Frazzy Dazzles

I am often frustrated by the ’state’ of our dinner table. But looking at it I think I know who is to blame…

a little bit of her and a little bit of him…but a whole lot of me!

I have a space that I have made to sew and create things in. So why does it always end up on the dinner table?

Because the dinner table is where the family is. Because the dinner table is where the light, the warmth and the noise all are. Because I want to be with them and not on my own!

That’s my story and I am sticking to it!

I was lamenting the fact that I had spent the morning food shopping and now the weather was closing in. The clothes had come in off the line and were now hung around the heater in an attempt to get them dry. With the clothes inside the windows fogged up. To me this meant even less light could come into the room and and extra ‘bleakness’ was added to our day.

 But to The Little Bush Princess it just offered the opportunity to do a spot of fog painting. I guess that is seeing the glass as half full!

Mind you…I think the bedraggled hen you can just make out pecking her way through the lawn might have a different perspective!

Hope whatever today gives you….you make the most of it!

‘Shiny things’ is that chant that goes up between my husband and I when we can see the other one is getting off track and looking to the next thing before finishing the things we have started. That happens a LOT around here!

Pattern writing is something that I’m not sure I’m all that good at. For that reason I think I avoid it. Briar and Thistle have been sitting in my shop (tab at top of page for products) for a few weeks now with *coming soon* next to them….but still they are not here!

I don’t even have a lot to do to finish her off. I just keep avoiding it.

What is the name of the phobia?

Complete-a-projecta-tosis?

Whatever it is I am a sufferer!

focus grasshopper….foooocuuus!

On a different note…last night you would have been forgiven if you declined an offer to stay for dinner. Especially if you had seen what was bubbling away on our stove top!

The Golden Child has Loud Shirt Day at school today to help raise funds and awareness for hearing impaired children. The problem was that The Golden Child has had a bit of a growth spurt lately and didn’t have a ‘loud shirt’ that would fit him!

To remedy this we bought some cotton t-shirts (yes shirts….The Little Bush Princess was not going to be left out of this one!) and a jar of lime green dye….a favourite colour of everyone in our house. Then we set to work. In no time we had a bubbling pot of slimy limy fabric-y potion on our stove and this morning we had matching slimy limy children. I really think they enjoyed themselves and I know they will love telling people that they made them themselves!

I just hope he doesn’t lose his gold coin donation! Remind me to check on that!

For a great link to some fantabulous Aussie blogs go here.

Fiber jewelery. Does it get any better than that?

This little red felt ring cost me $4.50. It is whimsical. It serves absolutely no purpose. I should have spent the money on a loaf of bread and milk…but I didn’t…instead I bought it and I slip it onto my finger when I am hand stitching….and I love it. Sometimes it’s something simple that makes you the happiest.

Speaking of happy. I am happy that I have found another little giveaway in blog land. Why not pop over and see Zia Koko and leave her a comment. She is giving away some beautiful cards and fabric. I am sure she would love to hear from you!

Hope you all have a great day. The Little Bush Princess is at Pre School today…

….and I miss her!….

I get her back in an hour!

Now I am sure that these will be little siblings for Barley and Sugar some time soon….if I can just get around to them!

The Golden Child has gone off happily to school today. It is a nice warm Autumn day and I hope that he has a good day.

Everyone needed to get out of the house today.  I think that besides the yucky illness we have been harboring, everyone also had a healthy dose of cabin fever. So when we dropped our boy off to school this morning The Little Bush Princess and I kept going and parked our car near a paved walk and took ourselves for a stroll.

It was good to feel the warmth of the sun and listen to the ducks on the nearby golf course and do a spot of dog and truck spotting. A great game when you are three! The autumn leaves made great crunching sounds underfoot and were so deep in places that we could not see the edge of the path. All in all the morning has gotten off to a good start. I hope the day continues to unfold along a similar vein!

If you are like me and always looking for a new blog to inspire you then why not have a squizz here…..happy stash….the happiest stash of all! My friend Jen has some of her beautiful quilts photographed and are there for all to see. She is incredibly patient and is a dab hand at paper pieced quilts. I just don’t know how she does it. I don’t have the patients for such detail and precision. They are breathtaking. Go and have a look and let her know you have been there. She would love to hear from you!

We hope that you have a wonderful Wednesday. Ours is looking better all the time!

Today is not a fun day. Today is a sick day. Both of the children are unwell and it feels like we have been stuck at home for weeks. The Little Bush Princess is amusing herself with our magazine cuttings box.

I never throw out a magazine or a sticker book without first looting it for all useful material. On days like this I am thankful for my thriftiness.

Sticking seems to help her forget that she is feeling pretty yucky today.

There was a point in the day earlier on when they were both feeling a bit better and were up for a bit of a game. The Golden Child covered the craft table with blankets and they pretended it was a hide and they were researching swamp tigers.

They are under here somewhere. They made me laugh. They had a teddy bear growler that they were using to lure the tigers to them. I don’t know if you have ever heard a teddy bear growler…but I think the only tigers they were going to be attracting would have been tiger paramedics coming to provide aide to their stricken fellow tiger!

Their conversation was so funny…I always knew that they got a lot out of David Attenborough. Now I know just how much!

Don’t his eyes look tired? Pigeon pair in their pj’s all day.

It was a little bit of happiness in an otherwise rather melancholy day.

I have to just start with…I love cloth dolls. I think it stems from this young lady..

Play School’s Jemima is a little hero of mine. Isn’t she lovely? I know to those seeing her for the first time she is not a sophisticated doll or even really an attractive doll, but to me she is iconic. I have already told you of the excitement of finding the original ‘recipe’ for her in an opp shop earlier in the year. Bliss!

Now I am thinking it is time to turn my hand to making cloth dolls. Larger dolls than I have designed in the past..Bigger than Briar and the Garden Warrior..although as I write this there are siblings of Barley and Sugar sitting on my work bench cut out and waiting to be sewn.

*sigh*

Where has my concentration gone? I can’t focus on anything for long before something shiny distracts me and gets me to look in another direction!

This little lady has been doing the rounds of my mind for the last week or two.

I am thinking I am going to have to let her out soon or she will either be forgotten or turn into something so hideously complicated that I won’t want to make her anymore. I think she will be the next sketch in cotton. I am just not sure when the scissors will get to come out….but I did buy some wool blanketing on the weekend. Happy Mother’s Day to meee! The Golden Child is home sick today so not for a few days yet!

I went to visit my brother at work yesterday. He works for a local hardware store in their tools section. While he served some people I wandered the shelves and looked at the tools that workmen use. The longer I looked at a little cordless screw-driver-thingie, the more I was sure that I needed one! It was even on sale….but I walked away from it…I really didn’t need it. But it did get me to thinking about the ‘tools’ that I use each day to make my life easier and I think that one of my simplest (well, my mum’s simplest!) ideas is an apron for a peg holder.

The Little Bush Princess calls it my ‘peg pouch’…part marsupial, part mummy!

But it works and it makes my life easier. If I have something half hung up and I don’t have enough pegs then I can keep hold of the item and just reach down for a peg. When I am just about to peg something up and I drop the peg (which is a real pain when you are pregnant! - which I am not!)….I can just reach down and pick one up out of my ‘pouch’. Or when it is getting ready to bucket down with rain and I have half a minute to get the washing off the line then I can quickly get the pegs into the pocket and keep on going. I am sure that we all know you can hold more clothes in one hand than pegs!

Then when I am heading to or from the house with a huge basket of clothing I don’t have to carry the pegs because they are around my neck! Easy to take in and out and stop the pegs from perishing in the weather.

So it is simple, it is cheap and it makes my daily task of washing the family clothes easier and faster. What more could you want? It doesn’t even need re-charging!

I will have a bit more of a think about this ‘tools of my trade’ thing. I am sure there are lots of little hints that we can pass from one another to make our lives a little bit easier.

Speaking of easier. It is mothers day today. I got a sleep in (which I was sooo looking forward to) and a lovely new pair of pj’s along with diary to help me keep up with all the things the family seems to have on at the moment.

The kids did me some lovely drawings and made me some beautiful cards….and The Golden Child sat himself down at the craft table last night and made me this….

Isn’t it gorgeous? I have worn it all day. It makes me happy….although the green twissly bit has gone into the wash up water a couple of times! It goes beautifully with my magic wand.

He likes to make me jewelery. I have some lovely little beaded bracelets and necklaces. I will trot some out to show you in the next couple of days.

He is a soft and gentle little soul. He was the one who started Mother’s Day for me. His sister has gone on to make the experience an even more fulfilling one. I am thankful everyday that our two little ones came into our live. I barely remember a life before them. I could never imagine a life without them.

Happy Mother’s Day everyone! Hope everyone had a great weekend.

And to the lovely Janie and Amber. I will sort out some packaging for your little presents and send them off to you as soon as I can! Tomorrow is Monday and the Post Office will open again. I will call in after dropping The Golden Child to school and you should have them in no time.

Just a quick post to tell you that the comments for the giveaway have closed. I used a random number generator to select the winners and their emails have been sent out sent out….so now it is just up to me to post them here!

The new owner of Barley and Sugar is Janie.

And the winner of the pattern is Amber from One Shabby Chick.

If you could just get back to me with where I should forward your prizes now.

I really had a lot of fun with this giveaway and look forward to hearing from you all in the future. There will be more giveaways. This was way too much fun!

Thanks again to everyone who commented and to the girls who offered links to my site from theirs.

Another post tomorrow!

Jen

The second Saturday of every month sees our little family trotting off to the local fresh farmers markets for a look see. Today is the second Saturday of the month…so off we trod!

We are moving into Autumn and you can see the produce changing. The colours are less reds, yellows and brights….now they are more deep greens and lots of leafy crops. The potato man was doing a roaring trade.

The succulents came from ‘the succulent lady’. They are just so amazing. The shades of green are uncountable! She let me take a few shots of her plants that she sells for only $5! Needless to say we have made the odd purchase from her.

The bread boys were there with their gorgeous sour dough loaves. The Golden Child is going through a bit of a Jamie Oliver stage at the moment. He wants to be hands on in the kitchen and loves a crusty roll. I think it will be lovely with the local sausages we also picked up.

The community turn out in droves which makes it a market worth going to.

The other thing that happened in our house in the last 24 hours is…our little mouse Lavender Honey passed away. She was a grand old lady who was the Golden Child’s pet. She will be sadly missed. Especially by the children.

Now I am not a mother who can stand to see her children feeling sad. And as much as Lav-nee will be missed replacing her seemed like a way of healing their little hearts. So now we are getting a lot of this…

Watching the two new little mice that have come to live with us. As yet they are un-named. There has been talk of ‘Primrose’ and ‘Milky-Face’…we’ll see.

I see it as a little mark of respect to Lav-nee that living without her is not a choice…but to continue to have these little creatures in our life is…and we have welcomed two new members to our family. Welcome girls (I just hope one of you doesn’t turn out to be a boy!).

Don’t forget to scroll down to the mouse giveaway post. Entries are open for about another 10 hours. I wish you all well and thank you for stopping by and joining in. I have had a hoot!

Cheers

Jen