Wednesday 29 September 2010

29 September

We have had some beautiful spring days to start off the school holidays with, and Miss M has spent most of them outside playing with her friends. Mister O is more of an inside boy, but even he has been lured outside for a bit with the lovely weather. And to pick caterpillars off my vegies!










Yesterday he also sorted out these tiny shells we collected while visiting Grandma and Grandpa at Port Macquarie - we hardly ever get shells at the beaches near us (Northern Beaches) so the amount of shells lying around was a real treat.



Tuesday 21 September 2010

22 September

Last day of school today! I am so looking forward to spending some Spring days relaxing at home. But to be honest, we also love our school days - we are Montessorians and we have really embraced the whole Montessori philosophy at home as well.








My little people have learned to work independently as well as to cooperate (mostly) with each other. And they have such a love of learning - Miss M is curious about everything, and one of the great things about a Montessori classroom is that the children learn without realising it. They don't sit down at desks and learn lessons from the board by rote; they choose their own work and they feel such a sense of accomplishment when they complete it all by themselves. They do have a checklist of things they have to complete by the end of the day - for example, they have to select two pieces of maths work and two of literacy work, but it is up to them which pieces they choose and which order they do it in. They can't get away with coming to school and doing nothing except grate cheese all day long (apparently there was one child who began to do this - the teacher gently directed the child to other things once they got the daily cheese fix out of their system!). Miss M loves every minute of it - she is zooming ahead with her maths and her reading, and she loves the social aspect of it - the classes combine different age groups (she is currently in the 3-6 cycle) and she enjoys playing with younger children as well as her own peer group. When I pick her up I always ask her how her day was; she always answers "it was fantastic - 100 out of 10!"

Mister O only goes one day a week at the moment, and I accompany him. He has benefitted so much as well - he has always been very independent but now he has learned that there are steps to every task he completes, and that if he does them in a certain order he can complete them with much less frustration. He likes the routine of the tasks - setting them up, completing them, packing them away. He gets a lot of satisfaction from doing all this for himself, and he has become much more confident in what he does.

Wearing Dad's old glassless glasses ;)



I know that this post isn't directly craft related, but it is still all a part of my creative journey through life :)

21 September

Tomorrow is the last day of school before the holidays start, and we are all looking forward to them. Miss M is definitely one for getting up late, and then spending the whole day playing outside with the neighbour's children. Mister O just loves having his sister home, and even though it is nice having him to myself all day it is also lovely to see him learn from her. He copies everything that she does, mostly with happy results :) Here are some old photos I found in my March folder of the two of them working together.






It's fun to see from these pictures how much my house has changed in just a few months - I have really allowed free reign to my Ikea love ;) Honestly, I would live in an Ikea store if they'd only let me.

Tuesday 7 September 2010

7 September

Here is one of my completed floor quilts - made using the Bricks and Stones quilt pattern by Red Pepper Quilts (thanks to Cherri Berri for mentioning this pattern on her blog :) The fabric is Oh Boy, such a great boy fabric.





This quilt was a commission, so I wanted it to be extra perfect. I hand quilted it when the machine quilting wasn't turning out, and I sewed on a name label for the little bub it's intended for.



My apologies for all the fluff and hairs sticking to it - I did give it a vacuum before I passed it on ;)



















Monday 16 August 2010

16 August

I recently started work on another two baby floor quilts, using some of the Oh Boy range.





I also bought some custom made knitting markers from a great etsy seller, Sunneshine. She is so lovely and she made up lots of samples for me to choose my sets from. I wanted smaller ones for sock and lace knitting, and these ones are so light and delicate.






And Miss M and I have been busy making brooches - we have to make so many because we keep forgetting to take them off her clothes before they go in the wash...

Tuesday 22 June 2010

22 June

It has been pretty rainy in Sydney lately, so there have been a lot of indoor activities to photograph. I only hope that it fines up for the school holidays!

Lots of knitting going on - I finished the Icarus shawl, although I still haven't blocked it. I used a pretty Dream in Colour baby lace called Cloud Jungle. The soft colours reminded me of the colours in a pigeon's feathers, keeping in with the Icarus theme - in the myth Icarus flew too close to the sun with his wood, wax and feather wings; the wax melted and the feathers slid off, can you see that in the shawl?




Lots of tea drinking


snuggling up under the heater


playing with favourite toys


and taking photos of the wet world outside when we weren't allowed to go out into it :)

Sunday 13 June 2010

Spring Garden Tee



I couldn't resist buying this beautiful pattern from Alana Dakos (Never Not Knitting) last year, and I finished it in time for Miss M to wear last summer. It is the Spring Garden Tee, and I knit it from Bendigo Cotton.



The cotton knit up lovely and soft, with very nice stitch definition, and I just wash it in the washing machine with no drastic effects ;)



The pattern was very well written, nice and clear and straighforward for a newbie garment knitter like myself. I will definitely be knitting more of these in different colours for Miss M. Alana has also just released an adult sized version of this pattern, which I will also be buying!

Monday 31 May 2010

31 May - still here!

It's been such a long time between posts for me, I have been so busy and the days are just flying by. I have a lot of photos from the last couple of months to share, although not as many crafty ones as I'd like.

My pincushions have been getting a work out lately with a couple of quilt projects I'm working on - photos of those later. The top pincushion is from Ruth :)


Since Miss M gave herself a haircut at school (!) we have been trying out new hairstyles. I must admit that it is easier to brush in the mornings now...


This drum kit was given to us by a mum who had had enough of it - shortly after these photos were taken we passed on the joy to yet another mum ;)



Woolly goodness - I'm not the only one who appreciates it!


I'm still not sure what I want this to be - I've cut pieces out and sewn bits together, and I just don't know. I love the colours though.