovely bag of goodies for my birthday, and look at these beauties which were included...

5, yes 5 fat quarters and a charm pack of the loveliest fabric you ever did see, all in my favourite autumnal colours!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  This lovely friend is going to help me put these, together with a charm pack I treated myself to, into a quilt.  We will do this on our regular Monday craft evening get-togethers.  I haven't had the sewing machine out since before Christmas so had better give it a bit of a dusting I think!!!!

So plenty to make me happy this week...

And today is my second bloggiversary!  I started this little blog 2 years ago today, Sue encouraged me to do this and I'm so glad she did!  I have loved having a space to log what goes on in my life, it is so good to look back upon...to remember the little, but oh so special things that make up my life.  And it has been wonderful to "meet" so many talented and thoughtful people out there in blogland. 

Well, I guess I had better go and tidy up a bit, the house got a bit messy yesterday what with all the celebrating!!

Have a lovely day and, to quote a line from Home Alone 2 (Lost in New York) "do bundle up, its awfully cold out there"!

Helenxx