Holiday Vibes: Hanging with Adey

Our holiday began in Singapore, so Husbie Darling could meet a work colleague but it was also a great excuse for us Sewing Besties to hang too!

If you're new to my blog, Sewing BFF Adey blogs at The Sew Convert, and we met via The Sew Weekly blog as original contributors in 2011. Later that year, on my way to a bike riding tour of Cambodia, I stopped in to Singapore and met Adey for the first time... which was amazing & fun! Now I had the Darling Family with me, we had a gorgeous family catch up in the new Gardens By The Bay, with a delicious afternoon tea first and then a big wander around the garden's 2 domes!

Have a look at how gorgeous & amazing this place is! (And how sweet Baby Darling & Adey are too:)

 The waterfall is at least 7 storeys high, and the whole place is a surreal temperature with amazing plantlife and such interesting garden designs! We loved it!

You'll see I'm wearing the green dress I made from the fabric Adey gifted me... which is a designer stretch silk blouse-weight fabric. Thank you Adey! I have all the details of putting the dress together with the Vogue Pattern in case you're curious! I also made Baby Darling's tshirt, but the neckline was sooooooo soooo baggy, it kinda looked funny after he wore it all day!

Here are some more photos of the garden, it was just amazing!

 

Thank you Adey & your family! We loved spending time with you all! xoxo How wonderful that sewing and blogging can lead to international unique catch ups?! I love & appreciate this community so much!

xoxo

The Backyard is Blooming

Last year, I was very loud in saying 'No To Pink' in my garden and again, here they are... all the pinky pinks have bloomed again... and instead of being a pink hater, I'm embracing it... because what the hell. I'm not a gardener, and I can't fix it in a hurry even if I was due to my toddler!

You have to be quick! Luckily this massive long stemmed rose (from my garden, I had no control over it!) had no rose thorns, so after BD grabbed it, and used it as a walking stick, he wasn't injured. I once had to get a tetanus needle because of a rose thorn once!

Hope you've had a great weekend! I visited Spotlight today! Yes, dreaming of sewing with buying fabrics... let's see how we go with the creating part! I'm spotting some sewing time on my calendar this week! Maybe I'll have to actually make 'appointments to sew' in my calendar?!

xoxo

A Study of San Diego Gardens

A little sidestep today, as I'm gathering up lots of garden thoughts and ideas for our lovely little house in Melbourne's West. Oh we love it, and since we've been back from our USA Vay-Cay we've had lots of dreams about how we can make our 1920s/30s abode into a California Dream!

I loved the neatness, simplicity and lusciousness of the gardens in California! We had a great walking time in San Diego (mostly in La Jolla) so I snapped a few gardens I loved... but I wish I took more photos, these are great (and will be pinned to my own pinterest for inspiration gathering!) but I feel I've missed the true style of So-Cal (do I sound like a local yet?)! We have a front garden here at home that would look great with a little Californian style and planting... but I'm fully aware that most of these Californian gardens have regular gardening services... so I guess I'm going to have to think about a low maintenance approach for ours... but we'll see where we go with it. I'm no green thumb, but I can dream. Californian style, perhaps!

So today, let me indulge for a brief NO SEW inspiration! Apologies for all the photos! Garden lovers rejoice!

P.S if any of these houses pictured are yours, I love your front garden! xoxo

A Macrame Terrarium

Have you, like me, noticed the love for macrame & terrariums online, in design blogs and pinterest faves? My friend at work talked about Terrariums a lot and we would laugh at the spelling and mispronounciations of the word... I could easily say 'terr-RAH-rium' instead of 'terr-rare-rium' to be posh. But I also remembered my family had a terrarium coffee table (YES!) and although I don't we called it a terrarium, it was a magical place there indeed!

Anyways, this week I cut up an old tshirt (bought especially for the colour from the op shop), and made this darling birthday present!

Following this tutorial was pretty easy for the macrame, you pretty much cut off a big tshirt under the arms, make it into 8 strips and then create a series of knots at different parts to cuddle the terrarium. My test macrame was pretty neat, so it didn't take too long to get to making this orange one. I found the round glass vase at the op shop in Gippsland, and planted two little succulent plants a few weeks back to see how they'd grow. And they're just darling!

If you're out walking a lot (like my #mamalyfe) you can keep your eyes peeled for broken bits of succulents if your neighbourhood grows them in the front yard. In the past few months, I've noticed lots of broken pieces or leaves and if you plant them, they'll grow! I never break off any bits, I just gather up pieces that I've found on the footpath, that's ok in my books!

I absolutely love it, and might be a new favourite pass-time! Refashioning mens tshirts and growing succulents!

Alternative Ice Cubes

When we working-beed at our place recently, I had an ice cube tray malfunction (ie, I tried to knock them out before they were frozon, clutzie!) so improvised with frozen blackberries! We have a lot of soda in our house (Sodastream Lovers!) so they tanged the soda just slightly, absolutely delish and looks cute!

I would have taken a photo with the glasses full of soda, but they went so quickly! It's hot working outside in the garden!

x

Green Thumbs Needed!

After a year of living in our beloved home, we spent a good working bee weekend in the garden, thanks to the help of Mum & Dad! I have fallen off the green thumb bandwagon, what with 2012 being the Baby Growing career year and all... so things were extremely out of hand (and the roses still are, mind!) in the backyard. Please don't even MENTION the front yard!

The summer has been pretty brutal so far, and lots of plants were in a state... the garden shed is like a greenery (a very haphazard shed) or bush shed, and the door became stuck a few months ago, and I couldn't get in to see what was growing (or not growing). Over the working bee weekend, Mum helped me organise and saved the lives of many gorgeous green things... so hopefully I'll be able to continue helping these plants survive!

And here are the future feature plants (my favourites!), the succulents!

The beginnings!

x

Some flowers for Friday

All these little winter flowers have grown in my garden, as soon as it's past 5 o'clock though, they disappear and wait for the new day.

*** Well, this Friday post is now getting posted on a Saturday morning ***

What I was *going* to say last night was... I'm home from work, with only 2 full weeks left in the office... I'm amazed at how fast the time has gone already... and how good things have been overall. This morning, however, I've woken up early with lots of aches and feeling like another cold is coming on... the pains of being pregz in winter time, in Melbourne and still working in the office. I'm going to smash through lots of oranges and other lovely prevention foods, and hope to keep it away.

Hope these little yellow flowers brighten up your wintery day if you're like me in the South of the World... and hope to see you soon! xo

No to pink!

We moved in last November, and my garden is gorgeous... don't get me wrong, I love having space and the greenery! It was such a gorgeous summer out there too! BUT, every single day since we've been here... PINK flowers bloom across the whole place.

The lovely former owner planted every shade of pink (and I fear there's more to come in winter... I see buds on the camellia plants!) flower and I'm just not a pink lover... I don't mind red and orange flowers (which makes me think those Fuschia's are orangey pink now)! I might have to get a green thumb going to replace these pink geranium ones, as they are very pretty but I think red and orange would make me really enjoy the garden! Anyone interested in a plant swap?

xoxo