Hi!


thought I better dash in and pop something up for November!!


We had a fun day out two weekends ago with Play Centre on the Kawakawa steam train...it was great to have all the Play Centre gang bring their Dads and brothers and sisters along too.


This is the lovely Gabriel who is lovingly looked after by the volunteers at the railway....and just behind you can see the Kawakawa fish and chip shop....does the most beautiful fresh fish with a herbed batter.....just in case you are ever passing through...highly recommend you stop and try the fish and chups here!!!
Some of the big brothers and Sisters...

chuffing down the main street...the Hundertwasser dunnies to the left......Dad and Samuel enjoy the rural scenery and count pukeko's and cabbage tree's... The volunteers love to show off their pride and joy and Samuel soaked it all in...so many levers and dials and of course the fire



and Yay! now we don't have to listen to the kids asking to go on the train everytime we drive through Kawakawa any more lol!!

The warmer weather is upon us at last...Samuel has been enjoying a dip in his 'pool' most afternoons and the vege garden is putting on a spurt all of a sudden! We are expanding all the time and have nearly completed the whole circle of the parterre pattern at last...one more bed to dig!!

Dad and Joseph built a go-cart together for the trolley derby at Kea's but I'll have to pop those pics on later as they are on Jim's camera...apparently theirs wasn't the fastest but was the most controlled...which in my book is a very good thing...I was having the horrors thinking of him flying out of control down a tarmac road lol!! After my stern face and raised eyebrows over the fact that their was no brake...the inventors went back to work and devised a brake to appease the great Mum goddess....heh, heh!!!

I don't have many flower type plants in my garden these days but these pretty little love in the mists are very special as they are from seeds Mum gave me from the ones at the farm...they are planted next to the garage so just as I used to admire the farm ones which were always by the gate as you walked in from the car...I now admire these as we go to and from the car....oh and Mum and Dad...the orchids have just flowered with some lovely great stems....I keep meaning to find out how to look after them properly but they seem to have liked the complete lack of attention I have given them and just got on with things lol!! Sometimes I do remember to splash a bit of water their way...but other than that, thats it!! Keep em keen, treat em mean seems to work!

On the scrapping front, its hard to find a spare moment lately but I have been having a little play with digital scrapbooking which is a lot of fun..I'm learning new stuff all the time...I did this one for last Sunday's Bossy Scrapper at Scrapbook Studio (thanks Boss Jenny for the fun sketches you found for us to work off) and was very proud to work out how to cut my photo into a circle all by myself lol!!

If you are a digi or hybrid scrapper don't forget to check out Louise Williams new site http://www.eidou.com/ her team have some fun kits to get you creating.

Paper scrapping wise I joined in the Halloween ATC swap at Scrapbook Studio and created 8 of these...which once you are on a roll wasn't too bad at all...although I did stick to a fairly simple design...I think she's a sweetie little wannabe witch though lol...

There is one more ATC swap happening before Christmas so if you are keen come on over and sign up here...this months theme is FABRIC.

If you are looking for a great way to wrap up your scrapping for 2008 check out fellow DT member Sonya's highlights for 2008 challenge here and her layout for inspiration here upload it in the gallery by December 30th to be in to win some fabbo alcohol inks from Scrapbook Studio.

There is also sign ups for the December guest designer here just put your name down and you will be in the draw to receive a lovely goodie box of scrap supplies to design with.

You have until 30th November to complete Liannes Sketch challenge and Lisa's monthly competition

and if that isn't enough to keep you going its my turn to post up the new NZdare on Friday...heh, heh...this one will get you thinking! and oh my goodness its almost time for a new Kiwi Jack too!!

Phewf...well that makes me tired just thinking about it so I'm off to check on my smallest one who has a tummy bug...he was horrified when I said this to him earlier because before he gets in his paddling pool Mum has to scoop out a large variety of unfortunate Northland bugs which have come to a watery end...'Muuummmmm buuuggs'! lol! So poor kid now thinks he has some creepy crawlies from the pool lurking around in his tummy!!

Oh and one last thing if you havn't seen it already....Jim and I highly recommend the BBC tv series 'Life on Mars' we just finished watching the series on DVD and were hooked!!

Playing catch up here...

Some pics of last weekend...

Homemade Halloween fun...

Got the boys busy creating their own monster masks....

"Slime and Blood" drinks went down well after all that monster tag in the long grass...

I made up Trick or Treat bags which contained these hard case teeth...very funny....

Followed by ghost stories before bed...the kids had a whale of a time...who needs to go walking the streets knocking on strange doors aye!!

The following day was Patricks birthday party day....a friend over for lunch, spider man cupcakes, treasure hunt and then into town to see Wall-E at the movies....love living in small towns....we were the only ones there for the 1pm session lol!! Had the whole place to ourselves...didn't have to listen to other people rustling their sweet packets, the kids could talk and laugh loudly, Samuel systematically went round and put every single seat down and tried sitting in the front row, the back row and every row in between heh, heh....a very happy six year old...had a lovely day and then on Tuesday his actual birthday got a few more pressies too....thanks to all the far-now who sent something...he loved everything!!

Fast forward through a week of Samuel going down with a cough and cold, having a pet lamb to stay while its owners were out of town, an uneventful guy fawkes, and ususal weekly stuff to today...

It was the BOI A and P/food festival show at Waimate North (2 mins up the road) today. And we actually entered some stuff for a laugh. Seeing as we have been into making our own bread lately we decided to make some for the baking section, I made the traditional white loaf and Jim made his fancy beer pull apart loaf with poppy seeds on the top...Joseph made chocolate truffles...I made a jar of lemon honey and we picked 3 of the best Avocado's off the tree to put in the garden produce section....

Look what we came home with!!!!

A first for my bread, highly commended for Jim's, highly commended for Joseph's truffles, 2nd for the Avo's....and sadly nowhere for the lemon honey...lol...but it has since been spread liberally over thick pieces of bread and is nearly gone...so it really was rather good despite its lack of award!! Very chuffed we all are with our last minute efforts....

...and we also won the DOC raffle for 4 native trees...so it was a bit of a lucky day for us!

Had a fun few hours at the show, Joseph and Patrick tried the rock climbing wall, Joseph had a good go at it and got about 3/4 way up several times...Patrick got a quarter of the way, looked down and bottled it lol! Thought he was very brave to try though...he said he would give it another go next year when he was bigger...good on ya P!

They all scored toys in the treasure dig, Jim brought the most expensive sausage in bread ever from the food festival tents lol...well they were choice organic sausages with saurkraut in french bread...so I let him off....luckily the kids were starving so after eyeing the saurkraut suspiciously for a couple of seconds (in which I was thinking oh my god Jim why on earth did you buy fancy sausages with strange vegetables on the top!!!)I was amazed and happy to be proven wrong and watched them wolf the lot!! Apart from Samuel who was far too busy jumping on and off pieces of farm machinary to bother about eating!!

Came home to spend the rest of the afternoon vege patch gardening... and dreaming and scheming of what we could grow and enter in next years show lol!!

And then the sun came out....

(look Celia and Mafoo the apple tree you gave us is blossoming!...don't ask about the pear tree..its umm sort of recovering after being munched badly by the goats...but it should come right eventually!)

Hope the sun is shining on you too, where ever you may be!!

Last night was our 17th Bossy Scrapper round at Scrapbook Studio, we have a fun night chatting and scrapping so do pop in and join in every Sunday 8pm in the chat room...feeling super clean and keen at my newly tidied desk lol...I dusted off this pic of me and my cousins...love the summery barefeet in dresses and the classic pic on the steps of our old house....

...man... thats 30 years ago lol!!

Boo.

Hope everyone is enjoying the long weekend...weathers a bit chilly for my liking but hey it could be worse....could be out camping in a tent like some crazy people seem to have an urge to do on Labour weekend....rather them than me!! Tents = hot summery weather, people!! not weird four seasons in one day Spring weather!

Well we are on the runaway train towards Christmas....wooowhoooo...all aboarrrdddd!! The school have hosted 6 other local schools for the annual Cross Country event...it was a good day, perfect weather and the both boys gave it their best...

Patrick spurred on by the smell of the sausage sizzle and the prospect of a sausage sarnie coming in 4th in the 5 year olds...

and Joseph kept it steady all the way coming in 11th in the 7 year olds...

...as you can tell it is obviously uncool to smile and look happy as Mum takes your picture in front of your mates...heh, heh, heh!!

Have been busy with Play Centre stuff too...got the Dads working hard out knocking up a raised vege patch for the kids last weekend...Its a small space but should be enough to have some fun growing a variety of veges...a teacher at the school passed on an idea for a very cool project to try and allow us more room to grow things...she suggested we try the upside down bucket idea for growing tomatos...check it out here The vege patch has been constructed in the old sandpit which is under a clear covered verandah so it already has strong beams for us to hang the buckets from in place and will stop those little fingers picking the tomatos before they are ready too!! Will share some pics when we are under way!

The boys are going great guns at their keyboard lessons and the teacher is having to give them extra songs to keep them from getting too far ahead in their songbooks from the others in the class!

Hmmmm I bet you can guess what Joseph was about to do at the end there!! Boys and their obsession with showing their butts huh!! Not suprising really if you know their Uncles lol!!! Just hope he dosn't end his performance the same way at the upcoming Christmas recital!!

The Scrapbook Studio DT have their October inspiration up

Awww....still can't believe it was 10 years ago now!! Love how the Prima Paintables turn out, you really can't go wrong with those and the new Tinkering Ink papers are alot of fun! We had been talking on the forum about using up our older film photos so for my layouts I chose pics from my pre digi camera '90's...its fun to scrap some older memories and good to liven up those old pics!

Thought this was fun check out this awesome wallpaper...you could scrapbook straight onto the wall lol!!

Anyway thats us for another stretch...Patricks birthday next weekend....time to stock up on party poppers and balloons again! He has ordered a Spider man cake...fun times in the kitchen ahead...Jiiimmmmm help....

AT LAST!!

Something momentuous to blog about heh, heh!!

Joseph has lost his first baby tooth...he's only been waiting all year for a tooth to get wiggly and fall out like everybody else in his class. It started feeling a bit loose last week and he's been working it hard out backwards and forwards (eewwww!) until last night after tea it finally gave up the fight! tiny little thing that it is! I came into the bathroom afterwards to find him grinning into the mirror at the gap in his teeth muttering 'At last, at last...!'

The tooth fairy did her duty last night...she was a rich one!! Two dollars!! (dang it was all I had in my wallet!!) You always get heaps for the first tooth and not so much for the following ones I've told him...in case next time all I've got is 20c!

In other news...of which there is none really! we are all fine, the animals are fine, the weather has been fine!! which has been fantastic for the holidays...first bit of rain today though....
The avocado tree is dripping with avo's again this year...spot who was sent up to get the ones at the top....
Everyone wave to the crazy guy in the tree....

Dad and the boys had fun making a teepee out of the plentiful bamboo we have around the place...Might have to try growing runner beans up some this year...the seeds we planted a while back are all sprouting away...they'll be ready for transplanting into the garden soon...we have had to fence off the vege patch properly from the goats...Lulu the wiley one soon figured she could smash down the temporary fencing we had around it...but it looks good now Jim has taken down some of the fencing between it and the house so it has become part of the garden as a whole rather than being just stuck out in the paddock.

The weather has even been nice enough for a spot of this on occasion...lol had to crop this pic to spare you the full frontal heh, heh!!

This poor old paddling pool finally gave in to a zillion little holes and we've since invested in a new one for the summer.

Scrapping wise there is a new Kiwi Jack up for the month so head on over for some home grown inspiration

and why not have a go at this one at Scrapbook Studio 1+1+1 challenge deadline is Friday night..

And Lisa has the new theme up for the ATC dares blog 1950's retro!! very cool...can't wait to have a play with this one....

If you are going to SENZ have a fun time and try not to spend all your $$ on the first day lol!! If like me you are staying home :-( then come and check out the forum at Scrapbook Studio
where we'll have some fun things going on for those who can't wangle it to Welly for the weekend!!).

Now lookee here Rae!! what is the meaning of this tagging me lol!! I've always managed to avoid this before or more acurately ignore this before heh, heh...sorry if you were one of the ones who have tagged me and I ignored it....but for the lovely Rae I will give a go...but later...will have to think up some suitably random answers first!

Meekxx

Revisiting an old layout...because Patrick has passed another of lifes wee milestones today...he can now ride his bike without training wheels....A real triumph because it wasn't an easy one for him....

He loved the little bike in this layout but soon outgrew it and progressed onto the bigger bike he has now, he just never seemed comfortable on this one though..being bigger and heavier I think the training wheels didn't give him as much stability and he became very cautious and much less keen on biking, especially when we moved here and there is only a metal driveway to bike on, which makes the going that much harder with training wheels...all the fun had gone out of it for him.

Every now and then we would suggest he try with out the training wheels and he tried a couple of times and it would usually end in tantrums and tears...fear is a yukky feeling...

Dad had done a wonderful job teaching Joseph but Patrick just wasn't having any of it so it seemed I needed to give it a whirl...which I had been hoping I wouldn't have to as I was just as afraid of letting him fall as he was of falling!!Suck it up girl!! So armed with the promise of being able to choose a new bell when he succeeded and a trip to the warehouse to buy a special diary and some dinosaur stickers to record his daily bike lesson progress we were all set to practice a little bit every day. Patrick suprised me by reminding me all this week after school...Mum...its time for my bike lesson....

Here are his diary entries...

Sunday 7th Sept...today I learnt to put my foot down (which we found is an easier way to stop instead of careering wildly into the fence!)

Monday 8th Sept...Remember to sit straight and steer (rocking the handlebars from side to side as you pedal in a panic does not help you to go in a straight line!)

Tuesday 9th Sept...I am strong! (Mum's little mantra to help convince him that he can hold the bike up and control the wild beast!)

Wednesday 10th Sept...no lesson.

Thursday 11th Sept...I am a Champion!!! (You sure are matey!!)

Yep 3 lessons and today Superman was flying once again!! I couldn't believe it as I was flapping along beside him in my gummies, holding the seat...all of a sudden I just felt him take over and balance the bike and he was away! I knew it would just click eventually, but was expecting it to take a little longer....Warning!!You may want to turn the sound down or better still... off!!...I have a bad case of loudmotheritis!

Joseph was great, cheering him on all the way...and proudly said 'Hey P! you'll be able to come to the bike ramp with me and Dad now!'....seeing a little wave of terror creep back over Patrick's face I was quick to add...yep but I think we need to practice a bit more first lol! One step at a time hey kiddo! So proud of you for conquering your fear and look forward to you being happy and laughing on your bike like you used to be!

Here are a few more pics from the weekend...

A little fathers day help for Dad...

Sowing seeds for the vege patch...

The current crop, can't get fresher than this!...Jamie Oliver's leek and chickpea soup here we come....

Speaking of 'Fresh' thats the photography word prompt #5 at Scrapbook Studio...go here to add your 'Fresh' pics and if you scrap them as well you will be in the draw for a fun Spring RAK from me!

Oh and just look at these babies fresh out of the oven yesterday!! A small blonde person, whom I shan't name, kept sneaking them and we were finding half eaten ones all over the house! They are caramel apple cupcakes by the way...a good way to use up those slightly bruised apples that bounce their way to school and then bounce their way home again in the kids lunch boxes lol!

Jim and I have also been baking our own bread this week...for no particular reason except its a nice thing to do and its yummier than bought! The kids are a bit suspicious of the yeasty flavour but are slowly coming to the party, eating it toasted or slathered in choc spread or both lol!

oh and look...sadly no we havn't got chickens...yet...maybe this summer....but we have been busy sharing the many Avacado's on our tree and were lucky enough to recieve these farm fresh eggs in exchange yesterday and today our neighbour also returned the love and gave us a lamb roast!...shhh don't tell Rosie and Poppy...

So feeling rather like the 'Good Life' couple at the moment!

...although it does have its ups and downs...planted 12 lovely strawberry plants yesterday only to have the goats get into the vege patch and scoff the lot this afternoon lol! lucky for them I was on to much of a high from Patricks cycling success to be too upset....otherwise goat ragout may have been on the menu for tonight!!

The Bossy Scrapper is still going strong on Sunday nights at 8pm in the chat room...so if you would like to liven up your evening with some chatting and scrapping...do come and join us! This was my layout for last weeks Bossy Scrapper #10...

Have a good weekend everybody,

Ka kite!

Ok move over rally cars, its time to get the scrapping show on board again! ...by the way Jim it has been noted that you are a paparazzi extraordinaire and that dude! the date stamp on your camera is whack!! lol.


Ahhhhhh...there we go, a nice layout.... that feels much better heh, heh! If you want to see what else I and the rest of the Scrapbook Studio DT have been up to recently check out our Design Team Blog for lots of fun projects, muses, ideas and layouts and updates on the forum happenings...


..... ooh even better a nice pic of the kidlet reading his birthday books from the Bulls Toomey's...thanks gang! My favourite is the tree one...but without a doubt the kids favourite is the goldfish one...because it says Poo. Several times. Even funnier when its a Goldfish saying 'Poo to you' to a funny little dog. Mum rather likes it too...alot...especially when it produces great guffaws and belly laughs from the boys.

In fact the small boys in our house say the word Poo alot at the moment for some reason...it is deftly swapped for any word at random during any conversation and the person who says it then doubles over in convulsive laughter...and the giggles being highly contagious as we all know usually rapidly infects any small person standing in the vicinity...which tends to leave the grown up standing there in bewilderment until said grown up wanders off to see if they can find another grown up for some saner company or maybe even to talk to the dog or goats. Dogs and goats cannot say 'poo' you see so you are quite safe from 'poo' conversations in the company of dogs and goats. only goldfish can. apparently. and kids.

Oh and by the way no Samuel is not reading heh, heh...just pointing! But he has connected to the fact that the black squiggles are letters which make words and when Mum says the words of the story she is looking at the black squiggles and so he likes to point at them in case I lose my place.

Our Samuel is really into all manner of games at the moment...except he has his own set of rules for each game.

Beetle...flick the spinner but if you don't land on something you need..just stick something on anyway..the object is to build the beetle as fast as you can so you can play pretend games with the beetles afterwards...with Mum....




Connect Four....put the counters in as fast as you can...the first one to use up all their counters is the winner....when you win...you punch the air with both fists at the same time and say 'yay I win'!

Buckeroo...first insist on playing this wretched game..... watch Mum mutter under her breath cause the silly donkey will only stay down if you hold your tongue right and have pressed it down a jillion times until you are about to give up and have to tell your expectant 3 year old that it won't work...then by some miracle it sticks and the game is on...pile things on quickly, but stop midway to pretend to play the little guitar...laugh and run away when the obstinate beast now refuses to Buck despite having everything piled on his back!!! aggghhhh!! Funnily enough Mum is not laughing but muttering under her breath again!

Now you might remember Joseph was trying out for parts in a cultural performance the school is attending...they are going to be performing the Maori legend 'Rata and the Totara Tree'...happily Joseph was given the part of one of the creatures that helps resurrect the Totara...they were allowed to choose what sort of creature they wanted to be and they have to sort their own costumes...Joseph is deciding between either a grasshopper or a weta...Mum is deciding whether to panic now or wait til closer to the time....rofl!!

Now if you are up for Scrapping type challenges this September be sure to check out the new

Kiwi Jack

The Nz dare...to scrap a weird photo...

The Scrapbook Studio September Sketch...I played around with the elements on Scrapblog to create this months sketch....if you want to give this one a go have some fun with it..you can interpret the elements in your own way and feel free to add in more photos if you wish!

have a good one all...might even blog again this weekend if we do something worth taking pictures of lol!

Meek

This blog is interrupted for Jim to show off his pics from the weekend at the WRC...the normal program will resume shortly....

Friday morning


Getting ready to leave to start on friday morning



Start of SS5


SS9 Mystery Creek Saturday Hirvonen
Hirvonen in Service before SS10 Te Akau South

Sordo on SS3 Pirongia West

Wilson on SS3 Pirongia West

Solberg waiting to leave Mystery Creek on day one. Heading for SS1 Pirongia West.

Loeb at Mystery Creek Super Stage SS5 on Friday after finishing Waitomo SS4

Wilson on SS11 Te Akau North on Saturday afternoon

Loeb leaving SS4 Waitomo 2 Friday afternoon

Loeb and latvala following back SH3 from Otorohanga

Latvala overtaking on SH3 heading north on Friday afternoon

Hirvonen Waiting at Mystery Creek to start rally

Loeb going through Otorohanga

Snapped in Mystery Saturday afternoon