Happy April!

Happy April to everyone. Another month has flown by so I figured I would update you all as to what we've been up to.

Not much really. Just plugging away at school and work. Stephen is consistantly out of the house by 6:30 am to get to school and start planning and preping for the day ahead. He usually doesn't make it home until about 5-6pm and commonly collapses on the couch after a hard day of teaching. I on the other hand have filled by days up with reading, writing, belly dance, swimming and sewing. Now you may think I have a far easier schedule than Stephen (and you'd be right), but I still find myself exhausted at the end of the day and raedy to collapse into a heap on the couch.

Seeing as how I've had trouble lately thinking of things to put down here, I thought I'd play a little game. I've read it on a few other blogs and found it somewhat entertaining. Every first week of the month I will go to a different food shop and see what I can find for 10$. Thus the opening picture. My first finds at the Asian Food Warehouse. I discovered these lovely Indian beers, which upon closer inspection prove to be made here in New Zealand. Haven't tried them yet, but we're looking forward to it. The octopus crisps were just too awesome to pass by and frankly they don't taste much like octopus, rather a simulated sea flavour. Can't think of any other words to describe it. I bought the bag of covered peanuts solely for the gap-toothed happy man on the front. I love how they use this elderly figure in the place of the usual youth (either ultra-cute or uber-hot). In fact, upon tasting them I'm not sure there are actually any whole nuts in them, but they are sweet and coconuty.

Otherwise, all I have to show for the last month is a bit of crafting. I found some amazing bags at the Arts Centre Market a couple of weeks ago. Unfortuately I'm not in a position to afford $100 bags, so I had to make my own. Here are the results. I already have several orders from friends.


I've also had some fun making softies. After cruising some of my favorite blogs I noticed a cute cushion in the corner of a picture that I thought, "I could make that." And here it is, Oni, my little cat guardian. I didn't name it until after I had made it and Oni just seemed to fit so perfectly. It was only later that I found out what "Oni" means. Oni's are Japanese demon guardians of a dual nature, taking on the general nature of the person they are guarding, whether that is good or evil.


And finally, I'm making progress on my quilt for little Kieran. Yesterday, I spent much of the day ironing and basting all my layers together so I can quilt it on my little sewing machine. After which I will do some hand quilting in each block and sewing on the binding. It's so much fun to watch it come together, I'm really enjoying this quilting thing.

Stephen, on his part, is busy in the kitchen as I type, whipping together hot cross buns, macarons, bread and other delicious baking delights. I guess we're both working on hobbies that will keep us warm ;)