Creativity

Last week I spent 4 wonderful days at a workshop on Children's Creativity, at the gorgeous Tauhara centre above the shores of Lake Taupo. The workshop was run by Pennie Brownlee, an amazing woman who's had years of involvement with Playcentre and has an absolute passion for understanding and encouraging children's development. She has a particular interest in children's creativity and is the author of a Playcentre published book entitled "Magic Places".

We were given a journal, pencils, pens, and lovely oil pastel crayons to work with and to keep, along with making finger paint, collages, and playing with clay. We sketched, we 'scribbled', we created, we learned so much, we laughed, we sang, we danced, we ate the most marvellous food. It was a much needed break from the noise and busy-ness of ordinary life, and I loved it. Mind you, I haven't put any new sketches into that journal yet. Sigh.


On the way home at sunset, we stopped on the Desert Road and took pictures of Ruapehu and Ngaruahoe. I don't think I've ever seen the snow so low on Ruapehu, and Ngaruahoe was wearing a cloud cap - so beautiful!

I am so, so lucky

Well, I can hardly begin to say how lucky I feel today. A parcel arrived from the US, from my "I ♥ Paisley" swap partner - thank you so very much Linda!
Inside were the most amazing things. A huge tote bag for me, made from bright, beautiful paisley fabric. It's so vibrant, you can't possibly feel anything but cheerful carrying it. Also in the parcel were two wee tote bags, one for each of my girls, with all sorts of other goodies tucked inside. And shrinky-dinks! which you can't get here! I feel really spoiled.

I'll try and post pictures of the beautiful things once the sun comes out again, which may not be for a few days. Ugh. Meanwhile, I'm posting a pic of my Paisley swap parcels, although not entirely everything was wrapped up, so it's a sneak peek at what I made.

So yesterday I posted that parcel off for the Paisley swap, and a postcard for the hand-made postcard swap went off to Portugal. Now I'm feeling "swap anxiety" about them. Nervously waiting for them to arrive ...

I ♥ Paisley swap day!

So, today I finished my crafting for the "I ♥ paisley" swap. Nothing like a rapidly approaching deadline to get me motivated! I'll post pics at some stage, maybe once the things have arrived at their destination. In the meantime, take a look at the lovely stuff other (better organised!) Paisley Swappers have made and exchanged.

And in other news, some friends and I did a little bit of thrifty shopping today at the Salvation Army store in town. Got a gorgeous pink gingham circle skirt for our dress-up box for 50c, which Helen promptly decided is hers and has worn for the rest of the day. Also found a pair of cute etched glass tumblers which the girls used for their dinner-time drinks while I had my customary Friday night glass of red anti-oxidant.

Tomorrow the re-branded Methodist thrift store "Wesley Vintage" opens at 10 o'clock. Through the window we spotted lots of strands of big faceted acrylic beads for just $2, so I'm setting my alarm clock tonight!

Mmmm, lemon cake

One of the good things about winter is that our lemon tree gives us plenty of fruit for making delicious lemon cake. I've discovered that the recipe works nicely in the microwave, so the whole process, from picking the lemons to eating the warm cake, takes only about 25 minutes.


Recipe
In the food processor, mix 1 ½ cups of sugar with 2 eggs, the grated zest of 2 lemons, and ½ cup of canola oil, until the mixture is thick and pale. Next, add 1 cup of yoghurt (I use 99.9% fat free vanilla flavoured yoghurt) and the juice of the 2 lemons. Mix again to combine. Then add 2 cups of self-raising flour and mix until the batter is smooth. Line a 20cm microwave ring pan with baking paper then pour in the batter. Elevate and cook for 10 minutes on medium high power. Let it cool in the pan for a few minutes then turn out and peel off the baking paper. Serve the cake warm or cold, with yoghurt spooned over the top. So good!!!

Fun with Du-kit

Packed Jen off to school (30 minutes late) this morning after 4 days off sick, only to have Helen come down with an ear infection. So my busy morning in town turned into a trip to the Dr with Helen and some unexpected quiet time while she sleeps on the couch.

I bought some Pearl Du-kit polymer clay about a month ago to try photocopy transfers. Rather than crashing around in the kitchen dealing with the aftermath of last night's dinner, I decided to try the transfers. It's really fun! But with both my attempts I managed to rub bits of the toner away with the paper. More practice needed...

I'm thinking this will be a fun activity for our After School Arts programme. The children can draw some little pictures to transfer and bake, then maybe make badges or bag-tags with them. Cool!

Birthday craftiness

So, I'm a little late with this. The most recent things I've made were for Jen's 6th birthday, back on June 10th. Some of them were inspired by my new blog-reads:


allsorts neat little pinspinners. I printed them onto double-sided scrapbook paper (One Heart One Mind) to save me the trouble and expense of adhering 2 papers together. The girls loved them.


Tissue and crepe paper bunting


Flower balloons, from instructions on Martha Stewart's kids website


Edible dough cookies, recipe from my Southern Living cookbook.

A fresh start

This new blog replaces my old one, which I've just deleted. Reading back through the old blog was a bit weird - the only crafting I was doing was knitting. And I was pregnant with Helen (now aged 3 1/2!).

So I've been inspired lately by so many lovely crafty bloggers. Soon I'll figure out how to list links to their blogs somewhere here :-)

I even have some photos to post of things I've made recently - just need to figure out Flickr and I'll be all set!