Oh dear!

I must admit, I did get a giggle in reading the local newspaper today. I guess it's comical seeings that sheep are one of the main things we see out here! Well I *guess* I can see similarities. They are both white and furry and cute.

Essentially if you can't read the article, which I'm thinking even with my glasses on here I'm having a hard time reading it on the screen, is that thousands of unsuspecting Japanese thought they were buying poodles, but were sold sheep instead at $1600 each!!

The jig was only up when a Japanese movie star went on a talk show and wondered why her new pet "poodle" would not bark or eat dog food. Hundreds of other women got in touch with police as they feared similar. One couple only became suspicious when they took their "poodle" to the vet to have its claws trimmed and were told they were actually hooves.

They did also comment in the article that sheep are rare in Japan and many Japanese do not know what a sheep looks like.

What an interesting world we live in. I don't know, I can see the benefits of having a sheep around the house. You'd never have to mow the lawn again. You'd never have to worry about your winter wardrobe - just knit yourself up another jumper. Although I don't know if a baaaaaaa would be a deterrant to any would-be burglary, but I do hear that sheep give a pretty mean headbutt!

Colorstrology

I did an extremely fun challenge on Designer Digitals this week where we found our colour for our birthday. Check out Pantone's Colostrology and find out your actual birthday colour and what it means. It's eerily accurate and besides which a lot of fun.

We had to find out what our colour is ... mine was Horizon Blue (they have brilliant names for the colours by the way). And then do a layout of what the colour represents to you. Quite fun! Drop me a comment to let me know what colour you came up with because I just love hearing the names.

"You have a kind heart and a strong feeling nature that should be expressed in a creative manner. It is important for you to infuse joy and amusement into your everyday activities. You are not afraid to fight for a cause. Although you tend to excel in many areas, it is sometimes difficult for you to appreciate your own worth. Your personal colour helps lightens your spirit. Wearing, meditating or surrounding yourself with Horizon Blue dissolves feelings of loneliness and increases flexibility and joy."

So here's a bit of a fluff layout and for those that actually know me (as in, in person) I think they'll fairly well liken the outcome of September 14 to yours truly.




Credits
Colorstrology Web Challenge by Patti Knox – sticker and pantone stripes
Background Paper – ksharonk Fairy Footsteps
Butterflies by Antje
Font – Century Gothic

Lest We Forget

It's not quite tomorrow yet, but I felt like blogging tonight. I was lucky enough today to stumble on an amazingly beautiful kit by Sue Jones, entitled Lest We Forget. Stunning in fact. And I couldn't wait to use it. I'd been looking for weeks at all the heritage and vintage kits in the various stores to find just the right one for my Poppa's army photo to no avail. I was planning to do a layout for Anzac Day, but nothing, nada. Until Sue Jones popped up courtesy of the Ikea Goddess list. Thank you Ikea Goddess and most of all, thank you Sue Jones.

As I was doing this layout today with a few flying phone calls back and forth to mum to find out what she could about the regiment that my Poppa was with, the circa year perhaps the photo was taken which we still are not sure (as Mike thinks it looks more like a WWI uniform, rather than a WWII uniform). In our efforts to find out more I stumbled onto the National Archives of Australia website, where you can search the war records of your loved ones.

OH ... MY ... GOD!!! I don't know how many times I've said that this afternoon. From this website I actually got a digital scan copy of my Poppa's enlistment paperwork dated 1938 (this was apparently the second time he enlisted hence the two service numbers, he was in the Citizens Forces before that). I was even able to save this bmp file to my computer. How amazing is that. Not even our family has a copy of these records.

So go to it Aussies, search your relatives and see what you come up with. Just a suggestion, I found it easier to search just the surname. Then once you get a return of that, you can then search within those of the christian names. It seemed to be a quicker practice.

So to all our returned and serving servicemen and women throughout the country and abroad, on this our (soon to be) Anzac Day, Lest We Forget.

Layout Credits

Kit – Lest We Forget by Sue Jones (I'm still in awe of this kit!)
Postcard – Katie Pertiet
Stitching – Bluish Dream by Lively kit
Rusty brad/staples – Lemonaid Lucy – Memories Kit
Font – Antique Type

Hmmm where am I up to?

Thought I better do a quick check and update of my Holiday To Do List seeings one week has now gone past. So where am I up to?

Lets see ...

• I have enjoyed my shopping trip to Ballarat.
• And we had our wedding anniversary last week which we had a lovely meal out.
• I have taken my sewing machine in to be serviced, so will await that return. Hmmmph now I don't have it, I want it!
• Now we have thought about paint for the passageway and I've gone as far as buying a couple of those small test tins. Who on earth knew there were so many shades of cream, it makes my head spin. I *think* we will be settling on half strength Dulux Hogs Bristle. Who on earth thinks these names up?!?!?
• Have been to the docs.
• Visited with my folks.
• And tried the first of four new recipes.

I think that's pretty good going for week one.

I do so enjoy not having to go to work (I guess, so would we all). If only that big lotto cheque from the sky would just fall down and dong me on the head. Until then, we work to pay the bills. :-(

Saturday night

So what is it, a Saturday night and a few of my friends from different parts of Australia, are online right now. Come on girls, what are we doing on a Saturday night? Woah, we are the party girl funsters huh?!?

Been visiting with my mum and dad for an overnighter, and it was nice catching up. Plus a spot of well deserved shopping with REAL shops! I got to finally spend my Christmas gift voucher at A Little Different, probably the best quilting shop ever from my home town. Looooove my brother, birthdays and Christmas always ends up with a voucher from there, they know him by name now! te he

Oh and I went swimwear shopping. Urrrrgh. Could there be anything worse? But strangely this was quite easy. I was bemoaning the fact that I needed a new swimsuit as I'd started water aerobics and my old one ... well let's just say ... hmmmm ... a tad threadbare and almost a little indecent last Tuesday night. ~~blush~~ So I tried on a couple and ended up a with a very nice black one-piece with brown piping. Very happy. I do believe I was in and out of there within 20 minutes, which I think is pretty good going for swimwear shopping.

I had started this layout before heading down to see the folks and just finished it tonight. We had gone to the Christening last weekend and afterwards at the BBQ lunch a game of cricket was started, mostly to keep warm! I was darting around with the camera and took this picture of Mike unawares and just love it. Nothing posed, all natural, he was standing there watching the kids play cricket, so proud of them!

Credits

Paper – ksharonk GrungeCity
Photo corners – ksharonk Good things #3
Swirls – Andrea Victoria
Font – Century Gothic and Dali

18th April, 2004

18th April, 2004. I'm remembering back three years ago today.

Right about now I was contemplating getting into my wedding dress, grandma was in tears of happiness, my two "soon to be" step-daughters giggling with glee and working out where to throw the next bit of confetti, dad as proud as punch checking his watch, mum fussing about trying hard not to cry but taking care of anything that needed to be taken care of, my brother trying to keep the girls entertained and out of mischief. And me, just wanting to get dressed and get in that car on the way to my date with Mike!

Three years huh? Lots have happened in those three years. I became a wife and step mum, I moved homes, moved towns, moved jobs, started a new life, held on to my old one, and along the way I've developed some new wonderful friends whilst holding tight to the patchwork of my old friends. It's a good good life I'm living and I wouldn't swap it for anything in the world.

Credits

Background paper – Vintage label (Vintage Text) by Rhonna Farrer
Sanded edge overlay – Tioberon studios
Grunge frame – Digiscrap.ch
Font – Cac Shishoni

Journalling
“For hearing my thoughts,
understanding my dreams,
and being my best friend …
For filling my life with music
and loving me without end …
I do”

Show and tell

As promised, a pic of one of the beautiful materials I bought from my shopping trip to Ballarat, just gorgeous. And something else to mark off my list - I made a new recipe for dinner tonight. It was a vegetarian kind of dish which was topped with tomatoes and fetta. Very nice. Of course I took pictures. Okay so the dish wasn't perhaps exciting, but it was very tasty and I do believe it classes as a new recipe to try!
I went to water aerobics tonight and am knackered. I've booked in for a term, should be fun over winter, but maybe not so fun doing the mad dash from the warm pool to the dressing room to the car in the freezing cold country air!

Special day for me tomorrow, you'll have to log in and read about what it is!

Where have all the black swans gone?

Well I can mark my first thing off my holiday to do list. I took a shopping trip to Ballarat today. Sum total after a morning's shopping = 1 bag of licorice (for Mike) and a cup of coffee! How very sad is that? But it was fun looking around shops that I don't usually get to see, love those little gifty type or homeware shops.

I then detoured out to Lake Wendouree. Now I've heard about it, I've read about it, but to stand on the bank and see the lake completely dried up is a sight to behold. My goodness I have memories of my childhood, every year we would visit Ballarat and armed with a loaf of bread each we would feed the black swans. I remember seeing little baby swans (I know there's a name for it, but I have no idea and it's not swanlets!) but I remember seeing those little babies paddling ever so quickly to keep up with their mums. I remember as soon as the car pulled up the swans would just know they were in for a feed and come clamouring over to you. All these fabulous memories of Lake Wendouree and the black swans.

But now the lake is dried. Instead of people walking around the lake which was the done thing back then, they were walking through it. Rowing clubs lined the banks standing like stick houses out of dust. It was so so sad to see. The lake, or the dust bowl it's become is still there, but the black swans have long since gone.

In my reflection of the lake as I walked along, I did see the irony in this sight.

After my visit to the lake, I went on to the War Memorial, what a fine job they've done there, meticulously cared for.

Then I headed back to Sebastopol to find the cutest quilting shop ever. I've been there before but only as a passenger (who obviously doesn't pay attention to where she is being driven) because I had no idea where to go. And I realized when needing to ask directions to "a cute little quilting shop around here" you don't ask the 20 year old petrol station man whose interest is more than likely cars cars and more cars, who looked at me blankly as if I was from outerspace. So I just kept driving and ended up finding it. Gail's Patchwork Emporium. Stop by if you ever get the chance, you won't be disappointed.

I made a little dent in the shopping there, my favourite material I purchased today was a cream and green toille Christmas print. Just beautiful. Tomorrow there will be pictures. Tonight I'm off to bed.

Sunday woes!

Sunday night here, and I usually have the Sunday woes about now, thinking about tomorrow. Urrrgh. Oh ... but wait ... what was that? I DON'T HAVE TO GO TO WORK!!!!! Wooo hooo! Sorry for rubbing that in. No more Sunday woes for me (for the time being).

Hubby, oh heck, I should stop calling him hubby on here, I show enough of his pictures. Mike and I went to a Christening today in a little country town. We were going to make it with five minutes to spare so were congratulating ourselves in the car thinking that whew, just made it, timed it pretty well down to the wire. Except the minister started the darn christening ten minutes earlier because he had another engagement to go to! So we missed part of it. Us and other guests. Don't think that was very good form.

But it was a nice day, the baby behaved (this is little Aliza that I made the quilt for) and a lovely BBQ lunch afterwards at their farm. Oh my gosh it got cold though, but all the kids didn't mind, they were burning off any excess energy playing cricket, which the adults soon joined in to keep warm.

Lots and lots of photos of my step children to scrap now, loooooove having a zoom on my camera!

I thought I'd end the week off with a layout of a silly little photo I took last year. It started off being a silly little layout, but it speaks volumes to me (interjected with a bit of humour). This was a very stressful time for both of us last year. Our beloved Molly developed a tumour near her shoulder. Thank goodness it was benign, but nonetheless that wasn't discovered about it being benign until it came out. This lump as big as a malteser ended up having her cut 18cm long and flesh 3cm deep taken out, resulting in 25 stitches. If you want to see her the day she came back from hospital, I had written about it back in August06, click if you'd like to see. Poor poppet, she looked so miserable.

So here's my (anti) cowgirl, and with that, I'll bid you goodnight.

Credits:

Paper – Lamour by Bad Candy
Notepaper by Katie Pertiet
Staples by ksharonk
Fonts – Bookman Old Style and Synchonous

Journalling:

“Molly you look a picture! Here we are in the middle of cow country and I subject you to the indignity of wearing this jacket. No wonder you have your eyes shut!

But if only you knew how worried we were. Just having had your operation and you were wanting to scratch your stitches so badly. Cow coat to the rescue.

Hey, I heard that if you shut your eyes really tight the other dogs in the neighbourhood won’t see you!!”

I made it !!!!!

I now have just over 4 glorious weeks away from work, on holiday leave, not having to even think about the place. I am OVER THE MOON! Imagine 4 weeks to unwind, to kick back, to be as busy or as lazy as I want.

I am an avid fan of Paper Moons site. She designs the most awesome of fun things to use, and she does a 'to do' list every day. I love that and had started on my own 'to do' list for whilst I was on holidays.

You see, I'm a bit of a procrastinator, but I do like lists. I like the satisfaction of being able to check things off one by one, to know that what I had planned has been accomplished. It's immensely satisfying to see things slowly disappear from the lists. Heck, sometimes I even do it on weekends with the housework or bits and pieces I need to do, just to see those lines get crossed off by the end of the weekend.

So this is my holiday list. Whether I get around to doing all of them I have no idea, but I know some will definitely be crossed off. So by cementing this list on this blog for all the world to see (hair raising picture and all!!) it does make it imperative that I update it, so I will be Mrs. Procrastinator no longer. Lets see how I go.



Credits
Envelopes and ribbon – by Paper Moons
Stamp frame – Katie Pertiet postage frames
Tag – Linda Gil Bildall from Bleu Kit
Heart brad –Bad Candy from Lamour
Clips – Clip Its by Patti Knox
Pressed flowers – Doris Castle Pressed Flowers
Note paper – Tia Bennett coloured notepaper
Font – Christopherhand and the stains are WC Rhesus

Three days to go

Three days
72 hours
4320 minutes
259,200 seconds

I'm hanging in there.

259,199
259,198
259,197

LOL

Four more days...

This is going to be my mantra this week. Only four more days to go until I get one whole glorious month off work. I don't even mind going back to work tomorrow. Cause there's only four more days. ~~big happy sigh~~

So today I've had fun scrapping a layout for Lifts with a Twist. For the uninitiated (Bells!) they present a layout and you put your own twist on it. Excellent for if you're feeling uninspired or you have the perfect idea for a page but can't think just how to present it. When I saw this page "Support System" by alitfin, I knew it would be ideal lift for one I wanted to do.

So without further ado ... Introducing Bo (Miss Bojangles) and Bowie (Mr just plain Bowie). Bo of course as you've all been subjected to through posts in the past is my kitty. Bowie belongs to my brother. When I was down in Geelong on Friday I attempted to get some good pics of Bowie, until he let both my brother and I know by hissing and spitting (he's a mean mean cat!) that he'd had enough. Such over the top movie star tantrums, hmmmph!!!

Apart from their names (which confuses their 'granny' no end - granny being my mum!! ha) they could not be more further different in their actions and demeanour.

So here's my take on a scraplift of "Support System". Mine is entitled "Kitty Cousins".

Journalling in case you can't read it ...
He's a he * She's a she
He's a city cat * She's a country cat
He wakes you up with a nip on your toe * She nudges you gently with the tip of her nose
Whatever you do don't touch his tummy * She rolls over just daring you to
He hisses and spits when he's had enough * She just walks away with a flip of her head
He's a spitfire * She's a lady
You love him * I love her

Credits
Scraplift for Lifts with a Twist from – “Support System” by alitfin
Papers and/or kit elements – Lamington by Tracy Ann Designs and Fresh & Distressed by Lyndsay Riches
Ledger frames by Katie Pertiet
Vintage Frames by Katie Pertiet
Stitching by Tracy Blankenship
Fonts – You are loved and Antique type


So how did everyone fare with Easter? I ask this as I sit here stuffing my face with a chocolate egg. I started thinking back to when I was a kid about Easter. The humpty dumpty eggs seemed to have double the smarties inside. And do you remember the colours and kaleidoscope of patterns that the easter egg foil would come in? They don't seem to come in such a variety of patterns any more. I remember I would unwrap my eggs ever so carefully so as not to tear the paper, and I would fastidiously smooth that paper down to keep. But that's where my memory fails me. What did I do with all that gloriously patterned foil paper afterwards? I honestly can't remember.

Signing off for now, but I'll continue my mantra ... four more days ... four more days ... four more days ...

Early start

Easter Sunday morning in my little patch of the world.

Alarm 5.45am

Dress in sleep hazed fog, grab warm things - gloves, scarf, beanie

Drive down the road to the dawn service

Hubby playing bagpipes (how his fingers worked, I have no idea, too cold!!)

Nice warm bonfire

Friendly faces

Singing hymns

Coffee and hot cross buns

And this magnificent light show appearing before our very eyes.

When there is so much anger and hatred in the world, so much horror and grief, so much harm and bloodshed, why don't people stop and take the time to watch the sunrise? It really kinda puts a lot of things into perspective.

A date with the devil

We had the Muster today. It was good, not great. I did however get to see a sheep be sheared for the first time up close. I think the wizened old shearer thought he was a bit of alright when I happily sat there taking photographs!

All was going fine, we were wandering around, chatting with friends, until we saw the bull riding. That's when things took a turn for the worse. Hubby with all his bravado decided he wanted a date with the devil.

It was a really tense moment when hubby first walked over to the arena and saw him. The bull. Eyes locked. Who was going to look away first? It was a battle of wills. That mean looking bull had terrifying black beady eyes, his nostrils were flared and I swear the sun glinted off his frighteningly sharp horns. The bull stood his ground but hubby was going to be undeterred. He was going to ride that monster no matter what.

The crowd looked on in tense anticipation. Hubby took a quick look above and crossed himself. Pulled down his hat tight. Took one look back at me. And then strode over to the bull.

A stunned hush went around the crowd. I’m sure they wanted to see blood today. Hubby was just mere entertainment to them. But what about me? I cared. I didn’t want him to be gored or stampled and come back to me a mangled mess of broken bones.

He gently, ever so carefully lowered himself down and gripped those reins like there was no tomorrow and rode that monster without fear for a full 8 seconds.

The pictures are terrifying, so look away now if you must.

Family day and the finished product

Firstly, because I am so chuffed at how they turned out, here's the finished product of my iffy cookies from last night. They went over a treat with everyone. There was also another bigger container for hubby's kids (and I would dare say the whole lot would be finished by now!! ha)

Really really pleased at how they all panned out. Nothing like the recipe pic, but all the same, everyone seemed to like their easter goody gifts.





So it was family day for me today, back home to visit with mum and dad, plus my brother came over too. It was nice. Catching up. Although I found it very hard today.

My dad has a disease called Progressive Supranuclear Palsy. It's a horrid horrid disease robbing this once vital, important, happy go lucky, loving man into someone trapped in his own body. He had a lot of trouble eating today and I ended up feeding him, like a child. It was hard. Oh at the time I was totally cool with it, acted as if it was the most normal thing in the world, made him still feel like he was in charge. But afterwards, on the way home, I almost fell into a heap, just thinking about it. I know it's going to get worse, heck this was just him eating a meal, but it was hard today. I was the parent and my dad was the child. Hard.

Tomorrow we're heading over to the Muster. Should be lots of fun, an annual event our town puts on, except I've never been before. Whip cracking, quarter horse racing, sheep shearing, and the mechanical bull, just to name a few things. Hubby has told me he is going to try the mechanical bull ... OH LORD !!! Camera will be at the ready, let me assure you.

Nighty night all.

Thank goodness that is over!

And now I can go to bed. Finally FINALLY, the cookies are done. I did another batch tonight and finished icing what I did tonight and a bit of what I didn't get iced last night. Funny how the first 10 were fun to ice. The last 60-odd were, well lets just say, rough and tumble! LOL

But my gripe here is firstly they weren't all that easy to ice. Well nothing like the picture. Heck the picture looked like it had a fine baker of 20 years experience ice the darn thing. And yet the recipe was in the "Kidz Corner" section of the Fresh magazine. Ha!

But they are something different this year. I also have little chocky eggs to go in the containers too. A pretty checkered ribbon and a little chick for the top. Except I'm not going to be able to put them together until tomorrow once the icing dries. Of course, I will take a picture of the finished product too.

So here they are, in all their glory.

Oh and the funniest thing. I was piping the blue on the tops, a gaudy shade of blue I might add, and concentrating so very hard and pushing the piping bag for all it was worth, not realizing that I wasn't only pushing the icing out the piping end, but also out the top of the bag too. And as luck (or my bad luck) would have it, I had the kitchen drawer slightly ajar - blue icing in there amongst the spoons, blue icing in little plops on the floor, on my shoes, down my jeans. Oh joy.

Never never never again.

If I see another cookie I'll *(&#W**&!!!

Who's idea was it to make easter cookies anyway? Whilst working full-time? Whilst not getting home till nearly 7pm from work after working back tonight? Who? I ask who? Next time I have a brilliant idea like this please stop me. Promise.

I have cookies cooling on trays from here till eternity right at the moment. The kitchen table is covered. Oh, and there goes the timer again, back in a tick...

Done. That's it for tonight. Last tray is out and the oven is now off.

Rewind a bit. I did mention on the weekend I did a trial run. Cookies were delish. But the icing. OMG it left a lot to be desired. I'm going to make my own icing. I stupidly followed the recipe. Too much butter in the icing mix, and milk. Who makes icing with milk? Anyway I swear the icing curdled. So this time it's plain icing sugar, water, and a few drops of colour. Poor hubby looked at my sorry trial and said "how come they don't look like the picture". BAD BAD MOVE DEAR HUSBAND OF MINE!!! He will not make that mistake again.

So let's just pray that my icing will look better than the trial one. Otherwise I'm going to have to do an emergency dash to the service station on Good Friday when we go down to see our families, cause that will probably be the only place open, and I'll have to pay exhorbitant prices for a block of chocky each.

Update later.

Happy Sunday

After a lovely sleep in and exercise with the dog, I've been sewing and scrapping all the live long day. I have some cookie dough in the fridge chilling for 30 minutes, so am just waiting for the timer to go so I can roll it out and bake them. It's a trial run for Easter. We decided this year on cookies (always do a theme, heck for those that really know me this will be no surprise!!!)

They are on the front cover of the latest Woolworth's Fresh magazine. You know, the free mag that you pick up at the counter. Ah ha! Found a link for our overseas guests so they can envision what I'm talking about. Aren't they pretty? Now, not saying mine will turn out the same, but I will of course blog the result.

Anyway back to what I was saying about my theme this year. Got really quite nice clear Decor containers, will fill them chockers with the cookies, intermingled with some little mini eggs. A big gingham ribbon and bow, perhaps a rabbit tag. And there you have it, one for each family. So that means four batches of cookies. But before I go to all that trouble, I just want to check the recipe works, hence the trial run today, which my lovely old neighbour across the road will score when I take her a surprise supper plate for tonight.

So after yesterday's decision about the album for my bestie, I've been giving it more thought. I'm going to call it "Memories of Us". Dig out the pics from when we first met in 1994 and scrap our history up to today, marriages, kids and all. I'm really quite pumped about it.

But before I do any more layouts for it, I wanted to use that picnic photo of me and hubby again. I like it, and though it deserved it's own layout. But hmmmm, for some reason the drop shadows have become way too pronounced in the jpg, but they're not like that on the screen in Photoshop. Not sure what's going on there. Oh well, call it artistic license I guess.

Credits:
Not so Blue Kit by ksharonkdesigns.
Stitches by Meredith Fenwick Stitch-o-rama
Font – Christopherhand

Journalling :
"We make a pretty good team, you and I. My greatest joy is that we found each other and there is no other person in the whole world that I would rather get old with, than you. Here's to all our future adventures ... together!"