Saturday, December 31, 2011

The end of 2011

Thought I would share some pics of our last few days in 2011!
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I've been taking photos of the sky at various times during the day and evening recently. This is from the infinity pool at the top of our condo, around 7pm one evening.
Lyndon has been plant shopping. Samuel and Maddison have been playing with the water tap and the big tub again.

The kids "helped" Lyndon pot up all the plants one morning.
Samuel did his own thing in and out of the pots along with Trevor & Jeremy from Thomas the Tank Engine :-)

He's also had a turn on Aaron's new skateboard hehee
Tonight we were back up at the pool again after dinner. The light was really lovely for taking pics.

This one is so typical of the kids!
Samuel gets out of the pool and runs to get the Thomas float board and thinks he's very clever lying on it! :-)
He's also very good and getting an i-Pad any chance he can and just plonks himself down quietly!
Tonight Lyndon found him on our bed playing Angry Birds (not that he can play it, but he does a lot of finger swiping hehee)

The last night of 2011 and I think we are the only ones in the vicinity here that have put their kids to bed! The noise levels from other apartments (especially kids), people walking about in the street and the music from the nearby shopping area is very loud! Hoping we can see the fireworks displays from this new apartment. We couldn't at our old one.
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Wishing you all a Happy New Year and a wonderful 2012. Thanks so much for visiting my blog this year.

Friday, December 30, 2011

It's Magic!

Not sure if you remember or not, but back in October I received this in a swap from the lovely Trace.
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We made it for our Christmas lunch we shared with friends last Sunday. :-) So since several of you back in NZ have asked I am going to tell you how I found it!

First step ... READ THE INSTRUCTIONS!! They make it so simple! When you open the "egg" you use one half to measure the milk and the other to measure the sugar. How simple is that! (pity I didn't read the instructions first heheee) I did check though that my sugar measure was the same as it was supposed to be and it was! ;-) The instructions also had handy tips on it which were interesting.
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So you put it in the mixer and leave it to do its thing ... which at our house generally involves at least two sticky beaks watching the beater go round!

And you watch it beat and beat and beat (I would not and could not make a pav using a hand beater!! Even a hand held small electric beater would take it's toll on your arm just holding the beater!) The mixture got peaks like it was supposed to and how it would if you had made one from scratch.
Beady little eyes kept an eye on it in the oven. Instructions said DON"T open the oven door during the cooking and cooling process ... but when little people swing on the oven door handle the door sometimes opens!
It did spread a little during the cooking process which it said it would.
And looked pretty good when it came out and after it had cooled. But the next day when I went to get it out and decorate it, it cracked very easily. (Never mind that can be covered up by loads of whipped cream!)
We put whipped cream, fresh strawberries, grapes and passion fruit on the top. I am not sure if it was the weight of the goodness on top that cracked it even more or not, but it did crack and slump a bit between decorating and getting it to the table.

Landslide!
Taste wise ... it was good. Inside texture was very like "marshmallow" I thought. Nothing wrong with that - some pavs are like marshmallow, but when I make from scratch they aren't. Not sure if it's because I might cook it a bit longer or what. Not sure on that. Our Chinese friends liked it though because they said it wasn't as "sweet". I think when a pavlova has a firmer outer shell/crust the sugar might be more noticeable? Anyone else think that?
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So would I use another one? Yes I probably would. I think they would make great gifts because really it's very simple to do (if you read the instructions hehee) And if you like marshmallow type pavs then it's definitely a must have on your shopping list! ;-)
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So thanks Trace - it was delicious and there weren't any leftovers which is always a good sign! :-)

Thursday, December 29, 2011

Scrap-it-Lah's Final Challenge

I was sad when I heard that this was Scrap-it-Lah's final challenge. It's been ages since I have participated in their challenges (actually since I have done anything scrapping wise!), so I really wanted to try and join in their last challenge. I have spent the last few days sorting out my craft space and finding places for everything, and finally I could sit down and stick some photos to paper!
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The challenge this month was to scrap 3 or more Christmas photos, using red/green/gold and one other colour of your choice and use glitter or glimmer mist. The photos don't stick to the colour scheme, but the papers do hehee :-)

I put glitter on the foam alphas.

Samuel was watching me take pics of the LO and when I had finished he grabbed it and started pulling at the tinsel!
Wishing the Scrap-it-Lah team all the best and thanks for the past challenges, it's been fun! :-)
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Thanks for visiting.

Monday, December 26, 2011

December!

26th of December! Goodness where have the last 3 weeks gone! I did intend to update my blog long before this, but we have just been busy enough! :-) I'll share some of my pics for my Dec Daily album (not all of them as there are others in some pics).
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Aaron had a hearing test earlier in the month. All good there too! (I did wonder if his ears were for decorative purposes only, but apparently they work fine! haha)
The packers came to our old place ...
We moved to our new place :-) And one of the first things I unwrapped was the train set so the kids could play without getting too much in the way of the movers! Our new place has this little room off one of the balconies (on the floor plan it's the "gym") which we have made the train room and the plan is to try and keep the trains and track out there! (mostly its working although they do creep out onto the balcony hehee)
Maddison had 3 days at her new Montessori before the end of her school year. She settled in with no problems (probably helped by the glitter paint! hehee)
We put up the Christmas tree on the 10th. I did the top where the few precious ornaments hang and the kids did the rest.
My Mum arrived the evening of the day we moved, so we have had a few meals out with friends! :-)
Aaron had to present a "celebration" museum at school. They had to choose a celebration from their home country and have a display about it. Well because of moving and not being on line, I got the info the day before it was due! So I said it would be best if he did Christmas! Thankfully Mum had bought some magazines from NZ with her so we went through them and cut out pictures that had anything to do with anything about a Kiwi Christmas.
While I was out and about that day at Aaron's school and doing other things, Grandma looked after these two little rascals hehee
Santa paid a visit to Aaron's class.
Maddison helped cook dinner one night.
We went to Port Dickson for a few days and Samuel discovered ants :-)
It was very hard to keep the kids out of the sea! This particular day Daddy and Grandma had taken the kids to the beach (for a walk!) straight after breakfast while I packed our bags!!! Good job they weren't in their good clothes like one of their little friends hehee (bet her mother wasn't pleased!).
I finally emptied the last of the boxes and got the movers to come and collect the empty boxes.
Lyndon installed a water filter at the kitchen sink one evening and the following day I had the sink repaired (it was falling out at one end). Check out that colour of our water here! That's less than 24 hours of use just from one tap!
Not sure this is our place or not it's so tidy hehee :-)
Kids and I had our photo taken with Santa at one of the malls.
I took Mum to Old Town for a look around in the cramped dusty little shops there. This was a hardware store! You couldn't fit down that isle if you had a little bit of excess weight (or a large handbag!!) haha
The eve of the eve of Christmas! (I had spoken to Santa and asked him to come a day early and fancy that he was happy to oblige hehe) :-)
24th Dec ... 3 little reindeer!
Christmas Dinner with some friends.
Dessert (yes I used the pavlova magic but will do a separate blog post about this) :-)
And I just had to share this!!! Mum and I went to the supermarket one morning and when we came back Lyndon asked me to check the camera. I had wondered why Samuel was wearing different clothes! GROSS! I tell you, you can't leave the toilet door open around here!
Tonight we have all been to the airport to drop Grandma off as she's heading home. Maddison has already asked several times if we can go to Grandma's house now!
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Happy Holidays to you all.
Thanks for visiting. Hopefully it won't be another 3 weeks before I post again!
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Thursday, December 1, 2011

1st of December

Seriously this year has just gone so fast! I can hardly take it in that it's December already. So here's what's been happening around here the last 10 days or so.
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Aunty R ... you asked about Maddison's outfit - it's a little dress and I have no idea where it came from as it's a hand-me-down :-) (I did a clothes swap for little girls clothes and got some bigger girl clothes back which was awesome and this dress was among them. It's her favourite!)

Aaron has had his eyes tested ... all in perfect working order!

Samuel has been watching Bob the Builder on my laptop with some SERIOUS concentration going on! Look at his hands heheee :-) He does make me laugh with his funny little manners and ways. (Excuse the fact he has no pants on! This was his third change of clothes for the day and I couldn't be bothered with pants anymore!)

Aaron's teacher is having a birthday next week and the kids have all been asked to make a birthday card for her to go in with the gift. She loves lions and calls her class the "lovable lions"! So I dug in my stamp collection and found this little beauty. Sorry it's sideways.
The last week Aaron has been asking me to do his hair spiky. But it doesn't stay like that, so tonight I surprised him with some hair gel! He thinks he's the cats meow now!!
And of course Maddison wanted her hair special as well! (didn't matter that they were heading straight to bed hehee). So I asked her if she wanted a french roll like mine. "That would be great thank you Mummy"!! :-)
As you know from my previous post I am going to do (and determined to complete) a December Daily album this year. So these next two pictures are for the 1st of December. :-) One chocolate advent calender doesn't work in this household! They have to have one each (good job the chocs are small is all I can say hehee) They didn't know about them and were pretty excited with the pictures I had chosen for them. (I am sorry I couldn't find a "Ba" one for Samuel though (Bob the Builder!) :-) He's very into Bob right now.)
Yum Yum!
When I went into the kitchen after story time with the kids I found some little feet poking out of my kitchen cupboard! hehehee
He loves parking his backside inside a cupboard and trying to shut the door! :-)
Right-ho I need to go and sort out a pile of laundry. Thanks for visiting. :-)