Linaloo

More fruity stuff

 
Deviating from my normal strawberry and rhubarb jam that I've made for the past few years, although I'll probably end up making that too, this week I've made apricot jam.  It's pretty dark because I had some problems with the set and ended up reboiling the whole batch, (largely due, I suspect, to the fact that I decided to wing it with my own recipe) but the end result is yummy indeed.  

Today is the last day of school and if the weather holds up, I think a trip to the local strawberry fields might be in order.

Berry brain freeze

Berry season is in full swing and frankly I can never get enough of them, with yogurt and granola for breakfast, in pancakes, muffins, cakes, I'm really not fussy.  As a rule however, I'm generally not an icecream or frozen yogurt lover as I seem to be susceptible to painful brain freeze when eating anything frozen.  But I make an exception for this one, David Lebovitz's frozen strawberry yogurt (without the alcohol). Nothing quite beats the homemade flavour.
This little contraption is a hand crank ice cream maker purchased at my favourite thrift store last summer for a couple of dollars.   It's a perfect way to get the children involved - they crank the handle for 5 minutes, it goes back in the freezer for an hour, gets cranked again for 5 minutes and so on for about 4 or 5 hours.  Not too labour intensive and really worth the effort!

 
So good, it makes brain freeze almost bearable.

 

 

Garlands galore :: jumping on the bunting bandwaggon

Right now, in my house you will find a crochet garland (won recently in a giveaway from Jo) adorning the fireplace:
Gingham bunting hanging over the patio doors in my kitchen from Tess:
Union Jack bunting on the new deck from Jane:
And cards for teachers, waiting to be written on my kitchen table:
A big merci à tous for your kindness!

Practical making: a bedskirt

 
Not the sexiest title for a blog post, nor the most riveting of subjects for that matter, but I do love a bit of practical making.  It seems the homemaker in me is always slightly smug and pleased with herself when she's able to put her sewing skills to practical use. (Although this project barely counts as sewing, as it involved just 2 little seams).

Our old bedskirt ripped ages ago and I have have been on the hunt for a replacement for while.  I've had a hard time even finding something suitable and I couldn't bring myself to spend a small fortune on one.  I knew I could probably make one but the thought of the amount of time it would take for the tedious measuring and accurate assembly of something for the bottom of my bed put me off until I happened upon this simple solution here. With a little bit of measuring, cutting of a flat sheet that has never been used, some joining, hemming and saftey pinning to the box spring and hey presto!  A practial, cheap and easy fix in just over an hour!  Admittedly white is probably not the most practical colour and I will likely end up changing it for a natural linen shade eventually, but it's certainly better than seeing all the dust bunnies lurking underneath the bed! 
I am so easily pleased.

Summer journals

 
 
I'm a year late completing this project having only just printed off photographs and taken these to the copy shop for binding but I wanted to share my children's 2010 summer journals.  Last year, thanks to some inspiration by friends with older offspring, I forced gently motivated my children to write/draw a little something during the summer holidays about what they had done each week as a kind of keepsake. To complete the journals I simply added some tickets, swimming certificates, photographs etc with a bit of glue tape. Despite their relatively low tech assembly, I am excited by the end result, in a kind of dorky "wish I had done this when I was young" way.  I love that they are able to see how far they have progressed in their handwriting and drawing abilities too - here's hoping that it provides them some motivation for this year as I will definitely insist suggest that they repeat the exercise.
  
Highlights include the tooth fairy forgetting to come (turns out that even she gets a day off on Canada Day) and my son's pride in his swimming prowess!