In the rainbow, after red is ORANGE!

Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet!

Red was the colour of berries in the crumble (yum..!)

Orange is My Friend Ruth's favourite colour, and here she is wearing the Orange Fancy necklace that needed to be made! Thanks for wearing it Ruth!


I should have taken a second photo of the top Ruth was wearing, as she made it from a pillowcase! It's stunning, and is a wrap top/kimono top, made exquisitely. I am hoping for a step by step lesson (ooh - a tutorial in the making!) ;-)

That was a quick rest!

I got some lovely comments thanks ladies, and have decided that the blog thing IS ok. I'm not really just blowing my own trumpet or anything, I am quite happy with the way it's going, and my self-conscious moment was just that. A moment.

So now I am back and will post a tutorial or two of things I am doing. I love tutorials, as I can see how things are constructed. It often inspires me to do more as when I see a good tutorial I think: I CAN do that!!

So a few days ago I was on about the Tetra-type juice packs. This has opened my eyes to just how much packaging there is in kids' lunch box snacks as well! Each box or bag contains all those individually-wrapped bags or packets, and so many of them are silver-lined to keep them "fresh", but this impacts on their recyclability. Eilleen at Consumption Rebellion has again wowed me with talk of constructing a solar oven and stove, and this HAS made me see silver everywhere E! Check out her pic here of a reusable sandwich pouch rather than using zip-lock bags. I also LOVE LOVE LOVE the idea of the fruit and vege bags, which I will be making from tuille that I have heaps of. They weigh nothing and are reusable!

So now I am looking now at 3 of the 1 litre juice packs, and 2 of the small lunch-box ones, and have decided to have a go at making a tote to take to the supermarket to keep cold things cool until we get home. All have been washed in warm water with soap and dried thoroughly in the sun to kill any bugs.

A tute of this is a bit tricky, as I have no idea how this will come about...

First I cut all the boxes so they were even.
I then cut one of the large ones in half to use as the sides of the bag. The small ones would be the base.
I zig-zagged the pieces together end to end so I had one really long piece of cardboard.
Sewing in the base was fiddly, as my machine has knobs and handles that got in the way.

After breaking a needle, jamming the bobbin, and sewing through my finger AGAIN ("no honey I don't need stitches - I already have them...) and FORGETTING TO TAKE PHOTOS (so no tute huh?),

We got to this:

Pinking shears evened up the top section which doesn't need a seam as it won't fray!
A hole puncher and some old cord from a pair of pants knotted through the holes, and I am off to market!

Giving it a rest

I'm giving this a rest for a while, as I am pretty sure I am talking to myself! My confidence has taken a dive, and I need to just think about WHY I am doing this, and IF I need to keep it going. Signing off while I take some Thinking Time and Play With The Kids :-)

RED is so vibrant in the kitchen:

My neighbour brought over some plums from his tree, which was so thoughtful and generous, and I wanted to make jam to say thank you.

There just weren't enough though, and it was really more fiddly than I thought (stone them, peel them, put stones in a muslin pouch, etc). I am not really very patient and wanted to Do It NOW, so stewed the plums, sieved them to remove stones, added a tired apple that was lurking at the bottom of the fruit bowl, some strawberries that Master 5 had forgotten about, and a few handfuls of raspberries from the freezer. A simple crumble topping:

1 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
3 tablespoons self-raising flour
melted butter to cover it all

and ate it with Hubby's home-made vanilla ice-cream, cream, and custard...

DIVINE

So about those buttons?

Before doing any button work, I wanted to find room in my little Creation Corner. This involves finishing off all those UFOs and so I have been in somewhat of a frenzy! (Or maybe it's justified procrastination??)

Anyway. A mermaid obsession seems to have affected the Little Ladies in my acquaintance. Miss 4, Miss 5, and Miss 8 are all obsessed.

So at Spotlight in my favourite area, the remnant baskets, I found this shimmery green number, which promptly became a mermaid tail. It's pretty basic as I do not have an overlocker (I do labour on this a bit...), and I was making it up as I went... I had no wadding, and so used a thrifted towel which worked really well to stabilise the fabric. The waist is just elasticated and velcroed so it can be adjusted.

I do hope Miss 5 likes it!

Chocolate? Sure - why not?!

Great chocolaterie's (is this a word??) are opening up All Over The Place, and Canberra is no exception.

One such great place is in the city. I love going there and sinking into their leather lounge, sniffing the wonderful smells, or sitting at the voyeuristic window adjacent to the kitchen, so you can see treats being created.

So although I don't want to endorse one business over another, I also think that good work must be acknowledged!

Love that Koko Black Hot Chocolate! Mmmm!

The Iced Choc is pretty damn good too!!

What will I have today..................??

The beautiful scarf top photo

I posted the other day that Eilleen made a gorgeous top from a thrifted scarf for Miss 2. Here is the photo - it's so cute! Thanks again E!