Living my dream

Newish LO's

A while back Donna and I went down to Hamilton to scrap with our friend Vicky. It was a lovely Saturday of relaxed scrapping. I finished one LO and when I got home just needed to do some journaling for the other. Well, its taken me all this time to sort out the journaling, LOL. But its finally done.

I was also sent a link to a cool youtube video clip yesterday which got me making some christmas stars in some new Heidi Grace Xmas paper.

All you need is 6x2" squares of paper and you're away. I only used single sided paper, but if you use double sided paper it looks even better.

 

It took me approx 10 minutes to make this little beauty and that includes finding and choosing the paper.

Such a cheap and quick way to make something really cute for your Xmas tree. Would be especially fun with your kids.

Got heaps more to share, but might do that later.

Have a great Tues.

T

Saturday Sketch Day

Hi. Welcome back to my Saturday sketches. Sorry I missed last weeks. Life just caught up with me.

But here are the two I've designed for Fiskars and SBO this week......

Fiskars:

Nice and simple. Giving you enough time to do a quick LO, then get out and enjoy that summer sun!

SBO:

Again, relatively simple, but with lots of options for multiple photos/pp/journaling. Different sized photos, well anything you want really.

Have a great Saturday!

T

SCKC Camps (Southern Cross Kids Camps)

Do you guys remember last year when we did a drive for the SCKC camps to create pages for mini scrapbooks for underpriviledged children who attended the camps? Yep? Cool.

Well its that time of year again. We are doing another drive for this coming years camps (2009). We have one camp here in NZ, plus 8 in Australia. We need something like 6300 pages to fill the books needed. Sounds like a huge ask doesn't it?! Wow! But I know how kind and generous you all are and what we all achieved last year.

The good news is that we already have enough to fill one camps books. The next problem is we need more pages ASAP to get ready for the camps happening in Jan 2009.

So who's willing to help out again?

All you need to do is make 1 or more 6x6 pages with a space for a small photo (I think 5x3)and send them to me or Nic (if you're in NZ) or Julie (if you're in Australia). If you'd like to see Jules post about it, click here.

If you've got any questions, please email me at the link above. I'll help out with any questions.

If you would like to get your local crop or shop involved, again, just let them see this and Jule's blog, or email me for more details.

I know we can do this!

Hey, the other day we were talking about swan plants and whether they are dangerous. Well Mandy sent me a cool link showing me all about it. Thought you might like to see too. click here if you do.

Ok, must go. Dinner of steak and roast potatoes coming up.

Later.

Finally

Finally I finished my Dare LO. The dare ended last night, but hey, better late than never right?

The lovely Jo Kneller hosted this dare and challenged us to use birds on our LO's. It was sponsored by Tarisota with not one but two amazing kits to give away so I sure hope you had a chance to enter?

I know its too late, but go check out the prizes here. They are so pretty, I wish I could enter!

Finally it felt like summer here. We had Sarah's friend Sam over after daycare yesterday and we hung out in the garden. Picking strawberries for afternoon tea, feeding the chickens and ducks/ducklings. It was great. Then when Sam's Mum came with her sister to pick her up we got out the sprinkler and let them run around under that for a good 20 mins. It was so warm and lovely. I loved hearing the laughter of 5 kids running around our garden.

It meant I didn't get to go do the food shopping. We let our supplies run down before we went to China, then when we got back, we didn't really have time, so we've been popping in and out of the supermarket for this and that since. So when I missed another chance, I realised it still had to be done so took off to the shops once the kids were in bed. Thank goodness for 24 hour shopping!

Unfortunately our bank balance didn't thank me. I just about fell over with how much it cost, but considering we haven't been food shopping in over 6 weeks, it was actually really cheap. LOL!

So finally we have food in the house. LOL.

And finally another part of my travel goal has been realised. I read somewhere about a family who has a wall chart of the world in their house. And on it are lots of pins showing where they've been. I've been thinking about it for ages and realised I really wanted to do something similar.

So in the weekend Andy brought home a map, I brought a corkboard a few days ago and once all the invites were done and dusted I sat down and started putting it together.

It still isn't quite finished. And its not on the wall yet, but wow, its been eyeopening.

I thought I'd been to quite a few parts of the world (and I have). But yesterday seeing my pink pins dotted around, I realised just how little I've really seen. And that is scary for someone like me with a travel bug. LOL!

I'm not sure if you can see the pins? The black ones are where we have travelled as a family. The yellow ones are places that either a) Andy and I have travelled together or b) We've both been to. The green ones are places Andy has travelled. The pink ones are places I've travelled.

I ran out of pink pins, so still need to fill in a few gaps in Europe and Africa. But it really reiterated to me just how big and amazing this world of ours is. I can't wait to see more of it.

Ok, speaking of this world. I'd better get back to the real world. Have a great day.

T

The last few days

The last few days have been full on.

Friends over, doctors visits, making invitations. It never stops. And its only going to get worse....did you know its only 42 days til Xmas? Oh my goodness. I can feel the panic starting to happen as I talk to other Mums and friends. Oh what fun! LOL! I sooooo love this time of year.

We've been very excited by other 'nature news' from the McClune household. Finally last week a mother duck emerged from her nest with 8 little ducklings. Then this week, another one was added. 9 ducklings. How cool is that?! They are so darn cute. And she is a very good Mummy. Constantly on the lookout for what might be around. So we've been spending quite a bit of time down the bottom of the section feeding them bread and corn (chicken food is great!) and just hanging out with them......

See Mummy duck head up, alert looking out for Toast (our cat). Good Mummy.

Here we are feeding them.

Tides out, so not looking particularly attractive. But hey.

And the kids turn 5 at the end of the month. Wow, like another friend of mine, I'm in the throes of talking to the school, organising school visits, thinking about uniforms, etc etc etc. Its a really exciting time, but I feel the nerves too. I wonder how the kids feel? Due to timing, they will be starting next year. Along with 5 other children who are holding off until the new year. Nice!

But of course we are having a party. Gosh I love kids parties (but thats a whole other story!), and we have arranged for Old McDonalds Farm to come. We figured with our 'lifestyle' it would be a good fit. LOL.

I've been busy arranging invitations. It took me far too long as I couldn't work out what would be quick and easy to make. Cutting out animals seemed way too hard (with 40 odd invites I needed something QUICK!). I finally settled on a barn as the cover of the invitation, then inside is like a book with two pages. One for a transparent picture of the kids, and one for the party details. I got the barn image off the internet. From the Ben and Jerry's website. Its soooooo cool. Check it out here. Now Ben and Jerry's are another addiction for me. Not available here, but if you ever go to the States, you MUST try their chocolate chip cookie dough ice-cream. OMG! To die for.

Anyway, here are some pics of the invites....

I've gotta say I'm really stoked with the way they turned out.

Ok, better go. I've got to finish my dare for No 8 Wired! Cor, its taken me forever to do this one. LOL. If you haven't done it this fortnight. Check it out. Tarisota are putting up two prizes and well, we all know how amazing their kits are, so give it a go. You never know!

T

The good life.....

After my post the other day about the caterpillars thought I'd give a wee update.

We had friends over on Friday afternoon. They are twins, also called Matthew and Sarah. Its a fun time when we all get together!

My Matt was very proud to show his friends all the caterpillars we have and the chrysalis too. They then came and showed us their finds.

We had a really busy weekend. Some of it in the garden. We did a heap of tidying up, mowing lawns and clearing and planting in our vege garden.

Along the way we found heaps and heaps of chrysalis all over the garden and in weird and wonderful places. I thought it might make a fun scrapbook page one day so took heaps of photos. I might have to retake some though, a few are a bit blurry. So check out the funny places our caterpillars chose to make their chrysalis...

The fence post:

The pot:

The garden wall:

The hose:

The onions:

The chair:

The swan plant (not so funny, but just allllll over!)

And I loved this....the passionfruit plant...

I loved this last photo cause there were actually 5 chrysalis in frame when I took it (I think one may be hidden behind a leaf now), plus a caterpillar too. See if you can find 5 chrysalis!

We are also on the hunt for a new nest that our chooks may be using. We haven't had a bantam egg since I found their other nest, but there are none there either. So either they're not laying, or they've got a new nest. And if thats the case, it must be really good cause we've looked and looked and looked, but can't find it. Here's hoping we find it soon or the eggs will go off!

We're also eating heaps and heaps of strawberries. They are soooooo good. In fact we can't eat them quick enough. They rippen so quickly right now.

Plus our first raspberry from the plants we planted maybe 3 months ago? have started to ripen. I can't wait to taste them!

We also have some blueberries on the blueberry plants we planted and some boysonberries on those plants. I can see summer being very berry! Yay!

Saturday night we had my sister and her children over for fireworks. Gosh I love fireworks (must show some pics from the Disneyland extravaganza!). Bit of a long story with the fireworks we had. We were going to use them last year. I can't remember what stopped us? Maybe the kids were too young? Maybe it rained? Can't remember. But we didn't. Then we thought we might use them at New Years, then we thought we might use them if we had a party for Andy, then, then, then it was Guy Fawkes again. So we used them.

We were a little worried they might be a bit dodgy after a year of sitting around. But they were great. Well most of them were. There were a couple that decided to take off in funny directions and had Andy running for cover! The kids thought it was a great joke. Luckily for them, they were inside behind the safety of a big glass window! LOL. But in reality it was a wonderful evening, especially so by sharing with their cousins.

It was also nice to watch the election results unfold. I don't think I've ever been quite so 'into' elections in a long time (if ever) and was kinda nice to have the American ones, then ours to keep me interested.

Scrapping news:

Sketches. I just ran out of time this week for my sketches I'm afraid. I'm going to try and get some done tonight and will put them up if I do. Unfortunately sometimes life just gets in the way of scrapbooking. How dare it. LOL.

Prima: Did you see they are having a DT (design team) call? Uh huh! Internationals can enter. If you love Prima, go check it out here.

Okay dokay, must go and dig a hole for the rat the cat caught last night. Thankfully he didn't bring it inside and this time I don't have to worry about, well, you know!

Later.

That photo

I got Andy to help me with the scanner. And it worked. So here's the LO with the photo on it which I've been procrastinating about all week.

Here's the journaling....

As Sarah raced off to the toilet for the 4^th time in 2 hours I had a whinge to Vonny and Mum about how often she needs to ‘go’ and more importantly how it seems to be directly related to how many new and different toilets are around.

That for whatever reason she seems to LOVE using new toilets.

A few minutes later I caught Mum looking at me funny. She then told me that I had been exactly the same. That her and Dad knew every toilet between Auckland and Hamilton as I ‘had’ to stop at each one.

I was gobsmacked. Andy and I have often grinned at the similarities in Sarah’s and my personalities, but I didn’t even know this about myself. And here it is biting me on the bum (so to speak) as another genetic inheritance in my daughter.

It just goes to show its all in the genes.

Hey Penny, do you believe me now? hehehe.

Now I just have to make a gazillion party invites for Matt and Sarah's birthday party at the end of the month. They really need to be sent out! Eeeeeeek. LOL.

Later.

PS: Forgot to mention that the photo was taken by Fiona Pierson at the kids daycare.

Who needs wisdom teeth anyway?

So I went to the dentist today. Came out minus a tooth.

How'd that happen? LOL.

Seems I have no other holes or fillings or anything. Yippee! Must be just about the first time ever? But the piece of tooth that fell off last week was from my top wisdom tooth. So the dentist suggested it come out.

I asked all about it. How much it would cost, would it take long, when could they do it, would they hold me hand? LOL.

What stopped me short was when she said, oh it'll only take a few minutes, I can do it now.

ARGH!

I hate going back for these types of things. They dwell in my mind, become worse than they should be. So I said yes. Eeeeeek.

20 mins later I was walking out minus a tooth (and thankfully not too much of a dent in the wallet!).

Luckily Linn was able to come back this afternoon to look after the kids and I slept for a couple of hours. The only thing I'm missing is a cup of tea. I love my cups of tea. LOL. And heat apparently makes the gums bleed. So I have to wait until tomorrow.

So thats me. No more procrastinating. LOL. In fact I even got that photo I was talking about scrapped too. Finished it off last night. Bummer is that I can't work out how to plug the scanner back in, so I can't scan it. So will have to wait until another day to show it.

Ok, back to sitting on my butt on the couch.

Later.

Chicken news

Poor chooks have been neglected on my blog cause there has been so much other stuff going on, but thought it was time to let you know about their adventures. And boy, have they been having adventures.

While the human side of the family was off to a different country to find out about other cultures so were our chooks. They decided that since we were away they would have a couple of small holidays care of a couple of holes in the fence (they dug under!).

I got talking to our neighbours and it seems our chooks didn't like their little home, but wanted a luxery holiday at the neighbours with a pool and everything!

Seems that they had got out a couple of times and gone to visit, but the most funny was one Sunday morning at 6.30am when the neighbours heard the dog yelping frantically at something. A really funny noise coming from the backyard and their cat going bananas at the window. Yep, our chooks were there and freaking everyone out!

And it turns out our house sitter was a little bit nervous about picking the chooks up. So that made life interesting for her. But she did a great job and chooks were returned to their home.

Luckily those neighbours are very cool and they just had a jolly good laugh about it.

So going back in time, when we got home we immediately went down to see them and all bar one came up to us from outside their area. We had to laugh. We set to fixing the 3 holes we found and they seemed to be fine.

Funnily enough while doing the lawns we moved the kayak and found an egg under it, so obviously they've been laying outside their house.

Then yesterday I found some of the bantams outside again. They seem to come and go as they please now. Flying over the fence. I think its time to clip their wings, or maybe just let them be. They always seem to come home at night time?

Then the other day I noticed we had less eggs. There were only two from the big hens, and only one from the bantams. I thought we just had a bad day. But then the last couple of days there have still only been two from the biggies, and none from the bantams.

I didn't really think about it too much, until today when I was tidying the backyard. I was clearing the path down to the water and mowing the lawns down that way. Right by the bottom the grass was up to my knees! Oh dear! So I thought I'd get a head start before the weekend. Plus its great exercise, right?!

I headed down the back again and noticed two of the bantams were missing. I found Pinochio and put her back. She was around the back. Where Andy had found her a couple of times. Right there by the huge pohutakawa tree.

I went behind it to carry on tidying and noticed a hole in its roots. It kinda looked like a little cave and I thought to myself, that would be such a great place for a chicken to make her nest.

I was kinda joking to myself, but it all started to click into place and I thought I'll just have a quick look around here and see if they've made themselves a new little nest.

Well would you believe they did and I found it!

Looks pretty innocuous right? Like nothing is there. But right behind those leaves is a lovely little nest filled with eggs.

They've obviously been laying there for a few days. There were 11 in total. Wow. So we are now going to be examining two nests to find our eggs. Talk about free range. LOL!

The kids loved it. We all got to carry two or more eggs back to the kitchen and that was just heaven for them. We then tested them to make sure they were still ok (drop them into a glass of water. If they float they're off. If not, they're fine), and then I went for a wander around the neighbourhood giving away eggs. LOL! Felt great.

So our chooks have certainly been up to alot of fun. And thus us too.

Later.

Tagged

Ok Heidi I see your tag. LOL! I think I may have done one like this a while back, but hey, I'm procrastinating again so why not?!

The tag is to give 7 random facts about yourself. That might be hard....I'm not that interesting. LOL. But here goes...

1. I've recently turned 39 and was in China. That means I've had 6 birthdays in countries other than NZ. 4 in China. 1 in Africa. 1 in England.

2. I have a terrible memory. So if I forget your name, its not personal. Just a lack of being able to retrieve that information. Sigh.

3. I have a funny habbit of coming home and saying to Andy lets do 'x' and bang its done. He now gets worried when I start talking about something new in case its the next thing on my long and varied list.

4. I would love to go and work in Africa to help develop a school / something. Its been a dream for many years. One day I will.

5. We recently completed step one of a new 'family tradition' - taking our children on 'adventure' holidays to places that are a little unusual to take children. This has been a dream of mine for many years. I dream of showing them different ways of life so their eyes are opened to the many varied cultures and ways of living in our big wide world.

6.  I love Xmas. I always have. I always will. I love the crowded shops. The stress of getting 'just the right present'. I love the songs piped through malls, and on my car radio. I love the spirit of joy. But more importantly I love the original reason behind Xmas and what that means for me.

7. I think I'm addicted to sugar. Enough said.

Ok, that's it. I'm not going to tag anyone, but if you feel inclined, consider yourself tagged. Have a great day.