A tiny mouse house for a bee suit

While I'm reasonably happy with my current 'crazy person' bee outfit, (cobbled together using various pieces of clothing, pants tucked into socks, and an old insect net which I found at the markets), now that we've got our beehive full of bees, I feel like I need to upgrade.

Not that my current getup doesn't do the job - I haven't had too many stings - but it makes me nervous, which means I tend to check the hive VERY quickly, and perhaps not as thoroughly as I should.

So I've decided to buy a proper bee suit. With a proper hat, and proper gloves. Exciting.

To raise funds for this purchase, I'm silently auctioning off the tiny mouse in a tiny house I crocheted at the beginning of this year. It's adorable, and won first prize in the handmade toy section at the Bega show! 

The mouse, house and blanket are all crocheted using 100%wool. The house is lined in polka dot fabric, and the lid/roof zips on and off so you can get your mousie out to play and then tuck it up in bed when it needs a rest.

To be in the running to win this little mousie house, you just need to send me a message - pearlandelspeth at gmail dot com - with your offer. In a week's time I'll announce the winner. 

Of course, if you've got a bee suit lying around, we can just do a direct trade...

Handmade delights for giving

Are you by any chance looking for some delightful handmades to give to a loved one this Christmas? If you are, I may just have something for you, but you'll have to order this week, especially if you want something custom made to arrive in time for Christmas. 

Here's what I've got for you:

P&E gift certificates - these are handmade by me (of course!) using reclaimed kids' books and cereal boxes (lovingly saved for me by my nana). You give them to your friend/lover/mum/sister/daughter, they feel happy, email me, and we have a chat about fabric and colour choices then I make them a skirt. Just for them. They feel good in it, it fits them perfectly, because it was custom made, and it's special, I tell you. $70 (this includes postage of the card and the finished skirt)

If you want to buy someone a ready made skirt all I have left at present is this beautiful turquoise Birds  of Tasmania wrap 'n go. It's about a 12-14, and it's awesome. $50

Crocheted stubby holders are crazy good, handy and pretty unique. I'm into granny-ing them at the moment but I can do whatever. $12 each

Crocheted heart hair clips. Sweet as! $10/pair

Crocheted flower bangles. These are made using the rings that come off yoghurt and Vegemite jars and 100% hand-spun, hand-dyed wool. And they look awesome with some redpeg ecostudio recycled silver bangles too! (Dirty gardening hands optional). $15 for a set of 3

That's what I've got in stock, which I can send out tomorrow. If you email a custom order to me this week I could probably get it to you in time for Christmas, but you'll have to act fast! 

I hope your Christmas/holiday/gift-giving time is a handmade extravaganza!!!

For the love of Niki and David

Last weekend I had the absolute honour of being present at the wedding of my beautiful friend Niki and her beloved David. As you may know, I'm quite partial to the old wedding celebration, but this one was extra-super-special and extra-super-loved-up, partly because Niki's one of the most beautiful people I've ever met, and partly because Niki and David have waded through a ton of heartbreak and tragedy this year, so a celebration of their enduring love was a pretty special thing to be a part of.

David in classic tux, Annie in brand-new hair and Niki in vintage pink

But what to make for such an amazing occasion? To be honest, I actually suffered from quite extreme crafter's block on this one. It seemed like there was nothing I could possibly make that could convey my feelings about their wedding and about them as individuals and how much I love them. I was stumped.

But I kept coming back to an image I had from a story Niki had told me about how much Lucien loved watching birds and leaves moving in the sunlight. While Niki and David's wedding was obviously about Niki and David, it was also beautifully and oh so poignantly about their little Lucien, so my wedding gift to them needed to honour him in some way.

And so I set to work crocheting them a little Lucien-love-bird, and I thought of him, and them, with every stitch I made and yes, many tears were shed.

The yarn was bought from an awesome "one-woman, one-cat" yarn and fibre studio based in Melbourne called Yarn vs Zombies and is hand-dyed in a colour scheme called 'outback rainbow', which just totally reminded me of Niki.

The lichen twig is from our land, and the heart was cut from a piece of wool felt which was shorn, dyed and felted by our friend Tabitha, using wool from her sheep.

It was important for me to not only hand make them a gift, but to include lots of things that had a personal connection to us and our land. I don't see Niki nearly as much as I'd like to, on account of the combined tyranny of distance and busy lives, so I like to give her little bits and pieces of 'me'. Also, Niki and I spent some super-fun and super-treasured times camping on the land (and hanging farm-gates in the rain with nothing more than a bush-saw and a ton of determination) long before we'd even moved to Bega.

I also made them a little crochet-monogram-wedding-cushion, like Jemima and Bhavani's (to be honest, I think this is going to be a wedding gift tradition from me from here on in) but I strangely forgot to take a photo of it before I gave it to them. 

But let's face it: the bird is really the main event, though it's only a teeny-tiny and, quite frankly, profoundly inadequate representation of the immense love and admiration I have for Niki and David: YOU. GUYS. ROCK. And I love you to bits.

And happy happy birthday crochet

There's been a bit of a flurry of birthdays of late, and, in celebration, I've been crocheting up a storm. 

The first crocheted gifts to emerge from the bonanza were these 2 little dragons for 2 of the sweetest little boys I know, Max and Evan, who recently turned 7. It's hard to get a sense of the size of them (the dragons, not the boys. The boys are normal 7 year old size) from the picture (when I found the pattern online I thought they'd turn out to be quite big), so I should say that these little fellas pretty much fit in the palm of your hand, which is pretty darn cute. I was really happy with how they turned out, and was relieved to hear that there was no issue with the fact that the green dragon was a little smaller, on account of me using different yarn. They were both 8 ply, made form the same pattern, using the same hook, but I guess the fluffiness of the blue mohair made it a bit bigger. The boys love their dragons, and have been sleeping with them every night. Success.

Next up was this giraffe for a little person called Iris, who, according to Olive has "sensational hair". Iris loves soft toys and giraffes, and has named this crocheted friend Gingerbread. Awesome. The pattern for this giraffe is pretty simple (good for a beginner), and turns out a pretty cute, cuddly little gift, though someone really needs to tell the lady who wrote it how to use apostrophes correctly.

 Last, but definitely not least, I made a frog dissection model for my brother.

When I found this pattern, I was super excited. What's not to love about a crocheted frog that you can open up and take the guts out of?? But I knew that not just any old person would appreciate such a gift, so I chose my target carefully, knowing full well that my bro is as much of a sicko as me when it comes to this stuff, so would give the frog the reverence it deserved.

The frog, and  its innards, were a little more complex than the giraffe and the dragons, but I believe the result was well worth it. I even labeled all the guts so my bro could properly identify everything when he 'dissected' the frog. It's true that a crocheted spleen may not be immediately recognisable, even to the most seasoned biological scientist.

As I said in my card to him "if spending hours crocheting tiny frog innards doesn't say 'I love you', I don't know what does".

But even if it's not frog innards you're inclined to crochet, spending hours making anything for someone always says 'I love you' in a way a bought present just can't. Go forth and create, people!

Happy happy wedding day

One of the things I love love love about this blogging bizzo is the connections that can be made with people from all over the place. Sometimes, what may seem like 'random' connections, then turn out to be kind of crazy coincidence types, as in the case of Jemima and Bhavani. Turns out Bhavani had been quietly reading our blog for quite some time from the comfort of their babe lair in Melbourne. Then, when we started writing about our chickens, she realised that her partner Jemima's dad actually helped set up our little abattoir! Kooky and cool!

So we started a little email back and forth friendship, and when I was sick, they made and sent the most beautiful apron, lovingly hand-embroidered with the words 'get well' on the inside of the waist band. 

It is seriously the best apron - sunshiny, giant ric-rac, cute buttons, looks great with legwarmers and dogs - and with the most massive big pocket in front. When I wear it, which is often, it's filled with all kinds of things - scissors, bits of yarn and thread, things I've harvested from the garden (banana passionfruits make an excellent snack for keeping in the apron pocket, let me tell you). It makes me SO HAPPY to wear it because it's beautiful, practical, and was made for me, by hand, with love, by 2 people I'd never even met before. Restores a bit of the faith in human kindness, that kind of thing...

When Jemima and Bhavani contacted us to see if we'd supply chickens for their wedding feast, we were thrilled! I love weddings! And I especially love weddings for people who care enough about the providence of their food that they'll get their wedding-feast-chook from our little farm. Go girls!

So we grew the chickens nice and fat for them, and then Jemima came up to visit the chickens and we finally met, and she brought me the most amazing hat (immediately a firm favourite), which had been knitted for me by her mum. Wow! And yay for making friends through blog-world!

The chickens, just so you know, were processed and portioned at the abattoir, with Jemima's dad watching over the proceedings. When they'd been portioned (cut into drumsticks, breasts etc) they were vac-bagged with some of Jemima's special marinade, so when the day came, they could just be squeezed out onto the barbecque. Neat idea, eh?

Because I love craft, and I love weddings, I of course had to make these lovely girls a little something for their day. The answer, (as always, these days) came in the form of some crochet. A Moogly Alphabet monogrammed cushion with pom-pom trim, to be precise. (Though less than one minute after this photo was taken, Violet Tiny-Dog Von Hungry-Face pulled off 2 of the pom-poms. Grrr...)

And I can tell you now there's likely to be a whole lot more crochet monogramming going on - those little guys are SO FUN to make! The little love heart came from Meet Me at Mike's.

I also made them a mix CD of (in my opinion) super-cool love songs, also monogrammed with pink glitter letters. Why not?

So here's to you Jemima and Bhavani - I hope your day today and your life forever is magical and special and ridiculously loved-up.

The first days of spring, oh how we're loving you

How exciting that it's spring! Given that we've just experienced what we hope will be The Crappest Winter Ever, the springtime this year is more welcome than ever - bring on the new growth, both literal and metaphorical, I say! My hair's growing back (it feels like a little baby lamb!), we're slowly recovering our energies after the exhaustion-inducing chemo regime, and everything is looking extra sunshiny and new given the deepened gratitude we're experiencing as a result of the last 6 months or so. We've been absolutely revelling in the warm sunny days, picking early raspberries, resting, enjoying spring rains, watching our chickens loving the new shoots of grass, smiling at rosellas in the kennedia, and working working working on the garden - weeding, mulching, harvesting and spring planting yay!

We've also been...

Crocheting veggie tea cozies for lovely gardening sisters,

 Debuting new birthday frocks and devouring the goodness (mushrooms! Honey! Profiteroles! Jersey milkshakes! Crazy amounts of beautiful, bountiful veg! Fresh and smoked fish!) at the Moruya Farmers' Markets,

 Being thrilled by big digging and dreaming about another little strawbale house growing from the mud over the next couple of years,

Crocheting around jar-lid-rings to make bangles for the Mumbulla School Spring Fair,

 Eating duck egg omelettes with greens from the garden and bartered kimchi in the sunshine almost every morning, and loving our life.

How about you? How are you heralding the warmer days?

When you're on a good thing...

There's a woman called Vanessa who lives in Balgownie, who's a fan of buying crocheted stubby holders for her friends as gifts. Obviously, I like this, because I love crocheting stubby holders for people, and I love the thought of people receiving handmade gifts.

Vanessa has bought stubby holders from me before, but this lot, which she requested a few weeks ago, turned out particularly well on account of the fact that I was lying sick on the couch, so had hours to spend on experimenting with fancy crochet stitches and embroidery and whatnot.

Vanessa and I are both particularly fond of the blue and orange criss-cross one, which is made using the stitch I recently learned to make a chemo hat. I reckon I'm going to have to make myself one just like it.

Oh and in case you're wondering, there are only 4 more skirts left in the skirt sale! Norfolk Island, the brown Australian Fauna one, the pink print one with embroidered pockets and the Cornwall mini. If you want one, make me an offer. I won't refuse!

Sometimes you just gotta crochet a dragon scarf for your baby

Early on in my days of fanatical internet-and-library-crochet-pattern perusing, I stumbled upon Moogly. Have you seen it? I freakin' love it! I especially love their 'roundups'. The first roundup I ever saw was the animal scarf roundup, and I instantly fell in love with the dragon scarf.

Last week, I finally got around to making one for Oscar. It was really fast and easy to make, and uses only a ball of wool for the body, and scraps for the other bits. I modified the wings from the pattern's instructions, and just made them using granny-square treble clusters, in Oscar's favourite colour - orange! The body is made using alternating double and single crochet, which creates a very cool 'scaly' kind of pattern/texture.

Draggy, as the scarf has become known, is spending a lot more time being played with than being worn as a scarf, and I can kind of understand why. He's pretty adorable. And what's not to love about a scarf that doubles as a toy?

Hurrah for lovely woolly hat action in the Winter time!

Many years ago, my friend Kim knitted me this hat.

It is so so beautiful and has been my favourite hat every winter since. At the time she gave it to me I asked her about the provenance of the pattern, and she explained that it came from a chemo hat website. We both laughed that laugh of young people who don't really think they'll ever get cancer.

And now here I am!! 

When the prospect of losing all my hair DURING WINTER became a reality, I quickly ramped up my hat collecting, mostly via donations from generous and crafty friends and family. But I just had to have another of these lovely hats, called, amazingly, the Amelia Earheart Aviator cap. I love it so!! I can't knit, so I sent the pattern out to some crafty knitting friends, and now have a couple more of these amazing hats in my special hat repertoire, each so unique that it's like having 3 different hats that are all related by their awesomeness - a super-soft most beautiful blue one from Linda, and a gorgeous pinky one from Carol that's a little bit bigger so perfect for sleeping, in addition to the lovely most gorgeous green with fancy embellishments from Kim. How special is that?!

In addition to my collection of aviation caps, I've also received a delicious fire-engine-red beanie from my Nana (instantaneously snaveled by Oscar), and couple of fab-o hats from my ma, including this perfectly-coloured crocheted rasta-hat-cum-beret, which is - wait for it - LINED IN FLEECE, so is officially the warmest hat I own. 

This is very very handy. I had completely underestimated just how much warmth my hair provided for my poor little noggin, which is now so exposed to the elements. Not that that's all bad. I absolutely love it when it's warm enough to go hat-less, to feel the sun and breeze on a part of my body that hasn't felt the sun and breeze since I was a teeny baby. But after about 3pm, when the sun sinks, the hat goes on, and stays on, til I'm safely inside sitting in front of the fire.

In addition to these gorgeous hats so kindly and warmly created for me by people I love, I also recently completed a hat for myself which I'm pretty bloody proud of. It involved me teaching myself a new crochet stitch (thank you YouTube!) and making a few false starts, and it was a challenge, but it was bloody well worth it because it's a pretty lovely hat, if I do say so myself. And my crochet confidence has increased exponentially!

Let's all hear it for triple crochet lattice stitch with a speckly rainbow trim- oooohhhhhh!

 When I fist started looking for hat patterns (when you're bald, and it's winter, I think multiple hats are definitely justifiable) I was a little bit frustrated because all the ones I liked were knitted, and learning to knit was just too much of a challenge at this point in my life. And then I found Knits for Life, who, amongst other things (like totally amaze-balls yarn bombing including a Very Hungry Caterpillar bike rack cozy!!!!!), boasts 'crochet patterns that any knitter would envy'. Hallelujah to that!

The top of the hat was actually the trickiest bit for me... Lots of counting - I'm a bit challenged in that department.

The pattern was lovely and easy to follow (once I got the hang of the new stitch), and easy to custom up a bit (I can't help myself) and I am very very happy with my hat. Probably going to make another one, sooner rather than later.

How about you? Have you taught yourself something new lately? It's such a great feeling!

What can you do when you're being treated for cancer? Crochet pink skull scarves for your friends!

When I first found out the likely trajectory my cancer treatment would take, I was freaked out on many levels, for many reasons. One of my main fears was being out of action for an extended period of time. As someone who, for better and/or for worse, derives a large part of my self esteem/sense of satisfaction/deep joy from Getting Stuff Done, a mastectomy (8-10 weeks recovery - no lifting with my left arm!!) and 12 weeks of chemo (a whole lot of feeling quite ill and immuno-compromised to the point where chicken farming and gardening are completely out of the question) was a pretty terrifying prospect. That's even if I momentarily forgot the fact that it all involved GETTING MY BOOB CHOPPED OFF and POISONING MY BODY!!!

Ahem...

Sage words of wisdom came from my Dad's partner, Connie (a cancer survivor herself) who told me to stop focusing on the things I couldn't do, and start focusing on the things I could do. Given that the main things I can do are crocheting, reading, writing, and the odd bit of preserving, it's actually not too shabby, really, and I'm kind of enjoying having a bit of a rest.

Once I resolved to focus on my new crocheting opportunities, I went to town (actually, the internet-town, but you know that I mean) searching for crochet patterns. In the melee, and quite by accident, I stumbled upon a pattern for this cute-as crocheted skull. As soon as I saw it I knew I had to make one for my pal Carly (seen here looking pretty bloody gorgeous in the graduation dress I made for her). I dunno why, I just thought she'd dig it.

Can you see? You thread the scarf kind of through the skull, to keep it snuggly-secure round yer neck...

After much deliberation I decided to make it like a neat little skull and crossbones, where the skull itself helps to keep the scarf secured in a snug kinda way. The scarf is just single crochet where the rows form the length of the scarf, and I did some chunky triple crochet shells at the ends to form the 'knuckles' of the 'crossbones'.

The skull bit was surprisingly easy to do, I think due to the fact that Kirsten's instructions are SO AWESOME. And funny. And low-key. And descriptive. And the photos are completely ace-balls. It's the kind of crochet pattern I'd hope to make myself, if I ever crocheted anything in an organised-enough way to actually write down what I did. Like my sewing, my crocheting is extremely organic/haphazard/experimental, depending on which way you look at it.

Look how cool she is! Oh and the scarf's pretty sweet too

Anyways, I was super pleased with the results, and I think Carly was too. And now I'd like to propose a toast to focusing on what you can do rather than what you can't. Words to live by, methinks!

Craft really is the answer to everything

The day I found out I was going to have to have a mastectomy, I came straight home and started googling crochet patterns for prosthetic breasts. When I told our dear and beautiful friend Ruth this story, she laughed and said: "I love the way you think Annie - craft really is the answer to everything". This phrase has now become something of an ongoing in-joke around these parts, mostly because it's just kind of partly true! Craft (if you're craftily inclined), in times of crisis, can be soothing, mind-centring, distracting, pro-actively-taking-control-of-an-otherwise-crap-situation, beautiful, calming, fun, satisfying and (maybe my favourite) productive. Is that not COOL???

In the midst of all the medicalised insane-ness going on in our own family's lives at the moment, Ruth's beautiful family has also been wading through some pretty crazy intense medicalised crap of their own, involving her 7 year old daughter Edie. Now let's just say right here that Edie is a trooper. She's a friggin cool, smart, sassy kid, and we miss her. Because of the fact that she is cool, smart and sassy (and has pretty much the BEST parents in the world EVER) I know that she's going to learn from and grow with her particular situation, and come out tougher and cooler. She just will. Coz she's awesome.

But we wanted to send her a love package in the mail to cheer her up, distract her, and let her know we're thinking of her and we love her.

 In case you didn't realise, love packages are THE BEST and I strongly encourage you to send one to someone you love TOMORROW. We usually include: something handmade in the craft category, something handmade in the food category, some reading material, some music, and whatever else we find lying around at time of parcel assembly that we believe will tickle the recipient. Package carefully and well, and decorate the box nicely, then send it on its way.

Edie's a reader, like our Olive, so her love package is full of books she (hopefully) hasn't read yet, recommended by Olive. And I also made her a pair of reading gloves.

Reading gloves are my crocheted take on driving gloves. For some reason, in my mind, driving gloves are very sophisticated, glamorous things, fingerless, made from soft stuff like 'kid leather', and held together with little buckles and neat buttons. If you're very fancy, your driving gloves are monogrammed or personalised in some other nifty way. I'm vaguely attracted to them for the same reason I love sailing ships: I'm a highly imaginative person who has read way too many novels, resulting in romantic attachments to ideas, concepts and objects I actually know nothing about. 

Given that Edie is a reader, not a driver, I wanted to make her some reading gloves, which she could wear while sitting up in bed devouring novels, to keep her hands warm while also allowing her to turn the page with ease. And I wanted them to have all the (possibly made-up) things I love about (my idea of) driving gloves. 

The answer? Crocheted fingerless mitts, made appropriately in Edie's favourite colours, adorned with neat little buttons and personalised with a Scrabble 'E'.

I didn't have a pattern for the gloves, so made it up, embellishing with scalloped edges. While everything started relatively well (I remembered to count the stitches in my initial chain so that the gloves would be the same size) I forgot to write down several other things I did on the first glove, so the second glove is a little bit different. But I was still pretty happy with how they came out. They're basically just tubes, with little thumb holes and scalloped edges. If you're a beginner crocheter, I reckon they'd be an excellent first (or second) project - I'm sure you could find a pattern for some online, though I'm more into improvisation myself...

So Edie, lovely girl, here's to you and your amazing awesomeness. While the reality of being thrust into scary and potentially overwhelming medical situations is not so great, you will be OK. You are so so loved. I hope you like your gloves. May your warm-handed novel-reading lead to a rich and fulfilling life full of highly-romanticised and possibly not very accurate ideas about things. Always better than the real thing. 

As modeled by Miss Olive

A good lookin' chook, some artichokes and a champion champers...

About a week ago, our preparations for the Bega Show began. We'd gotten the show schedules a few weeks ago, and spent hours poring over them, circling the categories we thought we'd enter: Crochet, patchwork, papier mache, dinosaur garden, flower arrangement in an egg cup, preserving of all varieties, beer, wine, yoghurt, eggs, decorated arrowroots, photography, drawing, a useful item made from baling twine (yes - it's a real category) and, of course, junior soft feather bantam.

We'd resolved that we'd enter in order to contribute to the beautiful display in the pavilion, and that it wasn't about winning... But that didn't stop me from jumping up and down when I saw that my rhubarb and raspberry champagne had won champion wine of the show!!!! 

Wooohooooo!!! I got a ribbon!!!! If it hadn't been locked in the cabinet in the pavilion, I would have worn it like a sash as I walked around the show.

It's true we did have some successes - Pearl got a first for her preserved (home-grown!) globe artichokes, second for her plum jam and yoghurt. I got first for my lager, baling-twine shopping bag, and champagne, and second for my crocheted stubby holder (yesssssss!). 

Fluffy rainbow stubby holder takes the cake in the novice crochet section

Olive's 'baby' Errol, got second in the junior soft feather bantam category, and Olive's papier mache and photography also got some second prizes. 

Olive and Errol in the poultry pavilion. In the words of the judge: "Yeeaaah... He's a good lookin' chook this one". What more is there to say?

Olive's award-winning photo of Oscar, taken on a late-evening roadside raspberry-foraging expedition

Not that it was all winning - we did have some entries that didn't get a mention, but it was really great to see them all there in the display. It's really exciting to walk the pavilion and look at the entries, and check out which friends have won in different categories. 

While it does make an unusual, fetching, sturdy and award-winning shopping bag, crocheting baling twine is not an easy project.

The kids got a real kick out of  seeing their entries, and didn't seem bothered at all when they didn't win anything. They were just excited to be on display, for all the community to see. And one of my favourite things about the show is that it really is pretty much all of the community who get involved. The old farming families, the newbies, like us, the kids from all walks of life all get out and about on show weekend, checking it all out.

But even more than seeing our entries, we all just loved being at the show, meeting up with friends and generally hanging out. The kids made their own fun, running off in a pack and sliding down a grass bank on pieces of cardboard for (literally) hours on end, while we all waited for the grand finale - the smash up derby. We ate (thanks Vickie!) and drank and chatted and laughed and people-watched. It felt like half of Bega was there that night - all the different worlds of Bega, coming together for a very unlikely spectacle. We felt very happy to be a part of it, ribbons or no ribbons.

The kids were super-serious about decorating their arrowroots, and even more serious about eating them after the show.

Number 7

Today our Olive turned 7. Amazing. 

While I love making birthday crafts for all my loved ones, making birthday craft for my kids is extra-special. 

As always, I made Olive a scrapbook of the past year, made from a vintage kids' book. As I stuck the 7's on the front, I thought "is this right? Can she really be 7 already??" It was almost surreal. I've written about the ritual of these books here and here, so I won't repeat myself. I'll just say that these books are treasures in our family, and I feel (I hope!) that as the kids get older, the books will be even more treasured.

But the favourite books of the day were the 2 new Ottoline books. If you have an avid reader around the 6-7 years mark, you may be interested to check them out. Olive has been obsessed with Ottoline since Pearl bought Ottoline and the Yellow Cat for her. Olive estimates she's read the book "about a hundred times". She could be right.

Even this morning, with crumpets and honey or jam on offer for a birthday breakfast treat, Ottoline Goes to School took priority.

Olive's propensity for reading also inspired another of her gifts: a quilted reading cushion.

When Oski was in utero, I made him a baby quilt, which now has pride of place on his bed. Olive's always been a bit miffed that she doesn't have a quilt of her own, and I had thought of making her one for her birthday, but her inclination for reading for hours before bed each night made me think that a special, quilted, reading-in-bed pillow might be better. 

I was pretty pleased with how it turned out. Olive seemed pretty chuffed with it as well. In addition to being a sweet reading cushion, she and Oscar decided it also made an excellent space-travel chair.

I also crocheted her a little toadstool, for use in fairy-gardens and other creative pursuits. 

But probably my favourite gift we gave to Olive this morning was something that was made for her by someone else. 

This super-sweet personalised O.M.R bangle was hand-made for Olive by the super-talented Gab of RedPeg, who I have already raved about here. The little round seedpod-like ball is a bell, so Olive now tinkles when she moves. The other charm is imprinted with the skin of a seed pod, and stamped with Olive's initials.  As Olive says, "it's sort of about me". She loves it, of course.

And what else is a gift for but to fill a heart with love and joy? Our work here is done. Happy birthday baby girl.

 

A little celebration, of sorts

Today marked a year since we moved into our little handmade house. It was a perfect, sunny winter's day, and we all felt happy, and more than a little pleased with what we've achieved in the last 12 months.

To celebrate, we...

made an amazing breakfast of stewed tomatoes, garlic, basil and parsley (from the garden), incredible home-made goat's chevre (from our friend Paul from down the road, procured at last weekend's food swap), barbequed mushrooms (from the farmer's market) and sourdough toast...

admired the freshly-printed logos for our little pastured poultry enterprise (coming in spring!)

did some work on the wood-fired pizza oven...

did some weaving with gorgeous rainbow hand-spun, hand-dyed wool...

stewed rhubarb, pears, vanilla beans and honey over the fire, alongside a lamb, preserved lemon, cumin and tomato braise and a mushroom and lentil ragu...

made a doily-sleeved top for a certain special lady whose birthday is imminently approaching...

and ate aforementioned lentil and mushroom ragu while sitting next to the fire listening to the wind in the trees and watching the stars appear. Dessert was stewed fruit with jersey cream. And then we toasted marshmallows.

In between all this we rode bikes and walked all around the land, drew pictures, happily read Kim's beautiful blog post about our little nest, made our first batch of kefir, spied on baby kangaroos just learning to hop (there are no words to describe the cuteness), collected fairy firewood, cuddled, read books, danced, swung from the swing-tree, collected eggs and admired the ducks.

It was a beautiful, beautiful day, and we felt ridiculously lucky to be living this life.