autumn has arrived

We were lucky to go and stay at my favourite place again at the weekend and autumn was so evident here with the beautiful array of coloured carpets of leaves that greeted us.....The colours were amazing....rich golds, reds and browns...


The light filtering through the trees was magical.....there was a quiet calm all around this place.....not a whisper to be heard but the occasional falling leaves let out a gentle swish as they passed you by....


There were so many wonderful spots to take photos through the trees looking back at the buildings beyond forming natures frames....


I tell you these photos have been untouched, no colour added no brightness just nature in its true form.....the beauty for you to see and to touch....


These pin oak branches were nearly bare .... walking under them and through the leaves they let out a loud crunch .....i felt like kicking them high to watch them float then tumble back down to the earth again..


Sitting on the moss covered seats looking back across the lake at the house is one of our favourite spots....here you truly feel the peace that surrounds you ....the calm is reflected in the waters edge but hiding in amongst these leaves are ducks and i gathered quite a few of their beautiful shed feathers to put in my journals...




These two pictures would have to be my favourite....i love the look of the leaves against the building and the furniture......coming away from this place at the weekend where you feel like you have been for days .....you feel refreshed and ready to take on the world again......i will be sad when i can no longer visit but i do treasure the moments i have there and my photos will continually take me on those journeys of discovery and wonder of this amazing place.....

Being Creative

For as long as i can remember i have always been busy with my hands.....whether it was making my own clothes, knitting, crocheting or cross stitch there was something wonderful about looking at something that you had created that wasn't like anyone elses........For the last few years after being inspired when a neighbour gave me a Somerset Studio magazine and being in awe of the fantastic work i decided there and then that this was going to be my new obsession...... i put down my embroidery needle and took up scissors and glue and paper instead...... I joined in some book round robins and this is a page (above) that i did in someones book from England.....their theme was Paris....



Recently i did a little book using my favourite items from the Collections range.....i am really into vintage and this was one of the pages above that i did.....


A very small accordian book i did.....i love working with things that are small as it is a challenge to get it looking just right.....I am lucky to work in a scrapbooking paperart shop....did i say work .....actually its more like fun everyday being creative.....


A slightly bigger accordian book......these are preprinted photos but of course as i tell everyone you can use your own family photos as well.....but not the originals!!! take copies and use them and then give to a family member as a gift......these little books don't just have to be done in the vintage style either you can use brights and use fun pictures of your own children......nothing is hard when you know how.....and what a thrill to receive one of these little booklets as a gift......


This is a collection of atcs which stand for artist trading cards usually they are made to do as swaps and i have hosted swaps with people in England, Australia, USA, Denmark and of course New Zealand....these are todays version of the bubble gum cards that kids used to swap....they are the size of a playing card and are a challenge to do artwork on them....there are now swaps with inches which are an inch square.....i think when you are creative you are always challenging yourself to do better and to come up with new ideas......i love to create and am at present doing an altered book on my new grand daughter.......

Art is a microscope which the artist fixes on the secrets of his soul and shows to other people these secrets which are common to all........Leo Tolstoy

Be aware of wonder, live a balanced life, learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some....(unknown)

Kindness and Love

Recently i came across this little article in a local paper.......it did not say who it was written by ..... but being a lover of words i thought what it had to say was so very true...


Remember there is no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end.

Forget injuries, never forget kindnesses.

He who feels no compassion will become insane.

What do we live for if it is not to make life less difficult to each other?

Tenderness and kindness are not signs of weakness and despair, but manifestation of strength and resolutions.

One can pay back the loan of gold, but one dies forever in debt to those who are kind.

Constant kindness can accomplish much, as the sun melts, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust and hostility to evaporate.


How delightful is the company of generous people, who overlook trifles and keep their minds instinctively fixed on whatever is good and positive in the world around them.

How far you go in life depends on you being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and the strong. Because someday in life you will have been all of these.

Don't wait for a funeral to pay a compliment. You may not make it in time.

You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late.


Wise words indeed, often we think kindly of someone or something they have done but we never actually tell them........remember my first post about what i wanted this blog to bring to people......it read......they may forget what you said but they will never forget how you made them feel and this is what kindness does to people ......ripples travel the world....... be kind to someone today and never look for what we can receive when we help someone, because we receive by the gift in our soul of how we feel when we give and that is something we want to keep and by coincidence that is what we just gave away...

The Land of The Long White Cloud

The cloud were amazing as we travelled back from our favourite place the mount at easter weekend......big thick fluffy clouds that looked like huge balls of cotton wool were everywhere it almost felt like you could reach out and touch them.......
One of my favourite pastimes as a child was laying back in the long cool green grass gazing up at clouds and looking for pictures in them.....often you would see faces and shapes, sometimes they would sweep past you and other times they just sat there......i often wonder if i was on top of the clouds and jumped in would i sink to the bottom or spring to the top....
New Zealand is known as The Land of The Long White cloud and on this day i could see why......there was many of those white clouds amongst the blue of the sky and even some dark ones forming in there too.....aren;t the shapes fascinating.....take time out oneday and lay in the grass and gaze up and see what you can find.....


Above all watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you, because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don;t believe in magic will never find it.....(unknown)

Home to me

Home to me is somewhere i can relax and read a book.......i love books and magazines about interiors, gardens and homes......


I love flowers in the home, nothing gives me greater joy than to pick a bunch of fresh flowers out of my garden and bring them inside....they instantly brighten a room, as we come into autumn the hydrangeas are changing colours and i love them like this....the ones above are originally white and this is the colour they change to.....white is my favourite colour in flowers....


These blue hydrangeas also started out as white and now they are blue........isn't nature amazing!!


Collections on my desk.....where do i write may you ask welllll actually i have another desk as well.......i love surrounding myself with unusual objects and things i am attracted to.....i love glass cloches and this one in front has a smaller one inside and inside this one is a birds nest.....


I have collected old china for a number of years in fact this is the first thing i ever started with and i love to put old plates on the wall....


I love birds nests and have a whole collection of them......this one here is made out of branches of an old silver birch tree .... i love the rawness of it.....and the egg i am not sure if that is real.....


I love reflections through mirrors......if you look closely you will see the blue hydrangeas in the mirror.

On the bed is pillows made from old lace and antique lace....some i made myself and some i brought......this is the girlie side of me!!


These two fellows are telling each other a secret.......these bears have been handmade by a bear artist.....i love their size and the way you can get them to show expression.....


My dressing table showing another view of the bed .....there is those reflections in the mirror again.......this is an old oak wing mirrored dressing table and when i brought it the stain was almost black....i stripped it down in our lounge during the evenings because we didn;t have a garage you can imagine my horror when i came in the lounge the next morning and saw all the dust that had settled everywhere!!! we live and we learn!!


My daughters rocking chair......she is now a young adult with a daughter of her own and will soon take this chair to have in her daughters room.....if you look closely you will see on the seat scratches....to me this is history because when she was little she had to actually climb up onto the chair to get on and these scratches are from her shoes, her as a young child is brought all back to me in flashes when i look upon this chair......some would look at this and want to sand it down but to me that is the memories of her life......


The dining room with the baltic pine dresser which has my collection of old and new china and interesting bits and pieces....beside it is a fruit picking ladder made by the husband of my friend whose house i showed you in the beginning.....he made all sorts of furniture and sold it......he was a very clever man.....and is sadly missed by many ...... for his talent and for the wonderful person he was.....


Another view and again those hydrangeas this time they have faded out to white with a hint of green in them......if you leave them in the water until the water is gone they will actually dry and you can use them as dried flowers.....


Yes i collected old baskets and have them above my cabinets in the kitchen....


My newly covered wing chair with a slipcover.....i am so pleased how this turned out.....behind it is a old school cupboard which would have been used in a class room to hold the school books, it even has a number on it written in white paint...... it is one of my favourite pieces of furniture....

Here is an extract by Alexandra Stoddard from her book called Creating a Beautiful Home.....
Perfection halts the creative process. It is the enemy of spontaneity and serendipity, surely two of the most glorious gifts of life.
There is too much emphasis on nit picking neatness on creating rooms that are nothing more than still lifes, but where is the living taking place?
We may celebrate the daily moments of life when we throw an extra log on a roaring fire, light a scented candle, open a window, move a chair over to the light and sip a glass of chardonnay, prepare a snack, read the paper, or write a letter with a fountain pen, but the soot, the scratches, the crumbs, the ring on the table the mess on the floor, the ink on the chintz, the wrinkles, the work these are all part of the romance of everyday living.

Perfection on the other hand, chills the mystery and leaves us frozen in space. Perfectionists miss it all, i consider myself someone who likes things done right, but a broken glass or a scratch doesn't send me into depression.
A bed can be a beautiful still life when not in use but pillowcases do get wrinkled and yes ripped, my old pine writing desk has several ink stains on the surface, some from my own pens, without these my desk wouldn't have a soul.
It is in fact the untidiness and the clutter of our cozy messes that we make our presence felt and that after all is what homes are all about...

My Heart

Today my heart is heavy and i feel like i need to build a sling for it made out of rope, there are small cracks and chips around the edge which is a sign of pain and suffering it has received, some cracks are deep some are tiny but they show i have lived a life, tiny bits unseen to the naked eye break off all the time and sometimes i want to put an iron cage around it but i think this would make it cold.

I store special things to me away inside its shelves, sometimes i want to open it wide to show all the good things stored inside but i am worried they will be afraid of the red instead of the joy within. I am afraid of being so open to everyone so feel safer knowing it is closed, that way i can show bits of it when i want to. I need to keep it safe and treat it well so cracks do not appear often, I nurture it with loving thoughts and actions.


If it were to break open all the good would come out and the bad would scurry in, some cracks have come close but in time they have healed.


Family have the greatest storage area, it radiates and pumps my heart with strength and love and courage and joy and fulfilment and happiness. Hurt, pain and anger are locked away in a steel box with padlocks and chains.


Today it is heavy, but it aches for people known and unknown, strange that, that it has the power to feel for things outside its control but that shows its compassion, I am hoping tomorrow it will feel lighter and joy will enter once again, it will feel smooth to the touch and glisten with love.....


A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and can sing it back to you when you have forgotten the words........unknown

The Love of White, A Bit of Pink and a Thank You

There is something to be said about having a friend that you can share your ideas with, who gets what you are thinking, who you can laugh with and who makes great food, shes a chef ....... and shares your name which can be confusing when someone calls out wendy....... my friend loves white and loves pink..... she had this beautiful cake made by a chef friend for her daughters 18th birthday....... looks too good to cut into i thought....


She has great vision and has rescued this house and made it into something truly beautiful, the above picture was before she worked some magic and made this area outside her bedroom somewhere you would want to enjoy early morning coffee in the sunshine....


And this is how it turned out an amazing difference don;t you think.... that brick planter at the end is on both sides and contains herbs which she uses in her cooking....


This was originally a wall with a window but Wendy saw the potential of adding fold back doors and a terrace where many a good time has been spent....its a great spot for looking back into the garden.....


and of course the indoor outdoor flow from the kitchen to this spot is just what was needed......us kiwis love our outdoor living....


The Shabby Chic lounge which for a little while had the dining table in while the kitchen was being done..... lovely pink floral and velvet cushions and a lounge suite that you sink into and instantly feel at home.....i think this is what i love best about Wendys house is that it is in fact a home and one you can relax in and enjoy...


The new kitchen complete with the table and bench, i love the mix of old and new, the white washed floorboards, the chandelier....



Another view of the kitchen, i love the use of the butlers sink and her collection of wooden ware above the pantry, the floating pink flowers in the vase on the table......


A view from the front of the house....where Wendy has grown a lavender hedge and planted old fashioned roses......in pink and white of course!!


The unsuite and laundry newly renovated in a small space that was once a very tiny, unattractive laundry area........again a smaller butlers sink and wire ware which is also loved...


Where you really want to spend your time in the sun......a great spot which before the addition of doors and the terrace was wasted...


The main bathroom which includes a claw foot bath and a shower not shown in this picture and again those butlers sinks....


A collection of chintz china and other bits and pieces... wendy has many gorgeous pieces of pink and white and blue and white china....


The front of the house and a really sunny spot in the mornings......doors that open off the lounge and if its too windy you can sit in the snug at the end.....
I have known wendy for well over 10 years now, we have seen each others children grow up and have always shared our love of decorating, magazines, gardens and much more.....now she lives about four hours from us but we do get to see her often because she lives where we visit my mother in law......it is always special to be able to spend time with her......

I would also like to take this opportunity when talking about white houses to give a big thank you to Maria of Dreamy Whites who has helped me enormously in getting this blog started.....i have a lot yet to learn but without her help i would not be able to be where i am ....... please visit her blog it is truly inspiration and delightful to read and look at....... Dreamywhites.blogspot.com

A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and can sing it back to you when you have forgotten the words.........Unknown