I went to the documentary Handmade Nation last night. Organised by Miss Millie and sponsored by Felt. Credits over heres what i thought…

SO lovely to see many wonderful women and a few brave men in the theatre. The theatre seemed quite full. Quite the success! I caught up with a few delightful ladies I have not seen in ages, which was awesome. The doco itself is very inspiring and left me feeling capable of anything! I also really liked and appreciated the honest portrayal of crafters. Some make things to sell because they like it, not because it makes them lots of money. Infact alot of them sounded like they held down familes, jobs and their crafting lives, including making enough to sell their work at craft fairs. Its funny I always got this idea we are all supposed to strive to craft and make money crafting full time. For some, they make a product that works and it becomes a sort of fad and takes over, all of a sudden they are making enough money to live off. But for others it doesn’t, no reflection on the quality or coolness of the product, almost luck. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is friends and creative outlets and sometimes funding your craft. One resounded clang I got was a guilt lifted, the guilt I felt for not making it ‘big’ in my hobbies or having my hobbies make me enough money to live off. So what right? I like my hobbies, just because i dont make money off them doesn’t mean I stop doing them. I get to share it with a few, my photos get used on walls and in designs, thats enough right?

OK so about the money thing. My actual JOB is web design. Life in freelance has been slooow. Since Christmas I have been only just making ends meet and thats thanks to the support of my amazing loyal customers and fabulous partner. Due to slowness I have been REALLY looking into what I am doing and how I can re-think it, re-market them and get this show on the road again. I have made no secret of it though, the talking it out really helps me get perspective and removes the stress of it all somewhat. I also have had many great ideas come my way thanks to my business-y techy friends, esp Ben from Diversity.

The changes are inspired by the new ways of communicating to customers via the internet, things I can do to really help business’s in their online marketing strategies. The need to start pushing my passion for usability and logical layout has also become apparent. I really don’t make a big enough deal of that side of my web design experience. I am still working on the best way to explain these new services and how best to reflect it on my online presence and then follow that up with real life stuff. So many ways to do this these days, its so easy to get bogged down by them all! Along with it, will be a new website design AGAIN. Yeah what can i say, its what i do… So watch out soon to be a new website, new marketing approach and new bunch of services. Any colour requests?

To warm up my fuzzy Monday morning brain I thought I might post a little on my lovely weekend. It started with a Saturday swim at the beach. First beach swim for the summer (i know soo slack) it was divine! I finished it off with some knitting.

We came home to start our baking and cooking fun. I made some more banana cupcakes, this time with chocolate icing and cinnamon. Using my icing funnel bday gift!

On Sunday we headed out with baked goods to a friend farewell pool party, where I was far too busy splashing around in a swimming pool to take photos. So I will leave you with a photo of my earlier-in-the-week attempt at making the kiwi classic pavlova. It was quite delish! Inspired by Jess over at spinning a yarn blog. It was messy and falling to bits, apparently that’s how they should be. I glued it together with vanilla cream…

I also made more cookies in the week (to use up chocolate chips) using this recipe, its fab i recommend! I sent most of them away to Kylie’s work so I wouldn’t eat them all. So addicted to baking right now.

Have a great week!

Hello all, I have been having a lovely week of treats. So far 30 is pretty darn good!

I have been thoroughly spoiled in the last week with TWO (not one) pancake breakfasts, chicken pie, curry, cheesecake, chocolate cake, nachos and more. Yes I do need to go on more runs, incase you were wondering. The gifts that made it my way were happily received (some people know me so well!) Kylie sneaked away to buy some Crown Lynn china that I love so much and developed a bunch of old films I still had in the fridge from Oh…just 2002! (You may see some of those a bit later) Dad brought me a little charm necklace that I modeled on my newly knitted socks for you (finished those about a month ago). I also received two parcels from my ‘other’ mothers. The sewing mum in the USA made me the gorgeous tote and little bag, don’t you just love the colours, embroidered flowers and crocheted and beaded flowers on the tote?  Linen love! Gush gush! The north island NZ mum was quite clever and negotiated Kylie for a parcel pick-up containing a much desired cake decorating funnel (otherwise I may have picked it up early and ‘found’ it unwrapped). The old funnel is very cheap and pretty hopeless. Now I will be looking at learning a bit more about decorating things prettily!

I have a favorite blog that I at least once a day visit and happily scroll through the pretties. Its call Design*Sponge. It pretty much interior design candy. Mmmm candy… I had the pleasure of writing a “Christchurch Design Guide” for Design*Sponge recently and its just been published! Hoo rah! Thanks so much Grace. (There was a bit of nail biting and wondering if it would “fit the bill”). If you don’t already visit this beautiful blog then it will be worth a look. Especially if you are looking at giving any living spaces a bit of “zing”. Heaps of styles and ideas.

I created a flickr album with a bunch of Christchurch photos I took especially for the guide. However my flickr is full of Canterbury shots to if you want more piccies have a look-see through those. As most know I love my home town, its small but so close to so many playgrounds and a great city vibe. If I have missed out on any places, my fellow Cantabrians, please comment on the post in Design*Sponge, it will be great to have different perspectives.

Little cat is sitting across the table from me as I write this (so cute). After setting the scene i can tell you the much anticipated build is soon going to start, the plans, as I type, are being completed by my beloved, who is currently endeavoring to get me a 3d outline of our house on the hill that I can sketch on. You see we need to decide on cladding (thats the stuff like weatherboard or brick… it goes on the outside… “YES SIMONE” i hear you saying) and retaining wall design. We thought it would be fun for me to sketch up a “artists impression”. At one point in my life I have been a passable technical drawer, I even used to enjoy it. So finally i get to use those skills again!

My holiday was VERY busy, infact busier than the whole month we spent in America, alot of travel was crammed into two and a bit weeks. Rest time was probably largely spent in Te Puke for five days over Christmas. Lets just say I was VERY eager to get home and get back to normal. Its a rather lovely feeling when your happier that the holiday ends than when it began. This must be a sign that I like what I’m doing everyday! Very unlike the days when i used to dread waking up in the morning! Although this year has started on the back foot work wise (a job was delayed due to less sales than anticipated, recession hello) I feel inspired and ready to see what else I can do in its place.

The photos in this post are of the property we spent our New Years at. Which was pretty cool to say the least. It was an hour and half drive up a 16k crazy four wheel drive track to a clearing that used to be a saw mill. Now it has several huts and a house with so much character and stories to tell. The land belongs to our friends parents, it is in various stages of re-growth back to native bush the land is full of caves and birds (we saw two baby rurus/moreporks – feed by their muma, Fantails, Tuis, Bell birds and the Wood pigeon.. plus lots of the little ones you get around there) The house was built in the 1970’s, they wanted colour and cheerfulness to live in, to get away from the chaos outside.

It was once completely surrounded by mess from the saw mill and goodness knows what else (not anymore!! Lovely now). Colour and happiness it certainly has. So well cared for I got to swoon over some great patterns from back in the day, when no-one was scared of using colour. The best photos are taken by Kylie, who FINALLY has some up on flickr!

To add to the many goals people are making public in their posts this year I have several. In one sentence i will write it SO quickly that MAYBE i won’t change it. Run a half marathon (EEEEEK), open an online shop, start writing here and in other places a bit more (blogs and magazines perhaps), tramp and bike alot more and have and exhibition of my photos and paintings somewhere. Others might include a stall in the markets and to create my own knitting pattern.. i had an idea over the break that I want to try. Also sell and giveaway wordpress templates and sell more photos selling in mychillybin, aswell as prints. Phew… and its at the end of the post which means maybe none of you read it right?

Reporting from Christmas Land in Te Puke. We have driven up to a warmer, wetter climate. Kylie’s Mum and Dads place. There is a big tree in the living room with a Christmas village and railway tracks complete with a Christmas train. There are lights outside on the trees and shubs with Santa’s sleigh being pulled by reindeer on the roof.

Today I have put together some of my favorite tutorials for christmas tree ornaments.. or ones that can be used for that. Some I would love to make for the tree next year. This may be the last post before the new years, busy holidaying. Wish you all a Merry Christmas and Wonderful New Years… I am off to the beach! Been hankering for some swimming for awhile… Love a NZ Christmas!

1.Christmas Birds 2. Pom poms (for garlands and hanging off the tree.. plus little “flowers”) 3. Dragon Boats 4. Circus theme Christmas Tree decorations on “design sponge”, the very cool topper on “once wed“ 5. Fabric pom pom garland (could use for anything) 6. For the knitters, little sweaters (thanks to buzzy bee) 7. Mini Terrariums

Little note to add: Twentycentmixture has just put together a really nice list of ornament ideas and Tutorials!

O and I was featured on Studio Home! Yay! Thanks lots Julia!

This year is I was slightly more enthused on the decoration front. Probably something to do with moving in with the boyfriend and becoming all domestic, or it could be that I am getting old and I am feeling like part of being grown up is decorating at Christmas. Regardless I have begun a Christmas decoration collection. The budget was blown this year on a fake tree, yes, i know, i know.. but one of us sneezes uncontrollably as soon as they go outside and the other one of us just can’t BREATH when its too dusty or polleny, Christmas trees INSIDE  just speak all sorts of wrong to a hay fever and asthma ridden person…


Due to the big budget blow out I had to make everything else. The theory is, as the years go by i will make a few more each year to add to our collection and eventually we will have an abundance of decorations. So this years start is some hand painted (by me) balls for the tree. Some pom poms by Kylie and a few others I have yet to finish. The ‘piesta resistance’ is my garland made out of pom poms and fabric yo yos including a bit of ribbon and some Christmas lights twinkling through. It looks rather sparse still but I will keep making decorations until Christmas time.

Blogland has been delivering on the decoration tutorials I have been linking like a crazy lady. I plan on adding to it and summing the best that I have found of them up on the blog a bit later. So if you have come across any or have written any let me know.

I am updating the shop at the moment with many New Zealandy images. Its been fun playing with their colours this time. All of them are up in Felt, a few left to go in Etsy..

Last weekend I went walking with the better half  and some friends to the Carrington Hut in Arthurs past. Pretty much 4 hours up a river valley and back again. Organised as a social trip, pancakes were eaten, other walks were explored and I am finally admitting my four hundred dollar boots were a really bad, expensive decision as I hobble around with yet another Achilles injury. Wrong size and shape…  walking on a river bed will make any boot thats not quite right, become completely obvious! My camera bag also came apart, just before a river crossing! Phew! Just in time to leave in a safe place whilst water was navigated. This batch of photos have all sorts of wacky effects. Why? Why not, one has to at least TRY these things. All in all I had a great time!

More in Flickr

TAKE NOTE: Giveaway still going on, comment on the post where i have it all explained, or sign up for the newsletter and you are in the draw to win some prints! FREEEEEE. I have a few there (thanks me lovelies), but would love some more.

Last weekend the girls and I went up Scarbourgh hill at the end of Sumner, a Christchurch beach. There is a steep and very popular walkway that heads up and over and down into another very popular sheltered surf beach called Taylors Mistake. This beach has a sweet history and a bunch of historic baches RIGHT on the beach, nestled into the rockfaces.

Baches are what New Zealanders call a small house primarily used as a holiday “home” the word “home” being used rather loosely, until recently. NZ is now coming into the 21st century we have building codes, health standards and stuff thats supposed to make us a healthier happier nation. Once upon time we didn’t have this and a person might build a little summer holiday house with a platform, some walls and roof and fill it with a few comforts of home, like a bed, chairs MAYBE running water and sink (if your lucky). With the building codes and living standards put in place our simple little baches are dwindling away. The owners often pretty normal people, with medium to low incomes, who don’t have the money to install a toilet or running water, so they are either brought out by someone more affluent to “do-up” or demolished.

Something else has happened to threaten even more or these wee places. Our whats now called the “Queens Chain”. I’m not completely certain of the ins and outs of it. But it boils down to this, all waterways, this includes beaches, lakes and rivers are public property. In the past the access to these waterways would of been restricted by properties on the edges of these waterways. Now several meters in from the edge of all of  all of these water ways have to be publicly accessible. For some places, this means, the ambling lawn from house to rivers edge will be changed into a walkway, so separating your property from that part with either fencing or an angry dog will soon be necessary. For others the house will have to be moved or just taken away. The rumors are some of the Taylors Mistake baches are on the way out.  I wanted to take some photos for histories sake.

I dont know how i feel about this. There are many positives and negatives..  to have public access to waterways we may be on our way to have public appreciation of the rivers and lakes… meaning perhaps less damming or destruction of such an amazing resource. So on a larger scale perhaps its a good thing. However there is the history in these places that i think we need to treasure. NZ is so young we have precious little houses older than a hundred or so years old left. I know the council is trying to keep some. But is it enough?

On this walk on the Sumner side I saw the results of an old historic property being sold. An old quarry stone house right on the cliff edge, amazing views and outlook has now GONE. Replaced by a fashionable dwelling of concrete and prematurely rusted metal facade. I was FURIOUS (To say the least).  I think it was one of the classic cases here in NZ where the owners let it become decapitated and uninhabitable, so due to health concerns they had permission to destroy it. Down the old historic building came… up a blocky boring fashionable building went. SIGH.

I went for a walk last Friday after a day inside, sheltering from the winds and intermittent rain. Thankfully it cleared enough for a quiet stroll up the hill that evening.

My favorite chair was pulled out today, Kylie and myself are ready to try the re-upholstery gig… lets see how we go. So far we need the tools. Anyone have any ideas on where to get upholstery tools?