We are in a taxi ...

On our way to the airport! Well we should be if all has gone to plan :-)
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Last sneaks of what I have done for Scrap-n-Crop's June kit. I've put together a mini album using lots of bits and pieces from the kit and it's all ready to add photos of Aaron's adventures during our "winter" holiday :-) So when we come back ... I can pull out this album for Aunty Irene to see straight away LOL And Aaron can tell her ALLLLLLL about it (no doubt his adventures will have grown all out of proportion when he tells it hehehee).

You can see some peeks of what Sharmaine has created in SnC's gallery here.

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Check back on the 1st of June for the full reveal.

Last day of school for a while!

I got a couple of small bunches of flowers for the kids teachers this afternoon and when I went to pick them up from school gave them a bunch each to give to their teacher! Aaron gave his to Ms Jane fine, but Maddison! Honestly!!! She carted the flowers all around, then gave them to me and blew me a kiss, so I explained that she had to give them to Ms Sue, so she did and then snatched them back! (whoops!)
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Here's a pic of them with their teacher. (Forgot to ask if I could blog their pics so have blurred their face just in case.)
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Aaron and Ms Jane ... only when I downloaded these pics did I realise he had the waist band of his shorts turned in and his tee-shirt tucked into his undies! NICE ;-) And that smile ... that's the new face we have when the camera is out!!!

The only photo I got of Maddison looking up - all the rest she's poking at the flowers. I got a cute little wooden hen with springy legs put into the bouquet, so she was quite taken with that.

They also had their bags of school art and work as well as their reports (which I haven't read yet!). I like the cross-eyed butterfly of Maddison's. heheehee

This year they are studying the human body at school, and recently it's been all about hands! So lots of their artwork has involved tracing their hands.

Happy Father's Day cards for Daddy!

This is the little verse in the inside ...

Maddison's Sunflower.

Maddison's duck.

Maddison's cottonbud painting ;-) Do you have room on your fridge for this lovely piece of artwork Nana?? :-)

And remember this story? I didn't get to taking a photo of his "spots" face at school, but it was in the bag ;-) They even have the hair pretty right LOL (not sure his ears are that close to his eyes though hahaha)

Aaron's sun.

Aaron's free-hand colouring. He's getting pretty good at staying nearly in the lines (as long as he's not distracted!).

Okay - off to finish the packing, then cleaning the fridge! Kids are both asleep and Lyndon is on his way home :-)

I have my priorities right ...

I am sniggering away to myself while I am typing this :-)
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So yeah ... priorities ... my craft suitcase is packed (and under 20kgs too ... just!)! Not much else has been done, but my craft stuff is sorted :-) heheheee You know it's really really difficult to narrow your craft stash down to the essentials (well what I class as essentials!) when you are going away for 3 months! I know I will have left something out that I find I really need! Oh well ... just have to tell my Mum it's something she needs in her stash LOL There are a few things that haven't fitted in the case, like my pencil case and a couple of punches, but I can handle that! They will squeeze in around my non-existent winter clothing I am packing!
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I don't like clothes shopping much, much prefer to shop for scrapbook & craft supplies! but when we get to NZ I am going to have to go clothes shopping. I don't have any winter tops you see! Doesn't really 'bare' thinking about actually! ;-)
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So I had better get on ... kids clothes are nearly packed ... have to sort out some socks for them and find their winter hats.
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I'll leave you with a couple of sneaks of some cards I've made with Scrap-n-Crop's June kit.

And don't expect to hear too much from me in the next couple of weeks ... I'll do a catch up with photos when I get to my parents mid June :-) I will have a couple of posts loaded to appear while I am away though.

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For those of you reading this in Malaysia, enjoy your summer heat and think of us freezing our tootsies off in winter wonderland :-)

Trunki Tanti's

Last week Lyndon bought a 'trunki' for Aaron to use when we go on holiday. Aaron thought it was pretty cool, but so did Maddison! She's really too little for one, she can sit on it, but falls off easily because she doesn't hang on properly and her feet only just touch the ground by tippie-toes! So we decided she was too little to have one yet! BUT ... (there's always a but isn't there!), after a weekend of fighting and temper tantrums on both their parts (his because she was on it and her because she wanted it!) I decided I couldn't face travelling with just one trunki if it was going to be like that! So yesterday I got another one (I left the pink one on the shelf because Aaron would have decided it was his instead of the blue!). And you know ... even having a trunki each Aaron still wasn't happy. He decided the blue one should be Maddison's and he would have the new green one! Honestly, I was about ready to throttle him! Maddison actually dug her toes in on him having the green one ... she pulls it round by the strap and completely looses it if she sees Aaron with her green case!

So this morning I decided it might help if I personalised them and made the blue one especially for Aaron. Rummaged through my rubon collection and found some Maya Road animal rubons that I haven't used. Originally I thought just a couple would do! But oh no, I needed to use the whole packet apparently! LOL Even used the 'M' and 'a' from Maya to put their initial on it. Actually a very hard surface to put rubons onto. It's sort of textured. The heavy black pictures went on easier than the outline ones. The green case worked better than the blue one, although there are a few bits missing on some of the animals (like the frog!). I have no idea how long they will last, but so far the purpose of them as worked. Aaron is happy with his blue trunkie and Maddison tows her green one around and stops every now and again and shows & tells me about the cat and the frog ;-) Here's hoping they are still going to be happy tomorrow!

Here's a couple of sneaks at another LO I've done for Scrap-n-Crop's June kit.

Still haven't started packing ... although I have got my priorities sorted and have started making a pile of what craft stuff I absolutely must take with me! LOL (think once the pile is complete I need to go through it and halve it!!)

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Thanks for looking ... off now to think about packing, or maybe adding to my craft pile :-)

Cards for Kinda Sweet

Here's the cards I made for Kinda Sweet a couple of weeks back. I used a variety of bits and pieces they had given me ... some left overs from LO's and others cutting into new pieces of 12x12 papers :-) Check their blog here for the materials list.

I like that leafy branch embossing folder :-)

These stickers challenged me! LOL But Aaron and Maddison keep picking these cards up to play with! Aaron said "WOW Mummy, they are really good"!! LOL (I love hearing his reaction to my craft work. It never fails to make me laugh. The expression in his voice and his eyes nearly popping out of his head!) :-)

One of my new punches :-)

Another embossing folder. Used coredinations cardstock so was able to sand it. Those stickers are "awesome" too :-) They are the same type as the pink jelly sort of alphas I used on the LO's.

Embossing and inking :-)

Closeup of the very cute brads.

Yummy flocked paper.

Ahhh G45 - love those papers.

Thanks for looking.

5 more sleeps

and goodness me have I got a LOT to do between now and then!!! Lyndon has gone to Japan for work today and he gets back the night before we leave! So when we arrive in NZ he's going to be a bit shattered me thinks! LOL
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So quick catchup with what we have been doing ...
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Friday morning at the playground :-)

A rare photo of Maddison on her pink bike! (Usually Aaron's on it!)

Aaron pushing his bike about instead of riding it!

In the afternoon a friend and I put together 4 of these little mini albums of the kids school mates & teachers. 2 for the teachers and one for her and one for me :-) I haven't taken pics of mine yet. Will do that tomorrow maybe.

Saturday Lyndon was away for the day (went to a funeral of one of our friends here). Aunty Irene came and spent the afternoon with us. Bought us lunch and this cake :-) It's called a chiffon cake (I think I have that right) and the green is from pine leaves. Basically tastes like a sponge but it's green (looks to me like a fluorescent green marker got caught up in the mixer hehehee). Nice though and Maddison has eaten way more than her share :-)

Coming home after lunch today Aaron found his shades!

So stylely hehehe (check the ears LOL)

And here's a couple more sneaks of a LO I have done for Scrap-n-Crop's June kit (more old photos heheee). Check out my new Darkroom Door stamps in action :-)

Bit of this and a bit of that

Where to start!! This morning I found this photo in my inbox from my Mum!!! Help us ... a week tomorrow we leave for New Zealand and parts of the country are looking like that?? I think I will be feeling the cold ... just a little! (probably a huge understatement!). Sure looks pretty though doesn't it :-)


(By the way it was 35deg at 11am today!! Temperature has dropped now though as we've had a big storm, it's now 28deg!) :-)
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Every day Aaron tells me he doesn't want to go to school, he wants to go in the plane to see Taylor & Mitchell hehehehee. I am doing the countdown with him ... it's only 5 more days of school left THEN we can go in a big plane! It's helping, I think, because he trots of to school happily enough after that :-)
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Speaking of school I have spent a few hours there this week with my camera taking pics of the 5 kids that are in their classes (3 in Aaron's and 2 in Maddison's). I don't have enough to do you know, so decided I would make the 2 teachers a little mini album with pics of the kids. It's been a bit of a laugh trying to get halfway decent pics, but they aren't too bad. Tomorrow afternoon Aaron's little friend's mother is coming to help me put them together, and we are going to do one each for ourselves as well. Basing them on the little pink friendship album (with the tulips on the cover) that I made at Scrap-n-Crop's art retreat with Rachel Greig. Making these ones a little bit smaller though so I can get 6 photos per A4 page instead of 2 like the ones for that album!
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Here's the pics of Aaron & Maddison that are going in the album.

(yes she had been doing the taste test!!)

What else ... oh yes ... today I finished off one of the canvas's I did with Donna Downey at Creative Escape in Singapore. Still have 2 more to finish, but they need paint and messy stuff, so they will have to wait till I get back from holiday.

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This one I just had to add a few eyelets and write in the smaller words. I actually would have got this complete in class, but I was having trouble setting my eyelets. I have the Cropadile Big Bite, which is fantastic for punching holes anywhere in a 12x12 area, but when it comes to setting eyelets I have found it a huge disappointment. On this canvas in particular all it did was just squash the eyelet and scrunch it up, instead of splaying the back out nicely. I set the last 4 with my old "manual" eyelet setter and hammer and they worked beautifully. Does anyone else have that trouble with setting eyelets with the Big Bite, or is it just me? Is there a special technique that I don't know about?

So this canvas ... the pink/plum coloured flowers are actually drops of alcohol ink. I found it quite difficult to do neatly as you can tell by the random splatters all over the place and on the big flower as well! :-) hehehee ... but they are supposed to be like that you know! It was purposely done LOL The big flower is made up of hole punch cast offs from cardstock and pages from a book. (Fancy keeping that sort of paper waste for treasure!)

I've also been working on Scrap-n-Crop's June kit ... here's a sneak peek. Been working with some old photos again :-) Love these pics of Aaron with his shaggy hair doo heheehee

I'll leave you with some things the kids have been saying ...

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Last night we were at a friends house and just before we left Aaron was running around like a wild thing in their garden (he'd been sitting nice and still for an hour, so was burning off a bit of steam!). Next thing we heard him crying and it was a hurt cry. He told me the tree hurt him! What happened was he was running around it and tripped on a tree root. I told him he was okay and I'd look at it in the car. Well when I got him in his seat I could see why he had been crying! He had a very nasty graze and lump which was already bruising on his shin! He was very brave though and stopped crying (cookies helped!) and when we were all in the car ready to drive off he pipes up from the back and says "it's really really painful Mummy"! :-) LOL Lyndon asked me if I had taught him the word painful. Nope - must have been from school. Sure enough when he went today (with the bandage still on so he could show it off!) 3 teachers one after the other asked him if it was painful!! LOL I just grinned to myself because Aaron very seriously with a little frown on his brow said "yes, it's really painful"! hehehehee

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Maddison runs up to us and demands a "uggggg" every now and then! Ugggg is her word for Hug! :-) She's also saying sish (fish), book, Bob (Bob the Builder) and alright! You ask her to do something and she says "awwright". So cute.
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Oh and if you like Graphic 45 papers, check out Kinda Sweet's blog here. They have put up pics of their new stock! Very nice :-) I have my stash already ... it's coming with me to NZ. Hopefully I will find/make time to have a play with it while huddled next to the fire!! LOL

A local taste ...

Thought I would share today some pictures for my NZ readers heheehee ... you should really come and visit you know. I could take you to some great places :-)
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Sunday evening we went to a local Chinese restaurant for tea. Now when I say local, I mean it's not like our Chinese restaurants we have back home! They aren't 'westernised'.
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For example ... they keep there fire extinguisher in a box. The seating is okay for sitting on, but you definitely wouldn't want to eat off it!

This is the "inside" kitchen where the drinks are made.

When you order Chinese tea the little cups come in a container of boiling water, so you rinse them around, take them out and then use the hot water to wash your utensils :-) hehehee (Who would have thought I would be laughing at that! LOL)

Chinese tea

Just a tidy corner of the restaurant!

Certificate on the wall (been there for a while by the looks!).

Condiments

You get your chilled water served in a glass like this :-)

This was some sort of fish dish - can't remember the name sorry, but I had to turn the dish around so the "eyes" weren't looking at me. I still can't like that!

And unfortunately I didn't get a photo of this dish until it was nearly finished ... any guesses to what it was?

Frogs!!! (oh yeah ... I passed on that one thanks!)

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This was the outside kitchen - right on the side of the road basically.

If you wanted to you could choose which fish you wanted.

And which frog!!!

Aaron was quite fascinated by the frogs! No, we don't need one as a pet thanks very much hehehee

But aside from the "localness" (is that such a word?) of it ... the food was very delicious. We enjoyed it all and yep, we'll go back :-)