Sidetracked

It's only a few days until Christmas and I still have so much to do.  I haven't even begun to think about what I need on my grocery shopping list which is just woeful organisation on my part.

So what am I doing instead of being a busy bee and getting everything ready for the big day?

Going through this of course....

 

 

My sister-in-law gave me this bag absolutely full of wool from her Mum.  There's so many different colours, textures and balls of the stuff that I'm in hooky heaven.  There's also about 20 pairs of knitting needles too so I may have to have another go at that and see if I can work it out.

 

To make me feel not as bad for being so sidetracked looking through this bag of treasures, I've been making a few little Christmas things.

 

 

Little Santa hats, stars and wreaths to go on the tree and add a bit of homemade goodness to the rest of the sparkle.

 

Of course my boy just couldn't resist......

 

 

 

I found these teeth marks and little chunk taken out of my blocking board not long ago. 

 

Have a fantastic weekend.

 

xx Susan

 

P.S. If you want to have a go at the decorations I got the Santa Hat pattern here, the Star pattern here, and the Wreath pattern here.

 

I did change my wreath pattern a little in rounds 2 and 3 but if you follow this pattern it will look great too.

Evenings out

We're not really a family who goes out at night much.  There aren't a lot of places to go at night around here which doesn't require a bit of a drive so we usually snuggle up at home once the sun goes down.

 

This last week however we've found ourselves out on a couple of occasions.

 

The first was the annual Christmas light drive where we go around our town and the neighbouring towns within a 10-20 km radius to check out the sparkles.

 

 

 

Sorry about the quality of the photo but I didn't take my camera and only thought about taking photos on my phone when we got to one of the last houses we saw on the night.

 

The kids were excited at the beginning.  There was lots of ho, ho, ho-ing and Merry Christmas yelled out the car windows at nearly everyone they saw.

 

We also headed down to Caloundra yesterday evening to meet up with Grandma as we won't see her over Christmas.  She's heading up to Cairns to be with hubby's brother and his family so we had a casual beach dinner with her last night.

 

It was the most gorgeous evening.

 

 

It's so lovely having family time like this.

 

 

 

I hope you're all having a fantastic week.

 

xx Susan



A candle lit.....

For those devastated by the senseless tragedy in Connecticut.

 

 

My heart breaks for those little ones and their families.

 

My children are the same age as those affected and I'm making sure they get plenty of extra hugs and kisses.  Sometimes we need to let some of those small dramas slide and just tell our kids we love them.

 

xx Susan

Making Christmas

I'm trying to make as many Christmas presents as I can this year. It's not only to keep the costs down but also because I don't want to buy the same old things as everyone else in the shops. 

 

Two of my nephews are getting these laundry bags.

 

A laundry bag is certainly not a fun gift but their mum did request them.  I may make some superhero masks and gauntlettes like I did for Little Miss R recently so they have something a bit more exciting.

 



 

For Little Miss R's teacher I've made a couple of Ouchie packs.  She has two small boys and I thought these would be great for them.  They're just small wheat packs which I keep in the freezer so when the kids have their bumps and spills they grab an Ouchie pack. 

 

They're cool enough and pliable enough to go on bumps and bruises but not so completely freezing that they don't want to use them.

 

 

I've also made a number of shopping bags which I'll give to various people with their presents, including Little Miss R's teacher.

 



 

 

They're really easy to make and I always fully line them and make sure everything's re-inforced so they're pretty sturdy.

 

 



 

I've almost finished 3 more swimming bags which will soon be winging their way north to Cairns for my two nephews and niece.

 

 

Yes the sewing elf has been busy around here. 

 

Don't you love these elf boots.  My nephew was going to his daycare concert dressed as an elf and my sister-in-law asked if I could sew him some elf boots. 

 

I found a couple of patterns for them but I didn't really like them too much so I just made my own up.  They're pretty awesome and Nephew R loves them.  Master M and Little Miss R now both want a pair!

 



 

 

I've also realised that there's less than two weeks to go until the big day and I'm nowhere near ready at this stage.  I'd better exercise that presser foot!

 

xx Susan

What my boy's up to now

Master M is so ready for school. We just need to survive the Christmas period and get through January without too many more disaster's.

 

Yesterday I left him outside with the dog for LESS THAN 5 MINUTES while I ran inside and wrapped my Mum's birthday present.

 

I came outside to this....

 

 

Somehow my not quite 5 year old son got some rope around one corner of the clothes line and then wrapped it around the pole of the clothes line.  I'm not sure exactly what he did to get it looking like this though.

 

 

 

It's definately snapped off.  As hubby's back at work my neighbour and his son (yes, the ones who felled a tree on my fence and gate last week), came over to look at it for me. 

 

It's now in two parts with the line section on the ground and hopefully some cutting and welding by hubby next week to get it back together.

 

Oh and he's also painted the toilet blue using the toilet brush.  It's now quite stained.

 

Family beware, I maybe in need of your assistance with sleepovers during the school holidays to help save my sanity when Shane's away.

 

xx Susan



We are now a family of 5

Meet Patch.

 

 

He's 11 weeks old and from the litter that my brother's dog had.

 

It would seem it was 3 against 1 to get a dog.  I was obviously the one. We'll see how I cope when hubby goes back to work tomorrow.

 

 

A wolfhound/staghound cross dog is not what  I would normally choose, especially with our small yard.  He is lovely though with soulful brown eyes and he seems to want to follow me around.  I think he's worked out in a short time who'll be looking after him!

 

xx Susan

Oh dear boys....

Yesterday evening I was inside, happily organising dinner for just hubby and myself.  Both kidlettes were having a sleepover at my brother's place so we were looking forward to an extremely rare night on our own.

 

I could hear a chainsaw going and didn't take much notice of it knowing it was just the neighbours clearing up some trees in their yard. 

 

Then I heard the big crash and knew something wasn't quite right so I ran outside to find the neighbour, his teenage son and lovely hubby standing around looking at this......

 

 

 

The chainsaws were then busy cutting the palm tree up.

 

We are now left with this tangled mess.

 

 



 

...and yes, Oh dear boys was the polite version of what I said to them.

 

xx Susan