Sweet Fabric:
family

I've banged on before about how I've lived my life on Map 46. I was born on the map, grew up on the map & married a boy from the map. Both our siblings live close by & we spend a lot of time with our families.

It was a tearful farewell when my sister & her husband made the move to Darwin 5 years ago. We've visited often & they came back each Christmas. I thought they'd never come "home".

The decision to move back was made swiftly and definitely.

They've moved into a gorgeous house (just a stone's throw from us) & I've been helping to get them settled in. She's done a sensational job of decorating on-a-shoestring. I finished off the family room with half a dozen cushions made from Warwick Fabric samples which serendipitously pull everything together.

It feels like she never left. I'm so grateful that she's made it home.

When I read I switch of completely. I plonk myself down & read & read like a woman possessed until the book is finished. I'm sure it's not the healthiest way to devour literature & consequently I don't read as much as I'd like ... my family needs feeding after all.

I was sent Like Being a Wife (a collection of short stories) last year & found it to be the perfect antidote to my obsessive nature. I took the book a story by story just when I had a few moments ... very civilised.

The wet, windy and grey few days in Queensland meant that I had the luxury of having absolutely nothing to do. I spent a lazy afternoon finishing Like Being a Wife by Australian author Catherine Harris.

Catherine writes beautifully. She is witty & wordy & wonderful. I highly recommend this work of fiction to you all.

Giant thumbs up Catherine.

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Catherine Harris interviewed.

Like Being a Wife from the publisher.

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I missed a day.

I had uploaded a couple of pics and then my internet dropped out...I was in Queensland. Then I dunno it just seemed wrong to be blathering on about my stuff when there was so much going on.

Safely back in Melbourne I'm thinking a LOT about the floods and those who have lost (& are yet to lose) homes & family.

She's a force.

What a lovely "welcome back" I received. Thank you all for your keen support.

The big girl has some vile gastric thing. She's small & thin & really can't afford a couple of days off the tooth. I'm crossing everything that the rest of us don't fall like flies.

The mattress has been dragged downstairs, off the carpet & in front of the Teev. It's just the way things roll in our house. You get sick & you move to the family room...a hangover from when I was a kid. I think a mattress on the floor is much more comfy than the sweaty brown vinyl couch I enjoyed as a kid.

Buddy sleeps on his own dog bed...always. BUT a comfy bed on the floor was simply too much for him to resist & I thought he looked so gorgeous so I left him.

Hoping she's back to her normal self quick sticks as she has quite a lovely crafty plan.

Despite the week long threat of rain & thunder storms, Saturday was the perfect day.

We all trundled out to the Yarra Valley for the wedding of my gorgeous cousin & her gorgeous fella.

My smallest was not officially in the bridal party but she's got a fair bit of spunk & kind of wangled her way in anyway. She did actually look like she belonged which was a happy coincidence.

The little dress was picked up at the Op Shop a few weeks ago. It's raw silk & still had the tags on it. OK so it's a size 4 & she's so not 4 but I think she looks super cute.

Since my disastrous ebay chaise purchase I've been on the hunt for a little sofa/settee/love seat for the space under the window in the family room.

Most of our furniture has been handed down, rescued, opped or picked up on the side of the road. This was not. It was purchased from 20th Century Scandinavia, 79 Lygon Street in Brunswick (9387 2664). That place is like heaven on earth. I was spoilt for choice!

I'm very pleased with the way everything has come together. I whipped up the cushions yesterday from a Warwick Fabric sample.

Read Lucy's post on 20th Century Scandinavia here.

The pencil scribble turned into a lino cutting adventure.

I had a lovely busy weekend...on the hook, on the lino, on the click, in the kitchen & with my family.

There was also a minor (but controlled) adventure with fire.

Not really sure if these guys are happy or running for their lives...

I'm a glass half full kind of girl so I'm ... choosing to see them as happy ... choosing happy for me & for my lovely family too ... & choosing a happy weekend for you all.

...the days
...the river
...my heart

What a gorgeous weekend we had!

The smallest (with gearless bike) wanted to go for a bike ride. We headed for Dights Falls...she wanted to go further...through the Children's Farm...up the huge stairs in Abbotsford...detour through Richmond...and all the way into the city...smallest commentary the WHOLE way...over 30 kilometres...I like a kid with heart.

The kids watched a street performer in Fed Square & then we packed our bikes on the train. It was just a short ride home in the semi dark from the station.

It'll be one of those days they remember forever.

& a little bit of making for me on Sunday too.

Just a bit of Monday eye candy really.

Isn't it beautiful? I picked it up at The Mill a while ago & it's just full of gorgeous supplies. My favourite treasure inside is the black & white stripey Myer bag which is filled with cut ribbon. It's a long time since anything from Myer came in a striped paper bag & I'm sure I can't remember anyone I know buying haberdashery from them.

Our weekend was relatively lazy - I can feel spring in the air & I'm thrilled about it. The Big Girl finished The Kite Runner on Saturday & the two of us sobbed our way through the movie yesterday.

Hoping that you had a fabulous weekend.

It's been an amazing week in my neck of the woods.

Just truly gorgeous things have been happening over the last seven days...

My sister & her family are coming home!!! You can't even imagine how insanely happy this has made me.

An amazing, amazing person sent me THE NECKLACE in the mail! Just a totally inspiring act of generosity.

I've received sweet handwritten notes, posts & lovely, lovely emails from internet mates. You know who you are and I thank you from the very bottom of my heart.

Finally, yesterday for no particular reason Auntie Pat gifted me a box of lambswool/angora Anny Blatt. This is an incredible treat.

All those years ago when I worked at Woolcraft I used to spend far too long "tidying" the Anny Blatt shelves so that I could enjoy the luxury of this yarn. I imagined that one day I'd be able to make something amazing with it.

Totally inspired by Assemblage & Aunty Cookie I've cast on a few stitches.

A quick scan of the house reveals at least one discard pile in every room.

In the family room there are 4 & I dare not venture into the craft room to count the remains of the day in there.

I've actually moved this scrabble discard pile at least 10 times to clean & then put it right back in the same spot.

I like 'em - they make it feel like home. It does mean that I have no recall for shoes, pjs, empty glasses & plates though doesn't it?

I had reason to be at The Mall in West Heidelberg yesterday. A place I haven't been since about 1985.

I stepped out of my car and as I took my first steps towards Cambridge Arcade I felt my scalp tingle and every hair on my body stand on end.

I could hear Non's Italian heeled shoes clip clopping beside me and I could smell her sickly sweet perfume. Max Bygraves was singing somewhere in the distance. Non's knitting was spilling out of the hessian bag I was carrying for her. I smiled knowing that she'd not be wanting to waste her 15 minute tea break just sitting in the tea room and chatting to the storeman.

I notice that the heavy steel grate that we'd struggled with had long been replaced but the terrazzo stairs are still there and I gasp...remembering how strangely scared I felt when I had to take those stairs alone.

I leave Non in the arcade and take the front entrance into the store. I feel tears welling in my eyes and a lump rising in my throat. Surely the store was bigger than this. It's a discount store now. Gone are the bays for holding yarn and the wall that divided the shop front from the "warehouse". There's been no refit though. The same peg board lines the wall where we used to keep the laybys and the floor and wall paint remain as they were.

As I walk toward the back of the store I spy the door to the tea room and a faint waft of International Roast coffee fills the air.

The shop which now occupies the space at the end of Cambridge Arcade is fittingly called The Family Store.

And this morning I went back to snap myself some memory anchors.

(or what goes around comes around). There's a photo of me aged 12 in our family photo album. It's 1986.

I'm sitting on a fence at Tooronga Zoo wearing Faberge Stretch Jeans, Dunlop Volleys, a sloppy t-shirt, a quilted jacket very similar to the one pictured & a rather awful sneer.

Apart from the quilted jacket which I'm yet to spy at Shoppo (but have seen glimpses of at Rummage), it could easily be a photo of my big girl. From a fashion only perspective though, she's always smiling.

Yep...we all know it's cyclical & I've got a fabulous leotard with built in overshirt I'm just dying to haul out of the dress up box.

I totally got this idea from a really old book of crochet afghans around at Auntie Pat's. The afghan was made in classic Nanna style with roses cross stitched into black in feature blocks on the afghan.

I've never been a big fan of double (US single) crochet because of the Aida like appearance of the cloth. Now I've found a reason to love it.

Never one to do things by halves the x's are all over the place.

The hat was constructed using a formula(!) & some fancy folding too. Amazingly, it fits the cute as a button kid it was gifted to. I just have to make sure that it wasn't a fluke & make another to test the theory & then I'll share it with you.

Have you seen something at my place that you like?

I've made a lot of stuff, hacked & re-worked a lot of stuff, found a lot of stuff & of course bought a lot of stuff too.

Some of the places I've made purchases over the years are listed here (in no particular order except to say that most of my favourite pieces have come from Step Back).

Step Back
Youngs Auctions
Camberwell Antique Centre
Camberwell Market
Maling Road Antiques
Smith Street Bazaar
20th Century Scandinavia
Arthurs Circus
Kyo
Simon Ancher
Bunnings
The Works
The Mill Markets
Op Shops
Ikea
Hard rubbish
Family "rescues"

& online
Ebay
Etsy (including but not limited to)...
Aunty Cookie, Loobylu, Bricolagelife, Vandalized Vintage, Tsk Tsk, Red Pepper Quilts, Meet me at mikes, Bellalulu, Yardage Design, Lil Sonny Sky, Gemma Jones
... for prints, soft furnishings & small vintage pieces.

Today my niece is 3. This is Milly.

I wanted to give her something really special.

A few months ago Jennie joined in with My Creative Space. I fell quite in love with her hand painted dolls & asked her to make a "Milly" doll. I sent a photo to Jennie, the next week I spotted Milly's lips on Jennie's post & the very next day she was in the mail.

Milly phoned to let us know that Milly doll had arrived & she loves her. She thinks her pretty long socks are wonderful & has asked her Mum for a pair.

Jennie makes to order, she dyes the face fabric herself, handpaints the faces & makes the dolls using fabric of sentimental value. I'm a sucker for a bit of sentiment so this is right up my alley.

All images have been taken from Jennie's flickr.
Jennie's shop here.
Jennie's blog here.

I made a lemon birthday cake for The Date...for desert at the family(his) lunch.

I'd scoured Delicious and found just the recipe. A nice list of ingredients that made me sure the resulting cake would live up to the "delicious" promise.

I made sure I had the best ingredients, nice olive oil, home grown lemons, quality prosecco, beautiful eggs. I set to work and made the cake. It did all the right things in my new oven (which I'm not great mates with yet) & looked gorgeous when I removed it from the tin.

I tasted the tiny bit that stuck to the side of the tin & my heart sank. It tasted very eggy.

What was I worried about? I'm normally pretty good with this sort of thing. I thought that there'd be plenty said about the egg cake rather than the lemon cake. Then all sorts of crazy food poisoning scenarios were running through my head.

I knew I wasn't going to be serving my cake. We went to Browns on the morning of & picked up a white chocolate & raspberry cheesecake (stunning) & a flourless orange cake (meh).

The cake was duly sampled when we returned home on Monday evening & it was, just as the magazine promised ... absolutely delicious.

There's a lesson here ... if you think it's good - it IS good & who cares what other people think.

It's been a big long weekend.

Shopping, cooking, footying, coffeeing, gym competitioning.

The biggest news in this lot of "ings" is that there was no crafting to be had - not even at the gym comp & I'm usually very well prepared for the 4 hours of boring.

& this is the way the weekend ended. Crumpled heaps in front of Masterchef last night & then falling into bed.

/craftroom with the big girl.

She's getting pretty good too.

These little easter egg hunt bags were made by her from entirely recycled materials. The fabric comes from a sample book & the jute was Op Shopped/thrifted a couple of years ago.

She's giving these to her brother & sister & her little cousins too. Sweet!

I love school holidays.

PS: The fancy new (but made of old bits o' technology by techie brother) media centre has caused us to exceed our download limit (which means it's faster to dial-up)!!! See you once we've sorted it out.