Christmas is coming

As every webpage and blog seems to want to remind me, Christmas is FIVE WEEKS AWAY. I'm always behind on this because as a transplanted Northern Hemispherer, Christmas in the middle of summer is plain weird and gives me none of the seasonal cues I would have had in Canada - like snow and cold. One of the biggest problems I have is that none of the traditional Christmas things make sense down here - rich heavy food, snow and winter-related symbolism, 90% of Christmas cards, wreaths, anything with red velvet. For those in the Northern Hemisphere, try to imagine having Xmas in July - can I interest you in some mulled wine, a roaring fire and snowflake imagery? No?

To that list I can also add most Xmas tutorials or winter issues of magazines not produced here or in Oz. However, I just took a quick look at the most recent Sweet Paul (winter 2011) and discovered that a non-traditional take on Xmas like he has lends itself very well to a summer Xmas here. So if you're reading this while reading jandals (or flipflops or thongs or whatever your lingo is) then have a look, you might be surprised.

Source: sweetpaulmag-digital.com via Hazelnuts on Pinterest

Linen

I really love natural linen and I have no idea why - but I'm drawn to it again and again in its various shades. I particularly love it paired with cotton, either plain or print and most especially red! I don't like wearing it because it does that nasty wrinking thing that makes you look sloppy after 30 seconds, but in anything else it's my favourite and my best (to quote Lola).



This is the beginning of my second pillow for the challenge, and my first ever attempt at hand-basting. Now I know why I will never do this for a larger project, it takes forever! But linen, she's a difficult mistress and until I get some 505 spray I'm going to have to suck it up and do it this way. And there's no denying, the basting has a certain appeal! This linen is a darker shade, with an almost green tinge to it, which makes it hard to pair with things but I think it'll be better for the pillow than a more natural oatmeal.

As a complete contrast, how about this photo I put through various iPhone filters until it looks (to me anyways) almost baroque in its hues




Unfortunately I can't remember which apps I used - I think Snapseed and Super Retro...I need to write these things down! It's funny with Instagram, forcing you to use the square format is quite good as it challenges you to think about images in a different way. I had a hard time not changing the linen photo to that size!

What I've been doing

You may have noticed that it's been a bit quiet around here. No, this is not because I've got a book deal, or because I'm pregnant or any of the usual bloggy reasons :) Just real life, window painting, visiting parents, school holidays, Instagram and my AMQG challenge. This challenge has gotten me all secretive and shifty-eyed, skulking the internets looking for inspiration while not letting on to my fellow members what I'm up to and most definitely not blogging about anything. I know this is wrong so I'm here to at least post a photo of the back of it. What? You thought I'd post the front and give it all away? You'll have to wait until the 1st December for that big reveal. The challenge is to produce a cushion using the green fabric and I'm quite pleased with my colour choices here, and even more so with the fact there is an invisible zip running up the side of those blocks. I've got another pillow in the works at the moment, in natural linen, so there may be another sneak peak to come.

Once that's done I'm onto the kitchen windows so posting may be sporadic for the next little while. I do hope you stick around though!

There's always Instagram photos though...