Flowers, Tea towels and Cookies

Flowers by Lilly, thanks little you are so sweet!

Tea towel by Mum.  For my birthday a  bit back.

Choc chip cookies by me.  With a added 1/2 cup coconut for a different twist!

What we did on Mothers Day...

We took some photos of Granma's presents after breakfast in bed.

We (me) are now addicted to making hexagons and don't know what to do with them all!  Click here to check out my gorgeous dolls quilt that Nanny made me when I was little out of scraps and hexagons.  It is very very special.

Back of the bag. 

These are all Nanny's scraps and some of the pieces were already put together.  I made some mini log cabin pieces and chopped up some more white and joined them all together to make the back piece of the bag.  Cousins and Aunties who read this will recognise some of the fabric from items that Nanny has made into beautiful items for them.  I think Nanny would be pretty happy that I am still using her fabric, esp to make something so special for my Mum who misses Nanny so much. (me too)

Inside of the bag with a special zippered pocket so Mum doesn't lose her stuff and a key loop.  Here is a link to how to make that pocket, it was easy Mum!

We tried out Mum's other gift, a tea cup bird feeder.

We admired the only flower on my Just Joey rose and admired the blue hyacinth for Mum as well.

We went to the beach, gave Granma presents, cards and chocolate.

We did my most favourite thing: collect shells. 

We had a Mothers Day photo, I love you both so much!

After lunch, we fitted in a slice of Mum's sponge, it was good as usual.

We came home, sorted shells, threaded shells and tied another string of shells and threw the ones with no hole in the shell garden.

The boys did some mowing.

We put the other teacup bird feeders in our garden to try out.

They don't match, but aren't they cute anyway.

And lastly, my little boy, found a bird ornament try it out.  Looks like a nice sturdy perch Joe boy. 

Mothers Day Creations

This is what I am working on at the moment.  A bag for Mum for Mothers Day.  I got inspired to make hexagons after checking out Lisa's.  I planned on using more of Nanny's scrap fabrics to make this bag so a few pieces became this hexagon.  Hexagon tutorial from here.  The reverse of the bag is patchworked scraps and you can see the handles below. 

Now lets hope the sewing machine is in a mood for sewing plastic this afternoon.

And my other project are these vintage tea cup bird feeders, seen here.  A great way to recycle old teacups.

Lastly, my 2 finds at the Antique Fair recently.  This teacup would make a super duper bird feeder but I am a bit partial to yellow teacups at the moment so it will stay unglued for now.

Have a Happy Mothers Day!

xxx

Table Runner

I made this gorgeous table runner this arvo after school.  Mum got the fabric in Bowral and the ric rac at the Remnant Warehouse.  She got lots of other good stuff as well and I am very jealous I wasn't with her when she bought it all!  My excellent Aunty was though, and took her to some really awesome places, you are so lovely Lydi!

I got that red and white stripey jug in Sydney so the runner and jug should feel right at home.  It looks kind of Christmasy too so I'm happy with that on the table right now.

And this is the rest of Mum's shopping, a little bit of Love (another skirt in the making), some Kaffe Fassett, Anna Maria and some more of those table runner panels.  The big dusty blue and strawberry piece at the bottom of the pile is for a massive tablecloth Mum is making.

How cute are these crocheted teapot cosies.  The little one was $8, its hard to see clearly but there is masses of hours in them, the black background is all crochet as well.  We love pansies!

Lastly my work in progress, Lill's next bebop cardi, one that fits hopefully.

x see you next time

Sydney part Two

...here's a few quick pic's of Mothers Day in Sydney!

Tulips

my completely most favourite flower in the whole world, although these roses are up there! as are most things in Mum's garden.

But gee I love tulips especially when you see them in big bunches like this.

Moving on to the most deliciousness thing I've ever eaten on Mother's Day...

High Tea at the Queen Victoria Building.

Holy smokes was that the best thing I've ever had, nothing nothing was wrong or even a tiny bit wrong. We (Kimmy and I) sat in there for 1 1/2 hours savouring every treat on that plate, drinking 3 cups of tea each, watching all the goings on, marvelling at the sheer amounts of Old Country Roses strewn all over the room and most strangely having our voices change into new alter-ego's.... Sarndra and Sateen (the Prue and Trude type). Private joke.

We had sooooo much fun and spent too much money but gee we missed our children. Next Mothers Day I have promised Lilly and Mum I'll take them to Sydney for High Tea.

On the craft front here at the Mummy Made It house, its all crochet crochet crochet. I have done 2 beanies for Lilly, which are too small, they only take 2 hours or so to do and in my experience I need to follow the pattern exactly the first time before I go changing things to suit. So now I am working on the changed versions. When I get it right, I'll tell you all about it, including links to the tutorials I used and what changes I made to suit my kids heads! I've got Mum working on a matching scarf, a stripey ripple scarf to match some new pumpkin patch leggings I got Miss Lilly. And I've half done a beanie for Joe boy in some lovely Jet wool. We are headed to New Zealand in August so we need lots of winter woolies.

p.s. I've turned off the auto music so you need to press play to hear it now

and the new song is from the Tinkerbell movie and so sweet! We love it!

Mothers Day Crochet

Nanny taught me how to crochet when I was 12 and that is probably why I can still do it, unlike knitting (another recent failure confirms that!) I love crocheting, I have never really done anything besides round and round blankets and granny squares blankets and those handy teatowels you hang in your kitchen. I saw a pattern recently in Better Homes and Gardens for crocheted flowers and got inspired to make some flower corsages, since Mothers Day is this week and I always try and make Mum something hand made to go in her present. This year she got a Pandora Bracelet, the I LOVE YOU charm, some blue tea towels and this gorgeous thing...

This pattern is from here, a new favourite blog to keep track of and the most gorgeous crochet. I added an extra row of petals (the darker purple around the outer edge). I also made one for Lilly's lovely teacher.

And since I am jumping ship this weekend and missing Mothers Day (don't worry I am sick to the core about it, truly I am) to attend a Conference in Sydney with my second best friend, I had an early Mothers Day with my little treasures.

This little boy couldn't wait to give me the present he made at Kindy, a gorgeous card with a photo of us on the front and a bag of homemade Coconut Ice! It was yum, we scoffed it down together, thanks Liza! I love the way Joey says Liza....Wyiza!


And today at Grade 1 the Mum's had a very special pampering complete with massage, manicures (my pink polish is still gleaming and its staying there for the trip to Sydney!) hair brushing, jewellery making, fruit kebab feeding, puzzles, singing, poems and lots and lots of love and hugs!

Happy Mothers Day to all my friends and family who are Mothers, Grandmothers etc, I will be enjoying this on the day with Kimmy and no doubt very very homesick for those 2 little people pictured above, and my husband of course!

Tree Climbing

Having trouble uploading pictures and the order they are appearing, since blogger won't let me rearrange them on the page anymore, grrrr.

So the above collection is of my gorgeous mosaic butterfly Mum made me that hangs at the front door. A snippet of our new front fence made from recycled materials, cept the small dog wire to keep The Fox in and some pictures of what goes on here every afternoon after school: tree climbing and tyre swinging. We don't have DS's or whatever they are called!

My Mum's Garden

A bit back I mentioned that my Mum was very clever at sewing but doesn't have much time for it anymore because she is very clever at something else as well...

So she has the most amazing garden ever and just loves it! Actually Mum and Geoff, my step Dad have the most amazing garden ever. I took these pics the other day when we spent the day swimming in the pool and checking out all the tracks and hidey places. This place was once an overgrown 3 acre horse paddock with a dam in the corner. And now about 11 years later it looks like this!!

She has always been good at gardening even when I was little and we lived at 'Inverness' in the cottage, there was always a garden with flowers everywhere in beds surrounded by rocks, so neat. With stuff that grew in that area. She is good at that. Drive around your area and see what's growing is what she says and then buy that. She turned up at our place yesterday morning with a load of flowering trees for us and today we walked around our yard and figured out where they will all go.

There are ducks on the dam, pet ones, that get fed bread, and wild ones that join in too. This is the one and only duckling that managed to hatch and survive from 9 eggs in the nest on the bank of the dam hidden in a nest amongst the Bromeliades. We are hoping it survives, there are eels in the dam, so far it has escaped them and also bad dogs or foxes we think that usually get the ducklings or eggs before they hatch.

There are ducks, chooks, dogs, a cat, lorikeets and possums to feed, and... the birds...so I won't remember all of them but roughly: 4 eclectus parrots with babies Jim and Bob, Sun Conures, Finches, Red Rumps, Cockatiels, Burkes Parrots, Splendid Parrots, I forget the rest, they deserve a post of their own! But there is a whole lot more than what you see in these couple of pics, stay tuned...

My First Quilt...

...and I am very proud!

It turned out great, probably thanks to the fantastic art work supplied by my daughter's class of beautiful kids. I just love our school and the teachers are the best. I was asked to make a quilt, if I could, for my teacher by our other Prep teacher who is as equally as wonderful and so very nice to think of our teacher. So she got the kids to secretly draw a picture and say something special about our teacher using fabric pens on pre-cut calico squares, then I got the job of putting it all together along with the lovely poem she found.

I have to thank my Mum for handstitching the binding down to the back. I used Heather Bailey's binding tutorial to get the corners right. I bought a walking foot for the quilting part and (hope this is the correct term) quilted in the ditch around each square. I think the quilt measures about 140cm square and I made a matching carry bag since I had a fair bit of leftover fabric.

I can't wait till the kids give it to her on Friday, she is so special and deserves every ounce of thanks we can show!