Nice Weekend

We had a lovely day Saturday. It started off quite lazily. I read a few blogs, did some window shopping on ebay and a couple of loads of washing, while hubby played Command and Conquer. Then we decided to go out to St Fagans again, as there was a craft fair on this weekend and I knew that Samantha had a stall there and had told her I'd try to pop by to see her.

I was a bit disappointed by the number of stalls there. When I lived in London I always went to the craft fairs organised by Four Seasons at Morden Hall and Hampton Court, which were massive themed fairs, usually medieval with falconry displays, wandering minstrels and the like and 4 or 5 large marquees packed full of stalls, so the fairs I go to now are always a disappointment to me! But what wasn't a disappointment was meeting Samantha. She's as lovely as she sounds in her blog and I could have chatted for ages. I didn't want to come away empty handed and could have bought loads of things from her, but wanted to conserve my pennies so I bought a pinny for my washing up liquid bottle!



After St Fagans, we went on to Penarth to browse the charity shops, and I picked up a lovely Boden top and a skirt and hubby got a couple more books.

On the way home we stopped off at the chinese to pick up a take away as hubby had a craving for chinese food!

On Sunday I got my sewing machine out. We'd bought our nieces a mug and chocolate bunny for Easter, but I felt they looked a bit boring in their cellophane wrapping, so decided to make the girls little tote bags to put the Easter gifts in. I've never made bags before, and totally winged it, not using a pattern or even measuring out the fabric, but just going by eye! I'm really pleased with the way they turned out and love the fabrics I used. Pretty aren't they?

First Post

Welcome to The Cottage on the Hill.

Here I will write about my crafty endeavours, latest thrifted finds, cooking, and life in general in the Welsh hillside cottage I share with my husband, 15 year old son, a dog, 2 kittens and a goldfish.

Today is Sunday, and that usually means I will be cooking a roast for dinner, but J, my son, defrosted some pork chops by mistake a couple of days ago, (he thought it was bacon, and was very disappointed to find he wouldn't be having bacon sarnies that evening) so I need to use those.

I will be making spicy orange pork chops for the boys, and a quorn fillet version for me (I don't eat meat). The recipe is a big hit with everyone. I serve it with sweet potato wedges and steamed carrots.

As I won't be spending hours cooking a roast, I might also make some cakes. I got a new vibrant pink silicon bun pan yesterday, so I want to try it out. I also got a new pink mixing bowl with a handle and a pouring lip. It matches my other pink mixing bowls perfectly. I seem to have a bit of a thing for pink.


The coffee pot in the picture is one of my charity shop finds. It cost £2.75. I'm going to make a cosy for it, but I'm not sure which fabric to use. I just got some lovely fabrics from ebay and they're all so nice, I'm having trouble deciding, but I think I might go with this one.


and use this binding which I bought in Oxfam yesterday. 9 yards for 99p!


While in Oxfam, my husband saw this:


he knows I love pretty china!