trackie thursday!

Yay! Another week, another trackie thursday.

For those of you just tuning in, trackie thursday is our slow day. No preschool, no playdates, no swimming lessons, no reason to leave the house, or even get dressed. trackie thursday is our day of rest.

Today we did have some friends pop in in the morning, but then all was quiet, it clouded over and got seriously cold. We braved the cold for our daily walk, and then got home with still 90 minutes to go until bathtime and the nighttime chaos/rituals.

So, remembering a fine idea I had seen recently on pinterest we set out to try to make one of these:

Now, I don't know about your kids, but my kids just don't make stuff that looks like this (perhaps they may one day). Instead, we made something that looked a little more like this:

So theatre designers we may not be, but it seems panto performers we are! We all happily whiled away nearly two hours on the making and then the performing and watching. What great fun! And of course, the dinos had to be in the audience, too.

Have a happy week! xx

trackie thursday!

Little's effort - a dolls house rocking horse

Yay! Another week, another trackie thursday.

For those of you just tuning in, trackie thursday is our slooow day. No preschool, no playdates, no swimming lessons, no reason to leave the house, or even get dressed. trackie thursday is our day of rest.

It is also typically the day that we do cool stuff at home. We play, we bake, we make.

Today, we painted our dolls house furniture. The boys really, really loved this activity. Not quite sure what the attraction was - the new paints, the new surfaces to paint, or the fact that it all felt a little bit like vandalism (!).

The Gherkin, concentrating (by some miracle the tongue is in xo)

Little stuck with it for a good twenty minutes, before he started painting his arms and face (with craft acrylics - excellent!), and The Gherkin was there for much longer. And, this mummy is learning - I remembered to ask the boys to paint with paper and placemats under their work. Last time we painted on the kitchen table we stained the timber...

The Gherkin, still concentrating, but clearly very happy

The boys are keen for me to "makeover" their dolls house. I think now after their great start I need to put some effort in, too!

Chat soon xx

feeling pinspired...

Hi again!

Now all three boys are going to bed (dare I say/write that 'out loud'?!), I have rediscovered the joy of evenings and time. Feeling pinspired last night I whipped up this little beauty:

Love the hand on the hip? Our gherkin's natural "I'm being photographed" pose - love it!

Note the monster patch on the knee. These jeans were favourites for ages until the gherkin's knee went right through them. This is not an original idea (seems I am all out of those at the moment - perhaps too much time spent on pinterest) but comes from refashion co-op (who apparently was inspired by someone else).

I did this job by hand, only because I was too nervous to unpick the seam and re-sew, but next time I will be braver. After all, Miss Cintia offered a really good tutorial on how to do this some time ago, that I have been waiting to use... next time!

Doing it by hand and stitching these on without unpicking the seam was tricky at best and a massive pain at its worse. The most difficult thing was my laziness and wanting to stitch on the teeth and mouth at the same time. Really it would have been simplest to either stitch the teeth to the red mouth or stitch the teeth to the jeans as step one and then the mouth to the jeans as step two. But no, I pinned it all on at once and then proceeded to stitch all layers together at once. Madness! And frustrating! (and causing me to spend way too much of the evening with my tongue poking out and eyes half-crossed).

But, the story has a happy ending! The Gherkin loved his new monster pants, so much that we had to Skype the grandparents immediately, and Little loved them so much that he started nagging for his own "dinosaur" pants.

Happy weekend! xx

happy (chocolate free) easter

Hi there!

I think I have mentioned in the past that we have a chocolate free easter in these parts. Why? Other than the fact that I work in health policy and project management (meaning, chronic disease and obesity prevention and management), we also have a young'n' with a serious nut allergy. We're talking anaphylaxis for nuts. So that means we avoid all things with even traces of nuts, chocolate being one of them.

What this means for us is an easter tradition that involves dyeing eggs, leaving them in a bowl for the easter bunny, who then surprises us with an easter egg hunt (using our dyed eggs) in the front garden on Easter Sunday. That cheeky bunny - so much fun!

 

Last year we did plain dyed eggs, this year we tried out some crayon resist and dyeing some a couple of times. The boys have developed some creative flair in the last twelve months! We used food colouring today (I wasn't organised enough to use vege dyes) mixed in with vinegar. Once dry we polished them up with a bit of canola oil on a cloth. Voila!

I will admit though - I do miss the Red Tulip Elegant Rabbit, though I have learnt recently they use palm oil, so yet another reason for me to not participate in the chocolate bingeing season...

Wishing you and yours a happy and safe Easter, whatever your traditions!
xx

celebrating the pom pom

The pom pom surprise for my boys is now up in their room. Yep, you guessed it, I made pom pom garlands. And had lots of fun doing it, and have many many more pom pom crafts planned. I am hooked! In fact, I may need a dedicated new board on pinterest - celebrating the pom pom!

I tried out a few methods of pom pom making - the ol' double cardboard donut method, the fork method, fingers method and the cheaty C method,

I have always found the double donut fiddly, and inevitably end up with my tongue out, though it does result in lovely, nearly perfectly round poms!

The fork method was a cute new way to make itty bitty pom poms but I did end up having to trim these a lot to get a really round shape.

I can never get the fingers method to work - I always end up with pom poms that look like they have been made in two halves :(

I will stick with the cheaty C method I think, as I was able to churn out much faster, rounder, happier looking pom poms this way. The C method is essentially the same as the donut method, but you don't have to guess how much wool/yarn you are going to use before you start, and you don't get to the point where you need to use a yarn needle. Hence the "cheaty" (read: easier) C method.

I know that there are purchase-able pom pom makers out there, but to buy one seems somewhat criminal, given I can make perfectly good ones without another piece of plastic in my life.

Here are some places to visit to get info if you would like to go a little pom pom crazy:

Ye olde cardboard double donut method: via crafted blog
Fork method: via vivid please
Fingers method: via dana made it
Cheaty C method: via craftaholics anonymous

The boys were somewhat chuffed with their new room decoration. Little Pickle told me I am a "beautiful maker", The Gherkin whispered a "wow" (the highest of compliments) and told me we needed to buy more wool to make more. Baby Pickle just laughed.

Hope you will enjoy some of my favourite inspirational pom pom moments:

Source: kidostore.com via Hannah on Pinterest

Source: mypoppet.bigcartel.com via Hannah on Pinterest

Source: blog.makezine.com via Hannah on Pinterest

Source: meetmeatmikes.com via Hannah on Pinterest

Source: bleubirdvintage.typepad.com via Hannah on Pinterest

Happy pom-pom-ing! xo

speaking of husbies felting woollens...

 

So, once upon a time I had a favourite cardigan. Pure wool, picked up from an opshop (thrifted) for eight dollars and big enough to keep me warm through my first highlands winter, belly swelling with bub number three.

 

Mr Pickles did me a favour a couple of weeks ago by washing all of my woollens and then popping them into the dryer. And voila! Felt ;)

 

Once I finished sobbing (kidding) I decided to make myself a beanie.

 

It was a piece of cake really:

 

   

1. With my cardi flat, and inside out, I traced around the shape of a favourite beanie

2. And then stitched along this line

3. And then cut the stitched beanie out of the cardigan with my pinking shears

4. And turned the completed beanie outside out

5. Done!

6. Oops! Not quite. A few vintage buttons later and...

7. I had a new, cute beanie to wear! I really should have been looking more excited, but I was too busy trying to take a self portrait (it's nothing short of a miracle that my tongue's not sticking out).

 

 

And just in time for an unseasonally chilly, wet highlands day.

 

How about you? Have you done anything with felted woollens? I now have quite a collection to my name, so I'm on the lookout for new projects ;)

Chat soon xo

 

 

we heart craft

 
So, every now and then my lovely hubby goes away with work. It's rarely for very long, typically 3-4 days, but it can make for a tricky time with the boys club (plus mummy) left at home.  Mr Pickles has just headed off on a whirlwind nine day trip to the U.S.

All has been going well. Until we went for our regular pre-dinner walk on day two of daddy's absence. The Gherkin cried and cried (and cried). He wanted to hold daddy's hand, not mine. He wanted daddy to put him to bed tonight, not me. He missed daddy. He wanted daddy to be home. He wanted to tell daddy that he missed him. (Being in horribly different timezones stinks). We stopped, sat down on the grass and had a big snuggle until he stopped crying. And then kept walking.

My nearly five year old boy adores his daddy. And he is beginning to realise that one day he will grow up to be like daddy. He watches Mr Pickles like a hawk, like he is taking notes now, for later.

One of my big wishes for the Gherkin is that he grows to be one half of the beautiful man his dad is*.

So, today we made special love craft for daddy. Printed pages covered in hearts, a little white crayon and watercolour paint, and hours of entertainment for the Gherkin (who really, really loved seeing the surprise messages magically appear).

 Happy non-Valentines Day Mr Pickles from your tribe. We love you, we miss you, do not forget to come home! xo

 * hopefully a little better at doing the laundry though, so all his loved ones woollens don't end up felted ;)

pom pommerific!

I have a dream of one day doing my big boys' bedroom up in nautical colours (not a nautical theme). At the moment it is... let say, eclectic (the reason you won't see any photos of that room on this blog for quite some time!). Today, I promised them if they went to bed like big boys, I would make them something new for their room for bedtime tomorrow night. I am part of the way there! Hoping that the two wee boys may give me some time tomorrow to do some more pom pom making and complete the project by bedtime.

Hope you've been able to squeeeeze some crafting into your weekend too.
xo

doing better. and making stuff, too

Hi there!

Guess what? I have been crafting! Somewhat boxed into a corner, with a little friend's birthday party here all of a sudden and my inability to face putting the three boys in the car and driving into a local town to a toyshop, I had to make something. And so I did - voila!

My apologies for the crumby, crumby photography - this was taken using my dodgy ol' mobile phone on our way out the door to the party. It's a 0s and Xs (tic tac toe) set in a bag! I would love to take credit for this original idea, but it was absolutely inspired by the work of others, including:

Source: realsimple.com via Hannah on Pinterest

Source: salsapie.blogspot.com via Hannah on Pinterest

Source: alwaysexpectmoore.com via Hannah on Pinterest

Now I'm wishing I had taken a better photo of my effort (and wishing I had also had blue felt in the stash, to use instead of the yellow.. never mind!). I was so proud of this effort today, which was actually completed within a typical crazy day with three boys under five!

Doing better on the being more kind front. I find that the hardest thing about three small people is the constant lack of sleep. I know that this has spoken about by others, more eloquently elsewhere (like here), but sometimes, what I wouldn't give for twenty four hours filled with a solid night's sleep, a slow start and an afternoon nap! It is absolutely the key to my mood and my ability to be a great mum to my three beautiful boys. So, what to do in the absence of sleep? Fake it! I am trying to plan ahead distractions for the boys, and funny stuff too - silly things that will break the tension when these build. So far, so good.

Hope your weekend is a wonderful one xo

a month of moments - late (late)

Pregnant again (that is, last year, not again-again!), I wanted to make a place to welcome our newest family member. I knew he was going to be boy number three, but still wanted a space that was not too boyish, that was, well, lovely to be in. So, months of pinning images of other nurseries, lights, crochet works etc all resulted in this:




It's not a classic boy room but I love it for my wee pickle. Love the Helen Dardik print that ties all the colours in the room together and makes it fun. The other two prints we have in the room are also etsy finds, from seven star and nevertheless. Oh! and we also have a typography-style print designed by my very talented designy sis in law, with all of baby pickles' vital statistics.

[Oh, and of course my beautiful Billee the oobee by Leslie Keating - Billee has now been a very special companion for all three of our baby boys].

I was going to post this on the thirteenth for a month of - late, but I am, well, running late. You see, the mobile/lampshade is still incomplete - I still have to rethread the crochet motifs onto that magical invisible quilting thread, and have about another dozen that need threading. Oh, and the mat. Still unfinished - I have the binding half done... nearly there! Whilst searching for the binding I found some pre-cut baby short pieces on my wip pile for little pickle (now two) - if I sew these this week they may just fit baby pickle.

It seems that not only can I not complete my crafty projects on time, I also can't blog about them on time! Anyone else out there guilty of the same crime?

Perhaps an appropriate crime though for a post titled "late"... ;)

Chat soon xo

a month of moments - sleepy

Hi again!

Taking inspiration from the month of moments, here is my post for "sleepy".

This little stitchy thing was one of my very first, and I did it last year when I was spending a ridiculous amount of time commuting to work. Yep! Did this on the train. As my first attempt, I was determined not to buy any new threads, and just use what I had. I remember when one of my friend's husbands asked me why I was stitching a dead rabbit, to which I responded, if the rabbit was dead I would have done this for eyes X X. Now I look back on it, I would probably add eyelashes. Sadly, in a family jam-packed full of boys, there was no use for it after it was finished (too much pink), so it has been relegated to the "one day this might be good to use for something" box.

We have a terrible time with bedtime here. With a two and three quarters year old and four and a half year old sharing a room, nights can either be very lovely, with bedtime stories, lullabies, cuddles, and just so much sweetness, or completely chaotic with tantrums, screaming and, yes, poo jokes. We have a pretty standard routine, which involves my reading the same book last before lights out, and then followed by two songs. Sadly though, this is often not enough. Tonight though, was a Good Night.

Cowboys and cowgirls, sweet dreams in the hay, til you saddle the sun and ride into the day.
Goodnight.

(from Lasso the Moon - our favourite night time golden book - always read last).

Chat soon xx

country crafts

Hello!

Our new country home town has more events, festivals, shows than we would ever have thought possible for a town of less than two thousand people. One event recently saw the local crafters - the "needles and natter" group - coming out to present some of their works.

 

Lots of "standard" country wares - face washers with crocheted edging, knitted baby booties, crocheted toys. Also among them was a tablecloth work-in-progress by Diane Workman - a collection of doileys that she is handsewing together to make a tablecloth. I have had things like this pinned for some time, with a plan to eventually doing something similar, but never had I considered handsewing! This is truly a labour of love, and even as a work in progress, on its oversized quilting hoop, looked just gorgeous. Makes my fingers itchy! Must get crafting... xo 

distractions

Okay, I am a lot less productive than I would like to be on the crafting front. And today's post is really just a chat about nothing much - cute toys on the internerd, new books on the shelves....
However, big news!!! We have decided to move (again) --- this time to the country. The Southern Highlands of NSW beckons, so we are working out a way to be there by January next year (in time for the new childcare/working year). We are a restless bunch.
The boys are growing. The Gherkin has discovered Patti LaBelle and is in love (his spontaneous dancing to her album this week was amazing), and Little Pickle greets his dad by singing "Daddy, Daddy Cool". Too funny.

Oh! and The Gherkin met the lovely Justine Clarke at a recent concert. They spent their time after the concert comparing outfits. The Gherkin is a shy wee thing, and she gave him loads of time to warm up - we were very grateful.

I have found a cute cute cute site that translates text into old school library catalog cards --- here's a fun one made up for the hubby. Not sure how I might be able to use this, but...

Have just noticed I got our wedding date wrong! Hilarious (only out by four years...)

On other distractions, I have also found the site (that probably everyone else has, too) Two of Us. Heard of it? If not, the concept is, you take an image of your smile, send it over the internerd and instantly get one back from a stranger. That's it. I thought this was a really cute, fun idea, until I tried to send a photo of my smile... apparently my smiles are not convincing?

 

--- this looks like a genuine smile to me?

Perhaps I have struck a problem for people with gummy smiles? I remember some years ago when my brother and I were getting professional photos taken for our mum and dad, we were told by the photographer to "turn down the gums", as our gums were "reflecting the flash" and "ruining the photos". This led to many year of awkward fake smiles in photos... only now am I getting my real smile back.

Perhaps for Two of Us I should try a smile with low levels of gum exposure? It's just too sad offering up your real smile and getting back: "we're using a fancy machine to make sure you're smiling, and it appears you are not. Perhaps you should try again?"

My gummy smiles were returned as unsatisfactory by the machines (five times) - perhaps I will try with my mouth shut...

Really, all this smiling at the computer - I really should have been sewing!
Here are the books I have been reading this past fortnight - hooray for a great local library!!! (And at least I have been reading).

  

Chat soon lovelies xx

ps. for those interested, the closed mouth smile didn't work either... that said, it was a shocking fake!

pinspiration monday!

I have been coveting one of these or one of these fabric necklaces for ages, and have posted loads of these, or variations thereof, on my pinterest. So, on a stashbusting mission, off I went. I need to give thanks to the lovely Melissa, without her tutorial, I probably would not have been spending nap time this way, today.
Okay, so here we go...

From a green stretch fabric scrap (could have used an old stretch top - next time) I gave the rotary cutter a workout and cut five looong strips no more than 1.5-2cm wide (sorry, imperial peoples - maybe 1/2-3/4 inch?). Then The Gherkin and I played tug-o-war with the strips, til they were all curled over on themselves and were starting to look more like yarn (or zpaghetti).

Then, The Gherkin out of the house for a while, and Little Pickles faaaast asleep, I got to work!
I decided I wanted a mix of plaited (braided) and plain curled fabric, so my steps are a wee bit different from the original sources.

Step 1.
Tie a big ol' knot to join together three strips at one end. Plait (braid) away, until you think you've had enough. Something I discovered, was if you stretch the fabric while you are plaiting, you'll get a narrower, longer plait... see what you like, and do it your way! Tie another big knot. (or you could pin at this point but I am more of a lunky knot kind of gal... we're going to cut the knots off later, anyway.

Step 2.
Lay your plaited fabric on a flat surface, and then loop your long, non-plaited strips back and forth, back and forth, next to the plaited strip.

You can then pin one side of the looped ends together with the plaited end on the same side, or you can just cross your fingers as you carry it all to the machine.

Step 3.
Pop the ends you have gathered together under your machine foot and go back and forth, back and forth, until you think it will stay together.

This is when I then had a play to make sure I would be happy with the look of the finished product. Have a play. If you think you would like the plain fabric strips wrapped around the plaited strip, do this now, if you think you would like the plait to lie flat, do that.

And then get your other ends together and sew across these.

You now should have one "group" of fabric strips that have been sewn together at each end (and this is when I cut my big lunky knots off).

Step 4.
Now, stitch these ends together, one on top of the other. Now you have a loop. It's starting to look like a necklace now, right?

Step 5.
Find a wee scrap of the same stretch fabric and wrap it around the joined ends, as many times as you like. You could then stitch this in place, but I did some cheeky weaving in with my crochet hook... ;)

Step 6.
Check yourself out in the mirror! Lovely. Now, if you had been previously inspired (as I had) by this gorgeous pic, you may also have made it the right size to fit your head, too. Hooray!

ha ha love this cool backdrop???

what to do when the room is a pigsty.... sit in front of the towels on the clothes horse, of course!

Enjoy lovelies - do let me know if you have made on of your own. I am thinking, next one will be coral and egg yolk yellow. Or, maybe mustard with grey? Or pink. Yeah, maybe just pink. xo