Beautiful Blogger Award

The rules state a recipient of the Beautiful Blogger award must:

*Add a link and a note of thanks to the person giving the award.

*Pass the award on to the most Beautiful Blogs you love.

*Share 7 things about yourself.

Thankyou Alecat of Serenades and Solace for awarding me with this award today. The last 24 hours have been rather tough ones with my Ess having an allergic reaction while we were out at the markets, little Eee performing her usual tantrums and my Generous Gentleman sharing some work news. It's not all new. However, yesterday it got to me and I spent hours awake last night worrying about things which I usually try not to let worry me as I know they are in good hands.

So worn and weary this morning, I found this award which has very much touched my heart today - thankyou.

I'd like to pass it on to some friends old and new:

Jeanne of A Peaceful Day, whose blog I recently found. She shares a wealth of information about her experiences homeschooling her daughter. She has wonderful taste for art and literature also. Her days are somewhat sad at the moment so I hope this award will cheer you a little, Jeanne. 'Your blog has been a blessing to me. I'm sure Alecat will join me with a little bit of envy that you live in the country with a lovely garden.'

Nina of Nö's Familie, who is a faithful friend, always able to offer a kind and helpful word. It is a delight to watch how she raises her two cherubs in southern Germany.

Mel of One Crafty Mumma whose creativity never fails to inspire me to start yet another project. Thanks Mel.

Millie of Needles and Haystacks, a lovely lady in Ireland who always has a lovely comment to make, a friendly smile to share and lovely sewing as well.

Sarah of The Best Days of My Life whose inspirational writing always speaks to my heart.

And 7 things about me?

:: I'm 28 weeks pregnant with my third little one.

:: I'm really enjoying the learning curve of homeschooling my girls.

:: I tend to store up my worries for a rainy day and then they all come out. Everything - large or small. I'm sure my husband thinks the rain won't stop falling from my eyes.

:: I seek beauty in the smallest and simplest of things.

:: I'm quite small, barely 5 foot tall.

:: I'd love to take my family to explore the Great Barrier Reef.

:: I love chocolate!

Wool Embroidery

Needlepoint: the delicious art of filling in holes with wool.

~Carole Berman and Jennifer Lazarus

The winds of motivation were sent to me recently from the warm summer days of southern Germany. The winds took a little while to arrive, yet today I have noticed that motivation has come. The day has been a little warmer, warm enough to sit in our front room, usually chilled by cold winds blowing down the hill. As I sat with my children, watching them play, and joining in on occasion, I noticed those warm woollen hats sitting partly made ready to be embellished with a little more wool embroidery.

At the same time I went through my stash of fabric to find some pieces for other projects I have been inspired to commence for little Eee's birthday at the end of next month. I have completed a number of things which have been waiting for me since my lack of creativity during my first trimester and also our first term of homeschooling. Such a sense of satisfaction I feel. I just hope that my surge of motivation doesn't leave me with too many more unfinished projects.

It has been nice however, to sit in the sun this morning looking out over to the hills with my hand to stitching while my girls play together. Sometimes I like to join them, however I notice how much the games change when I do. On occasion it is nice just to sit quietly and let their own creativity emerge, just between the two of them. Little Eee's playing is certainly moving from imitative play to imaginative play these days which leaves lots of room for fun and games with her big sister as they imagine scenes, reenact stories, become fairies and princesses and babes and mothers and all the games that little girls adore.

For me...just a couple of forget-me-nots to go methinks.

Thankyou Nina for your inspiration on the warm breeze.

Pere al Vino Rosso

It is, in my view, the duty of an apple to be crisp and crunchable, but a pear should have such a texture as leads to silent consumption. ~Edward Bunyard

This recipe has to be the most simple dessert I have made in a very long time.

Baked pears with a red wine sauce served with vanilla yoghurt.

My little pear of dessert lovers were keen to help make this last night so I had them washing the pears, and apples as well, and arranging them in a baking dish.

We then baked them dry for about 30 minutes before adding about ½-¾ cup red wine, some peeled lemon rind and honey. We love drizzling the warm fruit with honey and watching the lines meld together to form a glaze for the fruit. We baked them again for 30 mins or so before consuming them with a dollop of vanilla yoghurt. We use the new Jalna a2 yoghurt as we have been advised by our health practitioner that it is a healthy practice for everyone to consume some a2 protein each day as it assists in digestive wellbeing.

All credit must go to Antonio Carluccio as seen on Poh's Kitchen recently. We have adapted the recipe he offered as we prefer to consume honey rather than sugar in this household.

Colouring our Days with Playdough

May you always have work for your hands to do.

May your pockets hold always a coin or two.
May the sun shine bright on your windowpane.
May the rainbow be certain to follow each rain.
May the hand of a friend always be near you.
And may God fill your heart with gladness to cheer you.
~Irish Blessing

Our days have been filled with rainbows here lately, with our artwork, marbling and rainbow colouring. We have also seen the occasional rainbow in the sky towards the hills. Ess has longed to follow them until we find the pot of gold at the end of it. Secretly, I think we all wish we could find it. However often the rainbow's end is apparently atop another family's house (sigh).

Ess is very passionate about colour at the moment and particularly all the colours of the rainbow. I recently asked her to choose her seven favourite colours over here so I could begin to plan my next blanket as I have finished the one I have been knitting for little Eee. Yes, I have finally finished it. She's still 2, that is still classed as a baby isn't it?? :) Ess chose seven pinky/purply tones and then finally wrote down "all of them" on her list. The selection is a lovely array of colour isn't it!

Here Ess is creating her own rainbow using the new playdough we made today along with our older colours which have become a lot less vibrant over the years. We think it looks fabulous.

Little Eee was adamant that I photograph the little balls we made together which she rolled and collected often requesting new ones from me to add to her growing collection.

I love to watch the way the children play and how it changes over the years. Little Eee's chubby hands are keen to explore the texture of the dough seeing how it moves, crumbles, cuts, rolls, squishes etc. She's also very keen to observe others making sausages and balls and rainbows and plaits.

Ess is keen to use colour to create patterns. She began with her own rainbow and followed this with a pattern made of shapes - all in red, the brightest of our new colours. Seen in the background of the above photograph.

These are the three new colours of the day, somewhat distorted in this image. They are actually red, orange and purple. I wonder how they look on your screen!

Learning to plait with playdough was very intriguing for Ess.

She was delighted with her result, as was I.

I guess it was the three new colours which drew me to plait the dough together. As a teenager I often plaited others hair and was in high demand in boarding school. I have never tried plaiting dough however. It seems like too much effort to me to plait together pieces of dough before placing them into the oven to make a loaf of bread.

So despite the sunny days of winter we are currently enjoying, it is still lovely to be cosy inside with my girls enjoying creating together with bright colours that delight our hearts and inspire our minds.

The Marble Effect

is so much fun!!

Simply take an idea from this book, the only idea Ess was really taken by,

two eager and budding artists keen to try something new,

some oil paints and some mineral turpentine, (still amazed I attempted this with my two year old, but clad with lovely plastic gloves she fared quite well)

a tray of water, a bit of swilling and swirling and...

ta da!!

:: most definitely a fairy ::

:: a river ::

:: would make a beautiful fabric ::

:: an angelfish ::

:: yellow balls being tossed ::

Lots of fun was had in finding images in the prints

reminiscent of the way we discover animals in the clouds in the sky.

The effect of marbling is achieved as a result of the fact that oil and water don't mix. As the paper is placed in the tray of water onto swirling blobs of diluted oil paint it effectively picks up a print of the paints swirling round.

The repeated exclamation was an enormous "Wow!" on behalf of both girls as the paper was pulled out to reveal yet another marvellous effect of colour marbling.

It was so wonderful that even I was keen for all the repetition the girls love by inserting paper after paper into each new swirling bath of oil paint and water.

Preparations for a Warm Woollen Hat or two

I'm making preparations for some sewing to adorn and warm my two lassies.

Here's some completed cutting out and browsing books to plan some embroidery before too much stitching together is complete and the hat become awkward to hold and embroider.

The book lying there on the right is:

The holidays we are enjoying now should afford me time to finish them...now just searching for the motivation.

Kangaroos on Millbrook

The human spirit needs places where nature has not been rearranged by the hand of man. ~Author Unknown

Across the creek, resting amidst the trees in the long shadows cast in the late afternoon we spotted that which we were on the hunt for.

They stopped to take a peek at us as well before bounding further up the hill and away from our curious eyes.

Travelling on our favourite road in the Adelaide Hills after being out and about enjoying the sunshine on a very cool winter's day we felt certain we would be rewarded.

There is nothing more fun than spotting wildlife in the bush for our dear little girls...all right, and their parents as well.

As Ess says, "it is so much more fun to play "Spot the ...." in real life rather than just in a book Mummy".