Christmas morning joy

Wii fit anyone, Santa really came through this year. And boxing training gloves and mits.
Jacko not properly awake, Seamus woke us all way too early.

The face of a very happy boy, love getting this sort of reaction Christmas morning.

Seamus woke up before 5 this morning and tried to wake his brothers up too, and me(trouble is I couldn't go back to sleep, may need a Nana nap before driving home). He is so much into the whole Chritmas thing. Note the empty glass, cookies gone and a half eaten carrot in the background, love that he still wants to do this.

It's been a lovely morning so far but boy am I ready for a nap now. Wishing a lovely day to every one.

Photos from last night

Just taking a little time out from the Christmas day festivities to post a few shots from last night.

Ahhh, photos going the wrong way around again, this is the end of the service. all the kids came up to celebrate the birthday of Christ with a cake and ballons(they all fell from the ceiling, the kids thought it was really cool)Paddy with the cake. Mary, Joseph(Joseph, guess why he got the part,lol) and the Angels(so cute aren't they) and yes they do have blurred faces, didn't think to ask the parents if I could post these.
The sheppards (Seamus is the first one)

Do you think Mary and Joseph could sit any further apart? Joe looks a little apprehensive about the prospect of fatherhood.

Fr Vihn and some of the kids, wished I had a wider lens with me, there where heaps of kids all gathered there.

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas.

Just a quick post to wish every one a Merry Christmas. I have photos of the boys in their nativity costumes, Joseph as guess who and Seamus made a cute little shepard, but no time to post tonight, have other duties to tend too (wink). Better go and pull out that wrapping paper.
Joy to you all.

Guess who came to visit???

Thursday night landmark(the company my dh works for) had their family Christmas party and the big guy came to hand out pressies to the younger kids. I had to laugh at Seamus' body language here, don't you think maybe he thinks he is too old to still be sitting on Santa's knee? He missed that some of the other kids he is friends with weren't able to attend and he was one of the oldest and didn't really know the younger kids, still he had an good night and loved the billabong pencil case he received. He is right into the Christmas spirit at the moment and has been the one that has decorated the house and made lots of Christmas projects. I am going to miss it when the boys have outgrown the fun of preparing for the season or hopefully they never will.

More snowflakes

Stamps-butterflies are winter's snowflake, hero arts snowflakes- cuttlebug white and gold embossing powder

Scallop on the lid of box- fiskars threading water punch.

Just a little gift box I made using one of PTIs timeless templates for Joseph's Kris Kringle at school. they were only allowed to spend $2.00 and as there is not much around for that I made the box and he filled it with lollies, stuck to our limit and every one was happy, at least I hope Taylah was.

We're such dorks.

Friday I drove up to Strathalbyn to spend the night with Donna and family and indulge in our little Twilight addiction. What a fun couple of days we had. we watched the movie twice, yes I do know we are a little sad, but once was just not enough. the rest of the time was spent talking Twilight,eating out, more talking Twilight, giggling,computer time, mare chatting and very quick trip to her lss which is sadly closing down soon. We had very little sleep but a lovely time and it made me realise just how much I miss her, there is nothing like spending time in good company. On the Saturday, viewing two, we took young Cam with us and he was out official photographer for the day. Getting these shots took lots of embarrassed giggles and lots of "Oh we're so sad". I love the last one of Donna patting Edward on the butt, I forced her to do it,lol. Loved the movie, I know it had lots of things in it that I could say weren't right or exactly the same as the book but really it didn't matter that much, I just went along for the pure enjoyment and the eye candy of course. The only thing that I didn't rally like was that it didn't go long enough.
So Donna, thanks so much girl, there is nobody I wanted to see the movie more than you, love you. And can't sign off without thanking her DH for indulging us in our little twilight fantasy world and allowing to have some time together, thanks Andrew.

I made her do it...

Christmas projects.

Jumping on the snowflake band wagon even though we do not have a single snow flake any where near Christmas in this part of the world. It's is still such a universal Christmas symbol though and there are times during December when I would love a few feet of snow to cool us down. This is for a class I am doing this Wednesday. The large snowflake and snowflake embossing folder are by cuttlebug I purchased from Bizzybecs ,the snowflake stamp is hero arts(used with white embossing powder and rubbed over with tim holtz distress ink in china blue and vintage photo) and the greeting Kaiser from my lss..

My countdown to Christmas album/journal, messy writing and all. I generally tend not to

use my horrid writing on scrapbook projects but I really want to get this done and I figure it is quicker (and probably more authentic) for me to pick up a pen and write. I still have some blinging up to do on the cover, add a few charms, maybe some ribbons etc, but that will come. The main thing is that I am keeping up fairly well inside. It does help that I premade the whole lot before December. Next year when I do this though I will not bind it first, or maybe use binder rings instead of the bind it all all some things I have decided to change or add and that is difficult when it is all bound together, you live and learn.

Optio awesomeness-for Donna

Not the most flattering angle but the way the water is bending everything is cool, I held the camera under the water leaned over and shot up.

I am not an animal...the wind was blowing the water causing some weird distortion.

Today I took the two younger boys down to the lake for the first swim of the season, a bit cool for my my liking but they never seem to mind it. Any way I thought I(or rather the boys) would give my new little camera a whirl in the water and test out the underwater setting. I was really impressed. Not that it is amazing standard or anything but for a little point and shoot the clarity was pretty cool. These have only been re sized for the web, not PSed.

it's started

deep in concentration, cutting out the tree cover half way through completion
the final product, may add a bit of ribbon ,not sure yet though as this one Seamus made is for a male.

the official countdown to Christmas. Ill prepared as I always seem to be at least the school teachers gifts have had a start made on them, mainly thanks to Seamus not going to school today. not that he was really sick or anything, just worn out I think, I couldn't wake him this morning and he had been up a lot throughout the night with bad dreams. I know myself how hard it is to concentrate without much sleep so I'm sure a small person has even less coping mechanisms. He wasn't going to get much benefit from school the way he was and a day at home with Mum seemed just the cup of tea.

I took these photos and a few others for my countdown to Christmas album

inpired by the one ali edwards made. Mine's nothing as elaborate as hers but will still serve it's purpose, to keep a record of the events in our home leading up to Christmas day. I will post some photos of it tomorrow, hopefully with a few of these pics in them. I am so thinking maybe I need to ask santa for one of the little epson picturemates, just so I can print photos for these type of projects quickly at home without having to go to the trouble of always changing the settings on my main printer(that and a prepaid wireless mobile thingy)Mmmm, I wonder will he listen.

Guess where I'm going?

Two weeks and two days. Tavelling up to Strath to see Don and of us are going to catch the movie in Mt Barker, woo hoo can't wait. It's been so hard reading reviews about it on blogs from the States, but not long now.

For Coco

Looking a little bewildered about being in a different house but seconds later she drifted off to sleep so I'm guessing she really wasn't too worried.

Coco's little Essie had a sleep over at our house. She fit right in and tinkled around the house after me all day. Such a sweet and gentle little soul.

go Seamus, my little disco elf

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Love the words to this song.

Some more photos from off my phone, I down loaded the memory card when I changed over phones a couple of weeks ago. I have been having quite a chuckle seeing some of these shots that I didn't know were there. I was quite happy with the way they printed up, was not sure if they would.

Title cut using the klic-n-kut and the font galuli, scalloped edge and dot edge cut using the cuttlebug and the quickkutz cookie cutter borders. Stamping done with hero arts stamps and just rite-stampers (avalable here ) Circle punch ek success and scallop and larger circle spelbinder's nestabilities.

A little hanging I did using doodlebats from scrapnfonts and my klic-n-kut. I found the inspiration for this on someones blog and of course forgot to write down whose. I really must remember to start doing this. So if it came from your blog, thanks, a really cool idea.

It makes me happy

to see these apples forming on my trees. There is nothing nicer than fresh fruit and vegies straight from the garden.

It's a record

This is my fourth post today. these photos are a couple I found on my phone that I had forgotten I had taken in Melbourne a few weeks back.

Jane very happy with her hand bag find at the Vic market (love that place) Sharon and Maria sipping drinks on Lygon street. We had the yummiest meal at an Italian restaurant called Cafe Corretto(or something like that, I remember it sounded like cornetto)

It was the most beautiful barmy evening and was lovely to be able to sit outdoors. Very unseasonal for Melbourne in October.

Lady bird, lady bird.

There is a welcome invasion of lady beetles at our local park. Aren't they the sweetest little things, those and gorgoeus lime green lace wings are my favourite of all the bugs, the rest of them I can quite easily live without,lol.

My birthday

Mmmm, Mississippi mud cake and mixed berries, mmmm. Thanks Coco. The girls.

On Friday I celebrated my 41st birthday with the girls. Had a great day, lovely pressies and Coco made me a cake. Love days out with this crew. Was extra special because Donna was able to make it down from Strath and have lunch with us. thanks Don, thanks girls.

Congratulations

To my pal Kathryn for having her first design team layouts published in the scrap heap newsletter, check them out here. Well done girlie, you rock...

We did the dance, we did the zombie dance.

To be sung to the tune of the monster mash (you know it's gonna be stuck in your head all day right?)As I mentioned in my last post the school did a dress down for down syndrome day last friday (Halloween) Seamus thought he would put a a bit of a show and do the zombie dance. I don't like the first photo, he looks so creepy with his eyes rolled back like that, an ability he inherited from him paternal Grandpa, th elast shot cracks me up though. It's amazing how a bit of cheap face paint and a grungy wig can transform someone so completely.

Happy Halloweeen

Hi, it's Susy the slack blogger here dropping in to wish everyone a happy All Hallows Eve. although it's not something we really celebrate here (sadly) two of the boys did go off to school this morning dressed as a tennis player and a zombie (with dreadlocks,lol) The school are doing a fund raising day for down syndrome, dress down for down, so they had the option of either casual clothes or a Halloween costume. No photos as yet due to the fact that they only decided this morning to dress up and we have spent the morning running around trying to organise something leaving no time for photos so hopefully tonight the costumes will be still intact enough to photograph. I have stocked up on some lollies just in case (hopefully) some of the kids around the area come trick or treating.

Must be a record

this is the first time in a few days that I have even turned the computer on, not a very common event for me as I usually have withdrawals if I haven't read my emails by breckie time. I just popped in to remind you that registration is now open for JessicaSprague's class (info in a previous post below)
cheerio.

Once upon a time...

My eldest son Jackson sported gorgeous long golden locks, as apposed to the short dark mohawk he has now (not the big punk rock mohawk, think more Becks type, maybe a little longer) this photos was taken around five years ago while on holiday in Victor Harbor. I have decided to do a little mini album on all the dos he has had, it seems to change so often.

The paper is called Jackson lodge (appropriate I thought) by Collage Press, the foam stamps are from the KOTM set by Lisa Bearnson released last year some time, I think they did a re release agian only a few months back. I stamped the stars around my journaling and title with versamark and then embossed, the brown stars were stamped onto vellum with jumbo java chalk ink then cut out, the title was also stamped in jumbo java(love that colour) Please don't look too close at the stitching along the horizontal straight strip, one thing I learned after doing this is not to try to sew after mounting your photos, very difficult. That's what you get for last minute decisions. The journaling was printed onto vellum, haven't used that stuff in scrapbooking for quite some time and kinda enjoyed it. The layout is from a sketched design I found on a piece of scrap paper in a nook next to my computer, I can't even remember where it came from or what the original looked like but I must have liked it to bother to sketch it out. I did vary a bit from the sketch but I always seem to. I do have a book to put ideas into but seldom seem to use it, I guess if inspiration hits I just grab whatever is closest to write on.

TFL

Any one planning on doing this?

You will find more info on Jessica's blog or on the web address above. It sounds like a really cool class and one everyone could benefit from, scrapper or not, and the best part it is absolutely free, gotta love that.

an album in an afternoon

DH was at work, number one son was at work, number two son was still holidaying at port Fairy with his Nana and numbers three and four were playing at a mutual friends house. the dog needed a walk and my laundry basket was resembling mount Everest but I managed to ignore it all and grasp the opportunity for a bit of peaceful scrapping time. I'm so glad I did because I managed to finish an entire album in one sitting(excluding the quick dash to my lss to get another packet of rubons) It's done very simply but it is done and the kids love looking through it as it's a lovely reminder of the perfect day we had in Port Fairy last week. It is one of the most beautiful spots anywhere on a sunny spring day and the weather really turned it on for us. We lazed around the wharf, eating fish and chips and dangling the rods in for quite a few hours. Divine, no pressures no rush and NO telephones. After this we went out to Yambuk to see a family we have been friends with for years, nothing like catching up with old mates that you are totally comfortable with. the kids all played outside on the four wheelers(they have four too), the Mums sat inside and drank champers and the Dad's chatted and drank coffee. No pics, we just enjoyed the moment. They have just moved into their new house and I must say that I am totally jealous but not in the nasty way, in the I'm so happy for you way. the house it beautiful, one of the nicest new houses I have ever been into with all the mods and cons and even gorgeous new furniture to match. they deserve every bit of it as they have both worked hard running a large dairy farm, don't know how I would cope with all those early mornings. what was meant to be a quick visit ended up at around 11pm, time flies when your happy(again glad I don't milk cows early in the morning)

that's ginger beer Paddy is drinking, not a real one,lol. I have to write that in on the journaling spot as soon as I find my slick writer.
It's a little hard to see here but I have layered the large flower rubons, one on the outside and one on the top of the acrylic album, the effect is quite cool IRL.
A few beady dangly bits
and nothing to do with the album, but thought the jar of pastel buttons looked pretty in the sun.