Tea party anyone?

Thanks to Aunty Sarah and Uncle Steve, the girls have shiny new tea sets. They are pretty and came in little cases. The kids have been having a grand time using the felt food with them to have picnics on the lounge room floor. When I see it all spread out it makes me want to make some more felt food. I have such a list of things to do though... Oh well.

I thought I should be over the busyness that has been going on in our neck of the woods by now but I think it may still be a little longer before I am back to regular posting (not that I am regular much). Some of the problem has been me being slack. Seems like I am always fighting for my share of time on the computer these days. It was easier when the kids weren't computer literate!

The next two weeks are going to be wonderful. Tim has time off work and we are going to enjoy having him around the place. We (as in 'he' by the way) are going to work on the garden and get our house looking spiffy outside. It has been neglected for a long time and Tim is getting things lovely out there again. I am also hoping for a lunch date at some stage. (Hint hint Tim) What extravagance! We don't get to go out without the kids too much. Especially for a whole lunch with grown up food. You know the kind of food that doesn't come with fries :-)

Have a great week :-)

Cardboard box kitchen love

I love a bit of love for my blog. More on that in a minute. 

I have been a bit absent lately because we have had lots going on. Esther and Ellamay both went to hospital for a day to get grommets in their ears (finally! YEAH! They have had trouble for years) and so there was a little bit of stress leading up to that and then the recovery time afterwards. Also, I am on a mission to help our house lose some serious weight. We are approaching Autumn and with every season I get frustrated with our little house and try to get rid of stuff. Of course, in the past it has been thwarted by lots of other things. Mainly because I am easily distracted by all the pretty things I can make. This time though I am determined to achieve. So far, so good. I am losing interest though because I haven't made anything exciting for a while now. I am having creative with drawl.

Anyway, back to the blog love. I was pretty excited to find that my box kitchen has been featured alongside eight other very cool play kitchens. I have been featured on Craft Gossip before for my play farm fences. That was quite a while ago now. I have just been thinking about making some more things for that set again. Ideas are always stewing while I am doing other things. Go on over to see the other cool kitchens that are featured. I do love a play kitchen :-) Much more fun than the real thing :-)

Also, if you would like to see the first cardboard box kitchen I made, you can see it here. As we live in a small house, with only a corner of the living area for playing, the play kitchens only stay as long as they are played with and then out they go. Now that the weather is cooling down and we will be inside more, it looks like it might be time for a new one :-)

Needle books

How do you store your needles? I have a pin cushion that use to take care of them but I was having trouble with little people pushing the needles right down into it. Frustrating, but again one of those things that I remember doing to my mothers pin cushion so it makes it hard to be too cross about that. :-) (Sorry Mum). This felt cloud is what I have been using lately. Although it looks kind of cute (to me anyway) it wasn't really doing the job. I have wanted to make some kind of needle book for a while now and even had a couple in the mid-craft pile (recently culled).

Since the three girls are now sewing with real needles, we are going to start working towards making up a sewing set for them while improving their sewing along the way. Good idea, don't you think? I searched flickr looking at all kinds of needle books that might be easy for kids. There were lots of great ideas and this one isn't exactly kids beginners level but the girls had an idea for what they wanted. Mostly, it had to be quick. I had seen this tutorial for a child's sewing kit a while ago, which includes a pattern for a needle book and pin cushion and thought it would do the job.

Mine is the pale blue, Amelia's is green, Ellamay's is purple and Esther's is the pink ballerina. Sticking with our regular favourite colours. Everyone got to sew the line in the middle of their needle book. I know that's not much but when there is three little girls all wanting to do theirs at the same time, you have to go with what works easiest.

They all did a pretty good job with the sewing machine. I am hoping to get Esther and Ellamay back on there some time soon to make some little bags. We have been dreaming up all the other things we need to make or buy for their sewing set. We aren't going to make the sewing box that goes with the tutorial at the moment, though I would like to try it some time.

This is the inside of my needle book. By the time we got to sewing my needle book, some one had fiddled with the sewing machine and the tension was wrong (again!). True to form, I didn't stop to try to fix it. Waste of time. It takes me forever to get it sorted out. I am an impatient sewer (sewist? Sewing type person? Whatever the word is).

I will have to get some photo's of the latest stitching the girls have done. They are pretty proud of it. Little felt hearts that turned into cushions for their Barbie's and little felt rectangles which have become mattresses for the Pony house. They want to start doing things that are more advanced. I might set them up with an embroidery hoop next and have them just do lines of stitching and perhaps learn some new stitches. They think using a hoop for stitching is a very exciting idea.

Echidna Cupcakes on a cupcake blog!

Sometimes you get to have a little piece of awesome handed to you in your day. I just got featured on a cupcake blog! Little ol' me! And completely out of the blue! If you want to see who I am being featured next to, click over to Party Cupcake Ideas. Very cool. There are some seriously clever people in this world and my cupcake is right in between them. Yep. That is pretty awesome.

Have a great week. :-)

Kite flying

After school on Wednesday, there was the slightest breath of wind and Amelia decided she wanted to go kite flying. Esther and Ellamay got these octopus kites for a birthday or Christmas and they don't come out much because we never remember to take them with us when we go to good kite flying locations and because we have power lines just outside our yard.

Aside from a few issues because Amelia doesn't have her own kite, it was quite fun. Esther jumped on the trampoline while Amelia had a turn of her kite. Sometimes there is harmony amongst our children :-).

First day of Grade One

I know I am biased - but could this be one of the cutest back to school photo ever? Amelia had to be in it. And she had to wear her party hat from Daddy's birthday the night before. Esther is wearing her school hat and Ellamay looks like she wants to get going. They were pretty excited to go to school after all the weeks of "boooring" holidays. I was pretty glad too. I think my children do like the school routine.

See them on their first day of prep here. They have grown up so much in that one year. Sigh. I wonder what this year will bring.

Tim's birthday

We celebrated Tim's birthday last week. We made a mower cake. Tim loves to mow the grass. He has a collection of mowers (I think that is kind of funny). Anyway, I came across this idea for father's day cupcakes and thought we could use it for the cake. The kids iced it and then attacked it with forks to make it look like grass. I made the mower from a fun size Mars bar, a few M&Ms and a piece of licorice.

So glad you were put on this earth all that time ago. :-)

Web

Hi. I'm still around. Just not so much here. I am trying to get some more pictures uploaded so I can get back to the Crisis. So this is just a quick catch up post.

Esther and Ellamay went back to school on Friday. (Ridiculous day to start back - just sayin'). Already they are starting to get to sleep just a little better which is a relief. The next couple of weeks will be a little interrupted for them with different appointments and things happening so I will try (ha!) not to let their school stuff stress me out too much until we are properly into the routine.

Tim, Amelia and I went to the Big Building on Friday also to see a different CF specialist. All good reports which was a relief. Amelia is doing well. She is back on her pink medicine for a cough but I am sure that won't take long to sort out again.

We have had more rain here. There was more flooding on the weekend, it wasn't as bad as previously. We could still get into town. The rain has made it bug central around here. Mozzie's are terrible little dive bombers and there are crickets and all manner of creepy crawlies getting about. Blerk. And spiders! I just have to walk outside and all of a sudden I start jumping around like a silly girl because I've walked straight into a web! There are webs everywhere. Everyone does that silly dance don't they? Webs do make for pretty photos which is nice (if you haven't destroyed them from walking through them of course).

Stuff I am in the middle of at the moment - school hair accessories for Esther and Ellamay, clearing out my mid-craft pile (even throwing away or giving away), trying to finish up some mid-craftiness and being inspired for Easter. Shh... don't tell anyone. Doing Easter stuff in February is a bit early don't you think? Anyway, since the kids are back to school, I am hoping to get back to my other life. The one where I can actually have a turn on the computer, get things done around the house (a little bit) and do some fun stitching or crafty stuff (a whole lot).

Enjoy the rest of the week and hopefully I will be back soon with some cool stuff we have been doing lately.

Paper town

In some of our Esther, Ellamay and Mummy time, we made this house and cars. I found this paper craft site called Canon Creative Park. It has heaps of great paper craft stuff on there. The kids and I decided to go with the Craft town option. We printed the pages out and I cut it all out after the kids were in bed. We spent our time together the next day, folding and gluing it all together. Now they want to make some more things to go with it. I have printed out the school but only half cut it out. Just as well we only have cheap ink in our printer is all I can say. :-)

I want to make quite a few things off this site. I found a cool camera that holds a photo and a matryoshka doll that I would love to make. Though the doll takes 17 pages plus 6 pages of instructions. I will have to make sure we have plenty of ink before I start that one.

I wanted to add this photo in to show you my photo tent that I got for Christmas. I ordered it. I am responsible for the fact that it is ridiculously huge. I need to work out how to use it best now. I think my lamps are not quite right. It's still pretty fun though. I can add it to my growing collection of stuff for photography that I am not entirely sure how to use. :-)