Reverse Garbage

Today we trotted off to Reverse Garbage to check out the free kids workshops as part of a family fun open day celebrating their recent move to new larger premises. Roboboy was most pleased with his huge fill a bag for $7 haul plus the green plastic thingy for 20 cents that is destined to become the foundations for a medieval castle.

 Liongirl is doing a spectacular version of her sulky lip pout. Unsure if this is because she has just realized she has spent the morning wearing a bonnet designed for a 6 month old baby or if she knows she can't compete with Roboboys cracker of a pose that surely destines him for a Target catalogue feature.

They spent a good hour or so whiling away time at a creative workshop for kids. All the bits and bobs you could dream of - fur, fabric plastic thingies, string, adhesive dots and unlimited glue, scissors and hole punches.

Within an hour they had made mobiles, a plane, a spotty dinosaur, a furry mouse and a necklace. Not to mention Liongirl herself using an entire bottle of glue. Then it was time to check out the warehouse and fill a bag with craft goodies to take home.

Reverse garbage takes off cuts and remnants from all kinds of factories  and businesses then on sells them to the community to avoid them going to landfill. The also have a small shop where you can buy items crafted from these cast off items. The warehouse is a den of crafting treasures. Including things you never knew you needed.

Spiky wheels, sheepskin remnants, topographical maps - they have them.

Looking for that Luna Park mask?

Plaster feet - with toes for $2, without for $1. Which frankly begs the question- where are the toes?

Oodles of fabric remnants, ropes, cords and carpet bits.

And every boy needs his very own man at work road sign. Actually this would have been a good back up for Roboboy's second birthday as the combine harvester proved difficult to source.

The kids loved filling the bag with goodies of their choice, and as soon as Roboboy can sway the democratic prep vote towards a space theme I'll be back for some of that silver padded stuff in the bucket on the right.

Back home a creative vibe was happening and we launched into creating our turret for the castle theme at school. Legoman and the kids snaffled some of my grey deck paint and started work.

Can you see where we are heading? Tomorrow we have to add some arched windows, cobblestone walls, a drawbridge and a moat, then it's off to school.

The perils of vintage wallpaper

This blog post could equally be titled "Corkboard and wallpaper- lessons in frustration" or "How to have big ideas and execute them poorly".

I have about a dozen projects on the go over here at Betsy's and today I really just wanted to follow through and complete something. I attacked this with a crazed zealot like intensity that comes from having a very short window of time without interruptions. It was also one of those slightly spur of the moment creative ventures that came about while I was painting some more white walls. I had just done another coat and while waiting the 2 requisite hours to recoat, decided that I could probably use the same paint elsewhere.

I have had this corkboard since I was about 14. The fact that  it  has followed me from my childhood bedroom  to 3 share houses to this house seems downright strange. Many other items have been culled and forgotten but this humble corkboard has hung in there. Back in the 80's it was brown with pine trim.

Back in about 1997 it received a white undercoat and it's pretty much looked like this since then. Recently I stumbled across some wonderful vintage wallpaper and thought that Corky might appreciate a makeover. Having never used wallpaper before I have to admit I was a little sucked in by the funkiness of it all and given that vj walls are not suitable for wallpaper, this was the only place I could think of to try it out.

Well aware of my  lack of skills with respect to wallpaper wrangling, I decided to pretend the wallpaper was just plain paper and use spray adhesive to attach it to the cork. Seems like a reasonable and well considered concept doesn't it.?
Except that despite generously spraying both the paper and the board, there was pretty much nothing  happening in the adhesive department. Hmm. So I thought maybe I should treat it like wallpaper and follow the wallpapering instructions. So, I cut it to size, dunked it in a bucket of warm water and tried again. Still, pretty much nothing happening. So I sprayed a little bit more adhesive and then it seemed to stick a little. And then unstick itself. Despite furious smoothing out of lumps, there are some rumples and the adhesion quotient is on the low end.

I'm still not sure if it was due to the fact that  the wallpaper is vintage 80's and has lost it's adhesive tendencies or if the painted cork is the issue. Legoman's take is that the porous cork is probably absorbing all the glue. Hate to think he might actually be on the money. Eventually with much cursing and half a can of spray adhesive it seems to have stuck although it wouldn't surprise me if it all detaches and rolls off tomorrow when it completely dries.

I do think that while it's still intact it does look quite lovely. And it's completely finished ( until I have to superglue it back together). Product disclaimer :  Any obvious wrinkles in wallpaper should be (until proven otherwise)  presumed to be reflections from the rumply folds in  my new boots (thankyou Myer stocktake sale and a gift voucher ferretted from the depths of my purse).

Vintage clobber and friends with chainsaws

It was a weekend of epic proportions over here at Betsy's. The momentous occasion involved both children going for their first sleepover together at Nonna's. Not being the sort of people who would waste such an opportunity we packed in as much as we could. We had dinner at a Thai restaurant, saw a movie, slept in until 8 am (the first 8 continuous hours of sleep had for about 5 years) and then went out for brunch at our favourite West End cafe.
Then there was even time for a little prowl around the West End shops. The above photo is from a cute little shop called

and they had some wonderful local designers as well as the cute little under the stairs arrangement of vintage inspired kids clothes and a toy room and blackboard.

A few doors down was a haven of vintage goodies called Bang Doll Vintage.

It was a visual feast of colour with outfits for the whole family. Fancy some lederhosen for your 7 yo son, yep they had those as well (on the left behind that lovely mustard coloured bag) . I was also quite inspired by the vintage apron collection and  a gorgeous red velvet brocade lounge that the owner  proudly told me he rescued  mere minutes before an encounter with a bulldozer at the tip.

I was quite enamoured with the green and yellow ensemble. Legoman was relieved that it appeared to be a tiny size 6. Yellow and lime green are really not my colours but gosh such a glorious sight to feast the eyes on.

We wanted to pop into Nook which is the cutest little shop of hand made bits and bobs but unfortunately they were shut. The shop cat was most welcoming however and was more than happy to come and smooch us.

Other than breakfast we displayed superb shopping restraint. Probably because later that day we planned to head off to an art gallery to look at an exhibition of one of our favourite artists. More on that soon.....

Back home, children all delivered it was time for some friends with chainsaws. One of our friends who follows the blog offered to send her hubby over with his chainsaw expertise to help Legoman with that massive branch. There was much pontificating over weights, angles and anticipated trajectories before one  large branch swung down on the end of a rope. Another small tree was felled before they became nervous and moved onto warming the barbie instead. As I was anticipating many more felled branches than actually occurred the photos are frankly almost as unimpressive as the actual branch felling but watching the good man with the machine was pure artistry.

Meanwhile the boys armed themselves with hammers and got stuck into some serious macadamnia nut collecting and cracking. We have a random 70's style concrete slab in our backyard which is the home of all nut cracking attempts and chalk art works. Legoman keeps wanting to dig it up but boys love nothing more than a good concrete slab and for the time being it is staying.

And the girls, well there were numerous tea parties, baking of sandpit cakes and a hearty game of Dora snakes and ladders. When you are 2 that actually involves lots of excited dice throwing and shouting of random unrelated numbers.

Eternal gratitude to Nonnas and understanding friends with powertools.

Rapunzel Rapunzel

Roboboy's prep class just packed up the pirate theme and the new theme (chosen by democratic vote) is castles, knights , dragons and princesses. Roboboy is not a fan of democracy as his theme suggestions of Lego, Polar bears and Space have not been widely embraced.  Another mum has created the castle and  the banquet table complete with silverware  ( I am working on a turret with drawbridge) and all we needed was a really long plait to create Rapunzel's hair.

 I had been contemplating where to get really thick wool, and lots of it for this momentous task when lo and behold look what I found in a bag at the op shop for a measly $4.  I have never seen wool this thick before- about 1 cm diameter but still soft. And in exactly the right colours, can you believe it?
Despite cutting all the lengths the same, I did end up with lots of short bits so the plait gets thinner as it goes towards the bottom. Lucky I'm not employed as a hairdresser. Hard to tell in the photo but it's about 2 m in length so should look impressive.

I also found this gorgeous fabric and some crochet patterns.

And the unexpected bonus was this lovely little Sylvac jug for $4. Like everything that comes home with me, it's all about the colour. Oh and a little orange reel of thread as well.

Does anyone else have THOSE op shop experiences where you actually NEED and the op shop provides?

Fabric florals and milk glass

I recently popped into my favourite op shop that had finally reopened after being flooded in January and closed for several months. I was so excited to find some glorious fabric and some beautiful milk glass for $1 a piece. A little side table came home as well but is still in the boot.

The orange floral fabric is huge and in pristine condition. It still has that slightly stiff feel of never washed fabric. The little Australiana tablecloth has a few marks but I plan to cut it up. The gorgeous mustardy seersucker is a huge round tablecloth and also has some marks but I think it might become some new cushions. Mustard is the new black over here at Betsy's.

I usually plan to go to two op shops at a time just in case one is a dud. A tiny church op shop five minutes away revealed the gorgeous thick brown floral curtains in the first picture. They also had not one but two chenille bedspreads for $4 each. The pale pink is so soft it's like a giant marshmallow. It also has some patches of fading so is easy to justify snipping.

So many things to tackle, just need to chat to the toddler about her recent decision to drop the day nap.

Hello Industrial Chemist

Roboboy went to a 7 year old birthday party today. Not just any party, no, this was a Professor Jellybean party. And for Roboboy it was love at first sight. A whole gang of boys donning labcoats, oversized nerd goggles and an hour of intense concentration while various forms of goo were created. Chemical reactions were witnessed and long stretchy snakes formed almost by magic. The air was full of boy excitement, even the news that No, there would not be any explosions, did not dampen the mood.

Professor Jellybean came, set up all the tables and stools, talked them through three experiments, left party bags ( with no lollies just sciency gadgets) then packed all her gear an hour or so later and left the boys to marvel at their creations.

Roboboy was so proud of his container of stretchy snakes and rainbow balls, he even went up at the end to personally thank Professor Jellybean for the experience. I used to joke about how when he ended up as a Human Rights lawyer all would be forgiven regarding the sheer hard work he has given me from the age of 2 until now. Looking at these images and his recent obsession with quartz crystal collection ( he pinched 3 more from the party boys driveway) I am thinking geologist, civil engineer or Nanotechnologist for biological warfare  are looking like the top three career options. If not, these photos are going straight to the pile for 21 st birthday humiliation.

Back home this afternoon all the boys tackled that huge pile of tree bits that Legoman left all over the deck yesterday. Just the sight of all this destruction flushed out the two younger Menace brothers who were straight in with handsaws to do some serious chopping.

I took the opportunity to sneak up onto the roof and scope out the view. This was over to the southwest. Look at those gorgeous rolling purple ranges.

And more to the west, gorgeous sunset and whirly gig to prove, yes, I really did go up on the crest of our roof. Oh yes and Roboboy had to come too of course. The feeling of being up there almost on top of the world was magical.

Legoman vs The Tree

There has been a lot of discussion over here at Betsy's about what to do with this tree. Well actually just the one massive branch overhanging the deck. This gorgeous poinciana tree was one of the clinchers for us buying Betsy. Our old house had a tiny yard but the most gorgeous mango tree in the world which had been the main feature for us when we bought there over a decade ago. We knew if we we ever left that house, it would be for another house with equally wonderful trees.

As you walk in from Betsy's front door, you can see down the length of the house, through some bifold doors , past the deck and onto the mammoth trunk of this grand old poinciana tree. Of course at the open house, the deck was  immaculately clean with not a leaf in sight, the gutters clear. The reality is of course slightly different.
Poinciana's have a LOT of really teeny tiny leaves. And they fall all day, every day of the year. In a gust of wind, the kids call it tree snow and it is beautiful. Unfortunately, when it rains (which it has done an awful lot over the last year) the leaves sit in the puddles and leach out a brownish dye that stains everything. The beautiful grey I had started to paint the deck is now riddled with grotty brown blotches that don't scrub clean. And the gutters, well poor Legoman cleared them completely and a month later they are putting him to shame again.

We are planning to build a roof over our deck in the near future which will protect the floors but will create a heap more gutters directly under the flight path of the tree snow. So, after much debate, I agreed to let  Legoman  loose up there to sort it out. Handsaw only, he is desperate for a chainsaw but I like him with all his limbs intact. It is a massive branch that we intend to lop, but the plan was for him to climb up and start at the ends, bit by bit so we could see how it looked. All under my watchful supervision, as he can occasionally go a bit crazy with the pruning until all you have left is a stick.

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This is the branch that is going, as you can see it is massive and a really long way up. Luckily Legoman used to be a competitive rock climber so has no fear of heights. He fortunately does have a realistic fear of his own ability to be  a complete klutz and sensibly tied the saw onto the tree.

Look at that progress. Nothing like a bit of wanton destruction to make a bloke feel at peace with the universe.

Not to mention stopping to enjoy the view of a sunset over Mt Cootha as well as the rolling hills in the far southwest on the way to Beaudesert.

Stretched out to get that one last troublesome branch, after 3 different attempts to get the ladder closer have been thwarted. The ladder, even on top of the deck only reaches to about 8 metres, this branch was around 9.5m above the ground.

Finally, come down to survey the carnage. Typically I had just swept the deck before this urge to chop overcame the man.

Guess what we will be doing all day tomorrow. Luckily, we have at least three handsaws and all seasons family funpass to Willawong Dump. Yes, that is the curbside find in the background. I had been sanding and undercoating until it became unsafe to continue.

And the kids? The were safely sequestered away in another part of the garden. Nothing like raiding the vintage sheet set for some cubby love.

All this sunshine has frankly had us in a garden appreciating  frenzy. We also put together our first raised garden bed, lice treated the chooks, installed the new double nesting box  and did some weeding. And all this in the first week of winter. Another reason I love living in Brisbane.