An unexpected joy

 Remember before Christmas, I mentioned having won 14 children's books by Robin Stevens?  All of them were her own books and she very kindly signed them all for me to our school and a couple of them even had my name as well!  I announced winning them on our school's Friday Zoom meeting and the children were SO delighted and excited at the prospect of borrowing them. I was pestered mercilessly about when they were going to be available to borrow (they had to be stamped, added to the library catalogue and the suchlike).   This week, several children proudly told me they had borrowed some of them!  It was so sweet how grateful and excited they were.  I loved the fact that I had been able to win them for the children. It also made me really realise how every new book to the library should be heralded and highlighted.

Anyway, fast forward to Tuesday, I had just finished my wonderful Emma Press session with Kate Wakeling (see this post) when I saw a direct message in my Instagram feed from the Aurora Orchestra.

If you don't know about this marvellous orchestra, they are a recent formation by Nicholas Collon and Robin Ticciati.  The orchestra has been incredibly successful and had a residency at the Barbican and have played at all the major concert halls.  They are well known for their innovative approaches to concert going. Every year for the BBC proms, they perform a major work for orchestra completely from memory. Every. Single. Member. Of. The. Orchestra. Has. No. Music!  This is an incredible feat!  I am lucky enough to have been conducted by Nick Collon a few times-he conducted my regular orchestra and conducted my music camp playing Daphnis and Chloe- the most amazing piece I have ever performed!

They've also started some brilliant children's work and have an education programme (which a friend works on).

Back to my Instagram message, I opened it to find that I had WON their recent insta giveaway for tickets to their upcoming Children's concert based on the Wolf, the Duck and the Mouse by Jon Klassen.  I had entered on behalf of my children at school as I thought it would be wonderful to be able to offer it as a giveaway/prize for one of our families!

I was so excited to win it!! Today, I posted the giveaway on our school messaging site and already got some excited families entering who have never been to a concert!  It was such a joy to be able to post something like that and I just wish I could offer it to all of them!

The Aurora marketing  manager was very kind and sent me a couple extra of the books to give as runner  up prizes too!

It really is an exciting thing to be able to give something to people- I felt buoyed by this opportunity all the way home! It made me think that perhaps I could buy a couple of tickets for my local orchestra- not quite the same but perhaps an opportunity (that isn't so expensive!) to offer another chance to someone, particularly as the next concert features the wonderful Vltava by Bedrich Smetana!

Xx

11th Blogiversary Giveaway winners

Hello All,

Apologies, I haven't announced the winner of my Giveaway. There were a few comments that I wasn't sure if they were entering or not or just saying, "Nice brooch!" and I wrote all the names down against the prize they wanted to win and promptly lost the list.
So, just now, I went through all the comments, assigned a number to each name who had said "I want to win brooch or Nails," and depending on whether they did a second comment with a blogging tip, assigned between 2 and 4 numbers to each player.  Then I used random.org to generate the winners.




Out of my list, the winner of the Sass and Belle bird brooch was no.26:  Petite Silver Vixen.



The winner of the nail art pens was number 6: Nevena!

Please could you both leave me a comment with your email address (you can type it backwards or with spaces to avoid spam) and I will contact you to get your address details!

Thanks to all who entered and all those who just left genuinely beautiful comments! I love you all!

xx

My 11th Blogiversary! Things I've learnt from 11 years of blogging AND a giveaway!!

Today exactly, 11 years ago, I began my blog!!! It was a Wednesday too! It's pretty hard to believe that as of next year, I will have been blogging a 3rd of my life! Scary eh?  Or cool, whichever way you wish to see it. I view it as the latter.

Sometimes I see posts about what people have learnt from blogging. Sometimes these state the obvious or reinvent the wheel. This is fine, sometimes you need to look at the wheel again to appreciate it. But I don't do it that often. However, now I am officially 11, officially in the ranks of wizened old blogger, I thought I'd write a little post about what I have learnt.

1. Sometimes posting about a really random topic really engages people in long and interesting comments, e.g. Contemplating one's slippers post was one that lots of people joined in as was 10 cakes I hate and 10 embarrassing film/TV actors I have loved over the years

2.  Variety keeps you going.  I'd go mad just doing ONE type of post! Why not introduce a new type of post!!! Last year, I introduced 5 brooches, the year before, TARDIS Tuesday and What is it? and I've included craft, waffling, outfits, faith, food reviews or recipes...

3. Not trying to be too professional is not always the disaster that many aspiring bloggers would have you believe. I am sloppy and I am doing ok.

4.  It's good to comment. Very good! Comments are nice. We all like comments. More comments please to everyone! If I visit a blog and I see the comment count is low, I will ALWAYS comment (unless you have Google comments in which case,sorry!) because that's nice. Sorry if I'm on the train as I do so- sometimes it gets lost as the signal is rubbish on my local line.
Bear in mind, some people will never comment back, despite their seeming nice people or not having a job. No matter how many nice comments you leave, no matter that you are one of their few consistent commenters, they are just a bit rude. But YOU don't have to be rude!*  ALSO -
Always be nice in comments. I've generally tried to leave nice comments. The only time I've left something that might seem slightly not nice comments is usually saying something like, "Sorry I haven't commented in a while, it's because I'm trying to comment on those who interact occasionally,". I've always felt mean despite countering it with, "But rest assured, I still am reading your blog and still enjoy it!"- it's silly I feel the need to justify when I've not commented, when the one or two people I've said that to have never visited my blog in return despite hundreds of comments! One comment in a few months is fine, just make one comment so the blogger knows you don't hate them!

*The only time you don't have to be nice in comments if the person is commenting on MUSHROOMS! Then you can be as rude as you like (about the mushrooms)!!!

5.  But for every inexplicably silent blogger (i.e. never comes back), there are 100 GORGEOUS vocal bloggers who keep you going with regular comments- I KNOW I am going to miss someone as doing this from memory, but these include:
Julia, Shamu, Pom-pom, Vix, Ally, Ivana, Laura, Sandra, Lisa, Hazel, Val, Fat Dormouse, both Julies, Char, Bevchen. Pink-haired Princess, Gem Countrylife, Claire, Katie Hookline and Sinkher, Curtise, Connie, Melanie, Angel Jem, Nevena, Anna, Susie, Janet, both Jans, Corinne, Anca, Tamara, Louise Roachlings, Angela, Thrift Deluxe, Rach, Ellie, Diary of  Penny Pincher, Petite Silver Vixen, Tasha, Linda P, Lily Fang, Lizzie Dripping, Suzanne Carillo, Patti, Dan Maricel, Sophie, Both Zoes, Jen, Renata Laura etc... 
THANK YOU.

6.  You will find people you get on really well with! Your loved ones will not understand it. They will find it weird that you can connect and find good friends through a blog. Ignore them.

7. Your loved ones might also think everyone just sucks up to everyone in blog world. They might not get that you are encouraging each other.

8. More people might discover you by googling you than you might think! Be careful what you write. I've been found by lots of people in real life over the years. Luckily I've not said anything that they could take offence to, but still, it's nice to have a secret blog! Thus, DO NOT INCLUDE your name in your blog url- I am an idiot for this reason!

9.  Support little blogs and new blogs. Remember what it was like! I was very happy to be someone's first commenter recently!

10.  It's nice to give someone 'Comment Christmas' especially if you're new you their blog.  Leave a whole stream of comments for someone, it's a nice thing to do and makes them feel loved!

11. You can actually win give-aways! I won a book clutch, an iPod shuffle, a mini handbag, a beautiful bangle, a fairtrade bracelet, a personalised Toblerone and possibly something else!

12.  If you post geekily and slightly obsessively about something (e.g. brooches and Doctor Who) people will actually start to think of you when they see those things in real life!!!! It's nice to be thought of!

13. Link-ups are great!!! Do them!

14.  Picmonkey.com is your friend! You can adjust horrid exposure and colours. Putting lomo mode onto your photos makes them look pretty!

15. Blogging actually improves your photography.  My Father-in-law comments that my photography has improved a lot over the years on my blog. He takes great photos so he knows what he is talking about.

Now, I know you're only here for the giveaway (mwa ha ha)!!  It's only a  humble, little one really, sorry for that,  but I thought I'd give away 2 little gifts here to say thank  you for following my blog.

The first is this darling bird brooch by Sass and Belle. We all know I like brooches!

The second is this set of funky nail art pens from Monsoon Accessorize- you can have an experiment and try painting funky patterns on your finger nails or toe-nails!

If you would like to have a chance to win, please leave a comment on THIS post saying actually that you'd like to enter the giveaway (no problem if you don't want to, I understand you might not like the items. If you just want to say something, just do so and make it clear you don't want to enter). These are open internationally, don't feel worried about postage costs, that's cool!
Say if you want to enter the giveaway for both items or just one.  What I'll do then is count each comment for two entries (two for one prize or one for each) to make it fair. You do need to be a follower via GFC or Bloglovin- please state your name for each.  Don't do the immediate unfollow thing after please as only losers do that!
If you want a bonus entry, then leave a second comment telling me what you have learnt from blogging over your time.

The giveaway closes on Wednesday the 13th April by the end of that day whichever time zone you are in, exactly in one week!

And thanks!

xxx

Giveaway

Hi there!

I'm returning very late from a birthday party of WWKTTG, my illustrious brother-in-law.  It was really nice to see him AND Ms Penguin, sister-in-law and his friends all of whom I'd met before. It was a bit of a faff to get there, esp as CBC is away this weekend so I had to walk to the station in the dark, but it was really nice to go and celebrate with him and them!

Anyway, my 9th blogiversary giveaway, which I'm announcing only a mere 1 year and 9 months late (ahem), is now closed and I have picked a winner.

I know everyone uses Rafflecopter nowadays, but I like things a bit more low-tech round here.

So...I wrote everyone's names who said they'd like to enter onto little stars (arranged here very nicely into a heart formation)

 Then turned them over and swooshed them around a bit with my eyes shut so they were all nicely muddled.

and then picked a winner:

Julie!!!! (as in the Home Jules variety as opposed to other Julies who read my blog!) 

Please could you leave me your email address in the comments Julie and I will endeavour to send it to you in my best recycled box as soon as possible!!! ;-) 

Thank you to everyone else that entered.

My 11th blogiversary isn't far off- in a mere 2 months, so I will try to have a little give-away then.  I like little giveaways- there used to be many more in Blog-world, so it'll be nice to do another one.  

Hope you are all well, and now I am off to bed before I have to be at church in exactly 8 hours!!!

xxx

A giveaway! (with apologies)

So, we know I am in the process of moving house.  Well, to my shame, high on a bookcase, I discovered the giftbag containing the items I offered as a 9th Blogiversary giveaway a little while back. Somehow, I completely forgot about them.  Sorry about that.


Therefore, I am opening up a giveaway again for the bag of goodies:

The giveaway is open internationally too.

To be in with a chance of winning,you need to be a follower of this blog- this is not a way of garnering followers BUT with 2 giveaways I did, I never heard anything from those people ever again which is a tad rude, not even acknowledgement that they received the item! (Not counting Sophie and Ang who DID acknowledge theirs and have been long-term blog friends)

 I am not up to date with all these rafflecopter thingies- please leave me a comment saying,"I would like to enter your giveaway..." and whether you follow by GFC or Bloglovin with your name.
If you follow with both, leave a second comment saying you follow with the other, it just makes things easier!

If you DON'T want to enter (I don't mind- the above might not be your cup of tea!) , can you state that, so I don't choose you as a winner inadvertently! I think the reason I forgot about this giveaway last time was because it was unclear who wanted to join in the giveaway!

You will receive:

• a light pink silky scarf from Indonesia
• a pack of 8 pairs of cute little earrings
• a charm bracelet
• a cube candle
• a mini Cath Kidston photoframe
• a sheep pencil
• a mini Scott Fitzgerald book
• a frangipani necklace
• a pack of lolly-cards (good for penpals or 'Ahrgh, I forgot to get x a birthday/thankyou/... card'
• a Nails inc cappacino coloured nail varnish (that I got with a magazine and found lurking around- not really my shade!
• there might also be something edible when I get around to it- or something for the bath...

You will need to provide me with your email address if you do win so I can send the items!

GIVEAWAY CLOSES FRIDAY 6.00PM GMT

xxx

April 6th= 9th blogiversary giveaway!

I celebrated my 1000th (published) blog post last week - I was really hoping it would coincide with my 9th blogiversary so I could have my jollies all in one but that was not quite to be!  And somehow, despite writing a draft of this post, I've missed my own 9th anniversary day, so here it is a little late!
Anyway, I thought I'd have a little giveaway to celebrate it and gathered a few little items I had lurking in my gift box!!! Nothing too exciting but maybe something you'd like!?

If you would like to be put in for the giveaway, please make sure:
1. You are a follower- none of that rude following and then nipping off with the booty and unfollowing milarkey.
2. Leave me a comment in the comments box telling me you'd like to enter it (please actually say that so I know for sure you're not just being friendly and saying hi but not wanting the things) and how you follow
3. For a bonus entry, you can also tell me a funny joke please!


If you enter, you will win all of the following items bought by myself:

• a light pink silky scarf from Indonesia
• a pack of 8 pairs of cute little earrings
• a charm bracelet
• a cube candle
• a mini Cath Kidston photoframe
• a sheep pencil
• a mini Scott Fitzgerald book
• a frangipani necklace
• a pack of lolly-cards (good for penpals or 'Ahrgh, I forgot to get x a birthday/thankyou/... card'
• a Nails inc cappacino coloured nail varnish (that I got with a magazine and found lurking around- not really my shade!
• there might also be something edible when I get around to it- or something for the bath...

Oh and here, just to amuse you, is a picture of a flower that looks like  a rubber glove being eaten by a furry cousin of Pacman/ovenmitt!

Innocent sweet Lolita

I was recently the lucky winner of two giveaways!  One courtesy of the lovely Char and one from Intrinisically Florrie! I received both items within days of each other and thought I'd like to combine them in a post and say a huge thank you to both of them!

The lovely Char, who has a real eye for really cute, fun, quirky items and manages to team brilliant combinations of different garments together, sent me this wonderful blue clutch bag in the shape of a book- it is pale blue with a gold tassel and I adore how fun and different it is!  CBC keeps joking about it!

In Florrie's giveaway, I won something we all know I love- a hat!!!But this one is unique! designed by Florrie and created as part of the Big knit!

Florrie is the most absolutely beautiful blogger who wears Lolita outfits.  They are exquisite- a real feast for the eyes! I thought it would be fun to try and create a Kezzie interpretation of this (will be my one and only deliberate attempt at the Lolita style! I'd say it's a tenuous mix of Classic and Sweet Lolita ).  I don't know the rules exactly, they are quite strict apparently, and obviously haven't followed them too closely- but I thought I'd make a nod to Florrie's beautiful style!

I wore it to church on Sunday and got much appreciation for it! How nice to wear a petticoat in the daytime!



Coat- Topshop via Fara Charity shop, Silk pussy-bow Blouse- Warehouse via charity shop, white tights-Kush, local boutique, Irregular choice- Bed of Roses Penelope, Hat- Intrinsically Florrie giveaway, Clutch bag- DinoPrincessChar giveaway

Car print skirt- Primark, pink tulle petticoat- Asos, ruffle rose cardie - Portobello Road market, Flower ring- gift from CBC during shopping ban, Necklace- Primark, Earrings-Topshop, Ruby ring- Father via Mother, via Fiance!

"Oh, what is that I spot in the top right photo?" I hear you cry!  Yes, indeed, it is my engagement ring!  It was the engagement ring my Dad gave to my Mum when he proposed to her- I was given it as my 21st birthday present.  I have always told CBC that I didn't want him to buy me a ring- and i think I drummed the point home enough for him to relent of his sense that he should buy me one. I have never worn this ring before this time and what's the point of having it if you don't wear it!?  Plus, I like the history of it, the fact that it is a daisy shape and the fact that CBC wont have to waste money on something so small as a ring!

School is winding down for most people except me! Today, I had a practice for the Christmas service at school, with Year 3 and Year 5 music lessons either side of it- REALLY pleased with the Year 5's- honestly, so happy with them!  All of them seem to know what homophony, polyphony and antiphony are and produced a nice arrangement of a Christmas song.

Tonight, my home-group delivered the Christmas hamper gift-bags to the hostel, which was really lovely- it was so nice to meet them! We all had a warm joy inside us after it! Even the rain stopped!

I'm off to see Goodnight Mr Tom  with Year 6 in London in the afternoon after a trek to the church for our rehearsal with choir, recorders, readers and drummers!

How's you?


Can I recommend you visiting Char and Florrie in the unlikely event you've never seen their blogs?
x

Highland fling!

Ha!!!!!! How to make CBC turn the other way and not berate you for buying yet another dress (Though I am of course berating myself in retrospect.  Honestly, I need to keep mself out of temptation's way...).  Take him into the charity shop to search for the book you need for the Blogging good read you are taking part in (Ended up buying it on 1-day delivery from Amazon since local library failed to come up trumps with my inter-library reservation grr.  Was on schedule to finish it Friday night until stupidly left it locked in school after taking it up to the staffroom at lunchtime to read during lunch.  Why can't I ever leave that room without leaving something!) and then whilst, by good fortune, his best friend calls on the phone, your eye is caught by the cutesy purple and blue tartan mini-dress on the end of a rack- you then point it out delightedly and in his distraction, he gives you the thumbs up! Somehow, in the confusion, amidst his obvious admiration of the dress, you take it up to the counter, swiftly pass across the £3 required and dash out the shop before he knows what hit him! (To be fair, it wouldn't work with say, a vintage tartan jacket in size 12- he'd mouth 'Grandma' at me, which is what happened when I tried to unsuccessfully to repeat the manouvere)



The dress seemed to say 60's to me, so I teamed with with a navy turtle neck, purple tights and er-un60's shoes!


Hair: oh how I wish I were brave enough to emulate the beehive look that I see many other bloggers attempting!  I'm too scared of getting my hair-brush stuck and having a sort of Friends, hair has to be cut out incident, when attempting the backcomb.  So instead I did the sides up and added a headband!


Jewellery:
A special shout-out to the lovely Luan at Green Tea and Cupcakes, in whose Giveaway, I won this stunning bangle a long while ago.  Isn't it utterly dreamy, so vivid and pretty!  It is the smoothest, loveliest stone to sit and absent-mindedly run your hand over, as is the banlge part.  Most bangles really annoy me (and I confess, they have ended up in the cull pile, sorry! It's usually only fitted bracelets for me.  Unless, I find that elusive bakelite one I long for) but this one is just lovely! Teamed with Primarni's finest rose earrings!


Today has been a good day.  Reception was lovely in the morning!  I taught them a new song called Cobbler cobbler mend my shoe in which the children have to have a dialogue  singing.  They did really well at it, especially D, little autistic boy who I captured on video singing it really perfectly with another little girl! 

Surprisingly, Year 6 were really good this afternoon.  I mean, not good as in they were totally well-behaved and focused BUT they really did well in composing and performing their own multilayer 'street cries' songs.  Must have been something in my calmly telling them that Shouting is not even Level 1 in music and I really shouldn't still be hearing it in Year 6!  Somehow they wanted to behave today, thank the Lord!

In case you didn't catch it- I took part in the lovely Floss's A pause for Advent yesterday. Do have a look if you can. It's always nice to have feedback!
x

Rainbow Felt flowers

 Hello!  How are you this fine morning?  One strange thing that keeps occuring this holiday is that I am waking up early!  By this point in the holidays usually, I am staying asleep for a long time! However, there is one benefit of aching muscles is that they don't allow you to sleep in!

I had a nice time in London last night, catching up with friends of CBC.  It's really funny going to the City (we went near Bank), you realise just how much money there is there. I would balk at spending lots of money on a drink like in this venue, but it's normal to all of those who are there.  It was nice to go out but whilst yesterday afternoon I felt the best I've felt in a long time, I didn't want to jeopardize my recovery by staying out till stupid o'clock dancing in loud city clubs/bars- not my thing- especially when not mentally prepared for it (having thought we were meeting for dinner) , so managed to get home by 11ish.

One of my favourite bloggers, Miss Lucy Nation, I have noticed, likes to wear a brooch, and I thought of the brooches I have kicking around and decided to wear them.

 This was Tuesday's outfit.  I like my heavnly halo- cast by the light-refraction (correct me on the science), a Topshop via Cancer research dress, which I decided to cheer up by adding this double felt flower brooch from Monsoon (it came on an itchy-scratchy cardigan which some moment of insanity caused me to buy.  I can't bear wearing it!  However, I rescued the brooch before culling last week).  I amused the guys at 'pimp my car' down the street by wandering past with my purple floral crown on. I'm a hippy, what can I say?   They see me trudging with my wheelie-bag everyday on the way home from school.  I wonder what they are thinking!

 This was Thursdays outfit - another rainbowy cheery item!  This dress comes from Spitalfields market some years ago and I always think of when CBC and I starting going out when I wear this- I wore this dress on the first day of music-camp when I invited him along.  It's funny the way you associate memories with certain clothes! Worn with Claire's Accessories rainbow bead necklace

Channelling my faraway tree influence, I added this felt flower brooch which my friend Liz at church made for me last year.  She made me 2 felt brooches and I bought her yellow lego earrings- except that someone in my church moved them where they were waiting for her and I know not where they went!

Today, we have a ladies' teaparty at church where hats are mandatory as are Ritz-style outfits!  I have lent a hat to my friend and now it remains for me to choose an outfit!  I'm thinking that mint polkadot dress I didn't wear for the wedding? What do you think?

Oh, and my giveaway winner-

Well, I used random.org and compiled the names in a word document numbered, based on whether they wanted the dress or necklace and whether they had given me a squag definition (loved them ladies, LOVED them!) so you were entered for one or both draws, with 2 entries in either if you gave me a squag and the results were as follows...

The necklace:

 Can you read that?  It's Mrs Country girl does Norfolk who says, "SQUAG: A stroppy mood a blogger gets in when they fail to find anything they want to wear in their overflowing wardrobe.


"Argh, I'm in a right squag this morning!""

Love it!

And the dress...

Miss Alice- who says
"A squag is a really cute creature that looks like a baby snail but is cuter, less slimy and wears knitted shell covers, x"

So ladies, please can you leave me an e-mail address in the comments box and I will e-mail you to get your address.  It might not be till next week as I am off to Kent for a few days tomorrow...


And because I enjoyed them so much, here is the definitive collection of what you bloggers think squags are:

Lucy Nation said...
SQUAG - The Society for the Quenching of Utiliterianist Aged Grapes. I'm surprised you've never heard of it!;)

Sophie - Country girl said...
SQUAG: A stroppy mood a blogger gets in when they fail to find anything they want to wear in their overflowing wardrobe.
"Argh, I'm in a right squag this morning!"

Zoe Lianne said...
SQUAG: The way a blogger feels when she or he is unable to blog. Useless, Sad, etc.
"Man, I feel a right squag today. My internets down!"

Alice said...
A squag is a really cute creature that looks like a baby snail but is cuter, less slimy and wears knitted shell covers, x

Green Tea and Cupcakes (Luan) said...
SQUAG is a South Queenslands Under Age Gnomes.

yogaduchess1982 (Nicole)  said...
Squag: When a puggle smooshes her nose in reply to a funny noise. :)

Thrifted Shift (Vivienne) said...
squag: noun; a handbag suitable for terrible wet weather such as a sudden squall. (portmanteau of squall and bag) Sentence: I always carry my things in a squag because it rains practically every day in Seattle!

Two birds said...
squag: swag bags given away at a squirrell party. a great bag full of acorns, day-old bread and berries.

Bethie The Boo said...
Squag - Noun, a scuba diver in search of octopus. The squag searches for the perfect octopi with the right length of legs.

Secret Blogger (Caroline) said...
Squag - noun, obviously a square bag.

My own definition:
Squag (noun) pronounced:  S-K-WOGG.  An inhabitant from the planet Xegos.  They have 6 legs, 5 pairs of wings, 3 eyes and have light green fur.  They feed mostly on a special kind of moss grown only at high altitudes that can only be reached by them and have acute sense of smell!

Enjoy the sun!

40, well actually 57 giveaway!

Hello there!

So I am in a total hurry, trying to pack 10 days worth of clothes, a tent, duvet, pillow, inflatable bed, sleeping bag, 3 recorder, flute and piccolo into one large yellow suitcase! It's not going well!
A while back, I said I would do a giveaway to celebrate this momentous gaining of 40 followers!  Well, somehow, I managed to gain another 17 in the meantime!  Wow, thank you! It's really nice you choose to actually show interest in my long ramblings!

Anyway, I had something prepared for a while but of course not got around to actually doing any proper fancy photos etc!

So I have TWO giveaway prizes!  They are duplicates of things of mine that have been admired in previous pictures!
The first is this Dorothy Perkins bunting necklace (a different one, not mine!)



 The other is a long stripey maxi-dress like the one pictured below!
It's a UK size 12, but it's stretchy so it can be downsized (I am an 8 and the one pictured below is a 10).  It lacks the waistband tie but you can add a belt! In fact, I have a new yellow one I'll add to it!

To enter:

a) You must be a follower of this blog via Google-friend connect.  I don't have bloglovin or anything like that so that's the only option!

b) Leave me a comment below.  Please tell me if you'd like to win the necklace, the dress, or both (I will enter names into seperate draws for the two prizes).

C) For a bonus entry, make up an entertaining fictional definition for the word SQUAG.  Leave your entry in a seperate comment!

I'll close the giveaway on the 10th of August!

Good luck!

That hat was made for you! Let them eat hats giveaway!

The 23rd November has apparently been and gone- at least, I discovered it was so when I wrote the date on the board this morning! Chaos in my classrom reigned as my kids carried out an investigation into 'What variables affect the brightness of a lightbulb?'  (the length of wire, number of bulbs and batteries according to their results!)

Anyway, so here is the prize....

 I put all the names on slips of paper into my new blue glass.that I bought in a charity shop last week (thrifted is what you mostly call it!)...

 Gave them a stir.....

 And picked one out....

And so the winner is Ceilia at Monday receptionist!    So please can you leave me your e-mail address in the comments box and I will e-mail you to get your address in order to send the hat to you!

**If I don't receive a message after 2 weeks, then I will redraw it!**

I enjoyed finding out about your favourite books!  The only one I'd heard of is Char's I think so that was a revelation!
I'm off out for dinner and choir practice before that!  Ciao bella!

Let them eat hats giveaway!

I never thought about doing a giveaway. It didn't really figure. I just thought that they were a nice thing that everyone else did but I thought that that wasn't really something I thought to do on my little eccentric blog! Just because, I wasn't expecting to have lots of followers (unless of course they were overwhelmed by my panache and zeal in writing!Which is unlikely since I ramble!) and I just guess I didn't really think about it. However, in a streak of meglomania (mwah ha ha!) and compulsion, I was buying some bits at ASOS and I thought why not- it'd be nice to buy something for my blog followers, especially in the spirit of one of my er- obsessions, namely hats!

So..... up for grabs, I have this 70's style black floppy hat with cut out flowers to giveaway bought from ASOS, worth £25. I like it very much and trying it on to check it wasn't squashed in the post, it looked very nice, so it's taking great willpower to give it away!

(image from http://www.asos.co.uk/ )

There's a second prize of a set of Cupcake (Alex read that as Fairycakes) cards (blank cards that you can send to penpals etc! Not made by me unfortunately!) and a brown and white polka dot headscarf

To be in with a chance of winning it all you have to do is:

a) Be a follower of this blog (seems a bit ironic given my previous comment, however... )

b) Leave me a comment saying you are following and you'd like to enter the giveaway (no cheating!) . In addition, tell me what your favourite book is (I'm nosy, what can I say!?)

c) I don't have any of those other mediums such as twitter, facebook, Bloglovin or anything so sorry, there isn't an extra entry system, but if you wanted to spread the word, you can have an extra entry (just leave me an additional comment saying as such!)

d) If you tell me a funny story, you can have another entry!

e) Feel free to tell others if you want. You can have another entry. Just leave me a comment to say so!

You can be an international or a Brit blog!

Entries close on November the 23rd and then I'll try to work out how to use that random thing or put you in a pretty pot and get Frank the hamster to pick one out or something!

Tschuss!