Crafting, cooking and gardening

The waterlily has flowered in the new pond

The house has not been renovated yet... I know, I have been waiting since 2011 and we only ended up doing very modest changes to it. The garden, however, has changed a lot. I have now closed the pond and created a second pond. The old pond is now a bog garden, a bit boggy today as it rained a bit on Monday... The frogs and newts have moved to the new one. I did offer a relocation service, too, courtesy of a huge bucket.

Entrance to the back garden

The old pond is a bog garden

My sweet peas... lovely and scented

The new pond with bobbing frog

If you are interested in the crafting and cooking, please visit these blogs: Rat Racer & Ecothrifter/Cambridge Cheapskate.

Fixing old furniture with new technology...

Happy spring everyone,
It is a bit chilly despite the sun shining most days, so I am enjoying sewing and crafting in my spare time. I am preparing activities for my daughter's birthday party, cleaning and fixing things around the house... so it was just timely to receive a Create & Craft kit from Sugru (which incidentally is crowdfunding further investment).

Antiques purists close your eyes now, because I am going to show pictures of a fix on a 150 year old wardrobe my father restored in his Italian workshop several years ago. It is all very well to be authentic but we did not know what to buy to fix it that would hold. The only professional option would have been welding.

These are pewter handles and the round element holding the handle had detached itself. It would have been a case of welding to fix it, there is no hole to insert a screw or other DIY equivalent. We took a big breath and my partner opened Sugru silver, carefully spread it on the shallow hole that held the supporting bit and then built a collar around the supporting bit to fit it back in place. I took a close-up photo and you can hardly see the fix. It had to be a strong one as the drawer is heavy so when you pull the handles they have to hold... We left it 24 hours and it's holding. Hurrah!

Before the fix

After the fix

Update...

Pond No.2

Pond No.2 : closeup of resident


Dear all,
Thank you for bearing with me. I am still waiting for the green light for the renovation to start from my partner (waiting since around 2012). I guess we hit makeover fatigue as we both revamped (if not nearly rebuilt) a few houses before this one, albeit in London.

This is a bigger job and we need to think carefully, I suppose. In the meantime, I have been doing a lot of gardening...

I am building a second pond as the first one will have to go once the frog spawn has grown enough to be encouraged to move. The extension will be too close to it, which is a pity. We had another pruning session and this is what I built using the long branches of pussy willow and two buddleias. I have sewn the fabric cover of the tepee and it will be unveiled at my daughter's birthday party.

Tepee's fabric cover is waiting for a special occasion

I have neglected this blog a bit because aside work, I am doing one for a public garden, here are a few photos and a link to the amazing Empty Common Garden.