Alpaca Farming

Situated in the beautiful midlands of Kwa-Zulu Natal is an alpaca farm, Heaven's Gift. Our club were treated to a wonderful tour of what alapaca farming is all about and the owner, Veronique Garbutt, certainly inspired us with her passion for these wonderul animals.
As well as the farm, Veronique gave us a full tour of her mill, where we got to see how this so soft fiber is eventually spun into yarn.
Thank you Veronique for sharing your life with us and thanks Nella for suggesting this tour.

Harvest

Its been a dry dry winter here, everything is brown. I so look forward to our first spring rain. My crafting days seem to have dried up like our garden, perhpas the spring rain will bring more than just wet relief. A couple of months ago during our autumn season,a season that always inspires me to craft, I made quite a few pumpkins and such.
Here is a group of some of those items.
A tall pumpkin, a small sack of potatoes, bunch of corn and carrots, fabric painted sculptures.

Inside Out- Gift Wrapping

I love taking time to look for gifts for friends and family, trying to find that something special and personal for each one. As well as finding the gift,I love spending time on wrapping gifts.
Here are some items for you to collect to wrap your gifts.
Look for old bits of jewellery, bling is just as good.
Keep a box of bits of ribbons in as many colors and and textures as you can find.
Buttons are also great to add.
Sparkly bits of thread, broken strings of beads are perfect.
Wrapping papers
Ready made tags, used or new
Jute, string and cords
Lace is always useful and decorative
Here are some pictures of gifts I have recently wrapped for friends.


A close up of the blue/cream paper.
I used a bit of old cream lace and a broken strand of pearls to tie in with the old look of the wrappping paper. I love those little butterfly clips, they are great to hold the message tag.


This one is in greens and off white roses. Inside is a lovely bone china mug covered in white gardenias.Instead of putting the little tea bag holder inside with the mug, I have added it to the outside to add to the wrapping decor. A little silvery wide ribbon, some paper ribbon done in two colours, a sprinkle of silver thread, and a butterfly clip to hold the message tag.


This one is done in pinks to match the pink rose covered mug inside. This is for a younger person so I chose some fun pink paper, added paper ribbon in two shades, some sparkle thread and a lovely piece of bright pink with silver sequence wide ribbon and my little butterfly clip in bright pink to hold the message tag.


I would love to see how you wrap your gifts, care to share?