Photo's to share

I haven't blogged for a few days so here is a quick catch up.

Alfie spends all day every day getting into stuff he shouldn't be......he is an adventurous little fella and more often than not he stinks so much that I can't stand it......just like he can't stand having a bath.

I noticed a few mushrooms popping up on Jodie's blog in the last few days.....so I thought I'd share one that popped up at my house.......I love the colours.

Megan has been saving her pocket money over the past few weeks and on the weekend she bought her baby's a few new clothes.....we went to the local markets but all the doll clothes were a bit ordinary so we went to Target and bought the real thing, 0000 and 00000 in the baby section fits perfectly. I took this picture not long after getting home......doesn't she look like a real little mummy gently holding her baby trying to settle it!!
A few days ago I took a few pictures of Ryan and Megan......it was mainly for practice on my camera and in the process I came up with a few photo's that I really like......here they are... I absolutely love this one of Ryan......It may not be totally perfect but to me it is.
This one I thought was a bit of fun.......Megan skipping.

Oh, and here is another mushroom we found while taking some pictures.

I have also watched an entire season of "Lost" which I hired last Friday.......why hire when you can watch it on TV you might ask? Well, where I live the TV signal isn't very good so that means I don't get Prime ( channel 7 ) at all.....so for the past 2 years I have missed them all, shows like Lost, Desperate House Wives, Prison Break and Gray's Anatomy....thought it was about time I caught up on a few episodes.

I hope to get some scrapping done very soon......I printed the pictures out I just need a day at home to get into it.

That's all I have to share today.

I'm a convert!!

Why has it taken me so long to pull my finger out and try a few of the different settings on my camera.......pure laziness. After seeing what a wonderful weekend Pip and Marianne had at their photography course and the instant improvement in the quality of their photos I thought I'd give it a go.... earlier this morning after the kids had been trucked off to school this is what I came up with......

Full Auto

My Aperture Setting
Manual

This next one is of a Paper Wasp Nest.......there weren't any wasps around so I thought it would be OK.

Full Auto

My Aperture setting

Manual

This next one is of an agapanthus in my pitiful garden.....the third picture was done on Manual and went really dark....don't know why, I guess I'll figure it out as I practice more.

Full Auto

My Aperture Setting

Manual

So there you have it.....I hope it didn't bore you too much.

I'm about to embark on a "Get rid of the CRAP" expedition in Megan's room, I've been wanting to do this for a while now but the thought of sifting through all that stuff was too much to bear and it was just easier to shut the door. I hate clutter it drives me mad and Megan's room is full of it, I don't know why but she hoards everything from seeds she found under a tree at school to a chook feather she thought was interesting......Oh and every single little piece of paper she ever scribbled on ( I will keep the good ones I'm not that mean ).

So I bid you all farewell my friends and hope to see you on the other side..........clutter free I hope!!

WARNING !!!

DON'T READ THIS IF YOU GET ALL FREAKED OUT ABOUT BLOOD AND GUTS!!!!
Really I mean it.....this will gross you out but it's all part of what goes on in my life so I thought I'd post about it anyway.
This morning while we were getting ready to go to school Ryan came in all freaked out screaming " Mum there is a chicken hawk caught on the fence", he screamed this repeatedly until I could understand what he was on about. Well the first thing I thought was to grab the camera ( as one does when something a little out of the ordinary happens ) as we walked closer it started to flap around.....I was kinda under the impression that this thing was dead!!! So I sent one of the kids in to get a towel while I took a picture.....when I zoomed in on this bird on my fence I noticed that it wasn't a chicken hawk at all it was an owl!!! I approached as slowly as I could and put the towel over the owl to calm it down and try to untangle it from the fence. Oh it was so freakin gross.....his eye was completely gone and what was left was tangled around the barb on the fence. I tried to get it off the barb and just couldn't, so now it's time to get serious I asked Ryan to get me a sharp knife....he came back with a steak knife which turned out to be useless, so I told him to go and get my craft knife with the very sharp blade.......yes that's right my scrapbooking knife saved the day ( it's now in the bin because I'm too grossed out to use it ). After a quick trip into town we took him to one of our local Vet's hoping that something could be done.....you'll be happy to know that at around 2 pm this afternoon he was still doing OK and if he survives he will end up at a very luxurious local wildlife park........well that's the plan anyhow.
Ryan wanted me to share this with you......he is so proud of himself, note that he turned his red dots into cricket balls.

I have been given another challenge be Marisa, this one is a bit of fun and it'll be interesting to see what other people come up with.

All you have to do is go to your sixth folder in your pictures and select the sixth photo and post it on your blog telling a little bit about the picture......too easy!! Select six other bloggers to pass it on to.

Here is my picture, it's Megan about to tuck into a cupcake she decorated all by herself....it was taken about 11 months ago after we spent the afternoon up to our eyeballs in cupcakes and everything you could buy off the shelf to decorate with.

Jodi

Jacki

Pip

Amanda

Tracey

Marianne

Sorry I didn't link them all, I don't have time as my new favourite show Underbelly is about to start.

Seeya!!

Slack blogger is back!

I know I've been a slack blogger in the past week....sorry about that, I'll try harder to blog on a more regular basis I promise.

I bought these gorgeous 6" x 6" calendar cards from Cut and Paste a while ago and I knew I wanted to do some kind of Year in Review album with them, but I wanted something a little different from the usual kind of layout with a series of pictures taken for that month, I wanted something that had a bit of a mish mash of everything......and which I was able to use up alot of older papers on. I have attempted to do the Year in Review the past few years and never got past January, I really want to get it right this year.......so here is a few little snaps of what I came up with this week (my second attempt, the first one was crap).

There are different sized pages throughout this album.......it all just depended on the subject and the size of the photo I printed........I don't want it to be uniform in style.

I haven't written about every single day of the month......because firstly it would drive me mad and secondly who has the time to do that! I just made up a small card with a small photo and a quick note about some things which I thought were worth writing about.

Some pages have what would be considered a full layout.

You can just see on the edge of this one that there are three rings......that's because this is just a 3 ring binder I bought from the local News Agent.....at the rate I'm going with this it's going to be full by the end of next month but I am still able to transfer all my pages to a larger binder if needed.

The idea is for this to be quick and very simple......so far it's working although I still have to catch up on another 4 very busy weeks.

A few afternoons ago we were hit with a huge storm.....the rumble as it moved across the paddock towards us was amazing.
Megan sketched me a little picture of the both of us earlier.....I'm not sure if I'm meant to have two belly buttons or that my tits are down around my waste. She asked me yesterday if when she grew up is she going to have wrinkly skin like me? What am I supposed to say to that? I know that I'm getting older but having your own daughter draw you with tits around your waste ( which they definitely are not ) and wrinkly skin is kinda depressing.

The lovely and very talented Marisa gave me this award.....this was a nice surprise thanks Marisa for thinking of me.

Here are the steps:

Say one nice thing to the man in your life.

Thanks for cooking dinner while I was buried in my scrapbooking the other night. I think it was meant to be soppy but I didn't want to make you all sick!

• list atleast 6 ways you measure success in your life.

My children's happiness, good health, a beautiful family, the most amazing friends, being loved and being able to love others, I enjoy the simple things in life.

Now the tough part is to choose 5 bloggers which you think "Measure Up".

Jacki

Jodi

Pip

Melissa

Tracey

Hope you all enjoy your award :)

It's hard to believe how cold and wet it has gotten.....cricket was cancelled this morning much to Ryan's disgust, he put on his whites anyway and he is currently trying to make mini muffins while wearing his cricket gloves. I on the other hand love the rain because it meant that we could all sleep in and just listen to the rain.....a rare pleasure!

I love a give away....and guess who has one over at their blog right here right now!!!

Have a good weekend.

Bit of this and that!!

I think I have kept just about every scrapbooking magazine I have ever bought over the last 6 to 7 years.....quite a few boxes of them. I thought it would be a good thing to have a bit of a clean up to free up little more storage around the place, so instead of putting all the magazines in the bin I went through them and cut out anything which caught my eye.....a title, colour combination, technique anything I could use for a little inspiration
Here is one of my everyday pictures......I took this at around 6.15 am on Friday morning while I was hanging out the washing before it got too hot........mother nature painted a beautiful picture across the sky....who would have guessed what fury she was about to unleash upon so many unsuspecting people.

"Sunrise"

Here are a few pics I took of Megan late Friday afternoon....she was about to cool off under the sprinkler......

Watch as a little water is added and she slowly turns into a monster......Check out the eyes it looks like she has rolled them back in her head.......freaky!!!

By now it looks like she is totally mad and about to attack.....and all I did was put the sprinkler on!!

Both Jodi and Marisa tagged me a few days ago so I just wanted to let you both know I haven't forgotten....I'll get to it shortly.

That's all I have for today.

More Layouts

Here are another couple of layouts I'd like to share......You might remember that I won the February Double Up pack from Cut and Paste a few weeks ago, this is what I have come up with so far....I only got the kit on Monday morning so very pleased with the result.

and a little more.........I'm totally in love with this layout at the moment the papers were perfect and those pink and black verb stickers from Heidi Swapp are to die for!!! Seriously they are so yummy I want to use them on everything.

Another layout......this one for Ryan and his Cousin Jake.

"Cool Cousins"

a little closer.....

and a little closer......I love the Jenni Bowlin Calendar Cards, very cute and I also used them for a template to make a few journaling cards out of patterned paper.

I still have some papers left so I should have another layout made from this pack to share with you early next week all going well.......Got alot on in the next few days so scrapping will have to wait.

Here is a look at the complete February Double Up pack go and check it out here.

Here is one of my every day life pictures......Frogs frogs frogs....where are they all coming from, everyday there is a frog be it big or small in the laundry.....this little one was found under the dining table while we were eating breakfast.

"Little Kermit"

Had a power outage for the second night in a row last night....this one went all night and didn't come back on until 6.30 am this morning......If we don't have power that means no water, no air conditioning, no fans, no toilet flush, NOTHING BUT STINKIN' HOT WEATHER ALL NIGHT.....I survived just! I think it would have been cooler if we took our pillows out and tried to sleep on the trampoline....I hope we don't get another tonight.

That's all I have for today.

Nice Surprise.

Got my February issue of Scrapbook Creations today........what a nice surprise I got when I saw these two layouts in it.

"New Shoes"

"Totally too Tweet"

and a bit closer
I have been really busy all week doing something which I'll post about later.....check back for that one. As for the rest of the week.......I have so much on that I'm wondering how I'm going to get it all done........that's what you get for putting important stuff off, and off, and off, til you come to the realisation that it isn't going to do itself and then you have to bust your ass to get it all done on time.....sounds like fun doesn't it!!

I've been checking out a few Scrapbooking Blogs late at night when all is quiet and I'm very excited to see so many beautiful new ranges that were released at CHA last week.......I can't wait for them to make their way to Australia so I can get me some. So if you have a spare five minutes go and have a look you'll like what you see I'm sure.

talk soon