Easter frocks all sweet & floral

During the lead up to Easter I've been busy whipping up some sweet little floral dresses. All dresses are made from upcycled vintage cottons that I have op shopped over the last year or so from local charity stores. These dresses are very versatile as they can be worn over long sleeved tops & tights for winter, as well being perfect for summer as is. The style is very roomy with a drawstring waist which allows for many years of comfortable wear.

The two dresses with the contrast border hemline have a pretty lace applique detail, so fancy schmancy.

All these dresses are now hanging in Mooch Inside at Hardys Bay looking quite a treat if I may say so myself. I hope who ever buys them gets as much enjoyment out of them as I did putting together the print combinations & sewing them. Each dress I make is a one of a kind a has a lot of love that goes into it's fruition.



I thought a little handmade brooch might be nice for this dress using the dress fabric & an antique green button.




This little dress has a great 1950's feel to it with the printed border hemline & lace trim. Gorgeous yellow old rose print.


It's the last day of the Easter School Holidays here in NSW Australia & I guess it leaves me with mixed feelings. It has been so lovely having lots of relaxing time at home with the kids doing our own thing & with no fixed routine, but I would be fibbing if I didn't say that I was looking forward to having time to myself for my sewing.


Hope you all had a special time with family & friends over Easter. I would love to hear what you got up to & whether or not you celebrate Easter at all.

red,white & blue the boys love you

Easter holidays are fast approaching, with some school children already on vacation in our area. This means lots of holiday makers & extra people visiting the store in which I sell my sean-the- prawn goodies, so I like to top up my stock. I have decided to make a couple of cot quilts/throws & probably 3 of my little puff sleeved drawstring waist dresses (picnic dresses).

These snap shots show my first completed quilt made from gorgeous Japanese craft fabrics & screen printed red linen fabric from the Prints Charming girls. I also threw in a little blue & white stripped ticking fabric to pull it all together.

I backed the quilt with a very feint, fine beige & brown stripe printed fabric. The border is a very narrow, hand stitched binding which is the same fabric as the backing.

Originally intended for a little boys room, I now think it is quite contemporary & could sit well in any room of the house where even the adults could enjoy it's playfulness. The monkey fabric is just too cute, love it!

100th Post, wild about wildflowers.

Hip Hip Hooray, 100 posts today! Considering I've been blogging since 2007 it's not really that many posts. Should probably be celebrating at least 200..but hey, they say quality not quantity.

I have finished my Australian Wildflower cushion family & I must say I really love them. The prints are on the most delicious natural slubby linen & they are trimmed with a totally gorgeous cream vintage cotton pom pom braid. That braid was given to me by a friend 12 years ago, I have been so good hoarding it away, pulling it out on many occasions, but then waiting for the right moment. Everytime I use it I feel a teensy bit sad that it is getting closer to running out, but it sure is nice to see it take on a life.

Flannel Flowers, Kangaroo Paws, Wattle, Sturt Desert Peas & Grevillias just to name a few. After dropping them all over to Mooch Inside where I retail, my hubby said he was disappointed that I didn't keep one for our house. So now I have to make the big decision of which one I like the best..... easy peasy it'll be the Flannel Flower & Sturt Desert Pea cushion. I'd better hot foot it back to the shop, with a bit of luck some might sell over the week end. If you are interested in purchasing anything that I feature on my blog, just send me a message & I'll pop it in my Etsy shop for you.

I like this combo together, Waratahs, Wattle & Banksias. These two cushions feature many of the flowers that grow native to the area in which I live. I am lucky to be able to go for a walk in the bush at the end of my street & to be surrounded by such beauty.

Do you have a favourite wildflower?

fairy party time

Last Saturday we hosted a fairy party for our daughter's 4th Birthday. It was such a lovely party, so gorgeous to see the kids all dressed up in their fairy best and we were so lucky with the weather. The sun was out although all week they were forecasting a wet weekend.

Almost all the fairy guests are in this shot, some were a little camera shy. As the girls arrived we helped to top up their fairy accessories with extra wands, wings, tiaras. All guests received a colourful popcorn necklace that my hubby & I had painstakingly threaded a few nights before. I think they make a pretty cute bunch. Aunty Susi painted their little faces so beautifully, with most asking for a butterfly.

While waiting to get their face painted they could practice a little fairy craft, decorating paper cutout fairies with sparkly stars, flowers & glitter textas. I can't believe just how quite they all were colouring & sprinkling. They created masterpieces.
When they were done decorating their fairies, there were a lot of yummy fairy sweet treats to devour. The cup cakes & butterfly shaped fairy bread were definite winners along with fresh watermelon wedges & home made sausage rolls.

My hubby once again out did himself with another cake extravaganza. I think he is feeling the pressure more each year as he tries to better his last effort. He nailed it this time as the Birthday girl couldn't decide between Barbie or a fairy cake, so she got both rolled into one. My favourite part of this cake was the little grassy knoll fairy garden, complete with flowers & butterflies.

This shot gives you a bit of a feel for what was happening around cake time & shows off my paper decorations nicely. Note the tissue paper pompoms & garlands of stitched together paper doilies blowing in the breeze. Talk about looking like a mum with too much time on her hands.

Hard to keep those little picky fingers away from the cake while lightling all the candles. Ooh the temptation.

Got to love a bit of dedicated fairy wand waving...go girls, and Happy Birthday to my baby, you are growing up way to fast.

Although our life goes on & we enjoy our good times & celebrate what is important to us, those who are suffering are not forgotten. There has been an overwhelming run of natural disasters of late...let's do what we can to help those in need.

party prep

My daughter turned four recently and I thought it would be nice to throw her a fairy party since she wanted her cake to be along those lines. I whipped myself into a creative crafty frenzy, with my head starting to explode with ideas. Above is a picture of the no sew tutu that I made from strips of various tulles looped over a ribbon. I later went back & cut petal shaped ends to each strip, which this photo doesn't show. End result was really quite snazzy...fancied it for myself.

A tissue paper pompom making evening was had by my lovely hubby & I. It became quite competitive between the two of us as to who had the best technique & the best looking finished product, spiky petal effect versus the scalloped. A lot of fun, but boy were we glad to finish the last ones. An easy enough exercise but rather labour intensive. It was no trouble to find YouTube tutorials on both of these crafty exercises...hey that's not cheating..is it?

Helga's Dresden plum cake & stitching

Yesterday, I had quite the baking day...first up was this delicious plum cake & then I went on to making a wholemeal pear cake, along with pear muffins for the kiddies school lunch boxes. Mother of the year?.. I do believe I'm in good running.

The plum cake is a favourite of mine, taught to me by an elderly German lady I once stayed 10 weeks with in Adelaide while working as a costume cutter/ pattern maker for the 1997 Adelaide Arts Festival. This is a recipe of hers that she brought with her from Dresden when she moved to Australia as a young twenty something. Sure is simple to make & super dooper yumsville.

I'm starting to make a series of Australian wildflower cushions. This is my first complete one & I have four more halfway there. They are all featuring different native flowers, some banksias, kangaroo paws, waratahs & I think they look really jazzy with the vintage cotton pompom braid around their edges. So nice to use that pompom braid, I've been hording it for over ten years now.

Pictured above are a couple of skirts that i have been making for the birthdays of two gorgeous girls Petra 7 & Ava 5. I ended up doing a contrast topstitch along the top & lower seams of the border hem panel. I think the result was quite pretty, just hope they like them!! Hard to know sometimes.

I whipped this little skirt up for my daughter the other day when she was at preschool. I've been enjoying making some clothes for her as I often feel guilty when making garments for the shop or as orders for other people. She always gets excited & asks in the sweetest voice is that for me & I have to explain to her that it is Mummy's work ......Well this time it is for her & she will be so happy, & maybe she'll even do a little spin around dance.

I'm still loving playing around with my pictures using the Instagram iphone app. Do you like the result or prefer the untweeked style of photos I used to post?

big girls bed & pina4

Today I made a pinafore for my almost four year old daughter..so I'm calling it her pina4. I can hear you all groaning about that one, yeah my sense of humour is a little on the cornball side of things. I think she will love her little dress...what a surprise when she gets home from Preschool.

This is my daughter's first ever big girls bed. Poor little poppet only just got out of her cot, she'll be four next month. She loves her bed & has only fallen out once, but kept sleeping right through the ordeal...now that's a skill I wish I had. Mind you it has been quite a while since I fell out of bed. Aahhh that takes me back! Went a bit artsy again with my photo finish, the room is actually nice & bright with colourfull curtains that I patchworked myself out of lovely yellows & green prints.