crafting

Getting creative on holiday

| poppypeach

What has been happening over the last couple of weeks. For one, I worked crazy hours on my last week of work before the winter break. So over the first week of break it was time to get down and get busy with crafts and projects that have been waiting to be bought to life. It has been so good as I got out the craft boxes that need to be dealt with and began making starting with needle felting and knitting then it was working with clay and making jewellery to add to my winter clothes. The fun part was getting out my knitting machine for a couple of weeks and knitting up some layers of wool for the rest of winter – it has been ages since I got out my Brother chunky knitting machine so some online tutorials came to the rescue and I got to work with a plan of knitting and felting pieces to create layering vests. Then came the brilliant idea of cutting up an old cardigan that is annoying to wear and sew and felt the pieces together – it is so good to create again! Next week will be minimal creating as I am back at Uni so my study comes first.

And yes we have all been keeping our distance – this is from the tram trip I took to the city today for my first aid course for work.

In the background our house has been moving along and I went to meet a landscaper there the other day. There is joinery in place and the painting has been done to a point and the move in date is still another couple of months away. I was imagining myself working in the kitchen with our NEFF oven and gas cooktop with the island for prep space – so much fun to be had when we finally move, the countdown is on!!

Here are some of my creations that I have been making over the last few weeks while I have been away from Uni and had time to clear out and make. The two vests I made with my knitting machine are layering pieces for winter using an old jumper sewing together felted yarn pieces. This was yarn that was donated to me ages ago so I am happy to see it in action.

My rainbow needle felted cardi is a project that has been on my list forever and I finally built up the courage to start and it was quite rewarding and meditating sitting there at night needle felting away – I had no idea it was so addictive. So now all my holey jumpers have been fixed with needle felting 😀

I have been making with oven baked clay and I first started with making beads to jazz up my winter outfits for work. I also made some dangling earrings and now I am making stud earrings which I love as they do not get stuck in my with high scarves and jackets. I wore a pair out to the city today and they were so comfortable so I will add them to the Etsy shop in the future. Plus I have crocheted a lovely little lap blanket that doubles as a cape or a place for our rescue kitty Apricot to sleep.

It has been so good to be free to work away at my crafts over the last few weeks and make and create. I am layered in warm wool and can accessorise with colour. I had no idea how much fun it would be to work with oven bake clay and add signature crochet strands of colour from yarn I found in Portland, Oregon. Next week it is back to reality and studying again and then I will be back at work, so I gotta enjoy this free time while I can.

Calling upon our super powers

| poppypeach

I have had to call upon my super powers as the new change of pace has really been a shock to my routine. I have gone from groundhog day of everything being the same for two months to working as an educator with 3, 4 and 5 year old little people. Whew it has been exhausting but I know what centres me and makes me happy is crafting while I am away from my studies or work.

Now that I am finished with the garage organisation for our move in 3 months!! I have bags of stuff to donate and have already sold some fabric on Marketplace. My other projects of selling my vintage clothes collection is at my Etsy shop and I soon will be adding my beaded creations below once I have given them a road test when I go to work and see if they are up for the challenge of a day out at work with children.

I have now completed an induction for my part time job and seem to be getting into the swing of getting up early to be at work by 8am. Which is fine as I am a morning person. This beautiful rainbow was created by the kindergarteners at the head office which I knew of the location as it was the end of the train line. The building had a great view of the city in the distance. So this week was a bit crazy and I have been doing extra shifts as a cold has to be treated as COVID and my co-educators have been stuck at home recovering and waiting for their test results – which are negative, whew!!

So while I have been having a nice amount of downtime in between work and cooking amazing seasonal dinners with food from CERES I have been making. I bought some Fimo to make mobiles when in isolation but I later decided I would make some beads and it has been so fun to play with clay again. I really love making the beads and also some earrings with the mix of colours. I reckon they make great gifts and I can also gather up a supply for a local market – yay! I have always wanted to try to combine my textiles crafting with clay and these are the perfect combo to jazz up a winter outfit.

After cleaning out my fabric stash down to one big box, I found this gorgeous cat fabric that I had made into a dress for Miss H and now that she is too big for it I cut it up and pieced it together for a skirt for another year or so I reckon and then it can be passed onto another cat lover!

As I am getting used to this new routine with going to work and time at home, I am making sure that the free time I have now is not wasted so my plan is to needle felt a cardigan in rainbow, do some knitting on the knitting machine, make a spring dress, finish a baby hat for my friend and continue to create with clay. Now that I have dug out my supplies I plan on getting busy and creating for the next couple of weeks before Uni starts up again in the second week of the kids school holidays.

There will be many more opportunities to photograph sand castles, children’s paintings and their creations when I am at work to document my learning on my teaching blog. Documentation and reflection is so important where I am learning so much from the experienced teachers at my work, it is so good to be working again in something I enjoy!

Crafting in the time of COVID-19

| poppypeach

This year I have spent at least two weeks between posts – which is slack for me as I like to keep this like a journal of my goings on. It’s funny you think with all the inside time we are having that you have time for plenty of other projects that are on the “To Do List”. Having to stay at home, it has been good to get into a routine with doing my Qi Gong meditation, have breakfast, exercise online with Body Combat and then study for the rest of the day and then make dinner. Then at night time chill out and craft with cold fingers! At the moment I feel like I want to be crafting all the time to make more layers to keep me warm in this icy cold rental property we are living in. This place is ridiculous it is hot as hell in the summer and colder than the outside temperature in the winter. It has heating which is useless as they are electric wall heaters that suck up energy and our power bill is outrageous $1500 for a quarter of a year – yep that sucks!

Anyway I have been researching and writing for my Arts Education folio which includes a 600 word reflection piece. That is the thing I really enjoy about teaching it is the constant reflection on your life and how your teaching will harmonise to your sense of being, which has meant that this unit of Arts Education reignited my energy to teach an integrated arts curriculum and how important it is for the kids in the 21st century. The arts teaches critical and creative thinking, which is a must have in this day and age.

I have been going through all the yarn I have at home and knitting up many hats. This hat is a fave and it is the Starving Artist pattern on Ravelry and it is so warm and comfy for my short out of control hair at the moment – I have a hair cut booked in June!! It is a very easy pattern to follow that looks great on as well. This Malabrigo yarn I have knitted and frogged multiple times and now I think I have finally found the right pattern for it. The colours are perfect for this hat. This yarn is also knitted up into a night cap and cowl to keep me warm at night – you gotta do what you have to when the nights drop to 3 degrees celsius in a house with zero warmth.

When the payday came through I decided to track down my favourite Malabrigo Rasta and this was found at a yarn store in Brisbane. This has to be my favourite yarn of all time, it is perfect for the Melbourne winter and this is going to be a hat that will go down over my ears, so looking forward to knitting this one up as it will be so comfortable and warm. Aaahhh Malabrigo!

My other craft is crochet and you can see this project in the top pic laying all over my assignment notes. I have had to make a lap blanket to keep warm when studying at my desk. So I have been gathering all the scratchy yarn and making a blanket out of it – you can never have enough blankets in winter – especially in this ice box. It is moving along quite well with that giant crochet hook and is a cinch in single crochet. It is so important to balance work with the arts and crafts for me as it keeps me on an even keel as I always need an outlet to create constantly no matter what I am making. Yes definitely the arts really keep me going and provide the grounding for my creative energy.

Crafting in times of sadness, heals the soul

| poppypeach

In times of crisis humans collectively get together to help each other and get stuff done! After feeling so overwhelmed at the mass destructions and loss with the Australian bushfires (that are still burning) I wanted to help. I saw online that the Animal Rescue Collective Craft Guild were looking for items for all the rescue animals, so I started doing a few at home. Later I discovered that our local library has a MakerSpace and asked if we could use the room and get a group together to sew for the animals. I was so excited when they said yes as long as I organised it. It was such a surprise that I have had to put study on hold for a few hours this week to make it happen. So I advertised on the Good Karma network and at the gym and got a group of 5 to 7 people for the three days this week to help out with ironing and cutting fabric donations and sewing on the four machines at the library.

While we were working at the library, the librarian shared the above article with us and it was so exciting to see the love for all the animals plus we got to confirm who we were sending the pouches too at our local hub in Melbourne.

So by the end of the week we have made close to 100 between our little group and have cut out some liners ready to go next week. We are planning to do some more sewing this week on Thursday and Friday to keep the momentum going! All with for the animals 😀

Oh and if you are keen to help the animals they need monetary donations to transport everything around this massive country of ours.

Now I better get back to my assignments and study for this week!

Wishing you a very merry Chrissy

| poppypeach

Finally, I have some time to write what have been going on for the last couple of weeks. It seems like a while ago, so here goes! There has been a lot of awesome Chrissy celebrations with my work friends and then I got a cold from late nights studying writing an essay, going to work early, hanging out with kids and their germs and feeling run down. So last weekend was pretty quiet, which gave me time to catch up on wrapping prezzos and all that jazz. Then came the last week of my teaching placement, which was intense as it was all about wrapping up so all the kids work, placing their crafts in their goodie bags, getting the kids ready for the singing presentation to their families with a fabulous spread of food and saying goodbye to the kids who were transitioning to school. I have to say it was full on!

I have enjoyed my time in early childhood hanging out with the 3 to 5 year olds. The educators I worked with planned a tie dye afternoon so that the children could wear them for their performance, the one on the left is the one we all tied together with rubber bands for the kids and used the tie dye kit and the one on the right is using a food dye which worked just as well. It was very well executed where we used lids of big plastic boxes and the kids used the bottles of dye and just spread it on their t-shirts. You would think 3 year olds this is gonna be crazy but we managed to do it in a good amount of time and not much dye was on the kids, as for me I had blue hands for days!

The other fun project I managed to make with the kids was vegan gingerbread – this was a tricky one, as the dough was a bit dry as we could have messed up the ratio of flour to wet ingredients which was nut butter and golden syrup. This cooking project was with very enthusiastic 5 year old children who were eating the dough scraps that even fell on the floor. Their biscuits are cut out here and they were cooked but were quite dry when they came out of the oven, so it was certainly an interesting experience! Next time, I would consider smaller groups and doing the project multiple times.

The gingerbread house on the right is made by my daughter who loves to bake, she did this one over a weekend with making the gingerbread one day and the next day we researched the royal icing which would be the mortar to hold the house together. It was an very delicious recipe which is even better as we could snack on it after we took some pics.

I also finished my tree skirt for our makeshift tree this year! I managed to wrangle a bunch of leftover yarn to make this very colourful crochet tree skirt which is sitting underneath our stash of pressies this year. For a family who was pretty disorganised about Chrissy I feel we managed to get it together reusing the paper from our move gift wrap!

And our house is looking amazing, we can imagine checking out James working in his study, checking out who is coming to visit down our hallway, looking through windows while doing the dishes and looking up we have a roof! It is so exciting to see the progress since our initial deep dig in the ground and now the house is framed and ready for its details of the windows and doors, the black charred timber, weatherboard and brick for the exterior. The beautiful recycled timber Tasmanian Oak floors and the kitchen and bathroom with their terrazzo floors. We even went shopping for the kitchen yesterday and trying to find a stovetop and oven that will serve our cooking adventures, so good though so overwhelming!

Its time for a break now, so our builders will have time off and be back into it after New Years where we will see much more unfold. I am so happy to be back home and to be able to wish my friends a very merry Chrissy at long last 😀

Teaching Practicum and lots of crafting

| poppypeach

So far over the last three weeks I have come home covered in glitter, glue, fabric dye, food dye and flour. I have certainly had a blast at this kindergarten teaching practicum and I have been lucky enough to be working with an amazing mentor teacher and co-educators. Life has been full on this week with completing an essay for a fourth year uni subject and having to go to work plus keep up with my other two subjects – I have to say I am feeling pretty tired. But tomorrow night I get to go out and have a drink or two with my work mates – yay!!

Oh and the cute bear on the glitter chair is one of the completed bears from the Year 5/6 cohort at my daughters school that I volunteer for, it came out so well.

So the kids have been so busy crafting and the windows are covered in so many Chrissy themed items, I am a bit of a fan of these stained cellophane windows which I had to cut out the other day with a scalpel, one of the joys of teaching! There has been so much glitter everywhere I go that I have had to dust it up and recycle it for another project, the kids go crazy with it!

Also the time we have in the arvo together to reset the class has been fun too. Recently we have been putting on music and getting everything prepped for the next class! I cannot believe I have been on my prac for 3 weeks already and it is nearly over. We were very lucky to have a dragonfly visit our classroom the other day when we were prepping the class, there are so many critters that come be as the creek surrounds the kinder. Across the road from my work, at the lake, is this amazing tree in bloom. It is a Silky Oak and I just love the flowers it produces as the colour is incredible. I had to look it up as I had no idea what it was and the flower reminded me of a grevillea so I did a internet search and finally found its name. Going for lunch by the lake, it is full of life with so many water birds and a perfect place to recharge when I am at the kinder for a full day.

Last Friday I met my friend in the city for a couple of drinks at an old favourite water hole in the city – Hells Kitchen. We used to head over there every week, when we worked in publishing and hang out and drink the night away before heading on the train – feeling quite happy! After our drinks we went across the way to have some delicious dumplings before checking out Federation Square and the Xmas tree and all the cool decorations. Its so good to be back in Australia for a hot Chrissy, though it is not feeling like summer at all with 18 degree celsius days.

And an update on our house, the carpenters have been super busy and have framed most of the house and now the scaffolding is up for the roof. Also there are a couple of windows in place with the curved walls downstairs, it is so close yet so far!! We are so keen to move in 😀

Working mum/teacher life and cat rewards

| poppypeach

Finally taking some time out to write what I have been up to for the last couple of weeks! This is the first time in ages that I have posted intermittently here but life is a little bit busy at the moment. I am nearly half way through my first teaching practicum in Australia and I am just loving it. It is exhausting but the kids are so engaged and enthusiastic about everything, whats not to love! For my lesson with the kids I created a table with books, insects and magnifying glasses for the 5 year old class I am working with. It is called Insect Detective and since introducing it to them on Monday they were engaged in finding insects in the yard. We watched a video (the technology requirement for the AITSL teaching standards) and we were off into the yard with our clipboard, identification sheet and pencil to go out and count the insects in the yard. I have to say it was an astounding success as all the kids participated one way or another and it will create a connection to the natural world that makes you appreciate it that little bit more.

The rest of the time in my prac I have been observing the children, recoding conversations and making christmas crafts. I especially like this craft my mento teacher found where the kids went outside to collect sticks from the playground and then had to sort them in order from smallest to biggest. I love how it has a maths element to it and the kids were really enjoying it too, especially the last part where they get to decorate the tree with sequins and glitter. I have been coming home covered in glue, glitter, paint and dye and I cannot believe that you can be paid to hang out with kids and create! The cool thing is that this experience in early childhood is showing me how important early childhood educators can be for a little human, they are little sponges and the good behaviour that you model as a good citizen these children can replicate and this is where the magic happens. Humanity needs more places that are welcoming and diverse like the kinder I am working at and I am realising the profound impact an educator can have on children in their early years.

I am supposed to be writing an essay at the moment but I wanted a break from the grind and the opportunity to look at my life. Sunday I went to the Cat Lovers Show with the family. I was so excited to see the cats from Catmantoo and there was so much stuff to buy for cats as well. We found a great cat cafe near us in Preston, where we will get out next fur baby. It was a super day out with lots of cats but no pats! Well we could go to the adoption centre and pat some cats but that was a bit dangerous as we would love to adopt more kitties!

    Busy little bee

    | poppypeach

    Checking out what has been happening in my life over the last couple of weeks and it has been full! It has been over a week since I posted what has been happening here and since I had an assignment due last week and then I had to start drafting an essay with my hubby out of town there was a lot going on!

    I have been enjoying the volunteering at my daughters school and seeing the progress of the kids felt animals! They came out so well, with each animal having a personality of their own 😀

    Our house has made some incredible progress with the carpenters adding on Level 2 which is the kids rooms. We are so happy to see that there is so much happening on the build and we can start to get a feel for the place now.

    This artwork had the best pun by Tinky the artist:-
    It was a filthy job, but the rubbish removalists thought it was their best work yet.
    Barek artwork on found signage
    Sea spirit

    Today, which is Sunday Funday, we enjoyed some family time out, before it goes all crazy for the next 20 days when I start work full time on my prac. Today was a lovely 24 degree day and we went out into Collingwood to Off the Kerb gallery to see the Barek exhibition that is showing for a short time. We so wanted to buy another piece of his work but as we have not unpacked what we already have in our art boxes for the gallery space in our house we decided we will go visit him in the studio when we see what space we have to jazz up. We all love his work and especially the pieces on the found signage.

    I reckon there will be sporadic times of posting over the next four weeks, as I start my teaching prac for Uni where I have be documenting my experience constantly plus I have an essay to write for another subject and I have this great media unit I am doing at the moment too. So up until Chrissy it will be full on. Gotta get to bed early for my big week this week!