Tuesday's treasuries

What a great couple of weeks!

And what a lovely surprise to see that my destash and supplies shop planetdebris was chosen by Moags and Smeet for this treasury full of Aussie sellers.
She made it look great didnt she?

Moags and Smeet are jewellery designers after my own heart we share a love of bold jewellery and gorgeous stones.

I doubly love this bracelet - I love turquoise and I just adore the chunky clasp, it's really special.
Check out their shop for more gorgeous creations.

turquoise bracelet by moagsandsmeet

And then things got a bit colourful!
Firstly The Rainbow Connection by petaliferous.
Bri was kind enough to pop my rainbow bracelet in with all the other rainbows.



So I chose something suitably bright andcolourful from petaliferous.
Such pretty rose studs!

bright red rose earrings by petaliferous

Who doesnt love red? Or scarlet?
Many thanks to catlovesbear for including my red venetian glass earrings in her Scarlet Soho collection.


catloves bear is in vacation mode at the moment but makes ecofriendly bags and totes like this pretty floral one.


Anothe gorgeous bright one but with an unusual theme - what fun inspiration from tattytess!
Thanks to tattytess for picking BoosTees mitts with all the tea party goodies.


I'm a bit impressed with tattytess's shop, there are amazing upcycled creations like this bright top and another one that inspired a treasury that I created. (see below)

bell sleeve shirt by tattytess

Vickie of jewelflyt has such an eye for colour.
Look how she put this treasury together!
Lime and berry - yum!
Thanks Vickie for chosing my lime green earrings.


Vickie is a very talented silversmith and jeweller.
How pretty is this necklace with its aquamarine set pendant?

azure sky necklace by jewelflyt

Do you remember kaleidoscopes?
All the lovely coloured patterns?
Adorablelittleme has managed to create the same effect here -

yippee! for finding one of BoosTee's brooches here!

Adorablelittleme has some cute hair clips and earrings, like this set in my favorite colours.
I just love the sand and sea combination.

surf and sand set by adorablelittleme

OKbuyer obviously loves jewellery too!
How honourd I felt to be included with all these other lovely creations

If you like beads check out OKbuyer's shop for beautiful and unusual beads like these czech triangles.

czech picasso beads by OKbuyer

Now to my treasuries.
This is the one I mentioned earlier, inspired by tattytess' shop.


And one linked to my blog post about the anniversary of the bra's creation!


Happy treasury making!

Mad about - rhubarb

A couple of weeks ago I blogged about my favorite fruits and asked is rhubarb a fruit?

Well technically the answer is "no"

Rhubarb or Rheum rhabarbarum is a member of the buckwheat family.
Originally grown by people in the region of Mongolia it has been cultivated for over 3000 years!


It's a very showy plant with it's large green leaves and red stems. It wouldn't look out of place in your garden.
Unfortunately we didnt think that many years ago and pulled out a very old crown of rhubarb that was growing in our rockery.
I remember my grandmother used to grow it and we used to love going to her house and picking the young stalks, she would give us egg cups with sugar in and we used to dip the rhubarb in the sugar (our poor teeth!)

Rhubarb is very high in fibre, so it's very good for you.
It can also be a laxative ; }
- but I'll let you decide if that's a good thing or not!

Despite my childhood escapades rhubarb is best cooked.
You remove the leaves and throw them away or compost them because they are toxic.
Wash the stalks and cut into 1" lengths.

You can just stew it with some sugar, but it also goes well with apples (peeled,cored and chopped) or strawberries.

You can make -
Rhubarb pie, crumble, jam, muffins, cake or sauce.

There is a whole site dedicated to rhubarb recipes.

I also love rhubarb yogurt : )

Here is a great recipe for rhubarb and apple crisp.


You need about 4 cups of cut fruit - rhubarb and apple.
Put them in an oven -proof dish.

Mix together
1 1/2 cup oats
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup melted butter or oil
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon

Sprinkle over the fruit.
Cook for 30 mins at 180 degrees C.

Have you got any favorite ways with rhubarb?

images from enjoy gardening, rhubarb recipes, sheknows, freerecipes.org

What to do with donuts?

I cant stop buying donuts!

No! not the sugary, jammy kind but donuts for jewellery.

But then I never know how to string them!
You could just loop a strand of leather through it and make a simple necklace.

Or you could purchase a special donut bail, like these from abeadstore.com


They are simple to use and look quite pretty.

But I am never prepared enough to have special bails like that.

So here is what I have done -

A simple wire wrap.
I didnt want to hide the lovely design on this ceramic pendant, and the gunmetal wire kind of blends in with the design.


A simple wire wrap plus dangle.
This is a gorgeous ceramic donut, but it looks like stone doesnt it?
I wanted to make it a bit more fanct but not overwhelming, so I strung a brass spiral charm after I did the wire wrap, and it covers the wire up too.


Another wire wrap plus dangles.
I wanted to incorporate several flower charms on this very large peace stone donut, but nothing worked.
The flowers have double holes on the back, like a button shank and so wouldn't sit flat.
So I made separate loops on them and strung them as I made the wrapped loop for the bail.



Beaded loop.
I made two seed bead loops for this large lime jade donut.
I like the way it hangs from two suspension points.



Several beaded loops.
The loops on this jade donut form part of the freeform peyote design.


I have also seen very elaborate beaded bails in beading magazines.
And I'm keen to do some more freeform wiring to hang donuts.

Now I feel inspired to make some more!

How do you deal with donuts?
"munch munch"

Delicious noodles

This is a cross between Pad Thai and Gado Gado, and it's from a Moosewood cookbook.
It's easy and you could vary the vegetables.



170 g packet of rice noodles, the flat kind

- Cook rice noodles in boiling water as per the packet

2 Tbs lime juice
Grated rind of one lime
1/2 cup peanut butter
2 tsp brown sugar
1 cup of vegatable stock

- mix all together using a whisk


2 leeks, make sure you wash all the dirt out from between the leaves
2 green zuccini
1 red capsicum

- slice all the veg into thin sticks 1/2 to 1 cm wide and about 10 cm long.
- Saute in a little oil with 2 crushed garlic cloves and a tablespoon of lemon grass, in a wok for 2 to 3 mins until just tender.
- add peanut sauce and the noodles and stir until heated through.
- garnish with some chopped fresh coriander

Delicious!

Wednesday wishlist

Mostly this wishlist wednesday is about things beyond our wildest dreams - things you covet but know you will never buy.

This week I'm going to wish for some non-personal things.
Some things that make a crafty persons mouth water!

Things that I can justify because they relate to my craft and I might actually use them and I might eventually make some profit out of them.
Their purchase can be justified on an economic basis!

Like fabric to embellish some tshirts for BoosTees

bike bits fabric pack by breenolivetextiles

Or stamps to make some cards, stamp some wooden blockor polymer clay to make pendants.

winter trees by oldislandstamps

Or some papery goodies to make tags or little thankyou cards.

french ephemera by CharmedMemoryCollage

Then I might actually use some of the things I have stockpiled here - tshirts, dominos, polymer clay, assorted bits of paper and card etc etc.

How do you justify your crafty purchases?

7 interesting things about the bra

Since we are celebrating 100 years of the bra, I thought I would continue my 7 thing series by including some interesting, and possibly little-know facts about the bra.


1.Women have used bra-like devices, designed to lift, separate and restrain their breasts since as early as 2000BC.
There have also been times when it has been fashionable to wear a band or other device to flatten the breasts.
But the fashion now is really for comfort - with a bit of sex thrown in!

2. The average woman owns between 9 and 16 bras.
And a disturbing bit of reasearch reveals that women in Britain only wash their bras 6 times a year! Or wears them 7 times before washing!
I'm sure that's not the case in Australia!

3. 80% of women wear bras that do not fit them properly.
But beware because a badly fitting bra can cause headaches, back pain and radiating pain down the arm.

4. Over the past 15 years the average bra size has gone up from a 34B to 36C.
That's one to make the guys happy : )

5. In 1991 a woman was killed by lightning which struck the underwire in her bra.

6. In October 2009, Somalia’s hard-line Islamist group Al-Shabaab forced women in public to shake their breasts at gunpoint to see if they wore bras, which they called "un-Islamic". Those found to be wearing a bra were publicly whipped because bras are seen as "deceptive" and to violate their interpretation of Sharia law.

7. Bras have been designed that detect cancer, detect radiation in case of a nuclear attack, to deter the wearer from smoking and to alert police in case of a mugging attack.



References:
nationalgeographic
wikipedia
telegraph.co.uk

This week's adventures and achievements

I went for a beautiful, if somewhat scarey bushwalk up the escarpment near Wollongong.

Actually going up was OK, it was coming back down that was bad for me - I was petrified I was going to slip again.

path along the escarpment

view to the north from Sublime Point

view to the south from Sublime Point

Anyway all was well and I was able to do another couple of small walks on Tuesday to some small waterfalls in the mid Blue Mountains towns of Hazelbrook and Woodford.

transit of venus track at Woodford

horseshoe falls at North Hazelbrook

And I made ten bright bracelets -


What did you do this week?

Crochet - the new yoga?

I heard someone the other day describe knitting as the new yoga, but crochet seems to be a resurgent craft, so I'm proposing that crochet is the next new yoga.

I'll admit from the start that I have never learnt to crochet.
My mother was a avid crocheter and made me a turquoise crocheted smock in the 70's when such things were fashionable.
But I think that crochet has come of age and is no longer the domain of the crocheted dolly toiletroll holder!


There are many on-line tutorials about crochet.
Here is one that I found tells you how to start.
I looked for a video tutorial because it seems to me that you need to be shown what to do with something like this, if you have absolutely no idea (as in my case)

Get Your Crochet Started

There are other useful tutorials on this site for basic crochet techniques.

I have also learnt that there are various style of crochet -

- granny squares
- freeform
- amigurumi

If you want to learn a bit more - granny squares for example, super-blogger Jess of epheriell pointed me in the direction of a tutorial by the very talented Renate of Rensfibreart.
You can find this free tutorial here.



Now you have mastered the granny square - what can you do with them?


It seems the possibilies are endless!


I love this granny square rug that I found on firefly cottage's blog.
Is like a beautiful rich mosaic.
Apparently it is from a granny square flickr group of which there are many.


The appeal of crochet is that -

1. You dont need a lot of equipment - just a crochet hook and yarn.
2. It is very portable - you can take it on a bus or car trip.
3. You can make a bit at a time and sew them all together later.
4. It is a stash-buster.

I might even have a go myself!

In the meantime - some more crochetty inspiration.

rensfibreart

ketzl

artnomadix

crochetroo

SylvChezPlum