Saturday, September 22, 2007

Flashback Friday

I looked for a photo that matched the theme of 'what Mum did to my hair', and realised, Mum didn't actually do much to my hair! Now that I think about it, I always wished she could do a bit more to it, like braid it and stuff. I wasn't a kid who went to school perfectly coiffed - more often than not, my Dad would grab my hair into a ponytail on the way to school on the red and white bus!

So here's a photo of pretty much the worst I did to it, until I was older, anyway! I think it's 1987, and this is a photo of our household - we were living with two other women at the time. Mum, my brother Simon, (bushranger) Dad, brother Daniel, Suzanne, me and Coralie.

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Sewing space

Was gonna blog before I had my teeth removed, but ran out of time. However, I'm not doing too badly at all, which is a pleasant relief. I took painkillers at midnight and haven't taken any since. My face hasn't swelled up to the size of a balloon. The hospital staff were nice, putting on the hospital gown wasn't that bad, and the surgery apparently only took half an hour. So yeah, I got off pretty well! But enough of my teeth! I had a biscuit as soon as I got home, in the spirit of Auntie Cookie!

We recently set up a table in the loungeroom, which I have promptly covered with crap, or rather, the makings of an outfit for a three-year-old whose birthday is this weekend. I'm loving having a space to leave my sewing lying around - means I can do ten minutes at a time, if that's all the time I can get. (I'm going to milk these teeth for a bit more time from my hubby, haha)


I'm making this Burda pattern - a tunic and pants with matching little bag.

Here's the pile of fabric awaiting transformation into (quick, easy and) cute baby bibs, once I finish the bday gift.

And look, here's the disdressed tote bag I bought ages ago, that I still haven't gotten to making. But I will! Before December, I will!

In terms of my other main medium, knitting, I've been working on this short-row hat (IK pattern). I love the effect, enjoyed working with the Noro yarn, but it is totally the wrong shape for my head - those skin tight hats just don't work for me - so that was a bit disappointing. I've yet to knit up the crown, but will get to that, and will feel more motivated when I can think of someone who might enjoy it! (It would have helped if I'd checked the final size and discovered that my head circumference was 10cm bigger! Does that mean I have a big head?? It said "to fit an adult"! But dunno if it would have made a difference, given the overall shape is close-fitting, which isn't my style...)

I've been enjoying having this straightforward piece on the go - a hoodie for one of Piper's friends. I love the mindlessness of stocking stitch, especially when I was having to concentrate so hard on the other hat - well, counting stitches, mainly... This gift needs to be finished by November, so I think I'll make that deadline...
So yeah... gonna have some lunch and crawl back into bed, not cos I feel like crap, but cos it's so delicious to be able to lie in bed in the middle of the day!

Saturday, September 15, 2007

Flashback Friday

I reckon I'm about six or seven here - that old couch in the background brings back memories!Here's my brother Daniel with my Mum in 1985. Had to include it because, what a smile! On both of them really.


So cute!

Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Vintage finds...

Savers had a 50% off sale yesterday. Usually I avoid the madly overrun place on such days, but then, I just happened to be walking past, and my Mum just happened to take my three-year-old for an hour, so I moseyed on in! At first I felt like I was never going to find anything, and certainly the kids section seemed to have been picked clean, but then I kept thinking of things I'd been looking for. Bumped into a few old friends and had a pleasant old natter, and then, right at the end, I found myself in the crockery section. I've decided I love vintage teacups (hardly a novel idea, but who cares?), especially with an accent of orange. I trawled through the pricier stuff and this is what I found:


Look - that chip on the platter happened as I lifted the bag off the counter - I heard something go crunch and that was it. What a total bugger, cos I probably like that and the teacup the most. Oh well. Around twenty bucks for all that... not bad.

In other news, I have been making stuff, believe me! I've been working mainly on my hat, lovely Noro yarn with this IK short row pattern. Almost done, to the point where I might as well take a photo when it's all done, rather than right now...

And in other news, I'm having my wisdom teeth out next Tuesday. I am remarkably calm about this, having met the friendly oral surgeon (his discreet Irish accent is quite soothing!) and sussed it all out today. He had a cancellation, that's why it's all happening so quickly, but I figure, why not get it over and done with! Any tips for surviving the aftermath??

Saturday, September 8, 2007

Flashback Friday

This is me in 1986 (yes I know it's slightly out of the parameters of flashback friday, but I have a limited amount of photos - I was also a flowergirl in 1984 at my auntie's wedding, which I think would have yielded a more comical photo, but I don't seem to have one - will have to raid my parents' albums again!)

Suzanne, the bridesmaid, who lived with my family at the time, Jennie the bride, and me...

Friday, September 7, 2007

Things I love

Things I love:

These so cute stamps from The Small Object

They turned up in the mail this week!

Saturday, September 1, 2007

Craft night

Well, the craft night last night was great, in my opinion! I was actually able to finish some stuff, in between dealing with my kids, etc (not that I did too much of that, in the evening, anyway, when there were a fair few other people for them to bounce off! And most importantly, a Pippa to play with!). Not only that, I got to hang out with people I really like! Can't get much better than that!

Here's what was on the go:

- Anna was embellishing two tops for some lucky new babies...


- Jennie was knitting a sleeve for her DH...


- Nat was knitting a baby hat with bargain yarn!


And I dragged out the scrapbook and finished four pages - whoo hoo!


Here's the saga of the scrapbook. We were in Canada a year and a half ago, for five months, visiting my DH's family. I decided that, for Christmas, I would make his parents a scrapbook of our time in Canada, an ABC of our experience, in fact. I'd never done any scrapbooking before. And given I was putting all this effort into pulling together layouts and Photoshopping photos, well, I thought I'd make one for us as well (two relatively identical scrapbooks).

Anyway, I left it a bit late, so the last week or two, I was up til 5am way too often in an effort to finish the gift in time, and being an ABC, I couldn't leave out any pages! I got about half? of ours done, and then I had to leave it, otherwise I was going to kill myself with fatigue. So yeah, it has remained unfinished til now, til I dragged it out last night and saw the light at the end of the tunnel. What an ace feeling - gotta love finishing off old projects!

Now for some reason, I neglected to take a photo of the beautiful red shawl my Mum was knitting - not quite sure how that happened, sorry Mum! And I didn't even think of snapping a shot of Samara's gorgeous array of tags earlier in the day... bummer... But anyway, you get the gist. It was just a really pleasant vibe, mellow music, conversation punctuated by periods of industrious silence, and a virtuous sense of accomplishment (for me anyway!!)....

Anna finished these two tops - top job mate!


And here we are at the tail end of the night - Mum, Jasper, Anna, Jennie, Natalie and Sally.

Flashback Friday

Can't believe it's been a week since I last posted! I guess I haven't done too much crafty stuff, although there's always knitting on the go. Actually, I did wake up one morning with a compulsion to sew something, a prototype of an idea, and I worked at that in all the little spaces I had that day, but now I need to make the next stage - how's that for secretive?! I will post about it when it all comes together, but yes, it's made for a boring blog this week.

And I can't even find a musical flashback photo - bummer! Here's a photo of me anyway, with my Mum and Dad in 1981. Tonight my friend Anna and I are hosting a craft space at my place, from 2pm til 10pm. We've hosted craft nights before, but I felt like we hardly got going and then it was time to wind it up, hence the early start. I also felt like I was forever jumping up to make people cups of tea, so this time I'm just going to leave all the stuff for that on bench. I'm not talking masses of people here, just our friends who are interested in making stuff. I'm hoping to finish the tea towel I started at the stitching night at Meet Me at Mike's, and perhaps tackle the next bit of the prototype, but I want to set low expectations so that whatever I achieve feels good! I could even post some photos, now there's an idea...

Before then, however, there's a house to tidy!

Here's Piper with the one finished crafty item of the week, a spider who came together 20mins before I had to dash off somewhere. So yeah, no finesse, but Piper was happy!