Dilys, a dandelion cagoule and another disappearing weekend!

A quick post today, there's just time to share 20" 'Dilys' with you before I go back to work on a lovely peach bear with sky blue paw pads ...sorry, that bear won't be for sale as it's a special commission order for a customer, which I'm hoping to have ready to show her in the next few days.

Dilys will make her debut at the London Hugglets show on September 14th 2008

My weekend has flown by in the blink of an eyelid yet again. My sister Lynda brought her two daughters up from Basingstoke for a visit, so I popped over to catch up with them and also with our youngest sister Laura and her two girls, at Mum's in Sittingbourne. All the children are growing up so fast, which is worrying, because that means we grown-ups must be growing older fast too! I shamelessly left Stuart to his paintbrush and he did a great job. The hallway decorating is now almost finished (no thanks to me!) and I am praying the new carpet will complement the colour of the walls when it arrives; it's so hard to judge in advance - fingers crossed. We'll be without carpet on the stairs for about a week, so will no doubt suffer every single footstep as my kids go about their daily business; if that's anything like usual, it will mean early mornings and late nights ... prepare for one tired, grouchy bear maker!

I'm hoping that after a weekend under canvas at the 'V' Festival* in the pouring rain, my daughter's nocturnal activities will be significantly reduced next week. With any luck she'll be absolutely cream crackered and won't have the energy for her usual giddy social whirl. I'm expecting her, her zebra wellies, hippy chick dandelion cagoule (very cute!) soggy sleeping bag et al, home later today ... presumably once she's succeeded in digging her poor Mini out from the mud bath it's parked in. She was kind enough to send her anxious Mum a text while she was away, it read simply ... 'I'm still alive :o)' ... kids eh?!

*For the uninitiated (oh you lucky people!) the 'V' Festival is a huge music festival which takes place in deepest, darkest Essex over an entire weekend and where, from what I can gather, copious amounts of beer and other 'fun' substances are consumed (!) whilst thousands upon thousands of youngsters (and a few oldsters too ... although not this one, my festival days are long past!) bop wildly to mega decibels of what is loosely termed 'music'. Do I sound 102? Well, probably that's because I very nearly am ... or at least feel it whenever my diabetic daughter decides to participate in such gay abandon. Mind you, that said, I did catch a glimpse of Lenny Kravitz on the telly's 'V' coverage (whilst trying to play 'spot my daughter in the heaving crowd') and even I might have been tempted into a pair of spangly wellies for that performance!

18th August postscript: A wonderfully wild weekend was apparently had by all. It poured hard at night (naturally the tiny tent didn't withstand the rain and predictably the girls' lilos deflated) and the sun blazed each day. Fay survived for three days on a diet of beer and sausages. She arrived home with sunburned knees and cleavage, craving scrambled egg on toast (?!) and a hot shower ... or two ...