daisy chain

Jacarandas

I love the colour purple and I love Jacaranda trees.In fact, this blog was nearly called Jacaranda Dreaming! At the moment they seem to be everywhere I look, in full and glorious bloom.My childhood home was on Jacaranda Drive. It was such a wonderful,safe and happy place filled with fun times and happy memories of a loving and close family. The other day I travelled quite a distance to celebrate the retirement of a teaching friend I met when I was an eager first out teacher ready to start my new career.

On the way I made a detour here.....

I had a nostalgic wander down my old street and past my old house. Even though none of my mum's roses were in the front yard and our black and white letter box was long gone, it still was a neat and well cared for home and oh so familiar. I resisted the temptation to pose as a door to door sales person of some sort, to catch a glimpse of the inside. I am sure our lovely wallpaper (by now very retro and cool again!) is also long gone.

The red roofed one down the very end was my house.

Still on the Jacaranda theme this is the road I travel down everyday when I am nearly at school.

And this amazing specimen is in the school yard.

And as we Junior Primary teachers sing with our students at this time of year,"When the bloom of the Jacaranda tree is here, Christmas time is near!"

A Special Gift

Not much craft going on around here lately as I'm busy with school end of year "stuff"! It seems as though just when I cross one thing off my list another couple of things are added! A bit like Mary Poppins' bag-a bottomless pit of things that just appear!

On Friday evening we had our end of year dinner with the parents of the children in my class(I teach year twos in a two teacher unit of 54 students).It was a lovely evening with a chance to relax and talk in a social setting rather than amongst the chaos of the classroom.I was very chuffed indeed with my present!It was a print from a canvas that each student had contributed to as part of our art show that happened a couple of weeks ago. We have some very talented parents who co-ordinated everything and worked tirelessly on the finished products. This will be something that I will treasure always.

Each child drew and painted themselves in the playground and also signed their name. What a wonderful piece of art!

Working on my "to do" List

Managed to cross one thing off my "to do" list. Here is a peek at my Secret Santa gift ready to post to it's secret destination.

I have also designed and have started to make my Christmas postcards for another swap I am involved in.

One finished, 7 to go.

I had a wonderful few hours at the Quilt and Craft Show admiring other people's handiwork(there are some amazing quilt makers out there!!) and adding to my fabric stash.

These Japanese prints caught my eye.

And I can never go past some Kaffe Fassett brights without buying a few!

Alas, the weekend is almost over. School reports were also on my "to do" list. How many did I do? A big fat ZERO!!

Prototypes

I have gone a bit Softie mad around here! I had an idea to design some that looked a lot like flowers. Each time I made one something would change. They look more like punks than flowers but that is ok!!

This one is off as part of the Softies for Mirabel group.

This one is a gift for a friend's baby.

And this one is a Christmas gift.

Even though I didn't take the hand made pledge, I am going to try to make as many gifts by hand as I can this Christmas. I am not very fast at making things but I will see how I go. I can't believe we are in November and I have noticed that the shops are a not so gentle reminder that Christmas is well and truly on it's way!

Here they are all in a row-Happy Punk Flowers!!!!!!!

Here are some more very happy flowers-Yay!! We've had rain-lots of it!