Weekend fun

We've had a weekend in Rotorua recently so thought I'd share a post of captioned photos of our time away to inspire you with our lovely New Zealand scenery. I also made a couple of crafty magazine discoveries.

1st stop : Brown Sugar Café - Taihape

Heading north - Desert Road and that lovely mountain

Morning view from our holiday accommodation : Lake Okareka/Rotorua

Good breakfast here at the Fat Dog Cafe 

Lovely Tui sculpture to admire while shopping

New Magazine discoveries at McLeods Booksellers

These 2 Dutch magazines are divine - full of lovely images, some good reading, and I'll be able to chop them up for beautiful additions to include in my journal when I've had my fill of reading. See more about Daphne's Diary HERE and Flow HERE. 

View of Lake Tarawera

The Green and Blue Lakes are very pretty if you catch them on a sunny day...
we didn't!

Eat Street - night time dining choices.

Good food and nice beer samplings for the boys at Brew
- craft beer award-winning bar

Walk in the Redwoods Forest

A fun walk

Beautiful bush

Lunch at Solace before we travelled home

It was a wonderful relaxing time. 

Stitched Paper Daily Art Journal : pages 2-5

So excited about this new daily journaling project. This was my first page 

Pages from my 2011 project have now been turned into stitched paper daily journaling - click on any photo to see it larger : 

2011

Sept 2014 complete

2011

click on any photo to see it larger

Some of the pages have very few words - I like to just enjoy looking at the interplay of colour, images, and stitch - love the tactile nature of stitch as well

2011

2014 complete

Sew Wild technique here :-) Back view of this page so you can see the stitching

I keep my old sewing machine needles so when they get too blunt for stitching on fabric, I use them to stitch paper. I don't do anything special - just lengthen the stitch if I am doing straight sewing and make sure the paper is reasonable thickness - like scrapbook paper or watercolour paper. Otherwise, as you can see, decorative or zigzag or messy straight stitching all work just fine.

2011

2014 complete

I am loving both the {almost} daily practice and how these pages look when complete.

Holiday snaps

Last week we spent a couple of days and nights in New Plymouth - 3 hours from Palmerston North.

Fabulous weather and a great way to end our school holidays.
Recommended cafés :

Fat Cow Cafe : Just before you get to Hawera

Arborio : View to the sea - upstairs by Information Centre

The Federal Store Cafe : Devon Street

Good shopping treats for me on the way :

Jackie's for Scrapbooking in Inglewood :
Cute cheap stamps and half-price masks

and once we got to New Plymouth : 

Verge Art & Design Gallery : Sweet earrings and a clear plastic bag
that will find its way in as a layer on an art journal page :-)

The Artshop and Egmont Framing : Lovely paper and cheap printmaking tools

Gorgeous jewellery store : Shine (286 Devon Street East)
Lovely earrings, cheap cute stamps, and wrapping that
will find its way into my journal

I also love Kina - but no purchases there this time...On proof-reading the above, I realise how often I have said cheap! Feels good that I'm still living by my word for the year "Thrifty".
Good walking - we were blessed with gorgeous blue skies :-)

Te Rewa Rewa bridge

Time at the beach

Coastal walkway

Some time for art journaling collage

Beautiful mountain views

and finally got to visit Dawson Falls - a short drive signposted from Stratford on our way home.

And now we begin school Term 4