I am always interested to find projects that use repurposed materials. It is amazing to see all the creative ways that old materials can be used to give them a new lease of life. The July edition of Marie Claire Idees (#79) has a fun article on using old maps and globes. Here are a few pages...

Love the Decoupaged Boxes

Great covered notebooks and shelf edging.

Great display of globes. Check out the sweet bunting.

I have a stash of old World Book Encyclopedias (1975 edition) that I rescued when my parents were doing a clean up at their ...

... to my craft room is a Cricut Expression Machine. After seeing one in action, resistance was futile.




Although I am not a scrapbooker, I have been known to make the occasional card, and love to dress up gift packaging with customised tags and the like. I also love to give gifts from my kitchen and will now be able to make the perfect packaging.

I had a bit of a play around with all the features and made up a few cards for birthdays that are coming up.






The Cindy Loo cartridge has some lovely cupcake wrappers. I can't ...

The school holidays are flying by - hard to believe we are now in the second week! Sarah and I spent an enjoyable morning yesterday in the kitchen and craft room together. I have already shown you my pear muffins. Sarah prefers chocolate over fruit. She was inspired by her cook book "500 Chocolate Delights" and made up some Chocolate Shortbread, which is the perfect accompaniment to Hot Chocolate.



She also made up some Rich Chocolate Syrup which tasted divine on our ice-cream last night. She had fun customising the bottle.








Last term, Sarah did a unit in ceramics at school ...

Pears are plentiful at the moment so I have been experimenting with some pear recipes. Did you know that pears are a member of the rose family; that they have been used as a food source since prehistoric times; and that they are an excellent source of fibre and Vitamin C? These are just some of the facts I have learnt while trolling the internet for pear recipes.


I used a great recipe for Pear Muffins with Streusel Topping from Rouxbe. I didn't have any sour cream on hand so substituted a low fat yoghurt and they turned out ...

I spent a most enjoyable day yesterday with some crafty friends playing with Linda's cricut and fantastic range of cartridges. I particularly loved all the little gift boxes and bags you can make - the possibilities are endless. I think a Cricut is definitely going on my wish list:) Thanks again Linda for a wonderful day!






I have been busy over the school holidays with family things - getting my son ready for his school trip skiing in New Zealand, and having lots of teen girls over for a sleep over, among other things. I have found time though for some ...

Both of my jobs have been super busy this week which hasn't left a lot of time or energy for crafty pursuits. Coupled with the cold weather we have been having, my evenings have been spent in front of the heater reading The Aloha Quilt, the latest addition to the Elm Creek Quilt Series by Jennifer Chiaverini. This book follows the adventures of Bonnie, one of the original Elm Creek Quilters as she travels to Hawaii, and includes some interesting history of Hawaiian quilts.



The Quilters Apprentice was the first fiction quilting book I read, and I had the ...

The electrical Gods are not smiling on us this week. First up, the digital set top box died and we lost hours of recordings of our favourite programs that we hadn't gotten around to watching yet. Secondly, our toaster would only char grill the bread a very dark shade of burnt. Finally, my sunbeam mixer (which is heavily used in our household) was emitting a burning smell and making lots of clunking noises.

So what is a girl to do? Go shopping of course! We are now the proud owners of a TiVo, Toaster, and best of all..... a ...

Six is my lucky number - six members of my immediate family are born on the sixth day of a month (makes remembering birthdays so much easier). Perhaps that is why I am attracted to hexagons. I bought a pack of hexagon shapes at a recent craft fair (1 1/4 inch in size)  and they are making the process so much faster and more accurate.

They are a good project if you want to practice some hexagons




or some applique.



Pop on over to QFD Creative for the free tutorial. Sarah has all the fabric supplies in her store.

My copy of Sewn Spaces by Joel Dewberry arrived this week and it did not disappoint. I am a fan of Joel Dewberry's fabrics and modern style and have been eagerly awaiting his book. The book contains 26 projects that are divided into sections of Work, Play and Live. The book is beautifully styled and it contains full sized pattern pieces in the back pocket.


Many of the projects are suited to the beginner/intermediate sewer and there are a few projects to challenge more experienced sewers. Other crafting techniques such as glass etching, fabric printing, and machine embroidery ...

1. Crafty Gatherings with Special Friends



I spent today with two sweet stitching buddies - chatting, eating, and looking through craft books. Bliss!


2. Lemon Macaroons



I tried a new macaroon flavour today - Lemon. Loving citrus flavours at the moment. They were filled with my lemon butter. I used a recipe from here.

3. Hexagons



I bought a pack of hexagon templates at a recent Craft Fair. I have been enjoying stitching up a batch of hexagons and can see them appearing in all sorts of projects.


4. Sashiko


I finished my sashiko panel and decided to turn it into a ...

One of the things I love best about baking is getting all the details right - I have more fun with the decorating that I do with the actual baking. I spotted a fabulous idea for making some easy cupcake wrappers out of paper doileys at Intimate Weddings and Cake Central. I had seen the beautiful laser cut ones around but they have an expensive price tag. These ones are easily cut from paper doileys that I already had. A paper doiley that is approx 28 cm/11 inches in diameter will yield you three cupcake wrappers. Simply remove the centre ...

With the weather finally starting to cool, it is reminding me of Christmas time in the Northern hemisphere. I have been lucky enough to have experienced three winter Christmas' - including a magical Christmas in Colorado where we went for sleigh ride on Christmas Day. I think that is why Christmas in July is so popular here in Australia - the traditional menu's are more suited to the colder months, rather than a heavy meal in the middle of summer.

To celebrate Christmas in July there is going to be some on-line stitching fun over at QFD Creative. So if you ...

When we were challenged this month over at QFD Creative to make a tutorial that related to storage, I decided to make a Peg Bucket. I have been using my new peg bucket this week and it is a big improvement on the one I was using. The carabiner hook is perfect for quickly attaching it to the washing line, and the drawstring closure prevents the pegs from ending up everywhere inside my laundry cupboard.

You can find the tutorial over at QFD Creative, as well as all the fabric supplies. You can easily purchase a carabiner (sometimes known as ...

I have a bit of an addiction to craft books, I'll admit it. Another one arrived in the mail yesterday. It is the classic, Densye Schmidt Quilts (2005). I have often seen this book referenced by bloggers and was unable to find a copy in the local library system. I found it here.



The book has 30 projects - 20 are smaller sewing projects with many suitable for a beginner including eye pillow, cards, oven mitt and slippers.



It also includes 10 of her stunning quilts. My goal this year is to make a few projects using only solids.



I ...

It has been cold and wet here in Perth this weekend, the first real rain we have had in ages. It has been the perfect weather for:

Knitting - We stopped by Lincraft yesterday and Sarah found some lovely red wool and has already started on knitting herself a scarf.



Sashiko - I bought myself a sashiko kit in Japan earlier in the year and finally got it out to stitch in front of the TV. With the stitches already marked on the fabric it is perfect for when I don't want to concentrate too much!



Comfort Food - I made up ...

We had a lovely family dinner out on the weekend at a hamburger place -  one of the nicest things about this restaurant, other than the family friendly atmosphere (we all love the paper tablecloths that you can draw on - I usually sketch out quilt designs, Sarah draws cupcakes, while my DH and DS draw engineering diagrams), was the delicious tomato relish they put on their burgers. I have never been a big fan of chutney, mainly because I have only ever had the commercial variety. After some research, I found a great recipe here. I modifed it to halve the ...

This week I am reading I Love Patchwork and Sewing with Scraps - two craft books that have been written by bloggers. My sewing/craft book collection seems to be growing but I always enjoy looking through them. I love how shopping at the Book Depository makes it more affordable for Australians to buy books at a fraction of the local price.  (I am waiting for two more books to arrive as well - I love Birthday money - I think my extended family know how much I love selecting craft books!)

I love the zakka style and have a growing collection of ...

Sashiko ( literally "little stabs") is a form of decorative reinforcement stitching (or functional embroidery) from Japan. Traditionally used to reinforce points of wear, or to repair worn places or tears with patches, this running stitch technique is often used for purely decorative purposes in quilting and embroidery. The white cotton thread on the traditional indigo blue cloth gives sashiko its distinctive appearance, though decorative items sometimes use red thread. (Excerpt from Wikipedia.) 








I have always been interested in Sashiko, since I made my East Meets West Quilt around 10 years ago. I love to incorporate a bit of sashiko into ...

It was a case of third time lucky yesterday when I made another batch of chocolate macaroons to take to our Mothers Day celebration. (The Australian Women's Weekly cookbook refers to them as macaroons so that is good enough for me!) Now that I have mastered the chocolate version (made with some delicious Dutch cocoa) and using the recipe from the book that Susan gave me, I can see many more of these in my baking future.


We had a wonderful time catching up with all the extended family and there was loads of yummy food to eat. Sarah ...

Our jam supplies were running low (since I have started making homemade jam we seem to be consuming much larger quantities of jam - probably because it just tastes so amazing when compared to the shop bought stuff and I give a lot of it away!). With winter just starting the suitable fruit available for making preserves was dwindling. My DH mentioned that the plum jam I made was his favourite, so I made up another batch with the last black plums of the season (I think the supermarket had frozen them - don't you hate that!). This time I made ...

It was my birthday a couple of days ago and I have been celebrating all week! Yesterday I had the delight of catching up with my two favourite blogging friends, Susan and Janelle, for a day of laughter, shopping, and our continued quest to find the best patisserie in Perth. (This time we tried Chez Jean Claude Patisserie in Subiaco )

They spoilt me with some lovely birthday goodies-
Beautifully wrapped packages from Susan


with a lovely hand made card and other goodies




and a wonderful cookbook so I can perfect my macarons/macaroons. I am going to make some chocolate ...