One Hour Craft

Handmade in Broome

miabi — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 08:47:57 +0000

Broome seems to be an extremely creative place. Musos, painters, photographers, textile artists all seems to love this place. Its isolation – 2000kms from the nearest city (Perth, Western Australia) and its location on the outback coast with stunning beaches, seems to be a magnet for creative types.

If you go up there, each Saturday morning you can go to the Broome Markets. They are a hub of creativity, sounds and sights. We headed there on the Saturday morning with specific goal – to check out my school mate, Katrina’s stall.

Katrina and her business partner have embarked on a creative business venture, sewing adorable appliqued baby and toddler clothes. They are selling loads of these gorgeous singlets and bloomers.

My favourites were these “Stairway to the Moon” Singlets. How cute are they? And a great momento of a trip one of the most beautiful places on earth.

So, if you are up in Broome, go to the markets on a Saturday morning and pick up a mango smoothie. Say hi to Katrina for me. It was great to have a mini school reunion and meet up with Jenny, Katrina and Ros for lunch on Friday. It’s not hard to see why they love living in Broome.

And yes, there are still more Broome photos to come. You have no idea how inspiring the Australian outback coast is.

Mia
xxx

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Magical Sand Flowers in Broome

miabi — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 10:04:25 +0000

Our trip to Broome was filled with friends, love, happiness, sunshine, good food and laughter. It would be hard to have a better holiday. What really inspired me was the breathtaking landscape, the red dirt, the white sands on the beach, the huge expanse of blue ocean meeting the sky.
And I am in awe of these sand flowers. They make me want to paint, to print fabrics, to take photograph.

These flower-like patterns are made by the tiniest of crabs. The crabs make underground tunnels by rolling up sand into little balls and arranging it above ground. The crabs are smaller than the tip of my little finger.

Can you see the tiny little crab in the photo below? How perfectly camouflaged!

Hope you enjoyed these photos. There are more to come in the next few days. At the moment my days are filled with memories of Broome.

Mia
xxx

Handmade in Broome Broome see

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A Good Excuse…

miabi — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 13:18:58 +0000

I have been gone a long time. I know I promised jewellery but May just went. I have a good excuse for not posting in the last week. Here it is….

I’ll be posting loads of great photos in the next few days.
Mia
xxoo

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How to Become a Creative (Part Two)

miabi — Thu, 06 May 2010 14:04:54 +0000

This is the second part to my first post here. I kept thinking of new ideas about how to start or improve your creative thinking and problem-solving. So here are my other little tricks…

Get all your ideas down in writing. Many of us have heard of Julia Cameron's 'morning pages'. In a nutshell, her idea is to get up earlier each morning and write three journal pages, without editing a thing. I did this continuously for five years and have found that every creative project I have completed during this time has come from those three pages. I had two rules I stuck with. I didn't write any negative stuff (I think negativity is the opposite of creativity) and I tried to focus on writing down my ideas. These pages are magical. Really, try them! Get up half an hour earlier and just make it a new habit.

Start a visual board. When you have a big idea, like wanting to rent a villa in Tuscany in the summer for your family, start by buying a small notice board. Then begin sticking anything to do with this idea into the board. For example, if you see a photo of a villa, stick it on. If you have an idea, writei it down on a post-it note then stick it to the board. Website addresses, visa applications, bank account balances of your saving account. Stick anything on the board which supports your plan. When you do this it's amazing how many things you will read associated with your idea and how many things you will find to do with it. It is the first step of giving your idea space to create itself!

Create your own think tank. If you want to start a new business, why not organise a dinner party to discuss and brainstorm the idea in a group. Invite your most interesting, enthusiastic and creative friends to be part. Provide delicious food and wine, huge pieces of butcher paper and colourful markers and start the discussion. Let your friends know the topic of the night. If your friends are anything like me they will think this is serious fun and their ideas are free! Make sure you are glad to return the favour.

Take a holiday. Holidays are the best time to have ideas pour into your head. There is something about clearing your headspace and relaxing, that allows ideas to flow freely. When you go on holiday, leave everything behind. If you have a new direction that you want to travel in, go on a holiday before you make any decisions. Your brain will probably create loads of options for you, while sitting under a palm tree on a tropical island somewhere…..

Try these ideas out and see if they work for you. If you have any other way to start thinking more creatively, let me know.

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May is Jewellery Month…

miabi — Mon, 03 May 2010 12:24:53 +0000

April Food Month is over…. It was great. We had an abundance of delicious food around here. I added to my recipe repertoire. But it did get a little difficult after a while. The people in my life who I love and cook for, didn't want me to share all my 'secret' recipes with anyone – so I was asked not to post them. After being initially quite surprised by the request (command), I took it as a great compliment. I suppose sometimes food is so linked to your private life and your love of each other, that it is really too intimate to share with everyone. So, there were a load of recipes which never were shared. Maybe these ones will be shared with children and children's children, who knows? I hope so. I always tell Millie, you will be a good cook as long as everything you make is made with love.

May is Jewellery Month. This blog has been in need of structure for some time and this year I will experiment with having a different craft focus each month. We started with our little earring construction post at youtube and we will be posting more tutorials, links, photos, videos for this month. This is also close to my heart since I have shared very little of my jewellery making ability on this blog and since it is the craft I have done the most of. I am sure I have shared before that I quit my job a few years ago and went back and studied silversmithing fulltime. It was amazing and the reason why I was inspired to start this blog in the first place.

I'll be in the next few days to show you how to make some fabulous jewellery pieces….

Mia

xxx

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How to Be a Creative and Become Happier! Today!

miabi — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 08:58:03 +0000

(Me and a black kite getting to know each other on the weekend. Apparently he started sunbathing on my arm and it took his handler about five minutes to get him back, because he was just so comfortable there).

I had a chat with a mate today and she asked me, “So, what do you call yourself, an artist, a crafter, an author, a blogger?”. And I responded after a little thought. “No I really just call myself a ‘creative”.

I truly believe that being a ‘creative’ or a creative thinker is a mindset. It’s a way of being, a way of living. For me it is a way of thinking about possibilities. It’s thinking into the future and letting go of the past. It’s seeing a challenge and brainstorming 20 different ways to make that challenge work for you. It’s about finding an opportunity and running with it. It’s about sitting around with friends and choosing topics of conversation which are interesting, idea-filled, lively, animated and energising.

When you become a ‘creative’ you can take your creativity and put it into anything you like. For me,I have put my creativity into taking photos, designing clothing patterns, writing a blog, writing books, and using my hands to make lots and lots of different things. In the future, I may well write some music, finish editing a play I’ve written, write a novel and design a jewellery range.

For everyone their creativity can be used in different ways. One person may use their creativity thinking to improve their marriage, while another may use theirs to start a new business, or help solve a world crisis.

Most of all, I think creative thinking is a way to make yourself happier. Ideas are so much more interesting than other sorts of thoughts. Ideas possess the most energy and forward motion of any thought processes. I think there is a massive link between happiness and being a creative thinker, who can rely on a supple mind with fluid thought processes and avoids black and white rigid thoughts with no movement.

Here are my top ideas on how to become a ‘creative’ and be happier:

Brainstorm your challenges, don’t worry about them. When you have a challenge in life, whether it is a severe illness or a financial crisis, brainstorm. Take a huge piece of paper and a box of coloured crayons or markers and put on a stopwatch for 20 minutes (as you get better at it you might like to do it for 30 minutes). In this twenty minutes, you have to scribble down any ideas that come to your head. You are not allowed to judge them or not write them down. Once you have finished you’ll find that you will have a few great ideas to pursue into the next phase.

Give each great idea 20 minutes. Following from your brainstorming, if you have one or two great ideas give each one twenty minutes. You can do this in different sessions so that you don’t give yourself ‘brain overload’. Brainstorm the idea as you have done before. Then leave it for 24 hours to allow your brain to work its magic and start to make solutions. After 24 hours, come back to the page and see if you will either make it a working project, put it aside as a future possibility or bin it. Then either start on this or start working on another idea. You can use this method to sort out solutions to a housing problem, solutions to a bad relationship or working out how to afford a year in France (yay bring it on!).

Make a ‘Future Possibilities’ folder in your filing system. Fill this file with your great ideas, whether it be a new invention, a business venture or a book idea. This gives your inner creative genius, a space to work and encouragement to continue to work (this little genius needs as much encouragement as possible).

Turn problems on their heads. I can only give you this idea with an example. A problem could be, how do I make my house repayments? If you turn this on its head, you now ask a new question, how can I make my house pay for itself? The answers could be many and varied. You could move out and rent a smaller place and have someone else pay it for you for a while, you could rent out a room or take in a boarder. You could look into subdividing your block, selling off the back half and paying your whole mortgage off. You could start a daycare in your house and look after small children. The ideas are endless but they are so fun to think about. Another one, on a more personal level, could be, ‘how do I make my child happier?’. You could turn this on its head and say ‘how can my child make me happier’. The solutions could be hugging my child more often could make me happier, playing with him in the park each afternoon could make me happier, cleaning his room with him could help. Now see if that doesn’t help improve your child’s happiness as well. Honestly, I love this method. It can get quite hilarious at times & it can throw up the most random, creative, incredible ideas which can then turn themselves into great possibilities.

Choose your friends wisely. Hang out with ideas people. Keep company with people who are positive, upbeat and you can see them sorting through their lives bravely and creatively. You will notice these people’s input into your life will help you enormously. And talk about possibilities and ideas with people. When discussing the world’s crises, don’t wallow in the enormity of it all, throw up possibilities to ponder, talk about and laugh at. You never know, you may help! You have my permission to do a cull of the friends in you life who pull you down. If a girlfriend talks only about crises and things which are wrong while offering no verbal solutions to her only problems, seriously limit your time with that person. I always say this to my ten-year-old ‘hang out with the people at school who are fun, happy, kind, playing sport, doing things, not the ones sitting around gossipping or complaining about teachers or whatever.’ I think it’s a great thing to learn from a young age.

When I talk about creatives, I am not talking about artists only. Some artists are not creative thinkers in their own lives and some accountants I know are the most creative thinkers I have met (LOL, not mine). It is possible to become a creative right now and develop these and other creative skills that will help you keep a positive outlook and bounce back buoyantly from life’s challenges!

Mia

xxx

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Simple Earring Video Tutorial

miabi — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 15:20:38 +0000

Hmmm mmm. We interrupt all this mouth-watering food talk to bring to you our first jewellery making video tutorial, via youtube.

As most of you know, I have studied jewellery design and manufacturing and I have run a jewellery business for several years. I love making jewellery.

I have included five great jewellery tutorials in my book but I haven’t included any tutorials on this site. I was just waiting for a good time to start.

For this tutorial you need:
1 pair flat-nosed pliers
1 pair round-nosed pliers
1 pair wire cutters
2 earring hoops
2 eye pins
2 large beads
2 crystal rondelles
2 small crystal beads

I hope you enjoy. If you guys want more jewellery tutorials I will make and upload more in the next few weeks.

Mia
xxx

PS We’ll be back with a great big upload in a few days time of more recipes and cooking adventures. Until then, make a pair of earrings or two or three.

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Hi-Tech Cooking!

miabi — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 14:58:24 +0000

If you are like me, your whole life is contained within your iphone. I couldn’t live without my phone for an hour, let alone a day.
Well, did you know that there are great iphone apps available to take with you into the kitchen. How fabulous! So, I’ve been going nuts with my iphone and have found some great cooking apps.
Here are my top four:

Quick Collection by Nigella Lawson. This app is only a few days’ old. It is Nigella’s brand-new classy baby and it contains a series of 70 recipes for us busy cooks. There are loads of videos also. Who doesn’t love Nigella and her decadent recipes? I love her style but these are not recipes for the weight-conscious cook.

Epicurious. This app is uh-mazing. If you buy one app this is the one, according to all the reviews and to my playing around on it. Epicurious has over 25,000 recipes, a shopping list and ratings from other users who have tried those recipes. This app is absolutely free – but the downside is that you have to put up with a number of advertisements.

20 minute meals by Jamie Oliver. This app is a little bit more expensive than others but it’s only $7.99. These recipes come with great photos. I love cooking with photos. Great for all the visual learners amongst us. There are 55 recipes. Great for quick after-work meals.

All Recipes Dinner Spinner. This is really great. You can put in which ingredients you want to use, how much time you have and then it lets you choose from a number of suitable meals. This app has thousands of recipes which is great too. If you are like me and try to shop at the fresh market each week then end up with some fresh ingredients left, this is great. It will help you find the suitable dish for them. Best of all, this app is free!

I noticed today that Megan of Not Martha has a free giveaway for How to Cook Everything app, the new cooking app from Mark Bittman. Visit her site and leave a comment.

I hope these make cooking so much more fun!

Mia
xxx

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April Food Month: Food Links

miabi — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 15:24:29 +0000

As April is Food Month over here at ohc headquarters, I thought I’d take a little time and give you the links to my all-time favourite foodie blogs.

Gluten-Free Girl. This site has been going as long as mine I think. It is filled with great gluten-free recipes and ideas. I know it can be seriously hard eating gluten-free (as I do). She has some truly great ideas and it is a fantastic read. And her cookbook is finished. How exciting.

Vegan Lunchbox. This is great for non-vegans too. Jennifer has so many ideas on how to fill lunchboxes with healthy great food. I am not vegan and I get great ideas from reading it. She hasn’t updated since January, I think but is still a great read with loads of posts from the last few years.

Kristens Raw. Kristen Suzanne is a raw vegan chef. I am neither a raw foodist nor a vegan. But I love her blog. She has been responsible for extending my food repertoire hugely. I now eat chia, quinoa and use agave nectar as a sweetener instead of sugar in some recipes. Because of her I have tried rice milk, hemp milk and am a regular drinker of a green smoothie in the morning. And her passion just lights me up. I am always attracted to anyone who is passionate about what they do.

Crazy Sexy Life. Ok this is not even a food blog but it has a lot to do with food. Kris Carr, started this blog after she survived cancer. She is a vegan and a raw foodist also. I am interested in her insights into food and the articles by those in the know on her site. I love being encouraged to eat organic foods and when I need a good kick to my diet, I visit here and always remember why I am eating a healthy diet, why I don’t eat junk food, why I eat lots of fresh fruit and vegies – and it just makes me feel good. I have made several of their Recipe of the Week dishes which are in the right hand sidebar – and they were very yummy!

I know these are all vegan and raw-foodist when I am not. But I really enjoy the different foods they try! I will include more links later..

Any good food links to share?

Mia
xxx

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Day 14: Baked Flaming Bananas in Butterscotch Sauce Recipe

miabi — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 13:05:47 +0000

Hi. we are back with another delicious dessert. This one had me running all over the place. I ruined it once and semi-burnt the sugar in the bottom of the saucepan and then had to start all over again. Unfortunately I tried this out on a night when we had guests, probably not the best idea. And I must warn you…. negotiate with your husband beforehand as to who will scrub the saucepan as it’s bit of a killer.

This recipe is adapted from my favourite cookbook, ‘The Cook’s Companion’ by Stephanie Alexander.

Ingredients

4 Bananas

Rum

3/4 c white sugar

1/2 c boiling water

3/4 cup brown sugar

few drops of pure vanilla

1 tablespoon butter

100mls thick cream

Method

To make the sauce, dissolve the sugar in a saucepan over gentle heat until it is a deep gold. Pour the boiling water then stir until it is smooth. (Please note be very careful with this. If you pour the boiling water quickly it is sort of like a volcanic eruption, very scary…. I should know this is what I did the first time around.) Remove the pan from heat and stir in both the butter and the brown sugar until the brown sugar has dissolved. Stir in the vanilla and the cream and leave aside.

Bake the bananas in their skins on a hot barbecue. Turn after ten minutes and bake for a further ten minutes. The skins will be black and the bananas soft and very hot. Peel back one side of the skin. and place them on a serving dish. Warm rum in the saucepan, light with a match (another slightly scary part of the procedure, so be careful!) and pour flaming rum over the exposed banana. Serve with warm butterscotch sauce!

I served with ice cream also. This was very yummy. Even for someone like me who is not all that partial to sweet treats.

Enjoy!

Mia

xxx

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