Where to start?

Christmas was happy and hectic and fun and exhausting!

Here’s some pics of Christmas eve out on the lake…

The boat captain/driver and his Nanny

The smallest boat passenger refusing to go to sleep!

The Captain getting to stand on the back of the boat under supervision

Then after the Kidlets finally went to bed it was assembly and Santa sack stuffing time!

Aus’s Santa sack… I think Santa went slightly overboard!

Noah’s Santa sack (I’ll do another post on the making of the Santa sacks soon)

And lastly Santa (aka Daddy) enjoyed his beer and cookie while the reindeer (aka Mummy) polished off the carrot.

Daddy also had an idea to convince Aus that the reindeer had actually been to visit… he took his torch and wandered up the road a bit to a paddock, collected some sheep poo and brought it back to sprinkle on the lawn as ‘reindeer poo’.

It worked and Aus was utterly convinced… the flies enjoyed it too!

More on Christmas day soon

Jingle Bells

Please excuse the lack of recent posts! We have moved out to the holiday house at Lake Charm and are desperately hoping it may warm up enough to actually go for a swim :( There’s also no internet so posts could be a bit sparse until we move home again.

I do have something un to post about though… last week was our Mother’s Group Christmas get together. We’ve been together or 3 years now, since our 3 yr olds (almost 4 yr olds) were born and they have grown up playing together.

This is last years’ Christmas party at a park:

And this is last week at Lake Charm:

(We made the mistake of giving them their presents and then saying ‘Stop! Look up for a photo guys, smile! Smile! Smile! Hey! Up here!’… this is the best photo we got of them all together!)

‘Ok open your presents!’

Rip, tear… ‘Look what I got!!!’ And after all that present opening excitement and considerable amounts of junk food, a quick nap on the sun lounges…

Or a fight over the swing, whichever!  Now we’re just counting down til the big guy comes and there’s more presents to rip and tear and yell ‘Look what I got!!’.

Not long now!!

 

Super Organised! Or Super Bored?!

More wind and rain has started to drive us slightly stir-crazy. In need of something to do, we decided to be a little bit early with the Christmas cheer this year… 

Yes those are already wrapped presents you see there! Like I said… super bored.

Merry (slightly early) Christmas!

 

Whoops!

Somehow Christmas and family overtook me and coupled with very limited internet access, I missed announcing the winners of 2 jewelery pieces!

Wednesday's winner: Casey!

Christmas Day's winner: Sally!

Congrats to all those who won and thanks everyone for entering!
If the winners could get back to me with their addresses I can send them out!

Christmas was glorious and happy and exhausting. Aus got everything his little mind could ever hope for and he loves it all. Especially the red 'Cars' scooter Santa brought him ;P Noah didn't get quite so much as I was at a loss for what to get a 6 month old. He did get a get toy that plays songs at bed time and a book about Noah's Ark among the many pressies. He was quite content to chew the wrapping paper though. :) Sadly I have no photos because in the traditional mad rush of Christmas, someone.... alright me, forgot to charge the camera batteries! I did steal my Dad and Sister's cameras for a while so I'll be hunting those photos down soon!

2 days after Christmas we set off up to Batemans Bay to visit Jem's family. It turned out to be 10 hours from home until we got there, over mountains and boring stretches. The kids were absolutely fabulous. I couldn't believe how good they were but we all were completely stuffed when we arrived. A trip to the beach with Aus while Noah was with his Grandparents had him looking for crabs, building sand castles and jumping in the waves.



We had a great time up there but only stayed a few days. The long haul back was more than we could face so we stayed a night somewhere along the way and felt much better for it the next day :) We got back New Years Eve and proceeded to party like it was 1999 all over again. Me a little too much so and was put to bed before midnight to snore through the beginning of a new year... I know, I'm not proud. I'm a pathetic drinker, that's why I don't usually do it!

We've been living at the lake since a week before Christmas and only just moved back in to town this week, so most of my time has been trying to wash clothes and put away the mountains of stuff I can't remember ever taking out there in the first place! How does that happen?!

But I have managed to find time to send a few giveaway winnings off:



And most of all, keep working on the silversmithing! I'm really loving it, these are a couple of practice projects:


A Moonstone ring


An Opal pendant.

I've got so many ideas swirling in my head I just cant wait to get into it!!

Hope your Christmas and New Year was fab!

I'm back... finally... and with goodies

Ok perhaps that was a little bit longer of a bloggy break than I had anticipated. Sorry, life has just been so sweet the last 2 weeks I couldn't bare to leave it for a second.

My host parents from Denmark couldn't have been more lovely and were just as I remembered them. Putting them on the train on the last day was very hard and I might have let a tear or 2 escape :( Aus made it a bit harder because he seemed to be of the opinion that we would be picking them up again few days later and taking them home to live with us again. It was hard to explain that it will be a while before he sees them again. But on the up side we are planning our trip to Denmark for the end of next year or the beginning of 2011. I am so excited and can't wait to go back and check out my old stomping grounds! (pfff! lol)

I've also been playing in my little studio and am now teaching myself Silver Smithing, with the help of a few books and lots of trial and error. I have quite a few practice pieces I've made so far and I was thinking perhaps a give away or 5 would be in order? I only need the pieces for a photo really and then they just lay around, why not share the love? So from Monday next week I will give something away every day until and including Christmas day.

That should stave off the 3 ghosts of Christmas, don't you think?

I am super organised this year and as of today have no more presents to journey after. I hate the last minute rush where people seem to lose all dignity and run around like headless chooks trying to find something that suits this person or that person. I think long and hard on what someone needs or would be pleased to receive, then I shop on the net or make it myself. Etsy loves me this year!
I did make the mistake of telling Hubby to get me something thoughtful this year and left it to him to decide what that should be. He's come begging 3 times already for me to just tell him what I want. It's going to be very interesting to see what I open of Christmas morning this year ;P

As for the kids, Aus has been very good- it seems that mentioning the fact that Santa bring presents to good children does a very nice job of curbing bad behavior. I wonder if I can use it all year? He's so excited though and randomly tells strangers in the supermarket that Santa might bring him presents soon. You have to smile and wish you were young enough to still believe that some big fat bloke would creep into your house and leave presents for you. ;P
Noah has no idea what is going on yet and just enjoys his Jolly Jumper. And lately chewing on rusks, now and again choking a bit, blinking and then continuing to chew. He's still the happiest child I know and gives me bright smiles every morning from his cot. All you have to do is look at him to get a smile and not much more for a giggle. His favorite person is his big brother, who gets giggles almost all the time.
We did have 1 day where Austin was intentionally hurting Noah, dropping books and toys on him just to see what he would do. I took him aside and we had a conversion about how little Noah is and how big brothers have to protect and look after baby brothers. The next day he wanted his seat pushed over next to Noah's in the car. I looked in the rear view mirror and noticed that he was holding Noah's hand and smiling. He saw me and said 'Mum, Austin gotta look after Baby Brother, he's very little!'. Awe, it so good to know that at least the most important things I tell him are being take in :)

Anyway, soon I'll put up some pics of what will be on offer for this big giveaway, it's worth a fair bit so make sure you get in on the action!

Christmas and Boxing day...

Christmas morning... Santa came!!
Woo! Presents to be handed out by Nanny and her little helper!

Of course a few to be opened by the little helper...

And helper's Mummy: (thanks hubby)

The sun shone on our tree and the lake glistened...

Brother and his girlfriend already into the lollies:

High five's for the little helper resisting the urge to unwrap ALL presents!

Happy that all present have been unwrapped and the wrapping paper played with more than the presents themselves! Will upload video of the BIG present tomorrow.

On boxing day we'd been asked by my great Aunt to go and sort through some of my Great Grandmother's belongings that had been in storage for the last 27 years. We could take anything that caught our eye. So intending just to take something to make my Aunt and Pop happy I went along...
Whoops... I think I got more than I expected!
These are my gorgeous silver spoons/servers... all are silver!

My oh so cool glasses and crackled glass jug
(which apparently makes farting noises when you pour)

Some jewellery and a little glass bowl which is really cool. My Aunt said it sat on Ma's dressing table as long as she can remember ( I love that). Her watch is there as well with her name engraved on the back. Also not pictured is a rose gold ring with some stones missing but still with a ruby and little diamonds and also a rose gold bangle which I broke. So they are both at the jewellers getting lovingly repaired. Everything I got had some sort of stamp on it and I'm making it my mission to find out what the stamps mean...

My odd array of bits and pieces: a quote and a hym book, seceters that hold onto the flower when you cut it, a funny dust pan in the shape of a woman in a large dress, a Carltonware plate, an Alfred Meakin plate and an A & J Meakin dish.

I also got some interesting books... The atlas is fantastic, with gold on most pages. The same with the book about Queen Elizabeth.

I kid you not, that's not even half of what I came home with. I don't know what I'm going to do with it all but I'm just happy that some of Ma's beautiful things will be staying with me :)

Merry Chrissy!!!

Hope you have better lucky than this poor Santa!

Merry Christmas everyone!! Thanks to everyone who has so generously supported me with my new little 'venture'! And to everyone who left me comments and nice messages.
May you all have the best of Christmases and a Healthy and Happy New Year!

Remember to keep entering the giveaway, the more the merrier!
Back in a few days!

I'm sad... So I'm having a Giveaway!

I went to market today, only one order. So to make myself feel better I want to give away something to a lucky blogger (or 2!). To win all you have to do is leave a comment on this post and tell me the most crazy/funny/fantastic present you ever received or gave to someone. The winner will be drawn out of the hat on New Years Eve so you have a little while to enter.

But here's how you can get more entries: just post about this giveaway on your blog and you will have 2 extra entries (just let me know you have done so).

What will the winner get? This:

A Sterling Silver Necklace with the initials of your family!
(Up to 6 little disks with crystal colours of your choice)

Not enough you say? Well... I thought there should be a second winner. This one will be chosen on how funny/weird/outrageous their present was. I'll chose the one I liked best. This winner will get:

The disk can say anything you like (as long as it fits). Colours can be chosen by the winner.
So start entering! I really want to make 2 bloggers happy in the New Year!

If you want to have a look at some of the other jewellery I make check out this post.
I've done some more pricing for more styles I've come up with, so hopefully they'll be going up in the next 2 days.

Hope you are all ready for the BIG DAY next week! Love Christmas time!