Have you ever just painted carefree and filled up a page with colour?
Recently my daughter introduced me to collage, and the beauty of piecing together painted pieces of paper to create art. She follows a well known artist, Clover Robin, who uses collage brilliantly in her artwork. She is a surface pattern designer and illustrator who lives in England. We have purchased several of her pieces and love her work.
In the classroom, my teaching partner and I have explored Eric Carle and his collage illustrations with our kindergarten students. It was so interesting to learn that he too uses different media and textures to create his illustrations. He then stores the papers in like-colours to use when creating his beautiful, detailed illustrations for his children’s books. As a class, we explored texture and colour with paint and different types of combs and pattern-making supplies. The students then transformed their paintings into collaged flowers inspired by the book, The Tiny Seed. They turned out beautifully and the students gained a better understanding of the creation process.
I was inspired and created these spring flower collages that I wanted to share. The next step that I would like to explore is to try layering and overlapping with the collage pieces to create a more elaborate design.
My zinnia seeds are growing! These seeds from West Coast Seeds are on the move and looking healthy.
I over planted the initial pots with seeds and most of them sprouted right away. Once the first set of leaves had developed they needed to be given more space. With the help of my Mom, we transplanted each individual plant into its own mini pot. My Mom and I had great fun and lots of giggles while transplanting these into their larger homes.
While we were working with the seedlings, my Mom asked what type of seeds we were repotting. I told her it was a wide variety of zinnia seeds. She then shared a story that warmed my heart. She told me about the day that I was born. My Dad had brought her a bouquet of hand picked zinnias to the hospital from their garden at home. She smiled and I could tell that those garden grown zinnias had been special to her just like my Dad.
I guess this is a very good reason for why I adore these flowers so much, because they were the first flowers I ever saw! Interesting how life leads you along and you develop favourites and then someone you love shares a story and ties it all together in a neat little bow.
Most of the transplants have done very well, with only the loss of a few. Some are even developing their secondary set of leaves and the stems are getting stronger.
I purchased an amazing cart from Ikea for my indoor gardening trays. This three level cart on wheels is wonderful for seedlings. It allows me to spin the cart daily so that all the sides are receiving equal amounts of sunlight.
Once these little darlings grow a little bigger, I will be upgrading their homes to larger pots for greater growth.
Planted by hand, with love.
Such a simple phrase, “do what you love.” What a great reminder to follow your heart and commit to what you’re passionate about.
Using this mug makes me so happy. It brings a smile to my face. It makes me pause and think yes, I am doing what I love. I surround myself with people I love and I try to do things in my days with intention and all my heart.
This mug was purchased from Gather, located in downtown Bowmanville, Ontario. Gather is a lovely, well curated store whose motto is, “we love to gather good things for you .. clothes. jewellery. baby things. home things. happy things.” No matter when I go to this store I always come home with a treasure.
So, as I enjoy my fancy drink from my mug, I want to remind you to try new things, take up a new sport, read a new genre of book, take a hike on a new trail. Do something that brings you joy and puts a smile on your face. I challenge you to do something that you love today!
Do you ever get really excited about something? Well on my latest adventure to my local garden centre I soaked up the wonder of the West Coast Seeds display.
I perused the great selection of seeds and was so excited to find some ground cherry seeds. I had recently seen these on Instagram and was hoping to be able to get my hands on a package. Every year I try to plant something different that I have not tried before. My daughter has brought home ground cherries from the Atwater Market in Montreal and I’ve had them in desserts in fancy restaurants. I am so excited to be able to add them to my dessert plates later on in the summer.
I also found scallopini squash, rainbow blend carrots, and golden beets, all of which I am excited to grow and enjoy from the garden.
Another great find was the West Coast Seeds 2023 Gardening Guide. This booklet is jam packed with an abundance of seed choices, as well as great gardening content. I also checked out the their website and it is a great resource for the home gardener. It has tips and tricks, resources, seeds, supplies. You can even take a seed quiz to see what types of seeds are good to grow in your area!
One of the gardening tools I added to my collection this season is this seed sprayer from Lee Valley. This German made sprayer is gentle enough to use without disturbing seedling roots or soil.
If you have never planted seeds or had a garden I encourage you to try it. It doesn’t have to be big, and you can even create your home garden in pots or containers. Growing your own food, nurturing it, and then being able to harvest it and share it with the ones you love is a wonderful thing. Go plant some seeds!
Here is the perfect quick place setting if you are looking for a little something extra for your Easter table scape!
I found these great mini terracotta pots at my local dollar store. I have reused them multiple times for different projects. They are just so cute!
For this project, I gathered the following materials: a foam ball, wool roving, a small piece of felt for the feet, a glue gun and a felting needle. I simply wrapped the foam ball with the wool roving and began poking it with the felting needle. A special note to those of you that have never used a felting needle, these are super sharp, so practice caution when using them. Once the entire ball was covered I then felted a tail. Then feet were added with hot glue and I even added in a felted orange carrot.
To finish off my little Easter flower pot I cut a piece of card stock to create a little sign, which was hot glued to a cut skewer stick. Green paper shreds fill in the flower pot as a final touch.
I have also used these little pots with paper shreds and mini chocolate eggs for place settings. Another idea is placing some Spring seasonal flowers into the mini flower pots. You can also add family members’ and friend’s names to your card stock signs. This makes your table more personalized and adds a nice touch.
Happy Easter!
While visiting the East Coast on a family road trip a few years ago I discovered the oat cake. It sounds so simple and it is so delicious. It tastes a little like an oatmeal cookie but with more bite and it just is amazing.
Many East Coast bakeries had oat cakes as part of their local offerings. I was even surprised to see that Tim Horton’s out East offered the oat cake on their menu. Oat cakes were enjoyed a lot while I was on vacation and I had always thought I would like to try to make them at home.
I decided to tackle this bake using The East Coast Kitchen recipe. It was a simple straight forward recipe and had some tips and tricks to having a successful bake. I gathered my ingredients and began.
As they were baking, the kitchen filled with the wonderful smell of baking cookies. I was so excited to see if I really could replicate the flavours at home. I was challenging myself to try something new and had my fingers crossed that they would taste as good as I remembered.
Once the edges were lightly browned I pulled them from the oven. They looked perfect! Now to let them cool. I’m not going to lie, I might have sneaked one from the cooling rack before they were completely cooled. Oops. After all I had made 25 from the recipe and really only 24 fit on the cooling rack…
My expectations were not disappointed. These cute little oat cakes were perfect circles of wonderfulness. I had such success, and have saved this recipe so that I can make it again and again. I shared some, ate some, ate some more, and shared a few more. Challenge accepted and achieved. Oat cakes made by mum with love!
Did you know that the pussy willow is the first plant to flower in spring? When spring comes, I’m always on the hunt for pussy willows. They just remind me of new beginnings and the promise of the growing season ahead.
When I was young, the women in my life always had some type of arrangement containing foraged pussy willows. It was just one of those things you looked for in the Spring. Rubber boots were worn and a pair of good clippers had to be in your pocket. Then we were set to collect a bouquet of these ‘Spring Only’ treasures.
In my teens we lived in a house that actually had a pussy willow tree outside my bedroom window. I always thought this was rather magical. In the past we had always had to go hunting for them in boggyish side roads in the country. What a treat!
I still like to go hunting for the infamous Spring pussy willows with my daughter. We came across these beauties not far from our home. It still amazes me how soft and delicate these wonders of nature are.
This is just one of those little things that can brighten your day. When you find them you know that Spring weather is just around the corner.
I love gardening. It is a chance to spend time outside, an opportunity to nurture seeds and grow food for our family. Over the years I have developed my skills in the garden and have enjoyed sharing my gardening knowledge with others.
We usually like to have one or two projects for the Spring and Summer season. This year my husband has requested to try to create a pollinator garden. We have lots of bee and butterfly friendly plants in our backyard now, but we wanted to extend this into the front of our home as well.
There is a large amount of available land in the front of our home. We are getting the wheels in motion and making plans to create a new garden in this space. The main goal is to make a garden specifically that will attract pollinators. It is a protected area with a fence running along the west side, with lots of sun.
On our last visit to our local garden centre, there was a great selection of West Coast Seeds. West Coast Seeds are a premium quality of seeds and they are a Canadian company. They have a great selection of hard to find seeds as well as traditional selections.
We were excited to see that West Coast Seeds had already created a Bee Garden Blend by a Master Beekeeper. In my mind this is a win for us and a win for the bees! This package contains a wildflower mix that will attract bees and other pollinators to our garden. We also picked up a xeriscaping blend that requires little moisture once established, which will also attract pollinators.
Preparation will start for the new bed in late April for direct sowing in May. We will create the bed about 4 feet wide and approximately 20 feet long. Our plan is to amend the soil with rich mushroom compost, and triple mix. We also had some inspiration from our visit last year to a local sunflower patch. So we will add in a few varieties of sunflowers with the bee blend.
I am certainly excited to see if our new project will “BEE” amazing! Stay tuned for step by step photos of our newest garden project.
Let’s say goodbye to the festive wreath on the front door and change things up for Spring.
Today there are rain showers and there is mud in the backyard. Even though there is some snow still on the ground we are all ready for Spring. I heard my first robin singing its song yesterday, so I know that Spring is just around the corner.
I invested in a good quality green multi-seasonal wreath at Home Sense a few years ago. It is such a versatile piece. I find I can make it last through Spring and Summer with some little changes.
With three easy steps I came up with a great Spring look. First I added some simple yellow faux flowers from the Dollar Store. Second, I added in some sprigs of little berries in green and cream tones that I had on hand. And lastly, a little ‘Welcome Spring’ sign from Micheals. Voila; a Springy new wreath for the front door!
Happy Spring everyone! Bring on the puddles, rainbows, and Spring flowers!
In an earlier blog post I documented the process of creating this felt flower wreath. I am now sharing with you the final reveal.
I have a couple of tips to share with you for assembling the final product. The hoops were fairly skinny so there was not a lot of surface to glue onto. The solution that I came up with, was to back the area where I was glueing. I used a piece of felt that was the same shape and created a base to glue it to. This gave the flowers something to adhere to in addition to the metal ring. It was very successful.
After adding the flowers with a glue gun I added in some foliage to fill in the empty spaces. Using different colours of green I added free cut leaves around the flowers to complete the look.
Felt Flower wreath made by hand and made by Mum.
