time with the kids

ive really been focusing on enjoying some time with the kids this month. so im sorry for the lack of posts! i was just so busy in nov and dec that i took a month off from all my "work" and just did family stuff.

here are some pics of the some of the stuff we have done since my last post.


we had a wedding to prepare and organise :) brianna and liam got married (briannas idea). liam was SUCH a stud ...






we had some fake smiles ...


some even faker smiles ...


and some real smiles ...


liam proved that "white men can jump" ...


and also learnt how to use a potty (apparently its easier to pee in a potty while wearing stilletos" ...


liam and oates found their best friends - each other ...


and oates learnt to sit on command (thankyou puppy preschool!) ...


we did finger painting (and liam did face/leg painting) ...


i got a second-hand double jogging stroller. this isnt my exact one, mine is fairly faded and doesnt have these inserts on the seats. plus mine only cost me TEN DOLLARS from lifeline. so now i can walk the dog and the kids together.



the only thing i didnt do this week was go to WW! (eep my bad!)

i do actually have scrap shares (shock horror) i will post them up tonight :)

have a great weekend!!!


xxx K

Alice in Wonderland Garden Tea Party

brianna's official party has now finished :) it was yesterday and it was SO worth all the effort!

i normally invite over all the family friends with their kids so we end up having 20-something kids. but this time i decided to make it a "big girls only" party, and i narrowed the list down to 8 girls. this way i could focus more on doing individual treats for the 8 girls and it wouldnt blow my budget!

my fav aspects of this party:
- i did everything girly! so much fun!
- i LOVED the hanging paper lanterns and paper flowers
- i learned how to do a topsy turvy cake
- my mum and dad came!!!!!!!!!! this is HUGE cos my mum doesnt travel well. so she has only visited moranbah a three times since we moved here. so that was a huge blessing that she not only made it out here, but she also got to enjoy the party :) i really appreciated that mum!
- all the girls got presents during the games, these included barbies, colouring in books and fancy shoes. i kept my eyes out for specials leading up to the party so each girl got a nice toy to take home.


here are some pics:

the paper lanterns, fairies, glass candle hangers (i love these so much!), and crepe paper flowers. the pink tulle in the background is from my daughters bedroom. i hung it from the roof and draped it around the food and cake table to stop the flies getting on the food. was so handy - ill definitely be doing that again!


another shot of how i set it all up. i had heaps of teapots everywhere. on the sitting table i had them down the middle and i had coloured pencils, darryl lee large lollypops, lollypop sticks, massive sherbet straws and colourful fake flowers in them. i also had them on the food and cake table.

each setting at the table had their own lace placemat, mismatching teacups and saucers from Lifeline, their goodiebags and M&Ms. the goodiebags didnt have lollies in them, they had bracelets, necklaces, and lots of cool hairbands, clips and a scrunchie.

i did a doughnut tier instead of a cupcake tier for something different. ive done cupcake ones before but doing it this way made me realise just how much easier it was to fit the donuts on then cupcakes. i always seem to have the icing not quite fit when i make cupcakes.


this photo looks really pink cos of the tulle behind the table. but this was the cake i made. the top tier is buttercake, the bottom one is mudcake. colouring the fondant took awhile but was worth it. i had so much fun doing it cos i havent done anything like that before. the sticks on top were candles i found at coles. the teapot handle isnt part of the design, i shoulda moved the teapot behind it before photographing. oh well :)



my mum took pics of brianna so once i get those ill post those up. i didnt take any cos she was and she is fab at photography. but here is one i snapped of my neice Hula that afternoon after everyone had left while we were all relaxing beside the slip'n'slide. shes so cute :)


thank goodness the next birthday is at the end of 2009!! yay!


xxx K

What a beautiful day!!!

Brianna turned four today :)

(warning: longest blog post EVER - for the family's benefit)

yesterday was NOT so wonderful!!!! i spent the morning cooking a cake, but it was one of those chocolate cakes where u cook most of the ingrediants in a saucepan, then u let it cool, then u mix in the flours and eggs. so i did the first bit in the morning - then it cooled while the kids slept - then in the arvo i added the other ingrediants. i was planning on icing and decorating the cake at nighttime. but when i added THE LAST EGG it was ROTTEN!!!!!!!!!!!!! i was soooooooo spewin. i had to throw the whole thing in the bin. i was tired and emotional too, cos my hormones are crazy with this new pill im on.

so i gave up and i got packet mixes and made it lastnight. i was pretty disappointed cos i like to make the kids cakes. i had to stay up till 10pm to get it out of the oven. then i had to get out of bed at 2am when it had cooled (it was a HUGE cake) and wrap it in cling wrap. then i had to get up AGAIN at 4.30am to ice and decorate the cake cos i wanted it all to be done before brianna got out of bed.

i was SO tired!

but today just got better and better. brianna had an amazing day filled with friends, love, laughter and fun. i was so glad that troy and i got to give her such a fun birthday.

basically today brianna called the shots. anything she wanted to do ... she did! so here is the low-down:'


4am - brianna remembers in her sleep that i said her presents would be out in the hallway so promptly decides to wake up in the middle of the night for them!!!!! "go back to bed brianna!" haha.


5.30am - brianna wakes up again, this time we let her get out of bed for pressies from us :) she got three boardgames, 2 dressups, a red and white polka dot party dress for today, a gorgeous purple ballerina tutu, a cash register for the "shop" she set up at home out of cardboard boxes, a hi5 DVD game, a barbie, some little pet-shop dogs and her big pressie was a barbie doll house. she wouldnt stop playing with it all day!

her barbie doll house:


one of her new dressups:

this is the party dress and the register. its amazing how u can find presents for kids that are SO cheap, and they just adore what they get given. after getting her other presents and buying food for the parties, i only had a few dollars left out of her "birthday party budget" so i ducked into the local Salvos to see if they had anything in there. being a mining town its amazing what u find in there!!! i quite often get name brand clothing in mint condition there for $1. anyways, the register was only 50c and the dress was $1!!!!!!!!!!!! Gods blessing hey. He knew what would make brianna happy :)


9am - breakfast while watching Tinkerbell. i love that movie!!


10am - her "cake party". her alice in wonderland birthday party is on saturday morning, but today we had a morning tea at the local cafe so brianna could have a birthday cake on her actual birthday. kinda like a mini-birthday-party. some of her friends were invited and we just basically hung out and ate too much cake. very relaxed. i so enjoyed it!

here is the cake i made for this morning. she loves Tinkerbell so i couldnt resist that cake transfer!!! mind you, i ripped it a bit while putting it on (oops). its a bit hard to tell from the angle of the pic but its a two tier cake.


i found these cute edible icing frangipanis for the cake im making on saturday, so i stole some for this cake.

poor brianna actually put her mouth ON this candle when she was blowing it and she burnt her lip a little bit on the wax. poor little silly billy.


a few of her closest friends.


Midday - Home for a rest. she was exhausted.

3pm - We cracked open her new boardgames. They were awesome!!! she was so excited about them, and wanted to play all of them more than once. mummy needs a longer attention span haha. but i survived - barely. My favs were the Dr Seuss ones!! If you have young kids i highly recommend checking them out. We got the "ABC Game" and the "Cat in the Hat game". Brianna is pretty good with letters and numbers so picked it up quickly. They will help her practice her alphabets while also being fun.

5pm - Pizza at the park. Brianna got to choose the "what and where" for dinner. Family tradition. whoever's bday it is gets to choose. she loves pizza but doesnt have it often so i knew she would pick that. and cos it was a special occasion we let her have softdrink. she isnt allowed it normally. so she thought she was the queen. she doesnt like alot of softdrinks anyways, only raspberry lemonade.

liam with his pizza face. he thought it was awesome that he could have softdrink. he guts it more than brianna. typical boy! he was such a good boy today.


brianna giving me a dazzling smile for the camera haha:




Then it was just the normal routine of showers, milk, teeth and into bed. they got to stay up till 7.30pm tonight.

and thus ends my long long LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG blog post. i wanted to record it all for future reference!!!


xxx K

My exciting news ...

... well, its exciting for me and my fam anyways! :D Here is my new little poochie named Oates. He is an alaskan malamute and he is 6 weeks old.

He is just a complete joy! Oates has a lovely nature and is very cuddly. Troy and I have wanted our kids to have a dog for awhile, but it was never the right time for a variety of reasons (eg. no fence) but im very excited to have taken the step now.

My two fav things about Oates are that (1) he looks like he is always wearing a batman mask, and (2) the fact that one ear flops over, and one stands up straight. They are always like that!! You can see it above.

Anyways, just a quick entry cos Troy called me from work asking me to post up a pick of Oates so he can show his mate :)


xxx K

Im back!!

Wowza - im never going to move house over the Christmas/New Year period again. It was chaotic and terrible!!! Anyways, ill be back tomorrow with a proper post with some very exciting news :)

Just wanted to pop in and let you know that im still alive!


xxx K

idea for displaying prints

My #1 fav photographers for inspiration and drooling is the amazing husband and wife duo over at the image is found.

Tonight im feeling a bit under the weather - i think im getting a cold. and i was just doing a very quick check of my fav blogs before falling into bed for some much-needed sleep, and Nate had posted up how he displays his family photos. i adore this idea!! so i just had to jump on here and share. he said that he finds it hard to select which pics get onto the wall, which i can SO relate to! so he just chops and changes the pics all the time.



Its just a magnetic white board and a heap of cute mini magnets. pick them up for cheap from an office supplies store.

i can imagine the most perfect corner of our new kitchen that this would suit fabulously. so ill double check the house tomorrow cos its been a month since we have been in there and we get the keys in the morning.

what do u think? also, make sure u check out the image is found blog. they will blow your mind.


xxx K

my wishlist ...

Ive been having fun planning the furnishings for the new house and have been daily hopping around the internet checking out blogs and being inspired when it comes to interior design. Here are a couple of things that Ive spied tonight that I love. I am definitely gonna get the wall decal below!!

This decal is 8.5" high by 23" wide and would look PERFECT on the mocha wall in my living room. I love the idea of being able to put something other than photoframes on my walls. This can be found here for $35 (au$) which includes postage - and I could just about spend another $100 or so on the other gorgeous designs in that etsy store. Wouldnt it be fabulous to design your own little signs to put above ur kids bed and get them made there!!! I would LOVE to do that as my kids share a room with each side of the room being a mirror image of the other, except for colours, and itd suit the design perfectly.

And check out these cuties.


They are from this etsy store!! How sweet.

Anyways, im off to bed early. I had a terrible day. The kids were grumpy all day and had a few timeouts each, they didnt have a daytime sleep, i got stung by a bee on my calf muscle at the pool this arvo and it REALLY hurt, I was really tired cos lastnight i couldnt get to sleep till after 2am, and I ate my emotions by having a slight "im tired" binge of chocolate this arvo. Im so disappointed with myself!!

But I have to look on the bright side - at least my kids were with me to cuddle and kiss. Alot of parents dont have that this Christmas, so I cant take that for granted.

Im off to bed now. Night!


xxx K



PS. Catherine, that is the decal i was telling you about! ;) Christmas wishlist material :D

PPS. It was 44 degrees today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! hottest day of the year. My shoes were basically melting into the road on the way to the pool.

Goodbye to my beautiful friend Dee

Back when I was on the CIS DT I was fortunate to meet a wonderful person - Dee Lewthwaite. You may remember this post I made for her.

Over the past year she has been struggling with cancer, and this morning her body couldnt take anymore and she passed away. We used to sit in msn for ages and chat, and it saddens me that she isnt around to make the world a brighter place anymore. She will be missed by so many, especially the CISters. As she was very active in that community when I was a DT member there. I wish I was closer so I could go to her funeral, but I cant travel to Victoria at the moment because I cant afford it. This is so sad, and Ive been crying on and off about it all night since I found out. I wasnt going to post about it here but in the end I wanted to share in case someone who knew Dee didnt know the news and came here.

If you knew Dee and want to pass on a message to the family this is her blog:
http://dee-days.blogspot.com/. Her dad checks the blog and Dee taught him how to post messages etc.

She leaves behind two beautiful little children. And her scrapbooks will be there for these children as they grow up - a testament as to how much they were loved by their mother.

Ill miss you Dee ... I love you heaps.


xxx K

so what do u think?

I wanted something a bit cleaner. so i dumped the left column and u can find the category links just below the banner. ive got 191 posts here though so i am NOT going to go through those and categorize them though :) so the sections only start today.

i am SO looking forward to next year, and this blog will help me plan stuff and document the process.

the blog will no longer only just be scrapbooking as alot of my family check back here regularly. so itll be about other stuff more to do with whats going on in my life. up until just recently i didnt really like to talk about my life online. but ive decided to open up just a little bit. the change of thinking came about because id love to be able to read back on this a year or two from now and not just have scrapbooking stuff documented.

anyways, ive been editing photos and working a bit on this tonight so im very tired. so just a quicky post tonight. i will be back with scrap shares tomorrow!


xxx K

Changes are coming ...

UNDER CONSTRUCTION

Hopefully will finish tonight :) Check back lata!


xxx K

i need a fresh start ...

i SO cant wait for the new year. i think this is the most anticipation i have felt for a "new years" ever. i really feel that at this stage in my life i need to recognise a new beginning. this is for many reasons including:

• im feeling a bit burnt out after a tremendously busy November
• ive just rejoined WW with the goal to lose 15 kgs. I tried not long ago to do it from home but was unsuccessful. If I attend the meetings then I always have success. So ive signed up for the "unlimited" plan. And after only 1 week I have lost 1.6kgs already (woohoo!)
• we get the keys to the new house on 22nd December so will be moving over slowly over the Christmas break. We have organised a holiday house for the break, so we are staying there for a bit, then back out here to move, then backwards and forwards a bit over 2 weeks.
• im taking January off in regards to photoshoots - not one! (ok maybe one for my bestie Chantal who had her little baby boy 2 days ago!)
• I need to reorganise and refocus my priority list. Ive yet to sit down and think it all over but I plan on doing this while on holidays.

So until the new year I will be quiet here. I am going to do another post tomorrow or the day after because the next awesome Scrapboxx newsletter is out and its jam-packed full of inspiration!!! So I will be sharing those projects with you here once I get on the other PC, as it has the pics on there.

While on holidays im planning on giving this blog a facelift too, cos its looking very outdated and im SO over that photo in the banner LOL.

The gorgeous Marni Telford is visiting me tomorrow so I am totally excited over that. And maybe I can con her into taking my photo so I can put an updated pic up. We will see how time goes.

Anyways, I hope you ALL have a wonderful Christmas!!!!! And try not to get too carried away with the sales :D

off to mackay tomorrow!

i have two photoshoots booked in, one tuesday, one wednesday. but i will be back by Friday because I have another shoot here in Moranbah on Saturday morning.

i will leave u with this pic of the kids taken a couple of days ago. this is what you resort to when you are trying to save water in Moranbah! the pic isnt perfect, but most of the pics had brianna being quite "indecent", seeing as she is topless here. So this is the best you get :)

poor liam got SO ripped off with his tiny bucket! LOL. im gonna go buy another big one for the nexttime we go swimming in buckets on the patio :D


Have a safe week everyone!


xxx K

BlogParty on tonight!!!

I will be there!!! So if you arent doing anything drop on over cos it only goes for 2 hours and there will be HEAPS of freebies. All you have to do is show up! There is a timetable up so go see whats happenin :)

http://www.scrapware.typepad.com


xxx K

late-night photo editing session!

last night i was up till midnight editing photos for the beautiful Veronica! Here are two of my favs:


If you want to see more go here.

Im really enjoying doing all these Christmas photoshoots, but I tell ya what, it takes alot of time!!! Troy and I have decided that I need to take a break so im going to do only limit it to a couple of shoots in January, then get back to normal in February. Ive done something like 10 family shoots in the last month, plus the wedding, plus an upcoming promotional photoshoot for a school coming up next week. This is alot to take on ontop of my normal SAHM, DT and Scrapware commitments.

Did another shoot this morning and it was awesome!!! ive never met a family with such a unique "family-personality". Their family had their own unique-ness unlike anything ive seen before and it was so much fun to capture in photographs. They had their own vibe going on. Hard to explain!!


xxx K

my life is full of teacups, teapots & birds atm ...

ive been scouring around the thrift shops finding heaps of hidden treasures for Briannas party ... its been so much fun! Ive found some beautiful items that i cant believe people would give away! but i spose one mans trash is anothers treasure :)

i wont share any pics yet, as ill wait until i have found the 20 teacups (i call the style "nanna cups") and the 15 teapots I aim to reach. Im also collected little china/porcelin bird ornaments to decorate the table with. all adds to the "garden" theme!

my fav find so far is a gorgeous teapot shaped like a cottage! the lid of the teapot is the roof of the house - complete with a chimney even! next week im traveling back into mackay for a couple of photoshoots and a catchup with friends so ill go around the shops there and see what else i can find.

i am fearing that ill become a collector of teapots because i just love them! this party is kind of kick-starting my collection. my bro in laws pay me out a bit for drinking real tea out of a teapot ... but i promise you that a cup of tea tastes SO much better out of fine china!

Invitations are done (shown below with the addy/ph smudged out so u cant come stalk my kids!). i chose some images online from random places and brianna got to pick her fav one for her invites. she chose the image of Alice below. so im ordering the invites to be printed today and ill have them by Friday! YaY!


Im also just waiting for a quote on the cake pictured below to be made. Ive always made the cakes myself, so im feeling a bit weird ordering one in. but i will be making her cake for the "family party" we will be having on her actual birthday - the 14th January.