wedding garden AFTER

Well, only 10 days to go and the garden has burst into bloom, just maybe a little early... i am a bit worried it has peaked to soon :( but we shall see. I'm sure SOMETHING will be flowering on the 21st; now i am in maintanence mode. And i have become obsessed with long range weather forecasts. I have no problem with rain but i hate hate HATE wind (fingers toes and everything in between crossed)...

Dangles

I stayed up til all hours last night cutting out all these little shapes and bits from some paper offcuts i got from a stationary shop. My hand has serious cramp from holding my rusty old scissors! This is my vision...

It was a long weekend and i got so much gardening done it was geat! The spring has been so warm this far everything is booming and boosting - including the weeds, thus much weeding was done ans still remains. I found this cosmo in one of my planters, the petals are completely tubular. Is this phenomenal or merely strange? It certainly spun me out. Son had a friend to stay and i got a good taste of what it would be like to have three kids, interesting...s

The fennel flan i made was a hit!! We had to eat it picnic style in the living room as my table is smothered in wedding craft - to be blogged at a later date...

If the sun doesn't come out soon i'm going to go nuts, thank christ there is a decent race track around our lounge/kitchen and thank christ for my cat... he gives me faith

The Goldfish Moon

Oh my goodness just realised it is almost 2 months since my last post! This is because i have devoted my every spare minute since then to finishing a book in time to sell at Sonny's school fair, so here is a preview:

I have just this minute sent of the final draft to the publisher, so all is underway. My only regret is that i havn't managed to save more to get more printed, it will be a small stall...

Sunrise thru my boy's eyes

'Twas an early start this morning; below the sunrise you can see the concrete block wall in our back yard that i am to paint before te wedding. Yep, put it on the list along with 'finish bridesmaids dresses' and 'order oysters' etc...

Flighty like a fantail

Ishta refuses to sit in her high-chair; lucky we have a nice lil Ishy-size table...

I have trouble seeing things thru to fruition. I am very passionate and maybe thats why the fire heats very quickly, is fanned into an inferno, then sucks all the oxygen from me and is smothered when i can't keep up the pace...

I have decided to self-publish a small children's book to sell at Sonny's school fair in Nov. It is less than 3 months til my wedding and i havn't organised shit. Book club? What book club..?

Gorgeous Friday

* Gardening for hours, transplanted an olive tree, involving much digging (literally my arse off)

*Complementary makeover from a quite lovely clinique girl (though not quiet)

*Dinner with my darling; we didn't have the snails but we did cuddle a frenchman (who, incidentally, had me hold a giant bar of belgian chocolate...

A present...

for Miffy and the gorgeous Rueben. I think they are coming to visit tommorrow? I do hope so, i so want to meet the little one. Ooooh little boys are so lovely, lovely lovely little babies. I can't wait! Havn't seen Miffy in an age, except by Facebook imagery and thats useful but hardly counted...

So here it is, my second attempt at water-colour surrealism...

I found Sheree's comment on previous post most useful, thank you my love. If you happen to read this Sheshe, for some reason i cant comment on your blog?! Most annoying, i really wanted to tell you thanks for the hints and that i wait in trepidation for your most glorious exhibition, i love what i see and i see what i love... I found these frames at Kmart, $14 a pop complete with matte board! I'm going back tommorrow to clean out their stock.

The Crafty Pukeko

The cute little steiner shop at sonny's school is lookin for an image of a pukeko to use on a new business card. I have been volunteering on wednesday afternoons for the last two terms and finally made it to a "shop meeting" last week, so was privvy to discussions of searching for said image of said bird. I have been having a play with a set of watercolour paints and have hated all attempts. I have always used oils, being somewhat of a painting snob, and am finding watercolours frustrating to the max... but tonight i have had a breakthrough. YES the key, as i have found, is to use much thinner VEILS of colour, and build up vividness in that way...

labels

Just wish-fully thinking and manifesting my dream wedding...

A sweet face

I finished my dolly, babies got a sweet face. I love the idea behind such simple features, you really could imagine this lil boy experiencing any emotion, and even with the mere suggestion of expression i still catch a glimpse of a cheeky and cheerful disposition... there will be much love and mischief between the two, i'm sure...

A name?

I have almost finished my first jointed Steiner doll!! He is soooo lovely, i am in love with him like a newborn from my own womb (well, almost) and i feel he has such personality and soul. I can't WAIT to give him to Sonny, i just know he will love him so much and he will be such a special friend to him at a time when he particularly needs one. I feel blessed that Sonny has been spared so far from peer pressure concerning toys that are 'manly' and that it is common-place for boys to play with their "babies" at his school; if every man in this world had had his nurturing side nurtured as a boy, what a different life experience we'd all be having...

What i am wondering is what he will name him? And will he stay 'male'? Sonny suddenly began to love teddies about a year ago (something which took me completely by surprise as he had never been interested in them before) and several are now his best mates. They all have to be present and accounted for in bed each night before lights are out, but what i find interesting is that they are all female. I did an interactive piece at uni where viewers were invited to decorate a paper doll and place it within a 'scene' that i had created. 100% of participants created a doll of their own sex, all the girls made girls all the boys made boys...

I remember when Ben told me that i called the shots on how Sonny was raised, that he wouldn't fight me on anything, that there was only one thing he put his foot down on: BOYS DON'T PLAY WITH DOLLS! I bought Sonny one the next day, and now i've made him one with some soul.

5 things

I saw a great game on Oh Mishka (see blogs i follow) that i wanted to participate in, it went like this:

Grab your camera.Take pictures of 2 things in the room you're in right now.Put them on your blog and say why you chose those 2 items to photograph.Then comment here with the link to your blog post so we can all see each others' photos!

BUT i have never been able to follow the rules, and i can at least see my garden from the room im in right now... so here's 5 flowers in my garden i'm loving right now:

The last isn'y strictly a flower, but this heuchera is called "Southern Comfort" and therefore close to my heart *sigh*

Please note that the anenomes are not included, they are just starting to flower and ARE NOT my favourites, as their stems are too short and stumpy to do anything with. Oh trial and error, i am being tested...

Orange

I want to live inside an orange poppy

carried by a chubby fist

Or maybe be a cat...

home again

My Gorgeous girl has been in hospital the last couple of nights, as have i with her, but no fear- we are home again and wellish. So no gardening, and also i have still not finished the wedding invitations i have been trying to send this week (thats right Sheshe it's not just you, we only just finished our list last week so we havnt actually invited anyone yet - love your blog by the way) and i MUST MUST MUST get this done. Oh how i love to come home... I must rush out and water my seedlings that i hear screeching in thirst and neglect.

Beautiful day

I gardened my ass off today. It was completely gorgeous. I planted two new trees and many many seedlings, weeded some, potted up some itty bitty seedlings... i planted out alot of pansies i got the other day, they are no good for bouquets but i want to get my front garden bed ready for the wedding which is in *gasp* four months. It is really easy to find pansies in my

wedding colours - purple and orange. Check out these jokers:

I have another mystery daffodil! And its not even the same as the other. It's just a lone, sweet smelling, glorious little bloom...
Sean found a good sized carrot in the vege patch, sadly not purple. Ishy munched on it to the very stump! I really loved today...

Arch ways

I am obsessing over what kind of backdrop Sean and I will be married under. I would like to make some kind of arch, maybe like so:

Or... i really like the circus feel of the yellow and white fabric in the pic in my previous post.

Also, Hera has been digging up my poppies. I may be forced to beat her...

The Dog with Itchy Feet

My wedding

When i started this blog i intended it to record my garden as a process, from conception to realisation. BUT in a sudden resurgance of enthusiasm i feel like writing about my upcoming wedding. The theme is a "bohemian circus" and i have many pictures for inspiration, but am struggling to make my vision a reality on our tight budget. BUT where thers a will theres a way...

Embroidery

In the spirit of all things flowery, it is a very rainy day and i am working on my new "thing", an embroidery that the mother in law had tucked away in a suitcase. I am in love with the colours of embroidery floss, it's like painting with the best and most vivid thick oils.

My plants are loving this rain after all the sunshine of the last week, and it is suddenly so warm! I can positively hear them slurping up the watery goodness. A false spring me thinks, it certainly FEELS like spring, but surely not in August?!

Strawberries

Another stunner day, did alot of weeding YAY! Took Ishta to playgroup at Steiner school this morning then spent the whole afternoon in the garden planting strawberries. It was slightly a mission as i had to first move the strawflower seedlings that had sprouted up in the vege garden, then move over some compost, pick out all the centipedes for my dear son to "play" with, THEN plant the strawberries. I got these ones from the gorgeous lady at the farmers market who sells the edible plants. She is such a funny old hippy, i love her. She sells the most amazing herbs, and next week i am going to buy a blackcurrant bush from her.

My most gorgeous fiance cooked dinner tonight, and now he is going to babysit while i go to my Soul Doll workshop. We are apparently meditating on our 14-21st years tonight, which may be heavy as those were some particularly dark years for me... but its a lovely supportive atmosphere to explore them in, plus Osha always has REALLY good rosehip tea...

Indian summer?

It is a phenomenally beautiful day, it is a crime to be inside on the computer, but sean has taken the kids out and i just wanted to post a quick blog before they get back! I have some compost to spread, it hasn't rotted down as well as i had hoped. Apparently there is a real art to making compost which i have yet to delve into passionately, my style is just chuck it all in there and hope it magically transforms into nourishing crumbly goodness for my garden beds...

And check out all my seedlings a-sprouting! My gorgeous sean built this little hidey away around the side of the garage which is a total sun-trap, and my babies love it! The only downside is i think my neighbours may get to eavesdrop on all the secrets and wisdom that i reveal as i chat away to my lovelies...

Petit gardens

Aside from my larger flower bed and the two raised beds in the back, i have many little sneaky spots filled up with any type of pot, box or container i can find. Apparently bulbs do quite well in pots, as do herbs (for scented foilage) and sunflowers. And of course i have had raging success with marigolds (which are not actually for the market bouquets but for my wedding) so if everything else blooms as successfully i will be making mucho grande posies...

Lovely anenomes