Lest We Forget

Whether you have a military connection or not, make sure you take a moment today for a quiet 'thank you' to those who have served or are serving on behalf of our country . No matter your opinion of war , our life would certainly be different today if they didn't .

At the going down of the sun , and in the morning , 

We will remember them.

Vale Edward Arthur Chant

My dear grandfather Ted ( ' Gandie ' to my family ) passed away this morning , just shy of his 90th birthday .
I believe he had what they call a ' good innings ' .

"For death is no more than a turning of us over from time to eternity."  William Penn

A Cloche Encounter . . .

For the last couple of years I have been crushing on cloches, which are bell shaped glass covers (and also hats!) like this . . .

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that are usually used for either covering food or growing plants. 

But  I have seen lots of great re-purposed ones used in decorating .  Check out these beauties . . . 

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Lots of clever folks have made their own from various combinations of items like stemmed glasses, cheese domes, candlesticks, old lantern parts, hurricane lamps etc , and I knew I could too. So each thrifting expedition over the past year or so has seen me searching for great second-hand goodies to make my own. I set myself a goal of making one for $10 or less . . .

and now I have!

Mine is made from a $4 cheese dome . . .

and a $3 timber stand . I'm not sure of it's intended use, but I reckon some lovely old bloke learning wood turning was very proud of it years ago.

I gave the pieces a good clean with metholated spirits to get rid of the grease and dust, then used E6000 to glue the cheese board to the stand. ('Liquid nails' would also be great if you have it.)

Once the glue had dried overnight, I gave the whole thing a light sand to get rid of any varnish and give the paint a good key.

Then I started the spray painting, using a 'booth' (read cardboard box ) in the backyard. The trick to a nice even job is lots of light coats, with drying time in between.

I used White Knight 'Squirts' quick dry gloss enamel paint in Medium Grey and gave it four or five thin coats all over. (I did toss up lots of colours - I think it would have looked lovely in a pale aqua or dusty red, but went with a neutral so it can be used with any kind of 'filling'.)

Then after a good clean and polish of the glass dome and leaving the paint to dry overnight, I put it together.

Voila! With a few dollars and a lot of patience, a decorator cloche of my very own.

P.S. “Industry, thrift and self-control are not sought because they create wealth, but because they create character."   Calvin Coolidge 

It's your birthday, it's your birthday and we want to say . . .

Hope my dear husband had a great day today.

We certainly enjoyed his chocolate hazelnut cake for afternoon tea!

** I must give a big thank you here to my dear friend Tash. The little minx saw my birthday post where I showed off my lovely Kimono breakfast cup and went out and found the matching side plate. I love it and put it to good use today!  **

Happy Birthday D. xxx   

P.S. "For my birthday I got a humidifier and a de-humidifier... I put them in the same room and let them fight it out."

Steven Wright

Master Bedroom Overhaul . . .

Our bedroom has been needing some attention for quite a while now , so I have begun with a nice small project . I would like to change out some of the 'beige-ness' in the room and I have used this great Aviary2 fabric from Joel Dewberry which will tie into the new grey , yellow and green colour scheme for the room .

I decided to make some pillow cases to complement the grey sheet set I bought recently. To add some interest , I added a yellow detail . . .

. . .though I made some extra work for myself by choosing a directional print. D'oh! 

If you are making a set of pillowcases, remember that you need to cut 2 of each piece, but reverse the pieces for the fronts so that the detail is on the opening side of each case .

What do you think ? 

I 'll show the next project - revamped lamps - soon. 

P . S .  “ If you would one day renovate yourself, do so from day to day. ” Confucius

Happy Ēostre !

Hope you have all had a wonderful day , no matter your religious persuasion or how you celebrate .
We started the day extremely early with an egg hunt for the youngest member of the family . . .

before treats for everyone . . .

(I believe Penny was saying, " Where's my eeeeeeggs? " ) 

and a quiet day at home with a roast lamb lunch.

For afternoon tea , there were some pretty Easter treats that the kids and I made last night . . .

and lots of quiet play . ( We had a big day out at the Mt Coot-tha Botanical Gardens yesterday . )

Looking forward to another day off . Ahhhhh . Long weekends . Glad I'm not going to be on the roads tomorrow !

P . S .  "Concentrate your energies, your thoughts and your capital. The wise man puts all his eggs in one basket and watches the basket. "  Andrew Carnegie

Hippity , hoppity , Easter's on it's way . . .

When did we start decorating for Easter ?? 

I don't remember any special Easter-related items from my childhood , though when I first left home to go to uni I did have a cane basket I put in the centre of the table for eggs over the Easter weekend . Through the years there have been occasional items made from instructions in magazines , mostly for gifts , but it wasn't until I started reading blogs that I realised making a fuss of occasions other than Christmas was actually quite common ! I made my first egg tree a couple of years ago and have been adding bits and pieces ever since.

This year I have made a really pretty garland , using this beautiful free printable as a starting point .

I printed it out ( just on paper ) several times and then cut out all the pieces . Then I laid them out across the table , adding extra punched pieces ( from here ) until I had enough length ( I used 18 flags ) and the mix of colour and pattern was even .

Then I used these trusty staples . . .

to put the garland together . . .

Taa-daa ! All hung as part of my Easter display , and so pretty with all the soft pastels .

P.S. "I would be most content if my children grew up to be the kind of people who think decorating consists mostly of building enough bookshelves."  Anna Quindlen