Sunday 23 May 2010

Travel accessories!

I made a few little bits for my mum to take away with her when she went away last wk. They had to be simple light weight things so i made a passport cover and a travel file to put all her documents in.


I got the pattern for the file from last months SEW magazine and enlarged it slightly. For the Passport case i created a pattern myself and i am really quiet please with the result.



My mum does like her bling, and chose the gold fabric from my local shop last time she came to stay with me. I have already made her a shoulder bag with it. The floral lining is from a set of Ikea pillowcases i bought in a thrift shop for 50p. i love it.
I am considering doing a tutorial for the passport case if anyone would be interested?
I also made her an eye mask so she could try and get some sleep on the plane. It was made with the same gold fabric on the outside but i used a mushroom colour velour on the inside for softness against her eyes. Somehow i managed to delete the pic for it!



Lastly i put together a little photo album for her to take and show off pictures of our little family here in England. It was such a shock to the system finding out how much it costs to get your pictures printed at a store these days! I can't remember the last time i didn't print them myself but i normally just do it onto shiny card stock. I wanted proper photograph paper for these.......£16 for 36 6x4 prints!
After that i decided to buy this cheepo photo album for 99p



and recovered it with some more Ikea fabric, No sewing involved with this but i got to use my glue gun, which is just as much fun.....I do love glue guns!!!





Hope your all enjoying the wonderful sunshine we have been having this weekend. I made my first attempt at Sheering/smocking this afternoon, Ive not finished it off yet though so will have to show and tell next time.

Neilyboy left for Malta today, I have 5wks on my own (i wanted to wait till my mum came back) then he comes back to get us and we all leave in 6 wks...eeeek!

xK

Thursday 20 May 2010

Homeward bound!

''My mum went home yesterday!''


Now this may not sound like any major news, but when i say 'home' i mean BELIZE......The country of her birth...The home she left behind 30 years ago, and has only been able to go back and visit once before in all that time and that was 15 years ago.
So its quiet a major statement!

''My mum went HOME yesterday.....''

It was no easy feat either. Flying from the U.K to Belize. Her Plane left 6.30pm Tuesday evening UK time, and a hop, skip, and a jump, involving 3 planes and an 7hr wait at Newark airport later, she finally touched down on Home soil at 10.30m local time (3.30pm UK time) thats 21hours of travel. This for a woman in her 50s who suffers from fibromialga (achy joints!) and packed enough stuff in her suitcase to cloth all the woman of central America ( seriously! $50 excess fee!!!)

A BRIEF HISTORY OF MY MUM



Dorla Marjorie Broderick (nee. Gentle) was born in Belize in 1957.
She is the eldest daughter amongst 12 siblings, 6 boys, 6 girls.
Her father was Pastor Alvin Gentle, of the local Pentecostal Church, Esperanza village, Cayo.

I wouldn't say my mother was a 'wild child' exactly but she certainly (and still does) had a very playful spirit. She gave birth to my elder brother and sister when she was in her late teens. Their father was a longterm romance with a local boy. That relationship did not last and my mother soon discovered that she quiet liked the look of the white English soldiers who came for training in Belize's rainforest's during the 70s. They were exciting, they were blond, blue-eyed , and liked to flash the cash at the local girls. My mum was young, very pretty and looking for adventure (aren't we all at that age!)



My mother had many admirers... but only one she was in love with. He however ,decided after he had got her pregnant, that he really didn't have the balls to marry a local black girl with 2 other children and ship her all the way back to West Yorkshire....I guess we have to remember that it was the 70s, interracial relationships were still a bit 'taboo' in the North of England!!!, Anyway he swiftly disappeared into the mists of the rainforest's, never to be seen of again.......Thanks DAD!

Step in admirer no2. He courted my mother for 2 years and had been back in England for nearly a year when my mother received a telegraph ( Telegraph!!!) that he was on his way back to marry her.
They were married by my Grandfather in his church.
My brother Eldon was 6 by this time and my sister Lynette was 4, she had had a serious case of meningitis as a baby which had left her severely brain damaged. The plan was that I, the baby, nearly 3, would come over to England with my mother to live at my 'new grandparents 'house and once we were settled and given family quarters my brother and sister would be bought over as well.
We moved from Belize to England to Germany, and then back to England. During this time my younger brother David was born and my sister sadly died back in Belize.
My mother was devastated, she had not seen her daughter for nearly 5 years . My step dad did not offer to fly her home. She had no money to go herself.

The marriage lasted 6 years.

Once they were divorced, my seemingly devoted stepfather wanted nothing more to do with any of us!
My mother was quiet literally left in a strange country, entirely on her own to raise two young children.



In 1995 my mothers closest sister died. She went in for a routine operation ( i forget what for now) but something went wrong and she never recovered. I had just turned 18 years old and i was able to cash in the money which had been put in trust for me after the divorce. I was happy to use all of it to fly the 3 of us to Belize for a 'holiday' . By this time my older brother had moved to the U.S.A so we didn't get to see him. ( My mother flew out to Chicago to visit him and his family a few years later.)
We only stayed for 3 weeks but i fell in love with Belize! The people, the food , the country. I have no memories of being there as a baby but i remember now, how much i wanted to stay then. I had to quiet literally be dragged kicking and screaming onto the plane back to England.

So flash forward 14 years to last summer, when sadly once again someone we loved died without my mother having the chance to say good by. This time it was my grandfather. My mother was once again devastated and home sick. It is an expensive journey flying to Belize. Fortunately some scrimping and saving and a lucky tax refund has meant that this summer she was able go home again.

''MY MUM WENT HOME YESTERDAY!''

This time she is staying for 6 weeks, during that time she will celebrate her 53rd birthday, the 1st anniversary of her fathers death and the 25th anniversary of her daughters death.
I'm sure it will be a very emotional trip for her, there will be a lot of joy, laughter and a little sadness.



I guess i have shared a lot here about my mothers and my life, and i have done it because i want to share exactly how PROUD i am of my mum. She was left with nothing, and she worked so awfully hard to give me and my younger brother everything. Back in the early days she could have given up this English life and gone back to the bussom of her family, but she stuck it out for us, she believed the opportunities would be better here for us and to a certain extent she was right. Theres no denying England has a better education system, a lower crime and drug rate, lower infant mortality rate. Better social and health care!
I often used to wonder about the things that we missed out on.
The reason i fell so in love with Belize when i was 18 was because it was the first time in my life i felt i was somewhere i belonged, I was amongst people who looked just like me, and i don't mean just the color of their skin ( although growing up i only had one other black friend and she was mixed race too!) but the shape of their eyes the contours of their cheeks.

I was amongst kin!

I was amongst faith!

My Grandfather was a Preacher after all ,and i spent more time in Church those 3 weeks than i have done in the years since, I was mesmerized by the love i felt just setting foot inside his church.

But i am glad for the life my mother gave me, i m grateful for her sacrifice. I Have that sense of belonging once again, I have a man i love and am loved back (blond and blue eyed....I'm just like my mum i guess!) We have a beautiful daughter and a happy home. I have friends who have been my surrogate family for the past 23years.

I hope that my mother has a truly wonderful time and that it wont be another 15 years before she is able to go back to Belize again, because next time i want to go with her and take my daughter too.
I want Ruby to know that although her mothers family may seem really small (uncle David, cousin Kienan and Nanny) It is in fact huge....Enormous even.
Seriously! If you ever find yourself in Belize, just ask anyone if they know Pastor G's family. I guarantee the answer will be yes!


xK

Monday 17 May 2010

Happy Bloggiversary to me!


Now it has to be said that I am not the most consistent blogger! But I am pleased to say that i started this little blog a year ago today. It has been quiet a fun little ride, I have had the pleasure of meeting ( all be it cyber ) some wonderfully funny and talented people. Thank you to everyone who has read my nonsense, indulged my need to show off my makes and left flattering and encouraging comments.
As i announced in my last post, this next year is going to be an exciting one for my little family as we embark on our adventure in Malta and i look forward to sharing as much as i can right here!

I also promised in my last post that i would show off some recent makes as i have been a bit slack at this of late, so here goes........

This little dress was made for my friend Kate's daughter Marriella as a 1st birthday present. Kate spotted the Alice-in-wonderland fabric in my stash and dropped several 'subtle' hints that she wanted to wrap one of her girls in it!
It ties up with ribbon at the back. The pattern is Wholegrainbaby.....remember The Whirlwinds Apples and Pears dress from last year!
I found this cute little shrug which i thought matched if perfectly!

Another friend asked me to make a set of mice skittles after she saw Roo playing with them.
This time i made a little bag to put them in.

Cute! No!

More birthday gift's. These ones for Neilyboys Aunt Gillian. She always sends The Whirlwind lovely Christmas and Birthday presents so i wanted to make her something nice for her birthday. Unfortunatly the pics for these are really rubbish as i took them at about 1am and had to pop them straight in the post on my way to work the next day.....
A lavender bird sachet (my one and olny make from one of Cath's books!) and a scrappy Card.
This is actually an oven mitt and matching tea towels in my 'all time favourite' Cath Kidston fabric. I wish id taken better pictures because i was really pleased with these, they came out really well. I made the pattern up by tracing round a mitt i use and used double layers of batting and quilted it all, so hopefully Aunt Gillian doesnt get burnt hands!

I spent the end of last week making up some bits for my Mum to take with her on holiday tomorrow, but i want to do a whole blog post about that in the next couple of days because i think she deserves it!
Also I have a few additions to The Whirlwinds Malta wardrobe to show off, but i am going to have to fit it all in around the joyouse task of sorting out and ironing all of Neilyboys clothes for him to take with him this sun. I can not begin to tell you exactly how much I HATE IRONING.....

x K

Wednesday 12 May 2010

On the Move!

Sorry I've been away so long. Things have been very busy round these parts, but i wont bore you with the Mundane stuff, so let me just get straight to the Juicy, exciting stuff instead!

We are Moving...........

........To Malta!!!( but only for 9mths!)....Told you it was exciting!


Picture's of St Julians bay which is where we will be living.......

Neilyboys work need him there full time for this project he is working on, so he leaves at the end of this month, and we fly out the first week of July.

I can not wait! We have holidayed in Malta before and i think it is a lovely country, everybody is so friendly and they all speak English, which is a bonus so The Whirlwind and i shouldn't get into too much bother whilst daddy is at work.
The Apartment we are renting is bigger than our house! We will have a spare room (although i doubt it will be unoccupied for much of the time, telling by the list of friends and family who have put there name down for a stay!)
I have already informed Neilyboy that i shall not be going anywhere without a sewing machine so my first job over there will be tracking down the nearest fabric shop and acquiring myself a new baby!
Malta is very famous for its lace, so surely there must be a craft scene out there, although i have been trying to find a good Malta based craft blog, but so far i have only found tourist orientated ones!.....Anybody know of any????

There is soooooo much to organise over the coming few weeks......Most importantly, what clothes am i going to have to make/buy/try and squeeze myself into. and how exactly am i going to super glue my mouth together, because that is the only way that i can dream of gaining a bikini body in time (YES! I am thinking of it as one loooong summer holiday!).....My Gym card died a pity full death 2mins after i got it and is collecting dust somewhere!
Also there will be 6 long weeks of single parentness for me between Neilyboys departure and our arrival!.....I feel that i will be consuming a lot of alcohol in that time!

I shall be back later in the week with a photo montage of all my recent makes as i have popped out a few that i am quiet pleased with in the past few weeks!
xK