Muffinlicious!

First of all I would like to thank Lesley for passing on two awards to me which was so kind - especially as Lesley more than anyone else makes me laugh and therefore cheers me up on an almost daily basis with her blog.

I'm not sure how the rules work with these awards but I'm quite sure I should be passing these on to other bloggers who "cheer me up" and "spread the love" But there is the problem...

Because so many of you do just that. So I know it's opting out but if I comment on your blog - whether regularly or only occasionally then you do deserve both these awards. So consider them yours and pass them on if you wish. And thank you for brightening up my days - each and every day.

There hasn't been very much creative activity going on here the past couple of days. Mostly just finishing off the loft clearout and getting all the last bits of paperwork together for my tax return (how exciting is that!) but I have started making something for Lucy's Valentine swap. I can't post pictures or it would spoil the surprise but it does involve a little bit of this fabric.

I've also been preparing for our first Zigzag meeting of 2008 which is tomorrow. The ladies are mostly going to be working on their own projects but we are also going to be looking at the history of machine embroidery and the work of embroiderers like Dorothy Benson. When she was doing machine embroidery in the 1920s she was producing the most exquisite cutwork on machines that did not have a swing arm, so to produce the beautiful satin stitch edges she had to move the fabric side to side - I can't even imagine having that sort of control! This is my attempt at a piece of cutwork - made with the benefit of zigzag stitch. It only measures about 10cm across but it took me about six hours to complete. It was stitched on linen with a fine cotton thread - the centre is hand stitched with perle cotton. It was a copy of a piece of Hungarian embroidery that one of our Embroiderer's Guild members brought back from holiday - unbelievably it only cost her about £1. She also had a table runner about 1m long but I decided to stop with the coaster.

Finally - todays cake offering. Ginger muffins with a lemon drizzle icing. I know ginger is one of those things you either love or hate but we love it in our house. Ben declared them "Muffinlicious" and Sam said "Those muffins win the muffin race"... is your mouth watering? Or do you hate ginger?