Cross Stitch: Lavender Bag

I just made myself a lavender bag filled with the dried lavender harvested last year from the garden. I let the lavender in the sunshine for a while before I filled them in. The smell got a bit stronger. After my daughter was born, I have been in rush doing everything, as I feel I only have a very little time for myself. It might be the reason caused me poor sleep. I hope the lavender bag will be sort of helpful.

The pattern is from the French cross stitch magzine De Fil En Aiguille No. 44. There are more lavender charts. All are beautiful. I did mine with the 14 count aida. I think it would let more lavender smell out.

Wish everybody a good night sleep.

Free Cross Stitch Chart: Flower of the Month - April- Sweet Pea

Download the chart

Meaning of sweet pea: Delicate; Blissful pleasure; Thanks for a lovely time.

New Garden Tips

• Do check your soil. Take some soil of your garden and shake it up in a jar of water. After an hour to check how it settles. Dig a hole 1m deep in different parts of the garden. Notice the layers of soil, the stoniness, the worms, and the depth of any roots. Pour water into each hole to check how long the water takes to drain away. More than an hour means heavy, slow-draining soil, less than ten minutes and it is very fast-draining.
• Do a double digging if you are preparing a new border.
• Don't use treate timeber to make the raised bed of vegetables.
• Edge the carrots with chives. Plant basil with tomatoes. Garlics help keep aphids from roses.

The tips above are what I just learned from 'The Complete Gardener' book by Monty Don.

My Strawberries

Here are the strawberries I fought back from squirrels, slugs, snails and birds in the last year. It is pretty good, isn't it? But the taste is just so so, not really sweat.  Good to bake a cake. I am thinking to order a new variety.

Squirrel In My Garden

This picture was taken last year in my garden. The squirrels are our regular visitors and always help themselves with whatever they find, like bird foods, bread, apples and my strawberrries! The neighbour told me that she saw FIVE squirrels were eating my strawberries at 5 o'clock in the morning. Yeah, their party time. I can't do mornings.  The neighbour also caught one in the cameral another time when the squirrel was eating the strawberry out of the hanging basket which was on the fence between our garden and neighbours. She said, 'just want to show you it was not me stealing your strawberries'.