Right now

We're pretending we live in an inner city loft while we sit in the dark and look at the exposed brick. The diy renovation has well and truly begun! The dust covering everything may be the end of me. I am choosing to look at this as an opportunity for personal development and letting go of some of my neatnik ways.
This is how it looked on Saturday. Apparently, he doesn't believe in drop sheets.
Yeah.
I'll let you know how that goes.
The dining table is one of Mr Duyvken's creations. Give that man a brick pallet, a hammer and some furniture wax and he can do beautiful things. He made this 11 1/2 years ago when we were newlyweds with a very small budget for setting up house together. We collected brick pallets from the side of the road and he made a few things that we still use and love. He's a clever fellow that Mr Duyvken.

Perspective

I've been thinking a lot about perspective over the past few days because I had cause to say "...but I've only got 5 children" in conversation with someone who has 9 children.

I regularly need to grab these opportunities to reflect on the big picture; to count my blessings and not just busy myself with the next few hours. It's lovely to be so consumed but it's not good for me without these little rest stops every now and again.

So here's to living an examined life and to finding the time to do it.

Curiouser and curiouser

J brought home his very own felt creation recently and was very proudly showing it to his sisters when they had this very amusing exchange. I love overhearing things like this - bliss! C to J: Hey J, I like your snake.
J: It's not a snake.
C: It looks like a snake.
J: No it doesn't. It's a worm.
G piping in as she invariably does: It is a snake, J.
J: No, it's not, it's a worm.
G: I'm pretty sure it's a snake.
J: No, it has to be a worm. I know it's not a snake because snakes don't wear hats.

Can't argue with that.

Family of Seven Quilt Tutorial

Julie from Small Matters asked if I could share the pattern for my crosses quilt and I am thrilled to help her out. I haven't had my sewing machine set up for weeks so I cheated for this tutorial and just used paper and tape. Hopefully, it still makes sense! I didn't use a pattern but rather determined the size of the blocks based on the templates that I own and the fat quarter stack that I wanted to use. I used my 6 inch ruler so I could check each block was square before sewing it all together. I used 7 fat quarters of patterned fabric and some solid fabric (a little over half a yard) to make the top. There are 60 cross blocks in the finished quilt, 56 in the centre and 4 in the borders.
Want to make your own? First you'll need to get out your supplies and cut your patterned fabric into 6 inch squares and the solid fabric into 1 1/2 inch strips. Next slice your square wherever you like,grab your solid strips,

and stitch together. Slice again and stitch again.

Now you just need to trim the block and you're done.

Once you've got a pile together lay them out anyway you like and stitch your top together. I wanted to minimise the separation between the borders and the centre of the top so used the main solid (kona ash) as the borders and included trimmed cross blocks.
Why are 7 of the blocks red? Wll, there is one red cross for each person in my family so it's like a secret message hidden in the quilt.

I'd love to see one if you make your own so please leave a comment with a link.

Mr Duyvken

Excuse the bra strap look, that's actually a top under a drapey overshirt but in the pic it looks like a big old strap :-)
This was taken a few weeks ago at the school's fundraising dinner. The invitation listed the dress code as Black or Glam and Mr Duyvken, being Mr Duyvken, went straight to Glam Rock. He had hopes that we'd look like 2 of Poisons lost members but it wasn't to be. Black for me, I did have a baby less than 3 months ago thanks very much. He was not deterred and even though it was more disco than glam in the end the wig pulled it all together and we had a ball.
He was the only person in fancy dress but didn't mind at all. We couldn't be more different in some ways and this is definitely one of them, I'm more of a blend in than stand out kind of a girl. His endless capacity for fun is one of the loveliest things about him and this picture demonstrates that pretty well.

Pilates

For some reason this really amuses me, perhaps I need to get out more.

Eaveless

A silent band of hazmat-suited men arrived early yesterday morning to remove the (asbestos) eaves from our little house. They were led by a chatty lad from the country who nearly fell over when children kept appearing out of the kitchen and getting into the car. It was like one of those vaudeville gags where an impossible number of people keep appearing out of a phone box or a car but without the honky tonk piano soundtrack running underneath. Although, that would have good :-)
When I arrived home the house looked quite odd. Just a neat little box sitting in the dark with many signs of care and habitation (trimmed lawns and children's bikes sitting under the carport)and many signs of construction (tree protection fencing and the aforementioned eavelessness). After 3 1/2 years of preparing a DA application and a lot of budget massaging it is very exciting to be at this stage.
Mr Duyvken has been pottering around these past few weeks knocking out random bricks and banging about under the house. Frankly, I've been a little concerned that we may spend quite some time living in a too-small house decorated with a very post-post-modern aesthetic, deconstructing the suburban modern (but not modernist) red brick homes of the early 1960's by throwing a little 1990's grunge at it.

This is, by no means, the only hole in the house. The neighbours, I am sure, are thrilled.
But this afternoon, a totally camp and truly delightful delivery driver arrived and left us with 4 pallets loaded with promise.

C and JW danced on the bricks in the rain by way of celebration. Things are heading in the right direction!