Fabric, quilts & birthdays.

Oh, it’s been too long between posts. Crazy, crazy sale, thank you to all the lovely customers who shopped ’till they dropped. We now have loads more room for the next round of goodies. Can’t wait (she says, rubbing her hands together in glee).

Super sale stash.

Also recently decided that the new Red Letter Days and David Walker Rockets ranges were far too yum to disappear without hacking into them for my own stash. The result?

A cute kinder nap time binkee for my pumpkin…

Tomorrow my wee one turns three- full of attitude, sleeping in a bed and giving up his dummy all by himself.

No more babies.

Sigh.

Tour of (kinder) Duty.

These are the yummy bags I made for the fete. I’m rather pleased with them if I do say so myself.

I did kinder duty today and, not for the first time, was glad that I became a textile designer and not a kinder teacher. I tells ya, 26 rambuctious 4 & 5 year olds is REALLY exhausting. Especially when you take your two year old with you and try to keep him in line so he doesn’t disrupt the class. Whoooo, so pooped!

Golden Afternoon.

I’ve discovered that it tends to be the little things that make your day, and I’ve had a lovely Sunday full of the little things.

New growth on the trees in rocket park that make the most wonderful “swoosh, swoosh, swoosh” sound when the warm north wind blows through them. Aah, spring is here.

My big little man, who scooters up a storm. Today I watched him on his scooter, coasting along and slowing down using the brakes (which he discovered himself) and I realised he’s not a baby any more. Sob!

My big little man parks his scooter next to a park bench just for me, so I have somewhere comfy to sit and watch him while he has a play at the park. Sweet!

Apple blossom (which is my favourite). I love how it blooms the same time as the leaves bud, so that you have the white and the pale pink blush of petals, the dark pink of the closed buds and the yellow of the stamen all clumped together with the pale green of the leaves, all fluttery and dapple-y.

A golden afternoon and a portable coffee…

Followed by a dinner cooked by my husband. That’s perfection really.

“Snooty Birdies”

I’ve been having a bit of a play recently and came up with this cushion/ teddy new product. I think I’ll put it in the shop.

I think it went down well with our test group. Big one found it, took it to his room and told me he wanted it for him. The little one found it in his room and spontaneously cuddled it and made “Mmmmm” noises.

The ones I’m making for the shop don’t have button eyes so they are safe for little ones. I’ll be doing a few different styles, expressions and fabrics. I think they’re really cute little nursery additions!

These are now for sale at my fabric shop and they’re so “cheep cheep”…

Retail Therapy.

Visited Magnolia Square market today- I love the craft scene in Melbourne, everyone is really supportive and happy to give advice and suggestions.

Look who I found, camera shy, but still happy to oblige me with a picture of herself and her stall.

The lovely Allison of Lark and her beautiful stall at Magnolia Square- with some of the gorgeous products we sell at Belsize Square.

All the fabric‘s starting to roll in now too, to the point that my pumpkin just says “Oh look, more patchwork for the shop” (even more cute, because he was referring to a bag of lawn feed on the front porch at the time, but said so matter of factly!)

I digress… look at the goodies I’ve popped in the shop today.

Loving the funky monkeys.

Belsize Square the Store- Now Trading!!!

D’you like our shop? Please come and visit us, we are now open!

Oh yeah, this is where I’ve disappeared to, felt too guilty every time I logged on to do anything fun like blog, so I’ve been strictly head down, bum up trying to get the shop ready for it’s soft launch. And talk about soft launch, we’ve strapped pillows all over it so it doesn’t explode on impact! This is some of my most favourite stuff that’s for sale there, right now!

If you’re here reading this, then I love you already (of course), but if you fancy take a stroll over to our shop and have a play. I’ll be ever so grateful.

Actually, I am such a liar, also managed to have the little terror’s second birthday and sneak in a 5 day holiday when I didn’t think about work at all (and even found some sunshine and warm weather, yeay!) Bubba boys had fun too…

It’s really not a proper holiday unless you visit a big thing.

Actually, I didn’t take this photo. It was (sadly) our second visit to the big pineapple in a year and as lumpy was asleep I didn’t actually get out of the car. Pumpkin and his dad did the train ride, saw the koalas (which, according to pumpkin, are very smelly) – did the whole schemozzle.

Apple pie and sunshine.

Had a crazy afternoom last Tuesday. Had pumpkin home from kinder sick (again- aaaaah! and it’s only the beginning of winter!) and so with no taxi duties to perform in the afternoon (picking up and dropping off small people) had a sudden wash of warm, housewifely, momsy good feeling wash over me and decided to bake!!!

I should have known better- it’s like this rush of hormones, or a schitzophrenic episode where my alter ego, a 1950′s housewife called Enid comes out and destroys my kitchen with two kilos of flour a dozen eggs and a kitchen aid.

I love it when I start, but I always get bored about half way through and then it just becomes a chore… and the cleaning up!!! It took me two days to get all the dishes washed up and the dried up dough scraped off the bench without gouging great chunks out of the wooden top.

However check out my grand creations. Jamie Oliver’s Apple pie- it’s great served hot with greek yoghurt, Nigel Slater’s easy bread recipie (a bit dense, but maybe I didn’t let it prove for long enough) and yummy roasted pumpkin and cauliflower and bacon soup (I didn’t take a photo of that, because yummy as it was, it looked like a vat of vom.)

Also just finished quilting my latest etsy quilt. I think it’s my best one yet, v. happy. Am off now to sew the binding on.

All around, it’s been a reasonable week on the homecrafts front!

Tags: apple pie, baking, bread, enid, Etsy, housewife, kinder, Pumpkin, quilt, soup, winter

The festival of Mother’s Day

Today was Mother’s Day morning tea at kinder. Some smarty pants had signed me up for cupcake duty- and having been in quarantine all last week with feared measles brewing in my two little petri dishes (not measles after all, I’m pleased to report) the first I knew of it was yesterday- aaaarrgh! Still am self proclaimed cupcake queen and am v impressed with what I acheived at such short notice.

Made wee ones as little devils never do more than lick off frosting and eat lollies off the top, so could have just frosted small rocks and they would have gone down just as well! What do you think, don’t think we’ll have any problems getting the wee one to go to kinder- he seemed right at home!

No posts last week as home with sick ones, so consequently no life.

More Pumpkin’s Gallery.

Here’s the latest batch, the cream of the crop of pumpkin pics.

England’s Lane

This is where I spent much of 2004. I’d take baby pumpkin down after his sleep in the afternoon and we’d hang out for hours. If we sat near the counter, he’d make googly eyes at all the pretty young spanish girls that worked there! It’s also very close to Primrose Hill and was ideal for picking up a take away to have on my way to take pumpkin for a kick on the picnic rug. There view out the windows there is really quite a picturesque streetscape. Such a pretty part of London.

My clever Pumpkin

Just wanted to share how clever my pumpkin is. He made this beautiful ring, which he wants to sell in my etsy shop. He sits up next to me sometimes and makes things with paper and ribbon and textas and most importantly, “sticky take”.