Rourke and Henry

Grateful for.....the art of pretend.

Masterchef is back. In our house we love it. We have loved it from the beginning, we get suckered in. I love Julie's cookbook. I was glad Julie won. I was shattered when Marion was sent home, gutted infact. My phone goes off with text messages..... We have Merle's cookbook too, those are our first attempt of her Chocolate Eclairs- they are heaven.

it is indeed one of our family favourite shows. We love Gary and George and sometimes Matt. Mr Magoo believes we are semi related to Matt Moran- the things he believes are quite astounding sometimes. We all have our favourite contestants and argue and giggle about them.... it's like we know them. We cook some of the dishes and we can't stomach some of the other recipes. 

What the small do best is pretend. Evey meal and I do mean every meal I am judged. Yep I live with Gary and George, Matt is apparently sick most evenings, some mornings he is around as one of the smalls pretend to be two judges. I am judged on toast and nutri-grain, fairly simple dishes but somehow the flavour still explodes in their mouths!! I am judged on vegetables, meat, spag bol, leftovers, baking and pizza, infact if we consume it I am judged on it.

Friday night is usually Friday Night Nachos at our place, we love Smokey BBQ Chicken Nachos. I like the beer  I have with it. Well tonight we had Friday Night Nachos. Matt the judge was sick and I apparently am competing for a coverted white apron...the top 24. Oh please....

Tonight I played along a bit more than usual, maybe it was the beer.... I indeed went to Tasmania for this challenge, milked a cow, like as if, and churned that milk to make cream then added lemon to turn it sour and then popped it into one of Curtis Ston'e Coles containers for judging, cause you know how Coles is a sponsor and all. They believed it. 

The apple and reasberry cordial - did you make that? well, yes indeed, again in Tasmania I picked the apples and rasberries blended them and created my very own cordial...... are you getting the picture? My judges look, very closely at the food. They smell it. They need to know the name of the dish, they like to know if I'm happy with the presentation? They liked the crunch of the Nachos chips, the cheese was sufficently melted and that sauce, mmmmm......

Tonight I hammed it up for them, I (badly) pretended to be crying.... I told them this is my passion, my dream..... just give me a chance I said, I will not let you down..... They deliberated, for a long time and then I got a Yes from Gary. Phew, cue the tears...... George, please George, I deserve a white apron.....

Its a YES from George..... I scream, I'm standing so I jump up and down, I am fake crying thank you, thank you, I run through the house to find my other invisible competiors to tell them of my sucess, the judges yell..... You've gone the wrong way!!! So I run back screaming the other way. 

They are cracking themselves up laughing. That's the best bit. I compose myself and we then sit and eat, back in the normal surburban house we live..... and we are all smiling. Grateful for our dinner, grateful we can all pretend together. That was fun, they said.

And Yes it was.

Grateful has moved over here, go ahead and have a look. 

 

Busy, Busy.....

busy....busy....

...making...colouring, cutting, cooking, painting, baking....busy, happy, working... blessed with ACE customers ( I know I've said that before but its like the truest of true!) These school holidays have whizzed by, life whizzes by....

sometimes you have to make time to play....or else you go insane.... 

 

but the Lorax was good, we saw it this week, I liked it alot. I like Dr. Seuss alot, you learn stuff without learning it. That is especially good for the smalls learning stuff without learning it. We watched Percy Jackson and the lightning theif, Mr Magoo is reading it at the moment and much to his inital suprise I know stuff, random I know but I know a little bit about Zeus and Medusa and The Gods!! Miss Muffet is reading The Lorax. It is good she says. She likes Dr.Seuss too. 

The very new veggie garden planted Easter Saturday is growing....the weather has been quite hideous for children but the new veggies are adoring the weather cause they are growing like really, really fast.....some from seed! Yay. 

...In the words of Ferris "life moves pretty fast, if you don't stop and look around once in awhile you could miss it"  

I'm glad we found time to stop and check out the scenery these holidays, even though it has been busy, busy, we still had time.... oh and we played some humdinger UNO games! We like those too. 

...so this week I'm grateful for being busy but also grateful for finding time out... life's great balancing act.... one of my all time fav Dr. Seuss books...Oh, the places you'll go...read it you will be glad you did.I hope your hoildays were grand. 

Pop over to Maxabella's Grateful or Village Voices lots of lovelies hang out there.

 

Grateful for.....baking and the sharing of meals.....and recipes.

It's no secret that I do love cooking. I love baking the most, baking biscuits, cakes, slices lots of sweetish stuff. I often say if someone would pay me I could bake all day. There is something special about preparing and sharing food and drinks.

My cousin shared her famous (in her own rite), delish pizza dough with me a little while ago and another friend shared her fabbo pizza oven recommendation and joined together I have had the best time mixing, kneading, kinda throwing and preparing pizzas. Nothing flash, tried and tested favourites but super crispy, lotsa cheesy and all sorts of YUM.

This weekend we have shared pizza with Aunts, Uncles, Nana and Poppy, brothers, sisters and noisy excited, massively excited cousins. All hovered around the pizza oven. My cheeks heated up I think from the stone plate on the pizza oven, I do not believe it was the Smirnoff! Others disagree.

So this week I'm grateful for the sharing of meals and laughter and drinks and cousin concerts and bad singing (by me!), the catching up that goes with that.....seeing family that we don't get to hang with often enough.... and of course the pizza....  grateful for the memories made and good times shared.

Pop over to Maxabella's or Kidspot to share your grateful or just have a read, it's always lovely. x

 

 

 

Grateful for.....imaginings

I have been known to make up a story or two, maybe more. Ok, alot more than maybe. I make up stories all the time. I spin them alot. Sometimes I crack myself up and everything. Maybe it's a bit Peter Panny, the whole not wanting to grow up thing. Who knows? I think its probably fun to live in Never Never land. Anyhow this week I am indeed grateful for

1. my imagination, I have been spinning a few stories this week along with little animal pals to go with them.

these imagings will end up on the fabbo school canteen blackboard, Hector has alot more friends popping into my head too, so I'll share them with you from time to time.

 the number 2 thing I'm grateful for this week is the imaginings of Miss Muffet- this one gets tricky, kinda. Yesterday we had a bit of a car trip so Miss Muffet asked for pen and paper, I handed over the blue post it notes (supposed to be for groceries and important forgetful information) and a pen. Whilst scooting up the highway, Miss Muffet asked me to spell a few words and then wha-la, eight post it notes later we have a story about mermaids and a secret and an enemy and a saved day!! A gosh lovely little imaging by her. She read it out loud whilst we were still travelling and I was super excited for her. How cool. Then, there is a flipside, not a bad flipside just a I'm-not-sure-whether-to-believe-you-flipside. the tricky bit I guess. You see her brother had a day off school this week he was a little unwell and by the end of the day had recovered just fine, but much to I think her delight Miss Muffet thought she would tell his friends he fell out of a tree and was in hospital, suffice to say when they saw him in the afternoon they all rushed and "Are you ok? Are you ok?" was asked and asked. Dazed and confused his reply was "yeah" then the tree falling story came out!! Here's the thing, we have spoken to Miss Muffet the whole the boy who cried wolf and Henny Penny and she totally gets it but it doesn't change her imaginings/story tellings. She is very, very good and convincing. I think sometimes I entertain her stories a little too much, then I think your not a kid for long so I let her go......and how can I be cross when I do the same??

Yesterday I was simply proud and here is one of the post its, I'm going to keep them in a safe place. I'm so very grateful for her imagination. It makes me smile and sometimes worry all at once!

Are you grateful this week, pop over here and play along if you are.

 

 

grateful for.....blue skies and chalk pens.

This week I have been drwing with chalk pens from Smiggle. I have decided I love them. They are bright and cheery and so much fun. N.B they work tops on glass and kitchen cupboards. They have a bit of room for improvement on actual blackboard- they go on dandy, it's the getting off that needs work.

I am extremely fortunate to be given artistic licence at our school canteen and have had a fabbo few days doodling on the blackboard and doors. 

I had so much fun with this, I took to drawing on our kitchen cupboards at home. Quite often we play the Glad Game (like Pollyanna) in some form or another so this week we have taken turns writing one thing we are glad for each day, on the pantry door!! 

It's fun and the kids have had a blast writing on the kitchen doors and fridge and it's lovely for us all to share in one thing that we are glad about. And that can be anything at all. 

Blue skies today, spent this morning swimming and lapping up this magical weather. Grateful for that.

Grateful. Pop on over to Maxabella loves cause there is always lots of lovely grateful reflections to be read. 

Joyeux Noel.... 2011

I love Christmas, our flat-packed tree, carols and gift wrapping. I am known to be somewhat anal about decorating, wrapping and table setting. I can also provide evidence given Mr. Magoo now remembers where in the house certain decorations are placed.....and he quite likes taking the mickey out of me telling Miss Muffet to stand back and take a look at the tree.... Is it balanced?? We listen to Christmas carols and arrange decorations in festive manner, sometimes it involves me going.....No, no, no, not like that! and then the lovely vision of the beautiful family decorating harmoniusly goes flyin' out the window.... 

Wrapping needs to go together but not match..... and table setting is pretty much the same....

these are the memories we create....we tend to giggle alot about my OCDness and it ends Ok, we have a balanced tree with beautiful decorations placed just perfectly and I do not think my children are too scared, not yet anyway.

 

I love sentences that begin....Remember when.... these are the traditions and memories we create, they are the footprints that we leave to show where we have been, where we have come from.... I hope you have lots and lots of memories of your own special Christmas. it is above all for me family and love and fun and music and food (Miss Muffet asks for particular Banham- tradition-Christmas-food, so I'm think my OCDness is rubbing off quite well!!) and smiles, always smiles, smiles all round.

Hope you and your have the smilest Christmas ever.... Joyeux Noel xxxx 

 

Grateful for.....Saturday

I haven't played along for awhile now, so I thought I'd jump back in this week. Today I'm grateful for Saturday and all the simple things of today. Sleep in til 8am, generally I'm the type of girl that has always been, "right days over if I'm in bed past 7ish am" but today I did not rise til 8am..... I did not wake til 8am!! Quite unheard of here. But needed and embraced. (just this once)

Saturday coffee, tea and spiders....spent with the LOML and Mr Magoo and Miss Muffet. The Mr is away all week now so coffee time is also family time and often wet your pants laughing cause one of the smalls cracks me right up. Today Mr. Magoo tried, really tried not once but twice to drink from his spoon thinking it was his straw. Seriously. Seriously, he makes me laugh. I appreciate this time and relish in the fact we can spend it together.

Saturday pool time.... colouring and sketching never seems like work by the pool. It was a little cloudy today but it is lovley to chill by the pool.

Saturday BBQ and sunsets and caramel tarts. Our first outdoor dinner, the great Aussie BBQ, an amazing sunset and after I write this, one of my mums caramel tarts and vanilla ice-cream. They are the bomb!!

Today I am grateful for all these small things that make up my Saturday and my life. It is sometimes hectic and busy and me all cranky-arsed but today, today simple equals bliss...

 to see who else is grateful this week pop over to Maxabella loves.... 

 

I'm Grateful for.... the World Wide Web

 

This week I am grateful for this medium we know as the World Wide Web. It never ceases to amaze me the amount of talented individuals who continue to inspire me day to day. 

Maxbella Loves... blog, inspires me to continue to be grateful every single day, our family plays the glad game a lot and I like to play along over here when I remember....

Kind Over Matter.... I often stumble from side bar to side bar on peoples blogs so I can't remember how I found Amanda's blog but oh I'm glad I did. I'm also lucky enough to have an apple and tend to scroll through my history when all else fails and I want to find a blog I found day, or hours or weeks ago. Kind Over Matter has some super free printables and I took pleasure in printing some out and sticking them on my shop window for people to read and take. Yay, they did. 

Meet Me at Mikes, the very clever and ace Pip has a way groovy blog that I like to visit often. Pip makes cool stuff and has a cool shop and she has cool books too, you should totally check them out.

these are just the tip of a whopping, great iceberg . There are so very many amazing, inspiring and creative people in the world and this thing, this World Wide Web is a wonderful platform to launch from and I'm very grateful to I have it and live with it and use it. 

If your grateful too head on over to Maxbella Loves.... pop in and say hi it's a bit of fun.

 

 

Mr.Magoo goes double digits!!

Happy Birthday Rourke, double digits, the big 10, does't feel like too long ago I was in hospital wondering what the bloody hell I do with a cloth nappy? Worked that one out pretty quick actually!! Anyhow we've come quiet a way since then my cool boy, Dad, Miss Muffet and I hope 10 is as spectacular as the day you arrived.

You give us reason to SMILE everyday. 

Cake 1- the soccer field, went to school this morning. 

Nothing like a classroom full of kids and green icing! oh, to be 10!

today I am grateful for....family xxx

today I'm grateful for my family.... fairy ( I added the fairy bit) Godmother duties are on this weekend and I'm proud as punch to be my nieces and nephews Godmother....  

time with our families this weekend means loads of  giggling and smiles all round, the sort that cousins share.... extremely magical moments and fun made out of nothing at all.....

cherished memories from my childhood with cousins lets me peak into the future of these cousins and I know that they will remember these times for the rest of their lives.

If your grateful for something pop over here and play along.....

I hope your weekend is filled with sunshine and smiles and the sounds of laughter.....