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Category Archives: Our Home

Some photos or posts about our home

Reflections

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I find myself very reflective at this time of year. Maybe it is all that is involved in getting ready for Christmas or maybe it is the excess that is so prevalent.

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I have trimmed down my life to the essentials…my friends and my immediate family are what is important to me and my friends have indeed become my family. We live modestly and try not to overindulge at this time of year.

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My son and I went to see the David Jones Christmas window displays earlier this month and I had almost as much fun watching the children and the parents and the grandparents faces as I did looking at the scenes myself! Maybe it is because as the child of migrants we had very little in the way of family…especially grandparents so I love to watch the interaction between them today.

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My son has had very little actual time with his grandparents …he does not remember really the times when his British grandmother spent the holidays with us and my family…well let us say they would rather be with my brother and his family at Christmas…nothing new there.

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So here is what is important to me…the nativity…and my own little family. Sharing in children’s joy of the time of year …school concerts and the delight they find in the lead up to Christmas. I also love spending time with my closest friends and their families…..but I also love spending time alone sipping a flat white and reading the fashion, art and design magazines at my favourite coffee shop in Randwick.

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I love our tree decorations, such simple pleasures to be found in the decorations of yesteryear and in finding fabulous new hand crafted ones like my new found hand painted one above and the four hand painted ones my son gave me for Christmas last year.

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I love sitting watching the reflections on the wall cast by the tree lights.  I would love to know what Christmas means to you.

Oh by the way…if you look closely at the first photo…or click on it and make it larger on flickr you will see little old me reflected in the window…purple top….grey hair!

All photos courtesy of cjwriter [my son]

Mellow

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Late afternoon today….temperature twenty eight celcius…. this is the first shop bought handbag I have purchased new for over eighteen months…yay….I have been so good…but needed to change my handbags into shoulder bags as the other kind are problematic for me now. This way the weight is distributed better so less pain and numbness….and it’s also really pretty!!! It looks good with my Laura Ashley Table runner and cushions which I am using as a patio set.

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I also bought a lot of toning napkins which am going to make into a quilt…lots of polka dots…never used them before so should be interesting. The bag is by one of my favourite designers Olga Berg.

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Merry Christmas

Someone is having a little snooze before their big night…Merry Christmas everyone

Bejewelled, Bedazzled and Bemused

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We still have yet to find our Christmas star for our tree but have finished the decorating now after popping up to Bondi Junction to get more hot pink, lime green and turquoise ornaments to go with our bejewelled theme. I have almost finished making a bejewelled garland from tinsel and baubles as well.

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Yesterday Ollie the toddler from the flat opposite popped in when his mum picked up something from our fridge and as they are going to New Zealand for Christmas I gave him the bag with his Nativity wall hanging which his mum loved as he is too young for it. He liked the finger puppets too but best of all for him was the tree as he does not have one up what with going away and all….so he had the best fun with the glass ornaments which when he batted them looked like a spinning top! He cackled with glee and went at it again..this was after carrying around the animals from our Willow Tree Nativity scene…those are some form of pottery!!

His mother Debbie was a tad nervous by then but the absolute best place for him was when he discovered CJ’s room. He just stood and gawked at the wonder that is his room, I guess he realised that it was a boy’s room…even if an adult boy ….his expression was priceless. It was as if he were in Santa’s Grotto or Aladdin’s Cave or maybe Hambly’s toyshop in London. I also found the way to get him out of our place as Debbie was a nervous wreck in case he broke anything by then …I scooped him up and naturally he leaned straight towards her….worked like a charm although near the door he realised he had been conned and started screaming to stay.  Next year I will have the nativity on a removable stand so it can be taken out of the room before he comes so his mum can relax more!

Reverse progression…or is that regression?

Grown Up Craft Area...now

Today I finally finished organising my creative area so that it could accommodate my new fabric coated geisha figures purchased yesterday

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and my gorgeous geisha sewing box which was a birthday gift, to myself.

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This is how it has been until yesterday…

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a little too bright and distracting….

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making it very easy for me to pile box upon box…

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leading to nothing ever getting done!

Sewing corner...way back then..around February 2008

Above was around February of this year, do you see the blue and white china which was all the rage in the nineties? Here is a closer look….

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Well now the blue and white ware which was simply everywhere then seems to be going the way of the eighties craze which was… cringe….country. Chickens and hens and roosters and pigs and cows. I have box upon box of gorgeous country goods which just do not go with our current more minimalist Oriental take on contemporary furnishings. Just goes to show the way fashion and fads go really….so much of my collections were given to me as birthday and Christmas gifts by my husband and son and I just have not had the heart to get rid of them…until now anyway. I have been assured that they want me to clear everything out and are into less is more these days anyway so while David is in England I am having a huge clear out. He told me anything that is in the storage area of his …apart from his winter clothes….can be turfed out. So it is goodbye to all those games and jigsaw puzzles and sports paraphernalia given to him as gifts over the years.

I started with the lounge room and then the linen closet…who knows why we have so many sets of sheets…it is crazy! Yesterday and today I tackled the bedroom’s creative corner and my wardrobe….putting away things I will never wear this summer as I simply have too many dressy outfits [mostly thrifted]. There is no way I will be able to finish the storage area before David is back but I will have made a huge dent anyway…starting with twenty five years worth of videos …..I cannot remember the last time I watched anything but a DVD so it is madness really to have over 200 videos…mostly all stored in boxes! At one dollar each that will be two hundred dollars raised for our local library. Perfect as they are about to have a renovation and will be needing to restock their shelves with more up to date books as well as some classics. Thank goodness I have an old lady shopping trolley…or in my case suave golf buggy in electric blue to transport the heavy videos to the library!!!

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