Home

Back home again. We had a really good holiday (a few bloody awful days, but that's the norm for family holidays, isn't it? ISN'T IT??) and I didn't really want to come home, but as soon as we got here, oh, just so nice to be home.
The weather was pretty good, only got overcast and then rained on the last four days.
The kids loved the beach, more the sand than the water. They had some dabbling of the toes (Clary), and even a few quick dips in to the water (Ruby) but they were way more interested in just playing in the sand. Digging in it, rolling in it, throwing it. Oh, and of course, filling their pants with it. This castle is living out it last seconds here as Ruby moves in to destroy it. We had a great house to stay in, with everything we needed and straight across the road from the beach.
Ruby even went off to the movies with her Dad for the first time (on one of the rainy days). They went to see Wall-E and almost saw the whole movie before she announced "I want to go home"

Before we got to the beach we spent a week out west at the mother-in-laws'. Again, the kids had a blast, lots of kids to play with, went to the pool every day, spoilt rotten by many, many people. The road trip from Grandmas' to the beach, though,..............not so much fun. After seven hours driving on the first leg we opted for two rooms at the motel so MrSecondstitch and I didn't have to look at each other for a while. I debated for about half a minute about putting that bit in here as so many bloggers seem to have these lovely holidays where everything is blissful as they breakfast at gorgeous gourmet cafes and break up the road trips with visits to the wineries on the side of the road. We had breakfast one day at a darling little truck stop (can't beat them for a decent feed), and broke up our road trips with arguments, LOL. Travelling long distances with the whole family can be stressful.
So anyway after seven hours the first day, and about two hours sleep that night, we had another seven hours to go the next day. It probably would've been about 5 hours if I'd had a better look at the map, but really, is that even relevant? While we were out bush we went out to the sale yards (cattle) so Clary could see the trucks being loaded, as he is completely MAD about trucks right now. He was a happy boy. Fancies himself as a big truckie I think. Although with the level of excitement he displays when the garbage truck does its' weekly run I think he'd be just as happy being a garbo. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
OK, I hope I haven't bored you too much. Best I get to bed.

Oh, how could I not share this with you? We came home to a deep freezer which had been turned off for two weeks (Thank you MrSecondstitch. He got a little over-excited in his 'turn off all the power points rampage)
I would not even know where to begin describing the smell to you. I am a nurse and I have smelt some rotten stuff over the years, but our freezer totally won the stench war I tell you. My eyes were watering, and my nose just wanted to end its' life.
Don't let it happen to you.

See ya

We're heading off in a couple of days, out west to visit the mother-in-law, and then to the beach for a week to get over the first week.
I know I won't get time to post again before we go, so see ya in a couple of weeks :)

Crack out Grandmas' old linen, it's time to sew.

OK, it's kind of embaressing to show this as, again , it is the same old, same old pattern. Same dress, different fabric. But I think it looks nice and I am NEVER going to sew anything other than this dress so...............
Made this one last weekend, from an old table cloth. It's lined with an old sheet, floral, yellow, green and brown. These are not the best pictures but they're all I have. We went out to have a look at the dam, not far from here. Not a whole lot of water in it, I tell you. Pretty depressing. There was a lot of little turtles in the water though, I couldn't get a picture of them, too far away.
Anyway, I'll probably make some more of these faithful old dresses in the next little while. Nice light cotton ones, for summer. It's on it's way. Can't wait. I love spring and summer.

We have been away for a couple of days and can I just say that nothing says Welcome Home quite like maggots in your bin. Uck!! There's a friendly reminder for you people. Even if you think you're only going to be away for one night (it might turn in to three nights like mine), empty your bin before you go.

Sorry if that was a little bit too much information for some of you, but if you get a bit vague with your garbage when the weather's warming up, this is what happens, OK?

Just be grateful I'm not showing pictures of it.

The Dancing Queen

I love it when she puts on her Princess dress and sings and dances around the house.
And yells "NO PICTURES I said Mummy!!"

Sunday School Socks

These are our favourite shoes and socks right now. I love these little red shoes which we scored at the op shop, they are adorable. She also used to have a pair, same style, but in chocolate brown suede, gorgeous. Unfortunately one of them went missing on a shopping trip a while ago. Very sad, I loved those little shoes. I do really well at the op shops, finding great shoes for Ruby. But the socks, white with lace frill at the top - I loooove these so much. I had socks like this when I was little. They were always referred to as 'Sunday School socks' I guess they were the 'good' socks and reserved for Sunday School, LOL. I don't know if my sisters remember this too, but hey, LEAVE ME A FRIGGIN' COMMENT ABOUT IT IF EITHER OF YOU DO!!
*please excuse me, just dropping a subtle hint to family that they can leave comments here if they wish to do so*
I think every little girl should own a pair of socks like this. These ones are nearly too small so I am on the look out for them in a bigger size. If I could find them in my size I'd probably be wearing them too :)

I dragged this chair out of the shed when I realised it would be a good prop for a picture. It really isn't the best as a high chair and Mr Second Stitch is just itching to get rid of it but I've told him it's staying. He just loves to throw things out. Loves it. And I am a terrible hoarder. So I have had many many battles over what's staying and what's going in this house.

24 hours is not enough

I think I need about 48 hours in each day to try and get on top of things, plus about 10 extra hours just for sleeping. That would be nice.
I have been itching to do some scrapping but just haven't quite got there yet. I did pull out some old foam stamps which I haven't used in ages. to do this little 'tag'. My niece is turning one next week. I know this isn't a very 'baby girl' looking package, but I'm sure Abby won't care. I stamped on to one of those cheap paper doilies you can get at the supermarket. And at the risk of making myself looking like some kind of freak, I'll show this. It's just a little note book for Christmas stuff, like what I might get for certain people for gifts, what I've already got, Christmas food I might make. When you start Christmas shopping as early as I do, the closer it gets to Christmas you can start forgetting what you've actually bought. So then you just keep buying (I'm talking about buying for the kids) and end up with more than you really planned to. So I have to write down what I've already got so things don't get out of control.
I do this because I LOVE Christmas. Love it. I just made this from scraps, it's not something I'll keep but I just wanted it to look nice while I'm using it.
Looking at it now though it, ah, looks like I have sewn toilet paper on to it.
It's actually crepe paper, not dunny paper.
Seemed like a good idea at the time.

Firestarter

I am typing this in the comfort of my very warm and toasty house. Very, very toasty. I have built myself a blazing little fire.
The reason for the poxy photo of my rough head and otherwise awkward looking self is that I need this as proof for Mr Secondstitch that I did in fact get a fire going in his absence. And we can just say that this was one of many great fires I lit and not, say, a one off I persisted with this afternoon knowing that he will be home in 2 days (he's been away for 12 days I think this time. Will be home for 2 days and 2 nights and then off again) and checking out that fireplace for evidence that it has been used. Being a typical blokey bloke he loves a good roaring, way too hot, make everyone sweat fire.
But my Girl Scout skills are incredibly limited and I'm pretty crap at getting a good fire going. It is a very time consuming exercise for me. I use lots of newspaper/firestarters to get it going and it doesn't usually last. One of the oldies about town here advised me to use 'a splash of kero' to make it easier, but I just don't know that I'm ready for that kind of excitement in my life.
So anyway I got the stinkin' thing going this afternoon, and I have the photographic evidence.
I do love to have the fire, but if I could just have someone else to cut the wood, chip up the kindling, clean the fire place out daily, and get up in the middle of the night to throw another log on so it's nice and toasty in the morning - I'd love it a whole lot more. In other 'handy Mum' news I also fixed the washing machine today. I loaded it up last night to set it so it would start itself while I was still asleep this morning, but when I went to close the door it just wouldn't close.
There was this little very rusted out spring at the bottom of the door bit which had broken off at one end, hanging down. Door could not close. So my first plan was to just rip it off altogether, it didn't look that vital. But it wouldn't come off.
Do you see it. It's that caterpillar looking thing hanging down, looking like it's trying to escape my filthy load of (not quite) whites.

So I just need you to know that if this happens to you - this is a problem which can be fixed with Blu Tack. Easy. I'll let you know how long it lasts.
Is there anyone else out there who has to have a child lock on their fridge? We have had one pretty much since Ruby was old enough to walk, but I have never, ever seen one on anyone elses' fridge.

We have two real little fridge raiding bandits on our hands here. And you have to use the lock for it to work, LOL. I am always forgetting. And when I forget we have things like Ruby indulging herself with an entire punnet of strawberries in the time it took me to put Clary to bed last night! And this morning while I was hanging the washing out they both treated themselves to some post-breakfast apple pies.

Here they are. Little turkeys.

They are absolutely terrible to just helping themselves to little snacks when that fridge is not locked. And I can't lock the pantry so it's just open slather there. I don't know what to do. They're very sneaky.

And, just because, a picture of Clary trying to master the art of getting sunglasses on.