What do you do for Easter?

According to my boyfriend, Easter is kind of  big deal in my family... I had no idea!  We're not religious, but we do have Easter traditions (which I assume are German based). I always thought everyone here in New Zealand had their own family traditions for Easter, but after asking some friends, it seems I was wrong; they don't even visit family during Easter weekend (although they did get a few chocolates when they were younger). So I am wondering... Do you have any Easter traditions?

For us, we have a breakfast on Easter Sunday at my Mum's, traditional things include hard-boiled eggs, which have been painted with crayons and food colouring (each person selects an egg, and then the tops are hit against each other.. you can only eat your egg if the shell has been broken on both ends).

Hot cross buns (we always buy them, but I did some experimenting with recipes recently, and I think next year I will bake my own), as well as pretzels and regular buns from our local German bakery (and this year some gluten free bagels).

We also of course have some Easter eggs and chocolates! When we were younger, these would be hidden in the living room, along with a gift for each child. I always loved hunting for Easter eggs!

(I just had to show you these flowers, they are so pretty, and have the most amazing smell)

This Easter, I wore what felt like a very autumn appropriate outfit!

To highlight the waist, I turned my cardigan into a wrap-front top, securing it with this great ceramic brooch which my Mum made!

How do you spend your Easter?

xx
Lucy

Sneak peak: Photoshoot with my sister

Just a behind the scenes photo, from the photoshoot I did with my sister earlier this week (check out her new blog here by the way!). She also has some more pictures from the earlier photoshoot we did (which I didn't even blog about, tsk tsk!).  The rest of the pictures will be online next week when the online store opens.

I hope you have a great Easter weekend!
xx
Lucy

Bad luck days

You know the ones... where everything that could possibly go wrong does. These days happen to me every so often, and Monday happened to be one of them. Sorry about all the text, if you're not interested in reading about my day, you can skip to the outfit pictures at the end of the post!

It's Monday morning, I have a job interview at 8am, and although I got up at 6am, I am running late. It's not too much of a problem, since I planned to get there early, and now I will just be on time. Plus, I've decided to get the train instead of the bus, since the train can't get caught in traffic.

 The train station is 10mins walk from my house, and as I get close, I see a train waiting. I panic and run the last 50m, only to realise the train is at the other platform. Phew. I sit down, and wait a minute or so. Then I realise I am sitting at the wrong platform, and the train across from me is MY train. This leads to more frantic running. I get to the train, and the doors are closed. At this stage I am thinking I'm not going to make it to the damn interview. But then, magically, the train doors open and they let me on! How lucky, this NEVER happens! But wait, the doors have open again, and people in the other carriages are all getting out.. What is going on?

It turns out the train has broken down, and after doing some eavesdropping, I find out it has been sitting at the this station for the past 30mins.. Shit. It's way too late to get the bus now, and I can't afford to get a taxi. Lucky for me, the next train arrives after only a 5min wait. I'm only going to be 10mins late for my interview, which isn't too bad, considering. I try to call to let the interviewers know I am running late, but the call is diverted to an automatic answering service, which tells me I am calling outside normal working hours, and to call back in half an hour.

I get off the train at my stop, and start running (whilst cursing my decision to wear heels). I have to cross the railway tracks at a pedestrian crossing to get to my interview, and when I get there, the barrier goes down, and a train arrives. And stops. Right on the damn crossing. So I wait. and wait. After 5mins I can't take it any more, and I decide to walk the long way around. Just as I get around, the barrier goes up. My poor feet are not happy.

I manage to be only 15mins late to the interview, which is amazing considering the circumstances, however it's a group interview, and the receptionist isn't sure I will be allowed in now. I am, and I decided my luck is changing. The interview goes well, until the very end. We are reminded to take our name tags off before we leave, and I tuned out for a second while I am putting my coat on, and one of the interviewers makes a joke about how if I leave my name tag on, somebody might come up to me on the street and say "Hi, how are you?!" Hearing my name, I looked up, smile and say a big cheerful "good!" The I realise she isn't actually asking me how I am. Crap. Then to top things off, my name tag falls off and lands under the table, and I have to get down on my hands and knees and almost crawl to reach it, for which I get a very odd look. 

This all happened before 9am..  After the interview, there were a few more unfortunate events involving cash machines and public transport, but I think I've already written far too much!

Then it was off to my sisters to do a photo shoot for her coming-soon online vintage store, which actually went pretty well. Maybe I'd used up all my bad luck in the morning heh!  I will share some of those pictures with you soon (hopefully in the next post).

Below are a few photos of what I wore on my unfortunate interview day (from which I will be very surprised if I get a call back!), the skirt is newly thrifted, I am in love with the colour! The photos were taken by my sister, in my Mother's pottery studio

xx
Lucy

Scones and a new sewing project!

The other day I made some rather tasty cheese and chive scones. They weren't dry like scones often tend to be, in fact, I think they were the best scones I have ever made!!   I used the basic Edmonds recipe, with the cheese option (listed further down the page, after the basic recipe), and then instead of adding ham, I added 1 bunch of chives, and a teaspoon of smoked paprika. Oh and I actually added a little extra cheese and butter (got to counter-act my mostly vegan diet haha), and then some parmesan cheese on the top. The smoked paprika gave the scones a full, deep flavour, not un-similar to bacon (although I am not a bacon fan, it was sooo good). I totally recommend making these!

Now, my scones were actually a bit of a bribe for my friend, who drafted the collar pattern for me, as mentioned in my last post.  She was also kind enough to let me trace a pattern she made herself, which will be made out of the red fabric below.. Think sweetheart neckline with a tie-top, and a pencil skirt.. I can't wait to make it, and show you the results!

It's lucky I didn't do any sewing or baking today, because it seems like I've had one of those bad-luck days where everything that could go wrong, does! I will share that story, along with an outfit post, tomorrow!

xx
Lucy

New vintage patterns!

I recently bought a few 1950's patterns from Trade Me (the New Zealand equivalent of E-bay), which I am rather excited about sewing up!

The shirt-dress pattern had a few facing pattern pieces missing, and the collar pattern was also missing.. Luckily a good friend of mine is an amazing pattern maker, and was kind enough to draft me a new collar pattern!  Now I just have to actually make it heh (I don't have a sewing machine which can do button holes, so up until now I have avoided making anything with buttons).

I also bought a few 1950's & early 60's Weekend magazines from my local antiques store, which have great advertisements in them.

I also have several other sewing projects in the pipe line, but nothing is quite at a stage where it is ready to be shared with the world!

Have a lovely weekend,

xx
Lucy

Time is ticking

Well.. Sort of anyway!
 I love vintage clocks, and thought I would share with you a few I have in my house. They're all wind-up ones, and although they have keys, none are wound. I did wind up two of them once, both are on different walls in the kitchen, and they tick very loudly at different tempos, which drove me crazy (but did make me do everything very quickly haha). It was so bad that we ended up having to put one of the clocks in the back room with the door shut, until it had wound itself down! So for our sanity, the clocks are now use for display only.

People are often rather confused about the time when they visit! Especially since the one clock we have going is one my grandmother gave to me when I was a child. It's wooden, with bright colours and a small picture next to each hour, which tells you what activity should be performed at what time.

Do you collect certain household items too?

xx
Lucy

The sound of silence

Yes, things have been rather quiet here. My days have been filled with lots of school work, and large amounts of coffee. Because neither of those is terribly photogenic, I have been lacking blog-post inspiration and the end of daylight savings and the cooler weather isn't helping much either, I miss summer already!!

Anyway, here are a few pictures from the past week of non-school related things which were on my camera, including a great use for 1970's glass light shades I saw in a local cafe!

I absolutely adore the mixture of retro and vintage furniture in this cafe

These 70's light shades have small candles inside them, which I thought was such a great idea! (Unfortunately I've never been here in the evening so haven't seen them lit)

At the front door. I just got home from a long day at school.
(I have classes until 8:30pm some days)

Exhausted from all that study!

The view from my kitchen window

I also haven't been keeping up with my blog roll, so now I have loads of catching up to do, I bet you have all been busy!

What do you do when you've been too busy working to come up with anything blog-worthy? Do you have 'fall-back' topics? Or do you keep photos of things to be used when you're lacking inspiration?I want to know your secrets hehe!

xx
Lucy