Kelly Casanova Weaving Lessons

Kelly

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Photo courtesy of www.MercatorNet.com

I read about this amazing family in a Catholic newsletter I receive. The Mother of the family (Rosa) is the sister of one of the priests at the church we attend, Father Joseph. Father Jo and Rosa are from a family of 16.
I love to read about large families, particularly those who follow God and leave the family planning to Him.
The selflessness and faith of these parents is awe inspiring, and to think I find my 4 a great challenge!
Families like these remind us that a life filled with “things” is no match for a life filled with people.
You can read the article here.

https://kellycasanovaweavinglessons.com/2009/08/photo-courtesy-of-www.html

Garden Harvest

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Fresh, totally organic and straight from the garden, just beautiful! Gardening has been such a tough slog here, trying to grow things in a drought with water restrictions and horrible, horrible clay soil. But we have our small victories and these are one of them. Husband has just put in a plum and a persimmon tree as well as a couple of climbing roses. Planting anything is a gamble here without the free use of water (even with our own water tank, its uselss without rain to fill it!)
We have so many plans for gardening and growing when we get our “dream” acreage, and for the time being we live in hope that the drought will finally break.

Garden fairy and soap

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One of my nieces (did I ever mention that I have 29 nieces and nephews?!) sent me a lovely handmade card for the baby so I decided to send her something in return (she is 5 years old).

Being a lover of all things pretty and girly, I thought a little 4 inch garden fairy would be just the thing. I was happy to get these light filled shots of the said fairy as it was a gloriously warm and sunny winter’s morn.

I made some goats milk and vanilla bean soap for a gift. It smelled gorgeous in the pot, almost exactly like panna cotta. Speaking of panna cotta, have you ever made it? You must, you must, its simply wonderful and easy too! Here’s a recipe for you:
Err, if you’re on a diet or watching your weight you may have to develop temporary amnesia before you down this cool delight!

Vanilla Panna Cotta

Serves 6

3 cups cream
1 cup milk
the seeds from a lovely moist vanilla bean (you can use vanilla extract, but it ain’t the same!)
3/4 cup sugar
4 tsp gelatine

Bring the milk, cream, vanilla and sugar slowly to the boil. Remove from heat. Dissolve the gelatine in a little warm water just before stirring in to the cream mixture. Allow to cool to warm before pouring into moulds or some sort of container (I just use a plastic rectangular dish with tall sides) Cover with plastic wrap and set in the fridge overnight.

We have only eaten it plain, but next time husband suggested doing some fruit soaked in liquer as an accompaniment. I quite agree!

Wow! Lucky me!

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I love to get beautiful surprises in the mail, so I was thrilled to get a parcel from Marie from my second favourite country, New Zealand (Australia is my first pick of course!) I had mentioned to her that I’m interested in learning needle felting and she offered to send me some wool samples.
Her samples are extremely generous and will see me off to a very good start!

She also sent this cute little bird that she needle felted. There was an audible gasp from 2 year old daughter when she spied this, wool being her toy of preference.

Marie even included a hand written card with a picture of one of her lovely needle felted maidens. What a kind and generous soul! Have a look at her wonderful Etsy shop, there is a lot to love in there!

Gifts

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These gifts are all finished and ready to send tomorrow. A cute tote and a tea towel.

Some beaded jewellery and assorted hair clips. I love giving hand made gifts.

Husband has made a solitary journey to Mass this morning as 3 of the 4 children are sick, the baby is not one of them, thank God. There are a lot of sick people around at the moment, mid winter in a cool region.

We had the little one’s baptism yesterday. It was a simple affair (just how we like it!) with only a few people and a very old and wonderful priest.

Have a lovely and relaxing Sunday.

Some of my favourite dolls…

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I’ve lost count of how many dolls I’ve made and sold now.

I do have my favourites though.

Most are now scattered across the United States.

They’re all different and I loved making each and every one. Some people ask me if its hard to sell them, to let them go. No. I love the thought that someone loves what I do enough to buy one.
I love the thought of a little person getting around with one of my dolls tucked under their arm or into their bed.
This one is still for sale in my Etsy shop, the rest have been sold. I enjoy the challenge of custom orders too, you can purchase directly from the shop or contact me from here.

I hope your day brings you happiness, craftiness and contentment!

THANK YOU!

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I thought I’d just pop in to say a big thanks to all of who have left your kind comments, well wishes and lovely emails over the past few weeks, its been really heart warming.
I hope you can bear with me through this “settling in” period and keep visiting even though there isn’t so much to see right now.
I’m sorely afflicted with the crafter’s/ artist’s (is “craftist” a word?!) bane – my brain is constantly swamped with inspirations but there is no time to bring them to fruition. The ideas haven’t stopped, even if the hands can’t keep up. And I’m about to embark on a graphic design course.
Multi tasking has taken on a new meaning!

God bless you all, have a great day.