Blogtober Days 14-15 - A Breath of Fresh Air

Sorry to miss Friday's Blogtober post, but I knew that there was a photo opportunity coming up on Sunday! We went to help my parents out at Blackwood. They have a small holiday cottage up there and every year before the summer hits, a property clean-up is in need. Our family has long had a connection with the town - my grandfather was born there in 1905. It was a goldfields town in the nineteenth century and very different to what it is now, back then it even had its own skating rink! Now, it is a very peaceful place with lots of lovely walking tracks surrounding it. I took the time to snap a bit of the pretty native foilage yesterday - the gumnuts above, for example.

As well as taking a walk to the local cemetery where there are lots of beautifully ornate Victorian gravestones and memorials.

This is called broome, I think. So pretty - I brought a bunch home.

A lovely ivy grove which has developed quite spontaneously under a huge gum tree. I am quite sure the fairies live here. I was always told not to knock over toadstools (of which there are many at Blackwood in winter) when I was child because fairies lived under them.

Another native...not sure of the name (sorry!). This plant lived on our balcony when we were still renting and died a sad death - my mother has resurrected it.

Such a nice day! Hope you had one too.

Blogtober Day 13 - Fiddling About

I like to make jewellery and I am trying to add some new strings to my skill bow so I can make a few new bits and pieces for my Etsy shop, In Dark Woods. So it is that I am trying to work with wire at the moment. What I've discovered this afternoon is that I really need some round-nosed pliers if I am going to be able to make nice, neat spirals. I have had some fun in the meantime, though, 'free-forming' with the wire, binding it around and around some pieces of sea-glass to just see how they turn out. I quite like them and I think the irregular wire work suits the ragged pieces of glass. What do you think?

And a perfect accompaniment to this sort of fiddling is The Sundays on You Tube. What do you listen to while you work?

Blogtober Day 12 - Stitch

I was delighted to find this hand-worked tablecloth in an op-shop today. It's covered in these lovely, folky panels. Pretty, isn't it?

Blogtober Day 11 - Thrifting Love

This beautiful Berggren breadboard at The Travelling Owl ~ http://www.etsy.com/shop/wyoupcycler?ref=pr_shop_more

I love folk art and lately have developed a taste for the Scandinavian Berggren style. As ever, Etsy is a dangerous place for me to be...

A lovely grater at My Parents Attick ~ http://www.etsy.com/shop/myparentsattick?ref=pr_shop_more

Check out this pretty breadboard at Suzincolo ~ http://www.etsy.com/shop/suzincolo?ref=pr_shop_more

I love this keyholder at Scavenger Hunt ~ http://www.etsy.com/shop/scavengerhunt?ref=pr_shop_more

Happily though, I found some sweetly pretty Russian pieces to add to my collection while thrifting today.


Happy Days!

Blogtober Day 10 - Hassle Free

My parents celebrated 42 years of marriage on Saturday so we had dinner with them and I provided some sweet goodness. I know some very sloppy icing skills are on display here but sometimes I just can't resist letting the icing go 'sploosh!' and being the very antithesis of 'cake decorated' cakes with their undoubtedly very skilled but rather artificial little roses and so on. The recipe I went with was really lovely and moist and it was -

1/2 cup butter, melted
1 cup sugar
2 eggs, well beaten
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup milk
1/3 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup sugar

Mix together 1 cup sugar and butter.
Add eggs and 1 tablespoon of lemon juice; mix well.
Add salt, flour, and baking powder to mixture.
Add milk.
Bake at 170°C in a well greased loaf pan for 1 hour, or until golden brown.

[from http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090401215813AAHiS6k]

Yesterday my sweet husband and I went to one of our favoured bushwalking spots - favoured because there are also some very nice lunch options and a great second-hand bookstore not too far away!

I enjoyed watching the bug life going about its business...

And was really struck by the muted greens, yellows, browns and greys of the Australian bush that seem to be about at the moment.





At the bookstore I found The Illustrated Hassle-Free Make Your Own Clothes Book by Sharon Rosenberg and Joan Wiener. It was printed in 1971 so the front cover is suitably hippie and there is a definite sprinkling of 'I really dig that'-style comments throughout but I am super keen to start sewing some simple clothes for myself and this book seems to set everything out really simply and clearly. We'll see if it lives up to its claim of being hassle free! Has anyone else read and/or sewed with this book?

What did you while away your hours with this weekend?

PS I couldn't resist posting this very brief clip from the wonderful British comedy Miranda as she notes ways in which she is turning into her mother - one of which is by commenting on a cake's moistness (this is prompted by my own comments above).

Blogtober Day 9 - To see the ivy

We are having some gorgeous weather here at the moment. Lovely and warm with blue skies, the garden abuzz with insects and everything growing like mad. Despite the fact that I'm facing two deadlines (or perhaps because), this cheerful weather is putting me in a rather frivolous state of mind, in which I would much rather be sitting in the back garden reading Little Dorrit or continuing on knitting my first ever attempt at a cardigan than staring at the computer. For some reason, all this put me in mind of the 1981 series Brideshead Revisited, especially the first few episodes (it all gets fairly messy and bleak by the end). There's not only the lovely way the series is shot to gaze upon, the way in which the characters are played to relish (I love Sebastian almost as much as I love Aloysious) and of course Evelyn Waugh's brilliantly wrought plot but there's that wonderful soundtrack by Geoffrey Burgon which wends its way so perfectly through the series, making the entire package of vision and sound in these initial eps seem like one's witnessing some sort of dream. Ah, gorgeousness!



By the way, when do you do most of your reading and knitting? I am trying to do mine in the evenings but I find I am making no progress at all because I doze off, despite the fact that I am very interested in doing both!



And finally, has anyone ever knitted a fair isle jumper? I am in love with them at the moment but they look very difficult to make but are quite expensive to buy complete on Etsy. I suspect as a baby knitter they might be a bit beyond me at present, but I'd love to know about your experiences.

Blogtober Day 7-8 - Johnny Cash and Chocolate Cake

Oops! Only seven days into Blogtober and I missed a day. Work got a little bit crazy yesterday and then I remembered that I had volunteered to make the cake for my mother's birthday dinner last night...!! I went with this one - http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/18086/super+easy+chocolate+cake - which was delicious and a big hit.

I loved the movie "Walk the Line" about the American singer Johnny Cash. I've been a fan of Joaquin Phoenix since I saw him in "Gladiator" and, having seen the film, I also became a big fan of Cash's music. It seems to me that his songs (and the covers he chose to sing) remarkably spanned the spectrum from tremendous toe-tapping optimism to real melancholic despair. Here's two great examples of both ends of that span.