A McCranky Apron!

This is an apron Claire made the other day, I think it is really lovely with its orange and yellow tones, and just the other day we dropped of a heap more at mikes, which is always nice, and there not all orange which is good too. Unfortuantely though at the moment Claire is having machine difficulities, and sewing has come to a slight hault, I think we need to do some extreme op-shoping and make a really good op-shop wish, so we can get a new one, a prettier one just like Kootoyoo.

A Family Who Collects!

Its true, our family is quite fond of collecting, we all seem to have our favourite things, Claire's would probably be fabric, Mum is definitely a good collector of chickens and hens (not the real variety but the ceramic sort) Dad, I'm not quite sure what he collects, when we were growing up he collected the bird card's inside his favourite tea box (i can't quite remember what the tea was called but the box is still purple), I collect a lot of things like cake stands and tea cups, Nana had a great collection of salt and pepper shakers and still has quite the large collection of clowns, but our Brother probably has one of my favourite collections. He collects old ice buckets, and has quite a few of them too, at last count there were 27, but it could well have grown by then. He has lots of nice old wooden ones, with copper rings, some nice round orby ones and lots of leather bound ones and a few patterned ones too (i like the tartan one and the one with the world map on it best).

The thing I like most about Shaun's collection is that he doesn't really do much of the purchasing, himself, one day he just said to us, I think I want to start collecting ice buckets, soon after I found him one at an op-shop and then Claire found a few more then Mum found a couple and Dad pitched in to and then sooner or later his collection was huge. Not long ago I asked him how many ice buckets he thought he actually brought himself and he said maybe one, but that's okay because it still is his collection, he built a shelf for them all above his window, and keeps all of them in good view for people to look at, and likes them very much. I think that's the whole point of collecting too, allowing people to see something and think "I'll get that, that will go nicely with so and so's collection", and before you know it, the collection is huge.

I took the above photo's of the ice buckets as displayed in Shaun's room, just to prove that they are his and he likes them very much.

From Meaghan.

This is..what I'm Suprised I Like!

I'm really surprised I like Tony Jones so much, I mean I'm 21 and he is a little older and is sporting a few grey hairs, but I think he is wonderful, not only for his hard hitting political commentary, but for his wit and humor too. 

Thanks so much Victoria for a great theme and to Angela again for hosting!

From Meaghan. 

This is..what I'm Suprised I Like!

I have always loved cheese. I think I could live off a big cheese platter for dinner every night, but the thought of blue cheese always made me feel a little ill. How ever just a few months ago I built up the courage to try it. I felt that if I clam to love cheese so much then I have to have a good reason for saying that I don't like blue cheese. So I tried it and to my surprise I loved it. Its now one of my favorite cheeses. I think I'll have to find myself some cheese right now!

Claire...

Carnations!

The other day I went to the flower shop, and had a pretty hard time trying to decide which flowers to buy, finally though I decided on some carnations. I really like carnations, and can't quite figure out why they have such a bad stigma attached, maybe its because they are usually purchased from supermarkets and come wrapped in plastic and not some lovely paper, but I don't mind, either way I think I'll buy carnations more often!

Meaghan. 

Sponge Cake!

I was lucky (and I mean very lucky) enough to get a Kitchen Aid mixer for my birthday, even though that was a while ago I still hadn't had enough time to put it to use. Today though Claire and I decided to make a sponge cake, I've never made one before, mainly because I was to scared it would fail, but with my mixer I thought it may just be possible. 

I used a recipe I found in mum's very old and well used nursing mothers cook book. Everything seemed to be going well, even the fact that we didn't have a round tin, we managed with a square, the mixer whisked the eggs really well and really fast and I folded it all together with extreme care. We put it in the oven and were quite optimistic everything would turn out okay, but it didn't it flopped right in the middle. We managed to hide the fact by cutting it in half and turning it upside down, and evening it out with cream, but it still didn't quite cut it, I don't know if it was because we didn't use a round tin, or the fact we only sifted the dry ingredients twice and not three times as some other recipes suggest. I'm only comforted by the fact that some CWA members are too frightened of ruining sponge cakes to try baking it themselves, but one day i hope to master it, if anyone has any tips, or fool proof recipes i would be very happy to hear about them.  

From Meaghan. 

The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

My friend lent me this book last week and I read it last night. Is a really lovely story about a rabbit and some life changing events that happen to him. I think it's a kids book but adults will love it just as much. It will definitely bring a tear to the eye.

Claire...

Home Soon!

One of my Favourite friends Tim is on his way home, he left for Sweden in January to study for a while and then he went travelling all over Europe, I really cannot wait to see him and hear about all the things he has been doing, and do the things we used to do before he left, we are very good at drinking slurpee's to fast and eating lollies. 

Family Picnics!

This image should have been apart of 'A Week of Picnic's' but I only found it yesterday, its of one of the many picnic's our family shared together growing up. I wasn't born yet and Mum said Claire was about six months old. We're not exactly sure of wear it was taken either, Claire seems to think Hanging Rock, but Mum isn't convinced. That's' our Dad at the very head of the table, and Our Pa, with our cousin John on his Lap, Nana is the one with the lovely shirt on sitting opposite him, and a few of our Aunties and Uncles are other cousins are there too. We haven't had a picnic like this in a long time, as some of our family have moved interstate and some are living overseas, it would be nice to get everyone back together again. 

From Meg. 

Things that stay the same...

Right now I am nearing the end of my third year of Uni, as expected I have a huge amount of work to get through before its all over and I can start enjoying spring and summer. But as usually when the pressure increases my motivation decreases and as a result I spend a lot of time doing things I perhaps shouldn't. Last night this took the form of looking through more boxes I still haven't gotten around to unpacking, but in the end I was quite glad I did. I found these old photographs of me on what I think are my Fourth and Sixth Birthdays, what immediately struck me was how similar I look when compared to photos from my 21st. I obviously still enjoy a fringe, like spending time outdoors when its time to celebrate and haven't grown out of wearing t-shirts under dresses.  The butterfly tin, was my favourite, and I bet there was a marble cake underneath all that green icing!

From Meaghan. 

From Nana's Collection!

Our Nana had the best collection of salt and pepper shakers in the world. She had hundreds and hundreds of them displayed in a lovely display cabinet in her hallway, all of which were collected from op-shops right throughout Melbourne for many many years. When we were young we would sit in front of it and stare at them for hours then one day she decided to pack them all up, I guess she was just sick of looking at them all the time. Soon after that Mum brought boxes and boxes of them over to our house to sort through, we would spend days unpacking newspaper wrapped shakers marvelling at each new one we found. Nana let us keep any ones which we like the best, Mum choose these ones, I think she remembered them especially fondly from her childhood. The rest of them our cousin sold for her in bulk on e-bay, I think we were too young to really appreciate where they were going but I bet someone was really happy when the package arrived. 

From McCranky!

Harriette!

Our Cat Harry is really funny. I was trying to take a photo of her looking all pleasant, but she was way more interested in playing with its cord. She is quite the Cranky Character!

Arts Festival

Over the weekend and this coming week, I've been busy with seeing shows, on Saturday I saw Patti Smith in concert, which was one thing I never thought would happen. It was amazing, I'm still getting over it. Tonight I'm seeing a Patti Smith dedication to the Beat Poet Allen Ginsberg, along with Phillip Glass, i'm more excited than ever. Its all Part of the Melbourne Arts Festival, which is turning out better than i could of ever imagined. There are also films to watch, photography to enjoy and music to listen to, Patti Smith is quite amazing!

From Meaghan

This is...My current favourite reading material

This is late, but thats okay I think. I have for as long as I can remember been a fan of reading, but while I am studying and have the huge pressure of essay's and weekly readings looming over my head, i can't even contemplate starting a novel, so instead I read magazines, and Lula is definately one of my favourite. It has the most amazing photos, lovely articles beautiful fonts and their covers are nice and simple too.



From Meaghan.

A Week of Picnic's!

So this is the end of 'A Week of Picnic' we have defiantley had a lot of fun sharing our favourite picnic things and picnic memories, and are extra glad about all of the new lovely blogs we have found. Thanks everyone for joining in and thanks to pip to for letting us share her Blog!!

Meaghan and Claire

A Week of Picnic's...dresses!

Here a just a few of our favourite picnic dresses, they are good because of their floral print and their ability to look good against green grass.

A week of Picnic...sweet picnic slice!

Like the savoury picnic slice, we featured on Mikes lovely blog, hedgehog has been a family favourite for many years, Mum made it for us when we were younger but still makes it for us occassionally today. Its pretty simple and requires no baking which is good sometimes. You can definately make this one in advance, so its ready whenever the picnic urge hits!

Picnic Hedgehog

¾ cup or 180ml of sweetened condensed milk

60g of butter

125g dark eating chocolate, chopped coarsely

150g plain sweet biscuits

And an amount of dried fruit or nuts that you find most suitable (I like walnuts but anthing that takes your fancy is fine)Line a slice pan with some baking paper

Combine the condensed milk and butter in a saucepan; stir over low heat until the butter has melted and the mix is nice and smooth, remove from the heat and then add the chocolate and stir again until smooth.

Break the biscuits into small pieces in a bowl, add chocolate mix and nuts of choice and stir until all the biscuits are coated.

Spread mixture into the pan and cover, refrigerate for about 4 hours or until slice is firm.

After this time I like to further decorate the slice with some chocolate icing and hundred and thousands.

Then simply cut into slices, transport into some Tupperware and enjoy at your next picnic!!

Where it all Began!

I think our love of picnic's developed with the reading of Enid Blyton's The Magic Faraway Tree. Bessie, Jo and Fanny got up to the most amazing adventures all thanks to a picnic, encouraging us to picnic as much as we could and climb as many trees as possible, while tree climbing has since subsided, i'm not sure picnic's ever will.

Handy picnic Tools!

Picnic gadgets, really are the best, they allow optimal use with limited space. When I first found these in a picnic set found in an op-shop I was overwhelmed, one person must have been very clever to design such handy things. More picnic things over at lovely Mikes.

More picnic things.

Here are a few more close up piture of our favourite picnic things, as seen on mikes.

More Thermos's

Here are some of of our favourite thermoses, they have nothing on the one's pip showed us on mikes, that is one of the most impressive collections. It makes me want to search evrey op-shop in the country, looking for more!

A week of Picnic's!

Finally a week of picnic's is here, Claire and I have been talking about this for so long and can't wait to share all of our things. Each day we will post a blog on the Mikes site, but we will also put some extra things up here, so be sure to look at it all. These are just some closer picture of those sets. If I could I would collect picnic sets until there weren't anymore to buy, but for now these will have to do.

ps. thanks for all the birthday wishes, yesterdays picnic was really amazing, Claire put in so much effort, it was amazing.

Happy Birthday Little Sister!

Today is Megs 21st Birthday! 

We had a lovely day celebrating in our family's usual way, with a picnic. The whole family drove up to Bacchus Marsh where we meet Nana and our Uncle at a park near the town center. 

We all made great food, we had baguettes filled with pesto, roast capsicum, feta, sun-dried tomato and baby spinach, cup cakes, hedgehog, coconut ice and lots of other yummie things. 

Nana brought Meg a beautiful cake and we all sang "happy birthday" very quietly because we where a bit shy. 

It was a lovely way to celebrate Meaghans birthday and I'm pretty sure she enjoyed it. 

Claire...

Coconut Ice!

Today I took some time and made some Coconut Ice, its really simple all you need to do is combine one can of condensed milk, three and one third of a cups of icing sugar and four and one quarter cups of coconut. You then spoon half the mix into a container and then spread it evenly, you then add a few drops of pink colouring to the remaining mix and spread it on top. It is really tasty, and gives you lots of sugar induced energy!

From Meaghan.

Lost and Found...

...or maybe this is more the case of packed away and then rediscovered again. I had forgotten all about these tea cups until yesterday when I found then buried at the bottom of a box, I think I bought them at Camberwell market awhile ago. Its nice to find new old things again.

From Meaghan.

From my fabric stash..Part 4

I brought this stunner in Albury on an op shopping weekend last summer. It was a curtain and covered in spider nests and smelled really bad. But after a good spin in the wash it came up good as new. Meg made a nice bag for a friend out of it, and I've made a cushion out of it.     

Claire...

Night time strolling!

Last night walking home, I was overwhelmed by a lovely scent, I knew it could only be one thing, wysteria. Growing up I would always look forward to the time this creeper would flower, it really is something special.

From my fabric stash..Part 3

This one is a linen tea towel. It feels lovely and crisp, but I don't know what to do with it. Maybe it would look good framed. I just want to do the right thing by it, I think it deserves it. It shouldn't be packed away any longer.

Claire...

Moving in Spring!

Today Claire and I will be spending the day moving some more things into my new room. For so long I have been living in small little pokey rooms and now all of a sudden I have heaps of space to fill, I almost don't know what to do with it all. All it will take is some living and adjusting I think. Also the lovely Frances Baker and I contributed a post to Craft City Melbourne, its kind of a crafternoon in the Dandenong Ranges, visiting op-shops and tulip festivals. Josie was even good enough to include a map to make getting around a little eaiser.

From Meaghan.   

From my fabric stash..Part 2

I love this fabric so much, originally it was a double quilt cover and now I've made many bags and aprons out of it. I also have it in two other colour ways, but this one is my favourite.  

Claire...