Thursday Loves!

Today I decided it was about time that I do another blog post but I couldn't quite think of anything to say, seeming as not much has been happening but then I thought how little things are sometimes the best things to contemplate on. So, I took a few photos from around the Cottage to show you a glimpse of the things I have been enjoying recently.

Making Christmas decorations out of red tartan for our tree, which by the way is going up on the week end! Yay!

Sipping tea along side my home made short bread that are from Ma's extra specially simple recipe.

150 g butter

100g plain flour

50 g sugar

Mix it all together, put it in the oven and wait until they look okay.

Talk about estimating, but they sure do taste amazing!

Reading my 'Country Living' magazine by the log burner.

Never getting bored of staring at my favorite pages! I thoroughly recommend this magazine to any countryside loving Brit out there. All of it's pages are full of picture perfect scenes of cottages and the Great British countryside. It also comes with a free booklet of D.I.Y. Christmas decorations.

Just over half way to the weekend now, yay! :D 

Have a lovely day,

Chloe

xx

Festivities

Hello Lovelies!

In my Christmas obsessed mind, the minute Bonfire Night is over, I can go 100% crazy for tinsel, cards and fairy lights. If I'm totally honest, I've been thinking about them since September, but once November the 6th rolls round, I feel like I have a full festive license. 

I've always been one for Christmas. I love the magic and the warmth of it all. I love the way family comes together, and the traditions that are upheld. When I was younger, my family life was all in for Christmas. It is almost a family tradition to be mad about Christmas!

Now that I have my own family (and my wider family is a lot more settled and happy), I am going to enjoy making new traditions that we can honour each year and embed into our yuletide memories. Since Chris and I have been together for one Christmas already, I thought I would share some photies of the Christmas we have already had together, and some of the things we did last year that we are going to put into action this season.

Baking and making jam with my brother and Ma  is always a must when it comes to December! 

Sitting around with our family that we don't often get to see in a nice warm home.

Exploring the near by woods with little people! 

Taking strolls with loved ones.

Playing old games that never get old to me.

I hope you have a really lovely Christmas, even if it is (admittedly) quite early still!

Love,

 Chloe xx

A Very Lovely Give Away

One of my favourite ever blogs is 'Accordion to Kellie.'

Kellie is definitely an inspiration to all young ladies out there.

She is strong in her faith, has a great sense of style, and she can sew absolutely beautiful things!  

I hope someday I shall be able to sew as well as she does.

At the moment Kellie has a really worth while give away.

It is a $30 / £19 gift card for her lovely etsy shop.

I can not get enough of her fine little shop.

It has pretty photos of her modelling the clothes she makes, beautiful handmade products, and not too bad prices, either! 

Be sure to check her place out because it is truly lovely.

I hope you have a really good rest of your week!

Chloe.

xx

A Weekend Of Autumnal Adventures

So, last Saturday Chris and I had a few adventures. Don't you just love exploring? I love it and I hope I always will because there is just so much to see and experience. Amongst all of the fallen Autumn leaves with their whispers telling me that the cold months are on the way I took a few photographs of the lovely country side the red leaves were blanketing.

I have always loved Autumn. It has to be my favourite season of all time! I love the redness (if there is such a word!) that it gives. The warmth, the cosiness, the anticipation for Christmas. I love it all.!

P.S. I am ever so sorry if the photos of Chris and I look a little as though we are freezing to death, we were! Surely, that is the beauty of it all though? :P 

For The Love of Tartan

Last Sunday whilst looking around a car boot sale Chris and I spotted an elderly gentleman trying to get rid of a few rolls of pretty looking fabric. I think he was having trouble trying to sell them due to there being so much on one roll, but to me that is just perfect! For 20 pounds I managed to get approximately 10 meters of beautiful red tartan, extra lovely for these ice cold months. There is something about tartan that warms my heart so I instantly feel head over heels in love with this particular fabric.

I have been an aspiring dressmaker for longer than I can remember and I feel like now is my chance to get down to making a beautiful frock especially for Christmas day. I am very determined for this to happen so hopefully once I have finished making it I shall post a photo of me wearing it for you all to see. 

I have been gathering a few ideas for what style I would like it to be. Here are a few of my inspirational photos I have found on Pinterest. All I have to do now is find a nice pattern and then get down to some sewing. Exciting stuff! 

What do you think?

Love,

 Chloe xx

DIY Weddings

So it has been a few months since Chris and I got married.

Time has gone really fast! 

I have been looking back over the photos of our wedding quite a lot recently.

It came to my attention that our Wedding could be certainly be defined as a DIY wedding.

Why? You might ask.

Let me list to you the things that I can think of on the top of my head that were handmade for our wedding.

My shrug was made by my wonderful Mother - in - law. Jenny hand knitted the shrug in the style and the wool that I wanted. It is the most comfiest thing I have ever worn and I think it looked ever so pretty! I was astounded with her talent and it has a very personal touch to it!

The groom's men all had their waistcoats tailored to their exact size also by Jenny.

My hair piece was made by this wonderful lady on Etsy. 

WhichGoose

All of the bouquets and button holes were made by myself and a very loyal glue gun! ;) 

All of the food was hand prepared by our lovely caterer. She also made our gorgeous blue and white bunting Wedding cake with Love birds holding up the little flags. Oh, I adored it! 

All of the Church and Reception decorations were made and placed by myself.

With inspiration from various places like:

The Natural Wedding Co.

Ruche

The Guest Book we decided that we wanted something more alternative and that people would remember as 'fun.' So we went in search for a pretty vintage type writer that could still work well and then set it up at the reception for people to write a note or two for the Bride and the Groom. It worked really well and I heard lots of people roaring with laughter as they were trying to get used to such an old thing! 

Chris and I were going for a simple, individual and personal wedding that family and friends would look back on and smile in their happy memories.

Whilst I was planning the Wedding I had to reach out in faith due to being so young and wanting such an individual Wedding. It was never easy to articulate what was being pictured in my mind and make all of those pictures and thoughts come to reality but thanks to helping hands from Family and in laws we managed to get there and very happily get there we did! 

This week I would like to give future Brides the opportunity to have something hand made, lovely and to their tastes by offering to make the very same favours I made for our wedding for them! 

This little jar of mints was given to each guest at the Reception in return to coming to our Wedding to celebrate. We received so many compliments on how cute and what a good idea they were! 

If you would like some for your own wedding, keep your eyes peeled on my Etsy shop. 

Love, Chloe

xx

Vintage, vintage, vintage!

So this afternoon I listed a few new things so I thought I'd fill you in and show you some photos of the items.

First of all is this lovely trinket box.

This very pretty box has a very lovely embroidered purple and white flower on the centre of it's lid. The material of the box is a cream and white striped cushioned cotton. It is in perfect condition and would make a really nice gift or an ornament for your home.

Oh, and these beautiful little tea cups are gorgeous! 

An absolutely beautiful pair of little tea cups / coffee shots along with their matching saucers. The cups state on the bottom that they are made in England and the saucers state, " Trade Mark, Crown Ware, Dulcar, Made In England. They have delicate details surrounding the inside of the cups, the outside and on the saucers. A truly magnificent pair. There is a small chip on the rim of one of the cups and also a slight chip on one of the saucers. But they are not too noticeable. No fading whatsoever and are as pretty as ever in their pink and yellow floral design and their maroon over all colour. The cups measure 2.5 x 2.5 x 2 inches and the saucers measure 5 x 5 inches.

If you like what you have seen then feel free to have a hop and a skip over to the Lobley Cottage shop. 

Chloe xx

Tea Pot Centre Piece

Whilst scanning Pinterest for nice ideas for our home 

I came across this rather lovely photo.

At first I wasn't quite sure what to make of it but I soon fell in love!

I think that it is just an excellent and creative way to store those collected treasures.

What better way is there than to show it off?!

I always try to find homes for things that I buy and then, quite often, 

they end up in a cupboard

but this photo has given me the inspiration to be a little more brave.

I also found this photo of an old fashioned dresser.

I have a dresser of my own and at the moment everything being housed by it are a little bit mismatched.

I suppose that is the art of dressing a dresser, he, he!

I would like it to be a little more practical like this one below.

My one at home is full of old memories and things that are very personal.

As my dresser is sat in the entertaining part of the house 

I am considering maybe making it look more like this one,

with less personal objects sitting on it.

I love the way this particular dresser is so distressed in style.

It has a true 'farm house' feel to it!

I personally think that the more aged a piece of furniture is 

the more it gives off a sense of cosiness to the room that it is in.

Another Glorious Morning

Today, once again, like most Sundays we went to our usual field where people are selling their "white elephants." We came back home with more than we ever have done in one trip before and can not wait to show you all what we came up with! I think next week I shall try to take my camera along to show you all the marvellous things that I get to see each week! 

P.S. If you haven't already noticed, I now have my own Pinterest account, yipee! : http://pinterest.com/lobleycottage/

English Tea Sets...

Don't you just love them?

Our new set that is now in the shop! 

There are 4 tea cup trios available.

Look What I Did!

This morning I finally was able to do something I have been wanting to do for weeks now.

Embroider our blinds.

We ended up buying plain white blinds a month ago due to not being able to find pretty, affordable and suitable blinds.

I thought it would be a nice idea to spruce them up a little but I wasn't sure I'd find the time to.

After all it takes longer than expected. 

Especially when you aren't confident on a sewing machine.

All I did was scrape up some old fabric from my sewing cupboard,

cut out the shape I wanted using a Cath Kidston bird and heart template from her book called 'Sew!'

I then placed and pinned the cut outs where I wanted them and then stitched it all into place.

I then added a few buttons and done!

Perfectly revamped blinds.

  

A New Colour, A New Season

Today, I have decided, is the day I am going to pick up my half finished crocheted blanket. 

I started on it the Summer Chris asked me to marry him and I plan to finish it now that we are married.

I searched my wool cupboard for something I could use and I found a completely new colour.

My Mother in law bought it for me last year and I thought it would give the blanket more of a warm Christmasy look.

The main colours were red, brown and white.

So I though having a dark shade of green in there would make it look even more cosy during those long Christmas evenings.

This afternoon I have listed this lovely Vintage Serving bowl.

It was made by Wedgwood during the 1960's.

The hand engraved picture on the lid is of The Tower of London.

I think it is absolutely beautiful!

I will post again soon! 

Chloe

xx