I have a number of books I am going to set free.  I have been sorting and dusting off the bookshelf and filled a box with books.  The next step was to take them somewhere ( so the box is in the back of my car - it has been since friday!).  However, I discovered the bookcrossing site and fell in love with the idea of releasing books into the wild and seeing who discovers it!   So, if you happen to be in the public loo at the Coastlands mall and you find a book - check inside for a tracking code - it’s bound to be a book I set free!

So - when the little voices in the head start to get louder i know im getting a bit stressed!  (Does anyone else get little voices reminding you of all you have to do or am i the only psyco?)

I have decided to get a to dolist going!  I’m not really a list person - but for some reason when i have a million things to juggle - the list gets going big time.  This one is in Excel!  its by date and order of priority - impressed? 

I have just been accepted on to a “Return to teaching” course through Massey University- it will run for the next couple of months - so I will be back in the classroom soon.  Not sure how i feel about that yet.  Glad to have got onto the course anyway cos its free!  I have to go away for a week of training and come back to Craft 2.0 the very next day - so feel the need to be prepared.  I have also commited to rewritting some kids church curriculum on an ongoing basis, with total folly i signed up for some swaps - (very excited about the block print fabric swap with jezze )and my sister and I are trying to get our little craft thing off the ground (juggle, juggle).  Just not enough hours in the day at the moment - especially since school holidays start next week……

Can you see my TO DO list is justified?

I have been making some more M and C little hanging softies.  These are scented with rose essential oil - it makes them delicious.

Don’t you just love this colouring in page?  Download it and complete it - its such fun and gets the juices flowing.   After all, when there is a million things to do - i say procrastinate and colour in!

Madonna

Originally uploaded by shellsbells2007

Based on a lovely illustration my sister did, I have created this mini cushion of the Madonna and Child. My sister is an avid collector of this iconography and we decided our new collaboration needed a lovely piece that represented motherhood. I had such fun making her, there are more on the way for sure.

I am proud to announce my new “felt” shop - Sweet William.  Felt is a online marketplace for all things handmade from New Zealand.  The new shop is a collaboration between my sister, Paula and I.  She lives in AUS and I live here but we love the same things and decided to link up.  We have some great stickers, bookplates, paper packs and prints.  She has her shop on Made it.  The Australian version of “Felt”.

We even have a guest collaboration with Helen from Showyourworkings.  (my fellow gem) We prepared some  stunning paper packs for the craft2.0 market coming up on July 19th - some come find us there!

envelopes

Originally uploaded by shellsbells2007

I made these for a parcel I was sending out to a customer from FELT. They are made from an old Sears catalogue (Canadian) found in a second hand shop in New Zealand - don’t you just love the randomness of that!
I have a love for old catalogues and adverts because my grandfather was an in-house designer for a large department store in Cape Town. it was called “Garlicks” . It had several floors and and a cafeteria. My gramdmother wold take us on an outing into “town” to visit gramps in the store. We would catch the train, go shopping and meet him for lunch at the cafeteria. My gran would point out all his posters throughout the levels - so proud of his work - amazing, hand painted signs in lovely red and black ink, thick words and posing gorgeous.

I had a laugh at Helen’s post on how the search terms on our blog stats say a lot about our blogs - oh dear - not very deep, meaning-full, passionate or focused it seems.  Better up the ante!

I took some gifts on the recent visit.  I embroidered the tea towel of the Virgin Mary to add to my sisters very large collection of all things Madonna.  The line art pattern is available on my pattern page.  Feel free to let  me know how you used it.

Im back from a really great trip to see my sister in Melbourne.  We had a fantastic 6 days together and what was anticipated with great excitement is now passed.

Between the two of us we have five girls - and we wanted to take time to do some sisterly things together that can’t always be done with little ones.  However, we had to attempt some days with her two youngest coming along - and that was ok too because I adore my nieces. (Dare I mention the big stinky poo at the very posh patchworkoncentralpark !)

There was an itinerary as long as my arm and in the end we only did a quarter of it - but it was all so lovely that i felt it was definitely quality as opposed to quantity.

Some highlights:

The street art: 

The really fab Brunswick street which was grungy, arty, viby and a sensory overload.

 I got to see Meet me at Mikes where we had a yack with the owner. (was only a tad gushy)

 Don’t you just love this tag outside the shop?

Our goal was to get to the Rose Street Artists Market. It was good, but i was pleased that what we are seeing here at Craft 2.0 is just as good.  The all-day browse revealed lovely paper shops, cafes and gorgeous shop fronts.

We happened upon a fantastic exhibition at The Kick gallery called “maybe we have met before” .  It was actullay closed but the lovely guy there opened it up just for us and our hearts went pitter patter at all the inspired work - especially Catherine Campell’s

My sister took me to the most authentic junk yard I have ever been too off Northcot rd.  It was over run - with old bits and pieces - wrought iron, tubs filled with flowers, crazy vases and big sleepers and old windows.   I could have gone wild! It is only open sporadically and we were fortunate to see that the charming Italian man was there .  He kept praising my sister’s new hair cut.  I found a special piece to add to her collection - a plaster madonna and child.

We crammed in op shops, Camberwell market, a girls night out and extreme crafting sessions.

 {the best stall at the market!}

We had great pastries from the Italian bakeries and great coffee from all over.  A a truly yummy plate of hot chips and beer at St Kilda beach.

oh - and did i mention the three hours we spent at Borders just looking at books?  woowhoo!

Well the girls and I had a great holiday together (only one or two melt downs, mostly by me).  We did not go away - just spent some lovely time together.  The house was allowed to get messier (well, that’s the story anyway) and who though hanging out in your pj’s most of the day could cause such delirium for little schoolies. 

I found a nice biscuit recipe for jam dotted shortbread and we did some silly baking.

{very yummy}

  +  =

A lovely bunch of flowers made by the girls for me on a cold, rainy day.  I  got the idea from a great subscription http://www.kidscraftweekly.com/

The reason why I tried hard with the girls this holiday was so that I could feel less guilty about being an absent mommy for almost a week starting Thursday.  Why is that you ask?  Well, because  I will be rocking it with my sister in Melbourne, Australia - yeah!  She lives there and i get to visit all on my lonesome, ownsome while the girls stay here with dad.  I am v. excited and will slow this upload down with lots of shots soon.  If you know of a super cool spot to visit there - let me know so i can add it to my to do list.

YIPEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!