Pink Whimsy

house work

       

I have been cleaning my house continually for the past three days and things just seem to stay the same.  I am trying this new thing of being really organized, so my home runs like a well oiled machine.  My main concern about this new goal of mine is that I am just too lazy to be efficient.  Maybe I need a feather duster and a saucy maids apron to get the job done!  You have to love Elvgren, he's bringing sexy back.  Any how, I must get back to my list of chores.  After all cleanliness is next to godliness, or is that a big fat fallacy, I will let you know after my house is clean!

Cupcakes

Exactly five years ago, I was in tremendous pain, the likes of which I didn't know were possible.  I was in labour with my eldest son William and wondering when and if that awful, gut wrenching pain was going to end.  It did end and he was born the morning of the 18th April 2002 at 4:27am, Shakira was on the radio "Whenever, Whatever" she crooned as we looked down at our little darling.  Because my waters broke 24 hours previously to having Will he was put into a humid-i-crib and taken to the special care nursery, being a 10 pound baby he actually looked pretty large in that crib, one of the nurses remarked that he looked like he could eat the other babies in that nursery!!!  We got the all clear by 1pm that afternoon and he  has been healthy and wonderful ever since and boy, have we come along way since then!!  And here I am in the middle of the night finishing the 50 cupcakes he wants to take to school in the morning for all the kids in his combined grade!!

I even used my favourite sprinkle..... I have a favourite sprinkle??? I really have come a long way.

  Happy Birthday William darling!!  I am looking forward to pinata and cake tomorrow.

nu shoes = a nu you

 

I got some spanky new sneakers the other day.  I am entirely happy with them.  It has been many a years since I have worn sneakers but I feel like it is time to return to an ol' faithful, with a more grown up, mother of three kind of twist. And they are mighty cumfy. 

In my crafting news I am in the process of making a new cushion that was inspired by the always fabulous Anna Maria Horner.  This is a cushion I made last week that I am just so gushingly happy with I show anyone who will look and your looking so here it is.

      

This cushion was an unplanned, completely organic creative process!  Maybe that is why I like it soooo much.  It isn't just a cushion but an expression of my artistic ideals.  Or maybe I just like the way it looks on my couch!!

                

                   

And this is the back of it ....

       

I love this cushion, if you hadn't already guessed.  Talking of love I must finish this post with an unbelievably gorgeous photo of my darling Claire asleep in her daddy's lap.

 

 

oh how I have lost time

What a couple of weeks!!  I have been exhausted from, well, being me!  What have I been up to you ask? Well I will tell you it isn't a lot of rest and relaxation or sleep.  I have been feeling a little overwhelmed by life and something had to go and unfortunately it was uni, I took a leave of absence for the semester.  I was very sad about it and when I went into uni to hand in my form the lady behind the student services desk was all business.  She didn't look shocked or ask why or start screaming noooooo, she just took my form, stamped it with the date and said thank-you.  I sort of stood there for a while like an idiot waiting for, well something (perhaps a sad song sung by a trio that they keep out the back just for occasions like this one) and she was really nice and must of sensed that I needed some closure and she photocopied the form for me to take a copy with me... I should bake her some bickies.  But the main culprit of my absence from blog land is the nasty reality of breast feeding!! It turns out that I don't produce a heck of a lot of milk and poor little baby Claire was struggling to put on weight with just my milk, so we were doing top-ups of formula after each feed, which were also every 2 1/2 hours to try and increase my milk production.  A long and tiring story short is that after 2 weeks of trying this we were told by the lactation consultant that I should start weening her and move over to formula, apparently I have a lot on my plate at the moment and should stop stressing out over feeding and just move with the path of least resistance.  This has been a god send!! I feel vaguely human and with the aid of coffee I can now maintain a reasonable conversation.  I also feel a lot more relaxed about baby Claire's health because she is visibly putting on weight and she is happier and settled which is just fantastic.  I have been feeling myself regain my sanity and calm which is wonderful.  I haven't got a lot of craft done over the last couple of weeks either, big surprise there.  I have almost finished renovating my coffee table, I will show a photo tomorrow. I have refashioned a couple more shirts, started some cushion covers and attempted a clean up of my soon to be mine studio, and jobotI am thinking of a name, maybe something starting with a T or a P .  Tomorrow is Sunday and full of promise and I am looking forward to it.  Oh and sorry about the absolute lack of pictures.

Running

Do you ever get the feeling that you are running against the current?  And as fast as you run the current seems to sweep you away, sometimes you can make up ground in a slower part of the stream but pretty soon the waters flow stronger and next thing you know your back half way down the rapids and partially drowning?  Well that is how I have been feeling about my housework, art work, craft work, blog work and uni work.  And with Jack and Will's added efforts in the mess department and James' work schedule and and and and..... It will get better as Claire gets older, as I won't have to be holding her for the majority of the day, and if the speed that the last six weeks went by are anything to go by she will be a big girl before I know it.  Speaking of big kids here are some of the photos that Will and Jack have taken that I really like... they love using the camera and  Will often says that he would like to be a photographer.  Jack says that he wants to be a farmer or a "digger" driver on contruction sites.  Anyhow here is some photos that they have taken over the last couple of weeks, I just really enjoy their point of veiw on the world it is just so fresh and innocent!  Enjoy!

Claire by Jack.

A different veiw of mum's cupboard by Will.

Close up elephant butt by Will.

Self portrait by Will.

Jack taking a photo by Will.

Jack's foot by Jack.

lazy/crazy

Today has been interesting.  Jack has been finding his autonomous side.  This autonomy takes place mostly when I am feeding Claire and basically stuck in one spot.  It is at these times that Jack has been taking it upon himself to have little adventures which are quite messy, sometimes dangerous and always naughty.  This behaviour is driving me crazy!!!  Now I know that he is three and is not doing these things out of anything but pure curiosity or trying to be helpful, so I try not to get to mad with him when I discover him doing these things.  The word try having a strong emphasis on it because this morning Jack was mixing about $30 worth of laundry powders, soaker's and wool wash with wheelie bin cleaner (which is ultra poisonous and has a child proof lock on it, but unfortunately not a Jack proof lock) into a brown smelly concoction that seemed to be ultra toxic.  Jack knew he should not be doing what he was doing and tried hiding from me.  For his punishment I sent him to bed after I cleaned off all the toxic waste that was on him and he had a big sleep.  This has made me think that he is doing these things when he is tired.I will have to get him to  somehow get more sleep at night.  A 7pm bed time sounds lovely to me... think of all that bliss in the evening!   This afternoon, since Jack woke up, has been incident free, rather lazy and pleasant.  So I guess it is more sleep for Jack and more peace for mum.

How can I stay mad at him??

Army men straight up, with a twist

My three year old Jack, baby Claire and myself ventured up to the local shops this afternoon to purchase Jack's reward for doing a poo on the toilet, we have finally had to resort to bribery.  We have told him that if he does his pooy on the toilet he will get a toy car and our Jacks absolute affection and love for cars has convinced him that it all might be a good idea.... basically.  Anyhoo we were in the $2 shop, I never said they would be fancy cars and at age three, luckily he doesn't care. After a thorough search of the toy aisle, we found the two cars that were acceptable bribe for Jack's tremendous efforts in the bathroom.  Then I saw these little men that were along the same lines as plastic army men but they were space men and space aliens!  OUTRAGEOUSLY GREAT!! I found them irresistible and bought them... for the kids of course!

The alien one's are in primary colours and it makes it a little hard to see any detail but you can see just how strange they are....

   

And they reminded me of this bowl that I saw, that is quite vicious really, called WAR.  It is quite expensive for a silly thing, especially when the army men are about $2 for a bag of fifty, maybe I will try my hand at making one!  I wonder what the kids will think when I have melted their toys into bowls??  Well at least I will have somewhere to put my keys!!

          

quick update

I just worked out that it has been 21 days since my last post... how very slack of me.  Now let me see... what has been happening in my world, to start with I will tell you that getting used to having three children is an interesting exercise in multi tasking (I am breast feeding while writing this and helping Will cut some wool and giving Jack some instructions about cleaning up the mess he has made under the house, which he won't listen to).  I am back at uni this week GULP AND DOUBLE GULP where I will be the lady with the pram, I am nervous but excited.... I always feel so old at uni, less than fresh, not to good for my ego! I guess it's a good thing that I enjoy the learning too much to really let it get to me!!  I have started a new little craft project as well.... I am making broaches for my dearest friend Christy's HENS NIGHT!! I am having the honour of being a bridesmaid at her wedding and the fact that I won't really be able to stay long (or party harty) at the hens night because I will have to get home to baby Claire for feeding and so forth means that I really want to make something lovely for the night.  I thought that the broaches would be a little bit of fun and a memento for everyone who comes. I have all the things to make them and as I make progress with them I will show photos. Is it just me or is the excitement of having a new project to much to bare at times, I get so swept up in it. 

And as for the fabulous James, he has been working non stop, his hives have disappeared just as mysteriously as they came and he is looking very cool with his new hair cut I gave him this morning......

Will and Jack also had their hair shaved off this morning instead of having it washed, they are not big fans of being clean... and I dyed my hair a black plum colour which I am very happy with incidentally, it was a hair orientated morning here at our abode.... We also happily got our new couch on Friday and I am just so contented with it, our old one was just so dilapidated that I thought that one day it would just break in two.... here is a picture of the new lounge..... it is just lovely and made even lovelier with our Aunty Em on it with the kids.  YAY!!

sleepy

I feel like I haven't slept in a month.  Babies sure do know how to keep you up at night and during the day and at any other time as well. Thank god for strong cups of tea I don't know if I could make it through parenthood without them.  Enough of my tiredness, the exciting news is that I am FINALLY getting a spanky new lounge!!!   When I am awake at night feeding baby Claire, I dream about sitting on it and making cushions to place on it and maybe a new quilt to throw over it in an ultimately casual way ....mmmmm warm fuzzy midnight dreams....  So here is the hottest contender for the new lounge or sofa or couch, whatever you prefer.  This one is from IKEA so it is filled with yummy swedish sensibilities and functionalities, yarh.

                                                            

And while I am there I am going to solve my kids clothing storage problems with these spanky cupboards... which ofcourse I am going to paint white (I am mostly using a colour called WHITE LEATHER in the kids room, I think it is dulux)

                                                      

                                                      

10 days old

Oh my goodness what a week and a half..... our darling Claire arrived on the 21st of January at 4.25am and she is wonderful, really wonderful.  Apart from all the nappies and midnight feeds and things, it has been the easiest first few days, perhaps we are a little more confident this time around a little surer of our parenting skills and with that we are just significantly less stressed.  Not only is our little girl a lovely baby, she is a heap of fun to play dress ups with "Oh Claire you look just fab in lilac",  and I forgot just how nice it is to have a child that doesn't talk back!!!   It has been total action stations around here with baby Claire's arrival, I feel a lot like a milk producing machine, breast feeding is like having a brief glimpse into the life of a dairy cow, graze, sleep and give milk.  I have also been thinking about the way we call babies meal times at the breast "feeds" it is all a little primal isn't it?  Animals "feed", humans eat ..... unless we are at a Sizzler resturant then we are all like "bring on the trough, oink oink", I really love Sizzlers though especially the potato skins and the dessert bar, oh and the all you can drink soft drink bar, LOVE IT.  Jeez maybe I should just live in a caravan and change my name to Lurleen White Trash via depol and start swearing at my kids!

                             Here are the kids (with our new addition in the middle).......

                            

Our eldest boy Will started prep this week and so far so good.  I think he feels very grown up and up to speed with the kids across the road, who he plays with almost everyday and already attend the same school.  On his first day I said to him " Oh my baby is starting school!!" to which he replied, "Mum I am not a baby, you can call me a big boy or a kid... that's all" then I started laughing at how gorgeous that statement was, he is really a terrific little kid.  His favourite word to use in any sentence this week is 'actually', eg. "I have actually seen that before mum", or " I actually know all about that mum", so very adorable.   The new schedule of having Will at the school by 8.45am and picking him up by 3pm is a huge adjustment for us, really it is only a fifteen minute walk each way but the day is much shorter with the adjustment for return times we only get five hours a day which seems to fly by.  It will get better with practice I am sure, then I can get out the art and craft projects I am brewing on/up in my mind and start work again, then uni starts back at the end of this month, and then swimming lessons and then my best friends wedding (and the diet I am on to fit into a brides maid frock for it) and then and then and then.  Luckly, I really like being busy and it feels like the year is finally starting to gain some momentum.  Full steam ahead I say.

                                  Will's first day at prep 29th jan 07 (so grown up in his uniform!)