front door

We've just had the windows, gable, portico and door painted on our house (after four years here!). I just love the slightly wild red we painted the door and I was tickled today to see a geranium cutting that I pinched from a friend's garden six months ago, and popped into a pot on the front verandah has flowered for the first time to match, the forest pansy cercis tree in our tiny front garden is leafing out in harmony too!
p.s. My old camera always struggled with this shade of purply red. What a nice surprise to see this one capture it perfectly.
p.p.s. I was so touched by the deep goodness of the couple who carried another's child when I saw them interviewed. They are very so honest and thoughtful in the face of an unimaginable trial.

maple

I've only had my little maple tree a couple of years. And I'm pretty sure it hasn't flowered before. In fact I didn't even know that maples flowered like this!
What a lovely surprise to find these little sprays of lolly pink flowers appear with the emerging lime green leaves. And can you see in the last photo the little seed pod emerging from the flower bud with its characteristic winged form. Very sweet.

350 sales!

Over the last year a few people have asked me about printing the Filigree design tea towel in black on white. Its taken me a while, but now its done I love how graphic it is, and I love it here with J's father's day cup (D is for Dad). I have limited stock of this, so if you like it get in early.

In other exciting news, Flower Press hit the 350 sales mark this morning on Etsy. I'm not sure why those round numbers appeal but they do :-) It's pretty exciting to think the next big step is 400 sales!

Look out for a Flower Press giveaway as I head towards my second birthday on Etsy, 300 posts (hard to believe but I'm up to 292 with this one!) and my second blogaversary!!

dust

It would be remiss of me to not post at least one picture for all of you who weren't here to see Sydney's fabulous dust storm yesterday. I woke early to an eerie yellow light coming through the blinds and when I looked out the world was orange. Turns out the winds had brought some inland desert dust from the centre of Australia and dumped it over town. It was bizarre and felt sort of apocalyptic.
This is not my photo, it shows the pool at North Sydney with the Harbour Bridge behind. Such a beautiful town my city, even in orange!
Amy (badskirt) has set up a great Flickr pool with more great photos.

sashiko

A while ago I stumbled across some beautiful pictures of Sashiko embroidery and was immediately smitten. It's partly the colours, I love navy and white together. I love the graphic quality of the stitching and I love the geometric patterns.
The fact that you can buy panels with the stitches outlined seemed like a good idea for an embroidery newbie like me too. I bought a cushion panel in the Petal design and though you can see I haven't made a huge amount of progress I am enjoying it.

Mine came from kimonomono. I see she hasn't any navy panels at the moment, but you can buy panels and supplies here and here too, Purlbee has a great sashiko tutorial too. This second image is taken from Etsy store handyhandscorner. I love the colours of this purse and can't wait till I've got the hang of it and I can freestyle like this.

* Thanks so much to Ellen from TheLongThread for featuring my red Filigree tea towel on her Etsy Finds Friday post last week. If you haven't seen it her great blog is a fantatic resource for crafty tutorials amongst other things.

heaven

I've spoken about my friend Melissa Wastney and her beautiful work before, most recently in my post on embroidery love. I just adore her beautiful blog tinyhappy and the work she creates. Of course I'm not alone, Melissa's amazingly creative eye and authentic, simple and observant life as documented on her blog, and the way she expresses it through her beautiful work, are much admired.
And she is the sweetest person too, but you knew that :-)


A while ago we decided to make a swap and recently our parcels passed over the sea somewhere between Australia and New Zealand. Melissa posted a lovely piece about the parcel I sent, and promptly whipped up a fantastic pillow with the barkcloth I have been hoarding for nearly a year! I'm good at stash but she has inspired me to start sewing.

Yesterday I arrived home to an exciting brown paper parcel in my letterbox.
I opened it and Wow!
Look at all the beautiful things she has sent me. I am so very very spoilt.
And you know what. Her pieces are even more beautiful in person, if that is possible.
I'll stop talking now and just show you the pictures.
You can see for yourself what beautiful gifts she's sent me.


The funniest thing is that I was wearing a necklace I made last year at my daughter's art party whose colours matched the Marimekko bag that Melissa sent exactly (see above).
The jasmine embroidery purse is something I've admired before, I think its so clever how she's shown the colour gradation in the flower buds.
And the brooch is just perfect, I'm wearing it today and loving it.
Thank you Melissa :-)

margaret olley

Heather Moore has posted a picture of my favourite Morandi painting on her Skinny Laminx blog today, following up on her post about this painter yesterday (I sent her the link after reading her wonderful post). Coincidentally the Morandi painting, held in our local Art Gallery of NSW, is one of many bought with a bequest from the wonderful Margaret Olley, herself one of our finest Australian painters, and someone who I've been meaning to post about for ages.
Now in her eighties, Margaret is best known for her still lives. A recent exhibition though, which I visited in May, featured her landscapes in watercolour, pen and ink, done over many years and many from travels around the world.


I've had the pleasure of meeting Margaret and she is an inspiration. She is wonderfully talented, clever and funny. Her sense of colour, shape and composition are beautiful and her long career is an inspiration to all artists.


Disappointingly I can't find a good copy of this self portrait online. It is one of my favourite paintings of hers and I love how contemporary it feels despite being painted in 1948.

p.s. The lovely Mary Beth from Supafine who writes for True Up emailled me a while ago about using my one of my stash photos in her Show us your Stash column. You can see it today on True Up, that wonderful fabric resource for all us addicts! If you haven't read it, go and have a look.

purple

My new camera (finally) arrived Friday afternoon! It is fantastic, I love it already though I haven't really had a proper chance to explore it yet.

Oh and thank you everyone for your lovely words about my camera tribulations. I've loved all your wonderful comments.

The D90 has a very satisfying feel, straight away it is more comfortable to hold than the D50 and some of the basic controls have been improved. For example there is a special setting for taking photos without flash. I take most of my photos on automatic in natural light so I'm loving that. The screen on the back is much larger and much improved. And it has the capacity to take video! Our other digital camera does that but I'm looking forward to experimenting with SLR quality video. I'm already thinking what would be fun to post here...

I've quickly rushed a couple of product shots so I can list my new tea towels. Some of you might recognise the new Purple Blossom tea towel from the parcel I sent Melissa last week! If you haven't seen her lovely post and the cushion she whipped up from the barkcloth I sent her, then go and have a peek on her tinyhappy blog. She's so creative!

In other purple news, labradoodle Pippie has a new collar. She doesn't really like having her photo taken, can you tell?

teal towels

To be honest, it was a communication breakdown that led to this new teal colourway in the Chrysanthemum and Filigree tea towels, but I like to think of it as a happy accident! What were meant to be aqua blue prints came back as this wonderful, classy teal colour. (I have a few other new colours but until my new camera is up and running I'm not going to list them.)
This picture is made quickly on my scanner just because I can't wait any longer to share them. Apologies for the quality. The colour isn't quite right, it's slightly greener than this.
What do you think? I'm starting to love it! I think its a great addition to the range. A sort of deeper turquoise colour that we are all loving so much at the moment.

There are quite a few other things too I want to share when I get the new camera not just the new colours, adventures in embroidery, spring springing in the garden, a simple crafty trick I've just discovered...
And I will be having a giveaway. So come back soon!

change

flotsam, originally uploaded by flowerpress.

Well I did it! I finally bit the bullet and bought a new camera.
I'm buying it online so I don't have it in my hands yet, but hopefully it will come this week.
In the end I decided to keep my old lenses and just (!) buy a new body, a Nikon D90 DSLR. It feels very indulgent but the old camera was going to cost a third of the price of a new camera to fix.
I'm going to miss the old D50. I was uploading some old pictures to Flickr today and I can see improvements in my photography over time. I've learnt a lot by just shooting so many photos. That poor old camera has been dragged all over the place.
Here's an early shot. Some flotsam and jetsam from the beach, taken balancing on a kitchen chair, at the funny little beach house we stay at down south. I love the way photos hold memories so safe. I can nearly always remember when and where they were taken, what was happening, and sometimes how I felt. Magic.