Tomorrow Joseph will turn six...somebody pinch me...I can remember bringing my little baby home and laying him ever so gently in his cot fast asleep, a tiny dot wrapped up in his blankie, walking out the door and saying those exact same words...somebody pinch me, we have a gorgeous baby boy in the house...although these days I definately know he is there lol! he thumps around the house with those growing, getting ganglier by the day, legs and feet, talks ten to the dozen, and sometimes I could swear his ears are drawn on...as he just dosn't seem to tune into my constant squawking about doing teeth, bringing wet swimming gear home from school, homework, remembering to put your undies on (yes its true he seems to have a penchant for going commando under his school shorts and conveniently forgets this small item of clothing which drives me insane!)

What can I say though...I love him to bits! I love sneaking up quietly at school and waiting until he spots me so I catch a glimpse of the face that lights up when he sees me before it is quickly replaced by the whoops hang on I'm at school cool face...the oh hey Mum, its you face rofl!

I love the determination he puts into things that are important to him... like riding his bike and conquering the big ramps at the skate park with his Dad...biking is his thing and he is a constant blur on our street!

...I love the way he will complete a project from start to finish...like in the weekend he found my stash of plastic and cans ready for the recycling pick up and decided he was going to make something with it all....so drew a design on paper first then enlisted his Dad for drilling help and put together what we call his 'water feature'...thought it was so cool he had a vision and actually brought it to life....

Anyway we are all geared up for his big surprise tomorrow...while he is at school we are making over the baby room to become his very own room and Samuel will move on to his big boy bed in with Patrick....Patrick is keen to be the boss too so a good move for everybody I think! Can't wait to see his face when he finds it!!

The NZ dare this week is a goody but a toughy...street art! This is what I came up with, the grungy stencil look lent itself well to a masculine type layout..

And a bit of a heads up...tune in and check out the NZdare site this Friday evening...there is an extra special something.....oh somebody stop me....suprise.....mustn't let......the cat out of.....the baaaagggggg........

Saturday morning we went to the local Farmers market and picked up a bunch of gorgeous sunflowers...i'm not a huge fan of cut flowers but these really made me feel happy as I looked at them during breakfast this morning....the sunlight streaming through the white blind behind them made a great neutral backdrop...although I quite like this one too lol....looks like Patrick is about to break into a wee operatic number!

Nice to take pictures of still subjects for a change!!

I'm sitting here absolutely stunned that it is Friday again!! flip that went fast! and yes Nana brought cream donuts for lunch today too YUM lol!! Afterwards we went to the park, Patrick took his bike and Samuel took his ride on fire engine...one of those ones that you can stow stuff under the seat...at one point it tipped over and out fell the dough part of Samuels donut....with all the cream expertly licked off of course...funny!


Heres what I did with one of last weeks photos for my NZ dare layout


The dare is this round is to use a 70's album for inspiration...you can see the one I used on the No.8 wired NZdare site and while you are there check out the cool new banner Lianne has put up...yes mum and dad those are your cows lol! and no those cows do not represent the dare girls Jo! rofl!!


Anyway this dare was fun, fun, fun!! and I do hope you give it a go...just reading a few comments on blogs lately I get the feeling some people are shy about entering their layouts for the NZDares...for whatever reason DON'T BE SHY!! we love seeing each individual interpretation of the dares and we want to see you do things you otherwise might not do for your every day scrapping...have some fun, be inspired by the dare girls,have a go...and the bonus side to the creating and sharing and having fun is you might just score the prize draw as well so what are you waiting for??


(You know I think I could get a job selling vacuum cleaners or something with a spiel like that rofl!..)


I must sit down and write a list of things I will need for my day Freestyling in Auckland next month because what with the UK whanau arriving in a couple of weeks and a weeks R&R with them up in Tutukaka its all going to sneak up very quickly....I am so looking forward to this day...just me and lots of other scrappers doing our thing....bring.it.on!! Hoping to put a few names to faces too! Tia Bennett has posted a wee sneak peak of the creating goodies that will be used for her classes...


Ta da! and once my list is done I can clip it onto my little todo list fridge magnet...now, now don't laugh...Tia did say it was crafting month so I started fiddling round for the heck of it lol! really I am pysching myself up for the following...trying to get myself into an altered project frame of mind!!




So who is having a go at the DT call for SBO...love the whole survivor style idea...should be great fun even if I just end up voting! Have had a light bulb moment for my altered item so hope I can translate the idea from my head to the real thing...but I can't wait to get stuck into it this weekend...

Every Friday Mum comes for lunch and brings bakery goodies....I caught Bert up on a chair eyeing up the left overs and thought it would make a cute shot...wasn't til later that I noticed the other two there also hee hee...funny!

So its March already...Josephs birthday in 3 weeks..his first 'proper' party with school friends to be invited...its only ever been family affairs before now....but luckily ...for me he only wants to invite 4 kids WAHOOOO!! I had visions of trying to entertain multitudes of 6 year olds and failing miserably...but this I can handle! .. not nervous at all....heh heh..*gulp*

off to surf for kids party ideas now...

How exciting was the cyber crop at SBO the other night!! Only Elsie Flannigan was the mystery guest...although I think most of us had guessed!! Her 1st challenge was a 30 minute layout with doodling on a layout....eeek!!! I've never done a layout in 30 minutes in my life...and still havn't rofl!! This took me 45 minutes by the time the paint had dried...it usually takes me that long to choose my colour cardstock...hmm looking at it the next morning i could sort of tell it was a rush job, especially the title that looks like the kids did but it was fun and I like it... Thanks Andrea and Elsie for giving us kiwi scrappers a wee thrill on a Friday night!

I was so excited also to be asked to be the guest designer for the March kit at SBO too!! I think everyones a little worried for me cause there appears to be quite a bit of pink in the kit and wondering how I'm going to use it seeing as most of my photo subjects are of the male variety...hee, hee all the more fun it should be then!!



This reminds me...being surrounded by males, small, large... and small and hairy...well, farts are often a great source of hilarity in this household and today there I was looking through the MM idol entries and saw one I really liked and googled the artists name to see some more of her cool work and found this was her original entry but she decided not to enter it in the end...how flippin hilarious...a fart layout!!made my day that did...oh well dosn't take much sometimes does it lol!


It was hot enough to even get me in the pool at mum and dads today along with Patrick, the one discovering that hanging your tongue out like a dog really does help you cool off



I also caught Nana and Mr Bum Bum discussing the benefits of putting suncream on your cheeks!

Well I got off my chuff last night and actually did what I said I was going to do... a layout for the Scrapjack challenge....I just switched off and did it without trying to think of a hundred different other ways I 'could' be doing it and it came together in a jiff! A miracle for me!

This is what I have been pottering along with since doing Trinas online class at SBO...it was supposed to be for Valentines (rofl! cause I'm horribly slow at altering stuff) so it is now for our wedding anniversary in April. Just got a few more pages to do with pics of me in! By the way it is a Maya Rd "Love" chipboard book with some loverly urbanlily papers and an assortment of other bits and bobs!

I've had a big wadge of felt in different colours in my drawer for ages and yay! I finally used some on my layout for Dare #16

Had me going for a bit this dare as I had nothing much black and white in the paper stash until I hit on the idea of using a comic strip...Calvin and Hobbes are so cute and clever! Turns out the hardest part was trying to get a decent pic of it to show the cool font, which I didn't really succeed in doing as its a bit small but if you would like to download if for free...go here

Talking of free...not often you get an online class for free but at Poppy ink you can! You don't need the kit, do what I do when I'm cooking....just wing it with whatever is in your cupboard lol! The next class is by the fabulous Amber Skolnick...go here for details. Amber has also been Scrapjacked this week, she has such a fun style I think I might just have to give it a go and play too this round!!

Joseph and Patrick watched Sharkboy and Larvagirl on DVD this afo in 3D...I thought it was a great movie for their age group...full of action and a moral behind the story....they loved it.

An impromptu picnic tea at the park tonight, enjoying the summer evening, supported our local eateries and got pizza to go from the old courthouse cafe in Huntly, if you are ever passing by down SH1 and are feeling peckish give maccas a miss and head here instead...the pizzas are fresh and delicious!


The boys got out their bikes and Jim showed off a few tricks....


Dat!....is Samuels favourite word at the moment, which (of course!) means... whats that? The 'dat in this case was ducks...funny how little kids just love ducks!

and here he is having a little quiet moment with his digger when he got home.

Yes I will be posting the NZdares result for Dare #15 tomorrow after our wee hiccup lol...so stay tuned if you entered a layout as there will be a draw for the prize pack from SE (thanks Meg!)

and Jo has posted up Dare #16...its a goodie!

Have you checked out Scrapjacked...lots of fun there...

So what have I been scrapping this week...well I took Trinas 'all about love' class over at SBO
earlier in the week...gorgeous kit, great instructions, a fun nights chat and scrapping...and yes I am still working on my project which was supposed to be for Jim for valentines heh,heh but I had high ambitions there so wedding anniversary in April me thinks...I'm halfway so will post some peeks soon!

Should have been working on it tonight but Jims dad (Hi Pop!) tapes and sends over the most recent series of Top Gear from the UK so have been watching that instead...it was a very funny episode and I couldn't tear myself away....for the shame choosing a car programme over scrapbooking whatever next lol!

Hooray for jelly snakes!!

Patrick has been given a little incentive of his favourite sweet Allens naturals jelly snakes everytime he has dry pull ups in the morning....and it worked a 'treat' lol! he has had 3 dry nights in a row! Go P!

This was my scrapping effort this weekend



my take on a chicken pox layout....for the fortnightly challenge over at SE...use whitecardstock as a background...still on an orange and blue burst!

Also completed my layout for the next dare at NZDares....but that ones a secret for now hee hee...

Speaking of which...Meg at SE is sponsoring a fabulous prize for Dare 15...so rattle ya dags and ya scrapping supplies and create something for the hot/cold theme....dare ends this Wednesday 6pm...

I found the photo I was looking for....the one photo I would choose to take to the desert island with me...and while I was looking I found this one too....



I love them both....do you think the customs man on the desert island would know if I smuggled two in ha ha!!

Joseph had a happy first day back at school...reportedly his teacher is 'much more fun than last years and makes work seem like play'!!! Go her!! She had their names set up on the desks along with a welcome letter at each place and his seat is next to three of his friends so all is good and they went swimming so a great start to the year!

I've become a big sook lately....I discovered this the other day when I started choking up while watching Poohs Heffalump movie with the boys....this followed having a good sniffle with Joseph while watching Spirit previously and bawling my eyes out during the mini series last week called "The incredible journey of Mary Bryant"....I never used to need tissues when I watched movies....is this what happens when you hit mid-thirties rofl!!

New Autumn Leaves blog up following the launch of their new book called the Look Book, which is aimed at helping you to develop your own scrapping style....they are posting weekly challenges like they did with the Freestyle blog...check it out it looks like fun.

Their first challenge is 'to use the things that you love' on a page...so I've started by making a list of things I love to use or do at the moment...

Chipboard letters or handcut letters
my black zig pen to doodle or highlight
water colour paints
light and bright colour
journal boxes
polka dots
multiple photos
cutting the pattern out of pattern paper
I love pics with movement or a sense of humour
experimenting
stars

The Effer dares also have an interesting challenge this week....if you were stranded on a desert island but were able to choose one photo to have with you, which would it be and why? I've been searching my pics for one I know I have but can't find it!! will post it if I come across it....says something about my photo organization dosn't it lol!

Hope everyone has a peaceful Waitangi day tomorrow....

This is my layout for Dare #15 ...a sizzling summery theme this time and lots of good ones coming up too....if you havn't already come on over and join in!!

Do you do Valentines at your place...we don't...although I did make Jim a card last year...hurrumph, sometimes the girly within just cannot be kept down hee hee....but anyway if you do Valentines check out the cute little cookie idea at kiddley (scroll down to Thursday).

Heres the monkey I've been knitting for the last few weeks...all finished except I'm going to knit him a wee scarf for the winter! He's lovely, by no means perfect, one legs slightly longer than the other, his head is a bit wonky rofl but thats what makes him extra loveable I think and the boys seem to really like him and have been carting him about all day....knitting him up was fun, it was the stitching him together which took ages but I'm the same with layouts... sticking everything down at the end is my least favourite bit!

Ok, so Queen and Co you need to do something about your packaging....now I'm not talking about the gimmicky but sort of cute makeup bottles used to hold your delightful beads and brads etc.....I'm talking stuff that matters here like child proof caps!

This is why...see left.... concentrating very...very hard(I know this due to the degree of bottom lip stickyoutness) on picking up each individual tiny beadiful bead that he shook out of the bottle after expertly whipping the lid off before I could dive across the room in slow motion and putting it back in the said gimmicky, cutesy bottle....along with a ton of carpet fluff and dog hairs....my cutesy little bottle full of sparkly beads now looks a little like the old bottle of lip gloss thats been lurking in the bottom of your handbag for 2 years.

Yes my helper was 'helping' me tidy my scrapping mess today....because the big boys are staying at Nana and Grandads for a few nights I thought it would be very cruisy just him and I....but guess what? He's got no-one to play with now silly and has to play with me mwah ha ha!!

Ah well I would never use all those beads in a billion years anyway and the carpet looks very pretty when the light catches them!

Feathers wouldn't melt in my mouth.....its ok Bert we forgive you!

After taking Berts mugshot I couldn't resist a few pics of the garden.....

The lupins look so pretty in the morning sunlight, love different textures between plant and rock, pink flavour from the Japanese garden, cornflowers busting out in the wildflower patch...and my poor tomato plants which are kind enough to have huge tomatos on them despite the lack of care I give them!!

Man, blogger isn't playing today and I can't seem to move my pics around into the right order...will fix it all up later...

Oh yeah don't forget to check out the first Dare for the year over at the NZ Dares blog tomorrow!

blog ya later

...A poo of a day today....turns out our lovely Bert (Jack Russell who we rescued from the pound at the end of last year) is a chicken killer and killed 6 of Dads lovely chooks when we visited them today... the kids went over to collect feathers and he had gone with them, so they saw it (double poo!) and came running back for help....he's currently in the dog house outside for the night until I feel up to making peace with him tomorrow....destined to be a town dog for the rest of his life...no more visits to the farm for him of course!

Don't even feel like knitting...thats how bad I feel!

heres to a better day tomorrow...

It would seem I have been bitten.....by the knitting bug! After ending my post last time with....'so does anyone knit?'....I came across about a kajillion knitting blogs, then I sussed out the knitting section at the library and brought home a cool book called 'Stitch n Bitch, the knitters handbook...the essential guide for chicks with sticks' and with subtitles like 'it takes balls to knit....and skeins and hanks' I knew knitting had moved on from the Granny pasttime or halfdone, holey, out of shape scarves lurking in my childhood memories!

Had a bit of a practice session with a past expert knitter...aka Mum to get me over the casting on hurdle and I was away....

Anyway here is my first knitting creation....the pattern called it a 'techno-cozy'...it can fit a mobile phone or an ipod (pity I don't have one lol!) but I think its cute just as a little belt bag to pop a bit of money or whatever in...just realised....my sony cybershot fits....now thats handy!!

Oh well I think its cool and love the look of the chunky knit and bright colours....now where was that hottie cover pattern.....

Well Summer called on us today! Hoo...blimmin....ray!! After the four seasons in one day weather we've been having lately I did a little happy dance inside to see that beautiful clear blue sky!!

So happy in fact I relented on my little stance against paddling pools and fired one into the trolley at the supermarket this morning...best $20 bucks I've spent in ages....kept the boys in continual hurtling action...all at the tops of their voices for the best part of the afternoon lol...yes I pity our neighbours...but hey I got to sit in the sun on the grass, keeping my eye on them and the other on my book...oh yes it was good and nothing like fresh air, sunshine and water to get kids tumbling into bed that evening!


Is it a whale...is it a turtle.....noooooo its a paddling pool!


Always time for a spot of mowing too!

Speaking of books....my backorder of Elsie Flannigan's 52 challenges arrived today...yay! had totally forgotten about it so it was happy dance time again for me this morning...two in one day! ....still wallowing in it...the book that is, not the happy dancing...its good.

Ok now I know its Summer but I was searching for a gift for a relative in the midst of winter in the UK and came across these....what scrapper wouldn't like one of these to snuggle up to while scrapping on a chilly winters day....did you check out the cozy toes too...cute! Anybody knit?

Hope everyone had a good Christmas and survived the frustration of all those darned twisted wire bits that hold toys captive in their boxes!! at the risk of sounding ancient...they didn't need all that in my day!!! lol!

Had a fun xmas day at our place hanging out with my Mum and Dad and enjoying a relaxing walk round the lake after lunch...

Looking forward to the New Year now...have our bottle of champagne fraise ( had to try it of course!!) chilling ready to share with my partner in crime on our back deck under the stars...

have flashed up the blog a wee bit with the new settings on blogger, looks better....even had fun playing with a new pic of me...not that you can see all the fancy bits cause its so blinkin small rofl!! here it is ...




If you have littlies to entertain over the holidays check out this cool kids activity site for fun things to do...I've got my eye on making one of those sock monkey's....for no reason whatsoever except its CUTE and I want one and maybe even get the boys making themselves one too!

Have a good NY's and stay safe!