you're gonna find me...

paddling in the sea! Hurrah, we're off on our holidays, 10 whole days in beautiful Cornwall!  Hope you all have a lovely time whatever you all get up to, loads of love, 

Rachel xx

this moment

 {this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. Via Soulemama.

Have a lovely weekend.

Rachel x

my weekend...

this weekend I...

went to a spa with my best friend...

ate AMAZING tapas...

spent time in the garden in the beautiful sunshine...

and 'slept' all night on the floor of the boys room, comforting R whenever he woke up, hot and feverish and crying for cuddles and calpol.

I am knackered!  Mind you, I can imagine how I'd be feeling if I hadn't done the fun stuff to balance out the night shifts, and it would be a whole lot worse than this.  So despite (and/or because of) the lack of sleep and the poorly boy, I am grateful for the good stuff.  

And if you're ever looking for a tapas bar in Bristol, just click on the link above.  It was gooooooooood! 

Hope you all had a great weekend, with more sleep and less snot than mine!

Rachel x

this moment....

 {this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. Via Soulemama.

Have a lovely weekend.

Rachel x

rainbow and green go off on a jaunt...part 2

Yippee! it's the first day of the school holiday, and we have nearly 7 weeks of freedom from routine ahead of us...this is equally exciting and daunting, but we're so tired that right now I'm enjoying the change of pace.   I doubt I'll be getting much child-free time, so I'm very glad that me and Lou managed to escape for a few hours on Tuesday and go exploring!

After all the crafty and vintage goodness of Flo-Jo and Shop (see my last post), we wandered a bit further down the road to the absolutely gorgeous independent kid's boutique, The Pippa and Ike Show...

 

  

I have been meaning to go there since it opened a year or two ago.  I don't know why it's taken me so long, but now I've been there once I'll definitely be back whenever I have spare cash to spend on my or anyone else's little ones...it's just stunning. 

 

 

It's full of stylish and colourful Scandinavian and European clothing brands including Smafolk (70s-tastic prints, my favourite!!) and Bobo Choses , and toys, prints and homewares by great designers and brands like Ingela P Arrhenius and Ferm Living. 

 

  

Again, the way the space has been styled is so pleasing.  It's bright, colourful and cheerful; me and Lou found ourselves chatting for ages to the lovely owner Lianne, while we browsed through her gorgeous stock.  Although there was loads that I liked, I'm trying very hard to be restrained at the moment so I was careful not to let myself get too keen on anything.  I thought I was going to get away without buying anything, and then I saw this...

 

R's size, the last one in the shop, and half price!  What was I supposed to do?!  My kids are generally dressed in pretty cheap clothes, often cast-offs from friends or stuff from charity shops.  But I do have a serious weakness for Smafolk prints, and R has just grown out of the only special top that he has.  So yes, my resolve weakened.  But kids need clothes, right? 

Lianne told us that she has a new Webshop due to launch next week, so the link above is to the blog rather than the shop.  They have a sale on at the moment so when the Webshop goes live there will be bargains to be had!  And most exciting for me, I showed her a few photos of my fabric palettes from the other day,  and she said she'd be interested in stocking some of my handmade vintage fabric lampshades and cushion covers.  So I'd better get busy over the summer break!

There were other shops we'd have liked to look in, but after the fun of The Pippa and Ike show, Lou had to get to an appointment so I walked home because the sun was shining(!) and I was feeling energised by a morning of adult conversation and eye candy.  I have a feeling we will be going off on another jaunt when we get a chance...I'll let you know when we do! 

Rachel x

rainbow and green go off on a jaunt...part 1

Today I had some errands to run which could not wait, so off we went in the rain...luckily R is a cheerful little soul so jumping in puddles kept him entertained on the way.  

Yesterday was a quite different story though...both me and Lou of littlegreenshed found ourselves child free for the morning, so rather than our usual 'quick coffee then off home to do the hoovering' routine, we treated ourselves to a proper adventure!  I don't know about where you live, but our local high street has pretty much everything you need for day to day life; this is great, but it does mean that sometimes I go WEEKS without venturing out of our neighbourhood!  So we hopped in Lou's car and off we went to the OTHER SIDE OF TOWN - I was so excited!  

After a chat over coffee and a slice of delicious cake, our first stop was the delightful Flo Jo Boutique, a lovely shop and craft space which has recently been featured in Mollie Makes ...

 

 

They run fabulous workshops including knicker making parties! The shop is beautifully styled, with all the goodies displayed in 50s kitchen dressers and vintage sewing baskets.  

Just over the road we discovered an amazing charity shop, called SHOP, which was an Aladdin's cave of retro and vintage gorgeousness....

 

 

...again, it was styled really nicely, more like a vintage boutique than a charity shop. So far, Gloucester Road was proving to be a feast for the eyes!  And then we headed further down the road, and I'll show you what we found there tomorrow...

The sun has come out while I've been writing this, though knowing the weather it will start raining again just in time for the afternoon school pick up!  It's the last day of school here, I am almost hoping that it rains again tomorrow because I think what M needs more than anything is a day at home in his PJs. 

Hope you're having a nice day, 

Rachel x

fabric, fabric everywhere....

...no, I'm not complaining, it makes me so happy!! Saturday brought me 2 lovely parcels, both presents from lovely bloggers....

a stack of vintage sheet fat quarters and vintage wallpaper pieces from the totally delightful Ada, aka Vintage Sheet Addict...

and, totally unexpected and stunningly generous, a piece of fabulous Dekoplus from my friend Jenny of The Custards...

big thanks to both of those lovely ladies, I am one lucky blogger!!

And inspired by all this gorgeousness (and by the need to make some space in my stash cupboard for these new arrivals) I rummaged in my piles of fabric today and pulled out some summer brights to play with...

Yum!!  Looking forward to getting my sewing machine out soon.  If you feel the need for a patchwork cushion cover, send me a message on this blog or e-mail me at rainbowvintagehome@gmail.com - I love putting fabrics together in unique ways to create one-off pieces for people, maybe you'd like one for your home or as a gift for someone?

Hope you're having a nice day. 

Rachel x

this week I have mainly...

been sewing flowers for a friend's wedding bouquet...

 

and for her to wear in her hair...

 

 and for her daughters to wear in their hair.

The wedding was yesterday, we went to the reception last night.  It was a lovely romantic occasion in the best sense of the word, the couple have been together for 20 years and have 3 gorgeous kids, and are still totally smitten with each other.  A great start to our weekend.  I hope you are managing to enjoy your Saturday despite the rain.

Have a lovely weekend.

Rachel x

this moment

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. Via Soulemama.

99!! and 7!!

Wowzers, I have been so lazy about blogging recently but somehow lovely people have found me and I am up to 99 followers!! Am a bit blown away by this, especially as it's only about 6 months since I started sharing my life and vintage & fabric loves in this little corner of blogworld.  

I am in a bit of a tizzy tonight, wrapping presents for M's birthday (his party was last weekend but he's 7 tomorrow); I can't believe my baby is such a big boy now!

This is my favourite baby photo, it was taken when he was less than a day old...

this is his Dad's favourite photo of him when he was a baby, love the cheeky face!...

And here we are, 7 years later - and I cannot even begin to understand the wonderful, magical process by which the tiny baby has grown into this big, funny, sensitive, imaginative, energetic boy...

 

He's great. Tomorrow will be a blur of Lego, Hex Bugs, cake, and hopefully not too much rain!  

I hope you all have a great weekend, thanks for popping in and taking the time to read my ramblings, you're all gorgeous!

Rachel x

a day at the seaside...

Happy rainy Monday to you!  You wouldn't know it by looking out of my window right now (it hasn't stopped raining all bloody day!!), but yesterday afternoon the sun shone and the wind blew and we piled into the car for a few hours of blustery seaside fun....

M modelling Mummy's shades...

I did the balancing, M added the face...

 

more rock balancing...

and more...this one looks impossible from this angle!

 and then the boys chased each other around like lunatics for a bit before we came home...

a lovely family day, no squabbles or tears.  Nice and relaxing after the craziness of M's party the day before, which went very well but left me and F in dire need of a stiff drink!

So I'd like to put a request in to the universe - more sunshine please!  I can cope with rain while the kids are still at school, but in 2 and a half weeks the summer holidays will be here, and I would like to spend them doing more of this kind of thing, rather than endless days of lego in pyjamas (which I love, but that's what we do all winter!). 

What did you get up to at the weekend? I hope it was fun whatever it was!

Rachel x