A few recent artworks...

Okay, so because I haven't posted in a while I have a lot to catch up on.... here are a couple of my recent canvas artworks that have been keeping me busy!

Friendship.

Owl Canvas, in progress and completed.

A whimsical Umbrella canvas.

Babushka Canvas.

A canvas for my girls, a horse for Q and a rainbow for K!

A Rainbow Party

Miss K turned 5 last Sunday and we had a Rainbow themed party to celebrate! We tried to have as much healthy food as possible, whilst still making it a fun party for kids! We had 21 children and 21 adults attend so it was quite a busy day!

On the menu were sandwich platters, home made sausage rolls, home made chicken nuggets, party pies, a rainbow fruit and veg platter with dip, rainbow jellies, fairy bread, cupcakes, a few chocolate treats of freddo frogs and some choc gold coins to go with the rainbow theme! Oh and of course the birthday cake!

We had organised some games, but as the kids were having so much fun playing outside in the sunshine, we gave the games a miss! We had a bubble blowing machine going to create a lovely sea of bubbles and some kids music playing for the kids to dance and party to.

All the kids were asked to dress as their favourite colour of the rainbow, or as all the colours if they preferred! We had a surprise visit from a clown and also some face painting which my lovely aunties organised as a surprise that even I didn't know about. All in all it was a great day, my younger daughter who will be 4 next year is now starting to ask about what we will do for her party. I'm glad that's still a while away as I am all partied out for now!

Here are a few photos:

The Cake, it was four seperate layeside, pink, yellow green and blue. it was layered together with butter cream icing, the same as the outside and it was delicious!

These are the lovely party bags we made up for the kids to take home with them!

This is the Rainbow themed fruit platter we made up, it went very quickly!

Here is my party girl and her friend enjoying the rainbow jellies, we made them in small clear shot glasses which meant the kids could have a couple of flavours each if they liked.

Here are the Rainbow Jellies.

And last but not least, the Fairy bread stars!

Thanks for stopping by :)

A little garden in a spot that was getting too hard to mow!

This little garden bed took us a day to create! First we had to rip out a lot of pesky weeds, because this little spot was too hard to get the mower or whipper snipper into!

It is now filled with Red Cordalines, Mondo Grass, and a couple of succulents from my

Mum and Aunty's gardens.

The Native hibiscus with the purple flowers got a great trim, as it was getting too

big and growing crooked so we staked it also.

The border is made from some bricks left over from the bushfire which ravaged our

parents in law's home almost two years ago.

Looks a lot better now, and K had to get her camera out for a photo of her handy work,

she was such a great helper.

My little fairy

Here is K dressed up as a fairy at daycare a few weeks ago, so sweet. This lovely fairy dress cost a whole $2 at the op-shop!

I'd love to have some of these toadstools in our fairy garden out the back. I have a few little toadstools but big seats would be fantastic! I also like the idea of stepping stones made from tree stumps such as these I saw on Better Homes and Gardens a while ago:

http://au.lifestyle.yahoo.com/better-homes-gardens/lifestyle/galleries/g/-/6974523/4/create-a-fairy-garden/

Spring is the perfect time to get out and work on it, now just need the time and motivation to get going! I have made a start but it's nothing special just yet!

Here is a link to a very cute blog I found, it has a tutorial on how to make a toadstool seat, I think I may have to give it a try! It has some wonderful things, worth a look.....

http://www.soyouthinkyourecrafty.com/1999/07/toad-stool-tutorial/

Fresh lavender from my garden

Let me get one thing straight here. I am not a Gardener! I try, but I fail miserably mostly, except for one hardy plant.... Lavender!

I have had a bit of luck with lavender so far. The lavender plants here were well established when we moved in, so all I've had to do is keep them watered and pick the flowers off from time to time. I really love the sense of calm I get from picking lavender, it really does relax me.

I am thinking of making up some scented lavender bags for some of the girls in my family for christmas presents this year. As part of my plan to keep the costs down and give some hand-made presents. I'm thinking it sounds tragically daggy but who doesn't like their cupboards and drawers to smell devine!? What do you all think, too daggy?

Oh and the little cupcakes along-side it, are just to show off my op-shop find today! They are fake little cupcakes, which will go great with the girls tea-set! I couldn't have made them for what they cost, a grand total of $2. Oh and the lady at the op-shop was so gorgeous, she was telling me about what materials I could use if I wanted to make some up! Thinking I may just give them a try some time.

Oh Deer...cards and more

Whilst my very good friend A was visiting, I started on a new range of cards. To be honest, with all the laughing and fun we had that night, I'm surprised we got any craft done! I've called it the Oh Deer collection, for obvious reasons! I think Deers will be the next big thing, they are just so cute! I would like to do more cards, gift tags and even some bookmarks in this range. K really likes them too and went and found an old card I had made and told me I needed to put a deer on it!

Here are a few photos :)

Getting the guest room ready, yay!

K and I have been busy moving furniture and setting up the room for our guests who will be here next week. You can see from the look on K's face in the photos, just how excited she is! These are the (cheats) dresden plate cushions I made last year. I would like to make some more in different colours soon. We have moved K's bed into Q's room and

set up the spare mattress in K's room.

Just as well J is always collecting little soaps and toiletries when he stays

away from home on his work trips! They come in handy!