Bonnievale River Resort

This past weekend we went away with our little caravan to a place called "Bonnievale" I know right?
It makes me want to say "I hair from Bonnievale". Ha ha. How kind of them to name a place after me!

Okay, okay...anyway. We left Thursday afternoon (a mere 2 hours drive) and we were there. It's a nice little place on the river bank.
Time to be together as a family, relax, sit by the fire, toast marshmallows, eat chocolates, lie in, play board games, look up at the stars, swing, kayak, fish, bird watch....

Each top campsite has it's own wooden deck.

So this is looking out our caravan onto the deck, trees and river.

This is the view looking from the river back onto the campsite.

River and kayaks

 This is the camp pool, in the vineyard!

Honeysuckle.

Love the light!

This is part of the valley-orchards and vineyards and a water channel that runs through the whole valley for irrigation.

Just some random images of things I liked that I saw.
A funny sign.

A lovely ivy-covered door

A beautiful old Cape Dutch style built in 1818

A bell with wine barrel tables in the background

Rose styled succulent.

Hope you enjoyed the pix!
Will show you some crocheted projects I have been busy on tomorrow.

Shop update: Journals/ Project Life

I have some new goodies in my shops!

Birdie Mini Journal

A sweet little Journal/notebook.
A once-off, unique little book! The Journal measures 15cm x 10cm
It has 10 pages (not including the Front and back covers) Graph paper, card, envelope, Bird illustration. The covers and pages are all pre-punched.

Each page is blank for you to embellish. Included are tags, paper flowers, envelopes to tuck things away, paper doily, tags, transparent pockets, stamps, mini clothes peg,Journal spots, trim, buttons, tickets and other hand made embellishments for that unique feel and look.

 
Some close ups of the Journal. 

 

Everyday Journal Bundle for project life

 

 

A fun and practical kit for scrap booking and Project Life.

In this kit you will receive:
* 1 card sheet of ready-to-cut Labels
* 1 card sheet of ready-to-cut everyday journal labels
* 1 card sheet of ready-to-cut memory jar notes
* 1 pack of assorted pre-cut labels
* 1 pack of pre-cut bracket/circle labels
* 1 pack of pre-cut Project Life Cards
(Everything has been designed and printed by me)
©Bonnie van Esch Designs

You can purchase each item separately, but it is cheaper to buy the bundle!

All my products are printed on high GSM card and packaged in clear polyprop packets.
You receive over 50 units in total

Bingo Mini Journal and Embellishments

 

 

A sweet little sewn Journal/notebook.
The pages are graph paper and sewn by machine in the middle.
A once-off, unique little book!

The Journal measures 11.5cm x 115.5cm
It has 24 pages (not including the Front and back covers).
It is machine stitched together.


Each page is blank for you to embellish. Included are tags, paper flowers, envelopes to tuck things away, paper doily, tags, transparent pockets, Journal spots, trim, buttons, tickets and other hand made
embellishments for that unique feel and look.

A fun little Journal for your thoughts, A quick mini-album, a lovely gift....

Everyday Journal Labels for scrapbooking & project life

Assorted Tag set of 12

 

Love gift-wrapping? Scrap booking? Journals?
Always needing tags?

A happy little set of 12 tags, 4 large, 4 medium and 4 small white tags with two colors of bakers twine (made in South Africa) and white string.

Perfect for all your little projects!

 

 

 

Everyday Project Life Cards

 

Project Life Journal Cards
measure: 8cm x 10.4cm, fit perfectly into your Simple Stories or project life sleeves.

You will receive:
* 8 pre-cut Journal cards

(Everything has been designed and printed by me)
©Bonnie van Esch Designs

 

 

Memory Jar Journal spots set of 4

 

Looking for a fun way to spruce up your scrap book pages or add some fun to your project life pages? These fun little memory jars are perfect for achieving that!

You will receive a sheet of 4 memory jars. If you would like them pre-cut, I can do that for you at no extra cost. Please put it in the comments at check out.

Each Jar measures 9cm x 5m.
Printed on high quality GSM card.
Designed and printed by me.

 

 

All products are available through Etsy(For international customers) as well as with ZAR for my South African customers on my website.

Just send me an email with the goodies you want and I add on the postage, you do a EFT and voila-you get your goodies in the post!

Project Life Freebie

I fell off the band wagon a bit with Project life, but I plan to catch up and carry on.
Preserving memories for my family, my children is very important to me and I know one day, they will have something to look back upon, as will I, and smile about.

Here is another sheet of FREE project life journal cards for you.
Please note they are only for personal use and may not be printed and sold or sold as a digital item under any circumstances.
You can download the sheet here.

Crochet: Cowl/Hood

It is Autumn here and the weather is starting to change. The mornings are dark and cooler as well as the evenings. I wanted to make a cowl that could also be used as a hood for myself for this winter, and set about searching on pinterest for ideas.
I soon found this gorgeous cowl.
I just had to make it! I loved her original colors but wanted mine to be a bit more blue and grey as I have a lot of those color clothes.

 

It only took me two days to complete. 28 granny squares. 7 squares in each row. 4 rows.

I did the edging dc of pink and a dc of the dark grey. All using a 4mm hook.

For joining, I used Lucy's method .

 

I can't decide if it looks like I'm wearing a blanket on my head or if, in some sort of way, it is kinda cool.

I might make another one using only one color and dc stitches. I think the big joining bit also needs to go at the bottom where it isn't noticeable.

 Ha ha! the more I look at this, the more it DOES look like I've just wrapped a blanket around my head!!

 Oh well...i still love the coziness of it...

 and It looks okay as a scarf/cowl ?

so, if you can't crochet or don't have a cowl, throw a blanket on your head. looks about the same! haha!

crochet: Custom orders-Tea cozies

I had two custom orders for tea cozies recently. The First one was made using pastel shades: pink, lilac and purple. Very soft and vintage looking.

 

The Second a very bright and colorful one using salmon pink, orange and blue.

They could not be more different!!

crochet: Owl Blanket

Earlier on this year I gave one of my niece's this little lap blanket.
I couldn't make something big as she needed to take it on the plane, but I thought a nice little lap blanket would be nice-for when she is watching movies and snuggling with her mom on the couch.

 I like the colors, sort of not too girlish but not too boyish.

 Completed it with a shell edging.

 I really wanted to make this a big blanket but she loved it and that is all that counts. :)

As brief as I can manage.

 

I remember when I was a little girl feeling like life stretched before me like a never ending book. There was no "the end" when I thought about life, my future or the future of others I loved. As I grew up, however, that notion of a never ending life vanished. Sometimes I wish I could have the protection the naivety of a child offers one again...
Loosing a loved one is a very hard experience. Probably one of the hardest we, as humans, have to face at some stage in our lives.

I've been struggling to gain the courage and strength to write this post. I do not like to talk about my personal life, I do not like to share things that I am struggling with or going through. This blog is supposed to be my little sanctuary, my "get-away" place. Somewhere I can share my creative side, a place I like inspires others. A happy place. We all have lives, we all face problems and issues on a daily basis. We all go through the loss of a loved one at some stage. So it's been hard, because I don't want to ignore it just because it is too hard to write about and at the same time,I don't want to bring everyone down reading this. Balance...sigh...

So let me be brief as brief is about all I can manage.

As some of you know my oldest brother passed away 4 years ago. Sadly, my other brother (and my last) passed away recently. I do not want to go into detail of how it happened as I feel it is too personal but I did want you to know why I have been so quiet.

I am doing a lot better thanks to the support of loved ones.

I want to get back to sharing things on my blog and I plan to do that soon. I just needed to do this first.