Friday Feel-good

I'm obsessing over a number of things at the moment, one being the amount of water that keeps falling from the sky, another being roses. Re the water thing...it's been so-so-so-so-so-so wet here this week, wet like you wouldn't believe. The little babbling beck that runs through our town swelled into a raging torrent and burst it's banks. Local roads have flooded. And closer to home, my (leaking) bay window roof has been pouring a steady stream of water into the living room. I've been collecting it in the washing up bowl, which in turn has become a makeshift paddling pool for Little B. Sometimes he's taken his socks off first, but mostly he's been climbing into it fully clothed. It's not been an easy week on the mothering front.

It's been a wellie wearing week for sure. Yesterday Little B and I splashed into town to go to knit and natter at the café. Actually, despite the rather dismal feeling of my coat being totally inadequate and not actually keeping me dry, we had fun. I deliberately took myself down to Little B's level mentally and emotionally and attempted to experience the walk in the way that he was doing. Puddles (lots of them), lets jump and splash! Rain pouring down (and soaking us to the skin), lets feel the joy! Gutters leaking (and pouring showers of water on top of our heads), lets laugh and find it funny! It worked to a point and much to my surprise I did rather enjoy the whole wet experience. After getting so soaked, it also made it doubly delicious to spend the morning drying out in the warm, fragrant café amongst yarny friends, drinking hot milky coffee and eating toasted fruit bread. I even crocheted half a rose.

Which brings me neatly to the Obsession of Today......................

Ten stems of the most exquisite orange roses, purchased from the market for £2.95.

Oh the pure joy these flowers have provided me with today is almost indescribable. I have fallen completely in love with them.

I snipped the stems short because I really desperately wanted to see them in my red and white spotty jug. They looked a bit lost bobbing about in the jug with no leaves to speak of, so I went out (in the rain) to snip some miscellaneous greenery from the front garden to accompany them. That almost tipped me over the edge then...the glorious orange blooms with the bright leafy green foliage nestling in red with white spots... ooooooooooooooooooohhhh!

Sigh. So completely beautiful. I don't think I've ever bought orange roses before, and I wonder now why ever not? Look what I've been missing all these years!

If you could've seen me here at the table this morning (this was 10.33am), you would've seen a very happy soul indeed. After the gloom of the weather this week, with all the added hassle it has brought to the school run (not to mention the roof/bowl/paddling toddler scenario and the resulting piles of wet clothes all over the place), I really felt in need of some Feel-good.

This was my recipe for todays Friday Feel-good ::

• Some child free time (45 mins while Little B was at playgroup)

• Good coffee (a take-out from the local coffee shop, decanted into my pretty mug)

• Something sweet and calorie laden ( Pain au raisin from the M&S bakery, tut-tut)

• A jug of fresh flowers on the table (smoochy, swoony orange roses of course)

• A little bit of colourful Hooky to work on (woolly stripes)

It worked a treat and the Feel-good was overflowing.

The stripes are coming on a treat too, very jolly indeed. As you know, I'm working on a stripy wreath base for my May Roses, and I am really, really enjoying making them. I'm using the Rico Merino wool I bought recently (see this post for colour info), mixed in with some odd scraps of baby cashmerino. I'm working in htc (half treble crochet) on a 3.5mm hook, so the stripes are coming out quite neat and tight (I don't want the white of the polystyrene wreath to show through when I stretch it over). I'm choosing the colours and stripe width completely at random, and loving it.

While I was working on the stripes and having a play with the roses I'd already made, I had a sudden overwhelming urge to make a sweet blue forget-me-not type flower. So I grabbed some yellow and turquoise blue yarn and set to work using my teeny-tiny flower pattern.

I'm really happy with how it turned out and I think a few of them dotted in amongst the roses will look super-cute. This wreath is going to be quite something when it's finished, I'm so looking forward to bringing it all together.

Ahhhh another adoring gaze at that orange beauty. Amazing how rapidly the petals began to relax and unfurl once they came into the house.

Now then. I have to confess this wickedly extravagant thought that keeps persistently needling away at me. I can't stop thinking of all the other colours of roses that Mr Plant Man had in his pavement buckets today. Yellow, pale pink, magenta, red.......the memory of them is giving me this incredible urge to go and buy a whole armful, one bunch of each colour. I could cram them all into a big jug and enjoy a week of Mulicoloured Floral Magnificence. £14.75 for fifty roses ?? Hmmm, I think I just squashed that delicious pesky thought right back down where it belongs. Ten is quite enough. Orange roses are good. Orange roses are great. Less is more an' all that.

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Comments

[ankle wellies]

This is awesome, your wreath is beautiful!

[Katrín G Einarsdóttir]

Hi, just started reading a small portion of you blog and as I saw this lovely orange colored Rose, I hope you don´t mind me using the photo on my desktop ? Orange is one of my two favorite colors,(green the other one) It is so soothing to watch this color and it gets one going :o)

[Catherine]

Beautiful and easy, I love them!!!

Thanks!!!!

[Sara]

Hi!
I just wanted to say thank you for having an awesome blog. I am new to the art of Crochet and your step by step instructions on the edge of your Summer Garden Granny Throw created the perfect edge for my first blanket project! Thanks again

[Charlotte]

HI Lucy I just wanted to say a huge thankyou for the recent pattern you posted for the May Roses. I am new to crochet and still struggle, but your pattern was easy to follow, so after a bit of fiddling I actually did it!

[Taylor]

What a way to enjoy a wet day!! Looks like your wreath is coming along nicely. can't wait to see it!

[Sue]

Hi Lucy, thank you for all your wonderful, colourful posts! You have been such and inspiration that I have recently started my own blog. Hope you had a great weekend. xxx

[Anna]

Gorgeous roses, both real and crochet :) Waiting for the wreath to come, I am sure it's gonna be beautiful!

[Jill in Oz]

Hi Lucy,

Love your work! When I saw your stripes, I thought what a great scarf - I think you need to have one of these wrapped round you. Please don't glue it to your polystrene wreath so that when May is through you can extend it to lovely colourful stripy snuggliness.

Also, wanted to pop an idea in your head re: roses in abundance of colours. Could you ask the plant man to give you one stem of each colour? He's surely a happy charming guy who would love to see you happy with exhuberant blooms... :)

Best wishes from Oz

[cat_g_83]

Those roses are beautiful.

[Stacey]

Happy Mother's Day from Canada! May your day be filled with sunshine, laughter and colour! And a little hooky time :)

[Thriftwood]

Lovely post, exquisite colours, and you can almost taste the coffee and pain au raisin! And the rain can't last forever ... Can it? Have a lovely Sunday, love Claire xxx

[Belmont Yarns]

I haven't commented in ages Lucy but I have read every post and always eagerly await your next one. Time seems not to be on my side. Anyway this is such a happy colourful post. Everything is just beautiful. I wish I had the same way with colour as you do, everything seems so bright and cheery and full technicolour. Even your chat about a leaking roof makes me smile!

Helen xx

[Linda]

You have a crochet hook with polka dots!!!! How cool is that?!? Where oh where did you get it? Happy Mother's Day!

[Pom Pom]

Oh, the orange roses made my stomach leap for joy! I am thinking that roses might be cheap at the market today because it is Mother's Day. I may have to tromp down there and buy some! I've been buying plants with my flower money, but a bargain . . .
Your wellies are so cute! I don't have any wellies and I must get some.
Come over and look at my Wendy House, if you'd like. There is a toadstool perch for washing up doll dishes!
http://pompomsponderings.blogspot.com/
Your recipe for a bright day IS fantastic, good Lucy!

[Nata]

Great roses & crochet! Thanks for your wonderful blog, Lucy. Every day I'm dropping by in the hope for another delightful feast of colors :-)

[Sibyl]

Gorgeous, Lucy! The roses are beautiful! I love orange roses (and adore yellow ones).

Fingers crossed you are getting some of this lovely sunshine we're getting down here in Sussex. It's wonderful!

[Susan]

I look forward to your posts each week as they are so cheery. Scrolling thru your archives I came across a post about York in Connievan. It was 14 aug 2010. I am off for a road trip soon in a camper and the site you visited sounds fab, do you remember the name of it? I would love a stay there as we plan to go to York, we've never been before. Thank you and thanks also for the May Rose pattern, I'll be hooking on the road, they are a perfect portable project. Sus x

[Sandy]

Beautiful Web site and excellent colors on your photos. Looks like your having fun with this site and life. The best to you and thanks for sharing.

Sandy

[Sandra Licher]

I'd ask the Rose guy if he could make one bunch with different colors and then you could a multi-colored bouquet for the same price. Pre-order it maybe.
I love the stripes as usual and I'm so excited to see your wreath when you're done and the blue flower is precious. I'm sorry you're having such weather. It was on our news here in the U.S. too and they even showed Prince Phillip doing the weather on t.v. there! i hope you have sunshine for Mother's Day! Happy Mother's Day to you....do you have that in England?

[Kylie]

Loving the orange and loving your list too :) Kx

[susan]

I love roses - real, not real, fabric, pictures
....anything. But the peonies too are stunners.

[debbie @ happy little cottage]

Hi Lucy!
Thanks!! You helped me to relearn how to crochet!! YAY!!!! I am now addicted to making cute little roses!!! Happy Weekend xoxo Debbie

[Rose-Marguerite]

Your crocheted flowers are beautiful, the wreath is going to be wonderful. I love the orange roses, what a colour!
Well, I know it's difficult for mothers but it must be fully clothed or...it's not worth ;). Sorry, I imagined Little B in the paddling pool and it made me laughed. I know, it's bad... ;)
Regards from Brittany

[Carol]

You would have been in heaven at a local cash and carry yesterday - bunches of roses for 25p! Admittedly not every bloom was perfect but you bought a lot more than 25p worth of pleasure! No orange but pink, white, red and apricot.
Your rosey stripey wreath sounds beautiful, look forward to seeing it in all its glory.
Yes, the way to cope with the rain is to enjoy it in any way you can. I'm sure Little B will have made lots of lovely memories laughing and splashing with his Mum in the puddles.
Carol xx