The Return of the Magi - or was it the Maggie?

Ah, there you are. Where have you been? No, wait a moment it is me who went missing but I am back. Everything got away from me in December - we published the Approaches to Stitch book and had so many orders that Fee was under siege and needed help. Then I decided to give away a free class - if you haven't seen Sian Martin's excellent class on observation and drawing go to www.d4daisy.com and find it now. 

I barely had time to get over that when it dawned on me that people expect presents at Christmas time so there was a lot of scuttling about and before I knew it we had broken up for Christmas and it was family time.

Our trips to see Father Christmas on the train have been documented over the years but I really thought they were all getting too big for the train ride to Santa. I proposed a sophisticated evening of Pizza Express followed by the outdoor ice rink in Bournemouth. Howls of protest ensued. Cries of  'It's tradition, Granny', You would think I was selling them into the slave trade. So we went on the train again and it was fun.

Lauren (almost twenty) did decide to forgo the present after last year's Hannah Montanna episode but the big boys held out and actually got very decent board games.

 I must say that the train ride was quite magical and we seemed to go further this year, with a few twists and turns of the track. Then is was back to ours for 'proper' hot chocolate, made with real chocolate and squirty cream.

I had lunch with three of my 'besties' just before Christmas and that was great fun. We are the Crones so we celebrate the Solstice, that way you get four lunches a year! I made cards - see above.

We had quite a crowd for Christmas dinner, to celebrate the fact that we could fit everyone in the conservatory. We even asked my ex and it went off very well. The pic above shows what my friend Adele calls an eclectic mix of chairs. I couldn't set the table properly until just before we were ready as THAT CAT kept jumping up and knocking over my good glasses.

The lovely thing about grown up Gcs is that you get pressies. Lauren bought me a Crochet Hollywood kit and I have had great fun with it. Marilyn, below is almost there.

Here is Elvis. I have got better since I made him with his wonky cummerbund. 

I am now about to publish Ruth Lee's on-line class, free to those who have purchased the book. Same d4daisy addy as above. Also getting ready for Craft4crafters in Devon at the end of the month, so it's back to work with a vengeance. 

We have changed some of the free taster workshops on Workshop on the Web. Have a freebie on us at www,workshopontheweb.com.  

I promise I shall be back soon as I have lots more to say, Keep safe and hopefully dry - Ferndown is almost an island with all the rivers running very high.