Find a Happy Place

 

Sometimes, if we've had a particularly organised morning, and the boys have all had their breakfast, brushed teeth, packed lunchboxes and remembered PE kits, there is a little pinhole of time in which to sit and have a cup of tea before school.  Usually it's a case of sitting at the table, surrounded by crumbs and bowls of soggy cereal, but we'll ignore that, because like I have said before - one day I will have lovely clean and tidy house, but there will be no children living here.

The other day  for some reason only my subconscious knows a memory flew into my head.  It was the Christmas Party at my infant school and the teachers had decorated the hall with garlands and hoops (borrowed from the PE cupboard, no doubt) covered in brightly coloured crepe paper and ribbons.  There were also loads of those gaudy foil fold out decorations and baubles galore.  The whole place looked like a magical wonderland to a 6 year old me.  There was nothing remotely stylish or classy about the scene.  No window dressed whiteness or understated hues of antique gold and cream.  That had gone out of the window in favour of an explosion of colour.  It looked like the teachers had had a LOT of fun! 

Christmas Passed - Decorations from our tree a few years ago.

 

This fleeting memory (because that's about all I can remember of the party - other than dancing to the Birdie song, but we won't go into that!) made me smile as I sat there.  I guess because I was able to see the grown up me in that little girl.  She was also to be found digging her hands into a gifted box of buttons and beads, carefully cut from old garments.  I can still remember the coolness of the beads and the excitement of discovery as I dug to the bottom of the box.  She was also to be found absconding into a Scottish Charity shop while on holiday with her mum and finding scraps of half patchworked fabrics with all the thrill of someone who has found precious gold.  We then spent the rest of the holiday making tiny purses to sell in my dad's Trug basket shop!

It's no surprise then that these days, I spend a lot of my time in those same Happy Places.  Yesterday mum brought me a shoe box  saved from my Auntie's house move.  That same feeling......what would be inside?!!
A whole bundle of half patchworked fabric!  Obviously someone in the 70's was planning on a rather wild and technicolour quilt, or maybe even a skirt!  Goodness knows what I will do with them!  For now I think I'll just admire their authentic garishness!

Not only that; she had also had a fruitful visit to a local charity shop and found a great stash of embroidery threads and lace.

That early excitement and wonder about colour is still there.  I really do get a thrill from combining fabrics and textures for a new project and I would like to thank all those fun loving staff at St Andrew's school in Keighley for the inspiration.

This week I have had the pleasure of watching Noah discover the joys of felt tips.  When I was little I would look through the toy shop window yearning for my own set of Berol felt tips. (Never mind the Barbie!).  He sits for sometimes a whole hour carefully colouring and I can see the same look of pleasure on his face as I imagine I had on mine.  It's something about the magic of colour appearing like a string of rainbow from a magic wand.

If there is a point to this rather long and rambling post, it's this:

 I think children have a heightened sense of magic and wonder.  After all, pretty much everything is new to them!  Simple things are amazing to them.  The time that adults give to creating memories with and for children is so important and sometimes, you will never know the effect your investment has made.  For me, this puts the fast approaching season of Christmas into a new light.  I'm going to be thinking about ways to give them memories full of colour, magic and fun.  Little surprises that childish hearts leap at. 

And I think that will satisfy my heart too.

xxxxxxx

How not to look after your sewing machine

For a while now my machine has been skipping stitches, rucking up and even refusing point blank to sew two pieces of fabric together. Great! I thought - my lovely, reliable Janome is on its way out. There's nothing quite so frustrating as a sewing machine that's not reliable. You go to sit down after a day of dreaming about what you are going to make after the washing is done and the children are tucked up and you are stopped in your tracks by a machine that wants to do the exact opposite of what you want it to do. How was I going to get all the things made for the Fete in the Park this year?
So, after deciding to unscrew a few bits and pieces, placing everything in neatly positioned piles so that I remembered how to put it back together again, I unscrewed the bottom plate - and this is what I found! I have to say, it made me laugh out loud. No wonder my poor machine was refusing to work for me! This is definitely NOT the way to look after your machine and is not recommended.
I am pleased to report that after extensive cleaning with a paintbrush and tweezers and replacement of all the screws (a few times, due to dropping them into the workings!) my Janome is now working like a dream once again.
It's just left for me to decide what to create from the felted fluff I retrieved.

Not really.

On a nicer not, I enjoyed sorting my frustratingly cluttered button Box into my saved up Bon Maman jars. I think they look really pretty and I discovered so many beautiful buttons I didn't know I had. Some of which were lovely mother of pearl, which I tested by biting them (you can tell if it's plastic - it doesn't feel like a china cup on your teeth like Mother of Pearl!). I'll post a few photos of my favourites when the sun comes up again tomorrow.