Wedding Photos

Lovely wedding. Good weather. A couple photos to show. After all that time preparing, it's all over in a day. I am biased I know, but our daughter looked stunning. Lots of people at the church and 86 friends at the reception. Rellies of the groom flew in from England. Our rellies came from SA and the NT. plus a few local ones too, but most reception guests were friends of our daughter and son in law. His speech was a highlight; he had us all laughing, and this is from a person who doesn't like getting up in front of people.

Wedding

Three weeks till the wedding. Been making chocolates. 150 done - 250 still to do.

Last week-end I hosted a combined Kitchen/Pantry/Laundry Tea. There was around 35 ladies there. It was a fun afternoon.

Still need to make - the order of service booklets, place tags, petal holders, bomboniere, menus.

Wish me luck.

Lovely gardens.

Spring is in the air.

The parks and gardens are really looking lovely here in Toowoomba at the moment. Our Carnival of Flowers festivities start in 2 weeks.

On a sad note my husband's step-mum passed away on the 31st July, aged 87 years. She will be sadly missed but had been suffering in considerable pain for some months. She is now with her maker in heaven.

Wedding Invitations finished

Three pictures are of the full invitation which opens up. The main invite is glued inside and the gift Registry and Acceptance are loose and in a small pocket. On the front cover the top ribbon is fastened with double sided tape and the bottom ribbon with the teardrop crystal is tied on. There is a little hole in the side and another underneath the bow for the ribbon to go through.

The small single (wedding cermony) invite only is the same wording as the main invite but without the reception part. The bow is the same type of ribbon as I used on the full invitations. These bows I bought already tied.

The last invites are for the Kitchen Tea. There are other that say Laundry or Pantry as well, just to get some variety. They are all in a mix of blue, yellow and green backgrounds and this is just one of the papers used. I am happy with all of them.


Yeh. finished at last and mostly mailed.

Another month has passed.
Mum is looking well (besides having no hair) and is back home again and is getting around quite good too. At this stage I don't know what her tests have shown (if the cancer is stable, has shrunk or grown).

My brother from Alice Springs was home for awhile and is now in the USA being a tourist. He is on Long Service Leave. He will be coming back here for daughters wedding in October.

The day he left here, for his home in Alice Aprings, before going to the US, my husbands sister arrived from Adelaide for a few days so she could visit their stepmum. She stayed with us. Last week-end my husbands brother also arrived from South Australia and stayed with us a few days, again to visit their stepmother. She is in a bad way, but having said that, she has been that way for some time now. Never any improvement. They've upped her medication again. They seem to think she is waiting for someone in particular to visit but we have no idea who.

On the 4th July, our daughter ran the Gold Coast Airport marathon. We went down on the Saturday afternoon and stayed overnight at Surfers Paradise at the Paradise Resort. I was quite happy with the place, enjoyed the BBQ meal there and the floor show. Weather on the Sunday was good and sunny and our daughter ran the marathon under 4 hours which she was really pleased about. Took 25 minutes off of her time last year.

This past week I have been working on her wedding invitations. They open like a book, with the information to be placed/glued inside but they haven't organized their gift registry yet and decided on the wording. I really, really wish they would hurry up as I want to get them finished and out by the end of the month. (I said that last month too). The meals at the reception venue have gone up since they booked too (bugger). They are now having the wedding cake as desert so have gone to a cheaper option, instead of the entree, main, desert option they first organized, but because they want the chair covers, sashes, and fairy lights they have to pay $300 for these when in their first option it was part of the package.

We picked up the wedding dress last Saturday, but the front hem needs taking up (even with her buying very high heeled/platform shoes). So to the dressmaker on Tuesday we go. Must make phone calls to the cake maker now and let her know we need enough cake for desert and the hire place as we can have t-lights on the reception tables.

Husband goes away for a couple weeks holiday next month to South Australia to visit friends and relatives. His brother is turning 60 so wants to be there then, as he came up to us for my husband's 60th a couple years back.

I hoping this invitation stuff is sorted by then.

I have my wedding outfit at the dressmakers too as it needs some altering. Pants taken up and a nip and tuck here and there. Things I don't want to do myself.

Been working on our tax returns this week end. Am hoping to be called in to work on the 21st August for the elections. I worked at a polling booth at the 07 elections. The extra money will come in handy as always.

Anyway will post again next month.

Middle of june already

Middle of June already. Time is flying by. Last month I talked about the wedding. One bridesmaid has picked up her dress on the week-end but I haven't organized dressmaker yet. Left message but no return call. Hired the vases. Bought myself an outfit and made hairdresser appointment for me, so that's something done. Need to find an organist for the church, again left message but no return call as yet. Will try again tonight I think.

AS for my Mum, she is at home again after 4 and a half weeks in 3 different hospitals. She spent a week in her local hospital, a week and a half up here in Toowoomba, a week in the Mater in Brisbane and then nearly a week back in her local hospital again. Because her white blood cell count dropped so low after the chemo she is not to have it any more. That's why she was at the Mater. She had radium treatment whilst there. So now we wait and see what effect that had.

While Mum was in Brisbane I was taking Dad down to visit every second day. On work days I'd do my morning shift and give my afternoon shift to whoever I could get. I'm a school Crossing supervisior.

My brother flew in from Alice Springs the day after Mum was sent back to her local hospital. That was a surprise visit which was great for Mum and Dad. He flies back home tomorrow. He was a great help to Dad around the yard doing lots of tree/shrub prunning. Took away 6 trailer loads to the dump. Mum is the keen gardener, but as she was away the men got stuck into it and did a real tidy up.

This week we're expecting my husband's sister to fly in from Adelaide so she can visit their stepmother. She is in a nursing home and has been going downhill quite quickly too. She is now bedridden, unable to do anything for herself. She spends most of the day asleep. My husband went down to see her Sunday and sat with her for an hour or so but she didn't wake while he was there even though he did try to wake her. She is on constant pain killers and all that can be done is to make her as comfortable as possible. We do not know what will happen there.

Craft wise all I've done is a bit of work on the bibs I make for charity and fiddling around with wedding invitation ideas. Next month the invitations have to be made so they can go out by the end of July. That leaves 3 months to the wedding. Next Wednesday our daughter is taking a day off work so we can go the the printers, pick card, paper etc as I'm to make the invitations. She is so busy at work and the one printing place isn't open week-ends which makes it hard. A lunch break just isn't enough time to work things out. I really had wanted all this done by now but it wasn't to be. Wish us luck. Hope when I write next time, the invitations are progressing. Please, please may this be so.

A bit of this and a bit of that

Back again. Well the wedding plans are coming along again. Ran around and got a few quotes from florists and have accepted one of those this week. As we need to hire vases for the reception flowers will have to book those in the next couple of days. Went to Brisbane with the bridesmaids last Saturday and they lay-byed their dresses. Two of the bridesmaids need their dresses altered so now have to find a local dressmaker to do that. If anyone knows of a good dressmaker here in Toowoomba please let me know. Next big thing to organize is the invitations. Daughter doesn't really know what she wants.


Had a lovely Mother's Day lunch with our daughter and partner and his parents, brother, sister and husband. Then went to see my Mum who is in hospital at the moment, then saw my Dad. Mum has terminal cancer and had had a week of chemo and that makes her very sick. Will be going down tomorrow again to see her then again on the week-end.

Sewing has been put on hold. My sewing space is in the spare bedroom and I have cleaned it up, made space just in case Mum or Dad need to stay. The only sewing I have been doing is mending, some for us and some for a friend. Oh, I did make a pin cushion for the April Crafty Mamas swap. It was the same style as the apple one I posted about a little while back, but in different colours.

A bit of this and a bit of that

Anoth month has passed

I guess I'm not really a blogger as I only post once a month and I haven't really done any sewing either this past month. I've been fiddling with ideas for wedding invitations for my daughter's wedding in October. I've never done anything like what she's thinking off. We're looking at possibly a pocket invitation with cards in the pocket for an RSVP and Gift Registry. I think decorating the front will be okay, only time consuming, but I'm not sure about printing. Getting everything set out and lined up is my main concern.

So far the church and minister have been booked and they've done the pre-marriage lessons, the reception venue is booked, the wedding dress is ordered, the honeymoon is booked, the cake maker/decorator is organized. Over the next week or two we want to get quotes for flowers. Am going to Brisbane Easter Saturday with daughter and hope to find bridesmaid dress style/colour (I know some places are shut that day). Then we can arrange a day/s when we can go down with the girls for fittings etc. and order those. Also want to look for shoes. Daughter has done some ringing around for hairdresser/make-up people locally. The make-up she normally wears cannot be bought here and is not used by the local make-up artists.

The reception venue has weddings booked for the next 4 Saturdays and have said we can come and have a look at how the tables are laid out and what is being used for table decorations, nametags, bomboneire etc. We're also looking at doing our own bomboneire (probably spelt wrong) to match the wedding invitations plus want to have a matching Order of Service and Thank You note. These don't have to be exactly the same but using the card stock or ribbon or colour. so it all ties in together.

I'm also making the chocolates for the bomboneire boxes but as these will be unwrapped I only want to put them into the boxes the night before so need to keep this in mind when decorating these. Also need a Cadbury choc. button supplier as the local shop I've bought my chocolate from for years is closing down. Will see if the cake decorator can help me here. She may be able to order it in for me. I'll be needing quite a few kilos. will have to work out how much.

I know everything will come together but I have a feeling there are going to be some late light panics. One good thing, my husband has been granted two weeks LSL. A week before and after the wedding. We have rellies coming from NT and SA and groom's uncle and aunty from England. Hope to have a BBQ lunch on the Sunday after the wedding so bride and groom can catch up with them before they leave on their honeymoon on Monday.

I've spent many hours searching for ideas on the web, visiting local shops, printing places, a rose farm and fiddling, as I said above. My daughter works 5 and half days a week and just doesn't get much time (only her lunch time) to look at things.

Anyway, wish me luck. Will post pictures as things come together.

Another month gone.

It's been a month since I last added to my blog. I've some projects on the go but nothing much finished over this past month sewing wise. This is the Crafty Mamas swap project for January that I completed. It is an apple pincushion. I'm in the process of making a few more of these so when the end of the year comes I'll have some homemade gifts to give out.

A couple of my tea towels.

It's been awhile but I've really been enjoying this school holidays and have spent more time sewing than ever before. I've probably got 10 little dresses at different stages of completion, plus I decorated a few teatowels and have a partly made top for me too. I also have 50 bib fronts cut out which I will work on over the coming months. I like to put on a bit of lace, ricrac, bias binding etc. to dress them up a bit before I give them away. I am thinking of backing them with flannelette.

As much as I like being a lollypop lady (school crossing supervisor) and actually only work for 1 half hours a day, I go to work twice, before and after school, so thats twice driving over and back to the school I work at, plus getting ready etc., it is time consuming. Am looking forward to seeing th children though. I'm sure they will have stories to tell.

A photo of my pillowcase dress. It's for a new born and was made out of some material I had here and not a pillowcase. I must make some more of these, so cute and easy.

A couple bags I made for the last Crafty Mamas swap. The first one folds out into a shopping bag and the teddy bear one is quilted and the black strap is just bias binding folded in half. I really enjoyed the bag swap and it made me try things I'd never made before. The made a few of the quilted ones many years ago for a school fete when my children were little. They're both adults now, and I hadn't made a bag since until this swap.

Welcome to 2010

Have been making a few little dresses. Nothing fancy (I'm only a basic sewer), but a start. Made my first pillowcase dress, but not out of a pillowcase as its for a newborn. When I download my photos I'll post a picture. Going to have a go at using my new snap press soon too.