Funky anodised bullet planter

I clearly have a thing for house plants because I bought another bullet-style planter on the weekend.

Bring back the early 70's, I say!

Anodised bullet planter

I was over at young Katherine's place to drop off her iittala candle holder which she won from my giveaway.

She was showing me some of the pieces (art glass and West German pottery) Kristen had bought at an estate sale and I spotted this in the corner of her storeroom.

And it followed me home on its little tripod legs...

It's fun and kitsch. They are also hard to find in decent enough condition. And I love this colour green.

This new addition will live on the back deck. I'm thinking something tall and phallic, as in plants, will work well here?    

dracaena marginata

Painting in the rain

Brisbane weather is wet, wet, wet at the moment

Jason has been trying to do sneaky coats of paint between bouts of rain this weekend.

He's a dedicated man who plays Russian roulette with his paint brush. He's undercoated another side of the deck rails but that will be that until next weekend. We're crossing fingers for drier weather.

Undercoated deck balustrades.
We also removed the lattice panel which used to be near the lattice door.  It has opened up our vista nicely.

I will never complain about Jason's painting ever again after reading about poor Jo from Desire to Inspire, who's going through a painting nightmare.

The contractors she hired to paint her 150 year old Queenslander home, completely ruined her floors (click here to read about it). It is like they vandalised her home, such is the state of the paint work.

It really is just disgraceful and our hearts go out to Jo. (Jason was so angry, he was dreaming up Godfather-like justice on her behalf!)

Anyway, I'm only mentioning it here because I have a few readers who are renovating their homes and I think it serves as a good warning when contracting out work on your home. I know we will be more wary from now on.

p.s Also, please don't forget the Ferrero Rocher by BKH Christmas Centrepiece giveaway I am hosting. The centrepiece is worth $375! It closes tomorrow. 

Decanting the pantry

When we moved to the Sow's Ear last year, the kitchen was one of the first things renovated. I didn't bother to unpack the kitchen boxes until it was done.

The kitchen took a lot longer than what we had anticipated. By the time it was ready, I was so over the whole kitchen renovating process and just shoved the kitchen things everywhere and anywhere without proper thought. Silly really...

Every single time there is a post written in Blogtopia about food pantries and pantry organisation I just cringe, thinking about my pigsty of a pantry. I'm afflicted with pantry envy.

And part of the problem is I never decant food packets properly...mostly because I've never had many containers in which to decant. I've remarkably missed that Tupperware Party train that people jump on...!

Newly organised food pantry

 
Today, I finally did a pantry clean out.

Lots of empty packets for the recycle bin

It was such a relief.

I purchased some reasonably priced plastic storage containers and started the decanting process. I'll need a few more larger containers for the items bought in bulk like Basmati rice and flour, and also something for storing spices.

New storage containers

Anyway, I feel much better for my efforts. It was well worth the trouble.

So, do you decant everything or just particular things? And what do you decant into?

Vivianna Cutlery

I've been wasting time coveting cutlery on the Georg Jensen website because that's what one does 16 days before Christmas.

One of my all time favourite cutlery designs is by Swedish  designer Vivianna Torun Bulow-Hube for Georg Jensen.

It is called Vivianna and was designed in the 1990s.

It is the knife design which I love best.

Notice how it can be rested on either its flat side or on its edge.

This is what I would choose to give as a present for a wedding or engagement. But that doesn't happen very often since most people have a bridal list or a money-tree these days.

(We bought a two person set anyway for one couple who asked for cash...I hope they didn't sell it on ebay!!)

Helpful research assistant

There are some lovely and generous people who read Fun and VJs.

Karen from These Days of  a Busy Mum has been following our house history research and kindly offered to do a search of the Stables family through her existing Ancestry membership. What a gem!

"Yes, please!" I said.

Ancestry has online electoral roll information and Karen searched those records for me (she's an expert because she's been busily compiling her own family tree for the past few years).

Anyway, the information starts to paint more of a picture of the Stables family.

It tells me that in the mid 1920s the Stables family lived in Yeppoon in Central Queensland.

Zoila who lived in Farnborough was a student, Stanley was a farmer and Florence was at Hillside Farm, doing home duties. Their parents were listed as living in Palm Grove, Yeppoon. Father William was a fruit grower while mother Mary was listed under home duties.

In the 1937 and 1943 rolls, Zoila, Stanley and mother Mary were listed at the Sow's Ear address. Zoila was still listed as a student, Stanely was a civil engineer and mother Mary was home duties. In the 1949 and 1954 rolls, only Zoila and Stanley were listed at this address.

Last week the archivist from The University of Queensland sent me an email to say that she had more information about Zoila. The information included Zoila's matriculation student card with her date of birth as 26 August 1898 and it listed her as an external student. She was 29 years old when she was admitted to the degree of Bachelor of Arts in 1928.

The most fabulous thing I did discover were reviews of Zoila's book Tare Harvest (which was written under her pseudonym of Eleanor Peters) in the Observer and the Guardian newspapers in 1936.

She received good reviews for her first novel. One reviewer said she had genius. I've attached one complete review which you will have to click on to read, and an excerpt of another review.

Observer May 24, 1936

Guardian May 15, 1936

My next objective is to get a copy of Tare Harvest. I have a feeling it will help me understand more about the  ever-intriguing Stables family.

Thanks again to Karen for all your help and advice!!

If you are new to Fun and VJs and are interested in reading about the historical information on the house and about the Stables, just click here.