Last night, as you may know, I took a trip into the city to see Anything Goes at the Sydney Opera House!
The show, one I’d never seen before, was fantastic! The music was wonderfully jazzy and melodic, the story line funny and engaging and the dance numbers were absolutely first class! It was really great and a perfect birthday treat from my parents!
And of course, while I was in the heart of my beautiful city, I captured some photos for you of the Opera House, the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the sparking harbour surrounding them!
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Today has been a busy editing day, getting the Mountain Block tutorial polished and all shiny ready to upload for you in the next few days! I am sorry that it is a little later than usual, the past few days have thrown my schedule all out of whack!
I hope you’re all having a splendid weekend and are pursuing all of your quilty plans and dreams!
First and foremost, a big huge humongous THANK YOU to everyone for sending me your lovely birthday wishes yesterday! You’re all such wonderful friends! My day was perfect!
Tonight, another birthday treat is coming my way! My folks and I are off to the city to see Anything Goes at the Sydney Opera House! Yay! I’ve never seen this show before so hopefully I’ll like it! But I love all of that Broadway singing, dancing and shiz so I’m bound to love it either way!
I’ll do my utmost best to capture some beautiful shots of the Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge for you while I’m there! I love my city so much so any chance to share and show her off, I’ll take with both hands! 😀
Apologies for the short post today! I’ll be sure to tell you all about the show and what we got up to in the city tomorrow!
I spent the day rugged up at home (my favourite place) joyfully playing with my youngest nephew and niece! We sung songs, played with balloons, ate doughnuts and built Duplo towers!
Amelia: ‘Auntie, what is that big thing you’re shoving in my face?’ (I took the picture using my big DSLR camera!)Oh, those big brown eyes and pouty lips!! Too cute!Xavier singing his ABC’s!Doughnut time!
More of my family came over this evening where we had our traditional party tea, with homemade chocolate cake, lollies, Chocolate Crackles* and yummy fresh fruit!
And because I work from home (which means that technically I’m my own boss) I gave myself the day off! I do feel slightly bad that I did, as it means that Friday’s tutorial has now been pushed back a day or two! Sorry! But today’s little breather from everything has really helped clear my head and get a few things back into perspective!
Although, I do have one very exciting thing to tell you about! Last night I finalised everything for my next Quilt-Along Series!!! Yay! It’ll be a HST Sampler, made up of nine different blocks, all at different levels of difficulty and layout. This time around I’ll be using a beautiful fabric collection from RJR Fabrics that has some of the most loveliest colours and patterns that I’ve seen in quite a while! As soon as I saw it, I knew it was the perfect one to use for the quilt! I’ll announce what the range is and the whole story behind it once I receive it! Eek!! (Although, some of you might be able to figure it out with some of the clues in the picture below!)
Here’s a sneak peak of the blocks we’ll doing…
I guess this also gives a little insight into how I design and work out all the maths for my quilts! I must always draw them out and colour them in to be able to get a true understanding and visualisation of the block/quilt I want to make! At the moment, I don’t have a date for when this will begin, but know that it’ll be very soon! (Like ‘weeks’ soon!)
I hope your day was as lovely as mine!
xx
*PS. Curious to know what Chocolate Crackles are?? Here’s the recipe if you would like to try them! Every Aussie kid has been brought up eating these, especially at birthday parties, cake stalls, picnics and as special treats!
Chocolate Crackles
Ingredients:
4 cups of Rice Bubbles
1 cup of desiccated coconut
1 cup of icing sugar (powdered sugar)
250g of Copha (a type of vegetable fat made from coconut oil)
3 tablespoons of cocoa
To make:
First, slowly melt the Copha in a saucepan over a low heat.
Meanwhile, mix together the rice bubbles, icing sugar, coconut and cocoa in a large bowl.
Carefully pour the melted Copha into the rice bubble mixture and stir until well combined.
Spoon the mixture into a cupcake tray filled with paper cases and place in the fridge until set.
We’ve made it to the middle of the week and now we’re on the down-hill to the weekend! Yay!!!
Today I thought I would share with you a most beloved and favourited recipe of mine that I absolutely love to bake as the warmer Spring days slowly come back into our lives!
And that recipe is… Shortbread! Usually, I make it with a good handful of orange zest, but today I was feeling brave and choose to see how well it tastes with lemon zest instead! (Oh!! The fresh sweet smell of lemon filling my kitchen was just simply devine!) By adding the lemon or orange zest, it will just give the Shortbread a lovely subtle fresh fruity flavour that will make you go back for more and more!
So here’s how to make this delicious and fail-safe Lemon Shortbread!
You will need:
To make:
Begin by preheating your oven to 150C/300F/gas2. Then butter well a square slice tin measuring about 22cm or 9″.
Place the butter and sugar in a large bowl and cream them together using a wooden spoon until it looks light and fluffy.
Add the plain flour, cornflour and lemon zest to the buttery mixture and gently fold them together with your spoon. Then get your clean hands into the bowl and mix until you have a lovely smooth dough.
Place the dough into your buttered tin and press it evenly throughout the tin and into the corners using your fingers. (The rougher looking the better!) Before popping it into the oven, grab a fork and prick the surface all over.
Place it into the oven for about 50 minutes until the top of the Shortbread is looking lightly golden brown.
While the Shortbread is still oven warm, cut it evenly into squares and sprinkle a generous amount of caster sugar over the top.
This Shortbread is best enjoyed with a lovely hot cup of tea!
Recipe adapted from one by Jamie Oliver called ‘The Best Shortbread in the World’ from his book, Cook With Jamie, published in 2006.
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Let me know if you’re going to give this recipe a go! Even if you’re not the best chef in the kitchen, this Shortbread is insanely easy to make and just as easy to eat as well!!
Today in Australia we celebrate Father’s Day! The picture below was taken on Friday with my dad amongst his children and my oldest brother with his children.
My Family!
To celebrate the day, in the afternoon my folks and I took a lovely leisurely drive up the Blue Mountains and visited the Mt Tomah Botanic Gardens nestled amongst the misty mountain ranges. Things were slightly damp, a little drizzly and chilly but the scenery and fresh mountain air were absolutely beautiful!
While there I also took the opportunity to snap some stunning pictures of the native flowers for the blog! I hope you enjoy seeing some of the beautiful flora we have here in Australia!
It was such a lovely sight to see all of the fresh flowers budding and coming to life. There were so many colours, textures and patterns that caught my eye every which way I turned! I’m so happy that Spring has finally made its way back to us!
Whew! What a day! This poor little quilter is ready to dive into bed and go to sleep!
Today was Market Day at my church, where my sister-in-law and I shared a handmade stall full of lovely little knick-knacks, accessories and every other good thing!
Amie and I ready to sell!
Although the day was quieter than expected (unfortunately for us there was a local fair happening at the same time!), we both made a tidy little profit with what we had to offer! Yay!
Things that Amie had on the table included custom made Headband Frames, super sweet headbands with adorable flowers and embellishments, hair clips with dainty little bows and frilly lace plus these really clever dummy (or pacifier) clips made with super cute printed ribbons, studs and fancy alligator-type clips. So clever!
On my side of the table I had a pile of my famous Little Wallets, all of those delightful little pincushions I’ve been showing you the past week (tutorial coming soon!!), fully lined tissue box fabric covers, a few mixed FQ bundles, handmade earrings, bags of buttons, a few craft kits, some old craft books and my Pineapple Mini Quilt. Safe to say the Pineapple came back home with me as did most of the things I made. So because of that, get ready for an influx of stock in my Esty shop! Yay!
I was really happy with the way we were able to set up our table. I used one of my mum’s embroidered linen table cloths as a base to set off the ‘handmade’ aesthetic of our stall. Then I used the Pink Wire ‘Falkhojden’ shelves I bought from IKEA last week to place stuff on and then an array of pretty glass bowls, silver trays and cake stands to displays our wares on. I think it all worked out pretty well!
So now that the busy chaos of getting everything ready for this market day is over, it’s time to finally get my head back into YouTube mode and produce some awesome videos and tutorials for you to enjoy and be inspired by!
And just as a warning: I’m diving-in head first with three tutorials to (hopefully) get out to you over the next week and a bit! Whoo!
One of the wonderful things that has come out of writing a blog, managing a YouTube channel and having an active Instagram account is that of creating some beautiful friendships with fellow, like-minded people all across the world! There are quite a number of you who regularly comment, chat, encourage and inspire me in everything that I publish and upload which makes my heart sing with gratefulness, humbleness and thankfulness! (Whew, so many ‘nesses’!) Words can never do justice to how kind you all are and how proud I am to call you friends, even though we’ve never met!
One act of insane kindness that I’m still blown away with is one made by a lovely lady in the UK whom I met on Instagram, Ayshia. Over the past year or so through sharing photos and having lots of great little chitta-chatta sessions, we’ve crazily discovered how many things we have in common even to a point where it’s borderline scary! I find it so fascinating that someone who literally lives on the other side of the world can be so alike to yourself that it feels as though you’ve known each other for ages, even though we’ve never met!
Anyway, with my birthday coming up soon Ayshia so kindly sent me a lovely package in the mail full of sweet gifts that made me so happy!
Everything she sent was just perfect! Lots of UK memorabilia (because I’m obsessed with the country, as you may know by now!): British flag keyring, a pack of socks (that’ll wear everyday with my Aussie Uggs!) and a half-metre cut of quilting fabric with MINI Coopers on it!!! OMG! Then the most adorable draw-string button bag (with buttons!) from Cath Kidston that I’ve ever seen! I love it so much!
But the one thing that I am so grateful to receive is this beautiful cross-the-body bag that she made herself out of such gorgeous fabric!
I mean it’s absolutely perfect! Literally! I’m completely blown away by how talented she is and how wonderfully constructed the bag is!
The bag itself features two deep zippered compartments, both fully lined and has a nice long adjustable strap to sling around the body! My favourite type of bag! I’ve decided I’ll be using it tomorrow at the Market Day so that I always have all of my valuables and change safe and close to hand!
To Ayshia, thank you so much!! Truly, your utter kindness has blown away and I’m so thankful for our little blossoming friendship! I’ll cherish everything you’ve taken the time to send me and continue to sing your praises whenever someone asks about that gorgeous little bag!
And to all of you who regularly read my blog, watch my YouTube videos, like/comment on my Instagram and Facebook page, thank you for your lovely friendship! Everyday you blow me away with your lovely comments and words of encouragement that it makes all of the hard work and late nights totally worth it!
Today, the 3rd of September is my beautiful mum’s birthday!
Words really can’t express just how wonderful this woman is in my life as well as my brothers, my dads and our extended family and friends. I’m so proud to say that my mum really is my best friend. (Something I’ve only really noticed these past few months or so!) She knows everything about me, supports and encourages me and is always, always there when I need her for anything, whether it be big or small. She also always knows the right time and the perfect way to snap me back into reality when I’ve been in ‘the clouds’ too long, which is quite a regular occurrence I must admit! Put simply, life is better when she’s around and I don’t want that to change. Ever.
So today, we spent a lovely day together by going out local for lunch, laughing, chatting and being our usual nutty selves. Our dining table has been taken over by glittery cards, pretty flowers, chocolate cupcakes, oodles of strawberries and handfuls of crunchy caramel popcorn! Ooo, yum!!
Tomorrow we’ll be extending the celebrations further when my brother and his family come by for an afternoon-tea-slash-early-dinner party! It’s there, when we’re all together, that the fun, laughter, chaos and big ‘happy birthdays’ are sung! It should be fun, I think!
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Also today I’ve been busily sewing away making some sweet little things for my stall at a Market Day the PWA are holding at my church this coming Saturday! (Actually, I should OUR stall as I’m sharing a table with my sister-in-law Amie, who makes the most adorable little baby accessories!) Ergo, the day has consisted of making the finishing touches to a few new little wallets as well as quickly stitching up some very cute petal pincushions and some tissue box fabric covers! Well, the tissue box covers have only been cut out at the moment. I hope to squeeze in some more sewing tonight and tomorrow morning!
I’m so unbelievably happy with how these little pincushions turned out! The pattern I used was one that came in issue no. 52 of Mollie Makes. Once I read through it and saw how simple they were to make, I knew I had to get into it and make some to sell at the stall! Also, while we’re talking about them, hands up those of you who want a tutorial on how to make one… I’d be more than happy to share with you how I make them!
One of my lovely blogger friends, Sharon from the blog Artistic Sharon Runs has nominated me and my blog for a Liebster Award! (Thanks Sharon!! That’s so kind of you!)
A Liebster Award is basically an award given from one blogger to the next, recognising the awesome work they put into their blogs as well as helping them be discovered by other bloggers and readers! How great is that!? Once you’ve been nominated you can either choose to accept it or ignore it! The choice is completely yours!
As a nominee, I now have the responsibility to nominate 5 other bloggers for the award! But I’ll chat more about at the end of the post!
So as a part my nomination, Sharon has forwarded these 11 questions for me to answer in an attempt for you to get to know me better!
Let’s begin!
Q1 // How, why & when did you start blogging?
Me in 2011!
I first started my blog in November 2011. At the time I’d been thinking about starting my own blog where I could chat and share all of the quilty and crafty things I was up to! I also needed a way to share the process of a quilt I was making for my cousin in the UK as thank you for looking after my parents when they were visiting that past summer! (Here’s the link to that post if you’re interested! It was like only the second one I had ever written and published!)
Q2 // What’s the nicest thing someone has done for you?
The first thing that springs to mind is the beautiful farewell scrapbook that my department manager Kerri made for me when I left my job at Spotlight.
It was full of good luck wishes from my fellow team mates, photos of me from demonstration days and special store celebrations along with special embellishments and decals that were me to a ‘T’! Everything about it was so special and lovely. I’ve never had anyone give me anything like that where they’ve put so much effort and love in to it!
Q3 // If you could meet one famous person alive today, who would it be?
It would be a dream to meet the Queen! Can you imagine all of the wonderful things to ask and chat about! In her life she has met so many important people who have come and gone and I think it would be fascinating to listen to her opinion and experiences with them all. Plus she just seems like the most loveliest person to talk to over a cuppa and plate of biccies!
Q4 // What is one thing on your bucket list you absolutely have to do?
Q5 // Describe a beautiful place that you’ve been.
Definitely Fiji!
In February/March, I went on a cruise to Fiji and saw some of the most beautiful beaches I’ve ever seen! Clear sparkling turquoise water, perfectly white sandy beaches, palm trees swaying calmly in the breeze and the most chilled-out, relaxed atmosphere I’ve ever experienced! It was heaven!
Selfishness. Lack of respect. Ignorance. Laziness. Slow Drivers.
Q8 // What song will always cheer you up?
Q9 // Can you play any musical instruments?
No. Although, I did begin piano lessons as a teenager but realised quite quickly that it wasn’t for me!
I also really wanted to play the guitar, but like piano, I gave it up quite quickly as I sucked so bad at it!
Q10 // What does your ideal day off consist of?
Getting cosy on the lounge with a big quilt, a cup of tea, a slice of chocolate cake and watching a favourite film or reading a good book!
Q11 // What is one thing you really like about yourself?
I like the fact that I can see the bigger picture about most things. I’m pretty optimistic but at the same time I think it’s important to strive and achieve the goals and dreams you have.
I also like the fact that I’m a good driver.
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So now comes the more serious side to the Liebster Awards… The rules for accepting and nominating thy fellow bloggers!
Rules for the Liebster Awards:
1. Write a post thanking and linking the person who nominated you.
2. Include an image of the award in your post.
3. Nominate 5 to 10 other bloggers with less than 200 followers who you feel are worthy of this award.
4. Inform them they’ve been nominated by commenting on one of their posts.
5. Answer the 11 questions asked to you by the person who nominated you, then make 11 questions of your own for your nominees (or you may use the same questions).
6. Lastly, copy and paste these rules in your post.
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The five bloggers who I’ve nominated for a Liebster Award are…
3. Are you a cat person or a dog person? Or neither?
4. Where do you hope to be in 10 years time?
5. What is your go-to Karaoke song?
6. Favourite city?
7. What is one thing you wish you were better at?
8. Describe your ideal Summer’s Day?
9. What song always makes you want to get up and dance?
10. Your biggest crafting/sewing disaster to date.
11. What is at the top of your bucket list?
Like I mentioned at the beginning, you can choose to accept your nomination and ‘pass it forward’ or simply ignore it and continue on your way! No biggie.
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A big thanks again to Sharon for the nomination and I look forward to reading some of the answers to the questions I’ve posed to those of you who have been nominated!
At the time, I hadn’t written, checked or really had any plans of what to publish on my blog. Guilt set in and I thought to myself, ‘What can I do to ensure my blog won’t be neglected throughout September?’ Then the ‘crazy thought’ happen. As September is a busy month for me, why not set the challenge of writing a blog post every day during the month commentating, chatting, sharing and celebrating all of the good things that are happening!
So that what’s we’re doing! Every day this month you can expect a new blog post from me, giving you more of an insight into my life, my family, my sewing room and what I do outside of it too! The posts I write from day-to-day will vary from super long and wordy to short, direct and to the point. They may be all words, or just all photos.
Like I mentioned, September is super-busy for me right from the get-go! There are birthdays, special weekend celebrations, blog hops, quilt tutorials, shows in the city, a new job prospect and so many ideas to trap and share! And as an added bonus, September for us Aussies equals the start of Spring! Yay!! Goodbye winter worries, with your sneezy noses and freezing finger tips! Hello to glorious sunshine, warm breezes and colourful flowers in the back garden!
So, should we get this challenge under way?
Cheers to a happy, healthy, fun and memorable September!
xx
PS. This edit marks my 200th blog post published to my blog since I first started it in November 2011! Hooray!!
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