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Thursday, December 29

Yellow Days

Summer is here, and it makes me think of one colour - YELLOW
A little while ago I had a yellow tea party and since tea parties are all the rage I thought I'd share some pix with you all.
I didn't especially go out and buy any yellow things - I just found whatever was handy. By a lucky coincidence I was given a whole bag of lemons by someone who didn't like them - fancy that, not liking lemons!


Also I found some other yellow parties for you, some a bit more extreme than mine that's for sure!






Wednesday, December 28

Christmas and a time for new things

Firstly you made me wondering what happened to Hobby Horses and Second Courses... I have now replaced it with this sparkling new-look blog - Sew La Tea! I have had the Sew La Tea idea for a while - and have many hopes for it. The Sew La Tea idea is bigger than just a blog, as I ultimately want to open a sewing cafe under the same name. It would be a place to bring along your projects, meet like-minded people, be inspired, attend classes/workshops and all while you enjoy a cuppa tea and some freshly baked treats. It is a long term goal and at the moment I am doing a fair bit of groundwork to make sure it will be a sustainable venture. Any ideas or feedback would be great! 

Anyway, it starts here - with similar stuff to my last blog but hopefully more of everything! I got a new phone for Christmas and it should let me blog on the go now - which is very handy.

Okay - so that's enough talk - on to the posting!


A Bittasweet Christmas

Over at my design company Bittasweet Creative, I designed a 2011 Christmas collection - Pomme Noël
It included gift tags, labels, stickers and greeting cards. The designs were french inspired, and the colour palette was drawn from the humble apple. I sold the collection on Felt, Etsy and at a craft market. 

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For my own personal Christmas giving I teamed the Pomme Noël Collection with a beautiful gift wrap from Hands as well as some kraft paper, and finished the look off with a candy cane coloured twine from Typo
I used my modern chalk board Christmas tree that I made last year. 
My flatmates slowly added decorations on while no one was watching...
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Every year I like to give some homemade gifts to my friends. This year I made jams and hot chocolate mix. The first jam was Strawberry, Apple and Vanilla - a recipe from Frankie. The other jam was one of my own invention: Raspberry, Peach and Pomegranate. I sourced the fresh berries from Berryfields in Christchurch. They were the best berries I think I've ever tasted. The Frankie magazine recommended using nice berries, not old over-ripe ones. I'm glad I did - both the jams tasted delish!

The hot chocolate mix consisted of two flavours - Double Choc Orange and White Choc Mint. I made them by grinding the respective chocolate down and adding milk powder, natural mint/orange essence and for the double choc some cocoa. I kept adding a bit of each ingredient and testing the drink until it was perfect. I was very happy to have leftovers for me to keep! I put the mix in jars - separating each flavour with a paper disk. I topped them off with mini heart shaped marshmellows from the newly-opened Ballantynes

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Also from Ballantynes I picked up a Gingerbread house kit. Every year I make these - but this year there wasn't enough time to make it from scratch, hence the kit. It turned out way better than last years!

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A few snaps from Christmas day... Charlie surrounded by wrapping paper, My Mum's Christmas tree extravaganza (big family, lots of presents!), good old sparkling grape juice. 


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Hope you all had a lovely Christmas with friends and family. Happy Holidays! x
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