I’m so proud of Miss K, she is getting so great at drawing and putting her ideas on paper. These are some of the pictures she’s brought home from school lately. She’s nearly 6 and I think these are just fantastic! (I could be a little biased though):
A few months ago I was in an op shop and came across these. I’m fairly sure that my Mum had these when I was a kid although I think these are cutters with US holidays on them. They are still great and nostalgic and funky so I got them for the girls to use. Its been over six months and I forgot they were there until the other day. I rolled out this very crumbly chocolate ginger bread dough and Little L and I got to work.
After making a heap of these we got on to making tiny gingerbread men, lots of them!
Little L enjoyed pressing out the shapes but also eating the dough when I wasn’t looking! Tis a messy business this cooking!
The end result was a big pile of tupperware shaped bikkies ready to ice later and a nice top up of the small bikkie jar:
I did like the tupperware shapes but I had to make sure I floured them well each time or else they stuck to the dough. Did you have these as a kid?
In-between the rain showers there have been more and more slightly sunny days as we hurtle towards spring. Little L and I have been taking advantage of the sunshine as much as we can although the wind is still a bit cold. To combat the wind the other day I set up this little cubby house for her to shelter her. She loved it of course.
This is nothing more than some sheets, pegs, two chairs, some bath mats and two crates. She ran inside to get her baby doll and I got her some books. She played happily under there for a while before getting another crate and making it into a row boat. I love their imagination at this age!
I just love using freecycle. We’ve picked up quite a few great items using it (which I’ll share on another post). This is our latest acquisition, a doll’s high chair. I love that its hand made and wood and big enough for any of her dolls. This one was originally a matte baby blue with stickers stuck all over it. I bought a couple of cans of high gloss enamel white paint and set to work. Took a bit of covering but the result is gorgeous! Little L loves it as it was part of her birthday present which she had a short while ago (which I still haven’t blogged about!!). Do you use freecycle? What have been some of your best pickups?
I did not mean for there to be four weeks between posts. Considering that last year I was doing the photo a day challenge it would have been unthinkable! Alas, I have a good reason for my absence…I was painting, then leading then running a party then on holidays!
A few weeks ago I attended a meeting for our church holiday club and by the end of it I was thinking up ways to decorate the hall in a jungle/Indiana Jones theme. I needed a good painting challenge to sink my teeth into and I came up with the crazy notion of painting 23 metres (by 1 metre) of jungle on a roll of brown paper to cover the sides of the church hall. It took me around a week and a half of almost continuous painting and I must say, it was good therapy! Here’s how it ended up looking:
My job was to run the games and that was quite a task when we had around 40-45 kids come each of the three days. My voice took around four days to recover fully afterwards but it brought back memories of youth group leading, Girl’s Brigade leading and Vacation Bible Schools that we were involved in over the years. My hubby was Indiana Jones and led the kids around in-between activities and told the stories. We were just part of a team of amazing people who all worked very very hard to make the program work.
When the holiday club finished I had one day in-between to clean my house and prepare for my daughter’s birthday party. Seeing as I had started planning it long before volunteering for the holiday club I had done a lot of preparation already and just needed to do those final things that week and on the day before. It all came together really well and she, her sister and six friends had a great time. I tell you, after yelling out game instructions all week to 45 5-12 year olds, doing pass the parcel with 7 three year olds was a breeze! We had a music theme and I might blog more about that later but for now, here’s a pic of my food table:
The second the party was finished I put the washing on because my next task was to pack for a few days away down south. I hadn’t done one ounce of packing until the night before! We had a wonderful few days away and again, I’ll save that for another post but for now, here’s a photo from our break:
We have a few days left before school returns here in WA and those days are being spent catching up on all the things we haven’t yet done during the school holidays. So, thats what I’ve been doing for the last four weeks and the reason for the major lack in blog posts.
Oh and today I started a new blog (which is here) but I’ll also save that for another post!
As I have mentioned before, I recently set up my art space. I decided to set up a specific area in the room for the girls to paint, draw or playdough in too. The idea being that they can watch me and learn and we can be together in the same room. The girls love it, they just come in and sit next to me and start an activity unless its something like this where I need to do some setup.
As you can see, Little L loves the space and recently she’s requested to paint more often. I like having them next to me as the computer is close to them too and I can help out as well as get on with other tasks. Great fun!
For a while now I’ve been hoping to revive some of the girls clothes that had become stained or off colour so I picked up a packet of dye from the Art Shed the other day and had a go. It wasn’t hard at all. I chose the stovetop method because I didn’t think my washing machine was suitable for that method.
The clothes started out a grey-green or light pink and this is how they ended up:
The last shot shows the only item that was already pure white. I was amazed that the ribbon and stitching stayed white. Looks gorgeous! I think this whole process was easy and quite addictive. Hmmmm, what can I dye next?
I clean the floor after she drops her breakfast, I wash her breakfast bowl. I make her lunch and put it in her bag and get out her uniform the night before a school day. She rushes out the door after I’ve done her hair without as much as a thank you. I wash her clothes and hang them out then put them away when they’re dry and folded. She doesn’t really notice. I make her favourite dinner but she’s in a bad mood and tired so she screws up her nose and asks for desert instead. I go with her to her special Girl’s Brigade Mums night and she is instantly full of kisses, hugs and thank yous. Lesson learnt: kids notice not the things you DO for them but the times you are THERE for them.
I haven’t joined in with the We Play linkup for a while but thought this was a good opportunity. Little L loves to play Doctors and the other day I found an unused gauze bandage in the cupboard and gave it to her. Immediately her Omo (Elmo) had to have a sore arm and was put to bed. She took good care of him until he was all better and loved adding a few things to her Drs bag. As you can see, she takes her Doctoring very seriously!
Ok, so its been two weeks since I blogged and especially since putting up a photo of the day. I have two very good excuses. The first week was the craziest week I’ve had in a long time, preparation for my parents visiting, appointments and general mad rushing around. The second week we’ve been away and got back properly last night.
My parents are visiting from over east and will be here for a little while. They arrived Friday a week (and a bit) ago and the next day we took off to Cunderdin. We used to go there a lot when I was growing up but it had been 15 years since I’d visited the Smarts farm so it was great to return. We took K out of school for four days so we could all go and I’m glad. The girls had a great time and Miss K is such an outdoorsy kid that she got herself attached to Milly the dog. Usually she’s afraid of them but this dog has such a beautiful nature. Here she is:
Going anthill hunting….so dry there!
We got to ride on the back of the ute to feed the sheep, go hunting for an ants nest and play on some huge tyre inner tubes. After a couple of days we were off to Mukinbudin/Wialki to visit an old family friend.
Hanging up the washing with fly nets on
We used to visit Muka when I was a kid and it was so nice to visit again. There is something refreshing about going to the country, even if it was very dry and dusty (and there were plenty of flies this time). I am always amazed at the quietness, darkness and brightness of the stars when in the wheatbelt. Just beautiful.
At Wialki we spent time relaxing, doing nothing, taking photos, walking around the property and Miss K got to help fill the sheep’s water trough (and clean it). It actually rained and was quite cool on the last day which was a nice change. With nothing to break up the landscape, the clouds seem to go on forever!
What usually is a three and a half hour drive back to Perth took us about six hours with kids but that was ok. We came home again via Wyalkatchem and Toodjay.
We had one day in-between before we were off again to the Perth Keswick Autum Convention where we camped in for the first time as a family. Michael and I used to do that a bit before kids but I’ve been waiting till we’re past the pram/cot stage to do it with the girls.
This is at the Convention, Miss K is on stage with the other kids as they did an item before the main speaker came up.
We really enjoyed ourselves, Miss K had a great time with the kids in their own little meetings and we enjoyed the speaker. Little L got to have her first ever horse ride (they have free horse rides and face painting on the Sunday afternoon) and I now have piles and piles of washing to do! It was worth it though. So, here we are, home again and not too tired (well, the girls were a bit). Phew!
