Christmas

I don't remember ever seeing the Charlie Brown Christmas. I have seen it mentioned quite a few places lately and after finding this on youtube, I thought I would share it. What Christmas is all about.

Have a wonderful Christmas.

Santa Claus is coming to town

Joy to the world

Carol of the Bells

In the bleak midwinter

Little Drummer Boy

Christmas is coming

Christmas is almost here and I am not ready for it at all. How about you? I had planned to be so organised this year and make so many things and be quite festive but it hasn't happened. I have been pinning things on my Christmas board on Pintrest and have been so inspired to make all matter of delightful things, but not this year.

Remember in my last post when I said that Amelia had been to hospital for the day, in the ambulance? Well, the day after that post, Amelia ended up in hospital. She was in hospital, which meant I was in too. The tummy bug got the better of her. Thankfully, she responded well to the treatments and we came home 3 days later. Since then, the whole family has gotten sick, including me.

So anyway, I am writing this post as a sign off, of sorts. I give up, I give in, I surrender. I haven't been keeping up with the blogging so I am taking the next month off. The run of illnesses we have had in the house has really made everything harder to do. It is summer holidays here starting Friday, so it is time for a break anyway. The kids will be home for 5-6 weeks. I plan to rest up, relax and hang out with the kids. I hope we can do some making together and have fun.

I hope to be back to regular (ha!) blogging at the end of January. I need to spend some time going through the mid-craft list and let go of some projects that are just never going to get done. And I need to re-organise my 'to-do' list into what is achieveable and what is not. And then, I need to set myself some goals (New Years Resolutions?) to work out how to make time for my making. I need a creative outlet to keep sane and I have been getting increasingly frustrated that I am not doing more of what I love.

How's that for a post? A bit deep and meaningful? Well, whatever. Had to be said.

I am going to post a few of my favourite random Christmas videos over the next few days in the lead up to Christmas. I am loving youtube for getting festive while we have been housebound.

Thanks for reading along this year and I will see you in 2012!

Christmassy stuff

Hi. Remember me? I am the one that pops in from time to time. *Sigh*. I have to say, we have had a run of illness lately. For the last few months, it seems to have been one thing or another. The latest hit - a tummy bug that has floored us. One that had Amelia end up in the back of an ambulance spending the day in the emergency room. Fortunately, we didn't have to stay in and we hope and pray the problem will not happened again.

I thought since I haven't really had the time (or energy) to be blogging for a while, perhaps I should drop by and just give you a few Christmas ideas from the archives. And then maybe one day, I'll actually be back - with actual projects that I am in the middle of. :-)

Paper Reindeer.

Paper star Christmas Trees.

Rolled felt candles.

Decorated tree with recycled card circle garland.

See you another day.

Owl sleep masks

I think I might have mentioned a while ago that I am an Aunty again. Hooray for being an Aunty! I was trying to make a secret sewing project for my new nephew but now that he is a month old, I have pretty much given up on that project. You never know though. Perhaps I will revisit it with fresh eyes at a later date.

Anyway, I wanted to put together a gift for my sister-in-law that would be useful particularly at the hospital but for later as well. Something that is nearly impossible in hospital (and after you go home) is resting. You certainly don't get rest in hospital. I thought some kind of eye mask would be a great idea. It could be worn to block out the light and might give people the hint that rest is needed.

I found a tutorial for making and owl sleep mask. My sister-in-law likes owls so it seemed like a good idea.

I made the grey one for my sister-in-law and the pink on is for another friend who has just had a baby too.

They turned out really pretty. Even if that pink one is only "mostly" done, it still looks good. It felt good to make them. And so quick. I don't know how practical they will be but I like fun things. The way my family has been lately, if I have managed to do any crafting or stitching I have grabbed it with both hands!

The frog

Perhaps I should title this "Adventures in mischief and dirt." My darling girls can find adventure in our yard without any effort at all. This day it was a frog. A frog that they were touching and wanting to keep. Nothing against frogs, but I am not as game as I was when I was a kid to be touching things like that!

I told them they could all get their photo taken with the frog and then they had to put it back. I don't think the poor thing would have survived if they kept "looking after" it.

Cornflour slime

So what do you do with kids home from school and feeling generally lousy from whooping cough? You make slime of course! I found this recipe here. We talked a little about liquids and solids and then they got right to it. It was funny to see how each kid played with it. They are all individuals that is for sure!

And the mess I was left with. It kept them happy for an hour or more though so really it was a small price to pay. :-)

Lincoln's notebook and pen roll holder

Amelia's best friend turned four recently. Amelia thought they were like twins now because they are both four. :-) Isn't that cute. Anyway, we decided Lincoln needed one of my notebook and pen roll holders since both his older sister's had one and they use them all the time. I haven't made a boy one before though so I wasn't sure what kind of colours or fabrics to use.

Amelia picked out the fabric. That made my life easier. It looked a little plain so I added the felt circle on the front with Lincoln's name stitched on there. I really like the way it turned out. I think if I make anymore of these with the plain fabric, I will have to add some stitched felt on top.

I have to make one for his little sister now. Her birthday is at the end of the month. Nothing like a deadline to get some motivation! I just hope I can get it done!

Echidna makings

This year Echidna Day crept up on me. We have all been feeling pretty lousy still trying to recover from whooping cough (which is taking forever I might add!) and virus' that seem to keep attacking our family.

Our Echidna makings were limited to the above this year. Esther and Ellamay made some Echidna's from foam eggs and pencils or sticks. And Ellamay drew the awesome Echidna picture above.

Usually we make some kind of Echidna cakes but we didn't this year. We made do with our "sticky" food of chocolate malt sticks and chocolate raspberry bullets.

Stay tuned. I might be able to find something crafty to share soon. :-)

Echidna Day adventures part 2

More Echidna Day adventures. If you recall, I said I don't like reptiles. The snake above... perfect example of why I don't like them. It is a Red Bellied Black Snake. Actually, nothing against the snake above, I actually just don't like any snakes.

This lovely, sleepy lump of an animal is wombat. These things were huge and sleepy. I think it must have been afternoon siesta time when we went to see all the animals :-)

Our emu friend.

Kangaroos in mid bounce.

Eastern Grey and Red kangaroos. I don't think I have ever seen Red kangaroos before. We have lots of the Grey ones around here. The Red ones are so much bigger than the Greys. I don't think I would like to get too close to them. They are pure muscle.

The cockatoos were fun. Two of them took a liking to Tim. One was chewing on his jumper and the other quite liked his shoe laces.

Esther loved the cockies. She was so excited she could pat them. When we left their enclosure, one cocky said to us, "Hello, Cocky". So of course we stood there for a bit longer to see what else he had learnt to say.

These parrots were really enjoying the seed they had to eat.

This is a Bearded dragon. We counted 6 of them in the enclosure and they were just sun baking on the branches.

The kids were particularly excited to see this animal. It is called the Spotted Quoll. They have been watching a wildlife show on TV and it has been featuring about Spotted Quolls. They are an endangered species. Very exciting to see live ones - even if they were sleeping.

This is a Tasmanian Devil. Also, sleepy. I think the thing that struck us about this enclosure was that there was a chicken carcass up on top of the fence guard. They are supposed to be ferocious little things so we assume it got thrown there in a feeding frenzy.

This is a Brush Turkey.

We got to the last few displays and the kids were tired from all the walking. One of the last displays had Flying Fox bats and Blue-tongue Lizards in it. Ellamay was completely freaked out by the bats and Esther saw a lizard that was shedding its skin. This completely freaked Esther out. She has seen skins off snakes on the TV before but the fact that the lizard was walking around with some skin sticking out was too creepy for Esther.

We left the main park for their playground/picnic area and had some afternoon tea. We ate some "sticky" kind of food in keeping with our Echidna Day idea. Raspberry chocolate bullets and chocolate malt sticks. That seemed like good food to celebrate a "pointy" kind of animal.

Another year gone by and another year celebrated that we have abundant blessings. We thank God for the life we have and even though it has its ups and its downs, we are blessed beyond measure. I hope you have given some thought to what you have in your life to be thankful for.

Echidna Day adventure

On Sunday 16th October, we celebrated Echidna Day again. This year I really wanted to go somewhere so we could see and actual echidna. I made a phone call and found that they had one at the Kyabram Fauna Park. I remember going to the Fauna Park when I was a kid but the main attraction then was we use to go to the kiosk to buy mixed lollies. :-) I had only been in once that I remember on a school trip. That was probably when I was about the same age as Esther and Ellamay.

My very vague memories of the place when I was a kid was looking at displays and not being able to see anything. It was exciting to see things so close up this time. I guess a lot of things can change in 25 years. :-) Perhaps I am a bit taller too. This koala barely moved in the 5 minutes or more we stood there looking at him.

The animals there are very use to people being around. The emu above, for example believed it owned the path and we had to move out of its way because it wasn't stopping or changing its path for us. The 3 girls were in love with it as soon as it walked past and without a word they turned and started to follow it bobbing up and down just as it did. So cute and so funny.

This kangaroo was quite happy to ignore us as we stood nearby in awe of how close we could get.

And here is the creature of the day... an echidna... bottom. It was asleep with its head in the hollow log and did not care that we came all that way to see him. We asked him to wake up and pose for a photo, but he didn't hear us.

I got a little emotional having my family all there to see this echidna. It was a perfect way to celebrate Echidna Day. Having our family together, enjoying (reasonable) health and having fun.

These guys are called Tawny Frogmouths. They look like they own the place with their chests all puffed out like that.

I can't remember what this one was called but he (or she for that matter) was an owl.

Pretty sure this one was a Barn Owl. Really know my fauna don't I? :-)

We went into the reptile house... I don't like reptiles. I was glad they were behind glass.

This was the crocodile. It hardly moved the whole time we stood there looking at it. I wondered if it was real. Then it slowly came up and opened it's eyes above the water level. That was creepy.

Amelia was happy to have Daddy holding onto her while she looked at the crocodile.

I have another post to come of our trip to the fauna park. I hope to share that in the next couple of days.