The Purple Bunny Project - Part II

Part II - Finding new homes for Ten Purple Bunnies

As discussed in yesterday's post, I had ten purple bunnies on my hands and no plan for what I was going to do with them! Mr Moppysgirl has been busy raising funds (and training!) with the Pako Wanderers for the Oxfam Trailwalker Melbourne, so I thought that these ten purple bunnies could be put to good use in the fundraising efforts.

We exist. Now what?!

Oxfam Trailwalker is a team challenge, journeying through 100 kilometres of bush trails within 48 hours. Each team of four must commit to raising a minimum fundraising amount to support Oxfam's work around the world. More about all of that can be found here.

Now to get these bunnies to new homes while supporting Oxfam!

Here's how it's all going to work -

• I'm offering up ten purple bunnies in exchange for donations of $26 (per bunny) to Oxfam, via the Pako Wanderers Trailwalker team.
• I'll cover all delivery costs.
• Donations are tax deductible (feel free to donate more than $26 if you choose!).

And the process - 

• I will very shortly (in the next half hour!) put a 'The Purple Bunny Project' album up on my moppysgirl Facebook page. The album will consist of photos of each of the 10 bunnies.
• If you'd like a bunny, please comment 'SOLD' against the photo of the bunny you're after.
• I'll confirm who was the first to comment 'SOLD' (in case more than one person wants the same bunny) and send that person a message to confirm the donation process and also work out delivery details.
• Once I can confirm that the donation has been made, I'll get the bunny to you!

Hooray!!

The Purple Bunny Project - Part I

Ten purple bunnies!

Part I - How I came to have Ten Purple Bunnies

Here is a suitcase full of yarn -

Just a small portion of my yarn stash...

Here is my thought process while looking at this suitcase full of yarn -

• Hmmm... There's way more purple than I thought.
• Will have to make a few purple bunnies.
• Imagine if I made bunnies out of all the purples, that would look cool.

One further thought, since dismissed - 

• Then I could make bunnies out of all the pinks, all the blues, all the greens...

That was a couple of years ago. Since then I've made a couple of very minor attempts to start The Purple Bunny Project, but someone would request a purple bunny, or other colours would appeal more when I came to start a new bunny, so the idea had been left unfulfilled.

Until now!

After last Easter I had a very low inventory of just about everything. I'd sold lots of bags at Westfest (thank you!) and between Westfest and Quirk and Easter, I had not a single bunny in my bunny basket. It was a busy time and I decided not to put pressure on myself by signing up for any more markets for the year. It was the perfect opportunity to put The Purple Bunny Project into action!

It's taken just slightly longer than I thought! I crocheted purple bunnies in between custom orders and bunny drops to Quirk. Occasionally I would have a custom order for a purple bunny, so that bunny would leave the bunny basket and I would make a new one from that yarn. The dye lots of my yarns changed, giving me new purples to work with... and now I'm done!

Here is a basket full of purple bunnies -

The Purple Bunny Project - complete!

Here is my thought process while looking at this basket full of purple bunnies -

• That's a lot of purple bunnies.
• Now what?!
• Photo shoot!

Firstly, evidence that they really are all different purples - 

Dusky purples

2 different dye lots x 2 different colour codes = 4 bunnies!

Dark and mysterious purples

Now, totally random and self-indulgent The Purple Bunny Project photo shoot!

That last photo makes it all worthwhile!!

Now that all those photos have been taken, I had a more serious "Now what?!" to consider. What was I going to do with ten purple bunnies?

I'm pleased to let you know that The Purple Bunny Project will all be for a very good cause! These bunnies will be used to raise funds for Oxfam, via the Pako Wanderers, who will be taking part in the Oxfam Trailwalker Melbourne later this year. Check out their fundraising page here and their Facebook page here. (Full disclosure - Mr Moppysgirl is a Pako Wanderer :-) )

More information about how this fundraising will work, and how to get your hands on a purple bunny, coming tomorrow!

xx

Mrs Young's Ginger Biscuits

Ha! The last blog post I did was for a super quick and easy - and best of all YUMMY! - recipe. This one is probably even quicker and easier!

From memory, my mum and dad worked with Mr Young before any of us were twinkles in their eyes. When my brothers and I were little we would be taken to visit Mr and Mrs Young in Melbourne, which is where we discovered these yummy biscuits. Mrs Young kindly shared the recipe with my mum, and as we've left home, we have each taken a copy of the recipe with us.

Ingredients

4 ounces of butter (or about 115 grams)
1 cup caster sugar
1 egg
1 dessertspoon ground ginger *
2 tablespoons golden syrup
2 cups SR flour

* We like our biscuits really gingery, and so add 2 dessertspoons. If we have any crystalised ginger we also chop that up into tiny pieces and add that as well for extra ginger chewiness.

Method

Melt butter.
Add sugar, syrup, egg, ginger.
Mix well.
Add SR flour and stir to combine.
Roll into balls and place on a baking tray.
Bake in a moderate oven (180 degrees) for 15 - 20 minutes. **

** Err on the lower side to make sure you have chewy biscuits and not tooth breakers! Unless you like your ginger biscuits to be very hard and crunchy of course!

There you go - super easy!

Super Easy and Insanely Moreish Apple Slice

There was a morning tea at school yesterday morning, so on Thursday night I was looking for a recipe that was a) easy; and b) produced something yummy. Hey presto! Apple slice!

There were some disgruntled family members when they realised that this was not being made for them, so I made it again tonight. It's that easy!

This is one of those recipes that is passed on from person to person because it is just so reliable and delicious. It can be served in larger pieces, with cream, as a dessert. It is a great lunchbox snack. I was given it by a friend at playgroup and have used it many times. Now I'm passing it along to you!

Ingredients

2 cups SR flour
1 cup sugar
125 g butter, melted
1 egg, lightly beaten *
3 apples, peeled and sliced **
Cinnamon
Extra sugar

* If you are really short on preparation time, add an extra egg - the additional liquid makes combining all the ingredients a lot easier. You'll need to add an extra 5 minutes cooking time though.
** I always find 3 apples too many, but then we usually have large-ish apples.

Method

Combine flour, sugar, butter and egg.

Press into a slice tin - I line mine with baking paper.

Layer apples on top and sprinkle with cinnamon and extra sugar. I layer my apples in rows to make it easier to cut into portions.

Bake in moderate oven for 25 - 30 minutes.

Obviously no nice and even baking going on in my oven!

This slice comes out of the oven really soft - leave in the tin to cool for about 10 minutes. Use the baking paper to carefully lift it out of the tin so that it can be cut into portions.

Enjoy!

Not much of this made it past the "cut into portions" stage!

I did do some googling to see if this recipe is already out there. It probably is! I did find a couple that were similar, but none that I thought were as easy as this is.

Apron in first photo is a Classic Half Apron from Boojiboo.
Wooden spoon and asymmetrical board are recent purchases from Pop Little boards at Piccadilly Market.
Purple mixing bowl was from a long-ago Tupperware party. I cannot explain how awesome this bowl is. It just is!

Bits and bobs

How are you?  I feel like I have been sick forever!  Gah!  I've had a very nasty cough but today has been a good day and I think I'm finally on the way to recovery.  Hooray!  I hope you've been well!

I'm working quite hard to get some things finished off so that I can concentrate on getting ready for the Herb and Pip Pop Up!  I'm very excited about being part of a pop up!  There's an awful lot going on with end of term and getting ready for Christmas too!

Here are some things that happened today -

I finished off my first (Edit: this is actually the second! Oops!) bunny since the Ashby Primary School Market Day!  I felt a bit sad about having an empty bunny tin.  It's full to overflowing now with bunny bits and I'll definitely have some ready for the Pop Up!

This bunny is heading off to Quirk!

I've also completed a custom order for the lovely Nicole from 4Poppets.  Two lined bags with internal zippered pockets.

I braved the rain this morning to rescue a parcel from the letterbox.  It contained this gorgeous package:

Isn't it lovely!

Which contained this darling dress from Naughty Shorts!  I splurged a while ago and ordered this custom tea dress.  I can't wait to wear it.  In fact, I'm planning on donning it tomorrow with some tights and a cardi!

Divine!

While on the subject of dresses, I've been asked a lot about the dress I wore to the Ashby Primary School Market Day.  It's this one (needs an iron!):

and it's a Frankie & Ray dress that I got from Quirk.  There are new ones in at Quirk, or check out Frankie & Ray at The Makery pop up at Boom Gallery this Thursday from 4 - 9pm.

For the last six days I've been playing nurse to some sad guinea pigs.

Mimi and WombatVineyNibbles

Last Wednesday I extracted a large (enormous!) grass seed from Mimi's eye and rushed her to the vet where she was thoroughly checked out and taken care of.  We were sent home with some eye ointment that I am to administer two or three times a day.  Mimi is not very enthusiastic about this! WombatVineyNibbles also has some ongoing eye issues so I have been applying some of the ointment to her eye as well, and will arrange for her to also visit the vet when I take Mimi back for a follow up appointment.

I'll be off to the vet next week too for our cat's vaccinations!

Up until today this has been our Christmas tree -

My very clever husband assembled this in our lounge room so that we would have some form of tree where we have traditionally set up the whole shebang. Last year the tree was a very sad, denuded, disaster.  We had a very new and active kitten who thought the Christmas Tree was a wonderful play thing, and that baubles were marvellous toys.  After much negotiation with the small people, today we set up the official Christmas Tree in our front room -

Ta da!  It's feeling more like Christmas now!

xx

Advent Calendars - Get Ready! Get Set!

Is your Advent Calendar at the ready?  Are you a multiple Advent Calendar household?  Has that first door already been opened?  Are you super lucky and have one that is handmade?  Are you without Advent Calendar and feel like you are missing out?  Here is a little guide to what is out there!

The original card Advent Calendars - cute ones available from Phoenix

Cute!  Cute!  Cute!  Plus reusable and therefore highly environmentally friendly.

Cadbury Chocolate Advent Calendar - here or here

It's chocolate - what's not to like?!  Especially if this is yours and not the kids'.

Smiggle Advent Calendar

My small people are sharing this one, taking in turns to open the doors and then keeping all the goodies in a bowl to be shared out turn by turn once all the doors have been opened.  They're very civilised!  And they'll have a heap of stationery goodies for school next year!

Lego Advent Calendar - available in Star Wars, Friends and City

Who doesn't love Lego?  Plus you get to add all those pieces to your Lego collection!

Benefit Countdown to Love

I love Benefit and this looks awesome!  Sadly could not find any in stock - anybody in possession of this is very very lucky!

Other Advent Calendars I've come across are the scrumptious gingerbread one from Kuna's Pure Food,  lots of very clever handmade ones involving bags and bunting, and there has been a lot of wine related ones posted across Facebook.  I'm sure there are plenty more ideas out there too!  Whether you've got an Advent Calendar at the ready or not - I hope you enjoy the lead up to Christmas!

An uninspiring purchase.

Yesterday I bought an iron.  It was exactly as interesting as it sounds.

I cannot remember the last time I ironed a piece of clothing, but I do use my iron quite a lot - for sewing.  It is invaluable when cutting out, creating neat seams and even hems.  So, no basketful of clothes waiting to be ironed for me, instead my ironing board is heavily laden with crafting items.

My ironing board in use.

An iron isn't so useful once it has developed a leak and quite frankly the holes in the plate (is there a technical term?) were looking decidedly crusty.  So yesterday when we were in the vicinity of an electrical store, in we went.

What are the defining features of an iron?  There on display were at least a dozen irons, arranged in order of price.  I looked at them (quite blankly, to be honest) for a few seconds before a very enthusiastic sales guy came to the rescue.

There followed a couple of minutes where I tried to think of something intelligent to ask whereby I could make a decision between one iron and another.

"Does this one get creases out of fabric?  Yes?  Good.  And this one?  Right."

Of course I could not ask that so really I just nodded along while he talked about pounds of steam (I think?) and about his own personal choice of the CreaseBeater X3000 (I may have made that up).  That one was up the more pricey end of the iron line-up so I am glad he did not point to that one first.  Because how did I make my decision?  I chose the one he had pointed to first.

Unlike a purchase that is actually exciting, my new iron was deposited on the kitchen table and left in its box until this afternoon, when I wanted to take a photo of it to use to illustrate this blog entry.  I now have an iron with a 2400 W Power zone, Security Auto-off, Double Anti-calc, Double Anti-scale, 0-40g Variable Steam, 130 g/in Power zone (confusing), Self Clean and Great Stability.  I'm still failing miserably at being thrilled.

Old vs New

I don't know.  Maybe this iron will be amazing.  Maybe I will form an opinion on ironing that involves more than getting creases out of fabric.  Maybe I will fall in love with this new iron so much that I will start to iron tea-towels and sheets.  I will keep you posted.