Prayer Flowers

Last Easter Lee & I planted sunflower seeds as part of a creative prayer labyrinth that our church did during Holy Week. The seeds were symbolic of the prayers we had prayed for the world, our community & ourselves whilst walking around the labyrinth. We took our planted seeds home in little plastic cups & nurtured them on the windowsill in our kitchen.
After a couple of months I planted them out in our garden where they flourished much to my delight! Last time I planted seeds as a symbol of new life & God working through me the seedlings died!! Ooops!

This time both my sunflower & Lee's reached full potential. In fact, my sunflower went overboard & had fourteen heads on the one stalk!!

It was lovely throughout our rather grey summer to look out of the living room window & see all the large yellow heads bobbing & swaying in the wind (& rain sometimes).

It really made me smile to see the sunflowers especially as they helped me to remember the time I spent in meditative prayer when I planted them. It was lovely to be able to keep thinking back to that time with God at Easter. Seeing something physical that had grown helped me to remember that my prayers are fruitful & purposeful even when I can't see what has happened as a result of them.

It was also lovely to see that the bright flowers were bringing insects into our garden. I like bees!

We did, of course, have some sunny days over the summer & I took the opportunity to photograph the sunflowers. They looked stunning against the bright blue skies!

When the flowers had faded I cut the heads down. Doesn't this one look HUGE next to Annie-Joy?!

I love the patterns the seeds make & the colours in the seed holders. So pretty & frivolous!

It amazes me how over the top & extravagant God has made the natural world. All these seeds from one plant! Plenty for the birds & insects to eat, plenty to fall to the ground & grow new plants for next year & probably with a lot still left over!

Annie-Joy helped to pick all the seeds out of the heads & we collected them in a bucket. We will feed the birds with them over the winter. Next year I hope to plant rows & rows of sunflowers like Dawn Isaac's sunflower alley! Well, perhaps that's a little bit ambitious, but I can dream! :o)

Ten Things On 10/10/10

Today was the harvest festival service at our church & we were thinking of & thanking God for all the good things he gives us. As it's the tenth day of the tenth month in the tenth year of this century, I thought I would share with you ten things that I am thankful for along with ten photos.

1. I am thankful for the love, support & encouragement that I receive from my family & many friends.
2. I am so thankful that I am a creative person. What would I do if I couldn't make things??! (These are the fabric flower brooches that I made as thankyou gifts for the boys teachers at the end of last term).
3. I am thankful for rain drops! Rain drops on clover, rain drops on roses or kittens whiskers, rain drops anywhere actually! I like the rain!
4. I am thankful for the countryside & quiet spots to pause & reflect & contemplate all kinds of things.

5. I am grateful to be able to watch my children grow up (This is Annie-Joy last month, with her 3rd birthday Hello Kitty cake which we made together, Kitty included).

6. I am grateful to be able to share my children's discoveries & passions. It has opened up a whole new world to me! (This is Jordan last month, with his 9th birthday cake).

7. I am thankful for simple pleasures like sparkler candles, laughter, singing, hugs, acorns & walks through muddy puddles.

8. I am thankful for lovely places to play & explore & enjoy each other's company.

9. I am thankful that I have the ability to make plans & carry them out, however simple or mundane!

10. And most of all I am thankful that God is my guide, my protector, my helper & my friend throughout all the days of my life. (Collage painting by me inspired by Psalm 121).

My list could go on way belong ten things! What are you thankful for? What are your favourite things?

The Hungry Caterpillar

A few months back I bought a fabulous book called How to Make Books by Esther K. Smith & since then I have been rather keen on making little books! During one of my blog hops I stumbled upon a blog called Making Books with Children. It included a little 'how to' based on Eric Carle's book The Very Hungry Caterpillar (see here). I couldn't resist making one myself! It's a type of book known as a step book & I tied it all together with green ribbon. I strung plastic beads on the ends just for fun!
I tried to make the illustrations very simple from bits of paper....

...and then I used wax crayons to add a bit of texture.

It was fun! The book itself was very easy to make, as you would expect for something designed for children to make themselves.

I used textured & embossed papers for the strawberries which I cut out with a sizzix die. I added the hand cut stalks.

The oranges are my favourite fruits that I made. I love the little star bits (what are they called?) & the long stalk & leaf.

When I reached Saturday my thoughts of making things simple went out the window a little & I just had fun creating collage food! I used the text that was part of the blog 'how to' but adapted it on this page to include the caterpillar having tummy ache! These two pages were great to make. It's been ages since I made something purely for the fun of creating.

I really like how the cherry pie turned out! And the swirly purpley lollipop too!

I thought about punching holes in the food like Eric Carle's book but it required too much fore thought & I was impatient & just wanted to make the book. Maybe next time I will do it?

I think I had the most fun making the butterfly. I wanted to make him as much like Eric Carle's original illustration as I could. It took a while but I think it was worth it. Making books is great! :o)

Mr Tom R Toe & Family!

Lee's parents had an abundance of tomato plants on the balcony this year so they gave has a tray full of them to plant out in our garden. Lee loves the idea of growing his own vegetables. We haven't grown tomatoes since before Jordan was born.
It is such fun to water them & watch the flowers bloom before they turn into tiny tomato buds!

We had a huge number of green tomatoes grow helped by the huge amount of rain we had over the summer.

They took a very long time to ripen....

....but eventually some of them did turn a beautiful scarlet red.

We got quite a crop of them varying dramatically in size & shape but all tasting absolutely delicious! Timmy & Luke loved them! AJ was very proud to have harvested some of them in a little bowl all by herself (almost)!

Earlier this week I decided that no more tomatoes were going to ripen so my friend Jo & I pooled our resources & made some delicious green tomato chutney together. Neither of us had made it before but it was a lot of fun. We cried a lot peeling & chopping so many onions! Lee & Jo's husband are not chutney eaters but they both agreed it tasted fantastic (& they weren't just saying it)! I have just had a cheese & homemade chutney sarnie for my lunch & I can confirm that it is absolutely delicious! I think we will definitely be doing it again next year! What fun growing & making your own is! :o)

Sheffield Adventures!

Sheffield was never somewhere I wanted to visit as I always thought of it as a very industrial dusty city. However, when we went there to stay with some friends for the weekend over the summer I realised I was wrong!
After quite a pleasant drive to Sheffield across Snake Pass (which the boys thought was the best & most amazing thing ever!) we arrived at Derek & Jo's house with the car jam packed with all the paraphernalia that tends to accompany a family of six! We were all a little excited & full of anticipation as to what the weekend may hold. We had never gone to stay over night as a family with anyone before & certainly not with people we didn't really know! Lee worked with Derek for many years & after several conversations about this thing & that Derek invited us to stay with them & meet his family & visit their church.

We spent Saturday afternoon walking in the countryside surrounding Derek & Jo's house...
.....feeding the ducks.....

....which Timmy & Luke thought was fantastic!

Luke spent quite some time talking to the ducks & trying to feed them by hand. You can see the delight on his face as he looks at the birds.

Timmy also loved the ducks & tried to feed them by hand but he didn't have as much tenacity as Luke! He decided to throw his bread out to the little ducklings instead.

Luke's patience paid off eventually & he did indeed manage to hand feed the ducks! He was over the moon!

There were some gorgeous lillies floating on the water too. Jordan said he had never realised that lilly pads & flowers were really real! We were all a little disapointed not to see any frogs sitting on them though. :o)

There was a super play area too. The kids had a fabulous time playing on giant mushrooms, huge slides & new climbing frames. I enjoyed a rare sit down & a chat with Jo on the park bench with a cuppa from the cafe! I do like meeting new people & finding out their stories.

Jordan loves to push AJ around in her pram like a rally driver! Derek & Jo bought everyone ice creams & then we headed back for tea. The boys loved sleeping in someone else's bedroom. Jordan loved all the trophies that Derek's son had in his room. It really was quite an adventure!

On Sunday we went to Derek & Jo's church, All Saints. It was great! It was a very large Anglican church with a modern interior & a worship band & lots of creativity in the service. I loved the giant rainbow picture that was set out for the kids to make together at the beginning of the service & so did the children! Jo did the sermon for the service so it was good to hear her speak. It was also great to make connections with one of the vicars & to experience a different way to 'do' church. Jo cooked us a wonderful Sunday lunch which we all thoroughly enjoyed. Luke was really rather taken with the 'cutie roast potatoes'. I HAD to take a picture of it before he ate it! The kids had a great time playing with Derek in the garden after lunch. He really did have so much energy & enthusiasm with the boys! Jordan loved it because he found someone willing to play as much football as he wanted with! The journey home flew by like a dream & we arrived back home tired but happy. Perhaps this is the start of a new chapter in the Davies Tribe book, who knows?