Shh... It's our secret

 Hiya peeps!!!

Today a bit about new book of my friend Lizzie Chantree which will be released around 6th of May this year.

You can read more about Lizzie in my previous posts, so without repeating myself I can give you some infos about her new book :)

Book's title: Shh... It's our secret

Book blurb:

Violet has a secret that could change the lives of everyone she knows and loves, especially the regulars at the run-down cafe bar where she works. After losing her parents at a young age, they are the closest thing she has to a family and she feels responsible for them.

Kai is a jaded music producer who has just moved outside of town. Seeking solitude from the stress of his job, he's looking for seclusion. The only problem is he can't seem to escape the band members and songwriters who keep showing up at his house.

When Kai wanders into the bar and Violet's life, he accidentally discovers her closely guarded secret. Can Kai help her rediscover her self-confidence or should some secrets remains undiscovered?

I had a chance to read Advance Reader Copy - lucky girl me :)

Lizzie touched in it some of mental health/wellbeing issues we all can encounter, like lack of self-confidence and self-worth.

What I can say about this book after reading it? 

Here's what I wrote in my Goodreads review:

Good plot, interesting characters, few strong girls (young and old) popping from pages of this book makes it really nice, fast read. What happened and what will change in Violet's life? Who's Kai? Read and find out yourself.

What else I can say about this book?

I absolutely love it and definitely will re-reading it in some point soon!

That's all for today Friends!

Till next post!!!

Bit about reading

 Hi guys!

I'm bookworm... And I'm sure you know that already :)

Not reading as much as I want to lately, but still enjoy my 'me-time' :)

What I read this year so far?

Here list of few:

1. Agatha Christie's: 'Taken at the Flood' and 'Midwinter Murder:Fireside mysteries from the queen of crime' - both great reads, a must for crime story lovers :)

2. David Suchet's: 'Behind the lens: My Life' - absolutely amazing autobiography I had chance to read so far.

3. Dan Brown's: 'Inferno', 'Origin' and 'The Lost Symbol' - I think I don't need to explain ;)

4. Paul Aidan Richardson's: 'Icon' - brill read written by local writter

5. Deborah Harkness's: 'Time's Convert' - great follow up of 'All Souls' trilogy!

6. Andrzej Sapkowski's: 'Sezon Burz' - I love stories about Witcher :) - on pic book with bookmark I made for friend :)

I had a chance to read few ARC's - Advance Reader Copy:

1. Lizzie Chantree: 'Shh... It's Our Secret'  - some more about this book soon :)

2. Rhonda Parrish: 'Clockwork,Curses and Coal' - great anthology of fantasy/steampunk/fairy tales

So far I ticked around 25+ titles this year including books written/translated into my mother tongue, historic novels, fantasy, short stories, romances etc.

What books you enjoyed this year so far?

Leave titles in comments!

That's all for now :)

Till next post Friends!

Lazy Tobisia...kinda...

 Hiya peeps!

Again lazy with writing me... I mean here... cause my paper version diary is updated almost daily...

Hmmm...

Fact I made few new wirewrapping pieces like earcuff on pic below

read few books including one below and enjoyed making floral bookmarks you see placed on book's cover :) 

but not much writing really, only few words every other day..

I'll try to write more frequently... in my diary and here too :)

And that's not Fool's Day joke!

Till next post Friends!

December, December...

Winter started... I should say 'raining season' started :)

Luckily for us not everyday is cold and wet, just bit of drizzling from time to time, some chilly mornings... But sometimes we have chance for day like this:

Or sky like this:

We can still enjoy nice walks during weekend :)

From other life fronts... I'm reading book 5 of Dark Tower by Stephen King.

Colouring new digi images

Making new cards

Dom is creating new masterpieces :)

And we all are waiting for new member of our little family - Tula :)

She's a chipin and Dom recognize her every time we see her with no problems :)

That's all for today friends :)

Sneaky Santa game

Every year in our Etsy team we are playing Sneaky Santa game...

This year was challenging for me, cause my Sneaky partner did no wish list.

I had to play around - use everything I knew about her to find/made perfect gifts for her.

So...

Leda is bookworm from Sicily, Italy who making beautiful felt accessories and bookmarks. She likes cards, earrings and definitely handmade stuff. I like illustrations she sharing on her FB.

I thought... book! But which one? She has so many and I have no idea which she still not have on her shelf... That was lots of thinking :) Result:

You can see movie made on this book in cinemas now!

One of my first attempts with copper - red semi-precious beads inside cages.

Pendant with stone found by myself on local beach during Summer.

Images from Ching's shop: https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/gjzcck?ref=l2-shopheader-name, I coloured for Leda :) I thought she can like them :)

Little Christmas card with stamp from Tiddly Inks.

Leda received her parcel today and looks like she likes her gifts, so I can show you what I found/made for her :)

What do you think about my gifts? Do you like them?

Life with bathroom re-do :)

We decided that is time to give our bathroom some make-over. After living in our home 7 years we were sick of wallpaper there. Now our bathroom is almost done :) New tiles, spotlights, bath etc. and no more pink :).

I'm laughing that I changed myself into 'rainbow catcher' - few days in row we could admire rainbows :)

Dom spotted this beauty when we were on a walk :)

Other day we were in mood for Chinese and I took my bamboo steamer out of box and made 'money bags' :) Hmmm yummy - Dom fell in love with sticky plum sauce :).

He was also in crafty mood one day - result above :)

I made this card for his Daddy yesterday - today is his birthday :)

And finally found a time to start book 2 of Dark Tower by Stephen King.

Fingers crossed our bathroom will be done today :) Cannot wait :)

Mr King, digi stamps and bit of cooking

Looks like I have a bit to write about.

Mr King? Yeah :) Stephen King - I was reading his books ages ago when was teen :) and always that were horror/thriller things... Didn't realized he also wrote some nice fantasy... didn't till few days ago when I pick up book from library shelf and shock! no horror, but proper fantasy with dragon (in some point :) magician (very bad boy) and princes and king etc.

Very good book :) Now I'll be tracing 'Dark Tower' serie - I heard is really good, so want to check it :)

Meantime I became member of very nice cardmaking group on FB called Kit and Clowder. The girls helping there with colouring skills, encourage each other, organize giveaways and competitions and have lots of other fun activities and lots of chitchats :)

Thanks to group I find out lots of stamp companies I never heard before - honestly had no idea that so many people creating stamps - both traditional and digi.

Last weekend I decided to join some activities and thanks to that I have new stamp in my collection - digi stamp from Saga Stamps called From Me to You, but this is not all, girls start new competition - do project including this stamp, upload to team album to have a chance to win 2 more stamps :) I couldn't resist :) Here my cards:

I think I printed images bit too big, but cards turned out nicely :)

We had very 'foody' last weekend I can say :) Saturday with Moroccan twist and Indian Sunday - even Dom ate some of it :)

Beef tangine with dried apricots ( link to recipe in one of previous posts) served with pearl barley this time.

Fast Chicken Curry served with rice and naan bread.

That's all for today's writing, cause I'm starting to feel hungry only by watching food pics ;)

Transition week

Yeah... Transition week no 1 :)

Funny, specially that this whole transition will take 1.5 week and is connected with my little boy :)

Not so little now anyway - last Friday they had 'bye-bye party' at nursery and on Monday they were all moved to Reception Class, so last 1.5 week at school before Summer holiday for Dom will be not at Nursery class but in Reception.

We were on nice Bparty last Saturday - kids had lots of fun :) Meantime Dom was invited for another Bparty and he decided what he wants on his friend bracelet:

Only Libby can decide now she will wear it as bracelet or as necklace :)

Now Dom and I need to decide what kind of card we will make for her - nice stamp or cute ready made animal image.

I finished:

Great book! Now need to check if can have anything else of Mr Becker from library :)

As you see, I already started next book from 'The Clockwork Vampire Chronicles'. I love Remic's style and I'm not surprised my man loves it too - he's finishing last book from these serie and is eager to find something else written by Andy Remic.

These funny looking pair I made yesterday - ear sweeps - for non pierced girls who love earrings :)

That's all for today ;) Till next post!

What I read lately

I'm reading as much as possible every single day :) Guilty of almost eating books!!!

During last week I managed to read The First Apostle and The Moses Stone by James Becker ( started The Messiah Secret) and just finished Kell's Legend - first cook of The Clockwork Vampire Chronicles by Andy Remic (second book is laying near my hand :).

Have also 3 books of Agatha Christie waiting for my attention :)

Books by James Becker are like compilation of action, crime, history and thriller in one. Main characters Chris Bronson and his ex - wife Angela have no easy life. He's policeman, she's working for British Museum.

Relics, religion, politics, mafia.... You can find all these in here. Interesting plot which really can make you think.

Religious artifacts, crime, egoistic historians, Mossad - all these and more in 'The Moses Stone'. Want to know a bit about Ark of Covenant (Mr Becker is keeping known facts in place and rest of his story is fiction) - great book to read.

Hmmm... fantasy, steampunk, vampires.... Yeah! :) But I need to warn you - if you have weak stomach this book can be bit too much for you. As my man told me - action on every page plus no point to be attached to characters, you don't know what happens few sentences, pages later.

Interesting world, great plot, fantastic story and all happening very fast! Cannot wait to put my hands on next book from the trilogy :)

Around the house

Good title for post :) Just ... I have no idea what I should write :)

Weather is sooo English theme :)
And weather is.. we can say very hard to predict - forecast was talking about torrential downpour for yesterday - we have none, not even one drop of water, sunny... hmmm not exactly, humid - yes.

Two weeks ago we fought with ants - nasty little creatures - coming to the house without invitation :(
Success! We rid of them :) Cleaning everything possible outside with lemon kick them away :)

We sow dwarf bean seeds in the garden - nothing show up - 2 weeks already... We sow some more with Dom today - fingers crossed will be better this time :)

Our watermelons needed a bit of split up :) so I split them :)

I'm curious where I should plant them - I'm sure they should be in the garden, the problem is they need good soil and full Sun... my garden is south side so if is nice day we have lots of Sun, unfortunately soil in our garden is very poor.... Hmmm... Need to find the solution for it.

From crafty things: I was practicing with aluminium wire I found in my stash and made this:

More about it you can find on my other blog :) http://coppertobi.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/coiling.html

With some chill out time I back to being a bookworm :) and 'eating' books again ;)

What I read since last week:

Agatha Christie:

Halloween Party

Taken at the flood

Donna Leon:

Death at La Fenice

Ewa Bialolecka:

Tkacz Iluzji

 - in English title will be 'Weaver of Illusion' if I'm not wrong, but I didn't found English translation of this book.

At the moment I'm reading 'A Venetian Reckoning' by Donna Leon - I like her books a lot :)

I also checked few new cooking recipes and looks like some of them stay with us for longer. Will add them to my blog next time I'll be cooking them :)