{it's a date}

At last, the lovely old linen calendar tea towels are taking shape... as strings of bunting. 

I'm thinking that it'd be fun to hang them up for celebrations throughout the year, from New Year's Day,

to Valentine's Day,

to April Fool's Day,

to the 4th of July,

and, a touch of orange for Halloween!

Yes, almost every date is covered! It almost makes me want to find something -- National Fish Finger Day, Cadbury's Appreciation Day -- to celebrate every day of the year.

Hearts, Hearts, Everywhere

As you might imagine, our home is rather red. I will, sooner or later, make red curtains for the windows, but until then, little garlands of red hearts hang down in front of the blinds to add a bit of colour, and a bit of Danish warmth for the winter. 

The garlands were a product of one night in, watching a film. With nothing else to sew, I sat and simply cut heart after heart out of red felt. By the end of the movie, I had a pile of fifty hearts, and the sheer quantity of them inspired me to string them together and hang them from our exceptionally high, curtainless curtain rods.

Making your own garland couldn't be easier, whether you choose to cut out hearts from felt yourself, or buy ready made ornaments, such as the ceramic ones below (from potglasshande), and string them together.

Danish designer, Maileg, also has some lovely stuffed fabric hearts, ready-made, in fun stripes and spots. 

I love the idea of warmth and love shining out from our house through each window. I think it'll be quite hard to get myself to take the hearts down from the windows when winter comes to an end!

Bunting

You might remember, I was very inspired by beautiful bunting hung in nurseries. It's a lovely way of adding colour and patterns.

You might also remember Justin's reaction to the idea: "But it reminds me of used-car dealers!"

With another day at home, and a little more energy than usual, I couldn't resist giving it a try. And though fabric flags look lovely and hang beautifully, my lack of pinking shears plus my lack of motivation to hem edges led me to use some brightly patterned scrapbook paper, instead! I simply took squares of 12" by 12" paper, and cut diagonally down from each top corner to the centre of the bottom edge to make the triangular flag shape.

The letters of her name are cut from plain brown paper, and glued on. Then, little holes are punched out along the tops of the flags, and a piece of long string threaded through. (I taped the string to the back of the flags to prevent them all sliding together).

Oh, and Justin approves. "It's nothing like a car lot," he assured me. High praise, indeed!

We thought Tilly might be on her way last night, with an hour or two of stronger contractions, but I guess it was just a bit of practice! And though we're so eager to meet her, we did enjoy a nice full night's sleep last night instead, which seems like more and more of a blessing each day!

Let Your Flag Fly

"I found I could say things with colour and shapes

that I couldn't say any other way--things I had no words for."

-Georgia O'Keeffe