A Holiday Day

Today was the last official day of the school holidays, although we do still have pupil-free Monday before getting back into school on Tuesday, and it felt like a holiday day ... an outing, some reading, a bit of TV, some craft, some sewing, some blogging, some leftover pie ... a good day on the whole.

This morning we went to a big annual bookfair nearby. Despite my best intentions to buy only a few books we left $159 poorer with a shopping bag full of b0oks each. I'll write more about some of my purchases in the next days. The girls bought about 30 chapter books each, so that should take them at least until next week to read them LOL. Here is Emily with her stash ... excuse the lighting ... when they are going to cooperate with the camera you don't have time to rearrange to suit something so unimportant as lighting.

After lunch and a bit of reading we did some craft, trying this activity from Crafty Crow. Laura and I made a leaning tower:

Later Laura made on her own a little girl to live in the tower, she can hang from a crossbar with her arms, legs or hair, and she can yodel!

What will that girl come up with next?

Emily got into the act and made a tower of her own, more sensibly based on triangles .. she must take after her father ... and I finally altered Emily's costume for her church camp this weekend (which she is leaving for in about an hour)

Two weeks ago after we found out about the camp and that she needed a circus costume I walked into an op shop and thought to look for fabric or something for a magician's cape. Instead, I found a silver and pink jacket - with a bee-shaped tail - and the lady at the checkout kindly went out the back and found a pink fully body leotard to go with it ... all for $8.00! Naturally I was pretty happy with that and even more naturally I left it till the last minute to alter it - removing the bee tail and making it smaller under the arms, plus darning some holes and moving the buttons until ...

.... drumroll please

I present to you ...

Emily the Death-Defying Trapeze Artist

She can perform stunts to amaze with the greatest of ease

... such as ....

jumping!

Yippee!

Have fun at camp Em, we'll miss you!

On another note I am very happy to announce that my real-life friend and supporter of my blog has begun a blog of her own! So head over to Hill Upon Hill and say hi!

Another Pie

I must have pie on the brain. When looking round the house to pick something for this week's Vintage Thingie my eyes fell on this mug, which I think was my mother's when she was young.

Let's face it, I'm a sucker for any china with words on it, and nursery rhymes are even more appealing to me. I have the Oxford Book of Nursery Rhymes, and I wrote my final year thesis on children's singing games. And then there's the Christmas theme ... well don't get me started on Christmas this early ...

I think it is the only piece of china I have which is marked as made in Australia, this one was made in Melbourne.

The Great Pie Experiment

Chocolate Heaven Cream Pie from this book, my first ever "real" pie. Delicious.

Waitress DVD (plenty more pie inspiration there)

A good friend over to laugh and chat with.

The perfect combination for a winter night in the middle of the school holidays.

Perfect Afternoon

Today was a good day. Well it didn't start off too well, I guess, I didn't get enough sleep and I woke up sooooooooo grumpy, but after that it improved, thank goodness!

This morning we went to the shops and saw a little circus in the shopping centre. We weren't sure what to expect, but it was perfect for our girls and we enjoyed it too. Four guys and a girl did all sorts of cool things, including tight-rope, juggling, balancing, lassoing, whip-cracking, dancing and more. Lots of fun. Then we shopped in Borders for a while and I bought this book for the girls and me (but mostly for me!) It has the cutest do-able ideas for us all, Laura has already made a purse card for a friend's birthday.

Later we headed out for a drive - the clouds had cleared it was the most perfect afternoon. After some cold days last week, today was warm with balmy breezes, quite un-winterish.

We climbed on the rocks and played on a little "beach", then walked around the headland, looking at the boats, birds and bush while the sun warmed our backs.

This is the closest thing you will see to a self-portrait of me ... and Emily! And no, my hips are not really quite that wide!

In the next bay we found some pelicans and more boats.

It was all so peaceful, apart from the occasional boat going by or plane flying over.


After our walking we had an icecream and then tea from a thermos while the girls played in the playground. When the sun began to set it was time to come home.

A perfect end to a perfect afternoon.

Daisies and Ginger Gems

Daisies on the windowsill in the living room.

Today, after a lazy lunch at a local park, Laura and I made Ginger Gems for afternoon tea.

The recipe is from Amy, and it was the first time I had used my gem iron in years. We joined them in pairs with whipped cream - yum!

It was the perfect opportunity to use the new yellow sandwich plate I bought yesterday. Steve and I had a child-free day so we drove through a semi-rural area near us and visited 3 interesting antique shops. The first one was my favourite, full of beautiful china from all different eras. I resisted everything but this Grindly sandwich plate, which matches a pink one I have, and I was happy to pay $8 for it to add to my collection.




I wish I took my camera yesterday, it was such a beautiful day to be driving in the "country".

Over the last few days (without the girls) we have enjoyed 3 delicious meals out, (Malaysian, Thai and a nice cafe lunch) and also saw Prince Caspian, which we really enjoyed. So we have had a nice break with lots of spoiling. But it was so nice to have our girls back again.

Doilies

Today I thought I would show some of the doilies I've collected.

This one is just tiny, I don't remember even seeing this one before ... (hmmm maybe that is a sign that I have too many doilies ... or not!)

Love the shape and the embroidery and edging.

This one is classic with the parasols .... love it! Sorry I didn't iron it for the photo, I'm right in the middle of finishing a quilt, and there's time to blog but not time to iron LOL.

I love the blue and pink and green - just what I would choose to embroider it myself!

Check out those lazy daisies!

And I have a matching pair of these ones, which seem much older and finer. (See the winter sunlight shining on our coffee table through the trees? It's just about as cold inside as out, too!)

The crosstitched section on these is about 1 inch square, it's very fine.

I'm pretty sure all these doilies were thrifted, but one day I'll show you some which belonged to family. Check out more vintage goodies at Confessions of an Apron Queen.

Vintage Sheet Music

At last, some "notes" from A Woman of Notes. You were wondering about that ... weren't you?

These are some of my Nanna's old piano pieces, which were by our piano as I was growing up, and are in our music cupboard now. Some of them are just beautiful. This is one of my favourites:

I love the tinted photo of the girl on the cover, and the rose frame. This song dates from 1921 and boasts "Ukulele Accompaniment". Well that's fine, at least one ukulele here. maybe two.

I love how they advertised other pieces in the centre margin of the music.

This is another favourite cover, I'm tempted to frame it:

And the music itself? Well it seems that the fashion of the day was the "chime effect" - chords made up of 6 or 8 notes rolled upwards and moving parallel to create the sound of chimes. Hmmm not really my style ... but it is lovely to play them and think that Nanna once played them and loved them. And guess what? I just found a site where you can hear these songs here.

Nanna signed her name on the front of each one. And what is not to love about the publisher's label?

Today the girls and I bought flute music, and they begged for High School Musical. I was reluctant to buy music from one movie, which will date. But even as I walked around the shop I remembered my own sheet music from my teenage years ... Man from Snowy River, Chariots of Fire, Star Wars, The Rainbow Connection ... maybe it is not such a bad idea after all ... music carries such memories in its melodies. But instead we found a big book of flute melodies from Disney to the Beatles to jazz to Broadway, and ... as it turned out ... even a song from High School Musical. So we were all happy. Lots of fluting going on here.