A birthday, flowers, a mocha birthday cake and more.

Today is my boyfriend's birthday. I feel the need to point out that I think we have been together too long to call each other 'boyfriend' and 'girlfriend' though. 9 years is a fair hike of a distance - well to a spring chicken like me.

So yes, it is his birthday and I have just put his birthday cake into the oven. It is a mocha cake that I got from a recipe book that came with our coffee machine. I have made this cake once before, and it was quite nice so I am hoping that the 2nd attempt will taste even better!

In my last blogging effort I declared that my daliahs were starting to bloom and as I sit here on my couch I am looking at 6 beautiful blooms cheerily sitting in a make-do vase. One has already lived to decorate my house and gone the way of the garbage bin...

On another note I am a bit besotted with this website at the moment. Ahhhhhh such lovely pretty stuff! Me likey!

Have a safe and Happy Easter to those of you that celebrate it!

Goodbye Summer...

Even though it has 'officially' been Autumn for 19 days, I feel that this lovely season - probably my favourite - has only been asserting itself in the last few days.

We are now in need of the doona on the bed for most of the night, if I am up early enough in the morning (ie before 8.30 am) I need long sleeves on and it is 12.30 pm (daylight saving time) and there is still dew on the grass outside where it is shady. And finally a dahlia plant that I happily discovered growing last year - our first Autumn in this house - has it's first little flower buds on it.

So yes, goodbye Summer. Even though I enjoy what you bring to the year sometimes I do find you a little bit too full-on to handle!

2 down, many to go.

Well I have just finished my 2nd costume.

Many, many to go. Some are in various stages of construction some I haven't even started yet. Eep!

My usual online source of fabric sent me the wrong thing in my recent order, which has delayed my starting that particular project, but the replacement material should be here at the end of the week.

I am just enjoying a cup of coffee before I go and get back into it all.

Please enjoy the pics of this tutu I made last April/May. I finally got the dancer it was made for to model her costumes for me. This tutu is fitted especially to her and took quite a while to finalise the fit.





It was my first attempt at a fully fitted tutu made on a basque and I sort of improvised how to do it as I went along. Its not perfect but I was pretty pleased with the end result!

Just another Friday Morning.

And so begins another day.

Contemplating how my morning will take form.

I have already slept for a chunk of it. Ahhh sleep.

Work starts a 1pm. Really need to do some choreography for a routine, but I just can't get my head in the right space. But I seriously need to do it.

It appears I am having difficulty spelling today...

I also need to cut some music for another routine.

And amplify music as my new 'stereo' doesn't have very loud speakers and when you are teaching tap that isn't a good thing.

Sigh. Everything seems a little bit monotonous today.

Peace!

What's the buzz? Stuff I've been up to and a great t-shirt.

Well, it has been quite a while since I have blogged anything but that is mainly because I haven't had anything to blog about!

I have had a very extended break from sewing over our Christmas break and am now getting back into it. Once again, I am doing costume sewing for students for one of the eisteddfods that is coming up in May. Yes, I know that seems a long way off, but when you have nearly 20 individual costumes to make, and 2 groups to do (one of 11, one of 10) the time just goes so quickly. I have finished one already and just have to do some minor sequining, so already I feel as if I am off to a better start than last year. Three skirt have been cut out and are now hanging so they drop before I have to hem them. I have a lot of fabric waiting to be attacked, and learnt from last year that I needed to get deposits from 'clients' before ordering fabric!


I have also decided to enter a local Fashion award later in the year. The Flair Fashion Awards. I know I am not a fashion designer, but it is open to anyone and I really do enjoy the creative process when I make costumes so I thought why not try my hand at non-costumes? There are several different categories and I have already started on a few designs. I am actually pretty excited and can't wait for the entries to open later this month! It will be good to try to create something of a high calibre. Very fortunately I found a photography site that has images up from the past 3 years of Flair, so I was able to get some sort of idea of the types of things that actually get included in the runway show. This is it here. Some of the clothes are absolutely gorgeous and some well, maybe I don't know enough about fashion, but some don't seem so gorgeous to me... So I will be updating pretty frequently on that project I'd say.

One of the categories is "Rags to Riches" which is basically recycling from a 2nd hand garment and I found a lovely coloured dress on ebay which I was lucky enough to win. I only bought it for the colour... I will post a picture of it once I have taken one!

Also noticed the other day that I have 2 new followers, so welcome and I hope my blogs are at least mildly interesting!

Oh! I also found the funniest shirt the other day when I was visiting Jinx. Now I did enjoy the books (not so much the 3rd one - that one annoyed me) but when I saw this I just cracked up laughing. I think it is great.



I am seriously thinking of indulging my inner geek and purchasing one - blow the currency exchange rate!

The Twilight books were on the whole very enjoyable but I reckon if I had stumbled across this tee while I was reading the 3rd book I probably would have bought it on the spot!

Pyjamas!

I got my pjs finished with plenty of time left before Christmas and I was very pleased with how they turned out! My brother and new sister-in-law liked them too!










These ones were for my sister-in-law.

















These ones were for my brother!

Pre-Xmas "Do-Stuff" mode...

Okay, well yesterday started the pre-xmas clean the house thing. I did the lounge-room, office nook (which took ages it was an absolute mess) and some of the verandah. It was a long day.

Then I went out for our end of year staff dinner and had a lovely time! I don't get much of a chance to go out so when I do I like to dress up and look pretty! Yay!

Today, I put the xmas tree up and the other few decorations that we have. So that was the morning job. Then I continued on with my sewing projects I have underway. I cut out my boyfriend shirt that I am making him for Christmas and for once put all the little marks on it - usually I couldn't be bothered but since I want this shirt to turn out really nice I am putting more effort in than usual. I also cut out the other half of my sister-in-law's pj pant and as we speak I am nearly finished my brother's pj pants. I just have the button fly and the waistband/draw string to do. I will post some pics up when I am done!

I hope that everyone else pre-Christmas plans are going well!