Another birthday done and dusted YAY!!

I have but one excuse - another birthday!! This time Jess turned nine and wanted a sleepover like last year. So we made it a glamour photo shoot sleepover. Lots of nieces and aunties to help do 7 girls hair and makeup and then I took heaps of photo's of them all. :)







The request was hungry jacks for dinner so after compiling the girls orders into a sort of list Tom Bianca and Telia went and got them for us - bbq for us :) A beautiful cookies and cream Ice cream cake :) Singstar Abba went down a treat - loved this one hehe!!!





I put the lights out and tv off at 1.30am lol and 3 were still awake - little did they know Chionia would be waking them at 7am!!!! A few blurry eyes but straight into bacon and eggs and pancakes for brekkie followed bby a class in making their own canvas using a group shoot and photo of themselves on a canvas - they had loads of fun scrapping away with bling and flowers and Cricut word Memories but omg the mess!!!!! Oh and cuttlebug was a huge hit with them all!! A few knew it from school where Jess has taken it a few times and LOVE it:) Then we basically finished those and home time - phew!!!!! Needed a nanna nap in the arvo then fell to sleep with Jess on her mattress which is still in the lounge room.

Monday night we were childless.....OUr old gorgeous neighbours took the girls for the night - it was so quiet - so peaceful - so relaxing lol!! we had a wine up the road and then went to look at the new Hillarys boat harbour (been open a few months now.. ;) ) and went to a fabbo restaurant for dinner and the best thing - the next morning I could sleep in!!! Yay !! THanks guys much needed :)

Then back to reality - busy with work and work! and home life has been busy playing catch up after all these birthdays and do's! Jess took off today for a few days in Dunsborough with mum and dad - she couldn't wait! Me - some organising to do which I have just about sorted another YAY!! BRB Jess calling on the phone XX Nite all


lol and before I forget - TWiddleybitz has a new challenge set by Ellen Woodbridge - fantastic idea!!! Can't wait to see what you all come up with - www.twiddleybitzdt.blogspot.com

90 cupcakes, 2 birthday cakes, 1 fairy party and gastro!!

Been a little bit busy lately. Grab a cup of coffee and get ready for a long post lol!!!

April is a pretty busy month birthday wise for us and this year Chionia had her very first birthday party.......along with that came lots of pink and purple fairy things!! Lots of baking - 30 cupcakes for daycare, 30 cupcakes for school and then a few more for the party!!!





We kept presents to a minimum as there is a surprise happening for both girls next month but she got a leapster 2 from us and some My little Pony's and a cash register.



Her birthday fell on a Thursday so mum and dad came up from Dunsborough and stayed the night so we had a birthday cake on her birthday - a very funny fairy mushroom!! And for her party we had a beautiful fairy cake :)




Of course I had all the little bits and pieces for the party :)




And then it started :) Fairy Sparkle and Fairy Bubbles arrived and started the fun and games :) All the little fairies had a ball. I am also pretty pleased with how I tried to cut out artificial colours and flavours for the party - the only thing with artificial colours was the icing on the cupcakes and cakes - everything else - sausage rolls, mini quiches, white marshmellows, popcorn, fruit, fairy bread (yes I used Nemars NATURAL coloured 100's & 1000's ;) ) was all free from the crap!! Lemonade for drinks and lots of fairies went home very happy and tired!!! Thanks to Carol who grabbed some awesome photo's of the day as well :) Nice to have a scrappy mum there who knows what sort of photo's are important hehe







Unfortunately the bug Chionia got on her birthday itself (after everyone left the poor thing got gastro) Gary and I caught in the wee hours of Sunday morning :( I am sorry to anyone who picked up the bug whilst they were here (mum, dad, shelby, Bianca, Shelby Di.....oops.....!) Hopefully you are all better now - it was only a 24 hour bug :)

Then the next day was Gary's birthday - poor thing - as we were sick the day before I lost my last chance of picking up a little birthday pressie for him - He did receive a double swag a few weeks back for his birthday. So I though I would make him a yummy roast for tea - popped it in the oven - came back an hour later to put the potatoes in (in the meantime had been rushing around the house cleaning it up from the party still as we were sick the day before!) and found that the gas had gone out GRRRRRRRRR so dinner was delayed.......I didn't even have a cake for him as we were all caked out from the last few days!!!

A BOM class and a couple days of work and all of a sudden it is Easter.. Had to do some quick invites for Jess's birthday next Saturday which I completely scraplifted from Amanda - 5 girls coming for a sleepover and they thought the invites were sooooooooooooo coooooooooooolllllllll!!! :) Thanks Amanda :)



So yesterday I scrapped and had heaps of fun with some new goodies from the shop :) Prima petite fleur vines and some collections releases :) Along with the Graphic 45 pp I just LOVE - I believe they have docked in Australia just waiting for Printblocks to send them over!!! Fingers crossed they are here for the retreat YAY!!!

Also in the midst of all the birthday chaos SIA (Scrapbooking Industry Association) was on in Sydney - now for those of you who don't know it is a big get together of wholesalers and retailers in Australia - Twiddleybitz had a booth over there so all the few weeks previous hard work came together and the stand looked fantastic. Jump over to the DT blog and check out some of the new pieces. :)

Jess and little Monty - my sisters new puppy!!!





FIL & MIL wedding day photo - love these old photo's!! (don't worry it is a copy!)

And the BUsselton jetty photo taken sometime in the 1950's I think - way before the cyclone came through in 1978 and wiped out half of it!! Now it is a lot more commercialised....







Must run - need to organise the girls for the beach and then pick up my phone from the shop - oops left it there Thursday!! Have a happy and safe Easter everyone :)

Shark Dive photo's!!

lol before I forget again!! Just for you Carol Gary and his shark dive at AQUA a few weeks ago - a christmas present from SIL :) The photo's are not the best - it is either too dark down there and you get the flash bouncing off the underwater tunnel or just murky.....Anyway an awesome idea for a present for someone :)












and Jess being brave and holding the starfish in the touch pool for the other kids :)

Sneak peaks for my BOM class

I promised I would try and pop some sneak peaks up for the ladies in my BOM class so here you go - hot off the press so to speak hopefully this week we can start scrapping some pages!!!! The covers and albums are looking fan-bloody-tastic!! LOVE them :)

Birth announcement....




Otherwise we have been busy here...... Can't believe it is already the end of week 7 at school. I think I worked out last night we have something major on every weekend until the last weekend in MAY!!!!! I think I need a holiday!!!!!

Speaking of which instead of going to Bali we are looking at going to Queensland with girls - do the theme parks etc...just need to work in the time etc and plan it!!

Birthdays galore are coming in April throw in Easter as well and you know why I love May! - Our schedule goes something like this....

1st Bear's birthday
2nd - Chionia & Toms BD
4th Chionia's fairy party
6th Gary and Helens BD
10th-13th Easter
17th Riss's BD
18th - Jessica's and Fraser's BD
25th Telia BD

and I am sure I have forgotten someone!!

ok must fly - I have a clock crackling its paint I hope so need to organise the next step in that process. Gary has gone down for a hit of the driving range with Tom Jess and Bianca - I piked out and staying home with Chionia who just needs a little bit of quiet time I think - she was up early today - not good when you have been out partying the night before...!!!

Take care all :)

Craft garage sale.....

Just quickly if you are after a bargain we are holding a garage sale at work today - customers have registered and brought in all their scrapbooking and craft goodies they no longer want and are selling them at crazy prices!!!! Starts at 11am - 4pm 3/18 Enterprise Crescent in Malaga. Come and say HI!!!

There is everything from cricut's and cartridges to paperpacks, inks stamps the works!!!

Will be back tonight after a busy day ;)

Phantom, Drallion, TBZ sneak peaks and a long weekend!!

A busy busy weekend - Took Jess to see Phantom of the Opera on Saturday as Gary didn't want to go and OMG it took my breath away - we were only a couple of rows from the front of the stage and the detail in everything was just phenomenal. I absolutely loved every little minute of it as did Jess!!! Would go again in a heartbeat if I had a chance!!

Sunday was Drallion day with Cirque de Soleil - I must say I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would have - don't get me wrong - it was stunning but we have been to every one so far and perhaps it was cause we knew what sort of things to expect. Also I loved Phantom more so perhaps a bit of both! Chionia came along to her first show as well and behaved through most of it - she got bored towards the end but that was just her attention span saying enough!! hehe One of the clowns before the show started discovered gary's pony tail.... held it up and pretended it was his moustache - the clown then went away and came back with his mate and a pair of scissors and a bandaid lol!!!

SIA is coming up and TBZ are in full mode - can't say much about it but OMG their new stock is fantabulous!!!!!! Nic came around on Friday night to drop off some bits and pieces so make up for SIA and I have had sooooo much fun this weekend inbetween concerts!! Here is a sneak peak or two!!!



Long weekend here so apart from Chionia waking up at the crack of dawn due to falling asleep last night at 5pm we are relaxing this morning and some more scrapping and then perhaps once Gary is home from work at lunchtime we may go to the beach - after a few hot sticky days it appears to be a bit cooler today..!

Take care all :)

BOM......

Now I am sure that a couple of the ladies from my BOM class will be having a looksey here so I thought they may like a sneak peak at tomorrows class!!

BOM = Book of Me - is one of those things I had been wanting to do but never really got around to it...tell you what though I am loving it!!! I spent most of Friday arvo/night going through a trunk of photo's with lots of memories (lol I was skinny once!!) and then yesterday dragged out my 3 big boxes of memories. It is sooo good to remember all those little details. This weeks topic is Where I have lived - well me - I have lived in quite a few places!!! Still waiting on some photo's from dad on England











now I am sure blogger will mess up the order they are in but here is the journalling that goes with it!

I first lived in a house in Dianella but not long after I was born we moved to 143 Lawley St in Yokine.

This house was decorated very 70’s style!! Think shag pile carpets, damask wallpaper, browns and mustards. It had a huge backyard with a Jacaranda tree with a tyre swing in it (the swing I jumped out of and broke my collarbone when about 2-3yrs old). We also had a chook pen in the same corner – heaps of grass out the back and I remember helping mum and dad mulch the roses out the front! School was just down the road and I used to walk over the bridge crossing on Wanneroo Rd and then it was just behind the shops. I got caught once spending my lunch money after school buying lollies oops!

Not long after I turned 7 we moved to Borneo. We lived initially in Seria G10/11. All the houses were simply named a number in lots of about 12-20 houses then the next lot etc! Our first house in Brunei was long and skinny! Every room had air-con and Shell supplied all the basic furniture as well. The middle of the house was the lounge room just behind it the kitchen with a corridor going from one end of the house with the kids rooms to the other end where the master bedroom. We could pick our own paint for the walls and mine was a bright happy pink!!! We had an amah – a maid that cleaned the house and lived in the quarters at the back of the house. Her name was Jamila and she was fired as she used her quarters to solicit men. Next door lived the Durston’s who also arrived from Perth. We used to play volleyball and badminton with the net between our two houses.

A couple of years later we moved up in the scheme of houses to a new estate – G5 / 3. These were huge cedar wood houses built on stilts and only 100metres or so from the jungle – we were able to watch the monkeys and orang-utans play at the jungle edge. We also had to watch out for snakes. When we were leaving Brunei and selling all the plants etc, a French lady who just arrived in Brunei found a 12 foot python in one of our egg jars in the garage. The snake people came and caught it – it was sleepy as it had just caught dinner from under the house

Whilst living in Brunei we used to go to the Panaga Club a lot – it was a social club for the employees of Shell. It had heaps of tennis courts, badminton, swimming pool x 2, golf course, oval for hockey etc, sailing club (which divided its time between the Panaga Club and the KBYC), restaurant (which Mum and dad took me to for my 10th birthday – it was a fancy/expensive one), change rooms, bars, takeaway food etc – everything we bought we would sign “chits” for and it was added to our account.

Panaga School was for the Shell employee’s children and we had both English and Dutch streams. At one stage the school had so many children that 2 classes (mine and another) did the year in a house next door and we would walk over some bridges to have recess etc – we always went home for lunch and then back to school in the afternoon.


During our time in Brunei Dad worked a fair bit in England and at one stage went to live with him in Bath. We stayed in two places – Bath - where we had piano lessons with Mrs Sullivan, watched Punch and Judy shows from the grassed area for pantomime, the cobblestone roads with basket after basket of flowers lining the streets, to the book store I loved, to living on a farm with Biggles the dog (near Box I think)! I loved the flowers in England and pressed a lot of them – we didn’t have flowers like that in Brunei!
My schooling ran out towards the end of 1985. I did Distance Education with the Education Department of WA. I stayed on at Panaga School and one of my favourite teachers Miss Mulholland overlooked my lessons with Distance Education. It was this reason Dad took another job for Shell in Holland. We moved there after having Christmas in Perth in 1985. We went from 40degree heat to minus – We hadn’t had a winter since 1981 so it was sooooo different for us. We initially stayed at the Europa Hotel in Schveningen and a couple of months later moved to our 4 storey unit in Leidschendam. It was situated just outside The Hague and between all 3 schools we kids went to. All the houses in Holland are tall and skinny due to lack of space. Everyone rode their bikes though – they even had traffic lights at the traffic lights just for bikes!! I used to ride to school in fine weather – about 12kms – there weren’t any hills in Holland so it was an easy ride  in winter we could also ice-skate the river (aka De Vliet) in front of our house when it froze over.

At the end of 1987 we moved back to Perth so I could finish my schooling here in WA. We moved back into a house mum and dad had bought in Scarborough a few years before – 8 Lovett St (which I moved into when I left home to live with my fiancé Gary). After house hunting for a month or so we moved into Karrinyup in March. I went to Scarborough Senior High School and started in Year 9. I lived here until I moved out to live with my husband – then fiancé – where we moved back into the Scarborough house and rented it from mum and dad in 1994 – Grand final day – Eagles vs. Geelong!!!



Kaiser Memo board - class for March :)




Have a paper bag class this morning so need to get the girls organised - Shelby stayed last night so it is pancakes for brekkie today!!! After todays class I come home to collect Gary who has a session with Tom swimming with the sharks at AQUA!!