No more ball and chain

As of today the mortgage is gone..........woop, woop

Handmade Library bag

Kasey was getting some comments about her alphabet and pooh bear library bags being too babyish from peers at school.....grade 1 for goodness sake!! So, she asked me if I could make her a new one, so of course I obliged...so she is now the proud owner of a personalised, very girly girly library bag...

That should do the trick.  She loves it and is proudly hanging it on her desk, waiting for school to start on Monday..

Declutter challenge day 2

Well, I am still on track.  The 2nd load of clutter from the end of the garage was taken down to Lifeline yesterday afternoon, so now that is all gone.  I also managed to get my clutter plan done up and posted on my blog.  Rebekkah's boyfriend came by this afternoon and picked up the old fridge/freezer from the shed now that I have replaced it with the chest freezer, so that is gone as well.  I have a busy few days coming up, so I probably won't get to day 3 of my challenge until next week, which can only be in the early part of the week, so I will pick something small on my list to keep up the momentum. If I can find something on my declutter plan that will only take a 1/2 hour or so, then I will do it tomorrow or Friday, but I'll just wait and see how I feel.  I went to Kingaroy today with Toni and Kasey for Mum's birthday, and took her out to lunch at a chinese restaurant, which was nice. We also went out last night to Hog's breath for dinner, and then went and saw Despicable Me at the movies, so had a nice evening out, as I was feeling pretty down during the day and even when I got up this morning, but I am feeling much better tonight.

Declutter challenge day 1

I am setting myself a challenge to do some serious decluttering before the end of the year...today was day 1, and loaded up in the back of the car is 2 very large boxes of stuff from the garage that has been taking up room in there for the last 6 months, and prior to that, it was taking up room in the lockup area of the shed for about 2 years....waiting for me to have a garage sale....as well as some small trikes, 2 beanbags, a pram and a stroller and a few other bits and pieces....these WILL be dropped off at Lifeline in the morning on my way to coffee with Tammy.  When I get home I will be loading up the other half of the garage clutter, and that will go down on Wednesday morning on my way up to Mum's.  This will be 2 large 4WD loads of  clutter gone...I have kept a sand kingdom outside sand and water play table and will give this to Tammy in the morning for her little boy, and the rest of the stuff is really good quality baby and toddler toys, so hopefully someone who really needs it will get more use out of it than we are by it sitting in our garage.  I have also loaded up the Little Tikes playgym that is toddler sized, as well as the large rocker/seesaw thing for Tammy's little boy as well.

Day 2's challenge - get the 2nd load of clutter in to car ready to drop off Wed morning
                                 - Work out what will be on day 3 of this challenge's agenda


I have decided that the day's may not necessarily follow each other each day, but it may end up being 1 or 2 day's each week, followed by more or less the following week, depending on my schedule for that week and how I am feeling.  As October is quite busy for me work wise, I don't want to take on too much, but I don't want to lose the momentum of decluttering either, I have also come up with a decluttering plan that I can follow and mark off, with the idea being to have it done by the end of the year, I have this as a separate page here on the blog, so it is now written down, and I will mark each one off as I do it....here goes....

Mobile Ironing board and craft mat case

I have been looking at buying one of these for a few months now to take to sewing class, as they come in handy when sewing a project that requires a lot of getting up and down using the iron, and I can also use it next to my sewing maching at home.

 These are also great for taking to sewing retreats. One this size is $60 or so at the sewing shop, so I thought I would use up some materials that I already had here, and make my own.  The only things I purchased were the craft mat for $20, and the ultrabright heat resistant wadding, approx $3.  It would have been a lot cheaper if I had been able to find the craft mat at one of the discount stores, but nobody seemed to have them. If I had been able to find one, then I probably would have only spent about $10 all up....  here is how it was made:

The materials I needed were:
craft mat, heat proof wadding, fabric, fastener and a sheet of foam board from Office works and some wadding.

I cut 2 pieces of foam board the same size as my craft mat, the one I am using is 18" x 24"

I then laid my 2 foam pieces on the wrong side of my fabric.  I cut my fabric to allow about 4 - 6 inches extra all the way around, with an inch gap in between the 2 sheets of foam board.

I then drew a line marking the gap in the middle of the 2 sheets of foam.

At this point I cut from the top of the fabric a slot to meet the top of the gap, to make it easier to fold, but worked out later that I didn't need to do that, I could have just folded the whole top and botton section over.

I then cut a piece of fabric to cover the inch gap between the 2 pieces of foam.  I folded the top and bottom raw edges over, and then pressed a hem at the top and bottom so that the top and bottom of this piece sat in line with the top of the foam board on either side. I then sewed this strip in place top and bottom and along each side where the foam board meets, wrong side together.  This piece covers the edges on show after the craft mat and ironing mat are glued in to place.

 I also cut a piece of fabric 2 1/2 " x 7", and folded this in half, right sides together, and sewed along the long edge and 1 of the ends.  I attached 1 side of my metal fastener, and turned this piece right side out, and put it aside.

I then folded over the top and bottom edges of my large piece of fabric, so that they were even with the piece that I sewed in, which is level with the top and bottom of the foam sheets. 

I then placed the foam board in 1 side of my case, so that it butts up against my sewn edge, underneath this piece of fabric,  and placed the other 3 sides of fabric over this, and stapled in to place firmly and neatly with my staple gun.

All sides of 1 side of my case are now stapled to my foam board.

 I then took the piece that I have attached my fastener to, and secured the raw edge to the foam board, 1/2 way up my case on the right hand side, with the fastener facing up , with my staple gun.

 I then took my other piece of foam, and cut my heatproof mat, approx 2 inches larger around all sides, and I also cut a piece of contrasting fabric the same size as my heatproof fabric.  I then layered them, first the fabric, wrong side up, then the heatproof fabric, then my foam board.  I then pulled the fabric and heatproof fabric tightly over the foam board, and stapled with my staple gun.

I then cut a piece of wadding to the same size as the foam board, and attached it to the back of this piece, covering all of the fabric and heatproof mat, to create an even surface, as this will be against the front of the outside of the case, so I wanted it to feel smooth and even, and not have any bumps from where I folded the heatproof mat and fabric over my foam board.

I then temporarily placed my craft mat and my ironing pad inside my case to estimate the thickness, to work out where the 2nd side of my fastener was to be placed, and then attached it in place to the front of the case.

 I then used hot glue, and glued the back side of my green craft mat, and glued it to the inside  right side of my case. I could also have used construction adhesive of craft glue for this. I then glued my ironing pad to the inside left side of my case.

That's it....all done.  I now have a great portable ironing board and craft/cutting mat to take to my sewing classes...I'm very happy with how it has come up.

Block 1 of my Swirling Roses quilt....a new block of the month project

I have started working on a couple of quilts, they are called "Swirling Roses" I am doing one in purple for myself, and a cream one in Dupion silk as a gift.  I have so far completed block 1, and I am probably a little over halfway with finishing blocks 2 and 3.  The blocks are all embroidered, and is teaching lots of embroidery techniques along the way.  I have already learnt so much about stabilisers and positioning, so by the time they are all finished, I should be pretty advanced with my embroidery skills on my machine.  Here is block 1:

I am doing the purple one in greens, purples and pinks, and the cream one in lilac, purple, pink, burgundy and olive greens.  It is amazing how different 2 identical blocks can look in different colours.

21 Years today

Damian and I have been married for 21 years today...Happy Anniversary Damian....love you lots :)

PS: You had better call the florist, they haven't arrived with my delivery yet!!!