The excitement of Christmas Eve

I love watching the excitement in the kids Christmas Eve, the anticipation of Santa visiting and leaving them special presents.

The kids have loved changing the 'days til Christmas' calendar tree every morning this week, and have learnt all the numbers! They were so excited yesterday morning when there was only 1 day til Christmas.

The kids and I have been having heaps of fun baking Christmas treats and the kids especially loved icing and decorating the star & reindeer shaped cookies for the neighbours. I used Sandy's (now famous) Cookie recipe and iced them with strawberry and butterscotch glace icing. I made some little tags with the cuttlebug and tied them up with ribbon. They looked so cute! I'll definitely be making them again, as there were a big hit with everyone.

Since it was raining, the kids were a bit worried the reindeers wouldn't be able to see their reindeer food, so we got busy decorating this cute little egg carton reindeer food container to put out on the front doorstep. I knew I was keeping all those egg cartons for a reason!

I spent most of yesterday cooking some traditional Polish dishes for our mini Christmas Eve at home, since it's our year to stay home. We do the full Christmas Eve thing every second year at Mum and Dad's, and every other year here with our little family, so the kids can do the whole night before Christmas (Aussie) thing. The kids and Al still aren't fussed on the Polish Bigos (cabbage stew), but Erin devoured the entire Entree (smoked salmon stacks & stuffed eggs). Something I remember from our Polish Christmases with Grandma T is the sparkling apple juice in little glasses she put out for us. I bought some and put it in little glasses for the kids. Erin loved it, Aiden wasn't too keen.

Al's Mum painted this gorgeous plate for the kids to put Santa's supper on. Isn't it just gorgeous! The kids were so excited to put out the cookies they'd made & decorated especially for Santa!

 

Wishing everyone the most gorgeous Christmas and a fresh and bright New Year in 2011! 

Warm wishes,

Leah xx

A few Christmas goodies

A few of the goodies the kids and I made yesterday.

Yummy fondant filled chocolates, which Al reckons taste like snack (pineapple, strawberry, peppermint & caramel). None of us were fussed on the caramel though. A new version of White Christmas with mini marshmallows and Sugar cookies (from Sandy's recipe), which are so delicious.

Today we have plans to make Bigos (a Polish stew with pork & mushrooms, based on sauerkraut) and ice the cute sugar cookies we made yesterday. The kids are dying to decorate them.

Totally blessed!

I am totally blessed to have been able to spend the last few weeks at home with the kids, just being a Mum for a change, dragging the kids along to do the last of the Christmas shopping, taking them to see Santa and just spending time at home baking Christmas goodies together. I've really enjoyed myself, and wondering if this working gig (especially working for myself) is totally the wrong thing for me. Anyway, that's another story!


To all my gorgeous scrappy friends, I hope you have a magical Christmas and an awesome New Year!

Teacher's gifts

I was looking for a gift that was a little unique, so of course, I start scouring the net for ideas. I found this cute idea of a potted plant with a little sign, "Thanks for helping me grow!"

I made some cute little tags up on the computer with the kids names & photos on them, laminated them, and the kids and I picked up some plants the next morning on the way to Kindy. They both really loved the venus fly traps, not at all what I had in mind, but it does reflect on their love of nature. The teachers absolutely loved getting their little growing gifts.

Up for grabs... gorgeous My Scrapbook Nook kit

All this gorgeousness could be yours!

While you're there, make sure you check out the gorgeous kits and samples at My Scrapbook Nook.

An amazing couple of weekends

The last couple of weekends have been action packed!

Karen, Jolene, Leone & I spent last weekend in paradise celebrating Karen's Birthday. Okay, it was Macleay Island, but spending the weekend with such gorgeous gals made it paradise. Karen organised the BEST place, a gorgeous house overlooking the water with spectacular sunset views. Spent the weekend riding around the Island (all 15km of it), sunning ourselves on the deck, taking photos and scrapbooking.

 

This weekend Al and I did the Story Bridge Adventure Climb. It was really awesome and what made it even more special was that we were lucky enough to be up there when they turned on the pink lights for Breast Cancer Awareness month!  So, if you're going over the Story Bridge after dark in October, be sure to look up and check out the awesome pink lights! Definitely worth it!

Decluttering

Woohoo, I'm feeling fantastic! I love SPRING and the feeling of light, bright and sunshine it brings. Well, even though it's been raining a LOT lately, there have been a few little bursts of sunshine through the cloud, which has made me rethink my scrap space. I've done a bit of spring cleaning, down-sizing, moved things around and decluttered, leaving my space much lighter and brighter! I LOVE IT!

All this means I have a few things left over that I no longer need. I'll take some photographs in the next few days, but to give you an idea, I have...

Spice racks & jars
Various shelf racks
Plastic upright paper holders + inserts
Plastic drawers
Tote bags
Tools

If you're interested, check back soon for an update.

Holidays and all!

Finally have a chance to catch up on my little poor neglected bloggie. Main reason being, I've been updating our holiday blog from our recent Cape York trip. I'd love you to check it out! Here's a few of my fav pics.

I would love to be able to say I've been scrapping my heart out, but unfortunately, have not :( Not long after we arrived back from our trip, Al received some exciting news that he'd been offered a job in Perth for 2 years. After a long and agonising decision process, we decided not to go. It was absolutely painful, because as much as we wanted the excitement and fun of moving to a new city, there were a lot of downfalls, like the kids starting school next year, the cost of moving, finding a new house to rent, fixing our house up to rent, storage, and the list goes on. Now we've made our decision, we have finally had time to get back into our routine.

Work, work and more work...

but it's all good! I've been toying with the idea of offering more graphic design services in my web design business for a while now, and I'm excited to announce that I've finally done it!

Instyle Web Design is now taking orders for facebook page designs, blog headers, invitations and announcements, etsy & madeit banners, logos, business cards and heaps more. Head on over to our Instyle Web Design facebook page if you're interested, I'd love you to 'like' me! LOL, sounds funny, doesn't it! Our services are listed on the "Pricelist" tab. I'd love to hear from you!

I'm also in the process of updating our website to offer online payment options and changing the design in line with our new identity design. Check it out soon!

Sewing mad!

Wow. How long has it been since I last posted! Thanks to Miriam over at BubbaChenille for helping get my butt into gear ;) Check out her gorgeous chenille giveaway while you're there. I've never sewn with chenille (in fact I don't sew much at all), but I'm willing to give anything a go!

Speaking of sewing, I actually made a little gift for a friend's gorgeous boy who turned one on Saturday. I couldn't resist these cute fabrics, (and a few more!) lol

About six months ago, I was fortunate to win a gift voucher at Handmade Heaven, and I used it to buy a gorgeous handmade car racetrack travel roll. I've never seen anything like it before, and I immediately fell in love. My son loves playing with it, especially on long car trips, and it's so small and easy to pack up and take anywhere. So, I decided to try my hand at making one myself. Apart from the continuous bias binding, it was heaps of fun to make! I'd love to credit the original designer, however I'm not sure who it was. If anyone knows who makes these gorgeous tracks for Handmade Heaven, I'd love to hear from you so I can refer my friends!

My machine's getting quite a workout lately, and today I spent the day with a gorgeous friend sewing kindy sheets. WOW! Who would've thought it would take 3 hours to make one sheet set! Man! I learnt lots though, how NOT to sew sheet bags, and how to unpick real fast! Lots of laughs though and that's the most important thing! ;) Still have to sew about a thousand hand towels and a few more sheet sets, but now we've got the hang of it, should only take about an hour each!

How time flies! It's already March, and I can hardly believe it! My little girl is nearly 3 - YES THREE and she's getting all excited about her little Tinkerbell party. She's picked out a cute dolly varden style cake with Tinkerbell instead of Barbie in the centre! Yes, I get carried away with the birthday cakes, but I love making them, and the kids love choosing them! I love watching their eyes light up when they look through the cake book - it reminds me of when I used to do the same thing with Mum! Memories I will treasure forever!

When I was three, my Mum got my ears pierced, and as I was putting Erin to bed tonight I asked her if she wanted to get her ears pierced for her 3rd birthday, like Mummy, or did she want to wait til she was older, she said, "Mummy, I think I'll get earrings when I'm all grown up - how 'bout when I'm 3!". So cute.

On another note, I've been doing little creating since the Lazy Days of Summer Comp, which I was lucky enough to win second prize in ;) A huge congrats to Maree for winning - her entries were awesome!

Here are my entries in no particular order plus a few other layouts I've done lately.

Until next time xx

Alex the scarecrow

I promised the kids I'd help them make a scarecrow this afternoon, so when they woke from their arvo nap, we set about sourcing all the bits and pieces. We had so much fun, and Al even joined in when he got home and donated some of his old shirts!

This is how he started out...my lovely sketch and Aiden's colouring

Alex the Scarecrow comes to life!

Alex the Scarecrow's new home in our strawberry patch

 

A couple of cards

We don't usually "do" Valentine's Day, as our wedding anniversary is next week, but I joined in the Scrap Pile Valentine's Day card challenge. 

I designed a mini layout for the front of the card using a photo we took of ourselves mucking around.

 

This one's the week 2 challenge for the Lazy Days of Summer competition over at Scrap Pile. It was a real challenge doing a circle card, but here's my attempt!

Creations ~ the last few months

Thought I'd better update to include a few creations over my *SLACK BLOGGER* period. See, I really have been busy!! ;)

Loved the Kev Carmody - Cannot Buy My Soul concert. We had the best time!

 

Aiden and his diggers.It's a pity he's grown out of Thomas, he really did love playing with Jack, Alfie and Max & Monty, and I loved watching him play for hours in the dirt! Typical boy!

The first time we painted her nails. She was so excited!Although there was a near disaster afterwards, the moment wasn't lost.

Aiden at his Playgroup Party. Just hanging around on the swings.

I did this for my big sister in Sweden, who visited in December. I hope it got home safely, sis!

 

Loved these pics of us girls at the Scrap Pile retreat

in July last year. We had such a ball!

Over and out for now, and I hope to keep up to date a bit more regularly in 2010!