First layout

The Cathy Zielske class has begun. This layout is a pre-assignment. It's virtually a copy of her example, but I love it, and I love how quicky it came together.

Today's Layout

This is from the last assignment on my Type+Writer class.

Holiday Fun

I can't believe it's halfway through the second week of the kids' school holidays.  I am still totally enthralled with the fact that having my kids home now is such a huge pleasure in comparison to when Sammy and Mickey were both tiny. They were such a handful, that having home every single day was quite draining, and a far cry from a holiday. Now they sleep in until 8am, and they get up and quietly watch TV or play.  During the day they are playing heaps, with Legos and their computer games.  Sammy and Mickey playing with the Legos has been great to see, especially as I told them that Santa loves to see kids play, and who knows what they may get for Christmas, if he sees how well they are playing.  Yesterday the TV wasn't on at all and today it was only on for a few hours in the morning.

Sunday week ago, we headed down to Caloundra for our annual family holiday. We had a really nice time. We had a couple of days that were pretty yucky, but we made the most of them. We visited Peter's parents one morning, which was lovely - it's been a while since we'd seen them and she made some yummy morning tea which we all enjoyed. The boys still went collecting yabbies and attempted to fish, which only had the kibosh put on it when they headed to the jetty and the winds were borderline cyclonic.  We spent the week fishing, collecting yabbies, lying by the pool (me) jumping in the pool (kidlets). The hardest decision of the day was what we were going to have for dinner. Sensible eating went out the window for the week, and Bunny and I enjoyed a new Indian restaurant we discovered, plus a couple of fish and chip meals.  I cooked pizzas one night which were delicious, with salami, bacon, capsicum, cheese and onion and pineapple - simple but delicious and much nicer than Eagle Boys.  Even though the toppings were less exotic than I'd normally use they were delicious pizzas and the kids enjoyed them too. Like I said, one highlight was spending a morning with Peter's parents and the main highlight of the week was our last full day.  Because Geelong was in the Grand Final last year, (and we won), it was a little sad that we didn't get to spend the day with my parents, as they were in Phuket.  So, this year, they stayed the night in a motel, and we spent the entire day and evening together. We had a fabulous time. We had lunch and then headed in front of the TV and watched Geelong lose to the Hawks!  But, Mum and I drank a bottle of bubbles each and had a blast.  Then we took them out for dinner at the new Indian restaurant we'd discovered. That was a fun night. One of my favourite times growing up was when my parents would take us out for dinner, and I want the same with my children, although it doesn't happen often due to the fact it's so damn expensive, but I guess the rarity of the occasion makes it all teh more special. After having such fussy eaters, it's really rewarding to see the hard work of cooking different foods for my kids paying off as they will try different foods now elsewhere!  It was a fitting end to a great week.  

As an aside, we will go somewhere else next year though. We decided that $1000 for a week in a modest unit in Caloundra was overpriced.  We are looking at renting a house somewhere next year, and going out of peak season too. We can get a house with a pool for longer and pay less!  Our family's holiday needs are simple, we need to be able to fish, sleep, swim and eat. That's it. We aren't interested in gallivanting around. We aren't interested in theme park type expensive stuff. We just want to chill and enjoying being together. So we will choose something like Tin Can Bay, or Rainbow Beach. It's exciting - we will do a recognizance mission or two to figure out exactly where we will go. 

We got home on Sunday, and I spent the day washing and getting organized and back to normal. Monday and Tuesday of this week, had appointments and also a few errands. I had to take Billy-Joe to the Respiratory Clinic for a lung function test and yesterday I had a physio appointment.  I bought new taps for the bathroom, and some new picture frames, because some of the old ones I'd painted blue were looking rather daggy.  

Today I have spent getting up to date with my online class I started before the holidays. I did two layouts today. One isn't finished yet, because I need photos of when I was a kid, and I forgot to ask my parents for them yesterday so I could scan then and print them out today. So the layouts done, but no pics.  In the middle of all that I had to fix printer problems. My printer wasn't printing, because the computer didn't recognize the refilled ink cartridge, so a trip back to Cartridge World and that was all sorted.  The Epson printer had also run out of ink , so I ordered inks online yesterday and they arrived this morning at 7.30am!!  I love online shopping.  

I have signed up for Cathy Zielske's online class 'Design your life' through www.bigpicturescrapbooking.com 

I have some pre assignment work to finish before it starts tomorrow! I am rather excited about this one. Whereas the Jessica Sprague class was a digital one, this is a hybrid one where I download some elements, but the majority of it is paper scrapbooking, concentrating on learning about design elements. If I had been able to draw, I would have been a graphic artist - for sure. Graphics was one of my favourite subjects during high school, but without the use of computers, I was never going to go far with it all those years ago. Now, however, with the use of image editing programs, I could actually know what I am doing. 

Did you miss me? I am back, I just left for an hour to finish off and eat dinner with my family. We had spaghetti bolognese,which is one of their firm favourites.  

Kids are heading off to bed but have been given a few extra minutes to finish off their games. They are behaving so beautifully - they need rewards.

I will post images soon.