Little Red Riding Hood Pencil Case

In an effort to keep up my creativity with as little effort as possible I did invest in some colouring books (always a favourite activity of mine in my childhood and with my own children) and some lovely coloured pencils which I can never resist.  My absolute favourites are the Inktense pencils by Derwent, stunning colours with a real depth and intensity of colour as the name implies.  However recently I discovered the Lyra brand, favoured by Steiner schools I believe - a lovely 'feel' to them when I use them and a similar depth of colour.  I had to buy them individually so no tin to keep them in as with the Derwent brand.  What was I to do to keep my pencils safe?

I made my own pencil case!  Using a tutorial by Noodlehead I slightly altered the measurements to accommodate the gorgeous fairy tale pictures on my retro styled Little Red Riding Hood fabric.  As you would expect from Noodlehead, it is also fully lined, and ... quilted no less ... with iron on wadding so no actual quilting involved, but it is lovely and sqiushy and provides extra protection for my pencils.  I so don't have a problem with over-attachment to  my art materials :)

I love you coloured pencils xxx

If you're happy and you know it ...

... wear your happy shoes.

And even more reason to wear them if you're not totally cheery.  Fake it until you make it :)

I do believe part of my feeling flat has been hormonal (judging by the smug look on my husband's face when I mentioned this, someone else believes this too!)  It's also the time of year, rightly called 'silly season' - as I realize the big day is less than 4 weeks, panic begins to set in.  Then it's New Year which for unknown reasons fills me with dread - this year, however, I am relishing the end of 2015 and the start of 2016 as this has been my own personal 'annus horribilis'.  Blimey this is starting to sound really maudlin, it will improve I promise!

Today has been a good day overall.  My lovely HB came with me today to my little job running a crafty 'social inclusion' group (hate that term but nothing else describes it properly so we will have to stick with it).  She was my extra pair of hands lifting heavy bags of crafts and setting up tables.  We made angels - unadulterated Christmas fun today!  When we finished, she looked at my very smiley face and said "you'd like to do this full-time wouldn't you mum" and I just grinned even more stupidly in reply because it's true.  I love my work as a mental health support worker, but it doesn't speak to my soul if you know what I mean.  Maybe 2016 is to be my year for pursuing dreams of artistic business endeavours.  It would be really great to stop procrastinating and just get on with it, and it would be a really cool way to honour dad because he wanted to see me accomplish my dream. Better stop talking about it and get doing ('she's all mouth and no trousers').

Whilst I'm rambling on I can show you why I love red shoes so much - this picture shows I started wearing them at a very early age.  You will have to take my word for it that they are red!  (I will have to find the colour version of this pic and you'll have to believe me!)  You can see that I hadn't quite grasped the 'happy shoes' concept though!  Do you have special items that make you happy?

Going around in circles

Sometimes my work includes working at a respite day where I'm in charge of the craft activity.  I need to find something fairly simple but interesting as we don't have oodles of time.  This month I've chosen circular weaving.  All you need is a paper plate (or 2 together if they're feeble and flimsy like mine were!), acrylic yarn in different colours, scissors and maybe a plastic needle if you find it difficult to weave using your fingers.

Of course I had to have a go myself :)

I found a really good resource too.  Mr E is my new art hero :)  I did have some idea of what to do, but when I started off on my own, things didn't look quite right!  This blog helped me realize I hadn't made the right numbers of spokes on my wheel - odd numbers are what you need - doh!  Then you'll get that beautiful 'under, over, under, over' pattern.  I'll leave Mr E to give you the instructions as he does it so well.  (Follow link above).

Lovely.  I'm wondering now what else I can create with my circles, I'm also thinking they could be quite addictive ...

Create it with Lego!

Forget about Cluedo.  Forget about Monopoly.  If you want creativity and a good time when you play a game with your little ones, this is the game to play!  Create-It by Lego.  So much fun should not be possible when playing board games!   I've been so busy with my new jpb, everyone has lost out on quality time with me, so when Little Man asked if he could possibly monopolize some of my time for a quick game I couldn't say no.  

And it was just so lovely.  Just him and I.  We played 2 rounds.  He won.  Both times.

Then we souped up our creations and had a fab time making car and boat and helicopter noises whilst driving our creations around the dog (and our dog around the bend) and the front room.  Awesome!  What a great way to start the day :)

Gingerbread House

Thought you might like to see the collaborative gingerbread house project between myself and my boys.  Impressive hey?  A lovely rellie sent us a gingerbread kit at Christmas and we thought it was time to make it!

This is my contribution, silver sprinkles and icey icing icicles:

And this is my boys' contribution:

Bless 'em ... 

Button Moon

Is it my imagination, or did there used to be a kid's programme called Button Moon?  It had a cute little song to go with it.  The beautiful, supernaturally big moon we had this weekend, coupled with my love of buttons inspired this temporary artwork.

I just adore buttons!  They are so cheerful.  I love the sound they make as I empty them on the table.  I love the colours and shapes.  I love simply playing with them and putting them back in the pot.  Love, love, love buttons.

Pretty sure I've mentioned this before in this blog - but someone different might read it this time and discover the wonderful, therapeutic quality of buttons for themselves.  I hope so. :)

Sunday is a Fun Day

Look at what we've been up to ... creativity abounds in the hills ...

Painting a cardboard box to make a spaceship - very serious work ...

Making an evening dress for my daughter - gorgeous red satin and georgette (not that I was saying this when I had to cut the blessed stuff out ...)  It's the short dress with frills in the top left hand corner ...

Finished off by an open air movie night at the school, watching 'My Neighbour Totoro' snuggled up with the kids under a blankie and the stars ... ahhhh, bliss ...

Illustration Friday - surrender

"Art is nothing but the expression of our dream; the more we surrender to it the closer we get to the inner truth of things, our dream-life, the true life that scorns questions and does not see them." ~ Franz Marc

 
What an awesome topic for this week's Illustration Friday.  As the week has gone on I have been contemplating the theme of surrender, which has spoken to me in so many ways, and my painting has evolved as time has passed.

So, what does this picture mean to me?  The swing is surrendering to my inner child - seeing things in the new way that children do naturally, also not to take life or myself too seriously.  Like me, do you love that feeling of freedom, total letting go of fear as you make the swing go higher and higher, the wind brushing your hair alternately over and away from your face?  I surrendered also in my painting methodology - I usually paint in acrylics so watercolour is a totally new medium (which I am loving), I left myself only a little time to complete the picture so had to surrender to looser, free-flowing techniques and just 'went for it' - how free it felt to paint like that, setting no expectations for myself.  Lastly, note the white streak in the hair - that's me accepting that I'm getting older!  I'm turning 41 this weekend and I do have my fair share of grey hairs; I want to accept myself as I am as I age and not get too frightened by it - and I am really happy and comfortable as I am.  Wow, that feels really good to state that here, after many years of fighting with depression and low self-esteem - this assignment has helped me surrender in many more ways than I could have thought possible.  Hope you take something from the picture too - art is for everyone, as you know I'm a firm believer of that.  Have a fabulous Friday. xx

Christmas reds

We've just come back from a Jack Johnson concert which was BRILLIANT!  As well as being marvellously talented, he's also a very generous man and gives 100% of his show's profit to charities that are part of his 'all at once' organization.  What a great example of giving at this time of year!

*********

RED:

A beautiful hibiscus - red for Christmas - and a sign of summer ...

Our Christmas wreath - simple to make but effective and a sign of Christmas ...

simply gather together your Christmas fabric, tear into strips and tie each strip in a knot around the wreath until it's covered.  Finish off with a couple of bells and some red and green ribbon to hang it up.  Very festive!

Eek - a whole week has passed since I last blogged - feel like I've been stuck in some kind of timewarp!!  And now I have another cold to contend with - slept most of the day whilst Dunc made the Sunday roast and looked after our lovely Japanese homestay guest.  That's the bind of winter I suppose, germs ...  or ... maybe I just like the heat and sun more than I thought?  Wow, this bug really has gone to my head!

Here is our little strawberry friend who for a few minutes before it was eaten became a rabbit, a mouse, little creature from the woods, anime character ... and so on.  Anything can capture the imagination and send it on a merry journey into the whimsical - one of life's pleasures!

What stash?

We've just returned from a school movie night, watching "Where the Wild Things Are" under the full moon and stars. Only here could you walk to the car and have a kangaroo bounce across your path. We still find that pretty amazing ...

Anyway ... I have to tell you about this darling little book I borrowed out of the library to take on holiday with me. It's called 'Hooked for Life - Adventures of a Crochet Zealot' by Mary Beth Temple. It's a collection of mini 'essays' on the history of crochet, how to control your stash, habits of crocheters and everything else you ever wanted to know about crochet enthusiasts. It even includes a pattern to introduce each part; I am so going to make the Goth Princess Toilet Paper Doll.

It is a lot of fun, and makes the reader feel secure in that they are not the only craft zealot in the world - there are millions of us out there! Yay! Here's a small extract about the inevitable yarn stash we are all guilty of having/hiding. It kept me smiling for quite a while!

"Okay, I am going to clean out the stash today ... I will condense, I will combine, I will find room in the stash closet where none existed before and this time, this time, I will not fill up the newly created space with random yarn purchases (which are not my fault because as we all know, nature abhors a vacuum and you can't fight physics)."

I feel so much better knowing my weakness is a scientific matter. You just can't argue with it, so the stash remains!

Things that make you go mmmmm ...

Okay, I need to try really hard to get back into the habit of blogging after being away on holiday. It was a nightmare blogging whilst we were away as my laptop decided it needed a holiday too and wouldn't work properly, eating up huge chunks of text (usually when I'd written something terribly witty and so unique it couldn't be recalled) or made the cursor disappear and turn up somewhere else in the body of the text. Consequently I wanted to give the laptop a flight of its own and chuck it out the window, so I stopped blogging!

But now I am back in my snug little office with my PC and have no excuse really for not writing. To make it easier I thought I'd start with a few lovely treats I've had over the past few days.

Gorgeous cupcake and pink spotty pencil - who could resist when it's from a place called 'Speckle Farm' (certainly not me)

The first is a true delight - just look at that beautiful colourful cupcake. Hm, hm. If you haven't tried the cakes at Little Miss Cupcake in Kalamunda then you don't know what you're missing. It's such a hard decision trying to chose the one you want to take away in it's own little noodle box, so that you can ritually unwrap it as you sip your cup of tea. Yum, yum, yum ... And the best thing about this treat is that I was on my own, and I didn't have to share it with anybody. Ha ha! All that sumptuous icing and crunchy red flower to myself. Oh joy! Mmmmm ...

The treats didn't stop there ... on Saturday I spent the morning crafting with my Saturday craft buddy, both of us sitting at the kitchen table making patchwork and sipping tea and chatting. Then to complete the day a friend of ours cooked dinner and we shared it with friends and a good bottle of wine. Mmmmm... Sunday morning brought more creativity when I walked across the road to my very arty friend who has a studio under her house - we sat together at the workbench, each with a cuppa and a slice of clay and made a plant pot and a platter. The clay was rolled out, then we made impressions in the clay with various 'natural' stamps, e.g honky nuts, she-oak seeds, fern leaves and cut out pieces to line a terracotta pot which acted as our mold. I was called over later in the day when the pots had dried a little and could be taken out of the mold and stand under their own weight. Unfortunately, I forgot to take my camera, but I should be able to take some pictures when they come back from firing later this week. Goody, goody!

My Spotlight hoard - I bought eco-friendly yarn to make a hoodie, 8-ply to make an afghan for our bedroom (it will be a product of the 'granny a day challenge', a light to clip to work I'm doing, some pretty quilting pins and a plastic pot which has a lid with a hole in the top; it's for putting your yarn in so it doesn't get dirty. Fabulous. The dark tubular thing in the background is my wrist support which I've taken to wearing when crocheting.

And just before you think things couldn't get any better, the mmmmmmm factor went into overdrive with a visit to Spotlight, the two vouchers I received for my birthday burning a hole in my pocket. And yes, I spent the whole amount and have a huge mountain of yarn to knit and crochet, and a couple of things I wouldn't normally buy but wanted, to show for it. Bliss, bliss, bliss ...

Back to the real world tomorrow with decorating the house and starting my monthly bookkeeping. But I don't care because I have more than enough 'mmmmmm' to last for a good few weeks yet!

Fireworks - the ultimate in bling!

Sunset over Perth City, silhouette of trees in foreground - love the drama

Fireworks on the tall city buildings can just about be seen to the right of the picture.

The finale - more drama to light up the skies

Finale in more detail

Managed to get a few photos of the fireworks display in the city last night, from our vantage point in the hills. I love the drama of sunset skies! And the bling and glitter of fireworks, scrummy!

My wrist is feeling a lot better. Many thanks to the lovelies who gave me advice on how to deal with the problem. I was advised to do pre-crochet stretching exercises (on my wrist that is, crochet is not quite an extreme sport yet) and to gently squeeze a foam ball. So, I found out my small foam star with a smiley face on it and did some hand squeezing of that and gently stretched my wrist before crochet and I really think it worked. I'm also going to invest in a good wrist support - I did find a good website which sells wrist supports but I won't give you the link until I've tried the product myself in case it's pants and doesn't help at all! I only want to recommend things that work.

As well as the above I've been taking lots of fish oil capsules, as they are apparently very good for, well everything really, including joint pain and improving how the brain works (definitely needed). If nothing else, I do seem to be swimming a lot better lately ...

Manual countdown says: 10 days until my 40th birthday!

The Colour Purple

The top that started it all


Magical tie-dye


My lovely purple top - which I will wear!

I absolutely had to show you the results of my tie-dying project, which I started yesterday evening. The instructions tell you to immerse and agitate the items for dying for 30 minutes but I like to leave the dyebath overnight so the colour can really sink into the fabric. Then like the big kid I am I skipped into the laundry this morning to untie the wool from my fabric bundles and see the magic happen!

The fabric is simply calico, which I had intended to use for bags, but now I have the desire to make a groovy skirt with it. We'll see ... The top with sequins was beige (arrgh) and gave a rather 'nude' effect so I never wore it for obvious reasons! My hippy top is the one that motivated me to dye - it was very faded - my sister had given it to me years ago (or I may have 'borrowed' it) and it's very sentimental to me as well as being great protection from mozzies in the evening. So it has been resurrected. I'm rather pleased with it. Purple is my most favourite colour, and this shade is just gorgeous. It's called aubergine by RIT, and I buy it from Zena's in Lesmurdie (brill shop), though I guess you can buy it in most craft stores. I remember my friend in primary school wore a purple paisley dress once - it was a true 1970's design, but I was so envious. I still remember it to this day, whereas everything else is a faded memory. See, that's the power of purple!

Merry Christmas to one and all!

The beautiful lilies I received yesterday from my husband as part of my Christmas gift. They are presently filling the house with heady and exotic floral scent. Mmmm...


Out in the garden today, relaxing with a cup of tea, barbecue in the background.


A Lego man is overwhelmed by the whole Christmas experience.

Firstly, a Happy Christmas to everybody! May you be enjoying the festive season wherever you are in the world.

Secondly - what a lovely day to reach my 2009 goal of 250 blogposts! Hurray!

We've had a very peaceful Christmas, enjoying each other's company and eating a healthy Christmas dinner. It's true! We just can't party anymore as much as we used to when we were younger. We have to be kind to our bodies! My best present has probably been getting to talk with my family overseas and hear how different their very cold Christmas is - whereas we've been in the pool as it's so hot here. Which is probaby where we'll want to be tomorrow as we're venturing into the city - always looking for adventure!

Snowman Part 2

Here's our newly renovated snowman - and he looks gorgeous if I say so myself! You can't really see the glitter on his hat and scarf, but believe me, it's there. I even painted his mittens a lovely purple, rather than re-painting the old black. The children were well pleased and rushed out into the garden to re-instate him. That's the biggest compliment of all I think. Our neighbours will also be happy as they were the ones who motivated me to do something about our broken snowman because they'd noticed we hadn't put him out this year and they missed him! So everybody's happy. What a great ending to my little story!

Only 3 sleeps to go! ...

Snowman Part 1

Here is our poor old snowman sign looking worse for wear. One of his mittens fell off last Christmas and I only found it when weeding in the garden this October! My project here is to rebuild him and give him a bright new coat of paint. It also heralds a new section to write under, about recycling or renovating items to give them a new lease of life; I'm going to call this new section 'make do and mend'. I know recycling is the word of the moment but I wanted something more zingy and less serious sounding! I'll post a pic of the snowman in situ tomorrow - he's still on the kitchen table being painted at the moment.

I must be getting excited about Christmas and wishing it would get here quickly - I'd just put the bins out at the bottom of the drive when our neighbour pointed out that it's a day early. The bins are staying where they are. He was very nice and said he could put his bins out today too so I didn't feel so silly, though I told him that wasn't necessary. Kind thought mind ...

Righto, off to put some glitter on my snowman - bling, bling!

Monsters!

Just had to post pics of our artistic endeavours of today! We saw how to make these little critters on a kids' programme and decided to have a go ourselves. They are really easy if you want to have a go yourself - we're planning to make smaller ones, paint them gold, use massive amounts of glitter then hang them up for Christmas.

What you need:
Air dying clay, cotton buds (Q-tips), piece of wool or string, paints, glitter, anything else fun to embellish with.

How to make your monster:
1. Make a loop in the end of your piece of wool, push it into the middle of your lump of clay (not too big as you want to be able to hang it up and the clay is quite heavy). Really squidge the wool in the middle and roll clay into a ball with the length of wool sticking out.

2. Cut off one end of each cotton bud and push into the clay. I made a tripod of legs so the monster could stand up whilst I painted it, whilst the other monster has more of a wild hairdo - let your imagination guide you!

3. Make 2 (or more!) eyes from clay and stick them on. Be prepared to stick them on with glue after drying as we had to!

4. Let monster dry, approx 24 hours.

5. Paint and glitter in true monster style.

I know this project was on a kids' programme, but it was so much fun!! Don't know who had the most fun come to think of it ...

Revisiting my dim and distant past!

Hello there! How's your Halloween been? I bought some bags of sweets in case of trick or treaters as usual, no-one turned up as usual, so we ate all the sweets as usual. :) Yum. It's just an excuse for us all to pig out on lollies really ...

Anyway, today I've been thinking about how my creativity has developed as I've got older and remembered that I found some old drawings at my mum's when we visited the UK last summer. Here's one of my favourites - I think I was about 16 or 17 when I drew it! This piece of paper is over 20 years old! Yikes. Although the face is not in proportion and there are heaps of things 'wrong' with it technically, I like the overall feeling of light and vitality it exudes. And who wouldn't love luscious hair like that! It also sparked a history lesson, one of my children asked who Lucy was and when I replied it was one of the Beatles' songs was faced with a blank look. And ... they had no idea who John Lennon was! What are they teaching in schools these days? (Now I am sounding like my dad!!) It's great to keep a record of everything you create, in a journal, photos, sketches - interesting to see the development and the individual style you follow. Snippets of your life on paper ... I like the thought of that.

Getting ready for summer

A Tale of Two Seasons - winter warmer and summery skirts

Why, you may ask, have I taken a picture of my wardrobe? Well, today was a day for doing chores as the weather outside was unbelievably winter-like - heavy rain, trees swaying in the wind and very cold. Strange after a day like Sunday when we were all wilting in the heat! One of my chores has been to find out my summer clothes and put away my winter stuff (felt a bit premature doing that after today). Anyway, I love wearing my pouffy, tiered skirts in summer but up until today I've had to try and squeeze them into my chest of drawers - no more! I spent a small part of today choosing ribbons to sew into the waistband of the skirts so that I can hang them up in the wardrobe. Now I get to look at a kaleidoscope of summer colours every time I walk through my wardrobe and I just love the way the fabric 'flouffs' out as if each skirt is saying 'pick me, pick me!'.

The winter warmer mentioned above is the purple scarf I started knitting a couple of months ago - obviously too hot to wear these days, but it's so frilly and twirly I'm thinking of keeping it as a decoration, simply to look at and enjoy! I have a soft spot for the yarn I used as my gran used to knit matching cardigans for my sister and I in the multicoloured wool. Funny how we form our attachment to things isn't it? And how much pleasure these little things bring us! Here's to noticing the smaller things in life that bring us big smiles - may we all have time to notice them!