The one where I make a Yarn-Bombed Antler Necklace

I saw several of these cool, colourful necklaces being worn at Bloggers Connecting earlier in the year. It turned out they were made by Melissa at The Best Nest  following an Always Rooney tutorial. I mentally pinned it, then this week my brain spat out a yarn-bombed antler necklace light bulb when I was thinking hard about what to make for a friends birthday after a wasted hour with two bored kids in uninspiring, expensive gift shops.

They are dead easy so if you have half a mind you'd like one just go do it. It's just fimo, jump rings, chain, embroidery yarn and glue. I had everything but the jump rings in my stash so it cost me all of 20c to make this!


***OR you can buy them here (made in ceramic, with the colours of your choice, and VERY inexpensively ) from the Always Rooney Etsy shop


It feels good to be stretching the creative muscle again.



Strutting my yarn-bombed stuff at Show and Tell &  Made by Hand

Viking Man: Op-Shop-Show-Off: August 27th, 2013

Teak, rabbit fur and hemp rope. Made in Denmark, mid-century. I can find out nothing else out about this unmarked little Viking warrior I picked up at Riccarton Market for $3, other than that his country-men are very well travelled. But I don't need to, he is going straight to the little boys room (which is still swimming underneath a tide of stuff-to-be-let-go-of). Not much progress on that front as the little boy in question has been putting us through our paces on the sleep front, rendering any activity other than moaning about how tired we are irrelevant. Hence the late post today, totes forgot!

Right, I'm off for more coffee before he wakes again! Do link up anything relating to second hand living and I shall happily prop up my eyelids with matchsticks and enjoy perusing x

34/52 Portraits of my Children in 2013

Findlay-This photo is begging for a caption. "Ok, I can sit, I can drive a tractor; now where are the car keys?".

Claudine-On her way home from kindy. Me "you have pollen on your nose". Claud "That's because I'm a bee mama".



Joining in the fun of the Portrait Project at Che and Fidel.



* My favourites from last week were these three by the sea

In out, in out, shake it all about: Op-Shop Show-Off; August 20th, 2013

I pounced on this lovely thing when I saw it in a box of Terry's random, un-investigated op-shop finds as we continued the de-clutter this week.  The hand-punctured star-shaped perforations, evidence of knocks from a long life in service, in un-shiny, unpretentious grey. It's a keeper.

At first I thought it was a sugar caster and I wanted it to be a sugar caster so I could use it as a sugar caster and so it would have a use and therefore be more justifiably keep-able.  It rattled like a once-upon-a-time sugar caster but when I shook it all that fell out was dirt. The husbands identify-an-old-thing reference library failed me, so I turned to Google who told me sugar casters are at least 16 cms tall and suggested it was a poivriere, a pepper shaker, but then it told me poivriere are at least 12 cms tall...

It turns out this, all 10 cms of it, is a pounce pot. Originally it would have contained ground cuttle bone or pumice which was sprinkled and then rubbed in to prime paper for writing on with quill and ink, and/or to dry the ink before folding the letter in the pre blotting paper age. Swoon!

It looks almost exactly like this one made by James Dixon and Sons in Sheffield, England, (hello home town!) and the fact it was likely part of an inkwell set which are usually marked on the bottom of the tray explains why this has no makers marks when pewter usually does. I'm deducing from the fact that blotting paper was invented around 1840 and the James Dixon firm was established in 1806, and that pewter production declined rapidly in the late 1800's that this here pounce pot was made in the early to mid 1800's.

Sadly some old pewter was made with lead. Despite not being made for culinary use, if it is James Dixon made it will be lead-free since the company originally formed to produce a lead-free version of pewter. However I'm really not willing to take the risk, and though it would make a lovely glitter shaker I just don't want the kids mucking around with it-Claud still likes to gnaw on non-food stuff when the mood takes her and Fin's fast approaching his gnawing prime; so we either need to test it for lead somehow or, sniff, out it goes...



And the de-clutter tally for this week?

In the undecided pile
One pewter pounce shaker

To the nephews
A massive pile of "I'll fit them again one day" clothes.

To the op-shop
A big car boot load of all sorts of guff, including:-
  A box load of flower vases of various descriptions
  A bag of maternity clothes that are now too big (hurrah!)
  3 sets of salad servers

To Kindy
Big bag of massive feathers
2 boxes of cup cake toppers

To Nin for a letter writing social (how cool!)
A wee pile of oddments of envelopes and note cards

To antiques auction at Bell's auctioneers in Kaiapoi
Various drawings and prints

Notably absent (further psychological preperation required)
Toys
Books
Rags

33/52 Portraits of my Children in 2013

Claudine. At her Saturday morning swimming lesson. She worships her teachers: ballet, kindy, and mama. Tim-the-swim is no exception. Dive to the bottom to pick up a 'dropped' thing or jump into the deep end, she will do anything for him. A fish like her father, she can swim a few meters unaided now.

Findlay-His first solid food, this afternoon. He is two days shy of 6 months but we decided better his first meal a roast with the family on a relaxed Sunday than who knows what with just me in the midweek rush. Beef was gnawed, potato smeared and peas chased overboard. Such a happy, mucky baby!



This weeks efforts towards the Portrait Project at Che and Fidel. My previous portraits in the series are here.

A Little Give and a Little Take: Op-Shop Show-Off: August 13th, 2013

It's uncanny how having a baby, and then another one can shrink your house. The play corner, craft desk, high chair, recliner, play mat, hammock and a hundred thousand toys leave a once spacious room with just a few feet spare in the centre. The spare rooms no longer spare. Never minimalists, we were a High-Stuff-Household even pre-children, with heirloom belongings, a dozen hobbies between us (crafts of various kinds, kayaking, snowboarding, mountain biking, furniture renovation, studio pottery collecting et al) not to mention we both like to play in op-shops. Terry, he likes to find a thing, an old thing and find out all about it. He has an extensive find-out-about-an-old-thing library (mostly op-shopped). Me, I have my list (needs), but I'm not opposed to occasionally being seduced by something random I clap my eyes on (pretties) either.

We are pretty restrained on the whole on the buying stuff front though, truly,  and my distaste for clutter ying tends to balance out Terry's hoarding yang.  Yet somehow, despite regular yinging out, trying to organise the spare room into a new baby's eventual bedroom; and moving completely out and then back in after earthquake repairs has brought a lot of stuff to the surface in the manner of a shaken jar of muesli. And it ain't all raisins.

I found a definition of hoarding lately that I'm using as a touch stone to resolving our "is this life's messy clutter or unhealthy hoarding?" confusion. The definition says essentially that if stuff impedes your activities of daily living it is hoard. Can't step foot in the garage? Hoard. Can't see the bed in the front bedroom? Hoard. Can't hang Terry's shirts in his wardrobe? Hoard. Can't fit your excess soup in the deep freeze? Hoard. Can't find anywhere to put down your craft project out of reach of kids? Hoard.

Or, according to Terry, "we need a bigger house!".


My urge, nay my desperate freakin' need to seriously downsize our household contents has coincided perfectly with the Down To Earth De-clutter-a-thon, so without further ado, here is the tally for this week:-

• Three carrier bags full of hoard to the op-shop. I was heartened that none of it had originally come from an op-shop: my 'need or absolute must-have' op-shopping policy works, even if i do have occasional bouts of restraint remorse. Most were gifts of little utility or, ahem, taste. Hoarded because it didn't feel right to give away gifts I took a deep breath and just let them go. It felt good. I need to brave making suggestions for gifts when they are in the offing (not my style at all). Whilst I was there I picked up the above ombre silk scarf, $4. Naughty, hand-slap!
• Gave away 3 huge bags of black peaches from the deep freeze as we won't have time to make jam before the next ones are grown and picked.
• Gave away 2 litres of frozen expressed breast milk to a needy mama and babe via Eats on Feets.
• Sold a set of plan drawers (which held a yet to be dealt with hoard of paintings and prints) on Trademe.
• The ones that got away. Two very stained too-small t-shirts of Claud's which Terry dug out of the bin for his rag-bag(s).
• I also signed up for The Travelling Stationary Box and am going to have the mother of all stationary de-stashes this week (two drawers, a desk and random boxes so far!). 

I'd love to know if anything is off-limits in the de-stash at your place? Gifts aside, I really struggle with the children's toys in that since they are not technically mine I feel it's not my place to get rid of them...what do you think?

p.s. How many bags of rags do you think is too many?!

32/52 Portraits of my Children in 2013

Claudine-Emerging from her den in the lavender hedge.

3 years of following the cat and worrying hedgehogs in there and she has formed a little crawl hole from one end to the other. It's also the source of bird wings for her nature table (the cat favour green finches and wax eyes). It really needs pulling out and replanting but we can't let Fin miss out on the fun now can we?

Speaking of whom, there will be no Fin photo this week as he is super sick (Bronchiolitis). Quite apart from the fact I haven't put him down in a couple of days, I've no interest in a portrait of his misery. We're spending the weekend in bed together, skin on skin; him sleeping mainly, thankfully, (he cries pitifully when awake) and me surfing, coffee sipping and worrying...


Participating for the 32 nd week (!) in the Portrait Project at Che and Fidel.



* I was quite taken by little miss painted face last week. A striking face with and without war paint I imagine.

I am a girl in a material world:Op-Shop Show-Off :Tuesday August 6th, 2013

Retro Linen teatowel, $8 Trademe.  To be transformed into a Martha Stewart Linen Tea Towel Sun dress for Claud at some point in the not too distant future (approx. before next summer is over).

An off-cut of sheepskin, 50c, Rangiora Charity Barn.  To be transformed into a Sarai Mitnik Faux Fur Collar (featured in Mollie Makes Magazine, way back) for Claud at some point in the distant future (before next winter is over?).

Navy wool blankets; $22. Trademe. The last of the colours I needed for my Hudson Bay Point Braided Rug Project (TBC sometime in the next decade?).




Op-Shops. Making making affordable for all.


Have you bought anything second hand for making or creating purposes lately? Do tell!

31/52 Portraits of my Children in 2013

Fin-Frolicking in washing pile mountain, the only mountain we've been near this winter.


Claud-The real Winter Story-in bed, sick, with yet another bug.


Joining in the Portrait Project at Che and Fidel once again. My prior photo portraits are here if you'd like to see them?


p.s  My favourite from last week was of that boy breakfasting at Bluebirds of Happiness