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Yes, I know. I probably post way too much about Emma, but really she is the cutest little thing. Apple of my eye. Not that I am biased at all. Oh no.

We have a few photos of family and special friends up on our fridge and both Jack and Emma love to look at them (so do I!) and the other day, Emma decided she wanted to have a really, really good look at everyone, so she dragged a step ladder from the laundry and climbed up and stood there chatting to the people in the photos and looking at them for ages and ages.

She talked and talked to them, making up stories for them to star in and singing songs to them. So cute.

Another funny thing she does is to leave little toys in scenes all around the house. In all kinds of unexpected places we are always finding little scenes from her games, played and then left there, while she moves on to the next makeshift game.

We often have toys hanging around, arms and legs jammed into cupboard handles for instance. Or like above, hanging from their heads. Eh-oh.

Frogs sitting on printer trays. A doll, a (naked) Angelina and a well dressed banana - not in pyjamas but in a fetching dress - having a rest after reading a book together.

She loves paper dolls right now, carrying them around, sleeping with them. Loving them and scrunching them. She tells me that this one’s foot is called Emma. See, it really is.

And here’s a couple just monkeying around.

Thanks Emma, you make me smile every day.

Remember this from yesterday? I wasn’t too sure what it would become…

Well, it became an apron!

I used two tea towels (dish cloths) that are taupe with a red stripe and attached the patch piece on as a pocket. I really seriously love this. I haven’t made an apron before but it was so easy.

The pocket has a layer of batting and then a plain fabric (thrifted bed sheet) and I quilted it before attaching to the tea towel base. Some red cotton tape to bind the pocket edge and some white cotton tape used as ties. I sewed two vertical lines of stitching to divide the pocket into three.

Some of the fabrics in there are ones that I printed myself a while back, using stamps and fabric ink. Of course there are many designer fabrics in there too. About a month ago, I cut a huge pile of fabric strips and sorted them by colour, all ready for stripwork projects, remember?

I love all of these fabrics. And now I get to see them all the time - and even wear them! This apron makes me happy.

I couldn’t think up a good title for today’s post so “hello again” it is. No post yesterday because I fell asleep on the lounge at about 10pm. Right in the middle of watching Numbers so now I don’t know how it ended. Oh well. When I woke up I actually thought about doing that day’s blog post for about 2 seconds before realising that was silly and taking the better option - snuggling into bed. Very early for me, but I must have needed it.

I did some fabric piecing today. I didn’t really have an exact idea of how these were going to turn out (I still don’t) but it was fun, and lovely to see all the different prints working together.

It has been a little hard to get much done, with Jackie-boy home from school with Chicken Pox, but hopefully I will get some time tomorrow to make these into something. I am thinking apron pockets, cushion covers or bags. Not sure - I will think on it a bit more.

Yesterday Jack, Emma and I made two of our yummy apple cakes - one for my brother’s birthday and one for us to have here. Of course the one for my brother was eaten up by everyone at the family birthday dinner last night and when we got home, Paul and Jack (who couldn’t go because of the POX and my toddler neice Grace not having had them yet) had eaten a fair whack of the second cake. Jack and I polished off the rest today. Oops.

On a side note, I can’t believe I didn’t take a photo of yesterday’s cakes. I know, how silly is that? I love to blog about what I am doing though, even if certain people (my husband and sister!!!) think it is a bit dorky. What do they know? Anyway, I looked and looked for the photo - not on the camera, hmmm maybe I put it in the photos folder, okay not there, maybe it’s in this other folder, oh not there either, maybe in this folder over here. On and on until I realised that OH MY GOD! I didn’t take a photo of the cake!!! How could this be?

Back to the story: So Jack and I thought we had better make up for eating all the apple cake today, and we made a Banana Cake this afternoon. So much baking - it is fun! Even with little helpers.

Sam (almost 15) has enjoyed cooking for the family a bit here and there recently. He has even asked for a regular night where he will cook every week. YAY! He usually has to clean up the dishes after Paul or I cook, so when he cooks he LOVES that we have to clean up. Tonight, he is making Sausage Rolls and he even let Jack help which was nice.

Sometimes Sam’s cooking experiments attempts end up a little wonky - partly due to the Asperger’s (problems with following directions in order and processing info) and partly due to general teenage pigheadedness (”I KNOW how to do it!”) - but he is getting a lot more confident and learning some of the little tricks and shortcuts. Despite thinking he knows it all and ignoring our help, he is taking our suggestions in, even if he acts like it was his idea.

So fun to see the teenage things happening and remember your own self as a teenager! I love seeing it from this other perspective, as a parent. So much fun.
And of course, I love being able to sit here blogging while I listen to the cooking going on in the kitchen. Maybe that’s the best part of all.

One of Emma’s absolute favourite things right now is a dress I made for her about 2 years ago. It was miles too big then but with the addition of a tie in the back she was able to wear it when her dad and I got married in 2005. We’ve been together for 11 years but took a while to get married - this is our second (and perfect!) marriage for both us. Anyway, the good thing about making something for your kids that is too big is that they can get a lot of wear out of it!

It doesn’t matter to her that it is no longer Summer, or even Spring. In fact, it will be Winter here in about a week but she still wants to wear this dress! She wears it with stockings or jeans or track pants, and with a jacket over the top or a “warm toppie” underneath.

She wore it again today with another stripy top underneath and her dark purple pants with pink rick rack.

Luckily for her I have got loads of this beautiful fabric left (I bought a stack of it back when I was making kid’s clothes only) and so I think next year she can have a new dress - I’m sure this one will be too small by next Summer. Maybe it can go to her little cousin Grace next.

Here is another favourite thing. Yesterday I made Rhubarb and Apple Crumble and it was so good.  We had it with ice cream and thickened cream. Those are slivered almonds on top of the crumble - they give a really yummy and crunchy flavour.