Testing

We'll be off next weekend just the three of us to get some further testing done on String Bean. She is very excited by the thought of the three of us having a holiday in Sydney. So much so that she just had to draw a picture of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Not sure how much fun we are actually going to have, as the testing takes from 9am-4.30pm, but we are going to try.

I am so proud of how well she is going. Her ability to draw is just amazing. I especially love the little cars going across the bridge. They are all 'Wacky Races' apparently!

Robot Boy

Fuzzy Wuzzy has a thing for robots. His vapouriser is a robot and he loves the fact that it has a light and makes steam!

Last night in his spare time (well he should have been getting dressed) he decided to improvise and turn himself into a robot. Great use of Bob the Builder underpants and one of his socks.

String Bean had a dress up day at school today. It was based around the Olympics and the concept of Internationalism. We decided to send her dressed as the Queen of Spain. Complete with gloves, feather boa, tiara, flowers and her flower girl dress. The outfit was given some real regal punch by adding her knitted bolero. A gift from String Bean's Nanny Sue.

Figured it was the logical choice, given that she is of half Spanish descent. Not that you can tell really. She is so similar in looks to her Daddy it isn't funny.

Success

What a buzz. The evening went without out a hitch. All the planning paid off and the girls had a great time. They all produced some lovely layouts. I photographed my favourite to share:


Some of my favourite comments from the evening:
"This paper looks like wallpaper." Ah good old Basic Grey. This range of paper would have to be my favourite and I always seem to come back to it. Even if some of it does look like retro wallpaper.
"Gee you're really good at this. Are you a teacher?"

Teaching

I've been asked by a friend to teach a scrapbooking class to her Girl Guide group: The Monkeez. They are a lovely group of girls aged 14-18 years of age. I am so looking forward to this opportunity. Scrapbooking became my biggest time sink in 2004 and means that I've been doing so for 4 years.... how quickly time passes when you're engaged creatively. But in all that time I've never been asked to teach a class.

What a set of mixed emotions. I'm fairly confident this will be an OK night for the girls. Maybe better than OK. The strict $20 spend for 8 girls was challenging to say the least. The class is part of a 4 activity rotation, so can only last for 1/2 an hour! Ouch.

So I have planned a simple layout using products from my dealer (opps supplier & friend). Together we raided her sale stock and she very kindly let me take a whole heap of stuff to play with and make packs out of. Oooo how exciting.

In my usual anal style, I have already completed a sample layout to show the girls on the night, have made up 8 packs of supplies, packed up the surplus to return and packed all the necessary tools that we'll need.

I just hope that I haven't underestimated how much girls of this age group can do. I'll be back with my report tomorrow night!

I really need...

....a craft room.

I end up having to quilt, scrap and cross stitch in my lounge/dining room. Not much fun with Mr Nearly 2 running around.



I waste a lot of my time pulling things out and them making sure I've packed everything away. I'd love to have the space to leave things set up, so I could just pop in and work on a project for five minutes. All those five minutes are wasted, I can't even set up my machine in that time let alone accomplish anything. I could have a dedicated table for sewing, machine set up, mat and cutter ready to go. I'd set up a scrap space/surface and have all my nice little treasures out where I can see and therefore use them.

A space where I could safely shut the door and ignore the creative mess, knowing it wouldn't be trashed by String Bean, Fuzzy Wuzzy, or especially Squealy.

Well it isn't going to happen anytime soon. Ah I guess a girl can dream can't she?

On Trains and Haircuts.

What a busy but fun filled day we had together today. We started out by meeting up with friends at the Malkara Train Exhibition. The kids all had a wonderful time together and the highlight by far was seeing 'Thomas' on on of the exhibitors tracks.

Squealy was so incredibly excited by the spectacle that he was jumping up and down in excitement. By the end of the visit he was able to add to his already extensive transport vocabulary the following: boat, car, train.








After lunch I headed to the hairdressers as the time has come to take some length off my daughter's beautiful tresses. Her locks have ended up so long that her hair has started to thin on top. Not a good look for a 5 year old. She is now sporting a very cute shoulder length bob and is looking, all of a sudden, much older than she did before. It was actually nice not to have to plat her hair before bed and the length made it a breeze to brush. We'll see how she feels about it over the coming days, but so far so good.

A Mini Project

Just in time for my craft/dessert night with my besties, I've finally gotten around to working on this pillow for my daughter.

I had started by cutting the background fabric and the border. It then sat there for weeks while I worked on other very worthwhile projects, in typical Gemini style. I generally have five or six projects on the go at anyone time!

Last night I traced and cut all the visofix, ironed it all on, trimmed, pressed and ironed it all in place. Looks gorgeous.

This is a Country Collectibles quilt kit I picked up at my local quilting shop: Calico Patch.