lavender harvest

four baskets full sir

I've been waiting for a day over the last few weeks that has been warm enough to harvest the mass of lavender at the front door. Today was that day. I expertly made my way around the thousands of bees who were not too happy that I was taking away their bounty and now we are over-loaded with lavender for drying. I have hung up around a third of it in the garage and will now wait for a few weeks for it to dry into the aromatic loveliness that will be stuffed into all sorts of wee treats.

I was lucky enough to receive this magnificent book for my birthday and it details all the magic that lavender has to offer, including its antiseptic and sedative properties. Here are some of the ways that I use lavender and some recommended from the book:

- massage lavender essential oil into temples in a circular movement when suffering from eye strain or tension headaches, it relaxes you straight away.

- add a few drops of oil to a bowl of boiling water then cover your head with a towel and inhale to help colds and flu.

- dab the oil on 'neat' to grazes, burns, insect bites.

- dry for pot pourri just like nana used to. There is something so homely and french-provincial about having dried lavender hung around the house.

- dry and sew the broken up heads into fabric sachets for drawers and wardrobes to get rid of moths and make your clothes smell nice.

- put a sachet of dried lavender under your pillow to encourage a better nights sleep.

- add 10 drops of oil to 1 litre of warm water, 1 tsp of baking soda and a few drops of liquid soap for a green spray cleaner - Thanks Wendyl!

- and sometimes - I don't know if this is recommended - I put a dab of oil behind each ear to keep those nasty stress monsters away in the corporate showdowns.

Ideally you should have English Lavender in the garden if you are looking to get the oils and a really fragant dried end-product, but French (like mine above) will do just fine for drying etc.

birthday jewels

October really is the start of the silly season in our house, there have been birthdays, travel, exams, rugby games and extreme weather to keep us busy. I will update you on all of the above over the next few days (hurrah for the long weekend!).

The pic above is of my wee homemade gift for the early-Libran Amy-Jane. To match her style I created a little brooch from satin and a other bits and pieces I had in the cupboard. It really reminds of the 40s style cocktail evening dresses.

Source: ebay.com via Wayward on Pinterest

My mind is all-things-vintage after the Love Vintage fair in Sydney last week. I was just so lucky to go and it coincided with my birthday trip with my beautiful mum to visit some relatives over there. We spent 5(!) hours at the show where I just drooled my way down the aisles resisting the temptation to purchase everything in my path (I did pick up some wee treats though).

The real highlight of the fair was attending one of Kelly Doust's workshops and meeting her in person - I did a terrible impression of a star-struck fan at the time and will not put up the pic of us because I look like a stunned possum! It was a total delight meeting her though and I picked up a signed copy of her latest (and like always) fantastic book 'Minxy Vintage'.

The ladies from the Lindy Charm School for Girls

Spending some time in Sydney with mum was great, we wandered the streets of Newtown and Glebe and even did a mission out to Bondi. It was a strange experience to be in a CBD after not being in one for so long now.

Oh and finally - until my next post - if you have the chance, go see Submarine, the new Richard Ayoade (of IT Crowd and Mighty Boosh fame) film. Great acting and styling in a coming of age story.

turquoise spring

Yes yes I have been lacking on the crafty updates of late but that's because I was saving up for something big! Here is my project from the weekend - my new spring dress. It has my colour of the moment - turquoise. If I were to perform a post-mortem of the project I would have to say that I would be less generous with my sizing as I do have some trimming to do. I have the perfect (you guessed it!) turquoise belt to go with it too. (It wouldn't sit on the dress for pictures). Also theres a pic of my latest turquoise purchase - button earrings by Ella Amalie! Picked those babies up from Encraftment a couple of weeks back.

In other news I have found a stockist of Frankie in Christchurch. The lovely gentlemen (honestly, just adorable) at Canterbury Magazines in Addington keep each edition aside for me to pick up at my leisure. I think I've gone cover to cover with this issue about six times and counting. And look who's featured:

Vicky Lang from Follow the White Rabbit has a chat about trying to keep her business moving through the quakes.

Promise to pump out the posts more frequently as now life/bills/work/lack of motivation is reducing and vitality is increasing. Love blossoms, love daylight savings, love spring!!

new language

With the small amount of leisure time I have had this week I've been indulging in my new library book - Florence and Giles by John Harding. I have another of Harding's works, One Big Damn Puzzler, and it is one of my favourite novels. These books and Harding's other titles are quite different to each other - OBDP is light hearted and Florence and Giles is gothic and quite dark  - but the common thread between the two is the play on linguistics and modern language. I definitely recommend them if you are a fan of character driven witty novels.

In other news I have been pursuing the embroidery thread (oh hilarious pun!) and this is my latest effort - incomplete.

all zipped up

The little zip purse! This one I put together in the french provincial-style fabric to hold all my little goodies (perfume, lip balm, mints) in my bag. This is probably one of the most simple sewing projects you can do, all you need is some fabric cut into squares, a zip and a sewing machine - with a zip footer. If you'd like me to put a tutorial on here, do let me know.

We've had a busy weekend with dinners, breakfasts, dvds, library visits, craft fairs and thrifting. One of my favourites purchases was this book

Fantastic reference guide for (just about) everything. As you can see it's got Earaches to Earthquakes to curing forgetfulness (I need this one! My long-term memory is especially bad).

Sadly now I'm suffering from sunday-itis and feeling impatient for the next weekend to roll around.

Oh and it's Keep NZ Beautiful week! Sign up for your local clean up event or start your own. We have signed up to clean up the river on saturday morning, maybe I'll see you there.

all eyes on

What a week! Bit out of routine and quite dazed now we are at the end of it. Early morning flights, late nights and dinners have left me feeling quite guilty for my lack of 'blogging'.

Most of our eyes have been on all things english this week and just found this video which I thought was worth sharing.

What I'm quite excited about this week is a new book that I'm reading by Caitlin Moran. If you're a woman, read this book. It's marketed as the new feminist doctrine but I disagree, I think this is simply a summary of some incredible experiences in Caitlin's life and her perspective on the world. It is filled with hilarious stories of Caitlin growing up in a family of 8 in Wolverhampton. Do warn you though, it's not for everyone, you do want to retain an open mind as she tackles some rather 'hot' topics.

More snow is on the way so I'm ready to bunk down and finish some crafting!

warm joy

Now that the snow is melting and its a matter of staying warm through the freezing (-2°C!) nights I am so grateful to have my patchwork wool blanket.

Even though putting together a blanket like this is a time consuming process - finding the oversize tight knit wool jumpers, gently shrinking and washing them, and deciding what order to put your squares, it is well worth the process. I cuddle up with mine every night on the couch. Tonight its with a pinot, recovering from the work day and enjoying some Jonathan Creek. I was talking to a felting expert in Hamilton recently who advised me how easy it would be to add some detailing to the blanket. If I get up the nerves to give it a go I'll post the results.

The design for the blanket is from Kelly Doust's book The Crafty Minx.

Kelly is a self taught crafter who puts together the simplest patterns and is also a vintage clothes aficionado, I'm hoping to pick up her book A Life in Frocks soon.
I have made a few different things from The Crafty Minx and I'll gradually pop them on here for you to take a nosy at. For someone new to crafts I highly recommend this book.

Tonight I'm going to try out a homemade muesli bar recipe - sadly quite excited - I've promised C that it's going to be better than a bought one, fingers crossed.