Mushrooms

Deck the halls with wool felt mushrooms, fa la la la laah la la la lah...

 Ive been getting started on some christmas tree ornaments. Im aiming to have all natural decorations this year so its about time I got started. Here are my first lot, some cute little mushrooms. Perfect as seems they dont necissarily look christmassy so we can hang them up already. 

I also have some available in my shop .

 Speaking of my little shop, Ive had an enquiry about doing a wholesale order for an eco friendly shop in New South Wales. Rather exciting I must say! 

Im a bit in love with these joyous little fungusses

 Mum gave me this little Christmas tree a few months ago, isnt it gorgeous! Im hoping with this warm weather weve been having it might grow an inch or two before christmas (its grown a lot since I got it already!) I cant wait to bring it inside to decorate in a few months.

Apparently the mushrooms make great nap time conpanions too!

New washing machine

 Last week we got a new washing machine and dryer and Mum asked for a picture so here it is! (and my pretty new surfie pics I put up, I couldn't leave them out)
 I must say, its much easier to use then a twin tub that doesn't like to spin clothes and would rather not drain out the water.
Now I have washed every machine-washable thing in our house and some other things ie: my pillow which is now very lumpy. I guess pillows don't like to be machine washed. Hmm
Now I'm eagerly waiting for more things to get dirty so I can do another load. Lets hope this enthusiasm lasts. I'm fairly certain it wont but ill enjoy it for now!

Friday morning some kidlets helped me put a load in and just after it started they noticed a tiny bug inside. I couldn't figure out how to get it out so I told them he was going swimming. Oops, luckily they forgot about him!

We've had a busy weekend getting together with friends, lots of fun! Benny and I spring cleaned our house yesterday, everythings fresh, tidy, organise and new. Life is good! 

Day care activity: rainbow chard- from the garden to our table

A while ago I planted some rainbow chard with the day care kids. I had no idea what could be made with it but it sure did look pretty:) Since then its been growing like crazy so I thought id better figure out how to use it! My mum told me it could be used like spinich and also gave me a carton of fresh eggs from her little chickens so I decided to make an egg and spinich slice.

 We harvested lots of gorgeous big leaves

'Washed' them (ie played with them pretending they were boats until Karen stole most of them to cut up) 

 They mixed together 7 eggs each, 1/2 cup of flour, 1/2 cup of cheese and probably about 5 leaves of rainbow chard.

 They then scooped them into muffin trays (usually I would use a slice tray but I knew they would have more fun filling the muffin cups. They turned out just as nice)

 While they had their nap I cooked them.

We enjoyed them in the afternoon and pointed out 'leaves from garden' in them

By the way, ive started a blog to document my family day care, adventures of the little free spirits can be found Here

Orchard cardi

Ive almost finished my 'orchard' cardi (The wool is Jo sharp classic, orchard colourway) It could easily be finished, blocked and drying right now but unfortunately when I cast off at the bottom and tried it on I just couldn't bring myself to take it off! I love it!
 Luckily its perfect for the weather weve been having at the moment. I hope cool weather stays around a little longer so that I can enjoy in my new cardi.
Im not sure how much I love the colour, I may dye it blue.

Ive also been wet felting this bowl. Its made of the rainbow wool I showed here. The colours turned out beautifully in it.

On friday we went to the fertility specialist. I was nervous and had put it off (weve been trying for a baby for nearly 2 years) But Im honesly realy glad that we went.

Ive been given a script for Clomid tablets to try for 3 months and although I hate taking medication ( I rather natural remedies etc) I'm excited to try it and its given us some new hope. Fingers crossed, who knows    

daycare activities this week

Notice how its not called 'daycare thursday this week? Yep having some computer issues. Anyhow, this is some of what we did this week.

Made Banana pancakes, like Anneke made for me last time she came over. They were so good and dissapeared quickly!

 This pretty flower bloomed

 The chooks got spoilt with extra food as usual:)

 We made slippery slimey friends

 I weeded the veggie patch while the kids collected snails and the chickens pecked up bugs

Spring Adventures

 Yesterday after lunch I drove to Oma and Opas. I took along some crisp green broad beans from my veggie patch to share.

 We had a really nice day. When I got there Jo was there so we had a nice chat and spent some time together as weal. I had some lunch and then got out the spinning wheel to have a look. Between us and with a little help from you tube we managed to figure out my spinning wheel. Its now working with a little improvisation, here's what we did-
*Opa oiled some of its bits
*Its missing a rope thingy that goes between the big wheel and little wheel (yes super technical, you can tell I know what I'm on about) but I tied a piece of wool which is doing the job for now.
*The wheel turns a bit wonky and could do with re gluing but works OK for now
*A little piece of leather near the foot pedal broke so Benny cut a piece off his old belt to size to replace it.
Ive had a little go at spinning some wool and I'm getting the hang of it, its a lot of fun so far!

Oma re taught me how to knit a better way as my way was hurting my hands. Ah much better! Im almost finished my green cardi, will share pics soon

Madi, Daniel and Dad all came for tea. We had spaghetti, soup and apple tart for tea, Yum!

Here is a picture of their garden full of spring beauty. I would have loved to take the spinning wheel outside to fiddle with but it was far too wet.
I love this garden. Some of my favourite memories of it are eating meals together at the outdoor tables and swimming in the pool they used to have. Its always been an extra fun place to have Easter egg hunts, I have lots of cousins so there are always loads of eggs to find. This Easter I got to be the 'easter bunny' which was really fun:)

The wheel has been keeping the littles well entertained today (look at that little foot trying to work it, cute:) I can tell from the descriptions in my comments last post that were going to really love Pelle's new suit, it sounds great!

Dreaming...

 I am now the proud owner or this gorgeous spinning wheel

And lots of puffy fluffy wool.

While on my holiday I spent hours gazing out the car window at adorable fluffy sheep, thinking and day dreaming about how great it would be to learn to spin. Those alpacas i'm pictured with a few posts ago, when I looked at them all I could see was beautiful balls of handspun alpaca fleces:)


So when I got back I looked into spinning wheels.
I found the gorgeous one above for sale in Adelaide and got it for $38 (yippe!) and my Dad was able to pick it up for me. It needs a few repairs but hopefully we'l get it going realy soon.
My Oma and Mum have both done lots of spinning a long time ago, hopefully between us we'l be able to figure it out. In the meantime ive been watching lots of you tube 'learning how to spin' clips and waiting patiently (ok you got me, super impatiently!)
I will go pick it up on Tuesday. A nice reason to go to Adelaide and visit my Oma and Opa (im looking forward to having my Opas spaghetti for tea, its the greatest!)
This will be my last week of having Mondays and Tuesdays off, I have 2 new day care children starting and will be working full time again. This is fantastic to have lots of work again but I will also miss my extra crafting/visiting/ beach time.

I was 'talking' (computer msging) with Kelly of Free flowing ways who was spinning wool the other day, who mentioned how much kids enjoy watching the wheel spin. It hadn't occured to me that it might be something i'd do while I had kids over (although they love when I use a sewing machine or drill for little bits of our activities so I know they will enjoy this too!)
Pelles New Suit has been on my wish list for a while so I decided to order it as it sounds like a great childrens book. The pictures are so sweet I cant wait to recieve it. Just wondering, does anyone reading have this book? If so does it have a picture of wool being spun on a spinning wheel? (because that would be awesome!)

Day Care Thursday- Washing crystals,wet felting bees and snails, crayon leaf rubbings

***Firstly for anyone hasnt seen it yet (or hasn't gone over to vote today) my Waldorf inspired toy give away is still going on Garden mama, head over and enter to win a $35 voucher for my shop***


Her are some of the things we have been doing this week

 Since I began making Crystal pouches for my shop my crystals have become much loved by the children. I had them in my bedroom before as their not safe for the little ones yet. Ive been getting them out at nap time for the older ones to play with quietly while the little ones sleep. I dont think the little ones have ever enjoy such peace and quiet during their nap:) They love washing them, sorting them, and make all sorts of nice games together.

 Today we made some felted animals. I only planned on making bees as Ive seen tutorials on blogs (sorry I cant remember where) but I was asked 'what about a spider' by a little boy.
 Of course I couldnt turn down a crafty challenge so I helped him make two different spiders. one is four pieces of thick black wool knotted several times (the knot makes the body ) The bigger yellow one was made from a chunk of fleece. We knotted the middle a few times to form the head, I needle felted on some black wool for eyes and helped him divide the legs which he wet felted. They turned out quite cute, they'd make a nice Halloween decoration too.

 I knew that they would be most excited to dangle them (you will notice many things we make have string attatched for dangling them, its always requested by the children!) so I drilled tiny holes in pop sticks and attatched some of the rainbow cotton that I dyed the other day to the stick and then each animal. 

Weve also collected all sorts of leaves from the garden to do leaf rubbing. They were rather excited that they could nibble on the leaves that had come from the veggie patch (not that they ate them, they just thought it was novel:)

I recieved another gorgeous package from my super tallented friend Alison of Rumpelfeltskin  in the mail yesterday! I ordered four pieces of her rainbow felt and the adorable little girls crown and she was so kind as to gift me the adorable little boys crown pictured in the first photo!

For those of you in Australia, Alison will be sharing a pattern for one of her christmas felt crafts in Australian Homespun Magazine next month!!! (Im so excited, I cant wait to see it!) 

As you can see I cut straight into the rainbow felt and the children love the pretty felt pieces already without me even having to turn it into any thing! 

Give away at Garden Mama!

A gift voucher for my etsy shop is being given away over at Garden Mama!

If you havent already head over and enter!

I am so thankful to Nicole for offering to host a give away for me on her wonderful blog, its one of my very favourite blogs to visit. She takes amazing photos and has so many beautiful ideas, she is a true inspiration to me and so many others

Happy Monday!

 In case you were wondering what I was actually doing while I should have been washing the ginormous mountain of campfire scented clothes...

Im back

We had a great time on our holiday but were all oh so glad to be back! While we were away the garden went absolutely wild and I do believe my "chicks" (who arent realy chicks anymore) doubled in size. Ive been buisy knitting, brainstorming new goodies for my shop during the long car trips and look forward to sharing it all here soon. In the meantime I have a rather large pile of washing to tackle (and I thought Ayers rock was big!) Her are a rew photos from the trip, Ill write about it properly soon.