My wish came true tonight

The cats thrashed the Goldcoast Suns! Yahhhhhooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!

And all I can say is ... "Gary who????" Sweet victory!

As for today it was wet, it rained, it was cold. Nothing more really to say about the weather. Probably more of the same tomorrow. Mike was going to go camping this weekend and I was looking forward to having the house to myself for a weekend (is that bad???) but too wet and cold so he stayed home. We've all got cabin fever.

We did go and see daughter number 1 late this afternoon though. It's her birthday this weekend, 20! Where did the years go? Not a teenager any longer.

On the digi front, here's another page that will go in my nephews album. I love this photo of young Matt and Mike. Matt was always Mike's shadow whenever he was here. Just looking at this photo it's utter delight on his face that he is with his "Uncle Mike My Buddy My Pal". Matthew even had a framed photograph of his Uncle Mike on his bedside table and would say goodnight to him each night. Now that's a bit of hero worship that to be frank I think Mike was tickled pink about.

Credits Designer Digitals.


I have been scanning lots of photos today, it's been a tedious exercise but a worthwhile one nonetheless. Now I get to scrap them!

Twice in two days - unheard of !

Back again. Sitting here in this cold office up the other end of the house from where the wood fire is, and I'm actually wearing a scarf. I think a hot chocolate at this time of night might hit the spot before bed.

Another bleak day of cold and rain. Mike said the menagerie were stir crazy today, it's way too cold for old Molly's bones to be outdoors so she was only briefly out between rain breaks. Poor darling, although we have her on the Sasha's Blend, she takes a bit of time to unwind when she's been laying down, as do we all ! ha.

I was late home tonight, didn't get home until 6.30pm, so not my usual time. Mike said that Molly and Lucky were just chilling until about 3 minutes before I arrived home and then they started pacing and checking the door and pacing and back to the door, then up to the bedroom to see if they could see out the window to the street, then back to the backdoor. How did they know I was nearly home? We truly think they are psychic at times!

Oh and Sharon, yes you did warn me about Lucky's innocent face and the chewed shoes in my future, and whilst yes, I have lost a pair of new sneakers and the tops of my $120 ankle boots had the leather, shall we say "worked", oh and a pair of fluffy slippers were found in bits on the front lawn, he now seems to have grown out of that. Cross fingers.

The Album for my Nephews

Over the course of the remainder of the year I am planning to make random pages from photos I have taken over the time I have known my gorgeous nephews. These will all go into a book for them for Christmas so they'll never forget us. And yes I guess some will be sad and about how much we miss them, but some will be happy and funny and silly. So I'll show you them as I make them.

Here's some of the last photos I took of the boys while we were at the airport waiting for the last possible moment they would go through those international gates. A photo of my mum and the boys.

Credits Designer Digitals.


Oh and Margaret, the nighty night possums from yesterday was from the telly, when they say that at about 7.30pm when it's time for the kids to go to bed. :-)

Yet another week has begun

I was looking at the calendar today on my desk at work and with shock realised that May is now almost shot to pieces and with June hot on it's heels (I say "hot" figuratively because it means Winter!) the weather is already becoming horrid. Rain, cold cold mornings, more rain, wind, even more rain. I think it's going to be a cold wet few months for us.

Master Chef talk

So who is Mastercheffing? (I'm sure that must be a new word in the dictionary). Loving it but at the moment I could write the script, predicting each time whose time it is to go. Still barracking for Sun and Kate.

And in the shadow of Masterchef, dare I say we had on the weekend steak, green vegetables and ... wait for it ... potato rosti courtesy of Friday night's master class. Very nice. Although I'm not going to buy a rosti pan just to make it in. So I used egg circle things, heck the name escapes me at the moment, what are they called? Egg doova-lackies. So my rosti didn't turn out as good as the chef on the show's, but still mighty yummy considering how easy it was to make. Why have I not known about potato rosti before this?

Birthday Boy

Yes a few months ago now but we celebrated a "coming of age" in the household. Lucky turned 21. Well in dog years that is. The birthday hat didn't last long on his head, only as long as the treats held out! Smart boy that one.

Credits Designer Digitals.


I'm Proud

Yes I am. I am so proud of my oldest step-son right now, well I always am, but especially after his efforts on the weekend, where he umpired on the hallowed turf of the MCG at the U/18 curtain raiser to the Dreamtime match between Essendon and Richmond. Can you even imagine how exciting it must have been for him to walk out onto that ground.

And as professional and serious he is about his umpiring, I love that he commented "It was great watching myself signal on the big screen" !!!

For my overseas friends who read this blog, the MCG is the premier football ground in the country, this was a very big deal for my stepson. And you know there's going to be a scrap page in the making naturally!

And with that, time for bed! Nighty night possums.

Like a bat out of hell :-(

Sad face for sure. This is what we were going to do last night. We were going to see the Bat Out of Hell concert at the Palais. But things have a way of going awry when you book things so far out in advance. We were going with friends. Their son had an emergency appendectomy on Thursday so they weren't able to go, Mike ended up getting sick this weekend so all bets were off for us too, there was no way he was going to be able to sit in a car for a 6 hour round trip. So there would have been some happy people in the audience with 4 chairs in front of them with no boof heads in the way.

:-(

And it was too late to get the tickets to people in Melbourne to go, so we did our dough.

So it's been a rather quiet weekend. I've just made a purchase on etsy which has brought me joy! A poster about old dogs. Love it. I bought a B&W/grey version of it which I'm going to frame in a black frame and perhaps a red mat and put it on the wall here near my computer.

Even as I sit here typing this post, Molly is laying flat out on the floor by my feet (keeping my feet warm in the process mind you) gently snoring her little heart out, not a care in the world, every now and then she issues a satisfied groan which is most unladylike, but we can forgive her for that, she's geriatric now being 12 years old.

Isn't the sentiment on this poster terrific? I got it from Bubby and Bean.

Onto scrapping, I finally have scrapped some photos I took on the weekend away I had in Halls Gap with my friends here from town. So much fun, having a house in the middle of the bush with the wildlife just at your door, seeing the mountains around you in all sides, smelling that fresh air, I soooooo want to live up there. Always have, always will.

Credits Designer Digitals.


Now despite Molly's warmth at my feet I am feeling quite a chill in the air so off to stoke the fire!

MC anyone?

Anyone at all? Who is already hooked on Masterchef. Oooh it's going to be a long journey I think and I will thoroughly enjoy it. I already have a couple of favourites that I think I'll follow. Sun, Kate and Danielle. Go the girls!

At least I have a few girls at work who are into MC. Talk at the morning tea table usually turns to the program, can't help but be caught up in it.

And talk here usually turns to digi scrapbooking, and I'm turning out some pages that will be put into a book for my two nephews for Christmas, so they don't forget their Australian Aunty Carol and Uncle Mike, because no matter what happened, we'll always be that. So here's another one of those random pages from a random photograph I took. And a little tip I had heard of and used quite extensively with the more serious of my nephews, David.

Credits Designer Digitals.


Well we're just finishing hump day and now it's downhill till the weekend. Where is the time going? The weeks are just flying by.

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all the mums out there. Hope you've had a wonderful day.

I have.

I went to Geelong and took my mum to a secret destination lunch, secret from her, not from me obviously as I had planned it! We went to the Black Sheep Restaurant for their mother's day special lunch, delish! Then afterwards went and toured the National Wool Museum. I haven't been there since it opened, and it hadn't changed all that much but it was good to see again. Plus they had a special exhibition about women who had turned bad!! Women who had been jailed at Long Bay Jail and their files and stories from back around 1915-1940's I guess it was. Really really interesting.

It was a really nice day. Considering oh, over about the last 18 months mum and I have had quite a tumultuous relationship which culminated in us not seeing each other for just over 12 of those months. We're gradually on the right road now though.

I had made this layout with mum in mind and got it printed on a card from Snapfish. It turned out brilliantly. She didn't realise at first until she looked at the back and I had printed on it "Made especially for you from Carol 2011". Then she looked a bit shocked and then "oh" and then "ooooh, ooooooooh". Nice to get that reaction from my scrapbooking.

Credits Designer Digitals. It's a loooooong credit list.


During the afternoon my phone buzzed and I received a lovely mother's day greeting from number 1 stepdaughter. It thrilled me, the fact that she thought of me on mother's day. I love Mike's children with a passion, they are brilliant brilliant kids. But apart from one mother's day many many years ago, they've never acknowledged mother's day with me. So it thrilled me no end, and of course got me all misty.

So I hope all the mother's, grandmother's, nannas, daughters and sons of mothers had a lovely day full of everything you hoped the day would bring. Happy Mother's Day.

How to win friends and influence people

Oh dear, one of my fellow workers totally put a foot in it today, completely and utterly. She got an email from one of the people in a department in Melbourne who help us, except the woman had a different last name.

So my fellow worker got straight on the phone and exclaimed "Sarah!!!!! Congratulations!!!!!! When was the big day, how absolutely exciting, tell us all about it".

Silence followed from my fellow workmate and her face went beetroot.

Sarah had gotten a divorce! Hence the change in surname. Ouch.

Which gave me fits of giggles. Not for poor Sarah, not at all, not for my fellow worker, but for the ridiculousness of the situation. Okay, so I was rolling around the floor laughing, it's usually me who puts my foot in it, both feet usually at the same time. So it was quite refreshing to see someone else do it for once!

What we can learn from this story - never ASSUME as it makes an ASS out of U and ME.

Names changed to protect the innocent ;-)


Here's a quickie to show you, a page I did a while back from a photo that was taken of us when we went out on the Tall Ship in Corio Bay. My father-in-law was crewing on it at the time and it was a wonderful joy sail (do you say that? You say joy flight, so I will use that term joy sail). Although I can imagine if we were way out in the heads I would have had my head over the side!

Credits Designer Digitals.

Now, off to bed! Mike is still watching Terminator so I will leave him to it. Sweet dreams await me.

Still on the royal wedding

I got this photo sent to me on the email today, I laughed and laughed, just the way the Queen looks to be kind of looking but not moving her head and I can imagine Prince Philip answering this.

I can't stop chuckling at it. I'm sure the world has said enough about Beatrice and Eugenie's outfit and make up attempt, it really does look like they are little girls playing in their mother's wardrobe. Terrible.


Onto scrapbooking, you are going to have to indulge me over the next few months in the pages I'll be making of the boys. I'm going to put them all together in an album to send over to them so they never forget their Aunty Carol and Uncle Mike and the fun they had with us.

This would have to go down as one of my all time favourite photographs. I remember this day so well, I don't think the boys had much exposure to dogs and it was their first visit to see us way down here. David and Lucky because firm friends and Lucky just loved having someone to run around the yard with. They wore each other out and this photograph was the result. Precious isn't it?

Credits Designer Digitals.


It's getting late. Must ... go ... to ... bed.

Fun !

I had fun scrapping the photos from Friday, Anna's templates make it so easy and how perfect her paper from her newest palette was the exact match for the Queen's outfit! ha. That was most fortunate! It did end up in the local newspaper, with four big photographs from the event. We weren't outrageous enough though to appear!

Credits Designer Digitals.


Last night we went to a Ceilidh last night hosted by the Warrnambool Pipe Band. So much fun, so much talent, my ears though were ringing by the time we got home! It was a huge day yesterday, with the sun shining we had been in Halls Gap all day at the Grape Escape. Talk about getting around the countryside! Exhausted today though, it all caught up with us.

Lucky we did go to Halls Gap yesterday, the sun was shining, it was lovely, at one stage I even went sleeveless as it was so warm. But today ... it has been cold, miserable and rainy, with more following during the week. Wish the weather would make up its mind.