Farewell to mountains that lead to the sea

This is the last time that I will write my blog while I live in New Zealand. Plus a little while until I will write another post... have to find a house and get Internet... most important!

Doug, myself, Isla and Floyd all fly out on the same plane, Brisbane bound tomorrow. It does feel odd leaving what has become my second home, Wellington, New Zealand. Lucky for me then it is only 4 hours away :)

So, its never good bye, its see you later xx

Drum roll please...

Thanks so much for all your very sweet comments on my refashion and engagement. The winners of the give away are BagQueen and Amy, picked at random by Doug who closed his eyes and aimed at the screen twice :) I really like doing the give away, so expect more in future posts!

I will be making up your envelopes of craftiness as soon as I get back from a short break next week, I shall post them to you :) Just need your addresses, email me at minnietheminks(at)gmail.com

Here is a pic of some of my other recent op-shop finds.

These shoes are so sweet on and I plan on making one of the 1960's tops from this cute pattern I picked up, I think view two below...

Love her hair and lippy! One other great find was a book of the first 10 years of fashion in the life of Princess Diana. The book is jam packed with pictures, which can be great reference for me if I ever make costumes for a production of her life, te he. But they are also quite funny too, lots of bad 1980's fashion going on.

There is still some fashions that I really liked...

Cute flats, yummy pink dress and a huge overcoat!

Big belt, printed top... maybe ditch the match-y shoes!

I love this whole outfit from the sunnies, bag, collar on the blouse, big chunky bracelet, stripey pants and you know she does get away with that hairdo!

I will be absent from the blog for the next 5 days as I am off on my last holiday in New Zealand for a wee while. Looking forward to soaking in the natural spas, bliss.

xx

A dress for buttons

While reading all my favorite blogs this morning I skipped over to Frankie and read some old posts.

I now have to own my own house because I need, yes not want, really need this wallpaper! Its button wallpaper, how sweet!

Loving it.

Plus on the Frankie website there was a link to The Package Project. A very sweet idea to connect us craft-arty bloggers. You sign up to be partnered with another crafter somewhere else in the world and then send each other up to five items of loveliness in one ickle envelope. The sign up date is closed for this session. So I thought that I would use this as inspiration for my first ever give away.

It is a bit like lucky dip. I will make up two 5 item envelopes of crafty goodness to give away. Just leave a comment and then I will randomly select two people to send the goodies too :)

Well today I found a cute dress in an op-shop for $7. The shape was tent like but the fabric so bright and happy. The details of the shoulders reminded me of my Vogue 1940's costume too. So I decided to do a quick refashion using shirring. Yay!

Here is what it looked like before its morph via elastic...

I measured just under my bust and then just one inch on to my high hip (and just before the pockets on the dress, yes a dress with pockets, for mini Easter bunnies).

I then loaded my bobbin with shirring elastic and sewed in parallel lines half and inch apart from the line at the high hip to the line just under the bust. I also chopped of ten inches to make it a fun flirty length. Here she is...

Ahhh, so satisfying! Minimal work for a new dress. I got some other op-shop goodies but I will show you them soon! I still have a major amount of packging to do for our move and erm I am finding the most incredible bargains, plus, te he, hehe, te he... I got engaged!!! Whoooooooooooooooooooo!

xx