Buttons galore!

Hello again, I seem to have been lagging behind with this blogging lark the last week..still feeling a bit out of sorts but that's life..

Well, I've had to curb my ebay time after going a bit overboard on bids for mother of pearl buttons, but came away with 2 lovely packets of buttons and some found in Diss Oxfam last week, so a nice little stash to be going on with. My main use for them has been for the middle of these felt brooches. I came across some fantastic cards of vintage MOP buttons that Sue (propieter of Purl & Co) had been collecting to sell in our yarn shop in town, but think they've all gone now...so needed to find some more!

It's been beautiful weather here the last few days and have enjoyed some nice meandering walks with the dog. This time last year it was snowing up in Sheffield, as we made our way through it to get our dissertations bound before the shop closed. Did a bit of sorting out yesterday of 'leaving uni' boxes and bags that have still been hanging around in case of moves back up north. Sadly, in some respects, it looks like I'll be settling here for a while and so tried to put things away and make a bit more space. Brought back a few memories. It's silly that even looking at clothes can remind you of things and looking at my occupational therapy uniforms of white tunics and bottle green trousers inevitably made me remember my final work placement which would have started soon this time last year for 3 months. Things just feel very unsettled in my head just now, when you have to make lots of decisions and you're never sure if theyr'e the right ones...usually in my case they never are..

Doing the clear up yesterday also made me remember that it's a year on Wednesday that Nellie and me first got in touch, all because of a 'Po', a tiny little creature made out of polymer clay that Tomoko makes. These are incredibly tiny, you can't quite believe that it's possible to create something so detailed and small with your fingers, but then she is very talented.

Dad has actually had a spring in his step this week which has been lacking for a while. His new job 'doing his hobby', fixing motorbikes at his friend's garage is obviously much better suited to him than the school run driving job which he was not enjoying to say the least.

Mum attended an Intarsia workshop at Purl & Co yesterday, her Christmas present from Dad. Was very impressed by the results, a heart design. She said it wasn't as complicated as she had anticipated.

Am still quite perplexed about the complexities of blogging, I'd like to be able to add links in the text, for example to Tomoko's site and also to write between adding pictures but am baffled as to how to go about this. If anyone has any tips please let me know!