No fuss Valentine's day . . .

We don't make a big deal about VD around our house - it's all gotten a bit commercial.
But with so many feebies / cheapies around the interweb, it would be a shame
 not to do something.
This year's effort involed my local Aldi supermarket, the computer and printer,
some cello bags, ribbon and a stapler.
A few weeks ago I bought 6 red chocolate roses and a bag of foil wrapped hearts
while grocery shopping.

Last night I made and printed out a card for my hubby, designed on GreetingBee.com.
Together with the roses tied with a red ribbon, they were his gift.

For the kids, I printed out some free bag toppers from Pepper Scraps , divided the
bag of hearts up into small cello bags and stapled the toppers on.

These went into thier school lunchboxes - to eat or share or give to a Valentine!
In return hubby made me a delicious fluffy cappucino and bought apple danish
for morning tea at work. I also got a single red rose, which was not made of
chocolate and smells lovely!
That's the sum total of VD in our house - simple and thoughtful.

P.S. " Sometimes the heart sees what is invisible to the eye. " H. Jackson Brown Jr.

Happy Australia Day !

Hope you are all having a wonderful day of celebration, despite the weather.

We spent our morning on a trip from Swanbank to Bundamba and back, courtesy of the

 Queensland Pioneer Steam Railway. It was great!

We left from the Swanbank branch line heritage station, and though the weather was rainy, it was
better than being stiflingly hot (as it has been for the last couple of weeks). Rail travel of yore 
must have been very uncomfortable in Summer!

Pulling our train was a PB15 class locomotive, Number 448, built by Walkers of Maryborough in 

1908 and fully restored by volunteers. Our driver was 77 years old, and the fireman (the guy feeding

the coal into the fire) was 84. Talk about a vintage railway alright!

The carriages were all built in the early 1900's, with fantastic detail. 

The kids were just amazed at the opening windows, as they have only ever been on 

air conditioned electric trains!

They also thought that being able to stand out on the 'balcony' while the train was 

moving was pretty cool (as did I).

Even though the trip only took a bit over an hour, we got to see some pretty scenery 

and plenty of interesting railway-related operations like manual track switching and engine coupling.

Once the trip was over, we stopped in the picnic area (luckily there were shelters over the tables)

 for an Australian-themed morning tea. As well as fruit and dip'n'bikkies, I also included Cheezels, mini lamingtons and Wagon Wheels (which my kids had never had!). These were all washed down with the customary thermos of hot milky tea. 

Of course, when we got home and had lunch (we had to scupper the BBQ idea, 'cause it was raining

too hard by then) we made lamb-burgers! 

Now I am kicking back with a cuppa and listening to the Hottest 100 countdown on Triple J while

 the rain comes down.

Hope you did something beaut and suitably patriotic today, and that your celebration was as
dry as a bone and as bonza as possible.

Cheers Bigears!

Happy Birthday Poss!

15 years ago today I became a mum.

My little 6lb 14oz baby is now taller than his Dad (he passed me a couple of years ago) and about to start year 10.

He spent the weekend in the company of a few mates - at the movies, eating pizza, playing X-Box and talking late into the night while they all stayed for a sleepover.
Pretty typical teenage stuff, though I know that behind his single word answers, un-ironed clothes and sleep-in mornings lies a loving heart and an amazing intellect. I am so proud of my 'big boy', and so excited to see what the future holds for him.

Happy Birthday C. xx
P.S. "We worry about what a child will become tomorrow, yet we forget that he is someone today." Stacia Tauscher

Season's Greetings !

To my family and friends , may all the joys of the season be yours.

 Happy Christmas and best wishes for a wonderful New Year .

Christmas Preparations . . .

Plenty of baking, making and crafting going on around our house lately. How about you?

We have made many, many of these candy cane cuties for the youngest one's school friends . . .

and lots of shortbread packs for the middle child to bake and take.

I have sewn some very sweet little bird ornaments . . .

and made Irish Cream for the primary school teachers.

Packaged up in pieces of fabric and matching ribbon, they looked lovely - and every part of the gift is

re-usable, so they are green too!

 

I have also made a bunch of Christmas cards using the easy (and free) instructions and printables from here.

Still plenty of baking to go, and some decorating as well. I'll check back in with more preparations soon !

P.S. "Before anything else, preparation is the key to success." Alexander Graham Bell

Purple Haze . . .

I made a purple topper for our rainbow tree last week, over a couple of days.

I used these . . .

I already  had everything except the plastic star ($2 from the cheap shop) and the purple glitter paint (also $2 from the cheap shop - I'm the last of the big spenders!).

First, I glued some braid around the edges of the star to give it some interest.

 This took ages to dry, so I couldn't do the next step until the following day. Yeesh!

Then I painted the whole lot with the glitter paint, which didn't turn out as well as expected. This is after 3 coats, and actually looks darker in the photo than in reality. The 'paint 'is more like clear glue with purple glitter in it.

To add some depth to the colour, I mixed up some leftovers to make the best dark-ish purple I could without having to buy anything! I painted over the lot, and then added another glitter layer once it was dry. Phew.

Finally I was able to add a hessian flower and a ribbon bow . . .

and get it on the tree!

P.S. "Never worry about the size of your Christmas tree. In the eyes of children, 

they are all 30 feet tall." Larry Wilde

The Rainbow Connection . . .

A couple of weeks ago while chatting about Christmas I asked the kids
their opinions on a colour theme for this year.
( There are some of our decorations we haven't seen for a while
and I thought it was time for a 'multicoloured' decorating season. )

Eldest son suggested we decorate the tree in a rainbow pattern -
not just multicolored all over -
so that's what we've been up to this weekend.

We started with some new coloured LED lights, which are really bright!

Penny helped!

Then we sorted all our decorations into colour groups, to see what we have 

the most of. (If you want a rainbow pattern, you'll need lots 

more of the colour at the bottom than at the top.)

Our 'roygibiv ' became ' ivroygb ' (going from indigo at the top to blue at the bottom) 

and we used gold for the yellow. (Does anyone have yellow decorations? 

In all my boxes I don't have a single one!)

I tried just eyeing the sections of the tree, but it wasn't very effective
so we came up with this method:

I marked off a triangular section with vertical pieces of string, then added horizontal pieces
to make *6 even sections. (Our tree is 180cm tall, so I used a tape measure to put string
every 30cm.) *I put indigo and  violet into one section.

This worked really well. Once the marked off section was finished, I removed the string
and continued right around the tree with each colour, using the completed section as a guide.

The end result - pretty! 

. . . though I still need to find or make a purple topper.

Once the lights are on the rainbow is not as obvious, but it's still pretty . . .

So now we have a different look for day and night. 

Great idea, number 1 son!
 *Just as a reminder, you can see last year's 'luxe' tree here, 2010's blue, green and red one here
and 2009's aqua, red and white one here.*

P.S. “The work will wait while you show the child the rainbow, but the rainbow won't wait while you do the work.” Anon
P.P.S. I'm linking up to Sarah's Christmas Tree Party here, so go and check out some truly beautiful specimens!