Lazy days

It's been a quiet Easter (did my gazillion blog posts give me away?). Poor Rob hurt his back moving stuff in the garage on Wednesday so our plans changed. That's ok, I've spent the last few days scrapping, running, walking and entertaining Angus - Zoe has deserted us for a week of camping with friends - and Angus is taking full advantage of his only child status.

Perhaps the most action has been the latest escape of the naughtiest dog in the world. Angus opened the front door just a little too wide for a moment too long and Sparky saw the space and went for it. Ollie, Angus' friend, who was on the outside of the door took off in hot pursuit - barely keeping pace even on his scooter. Angus was left trailing behind, trying to put his shoes on as he ran. Sparky headed straight for the ponds and the ducks scattered.  Amid much shouting (and a bit of cursing) the boys chased him from the main pond to the small pond and tackled him in the mud - all three reappeared plastered in black stinky mud and identical silly grins. How that dog survives is beyond me.

Once the drama was over and Collingwood had won their ANZAC Day game I got down to some scrappy business. This one is for KIU - 1 piece of kraft, 2 pics smaller than 6x4, 3 different alphas, 4pps and 5 embellies.

And these are a couple of just because LOs :) I think my new paper love might just be the MME Stella range, shame the photo doesn't do justice to the rich colours and the weighty texture of these pps.

 

This one is using the wp little monsters kit - how cool is that fimo monster, handmade by Krissy?!

Today I escaped for a morning out with Janina. A pedicure and coffee - so very civilised! Then this afternoon Angus felt the need to hit the shops armed with his Birthday money and vouchers. I have to give credit where credit is due - that boy knows how to shop - it was exhausting but oh so entertaining. He came home with a jumper, two nerf guns, a Bear Grylls book,  a kicking tee and a lighter but not empty wallet. I fear that wallet means I will be spending some more time at the shops all too soon...

Thanks for stopping by you know I love it ;)

Update overload

Just when you thought it was safe to come back to my blog I posted for a fourth time in one day - crazy stuff! But please stay awhile, this is a scrappy post, no more pics of the family, I promise :)

So, this is what I've been up to. A Simon Says challenge from Kate the Great. Angus and his friend Bill striking a pose at their Yr 6 Farewell.

This one is is for the theme challenge at Challenge Heaven - a candid pic and twine. My kids were so excited when their school book packs arrived, they examined each and every item, but then who doesn't love a parcel and stationary items??

This one is my take on the sketch challenge at Once Upon A...Sketch. You had to journal about why the pics were important. Mine feature my scrappy buddy Janina and me.  I wanted to record how important her friendship is to me without being overly sentimental or soppy because she always makes me laugh :)

Thanks for stopping by I hope you're having a fabulous Easter break.

Birthdays and Parties Part 3

And now it's time for the final chapter. Angus didn't really have one special day - he had a week of celebrations - the Festival of Angus. He finally wound up the celebrations the day after his Birthday after a trip to the movies with his buddy to see Diary of Wimpy Kid 2. 

His big day started with the traditional present opening.

A hug from his big sister:

and trying on his new gear:

Before heading out for a haircut (yes he requested it) and brunch at his favourite cafe. Then it was home again for lunch with Granma and his buddy who came to stay the night to prolong the celebrations :)
This is a child who knows how to celebrate! But wait there's more...

Turning 13 is a big deal especially when you have mean parents who made you wait until you were legally allowed to have a facebook account, even when all your friends were fudging their ages to get on. Happy fb buddy!

And so my child of the light is growing up. He and I like to take long walks and discuss the state of the world. We pump each other for information - he confirms his knowledge of politics, drugs and sex (and sometimes rock and roll) and I check what he and his friends are up to (no sex or drugs but lots of music, emerging political views and even more sport). He reminds me that now is an exciting time to be alive and I love him for it. On our walk the day after his Birthday he confessed that facebook is pretty boring - less than 24 hours after accessing the holy grail! His honesty is another reason I love him :)

Birthdays and Parties Part 2

Rob is not a party animal. So, when the big four oh rolled around having a party was not on the agenda. But that doesn't mean his day wasn't special or that we didn't celebrate - oh no!!
Something else you may not know about Rob is that he is a Star Wars geek - an original fan dating back to a galaxy far, far away :) And what do all Star Wars fans need on their big day? Why, an R2D2 cake of course!

 

 He loved it!

And here he is modelling his presents - that thing on his head is a mini camera for cycling (what does he look like?! lol)

 And here is one of all of us celebrating the poor old man's big day ;)

  Happy Birthday Rob - you rock our world!

Birthdays and Parties Part 1

April is a busy month with both Rob and Angus celebrating their Birthdays. But this April was even bigger because Rob greeted 40 and Angus turned 13 - wow!

So we started the celebrations with Angus' party at the skate park - a week early because his Birthday fell smack bang in the middle of the holidays and Easter. So, the weather was freezing, the wind blew a gale but the nine boys and one girl didn't let it phase them. Got to admit it's one of the easiest parties we've ever done - two and a half hours of skate boarding, scootering and biking, interspersed with pizza and cake eating, a few tears and lots of grazes and dripping blood... all superficial of course!!

Angus got a new skateboard, a banana board to be exact - fully sick! Rob thought he'd look good on it too!

 It was a hopeless task trying to get a good group shot but they all sang Happy Birthday - even if it was too windy to light the candles. We even tried a group huddle to block out the wind but it was no good.

Angus declared the party a success and so it was :)

The time has come!

Right then, I have so many updates that there is no way I can fit them into one post and besides who'd be silly enough to read it? So, where shall I start? Hmm, how about a scrapping share and then I can move on to Birthdays and 12 hours of photos and then maybe some more scrapping shares - you with me so far?

Here is my take on the final wp sketch of the month. It was a double but I shrank it to a single. I used some really ancient basic grey as the base, felt good to get even one geriatric out of the stash :)

 

And this is another LO I forgot to share. It's using an older wp kit - yep more stash! These photos came home from camp so I got Zoe to journal about them - abseiling and rock climbing - my girl's heart's desire.

OK, that's it for now. But before I go I want to say thank you for all your lovely comments of late and an even bigger thank you to my new followers - you girls rock :)

And also a big shout out to Sue Plumb! Sue switched me onto Handmade By Suzanne - a fabulous shop, full of fabulous goodies! Sue is constantly creating truly awesome LOs using supplies from Suzanne and one day all my mouth watering and drooling got too much and I had to have a little shop! But then HBS had a fb and badge competition (you can see it over there on the right) and I was lucky enough to win a voucher - woo hoo going to take myself shopping today - thanks Suzanne and thanks Sue :)

Catch you all later - hope the bunny hops by your place!

Winner chicken dinner

How exciting - I was checking out some bloggy updates and discovered that I'd won the spot prize on Kerry's blog during the Pretty Paper Petals blog hop - neato! It was my first ever blog hop :)

Now I'm waiting and desperately hoping that the flowers I ordered during the hop will arrive tomorrow so I can take part in the sketch challenge. Fingers crossed...

Meanwhile these are what I've been up to.  First we have this week's wp sketch:

And this my effort for the blind scrap Hannah ran over at wp:

 

Those paint splatters caused me no end of grief. My paint was too thick and trying to get it to fly off the paintbrush in an artistic way was no mean feat and then the blobs were so thick an industrial blow torch wouldn't have dried them in time for me to complete the LO. So, remembering a technique often and ably demonstrated by Jasmine,  I grabbed a straw and blew through it. I huffed and I puffed and almost turned myself inside out but finally those paint blobs oozed themselves flat! Got so say I'm pretty happy with the result, now that I've recovered from almost blacking out lol.

Thanks for stopping by :)

Some more retreat LOs

As I was popping some LOs into albums I remembered that I had a few left to share but, fear not, I won't overload you with them all at once :)

My children are very good at humouring me when it comes to taking photos. I think they enjoy the attention! Anyway, posing for these photos on the first day of school was their idea. Check out that height difference!

And this one makes me smile :)

And now for my take on the wp sketch #2. The photos are of the kids exploring the boulders that once formed the base for the satellite dish and telescope at the Honeysuckle Tracking Station. The landscape is raw, ancient and awe-inspiring - to the kids it was as familiar as being on the moon.

Wow! That's three LOs without glimmermist...my next post is bound to very misty lol.

 Thanks for stopping by :)

April Already?

Like so many scrappers I love the anticipation that comes with the start of each month! What I don't like is the realisation at the end of the month that I've completed so few of the tantalising challenges on offer... So, on Friday I began the month as I want to continue it, scrapping!  I completed the Challenge Heaven number challenge - three photos, three colours, three alphas and a paper clip. My paper clip is a duck-shaped one from Typo.

And this LO is based on the first wp sketch of the month.

Thanks for stopping by and a really big thank you for taking time to leave a comment - I really appreciate it and love reading them :)