Eli and Talei at the Music festival

Eli and Talei all excited before it starts

Thursday night saw us all off to Rangiora for the choral festival. Eli and Talei were in the Kaiapoi School Junior Choir and had been practising hard all year. The festival was fantastic. We all really enjoyed the night. All the schools did great jobs with their items and the mass choir was very well done.

waiting while everyone was arriving. all chattering and excited

Mieke loves glasses

Mieke came to visit on Thursday and everytime you put the fake glasses on her she either giggled or got a huge grin. She is full of chat and giggly. Had a great time seeing her.

Yet another earthquake and another day off school

The end result

We will not talk about the continuing stress and uncertainty of earthquakes! But today found me taking my two kids to work. Thankfully work today was at my sisters house in Amberley. Off we all trotted (an hour late!). As a break in the middle we had tea and cup cakes. The boys spent ages and lots of concentration on decorating the cupcakes. Albie continually insisted that he was allowed to eat two!

total concentration on the task at hand

Having fun making one for Matthew

Satisfaction when eating

Rambo lives here

On Saturday my work, Longsilver Construction, had a paintball and pizza afternoon. Aaron thought he was Rambo, so did Mark and so did half the other guys. I had not realised it would be so funny to watch. Some just went hard out shooting and running with no fear (and had bruises to show). Others, aka Aaron, looked like they were at real war!! It was Hilarious!!! The kids all wanted to try on the gear and got to shoot using the paintball gun and the tree as a target.

 

Eli

Montana

Albie

and Jakob

new projects started

the finished size ready for sewing together

Yes I know that I should be finishing stuff. But I was trolling through various peoples blogs on my favourite list. Looking at their favourites etc. One person had a tutorial on using left over scraps to make scrappy triangles. It was only 3 inch in size and strips were only about 1/2 inch wide. Way too much work. Plus it was paper foundation. So I decided to do 4 1/2 inch triangles with no fixed form. No template, just sew left over bits into a triangle, rectangle size and then use my triangle ruler to cut them out. Very quick and satisfying. The tip of the triangle uses such a small amount of fabric that you really do use left over trimmings. At the same time I started doing 12 1/2 by 4 1/2 inch strings for what????? but they look great. I am imagining them with grey.

this is the strips sewn together. no ironing until cutting out the shape

This is the finished strings. Looking glorious. Again just using bits and pieces.

The most effective organic pest destruction

the chooks were happy to munch through this lot.

We have reinstigated the days of paying for the pest!!! Get rid of the slugs in the garden, the eat all my plants. So for every snail the boys find they get 20 cents and every slug gets them 10 cents. We started this pest destruction programme about a year and a half ago. Not a lot has been destroyed this way but the boys are very keen at the moment. Jakob was wanting to buy some Lego and decided he needed money. So off he went and look what he collected. $2.10 worth.

My Queens Birthday trip

Needing to catch up with good friends in Waimate and Ashburton I took the long weekend to go away. Thanks to lovely hubby who had a boys weekend at home. (lots of car racing competitions, x-boxing etc).


At Bronwyn's house in Waimate I woke on Sunday morning to the most glorious rainbow I have seen in ages. This was taken out of the bedroom window. (I then went back to bed for a while until I was rung by my sister-in-law with a "baking emergency").

On my way up to Asburton to visit Marie I stopped at my favourite place - The Shearers Quarters - just out of Timaru. A good spot to stretch the legs. Great food, though the coffee is not the best, fantastic for kids and the most amazing surroundings. To stretch the legs I went animal visiting and just love the look of the Kune Kune Pigs. They look so ferocious but all they wanted was a good scratch on the back!

The awesome kune kunes contd.

don't forget the goat

the entry to the cafe

lovely big outside seating and huge playground

love the toilet and handbasin. Really in keeping

the enormous verandah

On a finishing streak

could not keep Morris out of the photo

I always have so many things on the go. I am very keen whenever I start a new project but that starts waning at some time and I end up with at least 10 things happening. Whenever I am sewing (not quilting) I get it all cut out and then it sits on my sewing desk for ages before I get to completion. I am always so inspired by each new idea that I start something due to the inspiration and immediately drop everything else. So I am trying to fix that issue!! This week I finished a cross stitch sampler. It has been 8 years in the making. I started it in a class at the Christchurch Embroiderers Guild with Jane van Kulen. I finished it at a lovely day put on by Lesley from Forget-me-knots. Morris would not leave me alone when I was taking the photos so he is in there too.
On my recent road trip I finished another cross stitch of a kettle and cups that was probably 10 years in the making (no photo as I still have not removed the line markings on the aida fabric).
On my desk cut up has been a bean bag seat. When reorganising Jakob's room I started it. To go in his reading corner. Anyway -finally finished though it was very roughly made!!
I have nearly finished a dragon bag for my nephew - again my continual problem - the "nearly" then sits around for a very long time.

Jakobs new bean bag seat

My treat

A pot of earl grey tea, a gorgeous apple pie and cream and something to stitch. All while watching a recording of River cottage everyday. Bliss at the end of a busy day.

I stewed some granny smith apples while making dinner. A sheet of Edmonds flakey puff pastry, put on apple, grate some lime rind, a spoon of brown sugar and some raisins. Fold it over, make some slashes, rub with milk for a glaze and cook in a hot oven for 15 minutes. Serve dusted with icing sugar and whipped cream and a pot of earl grey tea.

4 Children and 2 dogs

Eli loves having Meisha sleep with him

Well it is a busy weekend. I am down one husband (he has gone to Akaroa to have time out to finish two assignments and study for exams.
I have acquired one dog - Meisha - the parents-in-law dog (they are in Akaroa too). Meisha gets spoilt when she stays as she is allowed on beds etc.

My sister has gone to Cromwell (for a party and a local show) with her partner. So we have Montana-Rose and Albie staying too. Thanks to Uncle Simon I got a 2 1/2 hour break as him and Lyn picked the kids up to go and watch Matthew play rugby (they lost :-).)

At five pm all were tired so they got to watch some Thunderbirds.

They are now all in bed, though I can hear little voices so growly aunty will be happening soon.Dishes to do, things to tidy and then I am going to give myself a treat.

In spite of all of this ( or because of all of this - I was so shot last night all I could do was sit down and watch some of my recorded programmes and stitch a bit) I managed to get some stitching done on a quilt I am designing. This has been on the go since the day I had with Leanne and Rosalie last year.It is based on the concept of design that Leanne taught us.  I have just managed to start designing some of the stitching. Am not yet totally happy with the applique but it is a learning curve and I want to keep it  reasonably simple. So it is flowers and hearts. (very normal I know but a begining).
I have gotten very optimistic by putting 2011 on the quilt. It now has to be finished this year!!!

The Road Trip

Well a lot has happened lately and I have had a lot to blog but have not done it.

Crashed and wrote off our little car. The only decent small cars with lower km's seemed to be in Auckland. So we bought a Toyota Will and Aaron and I had a three day road trip driving it back down to Kaiapoi. The funny thing is that we have not yet taken a photo of the actual car!!!
Her name is KCC (said Casey) short for Kaiapoi's coolest car.

Off we drove

only took a few photos on the way

Gorgeous Mt Ruapehu

And on the ferry