Omg!

Four to go!! Only FOUR to go!!!!!!! Soooooo close to completing my NY Resolution before the end of October!! Awesomeness!!!!!!!!
:) C

The Kingmans in Kiwi Land! Day 1...

Hi y'all!
Yes I'm back! Yes, I'm still alive and haven't forgotten that I have a blog!
I had a fabulous trip to Wellington with Mum, Dad, Yvette and Alicia, with no husbands or children! I didn't miss Jaimeson too bad, I'd say because it wasn't an environment I was used to having him in, and there were no other children around. I was so happy when I got home though, and LOVED getting his excited cuddles and big smiles again {hearts rising from head}.
Yvette is doing a FANTASTIC job at blogging about our trip, you can read Day 1 HERE, and seeing as I'd only be repeating what she has already so beautifully blogged, I decided I would concentrate on the food aspect of our trip. Cos we ate A.LOT. Like, we ate every day! (LOL!) No really, we ate at some awesome establishments & I do like taking pics of food, so I'm going to give you the "Kingmans in Kiwi Land Grand Gastronomical Tour"! Sit back and enjoy (and salivate {licking lips!}).
I'm sorry for the poor quality of my pics, it turns out 13000 pics (overall) is quite a large number to be taken by a little pocket camera, and it has decided enough is enough! They looked fine on the camera screen, but now I've downloaded them, I find some are quite crap. {smacking hand on forehead}. Better get a new camera for Hawaii then!

Lets whet your appetite with a little plane food! In fact, it wasn't bad. I think I am actually one of those weird people who enjoys aeroplane food. {Hands smacking against cheeks}. I KNOW! These kind of people do exist!

It was chicken casserole with green beans & mash and a little side salad of roasted veggies. Can you have a salad of veggies? You know what I mean... And then there was a square of apricot and frangipani cake. It was a bit weird. Like eating a piece of cold, apricot flavoured, kitchen sponge. I finished it though.

Our first night's dinner was at the General Practitioner on the corner of Willis Street and Boulcott St in Wellington city. It was in this gorgeous old San Francisco-style house that used to be the Doctor's surgery and residence. They even still have his leather Doctor's bag and some old books and tools on display! Totally awesome.

Their menu changes nightly. Can you imagine! You could go back night after night and eat something different!

I had Salt and Pepper Squid, then shared a chocolate cake dessert with Yvette. Both were delicious! The portion was small cos it was an entree size squid, but the flavour of the squid was awesome and the avocado on the side was so yum!

 Yvette had the mussels, and Mum and Dad shared Mussels and Lamb Shanks. Yum!
The meals were all so pretty too. I love when they put effort in to presentation like this! So cool!

Here we are upstairs in the GP in what used to be the Main Bedroom. I loved it's 2 big bay windows! So beautiful. There was a photograph of the city block it's on, with all of the buildings surrounding it knocked down to the ground, with the GP just crouching on the corner of the big empty block, so lonely! I'm SO HAPPY they didn't knock it down too, it's so beautiful!

These trophy antlers were covering the walls of the room we ate in, along with heaps of hunting pics from around the Wellington area. There was so much to look at!

There was this cool display column up the centre of the staircase with all the old tools and books in it. So cool!
So that was our first awesome meal! Stay tuned for more cool eats around Wellington!
:) C

Little Boy Blue..

Hi Y'all!
Not long til NZ now, yay!!
Here are some Baby Boy cards to keep you inspired to create!

Clearly, I had the Kaisercraft Elephant stamp out on my desk when I was in a creative mood for these cards! I made 3 cards using him! He's so cute though, I couldn't put him down! And I paired him with the Stampin Up retired {sob!} set, "Seeing Stars" which is an awesome set for guys. I'm always bummed when they retire some really versatile sets like this one! Oh well, I have enjoyed perusing the new catalogue for new favourite sets! The sentiment is from Kaisercraft too.

I had fun making it look as though the elephant was blowing the stars out of his trunk! Then I added some jewels in between to add a bit of bling. You can never have too much bling, even on boy cards!

Baby blue and brown is one of my favourite colour combos for baby boys. In fact, I think it is my very favourite. It looks so smart! I've used Kraft and Bashful Blue cardstock from Stampin Up for the base cards. The "baby" sentiment on this card is from Stampin Up's Pennant Parade set.

Then I made a card to use up all those little patterned paper scraps that were hanging about on my desk! It reminds me a bit of quilting, piecing all the small bits together to create a fancy background. It's fun! Not to mention a fabulous way to use up all those tiny pieces you hoard! Or is that just me? {tongue in cheek} The sentiment here is Kaisercraft and the little boy is by Stampendous I think.
Have you been stamping lately?
:) C

Project 365, Collages 57, 58 & 59...

More project 365!

225: City 2 Surf, my 3rd one, Will's 6th!
226: Jai loves playing soccer in the backyard, he can even kick the ball himself if you run him up to it!
227: Exploring the different parks in our neighbourhood. This one has an awesome slide!
228: Swimming!! Jai squealed the pool hall down with his cries of glee! He {hearts} swimming! Which is great, cos this is gonna be a hot summer!

229: Work.
230: Jai is able to lift the flaps on one of his favourite books all by himself now!!
231: Loving my new J.Crew bubble necklace! (allegedly authentic, but I did get it on ebay from Hong Kong so I'm highly sceptical!)
232: My gorgeous boy!

233: Some Op Shopping treasures from our Op Shopping Safari to the Northern Beaches. Not as big a haul as I thought I would find actually! Turns out our local suburbs are the best for Pyrex!
234: Daddy's shoes are still a little toooo big! Jai brought them over to me saying "Shoes!" and then proceeded to put them on his feet! So cute!
235: In new PJ's from Granny & Papa from Alaska!
236: "Hey, you come here often?" LOL!

:) C

Snug as a Bug in a Rug.

Good Morning y'all!
What an exciting week it is this week, I'm going to New Zealand on Thursday with Mum, Dad, Yvette & Alicia! That's right, I'm leaving Willy and Jai at home for 4 nights! Did I say exciting week? I meant exciting, apprehensive, scary, sad, worrying week! LOL! I have never stayed away from Jaimeson overnight before, and now I will be in a different country and everything! Luckily it's only across the ditch, not too far away {giggles}!
I am really looking forward to sleeping in and going out for dinner later than 6pm! (Though we will have Mum and Dad with us, and they sometimes like eating at Old People Dinner Time of 5:30pm! Hehehehehe!) And being able to try on clothes in shops without finding a fitting room to squeeze a pram in to, or leaving the door ajar! And not having to subconciously scope out everywhere you go for a Parent's Room or to see where the lifts are! It's a new kind of freedom I'm expecting! LOL!
I imagine this will be my only chance to get away without Jaimeson for, like probably ever (til he's 18 anyway! LOL!) and eventually we will have more babies to tie me down, so I'd better enjoy these 5 days while I can! Though I will miss Jaimeson so much. Luckily he'll have Willy to look after him {hugs.}

So, here is my little fellow, many moons ago, in fact over a year ago now! How time flies {watching time zoom past the window fast as a fighter jet}. What a sweet little thing he is! He was so little and chubby, he's such a skinny boy now. What happened to all that chub?

Fun stuff on this page: the die cut owl perched on washi tape. Love it! The yellow dot paper makes me happy, yellow is such a happy colour! The "keepin it real" journalling. You gotta "tell it as it is sister!" I'm not into making all my journalling happy and fluffy, I'm a realist.
Hope your week is super awesome!
:) C

Project 365: Collages 53, 54, 55 & 56!

More catch up for Project 365! I am sooooo far behind {smacking back of hand}. I know I always say that, so how about we just expect that I'll be behind, and don't assume that these pics are from any time recently! Cos they're so not! {turning back many pages of the calendar!} Here we are back at the end of July and into August....

209: Lunch Date to Cafe 3one7 at Parramatta. Willy is fishing for a Lam. Hahahahaah! {giggles}. Spaghetti is a good bait for catching children!
210: Playtime in the sun in the backyard. Yay for sunshine!
211: Jaimeson having a horsey ride from some of the guys at work who were having an exercise session in a local park. Never underestimate a toddler's ability to make grown guys go all mushy and play childish games! No matter how macho they are!
212: Jai's new (terrible) haircut! Luckily it only took a week to grow out! It was so nerdy!

213: Jaimeson's first Art Work! A drop & squash painting he did at Playgroup. What a pretty butterfly!
214: At work. Here is my multi-function phone. Thankfully, I changed numbers when I came back to work, so I don't get as many phone calls as I used to cos people can't find me! LOL!
215: I'm sick!
216: Willy taking Jai for a ride around the backyard in the Washing Trolley. It got a bit bent after this {smirk}. Clearly Jai is heavier than Will realised, or Will is a worse driver than he thought? Hahahahah!

217: Family photo! Having some play time together :)
218: Grocery Shopping! Jaimeson loves the giant cardboard cutout of Dawn French at Coles. Why? I have no idea! She does have a big smile!
219: Jai loving a birds-eye view of the world! No-where is cooler than riding on Daddy's shoulders.
220: Yay! Costco! With Granny & Papa :)

221: I dropped my car off for a service before work, and joined the long ant-trail of Commuters from the deep-underground train station, up to the surface. There are 2 of these extra long escalators to take you up from underground, it's very futuristic!
222: Family Farewell Cuddles before work!
223: MMMM...... breakfast out at a cafe! I {heart} Cafe breakfasts! Almost more than dinners I reckon! Here I'm having corn fritters with homemade tomato salsa and crispy bacon {sniffing the air for the delicious smell of frying bacon... sadly it's only a memory and not a reality!} We were at Dig.i.kaf at Glebe.
224: Met up with Alicia & Xander at Top Ryde Shopping Centre for a fun shopping & coffee day!

Yay, we've made it into August! Hooray!
:) C

Vintaging... and a Nap Nap

Hi y'all!
Time for some more Vintage Treasures!
Isn't it funny, the way you need to make a few passes at an Op Shop to see all the treasures? Why is it that on first pass you might see one or two things, but when you go back over it all again, you see more treasures that for some reason you didn't see the first time! Amazing! It's like they hide from you, playing a secret game of hide and seek, and if you're a hardcore player coming back for another pass, they'll spring out at you like "Hello! Here I am!"

That's my number 1 tip for Vintaging: go over the shelves more than once! And my number 2 tip: look up high and get on your knees and look under the shelves. The number of times I've found Pyrex platters underneath the shelves, and that's where Will found one of my most prized dishes- the Pink Flannel Flowers dish! He got on his knees and looked under the shelves and there it was, pushed right to the back (probably hidden by someone who was coming back for it later!). Number 3 tip: look in unexpected places... like look for Pyrex in with the tupperware. I've found gems there. It's like they see colours and presume it's plastic, so in it goes with the Tupperware, when clearly Pyrex is glass! Anyways..... back to the finds!

We were at Salvos at Lidcome and came away with these beauties! On first pass I found the Pyrex Cracker Barrell with AWESOME woodgrain print, it was $2 and in such perfect condition! I also found the orange ramekin $1 and the Fire King doily print ramekin $1, and the glass lid $2 on half price sale. Then on second pass I saw the lobster & veg print Pyrex tiny casserole. I wasn't going to get it, but Will loved it, and it was 50c so Will guilted me into getting it. I do like the Lobster now, after all!
Then I saw the clock. WOW!! And it works! Though it needs winding up every day! Talk about a hard-work friend! But it's soooo retro cool, and it was only $3! What a bargain! Then next to the clocks was something Jaimeson saw, and fell in love with. Cos it's one of his new "sounds". A Nap Nap! Well, the sound is actually for a Crocodile, if you ask him what sound it makes he claps his hands together and says "Nap Nap!" (snap snap!) So cute! And the St George Dragon apparenly makes for a good Nap Nap! Cos he got soooooooo excited when he saw it! His first Op Shop find! He loved it, so we got it for him. It was only 50c {wink!} but it made him sooo happy! LOL! The squirrel mug was only $1 too, and it's my new Work Mug for having my tea at lunch time!

Here is a close up of the awesome woodgrain paint on the Cracker Barrel. Cool hey!
Did you find anything cool this week?
:) C

Christmas is coming!

Hi y'all!
Have you been to the shops lately? Have you seen that all the Christmas stuff is coming in already?! How lucky we are in Australia, to get to see all the beautiful Christmas things from September to December, rather than having to deal with those other pesky holidays they have in America, like Halloween and Thanksgiving. {giggles!} Just kidding, but I do love all the Christmas stuff around already!
So it got me in the mood to post about some Christmas pages I've done this year! I don't usually do Christmas pages, even though I have heaps of Christmas supplies. Why?? {scratching head}. I think I maybe get a bit overwhelmed by the number of pics I take at Christmas, and I don't know where to start! That's why it was good to do the small December Daily Christmas mini-album last year, with all the different shaped pages & Christmas themed embellishments. I've prepared this year's already! YAY!!
Oh, look how little Jaimeson looks! Such a little cutie {hearts rising from head!}
I love this little Elf outfit Aunty Alicia bought him. What a gorgeous boy!
Fun stuff: Love the MM glitter letter stickers; getting to use up some of my mountain of 3D stickers (I have over 100 packets, oops!); the bottle cap I have had for about 10 years! Honestly! {gasp!};the cool candy-print arrow. I love arrows, I use them a lot!
Then this second page, sorry about the poor quality, I obviously didn't notice my lens was really dirty!
Fun stuff: being able to "frame" the ridiculous Christmas chicken with the white chipboard frame (which I've had for 6 years. O.M.G. must stop hoarding!); using up more 3D Christmas stickers- the mittens and layered star; the felt holly sticker at the top of the page.
I'm happy to have partly-assembled my December Daily album already! I feel organised for Christmas! I hope it sticks around! LOL!
:) C

Circle Circus Bunting

I love digging out old stamp sets and using them in a new design card, or in a totally different colour scheme to what I normally do. Do you get stuck in a certain colour scheme for a certain stamp set too? I've gotta shake off normality, and try new things! {shaking shoulders vigorously!}
So as I've been in a Bunting Mood lately I wondered if Circle Circus by Stampin Up would make a great string of "Bunting Flags". Kinda like a cross between the beautiful paper or crochet doily bunting I keep seeing on Pinterest, and a traditional string of flags.

I really like how they turned out! I used different colours to what I normally would work with too, like Kraft coloured base card and deep Eggplant purple paper with eggplant printed vellum sewn over the top. Then the inks for the Circles were Soft Sage, Summer Sun, Vintage Violet and Rose Red.

For this second card I used the same colours of circles and paper, but the base card is Rose Red. I sewed the circles onto the square of background paper before I mounted it on the base card, so the sewing doesn't show through on the inside.
Then I thought I would really switch it up by using some retro themed background paper, but still use Circle Circue (well, it was already out on my desk, and I'm lazy enough to not change sets! Lol!)

I used Melon Mambo, Tempting Turquoise and Summer Sun ink, and also the Perfectly Scripted set for the sentiment (Perfectly Scripted is one of my fave sentiment sets, the font is gorgeous. It's my pic for most used sentiment set!).

I like how the same set can look complimentary, or quite different, just by changing up the colours you use!
Have you dug out your old sets yet? Go on! Grab them, and some different colours to what you would normally use, and go for it!
:) C

Happy Birthday Felicity!

Happy Birthday Felicity!

(Yes, it's a busy birthday time in our Family!)
Happy Birthday to the sister closest in age to me, who I used to share a room with, used to fight with (cos we are the 2 youngest), who I used to copy but tried to deny it (I only didn't like mushrooms growing up cos you didn't like them!), lived with for the most of my life out of all my sisters!, who let me borrow her car and didn't get angry when someone ran into it, shared clothes with, made cards with, taught me that feeding Jaimeson prune juice with his rice cereal would help him poop, who looks the most like me and who I love very much!

Have a wonderful day!
:) C