Living my dream

I'm just so darn excited....

Today the kids and I went for a little road trip. We went to a place just outside of Te Puke. We picked up our last 3 chickens. And they are sooooo darn cute its not funny. We now have some lovely little pekin bantams. We have a black one, a white one and a grey one (and they are still to be named). They even have fluffy little feet. So so cute. When we got home we put them straight into the chicken house and they made themselves at home quite quickly. Then at 'bed time' we went to round up the others and they weren't so sure. Poor ole Dora's a little nervous. But after a few minutes I went back to check on them all and Bob had cuddled up to our wee grey one in one of the nesting boxes. Dora was on the roosting perch (at the other end) from our white and black ones and Chickenee was in the other nesting box. Happy families.

Must try and take some pics.

Speaking of happy families the kids were so good in the car today. There were a couple of sleep times, a couple of winges (right at the end) and mostly fun times. We would try and spot animals along the way and whenever we saw one would make the sound it makes. And even young Dan could join in with that one!

We played eye spy with my little eye, something that is 'blue', or 'green' or whatever colour it was made of. Easier for little kids who can't spell.

We found an old tape of nursery rhymes that we hadn't listened to in a while and sang through the entire tape. Sigh. But boy my kids can sing! Love listening to them.

The only bummer was when at 4.50pm coming along the motorway, Sarah decided she needed to go to the loo. Hmmmm, like I was keen to get off the motorway at that time of night?! I asked her if she could hold on? And she did. But as soon as we got off at our offramp, I stopped the car and she went by the side of the road. Clever girl!

Matt had a hard lesson to learn once we got home. I needed to get into the shed to get some chicken food out, and he had been playing with the keys in the morning. I had asked him to put them back, but didn't check he had. And they weren't there. So I told him he couldn't watch tv until he found them. Well, huge meltdown ensued as you can imagine, but I stuck by my decision. They have to learn there are consequences to things. Anyway, after he realised I wasn't giving in, he suddenly 'remembered' where he'd put the keys and sure enough there they were. I was sooooo proud of him. I gave him the biggest hug, a high five and told him I was proud of him. You see this is the kid that even if something is right on the floor in front of him, he can't find it. So there is more to this story than what I've briefly mentioned here. And I'm really really proud that he worked through his tantrum and found the keys. WTG Matt.

Hope your Monday was good too.

T

cherryArte

I love the new cherryArte product range. It is just sooooo scrumptious. Here's one reason I love it......

I actually created this LO for the latest dare at NZ Dares, but as it fitted into my cherryArte DT work, you can also see it at SBO.

Now if you're into digital, you'll LOVE our prize this week. Its from Digital Scrapbook Place, and if you haven't quite ventured into digi yet, this might be a GREAT opportunity.

Back to cherryArte.....I just adore how the ranges of papers give such different looks to a LO. The one above is the classic black/white and red, but there are other colour ways which are totally different. Bright pinks/greens/yellows/oranges all sorts of beautiful beautiful colours. And then there's the boy ranges. Sigh. Divine. Go check them out at SBO when you get a chance.

On the homefront, this weekend was another of work, work, work. But we've finally gotten rid of the pile of scoria at the driveway (thats 4.5m of scoria we've moved in 3 weeks!!!!). And the best part, its pretty much finished. Just a few 'tidy up' type jobs and we're all done. It looks fantastic too.

Kids stuff. I realised yesterday that I haven't had many 'cute stories' to tell lately. And I think its cause they're going through changes. Dan is doing the whole clingy thing which is totally unlike him. But I think he's getting his molars, and he's just grumpy. I guess its just one of those things you go through.

Matt and Sarah have grown up almost overnight. They are incredible little people, but as kids grow so do their worlds and Matt is now all about "power", shooting, jail and things like that. I know that's just what little boys do, but its one of those things that makes me a little sad. Ya know?

Sarah has discovered sulking. She's normally a very good girl, but when she sets her mind to something hmmmmm, lets say it becomes interesting. A little like, dare I say it, her Mum, I think?! LOL! Poor kid!

Alrighty, I must make a move. We've got a big day ahead of us which hopefully will involve picking up our last chooks. Yay.

Have a good one.

Saturday Sketch Day

And I've got two sketches for you to enjoy today.

The first one is featured as this weeks sketch at SBO.....

And the second is my sketch for Fiskars.

Hey, speaking of Fiskars. If you'd like to be a guest blogger on the Fiskars ANZ blog, then go check out this post..... Fiskars have a new monthly feature and we'd like to show YOUR work on site. Its pretty simple and fun, so go check it out. You may just be one of the first.

Couple of other bits and bobs.....Daniel is now starting to jump. Yep. He's got it down pat on the tramp, and is now trying to on the ground without help from springs. LOL! He can't do it all the time, but he does get both feet off the ground occassionally. Really cute to see him trying to bounce around the room! LOL!

Sarah has now decided its NOT good to eat Chickenee, Bob or Dora. So I'm not sure how that's going to translate to 'other' chicken meat. Eeeeek, what have we started?

Have a great Sat.

Meet Dora....

Yep, we got our third brown shaver hen today. So stoked. We were meant to get her initially with Bob and Chickenee, and even had her name picked out, so naming her this time was easy. She is really lovely. Fits in well with the other two (which I've heard can sometimes not go so well), and is quite a different brown colour so easy to distinguish. Whew. Thats her in the middle! So now we just need her and Chickenee to start laying and we'll be away. Bob seems to be doing really well. She's laying every day or sometimes every second day. Today we got it just after she'd laid it so it was still really warm. Wow. So cool.

We are just waiting on finding out how to get some Bantams from Tauranga to here then we'll have all 6 and our flock will be finished. Might call for a wee road trip early next week.

Alrighty, SCKC gifts. Did you think we'd forgotten about this? Nooooooo!!!! Just working it out between Nic and myself. We swapped over names and how many entries each person had, then did a draw. There were just under 150 entries (some people several times), and here are the winners and their gifts:

Margo from Manawatu – Fiskars squeeze punch

Kate A – SBO pack

Andrea Senn – Paper Pesto kit

Rachel Tucker – Stampin' Up! pack

Congratulations ladies. I know you're gonna enjoy these awesome products!

And thanks once again from all of us to all of you. An outstanding effort in creating all those gorgeous pages!

Ok, must go do some scrapping. Haven't all week and need to. LOL.

Later.

Day to day stuff

Ahhhhhh, the burst of easter is over, and its back to normal. Whatever that is. LOL!

Couple of things I wanted to let you know about.

Nic Howard has taken the plunge and moved blogs. Her new link is in my sidebar, but click here for easy reference. Remember to change the link in your sidebar if you've already got her old one posted.

Fiskars: The Easter weekend was a huge hit. For anyone who stopped by and took part, thanks for making it so much fun! And due to some of that fun, we're going to be implementing a regular monthly feature. Still fine tuning some of the details, so can't tell you just yet, but stay tuned to find out how you can be involved....

Chooks: Chickenee seems to be fine. Shes not hiding like she did the other day and is just doing normal chicken stuff. LOL. So I'm hoping that it was like Christi said and maybe she'll start to lay soon.

We've also ordered 3 bantams and hope to get them soon! I'm also looking at getting one more brown shaver to top off the 6 we're allowed. Can't wait!

My body: is absolutely aching! LOL. We've been doing some serious gardening around the place and my poor ole body is really starting to feel it. Yesterday was the first day in 6 that I didn't do anything and I'm so sore! LOL. Must remember its better to just keep going. LOL!

Daycare: We had one of the teachers and 5 kids around to see the chooks yesterday afternoon. It was fantastic. The twins were just so darn excited about showing off their chooks. We also finally cut our watermelon off its vine and had that along with some peaches from the tree for afternoon tea. Then we collected Bob's egg and went and fed the ducks. It felt like we had a mini farm here or something. Was so much fun.

SCKC: For those who have created pages for this, THANK YOU. We received enough pages to fulfil both Illawara camps, and the Melbourne camp, plus more. We are now stockpiling the pages for the remaining Australian and NZ camps. If you would like to keep making them, please do! We can certainly use them. Over the next few months we'll let you know if we're going to do another drive for another camp. If you'd like to contribute then please do! One of the camps is running right now so we're waiting to hear back from Jules how it all went, and will share asap.

Thanks to Penny, and Roo for the ones they sent me which I received yesterday. Guys, stunning!

Versacolor Pinecone ink: Thanks so much to Raewyn for sending me an inkpad!!! So cool. Now I don't have to worry about running out! LOL!

And a big hi to Debbie B (scrappygirl) who I met yesterday for coffee at the coolest little cafe in Ponsonby....called 'A spoonful of sugar'. Its well worth a visit if you live in Auckland. Its been designed especially with Mums and kids in mind. It has a wonderful kids menu, buggy parking, kids forks/spoons/knives and cups, and a playroom for the kids with qualified Nannys and a tv to watch whats going on in there while you sip your coffee in peace. Or the kids could just hand around with you (like Dan did) without any concerns about them worrying other patrons as they all have kids too!

They even do a special dinner on Sunday nights so parents can take their kids out to a kid friendly restaurant. I think we're gonna have to try that!

It was really lovely to meet David IRL and of course catch up with Debbie. What a lovely way to spend the morning.

Oh and harking back to Easter just for a second, I had to write about this in case I forgot ..... our find of the weekend, was the quite large, bright shiny pink piece of easter egg wrapper found in Daniels poop! Mmmmm, we knew he liked to eat anything, but that's getting a bit silly. LOL!

Ok, really must go do some work. Have a great day!

Carrying on the Easter theme

Yep, our Easter just seemed to go on and on and on. How lucky were we?

The kids were spoilt rotten by their grandparents. First by Granny and Grandad who came over to see the new chooks and left the kids with wonderful eggs and memories of learning to do their first dot to dot. How cool is that?! Andy and I talked after about how Granny had taught him to do dot to dot and now our children too. Love that kind of familial lineage (cor have I spelt those right?!). Granny and Grandad loved our chooks. I think nearly as much as us. And yesterday Andy took two of our latest eggs to Grandad. He LOVES fresh eggs. So as soon as we get our other hens (yep 3 bantams on order! And another brown shaver in the pipeline) I think it'll be a regular stop to see Granny and Grandad to give them eggs.

Next day my Mum came over. She had a wonderful idea to create easter hats for the kids to wear to our egg whacking party. They had such a ball making these. I even got brave and got out some of my old scrapping stock which I know I won't use and handed it over for their "Make you up box". They loved the little smiley faces, and I loved seeing their smiley faces as they created with their Nanny.

Unfortunately, they didn't wear the hats at egg whacking, but they did take them. Go figure?

Their Poppa made a flying visit dropped off some yummy easter eggs and hot cross buns. Lovely.

So you can see they were spoilt rotten. They only yesterday finished off their eggs (and that was with me taking and hiding quite a few, but don't tell them that ok?!).

Anyway, thought I'd show you a few pics from our egg whacking party (cor I'm still getting used to that name. It used to be called egg rolling! LOL).

Eggs ready to be painted

The kids painting eggs. Anyone able to help me get rid of the sunspot right in the middle there? I've got no idea where to start?

Our first casualty was had by...yep, you guessed it Dan. LOL.

But he totally got into the spirit of things and 'got it' straight away. Here is one of the eggs that Andy is helping him paint.

Here is one of the finished trays. We actually had three all up!

Getting ready for the first race

The first race is on!

Egg throwing. You should see the next couple of photos! LOL.

The start of the chopstick race.

And thats about it.

You can see that a heap of fun was had by all!

Ok, back to normal blogging shortly. Later.

More about Easter

Easter started for the kids at their daycare party on Thurs. You saw the pikelets last week. Well, they had a ball. I cancelled something else I had on to go and was glad. It was so worth it, and their last one at daycare. Scary!

Here's a couple of my fav shots.

Sarah and her 'usual' camera pose now. She has realised how important pics are to her Mum and therefore how much currency they are worth to her. LOL!

Matt at the party in a lovely pink tutu. The teachers thought this was just the bees knees. They had lots of girls in tutus, then Matt, the only boy. He does love a pretty pink dress! LOL.

Fiskars news

I managed to pop into the demo down at Spotlight in Wairau park to meet Danice Hamilton who is one of our Auckland demonstrators. She is lovely and had everything there to show people. Tarita who runs the craft department at this store had done a fantastic job, giving lots of room to several demonstrators and even having balloon arches for them to sit under. Fantastic to see a store really getting behind a demo like this! Thanks Tarita.

Here's some pics....

LOVE that balloon arch!

Over at the Fiskars blog you may have noticed we've had a heap going on this Easter weekend! Its been one huge weekend with lots and lots of fun, games and inspiration. I hope you managed to see, but if not, go take a look now. Well worth it!

As part of the weekend we had a sketch a day. Here are the ones I haven't shown here yet.

On Sunday we showed the tag sketch and asked the ANZ ambassadors to scraplift it. They did an amazing job. Here is the sketch and my version.

And here is the sketch from yesterday....

Raewyn has already done a LO based on this sketch which you can see on the Fiskars blog or her own. Awesome stuff Raewyn. You know how much I love it!

Alrighty, must dash. More later.

So much to catch up on

  ...that I'm gonna do several posts over the course of today.

Where to start? Mmmm, how about our chooks. Bob seems to be in a great pattern now. We're getting an egg a day. How cool is that?! The only weird thing is that she seems to be laying in the afternoon which is a little different to most chooks, but hey, we can handle that!

Chickenee seems to be going through a rough patch. Yesterday she was very quiet, stuck to herself, hiding behind a bush all day. Then this morning I noticed what I think is blood in her poop. I'm assuming this isn't a good thing? But will do some investigating and see if theres anything we can do. I really hope we don't have to broach chicken heaven with the kids quite yet.

Talking of kids we discovered something cool in the weekend. I was given some chocolate letter moulds by my SIL a couple of Xmas's ago. Well recently we've started to use them as ice trays. Now when the kids are after a really cold drink on these hot days, we grab the letters out of the freezer and put them in their drinks. The kids LOVE them and squabble a bit over who is getting which one, but mostly its ok. And I figure a cool learning tool too.

Alrighty, photos of the day courtesy of Vicky Gibson. I had the pleasure of having Vicky and Donna pop by for lunch yesterday (so lucky! Thanks ladies, so enjoyed catching up for real!) and all the kids got to hang out, meet the chooks, feed the ducks and just play together. Which went pretty well. Anna and Nicholas are both a bit older than Vicky and my kids but are wonderful with them. And I think great role models for my kids to look up to.

So heres some pics that Vicky snapped while we were hanging out....

Everyone feeding the ducks. Tide wasn't soooo good, but we still got to feed about 15 of them. This next one is of us in the chook enclosure. Checking out Chickenee who was hiding. That bush we're by is where Bob lays her eggs.   

Check out Kaya and Dan playing together. Ahhhh, man so cute! Just love it.

Next Dan and Arlo also playing. Check out the look on Dans face. As if to say hey, this is my toy (its actually from the toy library! LOL).

And last Arlo and I putting together a rice salad for lunch.

Hey, I've been featured on the Queen Kats blog. Its a great blog which features stampers and scrapper alike for people to see and gain inspiration from. Queen Kat Designs make very cool clear stamps, so go check it out as there may be some cool stuff you might get inspiration from.

Ok, gotta get going. Check back later for more.

I didn't realise

That booster seats with adult seatbelts are unsafe for children under 5. That is until this morning. I was reading this blog, which linked me to this blog which talked about it.

Both blogs are incredibly moving. I often visit Sheye Rosemeyers blog when I'm needing to remember how incredible and important our children are. I feel awful writing that. It sounds horrible, that I am profiting from her loss, but through her and her families incredibly awful loss I find strength when 'those days' of endless questions, fighting, and clinging get to me. I wish that their family never ever had to go through the loss of their beautiful Ava. I wish that for them everyday.

And today she has taught me another thing. Through another families grief, information about child restraints has been learnt, and what has been told in the past may in fact harm children in accidents. Please make sure you read Isabelle Broadheads memory blog to learn about the 5 point harness for young children and what it could mean to their lives.

We are lucky, my friend recommended a seat similar to the maxi seat she talks about and we brought it right from the beginning of the twins change over, so we are one of the lucky ones whose children have this type of seat. But there are occassions when we use the standard booster seat if we are taking another child to daycare etc. It looks like I'm gonna have to rethink this.

Thanks to both families for sharing their journey on their blogs. I bet I'm only one of many who you help each and every day.

Easter Sunday - what does Easter mean to me?

I was driving around yesterday when I heard talking about Easter on the radio. I have this very sad habbit of listening to talk radio on a Sat/Sun as they have fabulous gardening and DIY shows both mornings (I must be getting old, LOL). Anyway, the show after the gardening one yesterday has a guy come on and they talk about what words mean. Being Easter, they talked about that. Where it came from, why we have it, and why its when it is. I found it really interesting so thought I'd share here.

The first question they asked was whether it really was a 'religious' holiday. And the answer is definitely yes.

Whether you believe in God and Jesus, or not, this is the short version of how Easter came to pass.....

Easter is in commemmoration of the death of Jesus Christ. He was crucified the day after passover (and the actual original date I think they said was 20th April), then was resurected two days later, Totalling 3 days of Easter.

How it was originally commemmorated was to have it on passover. Exactly as it originally happened. However the Christians who travelled to tell people about God, decided that as passover changed each year, it would be simpler to have it on a weekend, so 'changed' the dates to suit them. LOL. Anyway, instead of being on passover itself, they said, lets make it the first Sunday after the equinox. Which is now what it is. Which coincidentally is quite funny as this date changes every year too. LOL!

This year is just about the earliest it can be. We are one day off being the earliest date it can be (the 22nd) and it can be as late as end of April. For example in 2011 it will be somthing like 24th April.

I listened to them talking on the radio and was grateful for understanding more. After years and years of going to church as a child/teenager each Sunday I still didn't understand how this came about. Yes, I had learnt about Jesus and his crucifixtion and resurection, but not anything about dates etc. I found it really interesting.

I also found it nice to sit back and remember for me what the true reason is behind this holiday. Yes, its lovely to have a holiday, but whether you believe in the resurection side of it, Jesus death is a fact and to think you're having a holiday because someone was strung up on a cross and left to die, well, that isn't really that nice, is it? So to then remember and realise that actually that's not the part we're celebrating, but that he came back to life again, that's pretty cool.

And did you know that in some countries, they still reinact Jesus crucifixtion? Yep, even nailing (literally) someone to a cross. I think it was the Phillipines???? Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

Alrighty.....I don't normally mention "off days" and such. I like to keep my blog an upbeat kinda place, but I'm human and have those days just like everyone else. Well, yesterday was one of those ones where you just knew as soon as you woke up at 3am, 4am and then 5am when you finally actually decided to get up, that it was gonna be a bad one. I don't function very well on little sleep. Hmmmm, who does? But then when I went to get a cup of tea and realised I'd used the last tea bag the night before, I really knew. LOL. Luckily I had brought some leaf tea for this very 'just in case' reason, but it takes longer ra ra ra (tastes much nicer though!) And then, worst of all, I was out and about yesterday. At two different supermarkets and still forgot to buy more! Gotta laugh. Thank goodness for that leaf tea.

But there were lots of things that made me smile...here are a couple:

Sarah using stickers in a fun and innovative way. She and Matt both did some wonderful pictures with said stickers and then the mood changed and we got this type of thing. I'm sure I'll be finding stickers all over the house for the next few days. LOL.

My little blondie in his Thomas jammies. Wow, how did he get hair THAT blonde? Both Andy and I and the twins were all blonde as babies and until about 2ish. But this little man is white blonde. Much more than any of us! But what made me smile was the jammies. He adores them. Some of his favourite books are the Thomas books. He will sit through them and listen and 'choochoo' and 'whoooowhooooo' all the way through. Well, these are new jammies and as soon as he they were on, he starts pointing at all the Thomas engines going 'whoooowhoooo'. Too cute.

Ok, easter bunny has come. The kids are about to get up so I'm gonna go enjoy this day, do some more digging a bit of nailing and an Easter party with the family later.

Have a wonderful Easter Sunday.

Saturday Sketch day

Hi guys,

Got a couple of sketches for you today as I'm doing a sketch a day over the Easter weekend over at Fiskars.....

If you'd like to see your work up on the Fiskars blog, then take a look at this post.

The ole body is feeling ok this morning, so I can see we'll get through today. Andy's already down the bottom doing stuff. I'm taking a wee break as I'm off to Spotlight to meet one of our demonstrators Danice Hamilton this morning. Can't wait!

And just wanted to say that I've been very slack on blog reading this last week due to everything that's been going on, but I can't wait to catch up with you all (and reply to your comments on my blog too).

Talking of catching up. Go check out SBO this weekend. They've got some cool challenges on with lots of time to do them.

Have a great day. Looks like its gonna be another nice one! Yeah!

Today I used the following tools....

A spade, wheelbarrow, shovel, post hole borer, chainsaw, & hose. Yep, we were out in the back section all afternoon. Fantastic. So much achieved that I lost count of how many barrows full of soil I transported around. Luckily the kids were quite happy to stomp down the soil when it got to its new home, and we even managed to make them mini see saws that they could stand and balance on with left over bits of wood.

However, I feel absolutely physically shattered! Every muscle in my body hurts. LOL! Serves me right for not keeping up the ole fitness. LOL. And we've only got 3 more days to go. Eeeeeek.

But on the good side of things, I've also been very busy on the Fiskars ANZ blog. So far today we've had 14 posts to keep everyone on their toes over Easter. Today has been full on and full of games. Lots of fun, interesting and wacky things for you to do, with some cooolio prizes to win (must go and post what they are!).

And the latest post is all about how we'd love to see your work on our blog. All you have to do is use one of the sketches we've featured on the blog and send it in to us and you may feature on it. Click here to get the full details.

Hang around tomorrow and all through Easter as we've got great stuff happening every single Easter day.

Talking of Fiskars, here are some Easter cards I made this year when sending some special kiwi choccies to some Aussie friends. Usually I just chuck in a quick scribbled note, this year I thought I might as well make some effort. LOL.

I used the oval shaped template to cut out the egg shapes, then used the new finger craft knife to cut the zig zag to make it look like its cracking open. Easy peasy.

Oh and hey, more Fiskars stuff........

This long Easter weekend when you go into NZ Scrapbook and purchase any Fiskars, Heidi Grace or Cloud 9 products you will be put into the draw to win a Baby G and Fiskars product PRIZE PACK!

Also, when you include any of these great products in your purchase and MENTION or PRINT this blog post they will DOUBLE the Bonus Bucks you earn on your ENTIRE purchase!

And if thats not enough, over the Easter period when you make any purchase in store they will give you three Easter gifts in a goodie bag FREE!

How cool is that?!

If you're in Auckland, make sure you pop in for this amazing Fiskars opportunity.

Wow! Lots, lots, lots going on with Fiskars this weekend.

And on the chook side of things, GREAT NEWS!!!!!! Yesterday we got egg number two and this morning we got egg number three! I keep looking at the eggs when we get them being totally amazed at them. Thinking wow, its happening and really just not believing it. It feels really surreal. Until we ate a couple this morning! hehehe. Check this pic out....

The only thing is that they seem to like laying behind some bushes. Which is fine, really. I just like the idea of the nesting boxes. LOL!

Ok, time to make life a leaf and leave (hahaha).

Have a good one.

This long Easter weekend when you go into NZ Scrapbook and purchase any Fiskars, Heidi Grace or Cloud 9 products you will be put into the draw to win a Baby G and Fiskars product PRIZE PACK!

Also, when you include any of these great products in your purchase and MENTION or PRINT this blog post they will DOUBLE the Bonus Bucks you earn on your ENTIRE purchase!

And if thats not enough, over the Easter period when you make any purchase in store they will give you three Easter gifts in a goodie bag FREE!

How cool is that?!

If you're in Auckland, make sure you pop in for this amazing Fiskars opportunity.

Wow! Lots, lots, lots going on with Fiskars this weekend.

And on the chook side of things, GREAT NEWS!!!!!! Yesterday we got egg number two and this morning we got egg number three! I keep looking at the eggs when we get them being totally amazed at them. Thinking wow, its happening and really just not believing it. It feels really surreal. Until we ate a couple this morning! hehehe. Check this pic out....

The only thing is that they seem to like laying behind some bushes. Which is fine, really. I just like the idea of the nesting boxes. LOL!

Ok, time to make life a leaf and leave (hahaha).

Have a good one.

Is it time for bed yet?

LOL! As I write this its not yet 9am. I've let the chooks out, made pikelets and decorated them with sprinkles for the kids easter party, written up materials lists for 4 LO's plus hints/tips, taken some photos, had breakfast, read and deleted 8 emails, sent another 10, organised the kids for daycare, had a shower, and made the kids beds. Its no wonder I'm feeling a little bit woozy this morning.

Now I'm not saying all this for a 'look at me, I'm wonder woman' cause its simple, I'm NOT! LOL. But I often forget just how busy my day is. A Mums day. And we're not even talking 1/4 of the day here. Just a few hours. .. Life .. is ..  just ..  full ..  on! Whether you've got one kid or more, work or not. Being a Mum is hard yakka. And we forget this and we berate ourselves for getting impatient and/or angry, for not getting everything done, for not being the person we hoped we'd be when we grew up. When really we just need to cut ourselves a little bit of slack, take a deep breath and realise that we're doing ok, we're human and there is only so much we can do at any one time (but don't tell Andy I said that!).

I think I started thinking about this yesterday when I was taking the kids to daycare. I saw a kid riding his skateboard in the middle of the road, changing his ipod to whatever else he was listening to and realised that (dare I say it), I'm just not as young as I used to be (surely not?!). It kinda gave me a wee wake up call. I do need to give myself a break every now and then cause this ole body of mine just aint what it used to be. LOL!

So anyway, the whole Mum thing has been in my mind alot this last day (as you can tell). I was watching an old episode of ER (vibe is a great channel!). Carol one of the nurses was giving birth to twins. It had been a bit traumatic and people were around, things were good, then her friends left and the nurse left and she was sitting in bed, having had a c-section holding one baby and the other one started to cry. It jolted me back 4.5 years to my first night in the hospital with the twins. Having the same thing happen. The feelings it welled up were incredibly strong, like it was only yesterday. The tears rolled down my cheeks. The fear, the joy, the pain, the 'what do I do now' feelings. Remembering just how scared I was.

Yet again it was great to see this, remember, then look past it and see the progress I've made. How I've grown into being a Mum. How you can live through the fear, the unknown and make it your own. How you survive, cause really, you don't have any other choice! LOL!

And it made me grateful again for what has been, what today is and what tomorrow will bring. Ever changing, ever present, ever new, ever the same. Life really is good.

And just for fun, here are some photos that made me smile this morning.....

The kids easter pikelet plate for daycare. Love the colour. Love that they're not all 'sweet'. Love that they were easy to make.

Yellow acid free tomatoes in our garden. Yummo. Love the water dripping off them.

Rockmelons again found growing in our garden. Can't wait to taste these!

Bob and Chickenee roosting. Thats Bob closest to us. She has less white around her neck.

Boy I giggled as I took this one. I looked through the viewfinder, went to click, saw Bob and Chickenee coming out and realised I'd left the gate open! It was a mad dash to take the pic, then run up and close the gate. LOL!

My gorgeous son in his Hawaiian shirt. Bit of a story that goes with Hawaiian shirts in our family. But we won't go there just now.

My kids with Linn about to go to daycare. Not the best photo, but kinda cute and for me, as much as I love my kids, I also love my 'me' time. So a big sigh of relief. LOL!

Ok, must dash.....

Have a good one and be kind to yourself today, ok?! And thats an order. LOL!

Later.

Missed a day blogging

And look at what happens.... all the news piles up like crazy! LOL! I'm on limited time here so I'll get through what I can.....

First off, why didn't I blog yesterday? Hmmm, well I have a deadline which needs meeting by tomorrow. And I needed to get three LO's plus some text written and in by then. And as I've had soooo much other stuff on (you know chickens and all! LOL), this has just had to wait and well, I did three LO's all in the last day and a bit. Yep, two evenings and one half day! Now anyone who knows me will know that I'm a slow scrapper. So will know how excited I am to have achieved this. But even better these ones actually came together quite easily (and don't look too bad - if I do say so myself. LOL). Especially when I realised that some of the photos I had printed to use, just weren't going to work and I quickly had to totally rethink one of them.

Anyway, the big job is done. Yeah! So back to normality (blogging) for me.....

And what did normality hold for me this morning? Errands and household stuff. I did some food shopping, the washing, dropping kids off, feeding/watering the chooks, seeing my Mum, going to the LSS (very important! LOL), Fiskars work, dealing with a truck driver (where to put some wood), emails, hmmmmmm, and that was all done before lunchtime. I'm looking forward to a quiet afternoon of tidying up. Yeah right. LOL!

In April and May my good friend Jo Kneller is going to be on TV! Yep, as part of her work with Up2Scrap she used a wonderful new printer that Canon have put out, and she will be showing how it works on 'Good Morning'. How cool is that?! I so can't wait to see it so I can give her some friendly jibbing! LOL! But seriously, she is such a talented scrapper and wonderful bubbly person, that I can tell she is going to ROCK that TV slot! Yeah! Go Jo Go!

Chicken news....no more eggs. Yet. Ok, chooks, you hear that....yet! Your Mum is wanting to know that you can lay more than one, sooooooo, get laying! LOL! They seem to be loving their home and we are too. Its so nice to actually use a bit of land that was just a big overgrown slope.

Oh and that pic, well thats the first egg. Still very excited by this! LOL!

And another 'oh'. I'm after some spouting. You know the stuff that goes around your roof to catch the rain water? Yep! I need 1m. Thats all. Just one measy little metre. But you can only buy it in 3m lots at any hardware store and that's just too much (and too expensive). So if any of you are building a house or doing rennovations or have a husband thats a builder or anything like that and you have some off cuts, shall we do a deal? I'm happy to pay for it. But I'm thinking it could make for a great food trough for the chooks. Email details are at the top left, so just sing on out! I'd be most grateful. TA!

Fiskars....Lots and lots and lots going on with Fiskars! Yeah!!!!! First off. The blog is just going off with an amazing array of Easter creations for you to look at and get inspired by, right now! Easter's not quite here yet, so go take a look, you may find something fun to make, or put in the back of your mind for a rainy day.

Annnnnnd, keep a special eye on the blog tomorrow as we have some stuff for the kids to make too!

Second Fiskars info.....there are some special demos happening at Spotlight in Henderson and Wairau Park. Don't know if you saw their latest brochure? But there is a heap of Fiskars product in it, so we'll be doing these demos in conjunction with that. If you're in Auckland and didn't get a chance to see the demos last week, pop on in to either of these branches to check out our latest products and tools. Plus you'll get some great discounts too. You won't be disappointed!

I also hear that there might be something special happening at my LSS over the weekend, so stay tuned. I don't have the green light to tell you what just yet, but will asap.

Ok, I think thats about all I've got time for. Need to go make a cup of tea and get ready for the next onslaught of kids and stuff. Hope you're having a great day!