Jen
Saturday, April 30, 2011
April
Poor neglected blog, here are some April photos. It's been a busy month, Darron won his category in a half marathon, the cat was a pest, Coen turned five and went to see some dinosaurs!
Jen
Jen
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
We Love Zoos!
We really do! I think our FOTZ membership has been the best idea we had in a long time. Last weekend we packed a picnic lunch and some snacks and headed over to Weribee Open Range Zoo. The weather was gorgeous, the animals were wonderful and we had a fantastic day!
I find giraffes quite facinating. They are so delightfully odd looking. Can we really be sure they're from this planet??
We saw meerkats,
and big cats,
and chickens.
Yup, chickens.
Hippos! Cute and deadly!
Well these ones were just cute.
We saw meerkats,
and big cats,
and chickens.
Yup, chickens.
Jen
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Our Trip To The Museum (Warning - Contains Snakes)
We had been looking forward to today's trip to the Melbourne Museum all week. We got ourselves ready reasonable early, for a Sunday, and set off. As we drove towards the city the sun was shining, it looked like it was going to be a beautiful day. Then as we drove through the park we spotted the sign for the Melbourne Zoo. We joked a little about it being a beautiful day and how we could go to the zoo instead of the museum, and before we knew it we were through the gates, proud owners of a Friends of the Zoo membership!
We wandered straight into the the Reptile House.
Warning! ~ Next photo is a snake...
That's the only snake, I promise.
This guy is the king of the castle.
So our trip to the museum ended up being a trip to the zoo! And a wonderful trip to the zoo it was! We might get to the museum in a couple of weeks.
We wandered straight into the the Reptile House.
Warning! ~ Next photo is a snake...
That's the only snake, I promise.
This guy is the king of the castle.
So our trip to the museum ended up being a trip to the zoo! And a wonderful trip to the zoo it was! We might get to the museum in a couple of weeks.Jen
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
I'm Pretty Sure He's the Most Beautiful Boy in The World...
And as his mother I am totally unbiased in this opinion!
Jen
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
A Bit of a Re-Shuffle
For a while I have been toying with the idea of setting up a separate blog for myself, for all my stuff. The stuff I make, the stuff I want to make and the stuff I say I'll make and never get around to actually making! In September I plan on taking part in Self Stitched September and rather than having to rummage through all the sewing stuff to get to the family bits I've moved my online studio. So if you'd like know what I'm doing in my real studio come on over to Huff Makes Stuff!
Jen
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Success and Failure
The Plan goes well. To recap, at the start of the year I planned not to buy any new clothes, anything that entered my wardrobe must be made by my own two hands or purchased second hand from a charitable op shop. With the first six months just about complete I have been reflecting on my successes and my coughfailurecough.
Lets start with that failure, which is really just a lapse and a life saver at that! In May my baby brother Tim tied the knot with his wonderful Beck. I had grand plans of making a dress from two separate patterns to go with a purple satin coat I bought for the occasion last year. As the time grew closer, I wasn't happy with my muslin, it was starting to stress me out and, most importantly, I wasn't enjoying the process. In this state of despair, I happened upon a wonderful, simple dress that fitted and felt great, and I fell in love with it. So I bought it. And let me tell you it was lucky I did! The couple of weeks leading up to the wedding (when I would have been making the dress) Coen was very ill with a high fever of unknown viral origin that knocked him about for a whole week and then turned into a nasty case of tonsillitis. The time that I would have been sewing my butt off was spent making daily trips to the doctor, midnight runs to the hospital and spending sleepless nights worrying about our boy. There is no way any dress could have been made in that time, and it was a big relief not to have to think about it!
On the other hand I am quite proud of my success in this little venture. I have had the thrift shopping gods smile upon me on many occasions! I have scored a pair of great jeans, a couple of comfy skirts and some tops that got a lot of wear in summer. A really cute jacket with a pixie hood, coloured tights still in their packs and my black waist coat. That waist coat has become a staple of my wardrobe, if you've seen me more than once in the last six months, chances are you've seen the waist coat! The best thing is that none of these items cost more than $7, and every purchase was a charitable contribution.
I have had some fun adventures sewing my own clothes too. Like the time I found a huge pile of underwear elastic in loads of colours at one of the local op shops and thought I'd have a go at making my own undies. I cut up one of Darron's work issue undershirts (that he never wears) and using a Knitwit type pattern from the 70's whipped up a couple of pairs of undies. It was intended as a bit of a laugh, so I could say 'Yup, I've even made my own undies.' As it turns out, they are the most comfortable undies in the whole world, and I have since made made several pairs from t shirts and other fabric from the stash! Here's the pair that started it all off:
Then there was the time I decided on a Thursday afternoon that I would really love a new dress to wear to Beck's hen's party that Saturday night. I already had the fabric and the pattern (Burda Mag 1/2010, 109 for those playing at home) so I spent 2 afternoons frantically sewing (in between the laser skirmish and go karting) and sewed the buttons on as the rest of the girls were doing their hair, and went out for dinner and salsa dancing in a brand new frock!
And the time I was procrastinating in a big way, repair basket overflowing, several items needing to be made by deadlines. Perfect time to make yourself a couple of pairs of bloomers to wear under skirts in summer. Yes, it is the middle of winter, my style of procrastination involves forward planning!
Speaking of skirts, this one is from a 1960s pattern, Vogue 7450, lots of fun. The fabric is from my stash, I bought the bolt, it was a bargain, now I have a skirt that matches my shopping bags... and the cushions on my couch. That's the waist coat I mentioned earlier, goes with everything, I love it!
There have been some hand knits in the mix as well. I've made a couple of cardigans, the green tweed yarn cam from the op shop, $5 for the lot!
A headband in my own handspun, in a lovely iPhone shot from when we had no proper internets.
A triangle shawl in hand dyed sock yarn from Mayhem & Chaos. The colour is Little Green Bag, the pattern is called Onerva, and together they make me very happy!
I also knitted some hotpants. But that's a whole other story...
Lets start with that failure, which is really just a lapse and a life saver at that! In May my baby brother Tim tied the knot with his wonderful Beck. I had grand plans of making a dress from two separate patterns to go with a purple satin coat I bought for the occasion last year. As the time grew closer, I wasn't happy with my muslin, it was starting to stress me out and, most importantly, I wasn't enjoying the process. In this state of despair, I happened upon a wonderful, simple dress that fitted and felt great, and I fell in love with it. So I bought it. And let me tell you it was lucky I did! The couple of weeks leading up to the wedding (when I would have been making the dress) Coen was very ill with a high fever of unknown viral origin that knocked him about for a whole week and then turned into a nasty case of tonsillitis. The time that I would have been sewing my butt off was spent making daily trips to the doctor, midnight runs to the hospital and spending sleepless nights worrying about our boy. There is no way any dress could have been made in that time, and it was a big relief not to have to think about it!
On the other hand I am quite proud of my success in this little venture. I have had the thrift shopping gods smile upon me on many occasions! I have scored a pair of great jeans, a couple of comfy skirts and some tops that got a lot of wear in summer. A really cute jacket with a pixie hood, coloured tights still in their packs and my black waist coat. That waist coat has become a staple of my wardrobe, if you've seen me more than once in the last six months, chances are you've seen the waist coat! The best thing is that none of these items cost more than $7, and every purchase was a charitable contribution.
I have had some fun adventures sewing my own clothes too. Like the time I found a huge pile of underwear elastic in loads of colours at one of the local op shops and thought I'd have a go at making my own undies. I cut up one of Darron's work issue undershirts (that he never wears) and using a Knitwit type pattern from the 70's whipped up a couple of pairs of undies. It was intended as a bit of a laugh, so I could say 'Yup, I've even made my own undies.' As it turns out, they are the most comfortable undies in the whole world, and I have since made made several pairs from t shirts and other fabric from the stash! Here's the pair that started it all off:
Then there was the time I decided on a Thursday afternoon that I would really love a new dress to wear to Beck's hen's party that Saturday night. I already had the fabric and the pattern (Burda Mag 1/2010, 109 for those playing at home) so I spent 2 afternoons frantically sewing (in between the laser skirmish and go karting) and sewed the buttons on as the rest of the girls were doing their hair, and went out for dinner and salsa dancing in a brand new frock!
And the time I was procrastinating in a big way, repair basket overflowing, several items needing to be made by deadlines. Perfect time to make yourself a couple of pairs of bloomers to wear under skirts in summer. Yes, it is the middle of winter, my style of procrastination involves forward planning!
Speaking of skirts, this one is from a 1960s pattern, Vogue 7450, lots of fun. The fabric is from my stash, I bought the bolt, it was a bargain, now I have a skirt that matches my shopping bags... and the cushions on my couch. That's the waist coat I mentioned earlier, goes with everything, I love it!
There have been some hand knits in the mix as well. I've made a couple of cardigans, the green tweed yarn cam from the op shop, $5 for the lot!
A headband in my own handspun, in a lovely iPhone shot from when we had no proper internets.
A triangle shawl in hand dyed sock yarn from Mayhem & Chaos. The colour is Little Green Bag, the pattern is called Onerva, and together they make me very happy!
I also knitted some hotpants. But that's a whole other story...
Jen
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Proper Internets!
After a failed attempt using mobile broadband for the home computer and a little while without any internet except what we could view on our tiny phone screens, we have full, proper home internet back on! That means I can get back to this here blog! See, I wasn't just being slack, I had a perfectly reasonable excuse for this neglect.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
