The Loo.... eh .... Moo

 

 

Remember way back in February when I was whisked off to London...... Yes it is a Long, long time ago, or so it seems, things have been rather busy around here, and to be honest I could do with another trip to London real soon.....

 

So where am I going with this ...... Let me tell you, while we were there I discovered this really quirky shop, I cannot for the life of me remember what it was called and  could probably go onto google earth and see but being that I am feeling a bit lazy ...... Well now, I bought this really vintage looking necklace and earring in this shop and was browsing around waiting for LSO, who was in the millionth(not sure if that's a word) outdoor shop, when I saw the most amazing bit of decorative wall art. 

Now for those of you who know me well, you all know how much I LURVE anything out of the ordinary.... quirky, funky and eclectic, my home is a mish mash of odds and ends..... And I love it, each and every piece has a story or meaning, or I have collected it on my travels!  

 

SO what had I found?? A really funky Moose head made out of patch work pieces that came flat packed and could be put together like a puzzle, I HAD TO HAVE IT - lucky for me LSO had left his credit card with me........(Insert BIG smile here)

 

Sadly however, when we got home and after all the excitement of Little Madame opening her gifts.... I looked for it but it was gone... oh woe is me!!! I had left it behind, or so I thought, a few days ago, I was looking for something, that had fallen behind my chest of drawers and to my absolute delight there was my moose head - YAAAAYY!! WOO HOO!! YIPEE!!

  

  

The Long Lost Packet

 And so I set about piecing it together, I was rather easy and with help from my Little Madame, it went from being a flat pack to a three dimensional moose in no time at all. And as you can see by the picture a lot of fun was had!! 

 

Press Out Moose

The Instructions

Looking Good!

Get Your Hand Out Of My Picture!

Little Madame being a 'cow'

 

So where to put it? My walls are pretty full, and I think that poor LSO groans but grins and bears it every time I bring something new home! We debated long and hard as to where it should take up residence, the lounge-over the fire place would be ideal but it just didn't look right, the kitchen - eh definitely  no place! The bedroom -  not quiet right, when I was struck by a thought, What about in the loo above the throne? It was quirky enough and would elicit a laugh, and to be honest lots of really important business goes on in there- so why not ?

Ta Dah!

And so it was put above the throne amid much pomp and ceremony,  and to be perfectly honest I don't think we could have found a better spot for it, it is at the end of our passage and as you turn the corner you see it and every time I see it, it brings a great big smile to my face. LSO now calls it "The Moo" A very apt name for our very own throne room ....... xxx




The Throne Room

 

 

 

Dazzling Dancing Dresses

 

MaNy, many years ago I did Ballroom and Latin American Dancing.... MaNy, many years ago! I loved dancing and it was a passion that took me to place I never dreamt I would go. I saw my dancing hero's performing  live when we competed in the World Ballroom Dancing Championships  in Tokyo, Japan and  wept as the 'god' of ballroom dancing, Bill Irwin announced "Let battle begin..."  a bit dramatic I know, but he said it every year as the annual Blackpool Championships began - it was what every competitor waited to hear!

 

Sadly life moves on, I had my !5 minutes.... and one simply cannot dance forever.... I lost contact with the dancing world when I had my Little Madame, and a few years have passed by since I had seen or heard anything from the dancing world...... Yes.... Yes .... I am getting to the point!

 

A few weeks ago I bumped into a very old friend(Sorry Les, I don't mean old, old, just long time old... digging a deep grave here!) We chatted and she asked me if I was still making dancing costumes - "No Time" , I said, I was really busy - I said .... cooking, baking, crocheting, wifeing, and mothering! But my friend Les is persistent, very persistent, she needed dresses and so for the last few weeks I have been up to my eyeballs in leotards, sequins, fringing, rhinestones, frills and lots and lots of organza!!! And Boy-Oh-Boy am I enjoying myself!   

 

So here are the three B-E-A-U-T-I-F-U-L Dazzling Dance Dresses I have made for my dear friend AND might I add.... World Line Dance Champion!!! 

  

The first dress was supposed to just be a 'trail-run' dress but it turned out so well that she wore it at the very next competition. It is a Waltz dress, It took 15 meters of organza and literally thousands of rhinestones! She brought me little lace flowers and I stoned them... now stoning is a very time consuming thing, its not quick and you have to build up a kind of rhythm, you need a pointed object, a bottle of gloopy glue and patience. You dip the end of said pointy object in to the glue, a minute amount is needed and then you touch the tip to a  stone pick it up and place it onto the spot where you want it( that spot has been dotted with glue already) It is a frustrating job, if you don't get it just right you drop the stones, or it gets stuck and you end up with gloopy glue all over the place!  

 

 

A Fairy Dance Dress

Lacey Flowers

Shoulder Flowers

The Back

The Front and A Neck Piece

This dress is beautiful, almost magical( Actually all it needs is a pair of Fairy wings) and if you vaguely can hear the beautiful 1...2...3 beat... of waltz music in your head you will be able to picture the dress floating and twirling  beautifully, it also sparkles as the skirt fabric has a beautiful shimmer to it, it is as though a fairy landed on it and  sprinkled magical fairy dust all over it!

The Making

 Dress number two , is sexy and when it is on it looks like she is half naked!  A flesh coloured leotard was the base and then I literally draped the acid green  fabric around until it sort of fell perfectly into place, pinned it, and then sewed it onto the leotard!(Hope no one looks inside this costume... eeekkk)

The Front

 
The skirt is a circle and a half as this gives it really nice movement! Once again, lots and lots and LOTS of stones just scattered all over the bodice and heavily over the bust area and -WOW!!! it looks fabulloouuss!

The Back

 

 Dress number three just happens to be my Favourite! It is a sassy, cheeky dress and is being used for a jive number! The very apt music to which this dance is being performed is 'Proud Mary' -It is the perfect music! She decided to go with fringing which moves really well, and although this might look  like it was easy it is really very difficult to work with, it simply has a life all of its own.... 

 

 

Different Idea's

Beautiful Colours

 

 The colour are amazing and these picture do it no justice what so ever...... A very bright pink and orange and an acid yellow, now if you look at the picture above, you will see that this dress didn't just happen, I pinned, repined and started to pin all over again! The mix of colours although gorgeous, just wouldn't fit, until ...  yes, you guessed it, a midnight epiphany!.... I sewed them on top of one another so when she is standing still it looks like a plain pink fringe dress BUT when she moves .... a riot of pink, orange and yellow!

 

Fringing and Bling Bling

 I used  big stoned motives on the bodice to give the dress more texture! Then lines of stones for bling and shimmer! It weighs a ton, fringing is very heavy..... BUT It is such fun and looks really sexy on Les! (My two dress makers dummy's Dolores and Mavis - do it no justice what so ever!) 




Looks So Good

 

The Back

 

The Front

So this is what has  taken up all of my time over the last few weeks..... And what is more I have loved every single minute and am so thankful to my dear friend, she has brought dancing back into my life after a long time, so my lesson here is it is never too late to do or go back to doing what you really love! I am looking forward to many more Dazzling dancing Dresses.......But in the mean time ...... Back to that crocheted blanket that has been so very neglected ......... xxx

PS:: Just heard that Les won the South African Championships this past weekend - those dresses must have helped! Well Done my friend!!!!! 

Hallooooooweeeeen!!

Halloween is such fun, we go all out,  we decorate the kitchen, we decorate ourselves and generally have a total scare fest! We have made it fun for Little Madame, because when you are little that's what life is all about FUN, FUN, FUN!!!

 

So no long rambling today just some pictures of  our Halloooooooweeeeeen....... Hope you enjoy them!

 

Skeletons,Giant Spiders And Witches Make The Kitchen A SPOOOOOOKY place!

Cob Webs Hang From Every Corner!

 

 

Butter Biscuits  - Bats, Ghosts and Pumpkins

Cookie Jars Filled With Treats

 

Creepy Cupcakes

We decided because of the rather odd weather we having been having here in our little fishing village!(Rain RaIn RAIIIIIN!!) We would go to Ushaka Water world for their Halloween Party,(just in case in rained on the 31st, and with the way the weather has been - it WILL rain!) and boy was it fun, the kids(and many over zealous Adults) tricked and treated their way down the shopping mall and into the House of Horrors Aquarium, then onto a Creepy Dolphin Show - it was incredible fun! Little Madame had and BLAST, even though all the witches, ghosts, vampires and other fiendish ghouls made her a little scared!

  

The Aquarium Was Gorgeous
 

Decorations At The Aquarium

I Am Sure I Saw That Mahoosive Sharks Licking His Lips....... Yummy Fairies!

A Witch That Was Way to Scary For Us!

Rest Time!(Don't you love the little pink sandals-no respectable witch would be caught dead in those!)

I thought I should just tell the overseas peeps that read my blog, exactly what Ushaka is..... It is an amazing  water park with a massive aquarium(that is in the wreck of and old sunken ship!), dolphin and seal arena's. They do wonderful conservation with the marine life along our coast. It is also the home of GAMBIT! The oldest and largest bottle noses dolphin in captivity! He is a beautiful elegant creature, and here in the fishing village, he is  considered a national treasure! 

  

Our Gambit!



Scary Dolphins? Never!

The Show Was Fun

The Witches Ridiculous!

The Night Became Dark

And we headed home after a wonderful fish and chips dinner at the Fabulous Moyo Restaurant...... My little witch was fast asleep before you could say Harry Potter..... clutching her enormous bag of treats and a smile on her face, I do have to admit that I had loads of fun too....... and in ending this HALLOWEEN post, all I can say HAPPY TRICK OR TREATING everyone! xxx

A Dream-Come-True Room

Ever since I began to craft, I have spent an extraordinary amount of time fantasising about having my own little craft room,  a place where I could have all my equipment out, a peaceful little space of my own! For as long as I can remember I have had  storage boxes with my "stuff" packed away, with effect very time I wanted to do anything vaguely crafty, I would have to haul boxes out, unpack what I needed and then pack away again, irrelevant of whether I was finished or not!  I dreamt and fantasised about how it would look, in actual fact I  have spent an obscene an amount of time dreaming about what MY DREAM ROOM would look like!

When we bought our house it came with an extra little room...... to LSO this meant study... to me this meant, no, SCREAMED craft room. Who do you think won this prized room?  Alas not me! Luckily, the previous owner liked wine( I mean, honestly, who doesn't like wine?) and had dug out a tiny wine cellar under said study!!! LSO had delusions when he though he was going to fill it up with wine, I wanted it, I had to have it, after much negotiation, I got it!!!

Now a lot of renovating needed to be done to our house as it was build in the 1950's (and with all due respect to the previous owner, it was stuck in a 50's time warp) so my little room took a serious back seat! It smelt damp, was dark, had a leaking window, so every time it rained it flooded and was decorated BADLY(look at the picture below, the flooring says it all) A desk and a rickety old book case, came with the room,  but I was besides myself with joy...... I had a CRAFT ROOM!

For the past 2 years I have lived with this room in the sad state it was in,(in all honesty, I hardly went down there, and it  just became a dumping ground) but about 3 weeks ago I decided that I had to take serious action, clean it out, get it painted and make it the happy place I had always wanted! And due to very generous friends, this has happened very quickly over the last two weeks, A dear friend let me buy left over laminate flooring, another dear friend's mother(thank you Trish!), gave me a counter top and shelving unit  that you will see in the pictures, and my dream started to happen!  

The Room As It Was-SAD

I began by clearing everything out! Mission! And got rid of so much junk that I have collected over a short space of time, ripped up the awful linoleum(YAY!!!!!!!!) and painted it white!

Candy Pink Stripes!

Then Little Madame and I measured out vertical stripes on 1 wall and painted them pink!(a much debated colour between her and I-she wanted purple, me -not so much! Did I mention I share this space with her) she actually paints really well for a little peeps! Next came the floors, a contractor(Graham) laid them in a few hours, with me peeping every other minute! And literally the next day a delightful man named Adrian came and fitted my counter, shelves and a set of drawers that I decided to purchase from him!  These 2 gentleman have totally restored my faith in contractors, Graham(Floors) arrived 2 days earlier than expected ,and when I called Adrian(Fitter) to tell him, he said he could squeeze the job in the next day. It was done in 2 weeks! I was besides myself with joy and happiness!!

Laminate Floors - Done

Counters,Shelves and Drawers - Done!

See The Stairs, It Really Is Underground!

I told Little Madame that we would only move in over the weekend, but as everything had been sorted into neat store bought drawer sets, one for sewing, one for yarn, it was easy and anyway, I was so excited that we moved in there and then!



All My Bits And Bobs Awaiting Their New Home



Sewing Machines New Home!

Books and Little China Girls



Working In Her Space

Her Laptops - Made At School



Yarn and Sewing

 So we are all moved in, and am dreaming about many happy days of sewing and crafting that are going to take place. Oh and did I mention how school girly excited I am? I did? Did I mention how verryy H-A-P-P-Y I am? I did?  Well let me say it again, very loudly I AM SO VERY HAPPY! xxx

Ta Dah!