Silverpebble has just had its second birthday.

I meant to pass on a book to another blogger every month this year. So much for that plan. Still, half way through the year I’ve found the second one that I am using to celebrate this blogging milestone. It’s a little (A6) red, hardback copy of Cranford, by Elizabeth Gaskell, published in 1961. It has lovely gold lettering on the spine.  I found it in a charity shop in Hunstanton.

I had seen the BBC adaptation and it was outstanding but I had never actually read the book. I was expecting a slightly stuffy, Victorian read. I was wrong. It’s a page-turner and surprisingly it reads rather like a modern novel. It is a great treat and there is a good deal of irony and humour:

I saw Mrs Jamieson eating seedcake…and I was rather surprised, for I knew she had told us, on the occasion of her last party, that she never had it in the house….However, Mrs Jamieson was kindly indulgent to Miss Barker’s want of knowledge of the customs of high life; and…ate three large pieces of seedcake, with a placid, ruminating expression of countenance, not unlike a cow’s.

There is heart-wrenching romance:

…and it was only by a sort of watching, which I could hardly avoid since Miss Pole’s confidence, that I saw how faithful her poor heart had been in its sorrow and its silence.

There are even echoes of blogland:

There was Miss Pole, who was becoming as much absorbed in crochet as she had been once in knitting…

I will be passing this precious little book on to another blogger in the same way as the Miss Read book, which is currently with Val at Dottycookie. The recipient then reads the book and passes it on in the same way, along with a nice something or other. Some chocolate, some seeds or a small hand-made something will do very well indeed.

This time, along with the book, will come a little silver charm of your own choosing that I will make for you and hang on a chain. What would you choose? A tiny bird? A cottonreel?  A primrose? A beach hut (this is something I haven’t made before)? A butterfly? The choices are endless (within reason - I think I might struggle with a rollercoaster or a 3D construction of a combustion engine). So, leave a comment here and tell me what your choice would be.

What’s more, two runners up will receive a charm too. Oh yes.

If you mention this giveaway on your blog you will receive two entries. If you put this button on your blog you will have three chances. Lawks!

Here is a little taster - not one but two clips of the BBC adaptation and an interview with one of my favourite actresses, Imelda Staunton, who played Miss Pole:

I will leave this open for a week or so. Good luck!

Meanwhile I’m preparing for Cambridge Open Studios. This is the first time I have done this so I am rather nervous and excited. I have wanted to participate in it for a very long time. I have my own artist’s page on the website. It all makes me sound like a proper jeweller! Anyway, I will be beavering away and not able to visit blogs as much as usual in the next few weeks. I’ll get back to it soon though.

I have a two-day fair this weekend, at Voewood, the Arts and Crafts House - it’s The Midsummer Fayre. It’s bound to be very lovely indeed. Yesterday a lady bought nine items from me out of the blue though. NINE! It was wonderful but this means I have to make like bilio to have enough for my stall.

Really, my pliers have to fly.

I cannot tell you how scary my hair is.

Don’t even get me started on the kitchen.

I have a list of shiny items to knock up by teatime.

I also have a new Pass the Book all prepared. This is a picture of the author to serve as a clue.

But for the rest of today I shall be garland-making, texturing, making foliage out of silver and trying to fit in some lunch. I’ll be back next week.

See you at Voewood if you’re in Norfolk this weekend.

Thanks in advance to the wonderful Mr P, who will be looking after the tots.

I didn’t manage to photograph my enamel-winged silver birds before I took them to Primavera gallery at the end of March. So, much like buses, you get nothing for ages….

…and then three come along at once.

They’re about 3 cm from beak to tail, have vintage pearl feet and they’re flying off to a wedding, to be bridesmaids’ gifts.

This tiny girl turns two today.

It seems she has some charisma.

Recently she grabbed some of my hair, held it to her chin and said ‘I make a beard.’

Back in March we were all gardening. She did her own thing - making puddles with a watering can and then sitting in them. After two changes of trousers she tired of this and grabbed one of the loo rolls we were using to plant beans.

Happy birthday, funny little lady.

My blog has just turned two as well. I shall do something about that shortly. Meanwhile we have fairy cakes to eat.

I’ve always fancied a spot of meadow in my garden. Real Flake-eating, Timotei hair-swishing meadow. The type you can sit in and pretend to be Fanny Brawne.

My friend Fleur has made one…

…at the bottom of her garden.

It’s full of meadow chamomile, harebells and poppies.

It makes me want to sharpen a pencil and write a poem.