Some of my favourite things

Some of the things I like around my home, I change the dispays regularly to suit my mood

PICNIC

Decided to brave the cool weather and drive to the Barossa Valley for a picnic today. It was so lovely and green and fresh. We bought lovely locally made cheese from the Barossa Cheese Company in Angaston and homemade tomato chutney and sat in the park between showers and sunshine and indulged ourselves with tasty food and local wine from Jacobs Creek.

Some of my favourite things

I just love pretty,vintage cutlery like these. I bought the sugar sifter spoon the other day at a market for $5 It is so pretty.

MY FIRST CAULIFLOWER

This is my first cauliflower from my vege garden I started at the beginning of the year. It will be dinner tonight, cauliflower cheese

HANDKNITS

I just love handknits I find they are so warm and I think babies are so lovely in them instead of toweling grow suits. The one above is white with handembroidered roses in a size 1 please email me if you are interested. It is for sale on my website www.jeanetteannchristeningwear.com

Australian Made?

I dont't know about you but I get quite frustrated about more and more products we need are made overseas when we are quite capable of making or growing them here or even in most cases do.
I find it has been quite difficult to buy fruit juice without imported fruit concentrate,I have only just found one out of a supermarket full.
The riverland in SA are digging there fruit into the ground because they can't sell it It is a crime I think. I cannot buy a tin of Tuna that isn't a product of Tailand. The final straw came yesterday when we were travelling on the new trams in Adelaide. We wanted to get off at a certain stop and the voice over the intercom said we had to ring the bell to notify the driver that we wanted to get off, fine but where was the bell? 4 of us could not find it. As the tram sailed past our stop the conductor said" did we want to get off there, if so why didn't we ring the bell". I said "where is the bell", he pointed to a button on the door that said above it PRESS TO OPEN DOOR. How on earth does that translate to RING TO STOP. I then told this to the conductor who just shrugged, I told him that had the trams been made in Australia this probably wouldn't be a problem. Why? when Australia is quite capable of coach building, it wasn't given the contract WELL NOW I HAVE GOT THAT OFF MY CHEST I can get on with my next batch of orange marmalade which has RIVERLAND ORANGES bought on the side of the road and LEMONS FROM MY DAUGHTERs TREE,

WALKING IN THE RAIN

Had a really nice day today, decided to go for our daily walk even though it was rainy and cold so armed with a very large umberella and rugged up with scarves,hats,gloves and padded coat, walked to the beach and came back warm and feeling very fresh... must do that more often.

vintage tins

I have been collecting vintage tins for years. Every time I look at them individually I recall memories from the past. Does anyone remember icecream that came in tins, well I have an original Dairy Bell tin that I actually bought in the early seventies with icecream in it.

BAKING DAY AGAIN

Have to go to and eightieth birthday tomorrow. What do you get an eighty year old man? So thinking cap on decided a box of homemade Scottish shortbread. After lunch ingrediants out got stuck in but knowing me, when I start baking I think I am making such a mess of the kitchen, why not do a whole lot and freeze it.
Five hours later sitting down for dinner totally exausted (I can't think why) until I look at the pile of goodies, plus the dinner and desert, I think yes it is well worth the effort. I can end the day quite pleased with myself

EASY SCRAP QUILT

I am in the process of using up as much of my scrap fabrics a possible, and what better way than in a scrap quilt. It has to be a scrap one because I can't quite commit to all that cutting and measuring in the lovely quilts most quilters make. My grandma used to make quilts as a way of saving money. She used to get scraps of fabric from the cotton mills in Lancashire England where she lived. The fabric was that striped stuff that old fashioned pj's were made of. I had one of hers for many years until it dissintegrated. The lining was a worn white counterpane.

I have pictured the one I am making and included instructions, hope you have a go it's quite simple.

Choose the colours you would like in your quilt, I always seperate all my scraps into colours that go together in seperate bags, so that when needed they are already sorted. Press all your pieces. Take a piece of fabric for the back of your scrap squares, I used calico 22cm square. Chop off a piece of fabric from your stash for the centre of your scrap square. Cut 5 sides to the piece then pin it to the centre of your calico square. Take another scrap in a different colour and with right sides together place it over one of the 5 sides and stitch, fold this scrap back so that you cannot see the stitching and press. Keep doing the same thing as you go around the centre 5 sided piece. You should now have the centre 5 sided piece with 5 scrap pieces sewn around each of the 5 sides. Continue going round in the same manner covering raw edges of previous scraps as you go until you have covered the calico square. Trim around the edges of any overhanging scraps.

Take a piece of fabric 24cm square(I chose a floral and am using the same one for all my backing squares)but you can still use different colours, whatever you have.
cut a piece of padding 22cms square and place behind scrap square. Place the floral 24cm square behind that sandwiching the padding between. Turn the floral 24cm square over the edges of the other square (now padded)turning over twice to conseal raw edges,pin and then stitch with tiny hemming stitches.

You should now have a scrap, padded and backed 22cm square.

Keep making more squares and using tiny oversew stitches on the back, sew squares together to the required size.