Breakfast Interruptus

As a rooster crows in the distance, the sound of a gentle breeze rustles the amber leaves outside my window. I rise and fetch a hot cup of coffee, quickly shuffling back to the warm cocoon of bed. An hour of reading my book and gently napping and I'm ready to face the day.
Slowly pulling my robe on I enter the kitchen and prepare a breakfast of eggs, hashbrowns, bacon, spinach, mushrooms and zucchini. While husband makes pot of tea and toast.
It takes an hour to eat and talk, but I'm feeling pretty Zen and about to set up my sewing orders for the day.
'I'll just check my emails first'.

AHH.
Chaos.
It is like the universe has discovered how relaxed I am and decided that I can't have any of that.
Despite my recent windfalls in having advertising in two magazines at once: Shop4Kids and LittleOneBaby, it seems that at least one of them has risen up to bite me on the proverbial.

The lovely administrator and creator of Downthatlittlelane website, Tessa, generously picked me out for some advertising in Shop4Kids. I diligently made up and sent off my two creatures, with DOWNTHATLITTLELANE plastered all over the packaging, so they would know who it came from. I also had my normal tags which displayed my email address.

A few months later, I was pleasantly surprised when some lovely person from madeit posted the spread on Facebook.
(major plot spoiler here - I DID NOT EVEN TWIG AT WHAT HAD CONSPIRED AT THIS POINT BUT SHOULD HAVE - MASSIVE DERR MOMENT)
Weeks passed.
Cobwebs grew between my ears.
I made up all my orders.
I went to work and came home again.
Until I awake to the sound of a rooster crowing and the sound of a gentle breeze rustling the amber leaves outside my window...and check my emails.

Umm...did I ask for Shop4Kids to display my madeit link especially?
*heart attack ensues. time rushes backwards to the point where I see the spread on Facebook, and then a montage of everything in-between* (yes, my life is like a movie).

No, I did not. Nevertheless, still feel like major douche. But what can I do? It is in the hands of the magazine and breakfast Gods now.
But next time the rooster crows in the morning, will I be slowly rising to a leisurely breakfast, or will I be rushing to my computer to check first.
Only time will tell.
Maybe this blog will feature in my next montage.

Mad Max and Wild Things

And as all good things must come to an end, so does the life of Maurice Sendak, the creator of Where the Wild things are.

[read for literary review of WTWTA]
Sendak wanted to show that kids are not always the saccharine 'mummy dearest' characters as often portrayed in books, but instead are sometimes seething with anger, boiling with indignities and ragingly happy all at the same time. And that instead of processing the emotions individually, they will tend to create scenarios to play out these feelings in - resulting in some pretty wild imaginary places and characters.

Obviously Sendak was still pretty closely in tune with his inner child. Where the Wild Things Are has struck a chord with audiences all over the world, enabling us to romp around an imaginary place and ride the rollercoaster of youthful expressionism. All of this brings us out the other side without realising we have just been through the churning catharsis of youth's unprocessed emotions.

[Read for quick summary]
Where the Wild Things Are is a classic book. The monsters are great, the night forest and adventure is fun, and you should just read it if you haven't. If you have, read it again just for the fun of it and remember how frustratingly easy, however difficult, life was when you were 8 years old.


here is Maurice

here is my Wild thing created IN HONOUR (note not copyright infringed) of Max

with my cat Zack, who is trying to pretend Max doesn't exist. Note terrified expression of denial.

I'm BAAAAAAAAACK

No, i'm  not the little girl from Poltergeist, but I have been away for faaar too long.

Due to some strange but timely events, I have been hurled back into the forest after dwelling on the fringes for so long. Maybe it's the weather, maybe it's the planets aligning, but truthfully, it's been my day job.

Now I have sorted out a balance between working for a living and living for work, I am fizzing with happiness to be dedicating myself to The Forest Flaw once again.

So here we come: check out 'little one baby' magazine and 'shop till you drop' magazine for some features on the critters.

Also I would like to announce our arrival back at ETSY.
http://www.etsy.com/TheForestFlaw

I have some wonderful new creations to share - and so many more up my sleeve, even maybe branching out in a whole new direction.

So thanks for your patience - see you in the Forest soon

New Releases **UNVEILED**

At Last, let the terror begin!!

Introducing HAMMY HORRORS!

Cast your mind back to early cinema, when a titillating evening could be spent at the drive-in watching the most over the top, campy, blood lacking spook-a-fying renditions of horror the world had ever known! 

 Hammer films made horror fun long before we had slasher movies and well before the 'group of annoying teens all get killed one by one until one is left for the sequel' genre.

They made such greats as:

note spine chilling depictions like 'horrorama'. ooh.

and 

he died - yet lived! ahh!

also cert x -adults only!

Now the Forest Flaw has it's own hammy horrors - in technicolour for your viewing pleasure

Dracula

Wolf Man

and 

Frank N. Stein

These are only the first three. Soon to unveil 3 more from the hammy horror range.

So keep your eyes out, 

NOT to be Viewed ALONE!!

Terrifrying

available from here and here

Jekyll and Hyde have moved in for summer

Time off from crafting has had a strangely dual effect.


1. It has made me tired. Oh so tired.
I like to nap. 
I forgot how much I like to have a little lay down in the afternoon with a cup of tea and snooze with the cat. 
Admittedly, it took me a few days to transition from 'frantic making mode' to 'afternoon torpor', but it definitely happened.
I can now feel the two o'clock tireds creep up behind me, catch me in it's cuddly arms and transport me to the dream fields where fireflies buzz and a stream trickles past the long grass.....
ooh, look out it had me again. 


2. Inspiration has gripped me.
Like superglue between your fingers, I am stuck on this new range and feel completely buzzed about making it. I am desperate to put them all up but am waiting till a few more are completed to have a grand unveiling. I will cut the virtual ribbon as soon as I can.


So ideas are swirling, but the energy has eluded me. I can't seem to get the pace back. I have gone from 10+ hour days to 4 and feel more tired than before.
Perhaps it's the heat.
However, it all amounts to excuses.


Perhaps I need to bombard myself with obscure cliche's and proverbs such as:
*Use it or lose it
*the early bird catches the worm
*A stitch in time saves nine
*A poor workman always blames his tools
*A woman's work is never done


But in the end it is up to me to just sit myself down and do it, because as the wise and bizarre old saying goes:


*fine words butter no parsnips

The Jingle Blog

There are new things afoot in the forest! 

Busy capturing them before unveiling in January - but beware - These guys aren't so fluffy!!

After night has fallen, the leaves all rustle round. 

A hoot sounds in the distance as the fires wither down.

A knocking at the window - could be just a tree,

But why then, do I feel an unknown creature watches me?

Foxes scatter to their dens, 

the owls stick to their limbs.

As floating in on misty tides the new kids settle in.

Old as time immortal, 

foretold by tv land.

These creatures have been dramatised by actors and by man...

To find out what these critters are - stay tuned to this blog station. They are the new found offerings from my imagination.

<MWUHAHAHAHAHAHA>

Super Me vs Evil Sewing Machine

In a world where Evil lives in a machine, only one girl can thwart it.
Well - it isn't me.

I tried.
Last week - before my holiday, Super Husband bought some shelves so I could organise my sewing mess. It is brilliant. I have bags and baskets and boxes and by jingoes it is all neat and tidy.
'Why don't I bring out the sewing machine and make a home for it?!' I thought.
My memory it seems is a short one. I had visions of sewing clothes and cushions and drapes and even a dapper smoking jacket for my cat if I felt so inclined. I could sew the world - nay, the Universe.

I cut up a dress that needed altering. I cut out material for cutsie pie pillow covers. I imagined sunny afternoons sewing covers for everything and shopping for materials I could wear. So I sat down and against my usual inclinations to just turn it on and figure it out as I go, I took out the manual.

I read how thread goes through arm A, spools past 7 into 23b up and around Y and lastly loops through BX5.
I read how the tension must be no greater than the axis of the planet spinning through Gemini on a leap year. I adjusted accordingly the foot direction to match that of the ancient Incan burial rites during the reign of Xicconiqu.
Gingerly I pressed the foot pedal. the needle went down, the needle came up with no thread on it.

'That's ok,' I said to myself. 'I must have not divided the Sanskrit by Pythagoras' theorem. I'll try again'.
Thread through A...blah blah BX5 ok.
I got out the iron. I hate the iron also. I made flat hems while the iron deposited white crud all over my material. Undeterred however I pressed on (haha, ironing joke).
Back to sewing machine, I pressed the foot pedal. The needle went down, the needle came up. the needle went   down, the needle got stuck. Ok, that's ok. I'll just reverse. The needle went up, the needle went down, the material bunched up.
After I had wrenched my material out and un-picked the mess it had made, I tried again. Reread the mathematical theories of sewing machineness again.

Lets just skip to the part where I start singing the "i'm going to throw you in the bin, put dog turds on top and then set fire to you" song. It went rather well.
The sewing machine, I have decided, is cursed. Probably because I cursed it - alot.

and the winner is...

Congratulations to Miranda Rauert for winning the Little Red Riding Hood!
I want to say a big thank you to everyone for getting The Forest Flaw to 120 likes and still showing no signs of slowing down :)


I have been very fortunate of late to be featured in a number of publications, and I could think of no better way of celebrating what seems to be the month of The Forest! 
I am also very glad that fate provided a winner with a little girl with seemingly a birthday coming up - so little red could not have found a better home!


Don't forget to check out the other designs too though - my most popular and most obscure can be found at both:


Down that little lane and madeit.com

recent publications:
Bendigo Magazine
Bendigo Weekly
Bendigo Advertiser - getting the 2nd most wanted locally made xmas pressie this year!!

And bring on Christmas so I can sew the entire NEW range of goodies I have cooking in my head in the new year!!

:)

*first GIVE AWAY*

Yay,

So excited to see my Little Red Riding Hood in the local paper as number 2 on Bendigo's Local xmas wish list - that I wanted to celebrate
So I am having my first GIVE AWAY!

Help me reach 120 to 'like' my  facebook page and WIN a little Red Riding Hood.

I will post it to you where ever you live too.
Winner will be randomly selected by computer program from ALL my likers when I reach 120!!

Red Riding hood has lost her way!

The wolf has eaten granny and now she is wandering the forest in search of the woodsman - stunned and shocked!

Red riding hood has a beautiful velvet cloak with removable hood. She wears black leather boots and carries a picnic basket .

Made from quality socks, faux velvet, faux leather and cotton and lace, stuffed with Pure New Zealand wool.

She measures 28cm x 17cm wide.

[Remember, these items are all handstitched collectables. Although they are sewn very tightly they are not made for active play. ]

Free to good home

Not many things in life are free. And certainly not the things that are on my xmas list.

But recently I have found that getting the free things can come at a cost - if you can swing them at all. In fact, they can be the HARDEST thing to get at sometimes.

Let me take you on a tour *cue squiggly lines and theruman music*
It all started a couple of weeks ago...

Starting a business requires a few things.
First: a product.
Second: all the other horrible admin crap that takes up every waking moment of your life until you can no longer look at your computer screen without wanting to rip your (or someone else's) eyeballs out.
Third: patience.

Example 1; 
Product: I filled an order for a beautiful shop Milt and Joe in my home town.
Admin: I began the process of registering my business name so I could get an ABN and invoice for goods. This is the admin part that makes you deal with the tax department and state government and requires you learn some ridiculous jargon and acronyms that have no bearing on what you need to do at all. It also jammed up for an entire day and almost made husband never want to talk to me again. Perhaps that was my fault - but I am blaming the government.
Patience: I had to wait two days before someone could get back to me and sort the whole thing out.

So you see the things that should be easy are not. Other free things I would like but find increasingly hard to swing are:
*   An entire day at home without having to sew
*   To eat a packet of salt and vinegar chips, or fish and chips, or any potato cooked in oil product without feeling the need to walk the circumference of the earth afterwards to burn it off
*   Good hair day on a day where it counts
*   Patience
*   Ability to see into the future
*   A magic elf to do all the work for me as I sleep
See, not too much to ask, but incredibly hard to get.

This entire process was compounded by another free conundrum:
Example 2:
Product: Free Golden retriever to good home
Admin: Rang husband. Tried nonchalant behaviour, begging, pleading, pouting, appealing to his squishy side and listing attributes of a dog I had never met, including it's penchant for wanting endless cuddles and it's ability to obey his every command. Answer no. Outcome - never allowed to read livestock section of paper again.
Patience: Bide my time...yes...bide my time...*maniacal hand rubbing*

So free does not necessarily mean easy. Free to me now just means a lot of effort. Free makes my hair stand on end and question what the catch is. Free means "not costing money - but perhaps a crap load of time, patience, begging, crying in frustration and eventually throwing a tantrum".

This is what I have learned. So take heed reader next time you see "free to good home", check what it will cost you first!

Actual free goodie!