Happy birthday to Archie!

My beautiful Archie is now a whole year old - in fact his birthday was a couple of weeks ago but in the middle of the chaos of life I didn't manage to post anywhere near the day itself.
I know from the lady who owned him and his mum that he was the first one of the litter of five to be born. He has been the sweetest kitten we've ever had, no bad temper at all and so cuddly even as an adult. Hard to believe he has changed so much from the tiny black-with-tabby-stripes fuzzy ball of fur here:

to his present sleek self! He is still very stretchy and bendy as you can see:

I couldn't work out how to post videos when we had him, but here are two short ones from when he was tiny - I love the second one where he topples over but pretends it was nothing to do with him!





Now of course he is so much more sensible and grown up. He likes to watch TV with us - Frasier and Grand Designs are his favourites so far, we don't know why:



It's proving to be a pretty grim time for us. My mum is still in hospital, mentally much worse than ever, it's unclear how much she'll recover so we're just trying to take a day at a time and see what happens, while clearing what we can from her house bit by tiny bit. Archie is keeping me going with lots of cuddles!

Another year older

Hopefully another year wiser as well, but I'm not so sure!

Here are a few of the lovely things I had from my friends and family.

A bit of a duck egg greeny-blue and pink theme going on don't you think?
A large jug to go with my smaller one was very welcome, and now has even more flowers in it although I had to take out the spiky foliage as Archie just kept on chewing it! The pink bird I bought for myself from the Fairtrade shop in Leicester - I just couldn't resist him (or her) and the simple bird shape is one of my favourites.

I had these beautifully wrapped Emma Bridgewater flower mugs from my in-laws:
and now want to collect them - they are very pricey but I can ask for one each year as a present!
And these lovely hand-made buttons:

came from my friend Tammy, who has recently opened her own Folksy shop and has committed to trying to buy hand-crafted things as presents whenever possible, so had chosen them from another Folksy seller. I think this is a really important thing to do, to buy from within the ever-growing community of like-minded crafts-people. I'm yet to sign up to Folksy as a seller but I think I'll start by looking to choose my presents from shops there and on similar sites- there is such a large range of lovely things available and it seems to be a very friendly community as some of you know because you're already part of it!

I ended up going out for coffee, lunch and a Pizza Express dinner on the day so what with the chocolates son no. 2 bought for me and the very rich dense chocolate cake he made for me all by himself, I still feel quite heavy and solid!

He also chose me some body scrub - didn't he do well?!

Son no.1, who is getting on for 15, sat at his computer having commissioned his brother to go shopping on his behalf. He later found three pound coins in his pocket and I suggested he go the relatively short distance to the local Tesco Express to get me some flowers, at which point he fixed me with a look and said "I'm not walking up the road with a bunch of flowers!" I told him this was fine, as long as he firmly embedded in his mind that once he had a girlfriend or wife, their Birthday would be of paramount importance and he must put lots of effort into choosing special things himself and on time!

On the morning itself I woke to see Archie's nose all upside-down very close to mine, he was all curled up and purry and said he was sure he himself must surely be the very best present of all!