:: 52 weeks of happy, 12/52 ::

Here are four of many happy moments this week.

1.  Creating a little terraced rock garden on a sloping site in the garden, hopefully to improve water run off.

2.  Receiving notification from the library that the next two books in this series were ready for me to pick up.

 3.  Op shopping for scarves for my next controversial sewing project.  :)

4.  Grateful for lamps and candles when the power goes off for over 12 hours.  Happy that for one evening there was no computer of t.v. on.  It was so beautifully quiet and peaceful.

The little lamp on the far left with the red glass chimney I've had since I was a young teen.  So glad I kept it.

Wishing you all many happy moments this week.

Anne  xx

Books and mending

I love books especially craft books.  When my parents recently gifted me some money for my birthday, I knew craft books were at the top of my list.  I buy most of my books from the Book Depository because they're are discounted and the postage is free even all the way downunder.  Bonus!  So here are the books I recently received.

Lots of delicious motifs to keep me busy.

A nice easy key of symbols to learn so I can crochet from Japanese patterns one day.

One day I'll make me a skirt just like this.  It's VERY different and I like that.

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I love quilts, just another thing I have to be brave enough to take on.

So much inspiration in these books.  Thanks Dad and Mum.

Last week there was an altercation between a door, a cat and a figurine.  The figurine was made by Nana who is no longer with us and as the figurine was damaged, it was very upsetting to the daughter it was bequeathed to.  I gathered up the pieces from the floor and set about trying to put them back together.  Tools needed for the job, glue, tweezers, toothpicks, emery board and lots and lots of patience.

Doesn't look so good up close but from a distance it will pass.

 Yesterday I went down to Spotlight and bought some fabric to make some summer tops.  If they turn out I might be brave and show them on here.

I hope you are having a fab weekend,

Anne xx

A thank you, genealolgy and a quilt

Hello, how are you?  I would like to say a big thank you to Louise of Ramblings of a Roachling for sending me two books and the most beautiful card for my birthday.

I love the two books Louise selected for me. In this post Louise talks about reading "The Uninvited", a true story about a family living on a farm in Wales being visited by creatures/aliens not of this world.  I'm quite fascinated by the whole UFO thing and made a passing comment that I would like to read the book one day.  So Louise went to the trouble of tracking down a copy for me for which I'm most appreciative.  I read the book in one sitting and must say that parts of it were a little scary but compelling reading, for me anyway.  :)  The book about the interesting and at time weird exploits of some Brits is so much fun to read.  I love it when people can go out and do something difference and have a lot of fun.

And just how cute is this card?!!  You have the most beautiful cards in England.

 I've been kept very busy this past week continuing to delve into the intriguing world of genealogy.  I met two second cousins for the first time and it just happened to be the 60th birthday of one of them so I decided to have a little fun and bake her a cake.  Decorating this cake with silver ball things and butterflies was most interesting.  I ended up with silver balls all over the kitchen bench top and floor with very few on the cake and the butterflies wanted to fly away. 

I also made her a card from one of my sketches.  Very handy to have a stash of little sketches to make into cards.

I had a very nice visit with my new found cousins and was able to scan some old photos of family members, some of which I had never seen including my great grandmother Annie Ashby.  My granny is the baby and my great aunt standing.

About a month ago I discovered Annie's grave in an old part of a Melbourne cemetery posted about here.

Here is a photo of her grave, in the middle front of the photo without any markings.

It is a very special thing to have a photo of my great grandmother.

When I can tear myself away from my genealogy projects I have a quilt to complete.  Some months ago I put these squares together.

I found this cotton quilt on sale, it's a summer weight at a bargain price and had the bright idea to use this instead of the normal insert batting.

I need some advice from all the quilt making ladies out there.  The bought quilt is a Queen size and the squares I've sewn cover the top of a Queen size mattress so there is some extra fabric that needs to be joined to the edges to make wide enough.  Can I also have some suggestions as to what I could use for the backing fabric?  I was thinking maybe a quilting fabric but it would have to be joined down the centre to make it wide enough.  I'm also wondering what would be the best method of quilting the layers together? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks so much for taking the time to read this long post.  I hope you are all having a wonderful day/evening.

Anne  xx

My favourite Little Golden books

One of the lovely memories I have of growing up is looking at and reading books.  I had a four favourites Little Golden Books that I just had to find to read to my girls when they were little.  My all time favourite was Tootle, followed by Thumper, then The Little Red Hen and Three Little Kittens.

Just for fun, I'm showing some pages from those books.  I wonder if they will jog any memories? 

Tootle

I loved these illustrations.  The butterflies, dragonflies and all those flowers draped around Tootle, magical.  I love dragonflies.

Thumper

 I love how these rabbits have ridiculously long eyelashes.

Scared little Thumper looks so cute.

The Little Red Hen

I loved this story probably because I grew up on a farm with wheat growing and my mum made our bread. 

My grandma read this to me many times, I'm sure she was heartily sick of it.

  Just have a look at this bed.  Isn't it to die for?  :)  When I was a little girl I always wanted a four poster bed just like this.

Three Little Kittens

How disciplining children use to be done.

I found it very hard to choose which pages I would share today.   I wanted to put them all in but how ridiculous would that be?  Thanks for joining me on my trip down memory lane.

Anne   xx

Snoop fodder

Kirsty over at kootoyoo thought it might be fun to have a little snoop at what we have on our bookshelves.  I was assured that styling and dusting weren't mandatory before posting photos.  So here are some of the places you can find reading material in my house.  Emphasis here on some of the places.  There are more.

In the lounge room.  Grown up sensible books on fashion, photography, gardens, decorating and oil painting reside here.

Entry way with bookshelf home to magazines on home decorating, gardening and crafts.

 Kids books and a few other bits and pieces.  Keeping the kids books for the grandkids which I hope are years away yet.
  

More books including novels, dictionaries, text books, yet more magazines, folders containing magazine cut outs, map books, photo albums and other general junk.

That's it for today's snooping fodder.  There are way too many places that need a good clean out and reorg.

Linking up to with kootoyoo, see above.  I'll be back later with some of my favourite little Golden books, a happy blast from the past.

Anne  xx

A little bit spoilt

Yesterday I was a little bit spoilt.  The reasons why are not important, what I was spoilt with IS!  I was given this beautiful book from a VERY good friend who knows I've entered the exciting world of knitting and crochet.

How am I to choose which bag to knit first?  

This one?  It's got a cute flower on it and it's oh so pretty.

How about this one?  It's so glitzy with those furry ruffles.  I can imagine this bag in purple, yes, definitely a loud, bold purple.

I like this one too.  These are some of my favourite colours but I can equally imagine a bag like this in aqua and orange or hot pink and purple.  Even better black, red and white, the colours of my footy team             ST. KILDA.  Then I'd have a bag to take to the footy.   Interjection here:  GO SAINTERS!!!!!!!  Good luck for the Grand Final this Saturday.

 

 For those of you who have been reading my blog for a while will know how much I love owls.  Can you imagine my delight when I found this fellow sitting on my kitchen bench when I came out for breakfast.  Squeal!!!!  I couldn't stop hugging him.  Yes it's silly I know, I just couldn't help myself.

He's going in my garden room.

 

I love dragonflies almost as much as I love owls and these solar dragonfly lights (there are ten in a row) will be going on the outside of my garden room.

I also have the absolute delight of looking forward to going to a big book store with a voucher and some money to buy a few books.  Top of the list is Bazaar Style and then I think it will be a book on crochet.


Thank you so much to my family and friends who spoilt me rotten.  :-)

 Anne