A Bird in the Hand and a Peacock in The Bush

As per my last rant (I mean post!) I am going to show some things that I love about Kal. So with camera at the ready Brennan and I took the boys to our local park. It is a veritable oasis amongst red dirt and saltbush there is a green grassed haven full of peacocks, ducks, emus, cockatoos, galahs and even a kangaroo. It is no wonder that our Spring/Summer range is a plethora of birds, I am surrounded by them!

There's Gold in Them There Hills!

I live in Kalgoorlie and I like it. Yes I said it, I like it, and I like it alot.

I have a need to pass this information on because it seems that every time I speak to a person who does not live on this side of the country I get an "Oh dear" or an "Oh I see" in a tone of voice reserved for the mourning. Sometimes they even feel the need to speak slower and enunciate a little louder too. Yes its harder to buy fabric, and harder to see reps but there's less traffic and no pollution. There's alot of miners and alot of brothels and skimpies but masses of great history and lots and lots and lots of gold.

I know it may seem a little hard to understand why anyone would in their right mind move here but there are many beautiful things about Kalgoorlie that aren't apparent when first you arrive, but once you have been here for awhile you start to see them. (No it is not the massive hole in the ground that gold is dug from, however that is a fascinating and awe inspiring sight!)

I am now on a mission to show the best and maybe the not so best of Kalgoorlie and will post photos weekly of what I believe makes Kalgoorlie a great place to live, and try to add a little bit of history too.

The End (of Rant)

Lil Cowpoke

Out today is the new edition of My Child magazine, we were lucky enough to have our Lil Cowpokes shorts used in their Cowboys and Indians photo shoot. I had to think what a funny coincidence that they have used the same hats that we did for our photos!

Shop 4 Kids

Shop 4 Kids Spring/Summer issue hit the stores today and I am happy to say that our gorgeous hand crocheted Hoodie/French Vest is modelled in the Gabba Land spread. Benjamin is an avid watcher of Go Gabba Gabba and is pretty chuffed that he has a hoodie just like the one in the photo. (Personally I think the model looks a little like Suri Cruise??!!)

To celebrate we are offering all blog readers 20% off the retail price until the end of August, just type BLOG in the discount code at checkout. Happy Shopping!!

The Not So Jolly Jumper

On a recent trip to Perth I went to Ikea and bought the longest extendable dining table I could find. This table is rarely used for "dining" as its main purpose in our house is for me to cut on. Therefore one end is always covered in patterns, scissors, laptop, pins, tape measure etc etc and the other usually has a bolt of fabric hanging off it at varying stages of cutting out. No hope for my long suffering husband to comfortably spread out his newspaper and quietly sup his coffee.

However it is a great place to cut and while I cut Joshua gets to jump, and boy does he like to jump! Unfortunately Tabitha the cat is not so jolly about the jolly jumper as where the jumper hangs is HER spot. It is the main thoroughfare in our house and she can survey what is going on at all times. She does this under the guise of sleep, stealth mode we call it, a mode she can hold for 23hrs a day. Tabitha has many spots that she has deemed her own.. every doorway, the change table, pretty much anywhere she chooses really.

You would think after 12 years she would get used to me moving her on but as the picture shows she justs finds a spot nearby, sticks an ear out and slips back into stealth mode. If there is such a thing as reincarnation I really want to be a cat.

Stick to your Day Job

My husband drives road trains for a living. He drives to a gold mine, loads the 4 trailers, drives to the processing plant and tips off. This is what he does for 12hrs a day (or night) for 2 weeks straight and he loves it. He loves it so much he has an enormous photo, approximately 3 feet long, that he wants to frame and hang in our house. This to me is just one step away from cartoon dogs playing poker or Elvis painted on black velvet, however unbeknownst to him and against my better judgement I have this photo being framed for his birthday next week. This means ofcourse it will need to be hung, more than likely, in a prominent position somewhere within our house.



And this is what I keep thinking of while I make hair ties, where? where will he want to hang it?? The thing about making hair ties I find is that its quite reflective, quietly sitting letting your mind wander along.... Where? Where?.. its usually quite relaxing... not the lounge, anywhere but the lounge! Anyway my hair ties are now finished for High Chair Couture. They are opening a new bricks & mortar store September 1st in South Australia so get on down there and check it out!

Stumping or Serendipity?

The reason behind my husband and I moving 3000klm to Kalgoorlie (hot, dry, dusty, miles from nowhere) from Noosa (beach, sun, sand, close to somewhere) was to be able to live the Aussie dream ie mortgage, kids, dog and cat. Now there have been times when we have questioned this decision until we restumped the lounge room and there was a moment of sweet sweet clarity....

Our house had a name plaque when we bought it "Serendipity", I fell in love with the house straight away. Though being largely pregnant this is no surprise as my emotions ranged between sheer bliss to sheer terror of having 2 children under 2. My husband on the other hand had been at his work Christmas party the night before and I dont think he really knew what was going on. Needless to say an hour after seeing the house we bought it, our first house purchase!

Sadly our beloved name plaque was gone when we took possession, even more sadly we realised how bad the floors were (and the walls, roof,bathroom, kitchen etc etc etc) This is when we started to question buying on emotion until a few discoveries were made under the old rotted floorboards

1. A 1905 newspaper ad for Brennan Bros (my husbands name is Brennan)
2. An old glass milk bottle for feeding baby (as mentioned I was pregnant at purchase)
3. A 1917 receipt book for Crispe & Piper (Our last name is Crisp)

And lastly an old wooden cotton reel right next to my sewing room. I take that as a definate sign that I have made the right career decision. And on that note back to the machine I must head, lucky for me its not a treadle.

Serendipity - noun. an aptitude for making desirable discoveries by accident

It Just Couldn't Be Saved Luv

Whilst in my garden this morning (hanging washing out, not drinking tea and eating cucumber sandwiches...sigh) I noticed that my last rose bush is flowering again. I say last as there were 4 beautiful massive rose bushes in the garden when we first bought the house in February. Unfortunately they had been taken over by some horrible weedy vine thing, locally known as 'mile a minute' due to its ability to grow faster than you can weed it out. Whilst I valiantly waged war there was never any question of who was winning so I decided to call in the troops.... a professional gardener.
The house being over a hundred years old I was sure that the roses were original and did not want to lose them, a point also noted and agreed with by said gardener. Happy and confident in my choice of battle plan I head off to my sewing room where after an hour of merrily working away (I may even have chuckled to myself I was that chuffed) I head out to check on the progress. To my horror there is now just dirt, no rose of any kind is left, not a petal, not a leaf, not even a stump!

Luckily I was in time to save the last one and as the photo shows it is just lovely and it has the strongest perfume just divine. This inpsired me to finally take a photo of my new Peacock Hair Ties and they are now available in store. Also soon to be available at High Chair Coutures new brick and mortar store opening in September.

For my "professional" gardeners explanation of this disaster which was reiterated by his trusty sidekick (as if once wasnt enough) please refer to the blog title.....

When Banana Bread Goes Wrong

Since moving into our new (very old) house my weekly baking has been sadly lacking, though with an oven that has two settings.. raw or burnt I feel that I have been a little justified in not filling the biscuit tins. When lo and behold both boys fall asleep at the same time, a rare event in our house, I was inspired to put the oven to the test. Thinking that banana bread cannot possibly be a failure I forged ahead. Firstly I had no cinnamon so I thought of adding a few white chocolate chips , happy with my sheer brilliance I put said bread in oven and set timer. Off I head to my sewing machine and set to work. After awhile I wonder why I have not heard the timer.. this is because I did not turn it on (not feeling so brilliant anymore). So after being in the oven for an hour and a half, (twice as long as normal) my poor bread was burnt on the outside, raw in the middle and completely fell apart when turned out. Not a Martha Stewart moment. Luckily 2 year olds dont worry about aesthetics and ate said bread heartily.