Wednesday Wishlist

A whimsical wednesday wishlist today -

cotton dress with trees by elviainvidepland

wooden brooch by psyboom

balloon factory by pearsonmaron

That's all!
Have a great whimsical wednesday!

7 things to do on a sunny winter's sunday afternoon

We are having such lovely weather at the moment.
Even though it's winter and the mornings are a bit chilly we have clear sunny days.
It made me think about the best ways to spend such wonderful days. Often in summer it's too hot to do some things, or it's too wet or too windy.

What are your favorite ways to spens a lazy sunny sunday?

Here are a few I thought of.

1. Go for a bushwalk.
Many of you know of my passion for bushwalking and this is a perfect time to get out into the bush. Not hot, no flies!
You dont have to go very far - just a few minutes along a track can give you wonderful things to see!

2. Go for a bike ride - for most of the same reasons that this is a good time of year for walking it's also great for bike riding.

3. Walking or bike riding too energetic?
How about a picnic? We are so lucky to have wonderful parks around here and then ther is the Blue Mountains National Park with the great picnic area at Euroka clearing. If you are in Sydney it would take you about an hour to get there - and there are kangaroos!

image from here

4. Get in a boat and mess about on the river.
Take a ferry ride.
Hire  row boat.

5. Dust off your tennis racquet - it's Wimbledon time!
Who doesnt have an old tennis racquet?
Even if you don't have a tennis court near you, have a hit in the back yard, the street - somewhere!
I guarantee you will spend so much time laughing - you will ache!

6. All those things too energetic?
Invite some friends round for afternoon tea.
When did you last chat to your neighbours? Invite them round and sit in the sun with them.

image from here

7. Too much socialising?
OK! you can just find a comfy, sunny spot and curl up with a book....and maybe a nap.
Maybe you just need to recharge your batteries.

image from here

How did you spend Sunday?

Help! I have some new t's!

Boos Tees has recently come into the ownership of some more tshirts.

A friend of mine used to do some printed tshirts but is no longer making them, so I jumped at the chance of taking them off his hands.

At the moment they are washed and folded -

The thing is I don't know what I should put on them!

The tshirts are khaki and look more like this -

They are ladies sizes 8, 12 and 16 (Australian sizes).
All suggestions warmly received.

In my garden

bower with blue things, a photo by planettreasures on Flickr.

This is the bower of a satin bower bird in our garden.
The bower is constructed from sticks and twigs - it's amazing.
It is always oriented north-south.
The male bower bird collects blue things to attract females to his bower!
The females go around visiting all the bowers in the area, checking them out for a suitable mate.

Since I'm having trouble uploading photos here, you can see more bower photos on my flickr .

Here is what the male satin bower bird looks like (not ours)
He is very glossy and bluey-black - lovely!

 photo from ozanimals.com

and here is a photo of a female -

photo from oztrek.com

My creative space

More sewing this week.
More of the batik fabric squares from my friend H.
This time I have made them into little fold-over clutch purses.

They are kind of small, but kinda cute.
What would you use these little sweeties for?
They measure 12.5cm across and 8cm from top to bottom when folded.

I might even post how I made them as a tute - what do you think?

If you would like to see what everybody else has in their cretive spaces or would like to join in - pop on over here!

Wednesday Wishlist

Although it's very chilly outside I can't help wishing for this pretty dress.

Maybe I could wiosh for some warmer weather or to be in a warmer place... let me see - where would I go?

tashi sash dress by humanrattle 

Maybe I need something to bring on the spring!

 

spring linen wall art by bookhouathome 

And just because I love it -

 

Taos collection plates by aedrieloriginals

My creative space

Something a bit different and a bit of a story.  

 

I am a member of a craft co-operative that is in Leura, NSW. It is called The Nook.
We are a shop that is open every day except Christmas day, and it is a great venue to sell handmade goodies.
Every October the village of Leura has a gardens festival and a 2 day festival market right in the main street of Leura. Most of the shops in the street use the occassion to publicise their business, but The Nook, being upstairs on the first floor and not having a shop frontage always was disadvanteged. Sure we had  little stall outside your front door, but how to get people up there.
So a couple of years ago we came up with the idea to give our customers a goody bag, with things handmade by our members, when they spent $20 in the shop.
It worked a treat and our sales for the weekend rocketed.
So the other day a few of us got together and had a working bee to make some goobybagness!
My friend H has more fabric than I have beads I think!
These are some squares she cut out once for cushions that never really sold, so here we are making them into coasters - to give away in October.

Nothing like being organised in advance!

If you would like to join in with Our creative spaces or just take a peek at what others have been up to, pop over here.

I won

This beautiful little pendant necklace -

Isnt it sweet?
I won it on La Femme Jewels blog.

Rachel of La Femme Jewels makes gorgeous jewellery using silver, enamel, gemstone and glass.

She has two shops to showcase her different styles of jewellery.
La Femme Jewels and rmdjewellery
Go and have a look, I'm sure you'll agree she is very talented.

The necklace came so beautifully packaged - how cute!

thanks Rach! I just love it!

Wednesday finds - Tapas

Further to Monday's post I thought it might be fun to run a "tapas" search.

After all if you are going to make tapas at home you might need some recipe ideas

 

  

recipe book by soupNstuff

You might need some new bowls and dishes - small bright ones in keeping with the sunny mediterranean theme

 

 tapas plate by pamdesign 

bowls by atelierBB

How about some really cute serving spoons

curled spoons by ateleirOKER

curled spoons by atelierOKER

A beautiful cheese or bread board

orange board by EcoStone

orange cheese board by EcoStone

Olives - of course!

 

 olives by bridgethenry 

And a menu!

tapas by juanjez

Buen apetito!

Mad about Tapas

Is tapas the next big food "thing"?

We're had pizza, thai, sushi - is tapas the next "IT"?

You'd think so if you live near me with 2 tapas resturaunts opening in the last couple of months (to mixed reviews!)

What is or are tapas?
Basically they are snacks, small plates of food usually served with a drink.



Tapas originated in Spain and means literally "cover".
There are many stories of tapas' origin including that is is simply a lid put on top of a glass of wine to keep the flies out! The lid could be a card or piece of bread or became ham or cheese as bar owners realised that salty food increased their customers thirst!

Another romantic explanation is that King Alfonso was travelling around Spain and stopped in the dusty town of Cadiz. The bar tender placeed a slice of ham on top of the galss to keep the dust out. The king so enjoyed the combination of ham and sherry that he asked for more "tapas".

Whatever the origin it is a very popular custom in Spain where dinner is normally eaten quite late - after 9pm and so people need a snack to keep them going until dinnertime.

I think that the interpretation of tapas has evolved as it has travelled across the world with every place that adopts the style putting their own spin on it.

Common threads seem to be olives and olive oil, seafood as well as meats and potato dishes are very popular.



One of the fun things about tapas is that the plates are meant to share making it all a very social experience.

Have you had tapas?
What is your favorite tapas dish?
Do you have any recipes to share?

My creative space

Lovelovelove these flat drop Czech glass beads!


They look like lollies!
But I'm not going to eat them.

What have you been creating?

If you would like to join in with this weekly meme or just have a lokk at others creative spaces pop over to our creative spaces.

Wednesday Wishlist

fairysteps makes the most amazing shoes!

I love them all, but I am especially partial to red shoes!

doris by fairysteps

Maybe I could wear them with this comfy top by treehouse28 -

top by treehouse28

And of course I would need a co-ordinating purse -

colourful purse by galleriadivina