Things I Love

I had such fun today, in fact for the last couple of weeks its been good. Good enough to almost feel all is right with the world again and to come by here and say howdy?

"What have you been up to Wendy?" you might ask. 

Today specifically I went shopping and did myself proud finding good deals on winter stuff for everyone except me of course. Even my nanny got shoes and a sweatshirts. That's moms' for you right, nothing new there.

If only someone loved me enough  :-)

The last two weeks I've been in and out of antique and collectable shops  so I'm brimming with ideas, I even ordered two mirrors for the main bedroom which I can't wait to get. I found the most delightful antique dealer that also does great reproductions of 17th to 19th century furniture. We can't all afford the real thing you know, even the reproductions are easily out of reach for most. Check out these Victorian nightstands which i think are fabulosity itself but ridiculously priced at $423 for one by the same store.**sad sigh**

Good news though, I started buying art again as  result of my trips into these obcure little quaint places in Johannesburg. Happiness. 

There are still challenges with my online life though. One, I still don't have a laptop of my own and am stealing hubbies when possible and two, I only got a nanny last week so I'm so busy to catching up on everything else I barely have time to visit to my blog life. But things are looking up, at some point I was a tad bit concerned that I might not get to come back to mine and your blogs which of course would just be tragic.

We are all of 3 months and 4 days today.

Oops, nearly slipped my mind. Here's the latest pic of le bambino **in my head that sounded Italian**. Ain't she just absolutely divine? Even if I'm a little biased. This is the most beautifully calm baby ever, if i'd known this is what exclusive breastfeeding does I'd have made more effort with the others..

Next. I've been busy trying to get the house in order as best as a not working mother can so mostly its turning out to be DIY decor on a diaper budget. Its either that or live in an empty house until I can afford new things again and that would just be enough to have me slit my wrists. So I've been educating myself. In my last posts I mentioned my sewing endeavours. Well that hasn't really gotten anywhere. I've discovered I don't have the patience for all the detail that goes into making clothes. Maybe it will come but I much better prefer the feeling of walking into the house and seeing something I've made in a jiffy. Like my kitchen curtans which I wipped up in two hours this week because my white ones just had no character. I'm quite proud of them but am sure in six months time after i'll have more practice i'll look at them in shame and say to self: what were you doing? _ that's what I said when I took off my other self made ones to replace them with these. By the way this Kathryn White print I got the other day was inspiration for the curtain choice. I love it.

Before
(It had a green
 faded velvet seat).
I was mending broken bits
and sanding by the time I
took this pic *sorry*.

After

I have a chair in my bedroom which was my first upcyle/reupholstery project and I think its time for another and hopefully I'll do better second time around. I picked this chair up at an antique dealer for about $7 because I needed something temporary in the room. I got an off cut fabric from a reuphosterer and went on with my trail and error. I didn't think it was half bad thereafter to be honest I still don't. I'll just cover the upholstery with a boy's room worthy fabric and stick it in my son's room for a desk chair. Believe it or not, covering a straight forward chair with like takes about 30 min. if you have what you need. Does that make you think about your dining table chairs?

I've decided to create a page for my DIY stuff because I've made other things and am in the process of upcycling and repurposing an old bookshelf into 3 separate units (a bookshelf, a linen cupboard and amoire for kitchenware) . I'll stick my detailed instructions on there in case there's another nut out there like yours truly. I find DIY therapeutic and rewarding and can almost guarantee that its the only hobby out there that's an investment with immediate and long term returns.

I can't believe that before the year is over I have reconnected with most of the things I loved. As you know if you follow my blog, things have been tenuous this year and I've been at the precipice of despair a number of times. But glory be to God, here I am, smiling again. I hope life is making you smile too.

Love and kisses from another  DIY Diva!

Baby Mikaela Updates and DIY

Hello friends.

It feels like its been forever and a day. 

Only 6 days left to Baby Mikaela Ogechi Ewurum's entry into our world. We're all very excited here at home. Her siblings speak non-stop about her. My younger kids are sorting out their clothes to share and are worried about the doctor cutting my tummy open, removing the intestines and everything to get to the baby and putting it all back (where do they hear these things) and big brother asked me first thing today if it hurts when they scrub the vernix (white sticky stuff) off the baby. So clearly she's on their minds. 

I'm especially excited because I can't wait to play dress up with my own creations. I just recently bought a sewing machine (about a month now). I've been feeling quite nostalgic lately and been missing my gran who's favourite things in the world was sewing. You'd only find her outside of her sewing station if she had church or something equally mandatory to do. Anyway, I got one, made a couple of blankets for the kids to start myself off and a comforter and very snugly baby blanket for Mikaela. It took me all of two hours to teach myself to thread the thing by the way and I'm still learning about thread tension which I only become aware of when the cotton breaks...Urggh. 

This is the before when I
started sanding things off.

I'll be showing off my little collection on a Watch Me Sew post soon. 

One of the things I really wanted to let you know about is my other DIY activity I've been on lately. We recently started visiting an animal shelter and it has a bookshop and a charity shop. So on a good day when we went to drop off some stuff as we were moving to a new place month end, I'm not sure why but I left with this tea trolley on the right. I suspect I thought I could splash a coat of paint on and use it for something (perhaps carting my books about). I hate the colour it was.

AFTER: A place in the bathroom.

So we moved into the new place soon after the restoration job on the first of the month. One of my pet peeves of the new place besides it being carpeted throughout are the cabinetless bathrooms. Especially  mine.The medicine cabinet is probably the height of a ruler and the width smaller (possibly). So what's a soon to be on a diaper budget to do other than improvise temporarily. 

Come the move, my tea trolley found its place after a  good rub down with sanding paper and several coats of paint. What do you think?

By the way if you're in South Africa visit your nearest SPCA. They really could do with whatever you have to give or buy to feed those poor abandoned animals. My kids love going there, if not for the allergies I'd let them volunteer.

In a nutshell that is my last couple of weeks. I know I said I'd be on holiday for this blog for a long while but there's so much going there that I want to share. So sorry.

Off to my sewing station I go. I cut out the pattern and material for my first baby bunting last night. I'm interested in seeing how that pans out. Cheers