Why I've been neglecting K&R!

I've been neglecting my blog of late, as I've been drawn into new ways to spend my time.

One of my new loves is sewing; i just can't seem to drag myself away from my sewing machine as I am having so much fun creating in a new way.

One of the things I have made is this grocery bag from vintage fabric that I found at a local thrift/bazaar shop.  I can just imagine this fabric as kitchen curtains or maybe in a 60's caravan, tootling around the country.  Don't you think?!

I also just created this simple tote for a friend's birthday present.  It was a super easy pattern from 'Sew La Tea Do' and I also attempted the suggested embroidery! I'm completely new to embroidery but am pleased to report that it wasn't that tricky.  Hindsight would have me embroider the text in a colour that contrasts strongly against the fabric, but that's a lesson I'll take into my next project.  That's one of the things I love about crafting; you're always learning and improving your skills, which means that the subsequent projects are always bigger, better and even more special.

My other new project is a little organisation that I have started with a colleague - Big Fat Smile. For about 6 months I have been dreaming and planning for ways to become more integrated with my community and to make a difference in the lives of a few (or many). I think that Big Fat Smile is going to be the medium that allows me to achieve this vision. Stay tuned for more BFS updates over the months to come.

"To the world you may be one person, but to one person you may be the world'.
- Author Unknown

Reflections on a crafty year

Before Christmas I had a really fun time sewing presents for my girlfriends.  I turned out quite a few of these super cute grocery bags for my lovely friends and I really loved spending the time to make them.

In 2011 I really surprised myself with how much I enjoyed making and crafting.  I received such a huge amount of pleasure from making something with my own hands and most of the time, giving that special something to someone else.  Developing my skills and enjoying the making process is one of my 2011 highlights and is something that will continue for me in 2012.

I already have two 2012 projects on the go! I'm making a special something for a cheeky almost 1 year old and I've also cast on a second pair of fingerless gloves, like the ones below (as I've had a special request from the previous recipient's younger sister!)

I'm planning on making 2012 a year where I continue to make, give and learn, cos it's just so much darn fun ;)

They're in the mail!

Well, here they are, MIL and my contributions to the Softies for Mirabel 2011 campaign.

The little dolls are courtesy of MIL.

Stripy Ted was handmade by me . This was my first attempt at toy making, I'm pretty happy with the result! His face was really, really hard to get right, so while it's not perfect I'm hoping that the cuddliness of Ted will compensate for his facial features!

Give Handmade

Yesterday I spent most of the afternoon crocheting. It's been years since I last attempted a crochet project. I was inspired by this lovely blanket, which luckily for me has an awesome tutorial to get me started.

Courtesy of Meet me at Mike's; Larksfoot Blanket. Isn't it gorg!

There's a special occasion early next year for one of my friends and in the spirit of giving handmade, I thought she would love (and I would love to give) a handmade blanket.

Giving handmade is also going to be my theme for Christmas this year. Last year I went with a giving nothing theme as I was feeling a bit down about the excess of our Western lives when compared to how little others have.  I decided to donate some money to Oxfam and kept the actual presents to an absolute minimum. 

I'm keeping some of that theme this year and I've 'bought' a goat and a duck through Oxfam Unwrapped (goat = 'a gift that's gruff, tough and does heaps of good stuff'). For the other presents I'll be giving, they'll be courtesy of my sewing machine.

Giving handmade is great for a few reasons; I get pleasure from making, the recipient knows that I spent time and love making their present, it's a great way to recycle or reuse and it's less commercial, hopefully it means a bit more.

I encourage you to join me and give handmade this year.  If you're not into making stuff yourself, you can always pick up great handmade gifts at Etsy and Made It.

Softies for Mirabel

Courtesy of Meet Me at Mike's

Some of my creative energy over the last few weeks has been spent trying to finish my contribution to the Softies for Mirabel campaign.  I have a really bad habit of leaving projects until the 11th hour to complete them, and with submissions needing to be sent early next week, it's going to be a push to the finish line.

I've been making a stripy teddy bear and hopefully he'll keep a special little person in good company for the next few years.  He's been made with love and I hope that he brings love to his new owner. 

I've also inspired my MIL to get involved and she's been beavering away knitting a few softies of her own.  Unfortunately MIL is a huge worrier; if there is something to be worried about, she seeks it out and worries on it for days.  On our recent road trip to Bendigo (to see The White Wedding Dress exhibition, which was totally wonderful...) she was talking to me about some of her worrying. I encouraged her to find a way to feel like she had some control over her worries and maybe finding a way to give to someone in need could help with this. As a result, we've both been crafting, making our softies and taking back control by finding a small way to make a difference.

I'll be sure to post a few pics of both hers and mine before they get sent on their merry way next week.

Phew

I've been working on this baby blanket since August, when one of my close friends had her first baby. 3 months later here were are... project finished!

It was a real chore to get through all of the moss stitch which makes up the body of the blanket; easy, but tiresome.  Knitting the lace border was much more interesting and was something that I hadn't attempted before.

I'm absolutely in love with the finished product; it's nearly as sweet as little baby V herself :)  

Family and the Holiday Season

Maybe the most dysfunctional Christmas family story!

This week I read this blog post from Gretchen Rubin of, The Happiness Project.  It provides some simple but really practical and sensible advice on dealing with difficult relatives over the holiday period. 

While she's thinking about Thanksgiving, which is approaching quickly, I thought the advice was pretty spot on for some family tension that often plays out for us over Christmas.

Check out her blog post for yourself, I'm sure that there's something that you can take away for your family this holiday season:
http://www.happiness-project.com/happiness_project/2011/11/9-tips-for-dealing-with-difficult-relatives-over-the-holidays.html

This year, we're spending the holidays in Adelaide with my family; all 3 of us... husband, M dog and me! Should be an interesting 8 hour toad trip with M dog in tow!

Knit, sew and ramble

Hold the press... I might have to change the name of my blog to Knit, Sew and Ramble, as I can now proudly call myself a sewer!

I've been wanting to continue to develop my love for making and giving and I felt that re-learning how to sew would be a great way to help me achieve this.  I've also set myself a new life goal of ensuring that I always create an atmosphere of growth; to keep learning, developing and growing as a person, both personally and professionally ('creating an atmosphere of growth' is something that really resonated with me from The Happiness Project). The first task that I set myself was to get back into sewing.

This weekend, I took steps one and two in this journey...

Step one looks like this:

My new Janome sewing machine! Yay!

Step two looks like this:




My first project; a small drawstring bag to house my sewing bits and pieces. I also think that I've found project number two here; apparently this is the world's easiest skirt... sounds like a good place to start to me! So now to find some funky fabric to make this super easy (fingers crossed!) skirt.

More updates to come!!

Giving

Giving:  the transfer of something without the expectation of receiving something in return...

I really love this sweet little pair of fingerless gloves and I hope that a certain 6 year old will too!

While the weather is probably starting to get a little too warm for gloves, hopefully there will still be a few cold mornings when they can be worn on the walk to school.

I know I've said it before, but I get a real kick out of giving handmade presents; I think it just means that little bit more when the recipient (or in this case, the recipient's Mum!) knows that I have spent time and effort crafting away and creating something lovely just for them!

In other knitting updates... I'm still working on the purple moss stitch baby blanket that I posted a photo of a few weeks ago. I've finished the body of the blanket and am just finishing the edging. I've also started knitting a teddy bear to donate to the Softies for Mirabel campaign; if you're able to make a toy of any sort then you should jump on board as well. You could knit, sew or crochet, anything would be OK, as long as you can do one of these things then I think you should join in! Go on!

Knit and Sew

Last week I roped in a few of my lovely colleagues to spend the day volunteering with me at Save the Children.

We worked our little fingers to the bone, as we stitched knitted squares into blankets. I had also knitted a few squares to donate to the cause and while I didn't have enough for a whole blanket, they got included with some other dontated squares to make up a blanket.

The finished blankets will be sent to India, Cambodia and Laos to help children keep warm in the hope of preventing pneumonia; one of the biggest killers in children under five in the developing world.

Volunteering is one of those things that I've always wanted to do more of, but to be honest I've never prioritised it or really worked at making it happen and that's about to change... as of now. I want to find a regular avenue to volunteer and to give service to the local or global community. I believe that having a more active service role in my life will help me to 'feel right' (one of my recently crafted personal commandments). Being involved in the Born to Knit campaign has been right up my alley; a fantastic combination of my craft and my interest in volunteering.

Now to get knitting for next years Save the Children campaign!

Reading... Retro style!

If like me you follow this lovely blog, you might be currently reading a particular children's classic, 'James and the Giant Peach'.

Some of you might be wondering, why would you want to read a kids book. Well I say, why not! If you were an avid reader as a little one (as I was) you'll remember long afternoons spent cuddled up with your favorite book and falling asleep at night time with your book flopping across your little face as you literally couldn't keep your eyes open any more! Many a night my Dad had to come into my room, put away my book and switch off my light for me, as I had fallen asleep mid sentence! I confess that I still do that sometimes now... just one more page... Zzzz.

Anyway, back to the point of this post. I'm reading 'James and the Giant Peach' as part of the Meet Me at Mike's Retro Readers book club, and I'm remembering just how ace kids books are and in particular how fantastic Roald Dahl is. James wasn't my childhood favorite though, this honor would have to go to 'Matilda' or the 'BFG' and don't get me started on Enid Blyton... The hours I spent reading her novels are too many to count!

So if you loved reading as a little tike jump on board and get reading with me, retro style!

Check your letterbox!

I posted a few weeks ago about letters, or more specifically, hand written letters and how much pleasure you can receive from sending and receiving letters.

I'm pleased to report that I have since written five letters to friends and family. I've also received one letter back! I was so thrilled to open this beautiful letter, where one of my dear friends explained how my post had reminded her how much she used to love writing and receiving letters.  After reading her awesome letter, of course I sat down and wrote her back! I think this might mean that we're pen-pals now!

The last time I had a pen-pal was in Primary school. I think that the girls name was Caroline and she was from the U.K. I have no memory of how we came to be pen-pals, but it must have been arranged through my school. We wrote each other a number of letters back and forth and I remember that I used those funny blue aerogrammes, how retro! Imagine telling my future children about that one day! Mummy used to have to write a letter on funny blue paper which folded up into an envelope, as this was the best way to write to someone in another country. I'm sure I'll be asked why I didn't just Skype, email or Facebook them. How much communication has changed in the few years between my childhood and adulthood.

I still have more letters to write and I still want to encourage you to write a letter to someone special in your life. Don't worry if you don't have pretty paper (although you can pick some of that up at Kikki K!), just grab a page out of your notebook and write a special hello to that special person.

The only catch is having to trot down to the post office for stamps!

Feisty Jane

Jane Eyre was one of my first literary loves. The character of Jane resonated strongly with me, I admired her and wanted to be like her; she's strong willed, independent of thought and determined not to be looked down upon because of her gender, her position or her lack of money or status. To put it simply; she kicks butt.

I saw the recent adaptation of Jane Eyre last weekend and thoroughly enjoyed it.  Mia Wasikowska gave a beautiful performance as Jane and I was pleased to see that Mr Rochester was just as handsome as he needed to be! I always thought that he should be handsome in a strangely compelling way; not traditionally handsome, or 'hunky' but oddly handsome and you should feel drawn to him. Michael Fassbender was a perfect Rochester in my eyes.


Jane and Rochester

In closing, if you haven't read Jane Eyre before, you really have to. It's a novel before it's time. I also highly recommend this film adaptation; it's probably not showing for much longer, so get down to your local cinema and grab your ticket!

Big wool!

Check out the size of my new yarn! No wonder it's called, Big Wool! I was sucked into buying this yarn and knitting a last minute winter garment for myself (seeing as I didn't finish my blue jumper this season, it's been put aside for completion next year!)

I've also started a blanket, for a new little baby who was born on Census night. The body of the blanket is in moss stitch and there's going to be a special lace style border, that will be a bit more challenging to knit. The moss stitch is getting a little tiresome, but at least it's something easy to work on while watching something nice on TV (like 2 episodes of Mad Men Season 4 on Sunday afternoon!)



Now it's hard to choose which one of these new projects I should be working on right now!

Challenge finished!

8 weeks ago I started the 'Happy Heart, Healthy Me' challenge at Curves.  My goal was to lose a few centimetres from my waist to make sure that I'm not at risk of developing heart disease. If a woman's waist measurement is 80 centimetres or more, then she's at risk. Scary, huh?

The 8 weeks finished on the weekend and I'm very pleased to report that I lost 6 centimetres! Woo hoo!

Completing the weekly activities and committing to at least 3 workouts every week really helped me keep the focus on my health over the colder months. Now it's time for some new goals just in time for a new season.

Change is in the air

If you've been reading along, you'll know that I've had two great experiences lately. The first was attending the '7 Habits of Highly Effective People' seminar. The second was reading, 'The Happiness Project'. Both of these experiences resonated very strongly with me and have resulted in some big shifts in my thinking and doing.

As a result, I'm making a few changes.

There are a few little things; like no TV nights, writing a daily one sentence gratitude journal (sounds a bit 'Oprah', but is helping me focus on all the great things I have to be thankful for) and taking time out for fun.

And there are a few bigger things; like creating my personal commandments (or personal mission statement as Mr Covey refers to), goal setting, committing to an exercise routine and making sure I stick to my new weekly and daily planning routine.

So far so good, but feel free to drop me a line and make sure I'm sticking with my changes!

Winter into Spring

I finally finished this man's snood that I was planning to send to Jock Palfreeman, but bad news... I just checked the details for postage and there have been changes to what he is allowed to receive in prison.

I'll contact the administrators of his appeal group and hopefully I can still get this snood to him.

I'm really pleased with the finished product; it even looks good dangling in my tree, imagine how much better it will look on!

It certainly is pretty dreary outside at the moment, but I'm sure that I can feel Spring in the air.  While outside taking these photos the sight of my daffodils certainly lightened up the drab front yard. I love that daffodils make the effort to get you through these last few weeks of a long winter and it's not long to go now, we officially have 2 weeks of winter left and until Spring springs into action.

Keep warm and enjoy the last days of hot chocolates and snuggling in front of the heater.

C-Day

It's Census night in Australia and I'm about to complete my form online (technology = awesome).

I was chatting with a girlfriend on the weekend about completing our Census list of questions.  In particular, we chatted about the heritage questions.  We were wondering which ancestry options to choose; the questionnaire asks you to select 2 ancestries which you most closely identify with.  Interestingly, one of the options is 'Australian'; that's not something that we normally have the option to select, it's always whether your English, Scottish, Irish, Italian, Greek, Chinese etc. This led us to question how and why people would select 'Australian' as their ancestry. What's the cut off point? Maybe if your grandparents were born here you can say that your ancestry is Australian. Or is it your parents? Or do you need to be a 5th generation Australian?

At the end of the day, unless you're an Aboriginal Australian, we all came from somewhere else, but I'm wondering when we get to start identifying ourselves as just Aussies and not as people from somewhere else. As someone whose family has been here for a number of generations, I most definitely identify myself as being Australian and I have no clear connection to any of my other ancestries; although it's clear that these blood lines have shaped some of the cultures and traditions in my family.

Nationality and cultural identity are always hotly debated topics in this country and I look forward to the day when we can just think of ourselves as Australians. With this option on the Census form this time around, maybe we're getting a step closer after all.

Curvy

It's the end of month 4 for me and my new relationship with Curves and we're still going strong.

I wasn't that confident when I put myself forward to complete the monthly weigh and measure (dread...); but it wasn't a bad result at all.

There's now 31cm less of me than there was 4 months ago and I'm feeling SO good about it!

For the month of August, I'm going to up the workouts to 4 per week and am hoping to say goodbye to a few more centimetres.

Watch out for another update in 4 weeks time...

Letters

When was the last time that you received a hand written letter? Was it back in primary school when you had a pen pal, or does your Grandma send you a letter for your birthday each year (along with a $5 note!)...

Personally, I can't remember the last time I received a letter, let alone wrote one, which makes me a bit sad. It's so lovely to check the letterbox and see a handwritten envelope amongst the bills and other boring bits and pieces that we receive. With my recently rediscovered interest in writing, I'm thinking that writing letters will give me another way to indulge in some creativity and also to let my friends and family know that I care enough to take the time to put pen to paper.

I've loaded myself up with some funky paper, envelopes and a pen (surely that's another bonus... stationary shopping!) and I'm looking forward to writing a few letters this weekend. If you're lucky, one might make it's way into your letterbox; and if that happens, I dare you to return the favor!