Radio Interview

Well I have quite literally just hung up the phone from speaking with Madonna King from 612 ABC in Brisbane. It's 5.53am there now and I will be on the air at 10.30am.

What a strange experience that was. Madonna was lovely to talk to; it was like having a chat with a friend really, but I still feel a bit weird about the fact that people at home will be listening to me rabbit on.

I hope what I had to say is interesting at least. I'll try to post a link later; if I can work out how to do it that is!

Heart Shaped Buttons

A mysterious package arrived in the mail for me today. It contained this sweet pussycat card from the lovely Diane at Heart Shaped.

She read my post about my sad and sorry sewing kit and offered a few more buttons to add to my Bonne Maman jars. Well I must say a 'few' is hardly the correct word here.

I love the retro ones. I might be receiving a sewing machine for my birthday and I thought I might attempt a retro owl, I think they will make fabulous eyes for him.

The monkey is cute and B1 will no doubt claim the chess pieces for some project or other. He is really 'into' chess at the moment. He and Granddad were having an on going tournament whilst he was staying with us.

Diane said that a contact from her work actually works for a button manufacturer.

I think my favourites are these stripey ones. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them but they will look great in the jars in the meantime.

It is strange how your perception of things changes as you get older. If anyone had told me I would be the slightest bit interested in sewing and displaying buttons (I mean buttons, for goodness sake!) I would have backed away slowly, maintaining eye contact at all times. Now I look at other lovely blogs and magazines and think I would like to try some of the crafts and home decorations displayed in them. I think I have become a major home-body since I've had children. I realise we have moved away from friends and family in Australia but my home has come with me in the form of the Bumble Bee'rs and although we certainly travel alot more now I think being away from all things familiar has made me look inward to my home as a sanctuary for our family. So naturally I want to decorate it......I just never thought buttons would be a part of that!

Can you see the little butterfly?

B3 helped my arrange these ones for the photo and what a lovely job she did too!

Thankyou so much Diane for your very generous and kind gift. I wasn't actually expecting anyone to send any buttons it was just a way to end the post but I am certainly glad and grateful you did!

Ambling Around the Garden

As Peter Cundall would say 'Bloomin' Marvelous!'

The Chook Pen

I can't say how it really began. I just bought one and they seem to have multiplied. I see them everywhere I go. Some cost £0.99 and some cost up to £12. If I see one and it's white I just have to give it a home.; perhaps it's a sickness!

Personally I think I just miss my chooks in Australia. We used to have four Light Sussex bantams and two black Peking bantams. The Pekings were so sweet with their little fluffy feet and they would sit on your lap and let you stroke them.

Mr Bee has said we can get a few chooks here if I would like to but I think it might be too much trouble when we go on holidays. We now need to consider boarding Tilly every time we go away and I'm not sure there is such a thing as a chicken kennel.

This little hen as a secret - she's a Jersey girl, but we won't tell anyone OK.

This is my only non-white chook. I'm still not sure she works in with the others but the longer she stays the more I like her.

This poor fellow was spectacular but unfortunately on his perilous journey through the UK mail system his bottom half was smashed beyond repair. I couldn't bring myself to throw away the top as I love the way he has been stylised. I keep checking on Ebay for a replacement or maybe someone will list the bottom half one of these days and he may once again be Top Chook.

Chook n. Australian colloquialism for a chicken, a young bird, especially of the domestic fowl.

Fun Fair

Our school held its annual PTA BBQ recently. We decided on a 'Fun Fair' theme this year so I baked these cakes to try and match the theme. I was going to do clown faces but I had to waste too much cake in getting the right clown head shape and as this is about feeding large number of people I settled on fireworks stars instead.

In the end we catered for about 180 people. You can never find out the exact number as there are always a few people who turn up on the night to buy tickets. Our catering was really good this year and we didn't end up with too much food left over.


We cook sausages, Chinese pork steaks and meat patties, which are served with bread rolls and a choice of six types of salad. Dessert was apple pie with ice cream and cream, chocolate cakes, crispy cakes (chocolate crackles to Aussies), cupcakes and jelly. All this for £8.00 for adults, £5.00 for children or £25.00 for a family of five; it's not bad value really.

The kids get to have a swim and we organised carnival games to go with the Fun Fair theme. There were colouring competitions, Fancy Dress prizes, Name the Clown (except I couldn't get a clown so I bought a monkey and made a paper collar and clown hat for him, but I forgot to take a photo), guess the number of lollies on the Gingerbread House, Lucky Dips, Splat the Rat, Toss the Toad and Hook a Boat. The Bumble Bee'rs had a fabulous time and it was declared 'The best night ever' by B1.

All in all it was a very successful event. I'm thinking Country Square Dance for next year; what do you think?

Box, box, what's in the box?

Mr Bee gave me this box seventeen years ago. It was during the early nineties when, in Australia anyway, blue and yellow and the Sun and Moon were quite a popular decorating theme. We decorated the bedroom in our first flat together along these lines and this box in the only survivor of that particular 'fashion'. It now lives in the cupboard in my laundry (utility room) but it is not forgotten and alone in there. I use the contents quite regularly, not very well mind you, but quite regularly.

Now here is my latest 'Country' magazine inspired recycling. I saw Bonne Mamon jam were holding a competition for people to showcase their uses for the post-jam-munching jars. There were some lovely ideas; so of course I started to wash them out and keep them. We have six now but they were all still empty, until today.

Behold, the contents of the box. Yes it is indeed my sorry excuse for a sewing kit. As you can clearly see it is a shambles.

Let us examine the more unusual contents: two sea shells, one Italian leather belt loop that I no longer have the belt for, one plastic eye from a toy but I can't find nor remember which one, some matching wool and jewel button from my red cardie, a mysterious wooden knob, an assortment of metal 'bits' from Christmas crackers and last but by no means least, those silly, little packets of tiny beads and sequins you receive attached to many a sparkly top. Does anyone ever bother to sew those things on? What a waste of time and the Earth's resources they are!

Ta, da. The wonderousness (is that a word? Well it is now) of the jam jars now given purpose. So dear friends and family before you relegate any old clothes not worth donating to Charity to the rubbish cut off all the buttons and send them to me, I'll give them a good home ;)

100th Post Slackness

100 already! I know it is a bit of a tradition out there in blogland to host a giveaway when you reach this milestone but I have been terribly slack and haven't organised anything so I will have to have my giveaway in the not too distant future.



So instead you get to have a squiz at my latest floral display collected from my garden.

All of these lovelies are from my Cherub Garden. I was able to cut them all from the back of the plants so you wouldn't have been able to see them when you looked at the garden anyway.

I am not one of those gardening purists who don't cut flowers from their garden, only utilising them for out-of-door decoration.

I like my 'free' poppies but I like their seed pods even more. I think they will dry well and will look nice displayed in a dish of some sort. I'll have to see what I can rustle up.

I try to grow plants that repeat flower so there is enough for the garden and the vase. This year it has been rather successful.