Belated Christmas wishes

I wasn't organised enough to send Christmas wishes to my faithful few bloggy mates before Christmas but I was thinking of you all and enjoying checking out what you are up to. I hope everyone had a beautiful Christmas and wish you all happy adventures in 2013.

We have had a lovely relaxed Christmas. Our girls seem so big now that they are both at school and that helps make the day easier when there are no naps etc to worry about and they cope better with driving to and fro the various family celebrations. They really loved hanging out with their big cousins. Although the ipads/iphones etc came out now and then, there was also chickens, a trampoline and games to keep them all amused.

I saw these little reindeers made of corks and twigs last year in a Better Homes and Gardens magazine and couldn't find any corks to make them. This year I was more organised and begged a few from friends who have a wine importing business. On Christmas Eve, the girls and I collected twigs and sat down at the table to create some little Rudolphs. Now they are living on the mantelpiece with our other favourite Christmas decorations.

My big girl knows the truth about Santa. I have never been very comfortable with perpetuating the myth even though I know it is part of the magic of Christmas for children. It always feels like lying to me. I said to our big girl "Let's not make a big deal about Santa coming" but of course our little girl was still keen to leave out carrots and biccies. We had to move the fireguard out of the way so Santa could get down the chimney. In the morning, she said "Why did Santa use our gift tags?". Perhaps next Christmas she might winkle out the truth.

Halloween etc

A little Halloween witch ready for "trickle treating"

A beautiful rag doll (who raided my wardrobe)

A girl, a cavalier (not ours) and a flock of seagulls

Life is crazy busy. Happy busy but photos and quick captions are all I can manage. Keep smiling, bloggy friends.

Mini quilts for sale.

Baby quilt for a special girl

I have been having so much fun making tiny quilts lately for our school fete and to give to friends that I have decided to make some to sell. I've also been making table runners for friends which has been great, as I've enjoyed the change from bright child type prints to something more grown up, like Kaffe Fassett fabric. I still have my little rainbow obsession (as my almost 10 year old daughter calls it) but the beauty of quilting is the endless possibilities of colour combinations. Here are some of my quilts. If you like the look of one, or have something different in mind, let me know, and I'll whip one up for you.



baby quilt for my nephew (with a seafaring daddy)



stars and stripes toy quilt

Kaffe Fassett table runner (wrapped in cellophane)

Rainbow mini quilt (toy size)



Helen's garden lap quilt



I also received my first stippling foot for my birthday in September so am excited to be able to start doing more complex quilting designs. It's been so freeing to move away from quilting straight lines and "in the ditch" and start doing curves and squiggles. Who would have thought cutting up pieces of fabric and stitching them back together could bring such an endorphin hit.

So...the upshot of all this is that I will soon hopefully have some mini quilts for sale and am happy to take orders. The little dolly sized quilts and table runners will be $20 and I haven't yet decided on a price for the larger cot sized quilts which are lovely on the floor for babies to lie and sit on. Perhaps around the $60 to $80 mark. I might get organised with an ebay or etsy shop down the track but for now, if you are interested, just contact me by leaving a comment.



rainbow tablemat

Many of these photos of quilts I have made  have appeared on my blog before but here are some of my favourites together in the one post.

The quilts are made with 100 percent cotton fabric and are machine pieced and quilted. The binding is sewn on by machine and then stitched around the back by hand.

I hope there is someone out there who needs a little quilt for a child, a dolly or a teddy.    Or a tablemat for a friend's table.       

baby quilt showing backing fabric



Baby quilt featuring Beatrix Potter fabric



baby quilt showing size

table runner (Kaffe Fassett fabric)



dolly quilt



boy's rainbow baby quilt

Catching up

 It's been quite a while between posts so I thought I'd just upload some of my favourite photos from the last few months to give a glimpse into what we've been up to. Looking back over the photos, I feel lucky to have had so many happy times with my friends and family. I guess we don't tend to photograph the bad days, do we? Nevertheless, I have been feeling the most relaxed and happy I have felt for a year or two and I am enjoying it so much. I think I have let go of a lot of my expectations of life, myself and others and am making peace with the messy, beautiful, chaos that is my reality. I even loosened up on the recent school holidays and stopped obsessing about how much TV/computer time/junk food the girls had and how untidy, and dusty the house was and taking home baked goodies along to get-togethers in the park with friends. Surprisingly, without any nagging from me, the girls still turned off the TV/computer and played outside climbing our bottlebrush tree and doing plays with their friends. The world didn't end because our house was untidy and nobody cared that I took chocolate chip cookies from Coles to the park for playdates.

The girls enjoying a ride at Movie World while Scott did some heritage work at the Gold Coast for a few days

Dress rehearsal for a planned production of Alice in Wonderland. (Can you guess which character this is? "I'm late....I'm late....for a very important date").

 I nearly burst with pride when my big girl played Dorothy in a Fame musical.(That's her in the blue gingham dress with Toto in a basket)

 I had a picnic with old friends at my old uni for my 47th birthday and the best part was watching the girls and their pals playing for hours in this enormous tree. The other best part was sitting by the lake, watching the ducks and their ducklings trot in and out of the water and chatting and eating yummy food with a handful of very precious old buddies.

 Some photos to show you what has been growing in my garden lately. How beautiful and cool is the green of this maidenhair??

 Most mornings I get up and go outside to see the morning sun on my flowers.

 Finally....some sweet peas! Is there any smell in the world more redolent of the innocence of a happy childhood?

 My newly planted little garden complete with lots of rocks to deter the Kipster from burying his bones. Fat lot of good that did!

 The kids in our street come to one of the G girl's regular free homemade lemonade stalls.

 With a special friend at Alma Park Zoo.

 Hanging out at the dog park with Kip (which we do maybe once every three months. Such slack dog owners!)

 The dog pog with a new chewy boney thing.

 My new hobby is making table runners for friends. All the fun of choosing fabric and playing with colours with a fraction of the time and money involved in sewing a quilt. I fell in love with this Kaffe Fassett fabric and am on my third table runner from three fat quarters.

 Facepainting at the Ekka

 ditto

 The girls chilling out at a friend's birthday party 

 With friends at the Medieval Fair

I've been making dolly quilts for our school fete and this one went wonky as some donated fabric wasn't 100 percent cotton. Never mind. After it was test driven by this rather surprised looking dolly, it went to a special little friend as I didn't like to sell a wonky quilt at the fete.

My beautiful Dad with some of his girls at Nudgee Beach on Mothers' Day.

I hope life is good at your place, bloggy pals.

Hello again

 Hello my lovelies.

I have got some weird errors happening with my blog and have been unable to get into it to do anything for weeks. It seems to behave better accessing it via Firefox than Internet Explorer but I've no idea why that would be. Anyway....I finally managed to find my way in and found that I had 5 comments awaiting moderation. Hmmmm! Don't remember switching that on but probably a good idea. So....a belated thank you to my bloggy mates who dropped by and left a comment. So good to see you.


Now that I have managed to do a post, I'll pop in a photo or two. I have just discovered the pixlr website which has lovely "Instagram" type filters that allow you to play with photos when you don't have an iphone. I finally have an iphone but strangely, I prefer pixlr to Instagram. Anyway......here's one of the photos I have been playing with.

My girls are growing up so fast.  My big girl is nearly 10 and my little girl has just turned 6. We had a huge party with all her friends and a good time was had by all. After we did the usual "pass the parcel" (with notes saying "to a girl with a happy smile" etc instead of the old stopping the music thing which I couldn't face with 16 children), birthday cake etc, everyone just hung out and kept eating and playing with hoola hoops, scooters, etc. It was lovely.

Not sure when I'll be back as life is full of "things to do", including writing a school history but I'm still visiting my favourite blogs to keep up with your doings. I just haven't been able to comment due to technical glitches with my Google account.

Take care
Hester

Just photos

Just a couple of photos for this post.



And these lovely masks are from Venice. My sister-in-law brought them back from a recent holiday and gave them to the girls who thought they were just magical



It's a lovely rainy day where I am. The only thing is I threw all the sheets and the towels in the wash and have no dryer. Might be a good time to go home to my mother for a visit.

A new chapter

One of the highlights of the school holidays for me was catching up with my oldest best friend who was visiting from Sweden with her family. It's wonderful for us to sit and chat while our four little girls (who have only met a handful of times over the years) hang out together, playing, reading and giggling. Makes me very happy. Funnily enough, our two oldest girls are quite similar in nature and so are our two youngest scamps. I guess it's maybe something to do with where you come in the family. It's comforting to know that big sister/little sister angst is not just happening at our place. And of course, we know how much they love each other really (Isn't that right, girls?)

Now we are into week 4 of the school term. I already feel like a different person - I am really benefitting from a big dose of peace and quiet five days a week. I feel very lucky to have a year off work to get myself together, get things around the house organised, cook more evening meals and iron more shirts for my hardworking husband who does so much more than his fair share around the house. And taking the girls to school and picking them up every afternoon without the added stress of rushing to and from work twice a week makes life so much easier. As everyone predicted, the hours when they are at school go very quickly and there isn't always time to do some quilting or have a nap. But I have already been to the movies a couple of times, caught up with my school mum friends and done a bit of reading/meditating so I am feeling really recharged.

I hope you are all having a happy and relaxing week.

2012

Well...finally 2012 has arrived. The year in which my youngest child starts school and I will have some time that is officially "mine" for the first time in some nine years or so.  I have a long list of lovely things I want to do like have naps, make more quilts, enjoy having coffee with girlfriends without being interrupted, browse peacefully in book/antique shops. I also have a longer list of things I need to do like housework, writing a history with Scott of the girls' school for its 50th anniversary, paperwork, selling things on ebay, getting a new laundry tap etc etc etc. Still.....I can feel the excitement bubbling up at the thought of only a week to go. I am on long service leave for a year which is a lovely gift from the universe. My new year's resolution this year is not to take any rubbish from anyone and to say "no" to anything I don't want to do. Sounds selfish but I need to do it.

Christmas was lovely. I hope yours was too. Like everyone I spoke to, the fortnight which preceded it was a mad rush but I tried not to get too carried away with trying to make it perfect. I bought the presents late but wrapped them early and managed to stick to our budget. I let the girls do the Christmas decorating of the tree and the mantelpiece and then enjoyed looking at their efforts. (I am still looking at them as my children NEVER want to take the decorations down). I was slightly stressed about the prospect of fitting in the usual morning presents and ham and eggs for breakfast, lunch with my family at my sister's, and then the afternoon and dinner with Scott's family at our place but I did all my cooking the day before and the day was a really happy and relaxed one. Fewer presents this year (cousins getting older and budgets getting tighter) but just as much love and food and music as ever.



I have been trying to eat healthily for the last few months but in the post-Christmas recovery felt the urge to eat one of my favourite comfort desserts from my childhood days. We had an elderly lady called "Mrs Nutting" (It was the 1960s-70s.... we didn't call adults by their first names) for a babysitter and she used to make us this chocolate blancmange and meringue pudding that we all loved. The chocolate part is made from bread, sugar, milk and I forget what else and you simmer it in a saucepan for a while before baking it until it is firm and then whacking on the meringue mixture and baking it for another hour or so. I can't be bothered posting the recipe right this minute but if you are tempted, let me know and I will stop being lazy and type it up.

While Scott was on holidays we just relaxed and did simple things. We went to beautiful Shorncliffe once or twice and let the girls run around like crazy things on the mudflats and fly their kites.

I thought Gret was going to break a rib she laughed and squealed so much with the joy of all that freedom. She ended up soaked in water with sand in her knickers and had to be completely rinsed and changed into dry clothes. She has an ink stamp on her forehead which adds to her general air of craziness.

It's nearly always incredibly windy at Shorncliffe so perfect for flying kites. All you have to do is hold the string and stand still and away they go.

Best wishes to all my bloggy friends for a lovely year in 2012. May life bring you many many happy moments.