Maddi and Me!

Yup! That's the talented Madeleine Stamer! And that's us in our art smocks, in school! Yes, in a real primary school, with kiddos running around, greeting you, showing you what they have in their lunch boxes, telling you about their weekend... a real school! I've ALWAYS dreamt of teaching little kids in a primary school and Madeleine and her school offered me a wonderful opportunity. I get to work with grade 1s for 3 whole Thursdays in a row and together, we'll be learning how to paint some recipe paintings. What a dream come true! Yesterday was week 1. And already, I'm excited for week 2. I went home smiling and told Darren all about it when he came home. It feels SO good to be a teacher. It feels like the right thing to do? Not sure if that even makes sense. But it does to me!



Anyway, hope I'm not boring you with all these teaching posts of mine. I promise pictures from my solo show opening soon! But for now, I'd like to just dwell a little longer in this whole happy teaching bubble of mine : )

PS: Maddi creates lovely paintings and has been known for her beautiful bird mobiles. I myself have been a long-time fan of her bird mobiles. I'm waiting for the day I can get myself this one! Oh and Maddi has a super cute home too! You can see some pictures here!

The Gruffalo!

A couple of weeks ago, the lovely team at Hardie Grant sent me two lovely books - Kids' Crafternoon Sewing and Kids' Crafternoon Papercraft. I must admit, I've been so busy I haven't had a chance to sit down and really go through the book word for word. I did however flip through it's beautifully coloured pages and a project that caught my eye was the cereal box monster pinata. It looked so fun and so cute, something that's really achievable for a 7 year old. So I thought it'll be nice to get some kids together to try making it! And I did just that! But as you know, I'm always the sort to improvise, change it up a little and make it my own. I thought why not make a gruffalo?!

I'll let you in on a secret. I've been a bit addicted to the story of The Gruffalo ever since one of my home art class kiddo's mum told me about it. I went and got the book. So funny and I keep walking around the house, repeating some bits of the story. ‎" A Gruffalo? What's a Gruffalo? " " A Gruffalo! Why, didn't you know? " ...." he has knobbly knees and turned-out toes, and a poisonous wart at the end of his nose! " Best book ever! Oh and I've even changed my boring mac wallpaper to a nice brown one with a gruffalo in the middle. Oops!

Anyway, back to our cereal box gruffalo. Well, I didn't quite end up getting a bunch of 7 year olds. Instead, I tested the project out with super-cute Milo and Frankie. They're both 3 ish 4.. So turns out I did most of the work, and they just kept laughing while sticking bits of eyeballs and noses, ears and teeth. They were simply amused by how funny their cereal box gruffalo looked. Well, I think they look funny too. I made one and it's now sitting next to my window. Makes me smile whenever I look at it!

This whole experience just goes to show how Kids craft books can still work for really young kids/toddlers. Not all projects will work of course, but with a bit of improvisation and simplifying, they'll work just fine too!

Opening tomorrow night!

Oh yes! My little show opens tomorrow night at Carbon Black Gallery, Prahran! Drinks are going to be from 5.30 to 7.30pm. I'll be there along with all my drawings, so will Miss Marshmallow Lollie! See you there if you can make it! The address is : Carbon Black Gallery, 188 High Street, Prahran. Gallery hours are every Wed - Sunday 12 to 5pm.

Melamine goodness coming soon!

Remember this post from quite a couple of days back? Here's an update! The samples have now arrived and Cathy Hope and myself, we're thrilled they all turned out looking so cute! It's so unreal to see my art on a plate and cup. Weird! But in a really exciting and good way. The colours on these sample plates are looking a little 'cloudy' and dull but that's because they're just samples. The final ones will be all bright and cheerful and correctly saturated. Mmmmmm. Can't wait!

Emily Green at Design Made Trade

Sorry, no pictures of my lovely studio buddy, Miss Emily Green. Instead, here are some pictures I took of her little open spaced studio last week while I was at Design Made Trade. I went with Indie on Thursday and we hung out after that. It was nice to just spend a day hanging with friends, not working and just walking around. Oh the joys of freelancing! Only problem was, I suffered majorly on Friday and Saturday, having to do a whole PILE of work. Oops! My hands kept cramping up!

I took a whole heap of photos but got a bit too lazy to post them all up. Besides Miss Lucy Feagins has done a nice round up just today so hop on over to her blog to check it out! I'm just going to show Emily's little nook cause she's a special friend and she deserves a bit of a special treatment.. Haha. Ok I am just biased because she's my super awesome studio buddy.

I took photos of Harvest Textile's stand too! But I think my photo does it NO justice at all! Emma took lovely pictures and it's up on the Harvest Blog! Go check it out! So proud of those ladies. They've worked so so hard on this new MakeKit range.. so cool!

Kids scarf knitting competition!

Hello everyone! My friend Pauline, who runs and owns Popcraft, is organizing a scarf knitting competition for kids! You can read more about it on her blog here. I think it's such a fun thing for a kid to do. Teach them knitting then get them to knit a scarf! If I had kids, I would teach them how to knit and we can all learn how to crochet together. I learnt how to crochet a while ago. Karen taught me how to. But I've forgotten. Oops! But I know Miss Pip is REALLY good at it. I went to her lovely shop today and there she was, knitting a lovely ripple blankie ( I think it's a blankie no? ) So cute!

So yes, get your kids some knitting needles and yarn, it's knitting time!

( Pictures taken by Emma. Those are her two little kiddos. They're often at the studio and they make me laugh so much, especially that little guy who's all covered in yarn. I always ask if he's eaten his daddy for lunch and he'll give me this huge NO!!! You got to be kidding! sort of smile. Hahaha.. You got to see it yourself!

Outfit Post No.2

I have been working really, really hard. Teaching kids, juggling freelance work, planning upcoming classes, prepping for my solo show, markets, sideline projects. I feel like I've been stretched to the max and I've hit my limit. Well. Sort of. Just the other night, I had a big meltdown in the middle of a restaurant! Gosh, it was embarrassing. So to reward and make myself feel a little better and more motivated, I've been shopping. Oops! So since a lot of you commented on my previous outfit post, and wrote to me saying how you really liked the posts, I thought, well, another post then! Enjoy! x

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Mustard yellow dress from SundayMorning Designs. I got it from Popcraft. Been staring at it since day 1.  Two months of staring everyday and I finally caved in and bought it this evening! It's so nice and so warm and in a cool mustard colour too! Necklace from Emily Green of course! Everyone should have an Emily Green! So colourful and quirky. Even Darren thinks Em's necklaces are cute!

Magic Marker print dress from Ermie. Oh I had my eye on this one for a long long long long time. Months! It finally went on sale so I bought it. I usually dislike buying dresses that requires me to wear belts. Simply because I always feel a bit more restricted. But this dress, I don't know why, it is just so super comfortable, I forget the belt's even there! I wore it out for the first time yesterday and got nice comments from everyone. Thanks Jennifer! This dress truly is amazing. I feel so good/lady-like in it!

And last but not the least, fringe earrings from London based Elvira Sazesh. I got them from Popcraft too. They are so interesting, I just had to have them. They're made out of suede. What I really like about them is that they're such statement pieces. I can just wear a plain top and they would just make my whole outfit more exciting! I wore them to class the other day and one of the little girls just kept on staring at me the whole time. She had this dreamy look when staring at me. I ended up asking her at the end of the lesson if she was okay. Her answer ' I'm staring at your earrings! They're so pretty.....'

So nice to have new clothes. I think the best thing about buying all these new clothes, they're all handmade! Yay to handmade goodness!

Upcoming stuff!

Hi everyone! A few of my crafty talented friends and myself.. we're doing a little pop up studio sale! It's on in early August. We'll be there saying hi, selling our lovely works, taking on new commissions. ( PS: Don't tell anyone, but I will be offering commissions at a discounted rate! ) My fantastic and super smart studio friend Emily Green will be in it too. So will Betty Jo and Madeleine Stamer, Pilgrim Lee, Crumb Threads, Peta Pledger and Shara Lambeth. So yes, come on down in this gloomy cold, say hi and hang out over nice snacks! I might bring some cupcakes!

And of course, I also have a solo show coming up next week! It opens on Wednesday at Carbon Black Gallery, High street Prahran. I will be showing all 16 pieces from my series of giant food diaries. They have never been exhibited in full before, so pop by the gallery to see it for real!

Alrighty, feel free to spread the word if you like. Thank you ! x

PS: Forgot to add! Opening night party for my Carbon Black show will be on at 5.30 to 7.30pm!

Last bits from the school holidays

So, as you can tell from how my blogging has been a little on the slow side, that's because I've got way too much going on right now. Preparing for an upcoming solo show ( Opens next Wednesday! ), an upcoming pop up studio sale, teaching little kidlets and adults, juggling freelance drawings, updating my shop with new classes and all. As a result, I've been so tired, I kind of stopped blogging a little. Well, sort of anyway. Sorry guys! Will be back to blogging proper once this crazy crazy time ends. Meanwhile, enjoy those little pictures up there. From my Harvest Special kids and adult watercolour classes.

I'm already preparing for round 2 ( September and October ) and have been slowly updating my shop with those new classes. Some of my lovely friends have already started asking. So yup, gotta get it done : ) My shop will be closed for a while. Possibly a week or 2 and will return with lots of new classes, gift vouchers even!

PS: Look at the cute big tanabata! The Harvest intern, Lucy made it. Ebony! I think she was inspired by your HelloSandwich tanabata making workshop. Cool beans!

Knitting Part II

I shall now unofficially declare Popcraft as Harvest Workroom's official chill out lounge! Comfy chairs and cushions. Beautiful yarn, nice chats and knitting times. I am usually an epic-ly slow snaily knitter but under the influence of Pauline, I have been knitting non stop. I now carry a knitting project in my bag everywhere I go. I've got 3 scarves on the go right now. And this is another one I've been working on.

Studio Time

Some pictures from last Friday at the studio. Don't worry, I'm not turning into an alcoholic. I'm drawing a bunch of Ciders for a job. And see that cute pink woven basket? The lovely Peaz family gave it to me. I love the brightness of it. I took it home and it's now filled with oranges.

Knitting

I know the scarf looks kind of wonky! I am still learning. In fact, it's my first attempt at trying moss stitch and also, picking up lost stitches.

So, I have recently discovered this beautiful 100% pure Japanese wool yarn. It's called Avril and I got them from Pauline at Popcraft. It has a really ropey texture. It's nice and chunky and knits really quickly. So as a result, I've been pretty much knitting in the morning, knitting on the trams, knitting at the studio, while I draw, While in the kitchen, while watching shows on the television, and also just before I sleep. Basically I have been knitting everywhere I go. Poor Darren. He ends up just having a mad knitter nana as a girlfriend. Oops. Oh and I have matchy green nails to go with my greeny autumn looking scarf. I think that scarf needs a bit of a mustard colour in there somewhere. Do you think?

I'm doing another scarf too alongside this one. It's a more masculine looking scarf. Grey and cream. I'm thinking I might get some nice wooden buttons to go with it. Not sure if Darren will wear a scarf with buttons. Might be too girly. Hmmm