Hellie's Birthday

My gorgeous sister Hellie had her birthday on the weekend - we had the pleasure of hosting the party at our place, and what a lovely day we had. The weather was beautiful, Dad did a great job on the BBQ as per usual, and the kids ran around having a great time together. We also made hearts and fish out of the novelty ballooons (thats all I learnt to do before the DVD went haywire!)

Here are some pictures of Hellie and the birthday cake - no we didn't try to light the candles with a flame thrower - these a special quick light candles!

Possessed Daughter

I think Jasmin was possessed by an evil spirit on Saturday. Can you imagine my horror when I discovered that she had drawn on her cupboards and bedroom wall with a black whyteboard marker? Imagine my even greater horror when I discovered the drawing on both hallway walls, the bathroom tiles and screen, the toilet walls, the laundry walls, washing machine and cupboards, the study wall, and my filing boxes!!!! Lucky our friend Rod was around, painting is amongst one of his talents - he had all the walls repainted by 7pm that night. Lovely excuse to get another couple fo feature walls. Here is a little sample of her handy-work!

Jasmin's Birthday

Well, needless to say we were all exhausted by the end of Jasmin's Fourth Birthday party. What a day. When everyone had left, this was what Jasmin said - "That was fun Mummy - Can we do it again tomorrow?". To which I replied - "No, sweetie, you can have another birthday party next year". Now Jassie has been busy inviting everyone that rings to her party next year. Here are some pictures from the day:


My beautiful little fairy girls. Bek - did an excellent job of face-painting for the kids.
The chaos of opening all the birthday presents - I haven;t seen so many presents! Lucky Jasmin and Mummy had some helpers!

Jasmin has been asking for a Barbie Birthday cake for the last six months - when she saw the cake she exclaimed - That's beautiful!

The force is strong in this one

Dave and I were most impressed this week. Our little girl watched four episodes of the Star Wars movies (IV, V, VI and II) , and she loves them. She has watched Star Wars, Empire and Return of the Jedi several times this week. She made Nan read her the Star Wars book we have (one of those books with the sound effects buttons), and has been playing with her Star Wars Toys. Children are so perceptive - we watched Star Wars earlier this week, she was busy telling us who were the goodies and the baddies!! Dave is most impressed.

I've also included a picture from the Turner Family Photo archives of Jasmin at 2 and a half playing with one of Dave's replica Light Sabres.

Double Trouble!

Hmm... when you get two little girls together there is bound to be mischief to get into at some stage. Today, Nan was running around trying to get Jasmin's lunch and bag ready for Playschool, when she suddenly thought that she hadn't seen the girls for a bit, and they were awfully quiet. Those with children know that when it's very quiet, there is mischief in progress. Well Nan found them in the bathroom together, the bathroom was completely covered in two containers of powder - and all you could see of Eliza was her eyes. Jasmin and Eliza were playing with the powder containers - and Jasmin decided that she would pour powder all over Eliza. Nan had to give her a beth to get all the powder off - she wished she had a camera handy - but our camera had been playing up, and we were reformatting the card (camera is all better now, so we are most pleased!).

Ali Challenge #4

This weeks Ali Edwards Challenge was as follows:

This week your challenge is to try the photo gathering technique. This is one of my most favorite ways to get multiple photos on a layout.

I used pictures of Jasmin and her Play school art work to complete the challenge. Love Heidi Swapp stuff at the moment - so used one of the holy cow rub-ons as well as the little bracket thingies. Paper is from Carolees Creations (Pink Candy Dots), and the good ol' Basill Basics Cardstock in white.

Separation Anxiety

I'm talking about Parent's separation anxiety, as opposed to a child's separation anxiety here. Jasmin went back to Goulburn with her Aunty Julie and Uncle Les after we finished with the Video shop ordering. Packed her little suitcase, with her clothes, toothbrush and toothpaste, a couple of books, her cash register which we have been playing with all day, and the Nintendo DS with Mario on it. She will probably not miss us much - but about 30 seconds after she was gone, we were already missing her. I felt like crying - pitiful I know. Instead of waiting to get her back tomorrow night when Nan comes home, we decided we would go back to Goulburn to pick her up tomorrow, and go and see Nan and Pop as well.

Special Time with Eliza

Often on the week-end mornings I get to spend some alone time with Eliza. This is just special time that the two of us get to enjoy together. Normally Dave and Jas are still in bed, and Eli and I get to spend anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour and a half, while the sleepy heads sleep in. This morning Eliza wanted to read, she insisted on holding the books and turning the pages herself - most of the time the books were upside-down.

The Weekend

It's not often we get time to hang around the house on the weekends - normally too busy doing other stuff. It was great to get a day at home on the weekend - and such a beautiful day it was on Saturday. We had lots of playtime outside on the play centre, swings, riding bikes, generally being silly. A nice lunch and little shop down at federation square. Here are a couple of everyday photos from Saturday... the first is of Eliza and her very first lollipop which she really loved. Took her about 2 hours to suck it, until there was none left - what a lovely sticky mess she was after that!



The second pic is one of Jasmin - she always makes me laugh, she insisted on wearing a sticker from her apple on her sun-glasses (she looked ridiculous), but insisted that she needed it there, and even went down to federation square for lunch with the sticker on her glasses. I think she is stubborn like her daddy!

AE Challenge # 2

Managed to complete Ali's second challenge last Friday night. Here is the blurb about the challenge and the results:

This week's challenge is to create a layout titled This Month. Use what you and your family did last month as the content. For each person in your family (or just for yourself) make a list of all the things that were happening.

Pink Blankie

I wonder if I had an attachment to something special when I was a little girl? I must remember to ask my mum. For Jasmin it was silky things (or in Jas speak "Shilky Shings"). It didn't matter what it was or who it belonged to - Jas would love to hold on to something silky as she went to sleep, and rub it between her fingers. For Eliza, it is her special pink blankie, which was knitted by Nan Holloway. She loves that Pink Blankie - I want her to remember the special attachment she had to her pink blankie when she gets older - so I did this page on the weekend, in-between completing a five inch pile of business processing.... I was on fire!

Bailie's Baptism

Bailie Isabella Ryan Dorsett (our great-niece I guess - our nephew's daughter) was baptised on the weekend at St Peter and Pauls cathedral in Goulburn (where both Jasmin and Eliza were baptised). She was also baptised by the same priest. It was very funny - he told all the same jokes he told at Eliza's baptism.

Here are the pictures of the proud grandparents:

Little Bailie wore her grandmother's baptism gown (Julie's). Bailie is only one month old - you forget how tiny they are when they are born, don't you?

0 to 100 in 30 seconds

Children are really amazing - they make you appreciate life so much more. It is really just the simple things. This morning we got up a little late (something to do with going to bed after midnight I think). Eliza woke up instantly this morning (as she normally does), I have never seen such a morning person - instantly awake and ready to play! Jasmin, who is not normally the morning person, also went from 0 to 100 this morning in 30 seconds. Any neighbours who were planning to sleep in this morning, would be sorely disappointed, as Jasmin rode around the back-yard singing "Oh Yeah, Oh Yeah" at the top of her lungs - she is so happy. Eliza joined in singing as well and trying to play this guitar we bought on a holiday to Hawaii.

They have put me in such a good mood for the day!

Eliza's Fabulous Five Favourites

Here are some examples from the little album I did for Eliza. Took me about 3 hours to put together the album - love the papers I just bought last Friday.




The supplies I used for Eliza's little album include:

• Junkitz Ribbon Bound Book (used Junkitz Loose Leaf Rings to re-bind instead of the ribbon)
• Jo Sonya Gold and Brown Paint
• Greener Pastures "aoteoroa" stamp
• Cosmo Cricket Paper - Jitterbug "Lula"
• SEI Paper - Sweetie "sugar daddy", "cotton Candy" and "snuggle bear brown"
• Heidi Grace Designs Paper - "Woodland Brush"
• Carolees Creations Paper
• Pebbles Inc. Labels - Baby

First Ali Challenge

I have subscribed to Ali Edwards Newsletter - where she also includes a challenge for us to do. I really enjoyed doing the first one - which was on your five favourite things. I actually did two albums - one on Jasmin and one on Eliza and their "five fabulous favourites" right now. Instead of using the wallet sized photos however, I used 4x6 photos. I had a great time putting together these little albums.

I am so pleased with the results. Both albums give you an insight into Jasmin and Eliza right now.

Their favourites are so typical of their personalities.

Here are Jasmin's Favourites at the moment:

• Fairies
• Dressing Up (or Dressing Down)
• Dora the Explorer
• Nail Polish
• Cooking

Eliza's Favourites are:

• Pink Blankie
• Chocolate Cake
• Climbing
• Musical Chair
• Bath-time

Here are a couple of Jasmin's pages:

The supplies I used for this album:

• Junkitz - Ribbon Bound Book (used Junkitz Loose Leaf Rings to re-bind it instead of the ribbon)
• Making Memories - Nothing but Numbers Stickers
• Heidi Swapp Acrylic Paint - "Betty"
• Heidi Swapp Photo Corners
• Cosmo Cricket "Kissin Kate"
• Basic Grey Chipboard Mini Mono
• ColorBlox Fluid Chalk
• Heidi Swapp Decorative Tape (Travel)
• Greener Pastures "aoteoroa" stamp