Baby wrestling and boat shorts

When I received my scrap bag swap parcel some gorgeous blue vintage fabric with boats and bubbles/ circles literally jumped out at me screaming ‘make me into shorts for Noah.’

If you follow my blog closely you will have noticed that I have a thing for dressing the boy in boat shorts.

What began as a ‘photo shoot’ turned into an impromptu baby wrestle.

Isn’t it such adorable fabric?

And it was a great way for me to practice using my new overlocker.

Noah was staying at my Mum’s when I made them, and when he asked what I was doing, she replied “probably sewing” to which he said, “I know Nana, but WHAT is she sewing?” When I was reunited with him and gave him the shorts he said: “I yove (love) my boat shorts” and hugged them close. Cute aye?

Joining in with our creative spaces.

Jen x

… and the winner is …!

True Random Number GeneratorMin: Max: 

Result:

19

Thanks to all her entered my Foundry 'the many and the few' print giveaway.

The winner is … drum roll please ….number 19 - Roslyn @ sew delicious!

Congrats Ros, and I know you will find the perfect place for that lovely print.

And to those of you that didn’t win – make sure you check Foundry's website anyway because at such reasonable prices I’m sure you can afford to buy your own little piece of prettiness!

And thanks once again to the lovely Alana from Foundry for generously donating this print for the giveaway!

Jen Xx

(By the way – in case you notice I deleted a couple of the duplicate comments so as to give a true number of entries.)

Home Sweet Home

When it comes to interior design I like lots of different styles. I like aspects of the modern, minimalist, clean lines idea (although looking at the large to be folded washing pile in front of me, I could not refer to much of my surrounding as minimalist.) And I also love the vintage, floral look too.

But I’m a have your cake and eat it girl and I believe that you can combine styles, or at least I try to anyway!

The house we are living in is old with high ceilings and wooden floorboards, while a large amount of our furniture is modern. In our lounge we have black leather couches, a modern white desk and cushions and bean bags in both grey and olive green. If there is a room in our house that has some aspect of minimalism in it, it’s this one.

Recently we hung a lovely little floral painting from the op shop in this room, and although it looked nice; in many ways I think it made the big bare walls seem bigger and barer. Because of this I’ve been thinking of ways to somehow tie in this new addition with the more modern furniture, but still keep it a reasonably non cluttered space.

So as a breather from playing with my overlooker (which I’d done all morning while Isabelle slept), I made this little stitchery. (In case you wondered Noah spent the night at my Mum’s freeing me up for this craft burst!)

The idea is that the green used in it will tie in the with olive green accents already in the room.

I really should find a storage solution for the CD/ DVD pile!

Home sweet home is such a unique slogan (not), but it fits me well, as I’m a real homebody and love just pottering around the house. (This is quite fortunate since it’s my current place of work as a stay-at-home Mum!)

Have you done any crafting recently?

Jenny xox

Have you entered my giveaway yet?

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, this is just a wee reminder that my Foundry giveaway ends tomorrow, Tuesday 27 March at 9pm (NZ time.)

The winner will receive the lovely 'the many and the few' print pictured above (unframed.)

Right, I’m getting back to my new overlocker!! (I was a little daunted by the thought of threading it, but turns out I needn’t have worried – thanks instructional DVD that came with it! Now I’m running round the house looking for things to overlock!)

Goodnight and Goodluck!

Jenny

Pretty Pastels

Pretty Pastels by jen232 featuring a button front skirt

Polka dot dress
$95 - modcloth.com

Wrap dress
$65 - modcloth.com

Short cocktail dress
$53 - modcloth.com

Tailored shirt
$25 - modcloth.com

Button front skirt
$58 - modcloth.com

High heels
$45 - shopruche.com

Friis Company snakeskin clutch
€43 - welikefashion.com

Blu Bijoux hoop earrings
$34 - maxandchloe.com

{Colour Love #3} Pretty Pastels

Before Pinterest I used to stick clippings of images I liked in a scrap book of sorts. (Post pinterest, I still intend to do this, but just haven’t in a while.)

The above images are the pages from my scrapbook that I compiled while pregnant with Isabelle. I was searching for colours I liked for her quilt.

I really love a dusky/ soft rose pink, pale green (I think ‘pistachio green’ as a great description),and cream/ white for a little girls room. As one of the magazine clippings above says, these colours can last a while… from a baby- pre-teen (and possibly beyond.)Whereas, in my opinion, brightly coloured lolly pink and Dora the explorer may not.

I also used a bit of duck egg blue in Isabelle’s room.

Here are a few images of Isabelle’s room and the things in it…

Here’s some more pretty pastels from Pinterest …

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Click on the images to go to the original link – or you can see them on my pinterest boards. (Feel free to follow me if ya like!)

I hope to pop back soon with a mini-post with a pastel collage I created on Polyvore. (Apparently it posts directly to your blog – but as it’s my first time using it, there may be some ‘technical difficulties.’)

Hope you all have had a fabulous weekend

Jen x

A new brother

Yesterday we welcomed a new member into our family!

No, Isabelle and Noah don’t have a new brother (or one on the way), instead I got my new ‘brother’ overlocker!

Did I fool you for a minute there?

I love it! - And I’m very lucky to have it. I’d wanted one for a long time, but didn’t think it was really in the budget. But I won a $100 Spotlight voucher in an OHbaby Christmas craft comp and then Spotlight let me put this one on layby when it was on sale with $100 off. My Mum contributed $150 as an early birthday present, leaving me with $150 to pay on what was a $499 product! (Who doesn’t love winning, bargains and generous Mums?)

Andrew picked it up for me yesterday, while I took the kids for a dental check up and he said to the lady at the counter: “I’ll be overlocking in no time!” (clearly a joke); to which she replied “hmpff I doubt it” – sounds like someone needs to get a sense of humour!

Speaking of dental appointments – I’m also loving the fact that the kids teeth passed with flying colours – yay, no cavities!!! (Phew!) and the fact that they still make those awesome critters out of cotton balls and pipe cleaners – who knew?

I’m also loving that these lovely bibs arrived in the mail from Mum2Mum yesterday.

You may have noticed from other blog posts of mine that I already own and love a few of these bibs. I won these recently from the Mum2Mum facebook page.

(It’s not even like I enter gazzilions of competitions – I’ve just had some pretty good luck recently!)

Finally, I’m loving this little guy – who helped me clean the car this morning. (It’s been a scorcher of a day!)

It’s kind of ironic because I won the bibs above by providing this ‘toddler tip’:

“Toddlers love to help, and be told they are helpful. My son helps tidy up and wants to help me clean. Especially if I say I have a special job for him and use the word 'teamwork.' Encouragement really helps too. He might not be super efficient at this stage, but it keeps him out of mischief while I'm doing it and I like to think I'm building a really helpful, considerate boy/ adult for the future.”

l guess this means I take my own advice?

This is encouraging, because I’ve had one of those weeks where you feel like you’ve got all the best parenting intentions, but that you’re doing heaps of stuff wrong – it can be hard work being a parent and I think sometimes we’ve got to take stock of the things we’re doing right and pat ourselves on the back.

Joining in with Paisley Jade's 'Thing's I'm Loving.'

Jen x

P.S. Have you entered my giveaway yet? If not why not? (Let some of my good luck rub off on you!)

Pixie

This post should really be entitled ‘ My Creative Space, a book review, girl style and miscellaneous ramblings’ – you know me, always trying to stuff heaps of random topics into one blog post!

When I was pregnant with Isabelle and found out I was having a girl, the first thing I bought was this book Vintage Knits for Modern Babies by Hadley Fierlinger. I’d had my eye on it for a while as the patterns are just gorgeous!

Having not knitted since childhood (a scarf that got wider and wider as I seemed to add stiches), I set about knitting this vintage pixie cap which is a beginner pattern. I was holidaying down in Christchurch with family at the time and my step mother helped me re-learn to knit. (It’s amazing how you never really lose these skills.)I remember resting the knitting on my pregnant belly.

I made it 3-6 month size and finished it quite quickly (well all but the chin strap.) Last winter I tried it on Isabelle but it didn’t look quite right (I think it was the lack of hair poking through. But I tried it on her now and it suits her a lot better, and still fits (just!)

My lovely Mum finished off the chin strap for me last night (thanks Mum!!)

I would totally recommend this book and pattern to everyone – it’s such an easy pattern to learn to knit on. It’s basically just a rectangle that you sew together up the back…

Annnd… as fate would have it when googling for a link to the book, I stumbled upon the author, Hadley Fierlinger’s blog which very generously has a free pdf pattern for this pixie cap (amongst other things) – so now you can make your own too!!!

Here are some other things I love about ‘Vintage Knits for Modern Babies’:

-It’s beautifully presented with lovely photos

- There’s a really helpful introduction, with information on choosing yarn, garment care, some really interesting history and more…

- A Kiwi connection. The author, Hadley Fierlinger, although originally from San Francisco, now lives in beautiful Wellington, NZ (my old home town!)

- And did I mention that the patterns are gorgeous!!!

---

I hope to get into knitting a bit more this Winter

Joining in with Our Creative Spaces (you should check it out.)

And, if you haven’t already make sure you enter my Foundry Print Giveaway, to be in the running to win this lovely 'the many and the few' print… As they say – you’ve gotta be in to win!

Jen xox

Giveaway : Win a Gorgeous Foundry Print

Recently I stumbled upon Foundry and instantly fell in love. They have gorgeous prints at really affordable prices and lovely tote bags too.

 

Wanting to brighten up my bedroom a bit I decided to purchase the 'Ever After' print in A4 size. That’s the one on the left in the pic below.

(It was really affordable too at NZD$20 plus postage.)

 

Wanting to share the love with you guys, I asked Alana from Foundry if she would consider hosting a giveaway here on my blog.

She was super generous and sent me, along with my purchase, the lovely 'the many and the few' print in A4 (see above right); to be used as a giveaway (OR to keep myself!!)

As much as I would LOVE to keep it myself, I have decided to give you all the chance to win it for yourself!

The details:

* This print is A4 on 250gsm Matt Stock and is unframed (it would look lovely in a white frame.)

(Remember this is for 'the many and the few' print.)

* I will open this giveaway to NZ and Australia

* This giveaway will close Next Tues 27 February 9pm (NZ time), I will then draw the lucky winner randomly.

How to enter:

* Visit Foundry's website and comment back here with your favourite product.

For extra entries you can:

1) Share this link on facebook;

2) Tweet about it;

3) Blog about it; and or

4) Follow my blog.

That’s a potential 5 entries!!! Please leave a separate comment for each entry.

Good Luck!

And make sure you check out Foundry for yourself, but be warned – if you do purchase from them, expect excellent and super friendly service! (Can you tell I’m a happy customer?)

Jenny x

[NB: Please include your email address in the comment too – if it’s not linked in your profile!]