Happy birthday, erm, "princess"

a couple of day before christmas claudine turned three! three! THREE! 

we gave her the much longed for bunny. claud christened her "princess ballerina". at three parental taste and advice is outgrown. we call her princess for short. we are all in love (though a little alarmed at the rapid eating of her hutch?!)

she had a tea party with all her pals, inside at the last minute due to the sudden onset of drizzle, drinking pink fizz from teacups and eating pink cake. my finest cake moment to date (it tasted wonderful!).

pin the pom pom on the bunny was a hit-and i love that i have a birthday commemorating tea towel to use as we wrote all the kids guesses and names on in fabric pen.

claud gave us a present the next day, and we are still all astonishment. she announced she wanted to wear knickers and refused nappies point blank. 

thanks claud x

linking up at show and tell

the advent swap completed...wow!

just briefly popping in from my christmas hibernation to say a big thank you to stella for my wonderful advent swap gifts numbers of which, numbers13-25 you can see here. hope your all feeling as relaxed and content as i am. see you in the new year x

       13.cool notepad and a very pretty, flowery pen.

16. D.I.Y mini bunting and decorative kite kits-on-a-post card-these are so rad!
(pretty sure stella designed and sells these, along with some of my other beautiful gifts which proceeded and follow, so if your insanely jealous of me go to her blog shop and buy some)

18. an ikea pine scented christmas candle. 

15. a darling little vintage pepper pot, a vintage wooden toy train (claud has claimed this hence it's can't be found to photograph, but the plan was to hang it on the tree) and a packet of nostalgia-inducing mini retro french postcards. 

14. a pack of great wee 'label/stickers

17. adorable christmas card fridge magnet and beautiful gold washi tape 

19. circus stamp kit

20. cool handmade retro envelopes

21. pretty magnetic fridge bunting

22. gothic script washi tape

23. stripy paper straws. claud calls these "happy straws"-so true!

24. sweet kids version of the night before christmas 

(we love this story and the illustrations in this version are delightful)

25. exquisite a-z fridge magnets; excellently named award winning kiwi coffee, the tiniest buttons i ever saw in my life (i so have to find the tiniest jar in the world to make a button jar for my doll house craft room!), beautiful stickers, gorgeous fabric...an absolute delight to open on the big day!

and thank you too cat for organising x

are you an Op-Shop Show-Off?

this sweet festive, rorstrand of sweden porcelain cup-or-sugar-bowl, and a trio of deer (i know nothing of  nana-nick-nacks, beswick maybe?) complete my christmas mantel this year, alongside clauds homemade advent calender and a sleeping elf. 
i'd dearly love a greened up up mantel but that soon to be replaced icky mustard wall paper makes green look bleurg so white was the only way. i'm looking to replace the mustard with a grey. it's very hard to find a grey that doesn't look either blue or purple or too light or too dark for this sunny room. but once it's done the white cup will join these other thrifted "whiteys" up there (from left: 'made in china': Arabia, Finland: Thomas, Germany) currently doing service in the craft room.

are you an op-shop show-off? or more modest about your superior thrifting abilities and luck? either way not everyone appreciates your skill, dedication or indeed finds. but we do here, and i'd be thrilled if you linked up and showed-off your second hand finds, new or old, here. (we'll be here every tuesday in the new year).

to link up just click on the blue click here message and follow the 3 simple steps to link up your blog post, and leave me a comment to let me know your here!
then if your keen grab the Op-Shop Show-Off Button from my sidebar to decorate yours (paste the code into a HTML gadget under the 'add a gadget' part of the layout section in blogger and save)

play along with us

play along with us

latest doll house makings-an adirondack chair

a lolly stick adirondack chair. the arms are from magnums. the others just random lemonade ice blocks (my preggy crave this time around). the leg bits are a split oversize crafters lollystick. tarted up with a little humbrol paint. a bit of a fail in doll house terms as they are not child resistant at all, but pretty to look at and in this context-a little scene for my mini-loving advent swap partner stella-very evocative of a southern hemisphere christmas to my mind.

the mini drinks were from op-shopped cocktail stirrers.
the tree is a from an overlocker thread tube also op-ed
the flower buttons were snipped from a stained cardigan of clauds

 the latter picture is my inspiration. i want these retro beauties in my back garden now!

my creative space this week and my Ta-Dah Tuesday too, and the all new super-doopah SHOW AND TELL!

oh i do love a miniature christmas scene

i finally found some mini christmas trees, at the bakery. and so we've been playing, with sea salt, op-shopped jars and claud and the husbands toys (the tractor he got when he was 4) this morning. i think we all know that we'll be going with the rabbit winter scene this year!

Advent swap 6-12

this is easily the best advent calender i ever had! for starters there's no fighting with my sister over who turn it is (though claud is trying to stake a claim she is fob off-able with the number stickers). no tasteless chocolate or 15 varieties of pictures of christmas crackers. just pure, tasteful cool stuff!  i'm so excited that the cat woman is thinking of making this an annual swap-yahoo-i don't think i could go back to a calender-less advent after this!

so, without further ado, here are this weeks surprises from christmassy super-blogger stella...

6. a wee diy camping scene. words fail me. i love mini's, i love things made of paper. i love tee-pees. present perfection! 
7. argyle pattern washi tape. i'm sure i have never mentioned on this blog my love for the argyle pattern?  suffice to say i wore out my last pair of burlington argyle socks (of the stash i've had since i moved here from england a long time ago) just a couple of months ago. sniff! you clearly have ESP stella?!!
8. weleda hand cream. i heart weleda. so do my 'rugged' gardener-hands now!
9. a giant bar of dairy milk. my fave. reduced to crumbs in an embarrassingly short time. burp! (actually thats a lie. i don't leave crumbs when it comes to chocolate)
10.a beautiful handmade card and bookmark-my stationary stash is starting to look very healthy indeed, thank you.
11. marigold seeds. i need all the help i can get defending the vegges and have just turned the last of the vegges seedlings out from some cute little terracotta pots, so these are going straight in-with clauds assistance.
12. the coolest, teeny-tiniest diy ivy and hyacinth plants for the doll house. ace, ace, ace! i have a project for the christmas hols now!

Thank You!



and i did send to stella...

6. homemade lavender bath cubes. 7. a printing kit. 8.elf-sized fairy lights. 9. op-shopped make your own paper stars kit. 10. a homemade 'stella' snowglobe tea towel. 11. an op-shopped book on DIY boats in bottles (she collects them, but frustratingly i just couldn't lay my hand on one). 12. a giant licorice allsort (her fave lolly) made of soap. 

 last week gifts

pin the pom pom on the bunny and a link up your second hand finds here

free printable invites from belle and boo

i really, really wanted to make a mason jar snow scene, but cant find any mini brush christmas trees ANYWHERE. so i satisfied my urge for mini makings instead with these little rabbit scenes which will find a spot on clauds birthday tea party table. hurrah for finally using up the last of the fake-grass that's been shedding continuously in my craft room and attaching itself to anything vaguely sticky since (taped things, glued things, claud). the toasdstools are florists decos i found down the oppy for 50, the bunnies from clauds extensive collection.
pin the tail on the donkey has morphed into pin the pom-pom on the bunny. printed on a tea towel mainly cause, in the manner of previous lollystick overstocking, i have a million of them to use up. luckily the real life bunny, a netherland dwarf, white with pink ears as specified after a little negotiation (from pink-all-over) who is living secretly in our back yard until the big day, is not as misshapen as my representation. in fact she is cute, white furry perfection; super-friendly and cuddly; and does tidy poos in one corner of her cage (i'm hoping she can teach claud, the cats and the hedgehogs whom are all going everywhere in some bizarre spring madness, a thing or two).
pass-the-parcel wrappings courtesy of a month of clauds playcentre paintings. party dress staining iceblocks from wild cherries and blackboy peaches picked last summer and discovered in the depths of the freezer this week.

here are some of the other party preparations


anyway enough about rabbits and poo. are you missing her library adventures fleamarket finds? i am. so i thought i'd have a crack at my own. i mean i buy enough second hand stuff to keep a linky afloat single-handedly, so, let see if it loads/anyone wants to play along etc, etc... if your keen, grab the button!

<a href="http://www.blackbirdhasspoken.blogspot.co.nz" target="_blank"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlmcIq8aMxdYhAJfQCoTkl49C4ID0iW579fvEA-i6L_dcj0JOnh4i-bR6doMM7O6Gfa9i9uAEfaMdqYoMEehKxogPeoH20sZY8mwEfsChsB65QEdTBFR9_nmgga2lHdi2iP1z2_MpG-U7y/s128/op-shop%20show-off%20(6)%20final%20edit.jpg" /></a>

play along with us

a cracker is not just for christmas

they are for birthdays too! scrap paper printed with this christmas cracker template, odds and ends of ribbon, pull-popping cracker whatsits, all from the stash; containing hand made hair ties with vintage buttons (idea from my vintage vow), elastic pom pom bracelets and wee lollies. the unfinished grey one on the end is for the boy. racking my brain for an easy, cheap, diy boy thing to slip in there. any suggestions?

advent swap 2012 days 1-5

as kids, once our presents were wrapped and on display, as opposed to not-so-secretly stashed in or behind or on top of mums wardrobe, we were allowed, under supervision, to feel them up. squeezing, shaking, sniffing, holding up to the light and guessing were all permissible. our guesses were neither confirmed nor denied. interfering in any way shape of form with tape or paper was banned. it was a very clever way of helping us cope with the wait...

Cat's advent swap has induced the wait-iest feeling in me since back in those days, and so i coped in the age old way. heres what i got given, and what i thought i got, so far...

1. Kiwi-xmas postcards. 2. crochet ribbon tape. 3. chocolate soap. 4. mini picture frames. 5. mini envelopes 

       (christmas card)            (washi tape)            (dairy milk bar)     (doll house books)  (mini advent calender)

i am so impressed with stellas attention to detail, not just in the beautiful things she illustrates (1. & 5.) but also in how carefully she has chosen things that are very, very me. brilliant fun! thanks hun x

righto, i'm going to try not to be naughty and feel up any more of them now i am in the midst of opening...

A PRESENT EVERY DAY FOR 25 DAYS!!!!

and what did i send stella thus far?...

1. cutlery customised by moi 2. jurianne matter paper angel decoration 3. a pomegranate 4.snowflake gift tags made by moi  5. a vintage copy of Dickens a christmas carol

...bit useless on the taking photos of what i sent front!

scandinavian christmas mobiles

flensted

vintage danish mobile made for export to the usa

flenstead

man i love mobiles (but crikey they're hard to photograph!). claud has a flensted butterfly, and the cutest vintage easter bunny mobile that comes out each year. i'm slowly building a collection of christmas mobiles. i'm very particular. the ones i like and buy always turn out to be of scandinavian origin. this years birds-with-festive-bellies mobile i have made myself-from instructions over at the house that lars built (she's running a 24 days of scandinavian christmas feature with beautiful and easy DIY projects, and a scandinavian christmas giveaway). 

Linky-ing with our creative spaces and ta-dah! tuesday and christmas traditions

"on the first day of advent stella gave to me..."

...a bunch of her AMAZING kiwi-christmas postcards. pohutakawa, kowai, homesick birdies-a hint of brambly hedge, i LOVE them stella, thanks so much!

I love advent swap!

claud wanted to show you what she got in her advent calender too. brung by "jimmy" the elf who helps father christmas to make toys on the night shift and then comes to our place in the morning to bring claud her advent gift and get a bit of kip...