A week of catch ups - day 2

A backpack for Sweeney...

A week of catching up!

This week I'll catch you up on all the crafty goodness that's been going on despite the blog absence!

... a bag for Inez

another one tomorrow!

subyX

nearly finished...

A beautiful curtain appeared on my front door for my birthday from Belgium!just shortly after I found this wonderful curtain from Cohuna...

and so my newly found Nicole Mallalieu handbag skills are getting some fine tuning!

since last we met...

Yikes time flies!

Things I have been doing since last we met...

...learning all about working with children with disabilites
...counting down til my Nikky Mallieliu handbag course
...swimming, fishing and mooching with the Casuarina crew in Darwin
...making crochet beanies
...playing with jaz and moo
...haggling with car salesmen
...haggling with rental managers
...cleaning up my room
...eating too much chocolate
...not blogging
...writing an abstract for the population health conference
...dreaming of retiring to Darwin
...project managing the shed renovation
...playing in the park
...missing my best friend emm
...celebrating another birthday

perhaps some pics next time...

subyX

Show and Tell

Instructions have been given for MORE SHOW- LESS TELL!! Thanks though to all who have expressed concern, but we're currently in play-it-down mode.


Anyway after a lovely break from the sewing room I've managed to complete some gifts that have been sitting on my desk for a very long time- some very belated welcome gifts for Lucia and Stella...




I've made an early start on the back to school products...






Yay I managed to get all my suby swim bag orders done before Christmas...

And my very favourite handmade Chritsmas gift was from the very talented Julie...

Other projects awaiting completion are my annual personalised calendars (so late this year!), 3 kids birthday parties (hence presents) this weekend, and of course pretty-fying the rest of the items on the grade 1 stationery and book list.

I'll leave you with a little blast from my past, Jhoanna's monk-chis and the ensuing discussions reminded me of him a while back. Isn't he cute!

PS don't know how long I can keep myself to this less tell pledge, so stay tuned!

as fate would have it...

Ok so for the bad news first... we didn't get the house! We were completely outbid, didn't even get a chance to get a bid in! If you missed the auction results last weekend it went for 1.121 million! Just a smidgeon over our budget (!) and almost $400,000 over the reserve! It was a great dream for a week though, and as a dear friend pointed out it was like we were in a movie for a week- completely removed from reality with our heads full of grand dreams! I'm sure the reality of living in a derelict mansion would have completely killed all those dreams after the first 6 months!

And so as fate steered us away from that crazy dream we were launched into the next rollercoaster of emotions- a cancer scare, but all ok for now we think...

Back to happy crafty news...

Did I ever told you about the singer story? The old treadly model that my grandmother brought over on a ship in early 70's?? The one that my uncle, after I said that I would take it off his hands, took to the tip???! It's always been difficult to talk about that story, but we recently struck gold at a country op shop and picked up this great old thing in perfect working order for $10! My grandmother must be looking out for me up there! And so I'm back on to my heavy duty jobs like handbags and for next year suede and leather diary covers. And so my first batch of handbags went out as Christmas presents for the kinder and school teachers.

Still working on last minute swimming bag and handbag orders before Christmas, but also trying to madly finish off more my own gift list. I haven't officially taken the handmade pledge, but it's something that I definitely do anyway.

Wishing you a very merry christmas, thanks for all your support and for checking into my blog! Check out our family christmas dance at http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1671923090

subyX

christmas confessions

OK confession number one... I'm one of those terrible mothers who loves to dress their girls in the same outfits, worse still in the same homemade outfits... eeek!






















I have wonderfully horrid memories of my own mother doing the same thing to my sister and I... (me second from right, little sister third from left) and I'm not going anywhere near the photos of the matching brown jumpsuits...








confession number 2... it is not the first year I have done it to them...






















or even the second...






















confession number 3...

ahhhh... it's my DREAM house... and it's up for auction this saturday! If by some small miracle we're successful then it might be goodbye small time sewing business, hello full time proper work...!







confession number 4... clearly I have no idea how to format this blog thing. Apologies for the poor layout!