Christmas at the Beach

This year we decided to have Christmas at the beach.  The weather was a perfect 28 degrees.

We packed up and headed to the beach on Christmas eve.  My BAM decided we should take all the food and all the Christmas presents which was his sneaky way of avoiding the shops.  He was the one responsible for packing the cars so who was I to argue.  He even developed the menu plan so that we had everything we wanted. 

Eloise woke first and then we were all up......they were all so excited to be opening presents.  Even when it was their turn to hand out present to each other and Nana and Auntie Kate they had ripped off the paper in the excitement before they managed to hand the gift over.

On Christmas day I don't do the Turkey that is BAM area of specialty.  Every year without fail we have a issue with cooking times.  And true to form we were late eating this year again.  This year BAM had set the oven control to the grill not the fan forced oven....so we lost time in the cooking.

The past few days the weather has stopped beach attendance but the spa has been over used.  Tomorrow there is no rain forecasted so beach here we come.

I have manage to get to the shops and I stocked up on recipe books and magazines (like I need anymore!!!).

I've done some sewing but that has even been hit and miss as I can't keep my eyes open.  All the eating and lack of activity on the rainy days has made us all very lazy.

The boys have conjunctivitis again...will they ever not have it??

A New Tradition

Ginger Breadhouses on Christmas eve.  Girls vs boys. (what was I thinking)

Boys version:  Engineering-ly sound via consumption of all the royal icing...earthquake and fire proof.  Has all the required doors and windows to make the building compliant to the building code.  (Are we getting a feel for BAM's profession). Gaudy has had a very strong influence upon the decorating style.

Girls version:  Perfect colour coded and pretty using a wide variety of lollies and appropriate decorating features.  No ginger bread space to be seen.

As we were completing the task a wise female observer cautioned me....give yourself room to move next year....perfection does not have to happen in the first year.

So we (me) sat back and ate the lollies and let all participants under the school age complete the task.

retromummy: flower sugar giveaway

I'm still learning how to use blogger and I have just found another way to link to posts.

Thanks to Corrie for letting me know this fantastic fabric exists and thanks also for feeding my addiction. This will all make sense if you read my post below. This is the link I was referring to below retromummy: flower sugar giveaway

Back to sewing.

• I promised Eloise I would make her a bag for dancing and it didn't happen.  The term is over.
• I promised the twins I would make them a quilt each and that hasn't happened.
• I promised Eloise I would mend her tail-less horse and that hasn't happened.
• I promised the boys I would make them a stuffed dragon each and that hasn't happened.
• I promised all three I would make then a cushion each for their beds with their names on it.  That has almost happened. 

 

Do I need to stop promising, be more realistic with what I can achieve in the hours of the day I have or just take on less in life?  Probably.  Will I?  No.  Am I an over achiever? Definitely.  I want to do it all.  I want to be the best mum I can be.  I want to be the best at my job and I want to be the best partner and friend.

 

Coupled to this problem........there is my addiction......Hello my name is Veronica and I'm a fabric-holic.

 

And just to feed my addiction Retro mummy has put the ultimate vice up on her blog...a giveaway of the flower and sugar range.  I even went to Lecien web page to get the official picture of the fabric so I would not be stealing anyones photos

 

Perfecting the posy

For my birthday my next door neighbour made me a posy of flowers from her garden.  It has been a long time since a saw a posy like this. 

It reminded me of how I used to see flowers as a child.  I can even remember giving my Mum a posy of African violets.  A posy is unheard of these days (well in my world it is).  As one of my best friends said "flowers these days always come in a box".   She's a midwife and is constantly surrounded by floral tributes and she is right they all come in those horrible coloured boxes.

So I've decided to conquer the posy.  I've set myself a challenge to perfect the posy.  I've started by looking at what plants my neighbour grows and looking around at my garden to see what have already that might be suitable.  Then I'm going to harass my neighbour (sorry Jan) for tips. Needless to say I'm off to the nursery this weekend (I was going anyway but now I have extra incentive).

Eloise dance concert was last weekend and parents had to present their child with a gift at the end.  So I made her a posy.  Here is my first attempt.  She loved it (I didn't really have a too critical an audience on my first attempt).

3rd Birthday

  

The boys have turned three.  It feels like they should be turning 30.  How can 3 years feel so long yet so short. 

So I made two pinata cakes.  So very slightly different that you would hardly notice.  This was easier than I thought.  The tricks were:having the right the bowl size, oiling the bowl before coating it with chocolate and heating the bowl to get them out.

I even made a cake for each for the inside an added lots of lollies.

We did however have trouble

We were not able to crack it with the hammer.  It seems in efforts to make it sturdy I also made it unbreakable.  So the knife came to the rescue

And once it was open they didn't stop.  So I had to be mean mummy and remove the cakes to prevent hyperactivity occurring on bed time...though it was a futile exercise as they are still over excited today.

The weekend break

Took a short break to Adelaide this weekend to catch up with friends, eat lots of food and spend lots of time at the beach.

Not much sewing was done but lots of reading.  Discovered the Jamie Durie Source book

this looks like it will become my new bible for a while.

We ate nachos and watched DVD's (well some people did..some fell asleep..I blame the lounge room feng shui)



I did manage to get Patchwork by Sea in Brighton.  Bought some more Kaffe Fassett fabrics (re:challenge its not 2011 yet).  I also found patterns by Chitter Chatter

and some by Judy Newman Designs.  I have since found her blog a very fine house

Back to business

Life at home has been really hectic and not much sewing has been happening.  This has been frustrating me especially since I was given a brand new sewing machine for my birthday.  My BAM bought me a Brother 1500D

So in order ensure I find the time to sew I am setting myself a challenge for 2011.  I am going to track my work in 2011 and focus on the unfinished objects that are filling up my house.  I have set up a page on this blog to do this.

I did however manage to finish the quilt for my girlfriends 40th birthday.

So now I am very excited to get on and finish my first UFO.  My marina's compass...not so pretty as the one above (yet)

Got a bit of a red theme happening here

I survived my first "End Of Year" dance concert

Eloise started jazz tap and ballet lessons this term.  I thought it would be good for her coordination and rhythm.  Given I never did any dance lessons I thought it would be fun....

Warning warning...no one told me about the "dance mums" and no one told me about the end of year (EOY)concert.  Wow I survived it.  I've had three kids under 18 months and I thought that I could not do anything as difficult as that.  Wrong.. welcome to EOY dance concerts.

Have you tried putting makeup on a tom boy?  Have you tried to get ringlet hair in a bun with no frizzy bits?  Tried to keep lipstick on a bored child's mouth?  And try convincing a tired, hot, hungry 4 year old that this third and final costume will be more fun to put on than the others. 

And thank goodness for safety pins....we mums of the Thursday morning group (BTW none of the mums in our group have ever done dance lessons ourselves) would have been lost without the box of safety pins I bought along.  Lucky I had sewing experience as well.  We just needed a hairdresser. 

I survived it.  It was logistical nightmare and hard work but I had fun. 


Is there a t-shirt I can buy that says"I survived EOY dance concerts"

Cooking School

Day two of my birthday weekend we all got up to a big BBQ breakfast thanks to my BAM and then I gave them all the presents I had made for them.

 

Then we all went to cooking school. My treat. I even made everyone aprons for the occasion.

So we spent half a day cooking and drinking and eating. 

A big thanks to Spanish Home Cooking with Nick and Maria.  What an excellent day we had.

We learnt to cook Gazpacho, Paella, Tapas and Churros.  I fell in love with the food and the people.  I am enrolling in their classes next term as I am going to master the Paella.  With three males in my house this will be a great meal and one the males can cook together over the BBQ.

My favourite was the churros.  I am going to give them a go this weekend or next.

Nick and Maria are an excellent team.  They were very knowledgeable and very easy to get along with.  They do a great job at educating you and converting you to a Spanish food lover ..if you weren't already.  All the girls had a great time.  Those that live here are going to do their classes as well.

Then after the classes we came back home and ate more food, sat around talking then said our goodbyes.  So many laughs and so much fun.  It was a great weekend

Party Day

The night before saw the frantic race to get the pom poms ready

And all the kids lolly (favour) bags

And then on party day...... it rained all day......but my BAM constructed a wind and rain proof layer and it worked brilliantly...it even had "flashing" a technical term for layer placed over a gap. 

All the bunting was dry as were all the pom poms.

All on the same plan in the same row...what are the chances of that?

All the girls arrived from the airport about two hours before the party...all drenched.  But once they were here they stayed dry.  It was just the kids that were drenched and freezing.  The chattering teeth gave it away.  My daughter ate to much food and was sick and the boys rode their bikes into the crowd.

The cake was excellent.  I have always wanted one of these cakes and I opted for the chocolate version.

We had a big slumber party that night.  Blind taste testing of alcohol beverages from our past.  Quizes and questions from the past and photo sessions.

Another picture of the roses in my garden



Cross that off my list

Bunting

Lollie packs - for the girls

Aprons

 Balloons (well a sample)

 Pom Poms (heres a picture of the practice ones)



Birthday banner

More Flowers from my garden...there are just so many at the moment