camping



  

Way, way, super fun!

custom made seat belt covers

I've said it before.. you either love leopard print or you hate it! It's in your genes. My mum loves it, I'm a fan, so naturally Lacie should love it??!? My baby turned 5, so the perfect gift of course was custom made leopard print seat belt covers.. I made these for her last week and couldn't wait to give them to her. She told her Grandma that these were her favorite present of all! Wooo hoooo. I told you it was in the genes :)

I also made her this little card and sewed on the little garland flags of material. It was a poor effort on my behalf as I "was" going to make real life size ones for her birthday but just ran out of time! Maybe next year? 

 

I had to pick her cake for this year as she wanted a surprise cake. I bet she didn't predict a dinosaur cake?!? This was the easiest one for me to do, as again time hasn't been on my side over the past few weeks.

The Women's Weekly kid's birthday cakes
"huff & puff" page 42

I feel soo guilty that I didn't make more of a effort with the hand and home made little things for her birthday. Maybe next year! Happy Birthday Lace x

creative monsters

I have created "creative monsters".. My fault 100%! Not one day or night goes by where the kids don't express themselves artistically. From drawing green crayon on the walls "because it looks better that way" (so I was told) or getting dressed in odd shoes and socks for the day, painting their beautiful dolls faces with my nail polish, sewing buttons onto socks, cutting every piece of felt I own into sticky taped masterpieces, cutting and cutting what ever can be cut, drawing their little people on cards, sewing together bits of material.... and last night making beaded bangles! Of course they are?! That's what happens when you have a whole fishing tackle box full of everything you need to go crazy with beads and bits and pieces you need to make what ever you want!! It has been waiting for them under my bed for ever.. until now. They didn't even take the time to get it out into the lounge room, they just HAD to start right there and then, right next to my bed!

impatient little people

finally onto the craft table, i mean dining room table

my new priceless jewelry
and well deserved glass of wine!

Lacie wanted to capture her new bangle with some action model shots! She was the photographer and I was the model. This was the best that we could come up with!

me the model

I wonder what tonight will bring?

dear diary...

This blog thing is kind of like therapy on ones hectic life. So here I go..

Last Thursday night I got a phone call from my husband to tell me I had to take him to emergency cause he snapped his Achilles tendon playing footy with his mates! The poor thing was in agony to say the least. I packed the kids in the car and off we went... well kind of.. after Mitch somehow poohed out the side of his nappy on to the wall, I somehow lost he keys in the car and had to run around mad searching for the spare set (mind you, this is while Heath is turning green with pain and about to pass out), when we were finally on our way I had a huntsman spider (I thought it was a trianchela, but my husband corrected me) as big as my hand sit on the other side of the windscreen and stare me out the whole way... we arrived. Long story short, he had operation the next morning and in a cast for 6-12 weeks! So for me, in short, I now have 4 babies to look after..

My patient has been very good (so far). I get text messages and emails from him from the bedroom if he needs anything.. After bacon & eggs on Sunday I got the kids out of the house and took them to the movies to see Gnomeo & Juliette. We loved it! Yesterday I did some cooking. Heath is a mad raspberry fan, so I found a recipe for White Choc Chip & Raspberry muffins from Julie Goodwins cook book and whipped some up for the patient. They were scrummo!




My kids went a little nuts over my sister-in-laws humus the other day so I made a big batch for them as well. I tried a little too hard on presentation for this picture! ha ha.. that's paprika and a bit of olive oil drizzled on top.. Little Bon is getting into some right now with some carrot and biscuits. If you can smell garlic?? Well, that's coming from my house..

I go back to working 3 days a week in April so I need to get some child care sorted pretty quickly, so in between cooking, nursing and stuff, I drove around my suburb checking out child care... How disappointing. Out of the 70 million I looked I would only leave my children at 2 of them. I need to reassess my situation.

You may hear a little less from me over the next few weeks, or possibly may get swamped with dear diary stuff.. ??

finally, my scrappy quilt mat..

Well, I'm not use to having to wait for days (3 days) to see my projects come to life!! But, finally I can move on to the next thing now that I have finished by Scrappy Quilt Mat. Mitch has been sitting on some of my other quilts I have made and the backs of them are just plain cotton and getting a bit dirty. So, due to my obsession on my scraps at the moment, why not use them up and make a play mat?? So, that's just what I did. Keeping to the "make the most with what you've got" I used up stacks of my scraps for the top of my mat, but I did have to go to the fabric shop to get some wadding and some heavier backing for the mat cause it will be going on the grass and dirty floors etc... And here it is. A bit girly, but oh well.. I love it! I know what each individual little piece of material is from.. It's like my own story and history of sewing in this mat.





If you want to see my tutorial on how I did this, please please please let me know and leave me a comment on my blog!! I have just about finished the tutorial, but wanted to get your feedback if it is something that would help?? I hope some of you are interested cause I'm loving doing them....

We'll be spending the rest of the night out the backyard as we have Heaths family coming over for a BBQ. Beautiful night for it. The kids are already out the back. Lacie is practicing hula-hooping with two hula-hoops, Mitch is sitting playing on his "new" mat I just finished, and Bon is digging in the garden looking for worms. And I might just sit and watch them do it....

a first day to remember!

"Mummy, I can't sleep!" said a little voice this morning at 4.30am. So in she hopped for a cuddle on the morning of her first day of school. "Mummy, my tummy hurts!" "You'll be right Lace" I said. She tossed and turned and was just sooo nervous. Finally we got up and as requested, apple and carrot juice was to be made for breakfast. No tears and some excitement was in the air! All dressed, hair done and bag packed it was time for some traditional "first day of school" photos. We all walked Lace to school together and saw her classroom. Air conditioning thank god! A few tears by Lacie and we said good bye. I'll skip straight to when we picked her up.... and I'll summarise..

• She sat in her slushy (shaved ice drink) and had a nice BIG orange stain on her new school dress. She thought it was hilarious!!
• I snuck in some lollies for her as a surprise at lunch time but they melted and made all of her lunch sticky and "gross" she said. Oops sorry Lace.
• We got home and I noticed a TATTOO on her stomach!!! ??? No more getting your head flushed down the toilet, these days it's a rose tattoo stuck on your stomach by the girls in the year above! You know who you are! ha ha...
• And finally... tonsillitis! Doctor said no school tomorrow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Well, we will wait and see how she is in the morning.

Ahhhh, what a day for a 4 year old! Here are some pics from this morning.

my family x

last cuddles

I'm still working on my scrappy project. Thought I would have had it finished tonight, but we had such a big day and afternoon. I was able to whip up a anniversary card for Heath while Bon had some quiet time and Mitchie slept. It took all of about 20mins. I sewed the red felt heart straight on the cardboard and printed the words on calico feeding i straight through the printer. I cut it to A4 size and ironed it first. But it worked using just the calico. I also wrote some nice little somethings to my husband on the inside and sewed that in too. I would have liked the font to have been a little smaller and not in bold, but I just couldn't be bothered doing it all over again.

You don't even need a sewing machine to "sew" a card. Just a needle and thread and some imagination! Make and sew your next card and email me a photo of it and I will post it on my blog!! The next card I make, I think I will sew some actual colourful fabric on the front?? a button too??? a pocket even? Embroide something??? ahh the ideas are endless.... what is your idea.. and just do it! Then show me of course.

I can't think of a title?

I had to finish off our little present for Will this morning. He is 6. Along with the super easy library bag I made, I made this peek-a-boo toy sack. I found the tutorial here. I plan on making about 4 of these bags for Mitchies room and hang them on some little hooks. Fabric bought from Peg's Pieces.

Before the party Bonnie painted every ones nails. Heaths too! Hmmmmm, will he remember before going to work tomorrow??

This is Mitchie at the party today wearing his new t-shirt I made him. It was a scorcher of a day today, so lucky it was a pool party and the kids swam all afternoon. And for some strange reason I nearly fell asleep on the floor laying face down on their bean bag .... hmmmm, I wonder if that had anything to do with my recent late, very late nights?? The sewing machine might have the night off tonight. But I can't wait for tomorrow for Mitch to wear another t-shirt I have made.

my mitchie xx

And I just couldn't help myself in showing you the delicious dessert I made for our good friends last night. Hot Chocolate Baklava with Vanilla Cream.... recipe by George Calombaris in the FEB/MAR Issue of Donna Hay magazine.Totally scrummo!

To all the mums and dads that have their babies starting school tomorrow for the first time, big hugs and smooches to ya all!! Lace has her little meeting with her teacher tomorrow, so the uniform is hanging on the door, shoes are shinny... NOT, due to her wearing them everyday for the past 3 weeks, we have matching white socks which is very rare in our house, the giant school backpack is basically empty as only has her hat which I am sure she will wear as soon as she wakes, and her green monkey bar knickers are ready too.
I pictured having warm cuddles and telling Lacie stories of what she was like as a baby and how big she is now to be going to school, and how wonderful it will be to have her very own teacher etc etc.... Well that sure as hell didn't happen. She decided that she HAD to cut out a felt tie for herself and sew it on a dress up shirt right on bedtime! Clearly telling her "no I don't think so" didn't go down too well, so it was straight to bed with no story and no cuddles. I think I was more upset. But as cleaver as BOTH my angels are they came up with a plan between them both that they were too hot and needed a cool shower! So yes, we all hopped into the shower and another half and hour passed by... BED TIME PLEASE!!!!! Cheeky things.

Until the next time we meet x

the fringe is back!

Yep, that's right! After a year or so of growing the kidlets fringes out, I have decided I want them back. Of course after consultation with the monsters, I mean beautiful angels.. they agreed!
It was a little excursion that even the girls Mumma couldn't miss. As hairdresser Denise cut Lacie's brown locks, I swept them up and wrapped them to keep for ever & ever as my Pa did for me. Lacie's big brown eyes nearly popped out of her head when the big reveal happened. Then she put on a concert in the salon with her new look! I should have warned them.. So then, we had to wake Miss Bonnie Doon for her turn in the chair. It's always a little nerve racking disturbing The Doon (Bon) as you never know what to expect. In then end she was happy for her turn, even if she nearly fell asleep in the chair (sitting on my lap). Our little Mitchie-bite sat happy steeling and eating the girls sandwich and playing with his favourite toy snake. The photos below clearly show that sisters just have something soooo special that I will never know. They just couldn't believe how different each other looked.

And right this very second as I am blogging away, the kids have put the iPod on the dock and are pumping out Neil Diamond's, Crunchy Granola Suite! De, de, de, de, de, de, de, de, de, de, de, de, de, de, de...

Easy Gardening with the Kids

How many times have you thrown the roots of used shallots in the bin?

Well next time, save them for the kids to plant. They grow back again!

my saggy old shallots

look at those beautiful roots

chop chop

get an old pot and some soil
then hand it over to the kids

and who would have thought, the chickens love shallots too!

get the kids to poke a hole

then push shallot root first in the hole

keep poking

a bit of water

wash hands and job done!

something we prepared a little earlier :)

The kids will love watching them grow, cause they planted them! They might even be happy to cut some off when they grown and have some in their mashed potato too!! Well maybe...

Mountain Getaway

Even though I didn't personally make anything this weekend, I was totally consumed by creativity. The setting was perfect. My little family, my dad, his Louise and her gorgeous daughter. We stayed at a very secluded cottage in the Blue Mountains called Bunjaree Cottages. We were surrounded by silence. Haven't heard that for a while!



it even had it's own "kids cottage"

The first thing the girls did was run around the cottage and pick wild flowers. We found this beautiful cup that was perfect for a vase. Lacie was so beautiful and said that these flowers were for Mummy's Mumma. How can a child at 4 years old understand the meaning of longing for a memory. For me? My next question is how can a 4 year old then turn into a monster? The confusing love for a child is amazingly unconditional.



thanks lace x



With out fail, my eccentric daddy-o creates something that means something....?... to him. It is normally a game for me and Heath to have to try and figure out. The below picture of my adorable son Mitchie-bite is holding one of the presents that dad gave to Heath. He's dressed in a traditional Indian outfit from his Indian cousin. Too cute. Anyways, Hmmmmm?? what is it? Well, surprise surprise, Heathie babes (after thinking about it for a few hours, as that's always part of dads plan) came up with the right answer!! The present (below) was actually for Heath, so that was a major clue to start with... First of all Heath said it was a beer coaster. Yes. Shaped in a football. Yes. The carved out lines in the wood are the Aussie Rules Football goal posts. Yes. Ha ha... He got it! We all cheered. That was a first. He also had drawn some shoe laces on both sides of the goal posts for Lacie. He had to explain that one. He also had a woollen knitted tie made for Heath.

arms up Mitchie

 We ate and we drank. The kids also got into the swing of things. We went into Leura for a wonder and the girls wanted an ice-cream. Bon had to try Coconut just to be different. So that's what she got and she loved it. I'm so proud of my girls eating a range of different foods. Bon is our perfect example. With a ham sandwich, she requests picked onions and olives on the side etc...  

 

Instead of milkshakes in Blackheath the girls wanted
apple & carrot juice and tried Pop Pop's home made ginger beer



some yummo homemade pizza that bon helped roll

bird watching at the back door

 

a hammock at the back door

 

an aussie tradition of eating watermelon in the summer

All due to hanging out with some seriously creative people, one of them just happens to be my dad, I have loads on the brain so be on the look out for some new posts.