It's funny how time can sometimes slip through your fingers, I started this shawl quite a few months ago. Working on it a bit each week at a creative fibre group I go to on a Monday night. The bulk of it worked up very quickly but it's lay unfinished for quite a few weeks now. The thing is tomorrow I have to hand it in for a local competition. So all of a sudden after weeks of inactivity it's finished, washed a blocked and labelled. Only thing is I've got no one on hand (other than a two year old)to take a photo of it for me from behind as I intended it to be worn, so you have to settle for a terrible self portrait. It's shawl size but it's worked in lace weight yarn (50/50 silk merino) from Jess of "Spinning a yarn" so it can also work quite well as a scarf too (so you could easily wear it around your neck as I am here). The yarn is stunning, Jess dyes it and this colour way is lilac, you can find her etsy shop here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/spinningayarn
Recently my local Salvation Army store was overflowing with silver, framed needlepoint and some fabulous vintage fabric in pristine condition. I got the feeling that they all came from the same person and perhaps a deceased estate, which seemed really sad. All these lovely collections ending up there, but it was nice for me to have a peek through all the collections. I picked up a little something from each collection, a lovely framed needlepoint of nasturtiums, some amazing fabric that I'll share once I get back into sewing mode and this silver centerpiece. I've been looking for a centerpiece for sometime and never seen anything that I liked or any centerpieces for that matter. Anyway I thought that this was perfect for what I was looking for, it's got a bit in the middle for pushing flower stems through but it can also be removed if you want to fill it with something other than flowers or float a flower in the middle. We celebrated my husband's birthday last week and the kids loved eating by candlelight, so much so we have been eating by candlelight ever since!
Each year in Winter we have been feeding our local wild birds - by local I mean the ones that visit our garden. We made pinecone feeders the first year. Last year we made bird cake and hung it in bags, but this year I was inspired by something that I saw on Pinterest here: http://pinterest.com/pin/118534946/ . It was really easy to do and instead of using straws to make holes I just used the end of a wooden spoon. We hung them up using some hemp twine from Trade Aid. They look nice on the bare Winter branches, a bit like decorations.
I love Edith Holden's botanical work, it's stunning and I so wish that I could paint like she did. I recently purchased (from Trademe) a book about her life called " The Edwardian Lady", it was really interesting to read more about her life and to discover that we share the same birthday. Edith died tragically as she was gathering botanical samples to paint at Kew at the age of 48. Like many artists she found fame long after her death, in her case nearly 60 years later when her book was published "The country diary of a Edwardian lady".
I was quite excited when I saw this lidded pot at the local Salvation Army store. I thought it was a vintage piece of milk glass and I'm sure I'd seen something similar in a Martha Stewart magazine. I popped it in the pram and headed home to wash it up. As I did I spotted something that disappointed me somewhat a maker's mark or in this case a brand on the bottom, can you guess who made my piece of milk glass???? - Avon! I am a little disappointed that it's not as old as I thought, but I still like it. It's on my bedside table at the moment but with two little ones who like to visit for snuggles in the morning it might need to find a new resting place.
I really don't know what went wrong this week, it started off so well. I've been trying hard to keep on top of domestic duties, like clearing the bench of all dishes before bed and organising dinner early or better still in the crock pot. It's a nice feeling to start the day with a clean bench and the morning seems to go so much better. The start of the week went well, bench cleared, washing hung out and put away (rather than just left in a heap on the couch or in a basket) dinner in the crock pot for the first few days = very little dinner dishes to complete, I was feeling quite smug about how organised I was becoming. Then snap, come Wednesday it all turned to custard and quite quickly. By Thursday there was washing everywhere, I found myself making breakfast amongst dirty dishes and also the clean ones that I hadn't put away. I cut up some grapefruit and soaked it overnight to make some marmalade, then discovered that I just couldn't fit the cooking in and had to pop it in the fridge till the following day( I hoped). The dishwasher was empty, but no dirty dishes seemed to be making it in, I was quickly running out of bench space all together. Then Mr A headed outside, ignoring all the mess, we made the most of some sunshine and got to work in the garden, planting and digging together (and mr A, pulling out the plants I'd just planted).
I've added a few more Orchid upcycled cards to my etsy shop, a few people asked if I had anymore so I thought I better get a move on and get some listed. I've got a few more things to list too so keep an eye out.
There has been lots of citrus love around here lately, lemon curd, preserved lemons, fresh grapefruit and oranges too. It seems it all can't get eaten and used fast enough. My friend gave me some grapefruit and inside the bag she included a great recipe that I'm excited to share as it's so EASY and well, we all need some easy in our lives. So here it goes:
The last day of the school holidays was the most stunning day (weather-wise) that we've had in a very long time. Wanting to make the most of it we headed to a local beach to have some fish and chips for lunch. Miss E was very keen and waded into the water! There were actually children swimming! in July! You know like July as in the middle of Winter! Admittedly it was very warm in the sun but still. It was great fun and all the talk on the way home was about the up and coming warm weather and lots more trips to the beach. A perfect way to end the holidays.
