Tuesday 29 January 2013

Home Sweet Home




Hello again friends.  It's been a while.

Yes, it has been Christmas and that's always an extremely busy time.  I actually decided to take a break anyway, to give myself some time to think and enjoy the specialness of this time of year.  It seems the boys grow quicker every year and I no longer have a baby in the house....really.....not really anymore.  So, it's good to put the camera down sometimes and remember it in my head and my heart instead.  Sometimes you can't do both!


Anyway, the New Year is well and truly underway and I want to get back into things, so here I am.
I wanted to show you a tiny corner of our home that has been developing since Christmas.  My beloved Doll's House, which has sat on my bedside table for a long time, looking unloved, waiting to be done up.  Suddenly, I decided just to go for it and stop pondering about what the "perfect" colours were.  I realised I would never get round to it that way.
So, here it is, with new white washed walls and red roof tiles. (And perfectly sized, newly painted pink table, found in a charity shop!!!  Do red and pink go together....do I care?)


My very kind friend Sarah gave me some beautiful Vintage Wallpaper from her amazing box of treasures - I had my pick!  I actually really love it when the wallpaper looks way out of proportion in a doll's house.  I'm learning I am not from the "everything from a specialist shop" kind of girl.  I wanted it to look like  it was made from the left over scraps of various projects - which of course it is.  So, I particularly like the lower room - which will be the living room, with it's maker's mark still visible.


In the attic rooms the blue and red strawberry wallpaper is a dainty, sweet pattern, perfect for children's rooms.  Imagine teeny tiny crochet blankets and patchwork quilts too!  I'm also going to have a go at rugs of some sort.  My mum used to make Rag rugs, the traditional way and I'm devising a plan to make a few of those with cotton scraps and hessian.  I have too many ideas, like this.....and maybe a kitchen like this, complete with half finished baking, like mine usually is!  Maybe I'll even have a go at a Princess and the Pea style bed - all those lovely little quilts to make!  And that's the lovely thing about a Doll's house.  It doesn't have to make sense - it just has to be pleasing.


I am fairly over the top excited about it now.  I look at it regularly and it makes me smile inside.  Eldest Boy asked me the other day what it was "for".  He was trying to work out why his mother would spend precious time and thought on something that seemingly had no purpose at all.  I guess that's the whole point.  It's beautiful and I made it.  And I love it.  And the feeling that gives me is a reflection of something Eternal.  That's what it's for.

The Doll's house is the thin end of what has been happening in the Welch house over the last few weeks in terms of change and creation, but that's a story for another post.  Sometimes DIY can be quite a meditative process.




Oh, and in case you were missing the snow pictures that are innevitable in every blog post at this time of year - here's a lovely one of Petworth House, and our local community sledging hill of choice!