New Cuties in the shop :)

Finally I have gotten around to listing some new products in our ETSY shop. I have had these in the pipeline for a while but finally found some time last week to do some button covering and then also the time to start listing a few on ETSY. It was so nice to go through my fabric stash and start putting some to good use ;)

Take a look and tell me what you think, the set of 2 pony tail holders are $5.50 USD and the Hairbands are $4 USD.

I also have some fabric button covered bookmarks on the go as well, just need to find time to package and photograph them. A 3pk will be selling for $5.50USD.

Hopefully these are all going to make great stocking fillers and little gifts for those who have it all. Keep an eye out on our shop as more will be listed each day (hopefully)

Bel x

Wednesday Fave Four ETSY Finds

Well for some reason I have a bit of a thing with ants this week (wait for sunday's shadow shot)
so I thought I would share some of my favourite "ant" finds on Etsy

petite juicy watermelon slice barrette....with ants by goldilocksbarrettes,

Invasive Fire Ant Plate by nonfictiondesign ,

Lemon Frosted Cupcake Zip Pouch by GulfCoastCottage,

big Leather Ant by sacaclaques

Have a great day everyone

xxEm

Shadow Shot Sunday # 13

Well at the moment I am away on a family holiday on Gorgeous Fraser Island (yay) so I actually got my shadow shot ready in advance :-) and have posted it just before jumping in the car..

I have been thinking for a while how cool it would be to get a shadow of some ants climbing along a stick or something like that, well low and behold this morning after Lucas & I fed the dog and were coming back inside, there were 2 ants crawling along the front deck and so i ran inside to get the camera just in time to snap this shadow... I love it.

Busy little ants

Hope you are all having a great weekend, I will post some pics of my holiday on my return
xxx Em


to see more shadow shots or join in the fun visit HeyHarriets blog here

Kreativ Blogger Award - Thank you :-)

Thanks so much to my new friend Lee from Just like Martha for nominating our Blog for this award.

Lee and I met through the Handmade Christmas Ornament Swap that I have organised, and actually realised that we have A LOT in common (OCD lol!)

So thanks so much Lee and I am proud to be on your list of favourites!!

Ok now what I have to do:

Mention the blog that gave it to you and comment on their blog to let them know you have posted your award.
Publish these rules:
Share 6 values that are important to you and 6 things you do not support. Grant the prize to 6 people.
6 VALUES IMPORTANT TO ME
1. Mine and My familys health

2. My son Lucas
3. My ability to stand up for what is right and what is wrong

4. Our good friends and extended famiy
5. Honesty and Integrity
6. Love

6 THINGS I DON'T SUPPORT
1. Drugs

2. People that steal from others

3. Sleepless nights

4. Bad media about people with Mental Ilness

5. Office Work (LOL)

6. Spam

Now pass it on to these people:
http://heyharriet.blogspot.com/

http://13mimosa.blogspot.com/

http://vintagericrac.blogspot.com/

http://farmyardcrafts.blogspot.com/

http://sewmamasew.com/blog2/

http://mejika.typepad.com/mejika/

Have a great night and a great day tomorrow all
xEm

Baking for the soul

On my way out to put the rubbish in the bin this morning I noticed a recipe for Rocky Crunch Cakes on the side of the packet, so after a particular rough couple of weeks I have decided to dedicate this week to sunshine and happiness and what better way to kick it off that doing a little baking :)

Here is the recipe, they were really really easy

ROCKY CRUNCH CAKES

110g Butter

1/2 Cup Sugar

1 3/4 cup Plain Flour

1/2 Sultanas (I used a mixture of sultanas and raisins)

1 1/2 cups Kellogg's Crunchy Nut Cornflakes (I am sure normal cornflakes are fine too)

2 tsp Baking Powder

1 tsp Vanilla Essence

1/4 cup Milk

Preheat oven to 180oC. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy and add remaining ingredients. Mix until mixture resembles a stiff dough. Place heaped tablespoons on a greased baking tray (I did teaspoon size, better for little fingers). Bake at 180oC for approx 15mins until golden. Allow to cool and store in an airtight container. I made 26 of the smaller size ones. Enjoy

And can I say sitting here eating my 3rd one, they certainly have brought some happiness into my day and made me remember all those yummy treats from my childhood.

I also thought I would share these few pics with you to hopefully put a smile on your face today. Whilst trying my hardest to get some crafting done one day last week, I am not sure if my little helper was a help or a hindrance. Either way we had lots of fun sorting through the fabrics

Hope your having a happy day too, Bel xx

Sunday Shadow Shot #12

Here's my shadow shot for the week. Its of my hubby trying to get our lawns mowed with a bit of help from his little follower ;)

Enjoy, Bel x

Don't forget to check out the rest if the great shadow shots on Hey Harriets Blog, see our side bar for more details...

New Pegboard Button Brooches Ready for the Shop

Here are some new cuties made from 'peg board' buttons with little stitched flowers

The Brooches are in store now

xx Em

Fun & Fabrics

Hi All,

Lucas and I headed up to Brisbane's State Library today for Music & Toddler Play time, wow did he have a great time, I wish that the libraries on the Gold Coast were set up like this.

This is Lucas inside the giant Monster puppet (playing peekaboo of course)

and this is him 'Painting the town Red'

and... here are the lovely fabrics just waiting to be created into something special for my back-tack and handmade ornament swap partners.

(oh and that little reindeer just thought he would pop into the pic, I am making them for our next craft stall - excuse his runny nose ;-) )

xx Em

Four Favorite ETSY Finds #6

OK, well its my turn again and this time I thought I would share some of my favortie Monkeys on ETSY. My little boy has a very large collection of Monkeys that was started before he was even born bu my older brother. We are a family of collectors, I think it is something that we all share :)

1. Amigurumi Monkey Patternfrom AmyGaines Shop

2. Marky Monkey Pattern from forevertandm

3. Baby Orangutan Necklace from motleymutton’s Shop

4. Plush Monkey from Area Thrifty One’s Shop

Enjoy, Bel x

Christmas Comes Early - Meet The Etsy BrisStyle Team

The BrisStyle Christmas Markets

some eye candy to tempt you

Location: Hamilton Town Hall, Cnr Rossiter and Racecourse Rd, Hamilton, Brisbane

Date: Saturday 13th December 2008

Time: 9am – 4pm

visit the BrisStyle Blog for more info here

xx Em

Handmade Christmas Ornament Swap RESULTS

Hi Ladies,
Here is the official list, I will send you more details via email of your swappee

The way this works is it is a down the line swap, so number one makes for number two and number two for number three and so on, until the end of the list where number twenty-four makes for number one (i will detail further in your email)
I have run the list through the random generator, so I havent "fluked" any matchings.

1. Selina
2. Joanne
3. Lisa
4. Ali
5. Marcia
6. Ann-Maree
7. Maree
8. Ruth
9. Katy
10. Katie
11. Vivi
12. Ngaire
13. Melissa
14. Rachel
15. Em
16. Jacqui
17. Belinda
18. Bobbi
19. Diana
20. Trish
21. Lee
22. Sandi
23. Rosemary
24. Leah
25. Ali T.

please let me know if you have a blog that I havent listed or your link isnt working. Ok emails should reach you some time in the next couple of days

xxEm

Shadow Shot Sunday # 11

Morning Everyone,

well it is wet and rainy and even a bit chilly today here, so I have had to pull a photo out of the archives ;-)

This is our dog Fergus (he is actually a long haired border collie with a haircut) lying in the shade of the trees at my inlaws farm. To see more shadow shots go here

Also, what a week for cockatoos, this is what came to say hi on our deck yesterday morning!! Lucas thinks he lives at a bird park with black cockies on Friday and then this gorgeous sulfur crested one yesterday!!

(I had to borrow this photo as the one I took has disappeared, so no credit to me for this shot altho this is about how close he was!! photo by Louise Docker from sydney, Australia)

The Handmade Christmas Ornament Swap is closed now and I will be posting the list a bit later today for everyone so they can get to know their swap partners.

Have a great weekend everyone.

Today for us will be filled with Bathurst V8s (this is a big car race in Australia), my husband has already set up the TV in the driveway so he can watch it while working on his car... what a dag!

xxEm

Handmade Christmas Ornament Swap 2008 & black cockatoos

Morning Everyone !!

Today is the last day to join in (10/10/08) depending on your time zone !!

So if you would like to participate in the Handmade Christmas Ornament Swap, and we would love you to!! then please go to the original link and check out the rules.. here

It is open to anyone around the world.

It has been quite rainy where I live, last night we had around 60mm of rain, oh it was beautiful to hear the loud sound of the pitter patter on our tin roof and the sound of the water wooshing through the gutters and into the water tanks.. Yay for rain!!

The black cockatoos are certainly happy this morning too as they came in a huge group (around 30 of them) and started picking at all the bark in the trees. If you have ever heard black cockies they have a really earie cry type call and they are actually quite distructive, but these ones were a welcome sight this morning as Lucas and I watched them soar in and out of the trees. Wow is all he could say ;-)

xx Em

Four Favourite ETSY Finds

My inspiration for todays Four Fave ETSY Finds is this day in history...
1871: A cow overturns a lantern in a barn, causing the 'Great Fire of Chicago'

Today is the 282nd day of 2008. There are 84 days left in the year.

Have a look at the new widget in the sidebar for Christmas countdown (scary I know!!)
take care, xxEm

1.Barn Print by Oranje
2. Coolest Herd Signed Print by PURRSANDBARKSART
3. Ceramic Owl Lantern Vintage Design White by fruitflypie
4. Fireside Print by foundwandering

Wordle Shmerdle

Hi,
I read on Ali's Blog a while ago about "Wordles" and have been wanting to do one for ages about our blog, here it is.....

I also did one that contains special wedding words and names and things to do with my friends that are getting married on the weekend and I am going to make it into their card. Go to http://wordle.net/ to make one yourself

Don't forget that you only have 3 days left to sign up for the Handmade Christmas Ornament Swap !! click on the icon in the side bar to go to the original post and comment.

xxEm

Growing Up!

We celebrated our niece Tanisha's 11th Birthday on Sunday. It feels like just yesterday she was this cute tiny little girl that adored and always agreed with us ;) ok she's still cute and she still reckons I am her favorite aunty so I guess I can't complain about that.

I have great pleasure every year in making the kids cakes, its so exciting pouring over the cake cookbooks deciding what they want. This year Miss 11 decided on a pink cupcake tower, which a) made me very happy cause it is a) really easy cake to do, b) I finally got to use my cupcake stand that I have had since last Christmas, and c) I also got to try out my brand new 'cupcake courier'.

As Em and I are both Kitchen fanatics, this has got to be the coolest thing in my kitchen at the moment. It was a bit of an expensive outlay, but I am sure with my little one as well as the niece's and nephew's it is going to earn its use over the years. Anyway, if your a kitchen gadget fan too check it out here

O'h and while I was loading up the pictures of the camera today, I also found some pics of the kids capes that I made last week. So far they have gone gone down a treat, I just need to think of a few more things that I can add to Sax's dress up box now...

Have a great day!

Bel xx

Beep Beep Giveaway!!!

Make sure you go and checkout Twinkle Star Art's Blog this week to go into the draw to win this fantastic print.

Sax and I were lucky enough to win Amanda's last giveaway and cant; wait to do a room re-decoration after Christmas :)

ENTRIES CLOSE - you have until October 10th to leave your comment on Amanda's Blog. The day following closing date, she will randomly select a name from the list of comments using a online random number generator. Best of Luck! :)

Sunday Shadow Shot #10

This weeks Shadow shot is of a poor unsuspecting stick insect that Sax found near our front door and terrorised over a couple of days (You'd think the poor thing would have moved on)

I had to include a couple if extra pics this week too, so you really get the idea :) and the little thing also made some great shadows as well

He tired to get away and then I had to contend with the tears and try my hardest to explain why this wasn't really the best pet to try and play with ;)

Have a great day everyone, I am off to bake a cake for my niece's 11th birthday (will post some pics when done)

Don't forget to join in the shadow fun at Hey Harriets (click on the picture in the sidebar for more info)

Bel x

More Ear Problems

My Little Helper wearing his special apron from Robyn at Hot Fudge

Hi All,

Well there is yet again no sleep happening in our home, poor Lucas has developed another infection in the ear that still has the grommet and glue ear in the one that lost its grommet!! so more antibiotics. It is making for a very tired, grumpy family at the moment.

So after reading Maree's post yesterday about having whingy kids and baking cookies, we did the same at 7.15 this morning!! LOL

Here are the finished product.

Yummmoo

xxEm

Chocolate Chip Cookies


125g Butter
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar, lightly packed
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 egg
1 3/4 cups SR flour
1/2 tsp salt
125g choccie chips
60g chopped apricots


Cream together butter, sugars and vanilla. Add lightly beaten egg gradually, beating well after each addition. Mix in sifted flour and salt. Add chocolate chips and apricots and mix well Shape teaspoonfuls of mix into small balls, place on lightly greased oven trays, allow room for spreading. Bake in moderate oven for 10-12mins.


from The Australian Women's Weekly 'The Big Book of Beautiful Biscuits'

Don't Forget about the Christmas Ornament Swap, signup until 10th of October,
click the star in the sidebar to read about it !!