Customise and Embellish.

Every now and then a girl has to re-arrange things a bit.

A certain amount of re-shabbying goes on, this time inspired by a day in bed reading lovely books.

It's almost worth feeling poorly to have the excuse to just indulge, sleep and indulge again.

Rachel Ashwell's new book is just a pure confection.

The Granny has vowed to strew lilacs across her feet in the manner of Rachel on the front cover.

Never mind that we don't actually have any lilacs.

We have climbing hydrangeas that are equally frothy.

All the text across my photos is from a gorgeous book I got from the library

called Boudoir, by Hilary Robertson.

She categorises the many styles of romantic and vintage glamorising of the boudoir in the most resounding way.

I find I am strongly inclined toward the "material girl", with a strong influence of "vintage girl" and a dash of "boho".

She says, "the danger of vintage is that the whole thing can become madly busy and "Grannyish", but the vintage girl avoids this by balancing pattern with plenty of white paint on the walls."

"...a collection of mismatched rosy china cups is infinitely more charming than a conventional tea set."

Material girl has "magpie instincts" which draw her toward anything decorative or glittery.

"...Material girl is more likely to hang a particularly delicious frock on the wall than tuck it away in a wardrobe..."

"She likes nothing better than to scour flea markets and thrift shops for crepe de chine slips or floral tea dresses."

"...fondant shades of pistachio, lilac, duck-egg blue and sugared almond pink are mixed and matched with abandon".

...no -one can tell you how to be eccentric, but if you follow your heart you will inevitably get the "boho" look..."

...Material girl has never graduated from childhood's dressing up phase..."

I just love the text in this book. It's spontaneous and insightful and not in any way cliched.

Rachel tends to be a little bit NOT these things sometimes.

Have a lovely weekend Blog Chics.

In Which I go on an Expedition with Pooh and Piglet to Martinborough - and Bring Back a Mirror.

When planning an expedition, you must first decide on your destination.

For ever such a long time I've had a hankering to visit the Wairarapa for an expedition up the main streets of Greytown and Martinborough.

Gorgeous little antique shops and boutiques and yummy little delis and French Bakeries.

I hadn't been there for about ten years.

The next thing you must do is choose your accommodation.

We chose Walnut Cottage, up one of the cute little side streets, up a long driveway,

surrounded by orange blossom, granny bonnets and self seeded poppies.

Set in the garden of a very nice man called Kevin.

As well we weren't looking for a woozle on this particular expedition, because I don't think we would have found one in Kevin's garden.

It was not the kind of garden in which to find a woozle.

But we did find a variety of funny little dogs.

And the next most important thing to have on an expedition of course, are the provisions!

Pooh and Piglet had made very sensible arrangements with table cloths to guard against Municipal bird poo, plastic knives for the blue cheese and other such practicalities.

Piglet is an ideas sort of a person and has a solution for all eventualities, which you will see further evidence of later.

My contribution to the provisions was Katie's date square and a big thermos of coffee - and the Granny's best marmalade for breakfast.

It was necessary to borrow the Granny's thermos and her latest jar of fresh marmalade for the event.

Katies's date square was a huge hit with everyone concerned and you can find the recipe here.

This particular "stopping for provisions" event was on the way back.

We had yummy french bread and left over cheeses, tiny peppers, buffalo mozzarella, avocados and strawberries left over from our dinner the night before.



Katie's date square was just as delicious after a day in the tin.
I am wanting to say here "a day in the tin in the Wairarapa sunshine", because that would sound so inviting and has such poetic ring, but alas the first day was freezing, with snow in the South Island making its presence felt. But we did have some lovely sunshine on the Sunday.

And it was in Martinborough on Sunday that I found the mirror.
Such a mirror as I had lost all hope of ever finding.
A French Country inspired mirror, the right dimensions for above my fireplace, with the right aged look.
And when I found it, it was a moment of instant recognition. This mirror was a kindred spirit and was made for my fire place, but how to fit it in the back seat of a small suzuki hatchback?




Piglet and Pooh are never without good ideas and steely determination when it comes to pieces of the heart and kindred spirits.
A girl just knows how important it is to have things come home with you, not wait for them to turn up on a courier van a week later.

And so it was arranged.
I cannot tell you how, but they did it with pieces of string to measure with and highly developed spatial skills.
Somehow they managed to alter the laws of physics and matter displacement.
I just watched and let them get on with it. As you do.

And I found this treasure along the way, which I will spend the next week with.

And here it is.

I can't wait to get it on the wall.

But I'll have to wait till the Mister comes home and can get out the chainsaw, the hacksaw, the micrometer, the spirit level, whatever it is that blokes need for these occasions.

And just enjoy it.

Mustering Cats.

Hello Blog Chics.

We've been busy round here with a lot of small people and some large people.

The large people have come very intermittently to build the shed.

Intermittently because the weather has been so bad.

Spring has really been wet, wet, wet, and very windy so far.

But that is far from unexpected, and thoroughly unremarkable, unless you are trying to build something with scaffolding!

The small people have been and gone now.

We had one sunny afternoon the whole two weeks they have been here.

The youngest two did manage to spend a lot of time doing outside things though.

All the games involve cattle, stock whips, yards, gates and fences.

Mustering cats on tricycles is a new string to their bows.

The shed provided quite a lot of entertainment as well.
Especially the machinery involved.




We did the customary trip up Mt Taranaki and the walk to Dawson Falls.
It wasn't actually raining, but it was very muddy on the track,
so a thoroughly good time was ha by all the small people in gumboots.






I showed off my photos of mountain fauna and boys climbing the bushline track to the Wozzle.
He said he would like to have the ones of the shed under construction please!!!!
Should have known!
His little brother interpreted one of the Woozles's drawings for me.
It went something like this...
"these are the cattle yards and these spots are the cattle waiting to be mustered into the yards."
And here was me thinking it was a butterfly!!

Life's a Box of Chocolates.

... "You never know what you're gonna get" - Forrest Gump.

This post is especially for my Auntie Doreen,

who has been waiting to see what pops up in my garden this spring.

These gorgeous blue irises are my favourite so far.

They are just the most amazing shade of purpley blue.

This week my nephews are visiting from Queensland.

We've had all the bikes and skateboards out,

lots of rugby tackles and chasey on the lawn, and making scones with Granny.

The cats have been conspicuous by their absence during the day.

Everything is coming into leaf and bloom.

Rainy Day Truce.

Sunday spent by the fire while it rains outside.

I'm stitching in the ditch in red embroidery cotton on this cot quilt.

I want it to look vintage and handmade, and cuddly, which is why I'm hand quilting it.

The Tail Cat and Marigold have called a truce for the day because they both felt inclined just to sit by the fire.

So if you pretend the other one isn't there it all works perfectly!

And when you nick off out to the kitchen to see what's available, someone else gets your posie!

Two in a basket is even cosier.

Graham's idea of phone a friend perhaps?

Oh Marigold you have such a dirty face! I am affronted!

I found some Brambly Hedge china on Trade Me, which was very exciting, because I've always wanted some.
This one is "Winter."

And this one is "The Meeting."

Spent the evening climbing over engines, ladders and various gear box parts with Hubby measuring up the Granny HQ kitchen.

Brain storming solutions for hiding the electric fence controls, and the water filtering system,

while still keeping enough bench space and keeping the look that we want.

We have come up with a cunning plan, which I won't bore you with, but I think it will work very well.

Watch this space.