Calorie overload

Warning, this post may add calories just by looking at it!!!

Feijoa Shortcake

It's started to chill down slightly, not too bad yet - we are still have 18-20 degree C days but slightly cooler overnight. We've had the fire going a couple of times, and as much as I loathe cold weather there is something lovely about the warm fire and winter dinners.

Roast Beef with perfect Yorkshire Pudding was the first winter meal request.

My Yorkshire Puds are pretty tasty!

and Pies, lovely homemade meat pies

The other half had a birthday, chocolate cake was the request from the children (although I knew he'd secretly prefer Carrot Cake - but to keep the girls happy Chocolate it was).

We went away for a lovely family weekend just an hour north of here in Waitangi. The girls loved the hotel - especially the swimming, and I just loved the chance to have a wee change of scenery for 24 hours.

No crochet to show sorry, I've just bought an e-reader so I've been spending my spare time reading a few ebooks - loving it! Love that I can now take all my patterns with me on the Kobo though without having to print out paper. So handy.


Head on over to my lovely friends Becs' blog "Born Again Creations" to check out her gorgeous giveaway - she is so super talented!

Have a lovely week xxx Kylie

Long time no talk

I admit it, I've been slack. So so slack. No posts in nearly a month, hardly any reading of other blogs either. Where have I been - well, nowhere exciting but have been in the midst of a huge work project, including creating a new website for the company I work for. I hired website designers, yet still so much input has had to come from me that I've been a little snowed under. Fingers crossed the launch all goes well next week!!

I've not let the craftiness completely slide by though, that's been very much my downtime relaxation. I sold a wee hat on felt - love the colour combination don't you?

And I've been knitting again. It's been so long since I picked up needles, but I've tried something different - socks.... Such Fun!

And I've been making loads of jewellery. Only a few items ever made it into my felt shop as I tend to carry my box of goodies in my car, so it's come with me to a party, to book group, to work and so on and I've really done well selling it to friends. I've not even had to push it - it sells very easily. Lovely little earner for me!

And of course much of it has made it's way into my jewellery box too, I get so many positive comments that it's been very rewarding.

Since I've last blogged I've celebrated a birthday, must say it was one of the nicest birthdays ever. The other half sent me out shopping for the day and I came home to a beautifully tidy house, a yummy birthday cake and then some very good friends came around for dinner. 

I also found the cutest vintage pyrex dish and lid set at the op shop so I was rapt with that too!

 

My sister sent me the most fantastic cookbook, it's a NZ one - based on recipes from an Auckland Cafe. Real treat food, and we've made a fair few goodies from it already.

My garden is coming to the end of the summer goodness, the autumn fruits are in full harvest - apples, feijoas, jerusalem artichokes and I've been busy sowing seeds for some lovely Stock plants to add beautiful colour to dull winter days. The vege garden has been planted for winter so we're on track for a plentiful garden.

Anyway it's 7:30 Friday night and I have some more work to do. Sad isn't it. Kids are slowing drifting off to sleep so it's the most productive time for me to get through the list of "to-dos".

Have a great week xxx Kylie

Another year goes by

It's my littlest girl's 4th birthday today, where has that time gone? Next birthday she will be a big school girl! We just had a teeny-tiny party with a couple of her little "boyfriends", some friends and us.

Numberjacks "4" cake

I'm linking up here with my friend Bec's blog as she has the most lovely idea of posting Make-Bake-Grow Sundays. I love this concept to really show off creations made during the week.

MAKE 

With the little one's birthday I've done a heap of "making" for that, including more of my Sweet and Spicy Macadamia nuts, and I've been doing more on my giant granny blanket.

BAKE

Birthday cake of course, see above. Green icing as requested by the birthday girl (I don't have very "girly girls" ).

Now I can't take the credit for these - but they are really really cute. My Mother-in-Law arrived with these for the party today - Tidy Teddy racers. Mini Moro (you could use Mars bars) bars with pebble wheels and tiny teddy drivers. Luckily there are a couple left over for us now that the children are in bed. I'll be making these for sure for future parties.


GROW

I haven't planted anymore since my last seedling post, but I love these Fragrant Stock that I picked today from the garden for the birthday table. They are abundant in one little part of my garden currently so I didn't mind cutting a few stems (I usually prefer flowers to stay in the garden, not in a vase - I love seeing them all when I look out the windows). My plan for next year is to plant a cut flower garden in an area that I don't see so much (we have a huge expanse of gardens) so I don't mind cutting them so much.

I thought I might add another category of my own. "DO". We can be a little guilty in this family of not going out of our way to do different things - we get a bit caught up with routine and what needs to be done. So we are trying to make more of an effort to get out and do fun things.

DO
We took the girls into the farmers market, for a hot drink after and then a play at the cool park at the Town Basin. Spider girl loves to climb (as opposed to her vertigo suffering mother!) so here she is up the frame. Makes my stomach churn just looking at her up there. I'm terrible with heights. She did get right to the top but I didn't have the camera out then.

Have a wonderful week xxxxx Kylie

Tea Party Sunday

Yesterday was my big girl's 7th Birthday, so of course we had a chintzy tea party to celebrate. Now my eclectic child "gets" my vintage love, she was so proud of it all - but I think the other children were really struggling with the time warp they walked into .... Oh it was so cute. Individual place settings with a handmade crepe flower each, charity shop glasses (perfect size for the girls), pink lemonade, sweet treats, doilies and anything else that made my heart skip a beat on the day.

One of the biggest successes was with a recipe called "Pink Passion Lemonade" that I found here (courtesy of Pinterest). It's essentially not lemonade at all, but lemon juice with a few other things. My big girl loved it!!

Pink Passion Lemonade
Juice of 4 lemons
Juice of 4 Passionfruit
3/4 cup unrefined sugar
3 cups water
2 -3 drops natural pink food colouring (mine was a bit darker than in the original recipe - kids liked it darker)
Ice cubes

Mix all together and serve (in vintage cups of course!)

The girls also loved these dipped marshmellows - no recipe required, but they did look fabulous on the lollipop sticks I found at Spotlight.

Honey rice bubble slice also went down well with the girls - lucky we have plenty left over as it's a treat we enjoy.


Now the crepe flowers were fun to make, I followed a few tutorials that I found on the internet but none of them worked well for me so here is my own mini tutorial.

Crepe flowers

Cut 2 widths (about 5cm - make sure both are the same width and about 1 metre (or just over 2 feet) in length) and place one on top of another.  Sew close to the edge with the longest stitch possible, and the loosest tension possible. The crepe with sort of gathers as you go.

Roll into a flower shape that you like, mine were fairly loose (tight rolling just didn't work out right) and glue with a glue gun as you go.

 Especially cute with contrasting crepe. You could make big or small - it wouldn't really matter.

Oh so gorgeous. My daughter was fascinated with them - even gave me a great big cuddle to say thank you for making all the beautiful flowers.

The birthday was simple, yet fun. So much Chocolate!!!

And the birthday girl herself, can't believe what a wee lady she is turning into.

Bliss

It's my birthday, another year older but another reason to celebrate as it's our 10th wedding anniversary. The Chief and I both took the day off and spent the day lunching, shopping and vintage treasure trawling. We got some fabulous gems, lots of them for our retro caravan.

I love these bowls, Crown Lynn - a NZ treasure. They really are a bit small to be practical but too cute to not buy!

A great book found at the second hand book store. Loving this one!!

I got very spoilt with a fabulous CD of my favourite group, Mumford and Sons (thank you Leah) and my wonderful husband got me a Tin Champagne bucket (10 year ann is "Tin")  with a bottle of my favourite wine - Veuve Clicquot.

We also did a bit of clothes shopping for the both of us today, I just love this new t-shirt which has a touch of "vintage" with the cute photo prints on the front.

Such a lovely day, topped off by my girls being happy and fun!!