A challenge.....

Well for me anyway... turns out that I got tagged by the very talented Miss Sue (thanks Sue ;P), for the Be Original Blog Project... I really don't think that I've got any original ideas for this but here is the run down.. .once again a copy and paste (sorry :) ), this one from Mohit Singhania's blog, where this all started.

In a new blog post, list and write about 5 to 10 methods you use to create original posts. It has to be a method you use regularly. These should be the best, quickest and easiest to apply methods.
At the start of your post, tell your audience (briefly or at length) what you are doing with the "Be Original" Project and put a link and/or a trackback to this post, for the purpose of giving them the full rules and for me to compile the master list of all participants that I’ll link to in a future post.
Be sure to also put a link/trackback to the blogger who tagged you for "Be Original" in order to let your readers follow the conversation around and to spread the link love.
Sharing your "Be Original" methods with your own audience, will also share them with the blogger who tagged you and the bloggers you tagged, as well as their whole audience!
Pick as many bloggers as you want and “tag” them to take part in the fun. You will be helping their exposure by linking to their site from your blog, and they will return the favor by having a link to your site in their initial post. After all, that is how a meme works (a unit of cultural information transferable from one mind to another.)

So here we go:

1. I basically just write about what has been happening in my life.. well the stuff that I can remember anyway ;).

2. Try to keep a record of some day to day things, as something to look back on.

3. Post photos, and the details of them.

4. Post scrap pages and the details and products used on them.

5. post the occasional helpful link, or idea (not that this happens very often ;) ).

Ok, I hope that I did it right, if not apologies to all involved. As for the tagging bit.. as regular readers would know, I've never been into the whole tagging others thing, so consider yourself tagged if you want ok, if not your not.. I know I know, I'm a party pooper, but that's just the way I am (as Wayne is more than happy to point out) ;P .

Ok, onto other things. I hope that everyone had a happy Easter.. bad blogger that I am I totally forgot to wish it for you all in my last post lol. We ended up going to Barwon heads Friday morning, dropping our stuff of at the house we were staying at, and then heading to Queenscliff for the seafood festival, raising money for the Good Friday Appeal. Had some nice fish and chips, even though I got in the line for the wrong one, and it turned out to be the longest line too.. oh well.

Afterwards, we went for a walk along the main st, and boy do they have some nice little clothing shops there.. I saw some lovey cardis. I just LOVE my cardigans ;).. does that make me a dag? (nah, just trendy right?!?) A photo of my 2 dags...

Then we went back to the house, to have this

ugly isn't it? tasted ok though....

And the bed!! Have to say that it was the softest bed I've ever slept in, I like a hard one though, so we did have some issues getting to sleep, although by Sunday night, I think that I must have gotten used to it lol.

Saturday, the local fair was on at the school. so we walked down the road to that. Julieanne got to see the baby animals

And I procrastinated on buying a cardigan (see another one ;).. which I didn't get in the end lol.. I'm shocking at spending money. Well shocking unless it's like a computer or camera or something lol.

Easter Sunday, we had the Easter hunt (well after I'd attempted to sneak into Julieanne's room to place her present from the Easter bunny: a dancing chicken that sings the chicken song).. I don't think that we went to overboard with the chocolates this year.. thankfully ;)

Wayne's parents drove down and they surprised us at the beach while we were there (I thought she sounded all suspicious on the phone!) We then walked home, Wayne, Micheal (dh brother) and I stopping off to have a look at an auction on the way home, boy was it expensive!

In the afternoon Wayne and I wanted to go for a walk to have a look at this run down house that was selling for over 1 million, but it ended up that most of the clan came with us. We then went and had a look at the surf beach and the gorgeous golf course there.

The afternoon was spent at the house, with everyone outside.. the boys playing table tennis, and the girls having a story read to them by grandma.. I did get some good shots of them.

Then before dinner snuck back to the beach to attempt to get some shots.. wasn't very happy with my results though

and the clubhouse

We left Monday morning as Stewart needed to be at work by 3 (in the end he didn't end up working lol), and I must say that it is always nice to come back home too.

Wednesday was 2 years since Wayne's grandad passed away. I still can't believe that he's gone, he was such a healthy person, and his mum and grandma lived to about 100.. so we were expecting him to go on forever, but it wasn't so. He had a heart attack, and complications.... I don't think that we really know what he died of in the end :(. Anyway we had a family get together at Wayne's parents and it was good to see some of the other family. I did feel a little sad that Julieanne wasn't there. She was having a sleepover at mums, and I thought that she would have liked it better there anyway.

Here's Wayne being his usual self

And I have to say that he generally is the life of the party.... even when he doesn't want to be, but if he's not it's always "why are you in a bad mood?" lol, he's not, he just wants some quiet time! But you can't please some people ;)

And finally here is something that I did for Wayne's mum.. I'm not real impressed with it, it was a rushed early morning thing, but I wanted to do something....

credits: painted circle splatz brush - Anna Aspnes. Roughed up tool kit - Rhonna Farrer. Blended Autumn papers - Denise Docherty. Autumn Glory texture - Nancie Rowe Janitz. Monoblendz Grafix papers - Anna Aspnes. Fonts 28 days later.

Well, that was a post and a half.. sorry for the rambling ;), but I need to get it all down so I'll remember it hehe.

Oh I almost forgot. Julieanne and I went to Chadstone today to see Happily Never After.. it was ok, but I think that I'm starting to expect to much from these kids films. I blame Shrek for that! Can't wait until June when the new one comes out!!

TFL and TTFN

A Tooth and some other stuff...

Well not really much other stuff ;).




Julieanne's first loose tooth finally came out today, after much wiggling. I'm surprised how well she went with the whole thing.. she is now extremely anxious to put it under her pillow tonight lol.. hmmm.. wonder what the tooth fairy will bring?

I'm glad that I actually managed to get this LO done before it fell out...


Journaling: It’s the first that is going to fall out.. it’s been wobbly for over 2 weeks now, so I’ve started to get used to the idea of you losing those precious little teeth.. I still don’t like it, but I’m slowly starting to accept that you are losing all of that babyness... it has come around so fast, and I really don’t want to see the end of it, but I know that you are going to make a beautiful girl with “big” teeth and big dreams.I will never forget this gorgeous grin of yours, though, showing all those precious baby teeth. 31 March 2007.
Credits:Monoblendz Graphix papers - Anna Aspnes. Ledger Frames No.2 - Katie Pertiet. Roughed up tool kit - Rhonna Farrer.
Fonts: Cooper Black, 2peas Journaling dingbats, 2peas Harlequin, 2peas Field Marshall.

We had a fairly quiet weekend.. Wayne had to work on one of the trucks as it's been making a funny noise, so he did that on Saturday. Then Sunday the lawns got done.. lol, that is a full days work around here.. well it should be, somehow I got stuck doing one section today ;). It seems that even the small amount of rain we had (we had 7ml last week when an hour away had about 40!) did wonders to the grass...

Also had a bit of a shock on Sunday on our way home from dropping Stewart off. The car we were following failed to stop at a shocking intersection... he went straight through, but there was a car coming along the other road.. she slammed straight into him, as she really had no other choice in the 100km zone.. anyway they were all so lucky, if either of them had of been going a little faster it would have been a pretty serious crash. As it was she only hit the back passenger panel, and spun the car around... I shudder to think what would have happened if she had of hit the front of the car... nobody was hurt, which was a blessing. We were the first there, so Wayne got out to see if everyone was ok, I don't know what he would have done if anyone was seriously hurt... he's a bit of a fainter with blood ;). Anyway he called 000, and the emergency services arrived a while later (I was actually surprised how long it took!). So that was the excitment of the weekend.. it does make you think of how dangerous the roads are! All is takes is someone not to give way... ::shudder:: :(

We have also deiced where we are going over Easter. We were going to go to Seaspray, and then that changed to Inverloch when that was booked, then Inverloch was booked so we got a house in Barwon Heads. It will be nice to get away :). Now just need to clean attempt to get the dust of my camera....... not holding high hopes ;)

Anyway, I can hear Wayne coming in the drive so will leave it at that.

TTFN

Shooting in the RAW!

Well that's what Wayne likes to call it anyway ;).


It's been a while between posts. I'm such a bad blogger, and really the only reason I keep it up is as a reference to what we did when and where (and even then, my record keeping skills leave much to be desired!)... and it came in handy when I did this...

I totally love Anna's week in review layouts (love ALL her work actually), but I think that a weekly LO is a little ambitious for me ;).. so when the month in review brush came out, had to grab it! This is a round up of January.. I had WAY to many photos to choose from though so I ended up with a pretty cluttered LO... hence the black and white, makes it look a lot neater :). Credits: A month in review brushes - Anna Aspnes. Monoblendz Grafix papers - Anna Aspnes. Fonts: Avant garde, Bernard Mt Condensed. Love my fotofusion too, would not have been able to do it without it... I might actually upgrade it one of this days too, so I can actually get a full 2 page spread done with out having to enlarge later ;).

Saturday night Julieanne had a sleepover at her friends house (oh and I just realised I left that off my Jan LO - her first sleepover - doh!! Opening PS as I type... grrrr... now the system is sooooo sloooooooow), as she'd been before I wasn't overly concerned about it this time, so Wayne convinced me to go out to his aunties restaurant in Healesville... well at 9.30 we get the phone call that she wanted to come home... we were over an hour away!! Terrible parents that we are ;).. but it would have to be the one time that we go out that it happens.. anyway, we'd organised Wayne's parents to go an get her, but then 2 minutes later get a phone call that she was sound asleep... ah children, life would be boring without them right?!

We went to the movies on Sunday and saw a 3D screening of "meet the Robinson's". It was a fun movie, nothing to jump up and down about, but it had a great message, as most of those Disney movies do... speaking of movies, I was talking to a lady at work about it the other day, and we both had to say that we weren't that impressed by "happy feet"... ooooo how un-Australian is that?!? It was a wonderful movie, but I don't think that it's deserved all the hype that it's got, and I can' believe that it won an Oscar over "Cars"... that was a good movie ;)... OK will get off my soapbox now lol... Anyway, the kids loved the movie (back to "meet the Robinson's now") even with the glasses, and afterwards we had dinner at TGI's.. which ended in a tired child throwing a tantrum (not mine), but I was glad for it, as otherwise it might have been a late one, which Julieanne really didn't need, after the Saturday night.

Also managed to do this for the ad challenge over at DD. I don't often do challenges but thought I should give it a go. Journaling: These are the days of Miracle and Wonder.Mordialloc Festival Sunday the 18th of March. Julieanne and Isabella on the Teacup ride. They were the only 2 on the ride, but they seemed to have a wonderful time, waving to use and laughing, and generally having fun just being children. It was so nice to see them enjoying their childhood, as I sometimes think we tend to force them to grow up way to fast. I hope that they will look back on these days and think of them as days of Miracle and Wonder, and hope they don’t pass to quickly. Credits: Font Al Capone. Anna Aspnes: Ad challenge Film Frame. Katie Pertiet: On the Edge Flourishes 2.

Umm, and suppose I should explain the title of this post, well I've decided to finally start shooting RAW.. I've been doing it on and off for a while now, but really couldn't be bothered with it all, but after playing with some files I did notice the difference in quality.. now I just need to get some bigger compact flash cards.. those 256 ones that I have just ain't going to make it ;). Oh and I also found this handy little tool for windows uses.. I was sick of not being able to see the thumbnail in windows explorer so did a google and found this.. and it actually works! And it also has (apparently haven't tried it yet) has a save as feature that lets you just save it as a jpeg... handy for emailing I suppose without having to open PS (and yes it has finished opening lol). Also found this too. It actually allows me to see my psd thumbnails (although not the big preview).. yay.. no more bridge!

Well... I might leave it there... round of applause if you actually made it this far ;).

TFL and TTFN :)

Little update...

But not much to say really :).

The weekend seems to fly past (as it usually does!). Saturday night we went to my mum and dads for dinner and watched the Concert for George, which mum had just got on DVD. I know it's fairly old but it was great to see. Me being a huge Beatles fan loved it... and I want to get a jacket like Ringo's for Wayne! Amazing how much George's son looked like him too... spitting image, although just a little smaller.

Yesterday we ended up at the Mordialloc Festival. We were supposed to go to the in-laws for lunch, but the local festival was on so ended up there... needless to say we were really not dressed for it, and my neck did get a little burnt.

It was fairly busy, but there was a great atmosphere there with lots of live music, food and drinks and hippy stalls. Rides too, but Julieanne only went on 2 of them ($5 a ride a bit on the dear side)... the teapots with Isabella

and the Cha-Cha with Daddy


It still surprises me how much of a speed freak she is, she just loves her fast rides (and this was fast), but is afraid of a moth.. funny girl :).

After we'd all had enough of that we walked across to the beach.. once again not really dressed for it as Julieanne is demonstrating here by hitching her skirt WAY up ;) (ooo, the compression has made the colours all weird.. oh well)

We then had dinner at Cafe Blah Blah and I had a lovely Chicken parma (Waynes standard)... and the sticky date was beautiful!

We had an early night last night, but we are all still tired! Another early one again tonight I think. Also picked some of our tomatoes today.. not the best looking ones, but they taste alright!

Still trying to figure out our home loan too... we are paying WAY to much at the moment, (care of our stupidity and a hopeless mortgage broker!), so hopefully that gets sorted out quickly, because we can't take much more of it as it is..

Also did this quick LO. I got the idea from Photoshop Creative Magazine (I think it's that way around), after doing a quick flick through in the newsagent.. didn't buy the magazine though, so had to go off memory... I had all these 4x4 photos and really didn't know what to do with them (as they are not of my fav topic) so just did this as a test... CC most welcome as always.. Used Roughed up tool kit by Rhonna Farrer. Fonts AL SongWriter, 28 Days later.

Well no more news on the wobbly tooth either... still just wobbly.. how long do these things generally take?!

Turns out I had more to say than I thought lol.

Lastly Hugs to a certain friend that has had some bad things happen and is feeling a little low.. thinking of you :).

TFL and TTFN

Wobbly Tooth!!

Wahhh... Julieanne has a wobbly tooth. She's going to lose those precious baby teeth, and I'm not happy about it!! I don't want her to grow up just yet, but I suppose it has to happen doesn't it? Wayne says it's about time, he seems to think that she is fairly late in losing them, but she's only just turned six, and I always thought that 6-7 was the average for losing that first tooth... Anyway, Julieanne is pretty excited about the whole thing.. lol, she just knows that the tooth fairy is going to come and give her some money ;)... Not too sure how much the tooth fairy actually pays these days though lol.....

Just a pic of those teeth....



On another note, we went camping on the weekend, and I must say that it was an experience. We haven't been for about 11 years so I'd sort of forgotten how grotty you can get after a couple of days with no shower! It was just so dusty! We camped right next to the Latrobe river at Hawthorn Bridge (or so I'm told anyway! I really haven't got the foggiest idea of where we were!). Then on Saturday the trail bikes stared appearing. Not that I have anything against bikes, but they are VERY noisy and I'd really prefer to hear the running river. Anyway, we packed up Sunday and found another *isolated* spot. Isolated because you needed a 4x4 to get there, and really we could not hear any other person around at all :). I was a little concerned about snakes though, but I just kept telling myself that they are more scared of us than we are of them lol....

I wasn't too sure how Julieanne would go, but she seemed to really enjoy it. And even manged to go to sleep! She loves her own bed and generally has issues sleeping somewhere else, but she was happy on her Bratz lilo.

Must say that it was FANTASTIC to get back home though!!! Even though we didn't have a shower straight away (had to put rock on the drive. MORE DUST!!), it was great to just have running hot water to wash my hands properly. Worst thing of all though is that I did not take one photo!! And I call myself the family photographer...

TFL and TTFN :)

There's a rainbow outside...

Well at the moment there is, it does look like it's fading though. Not the way I'd planned to start my post (actually I had no idea of where to start it lol), but it will do :).

Not a lot happening in my end of the world, but that's good. I helped my parents with their flowers last night, and I'm feeling it today... bit of a downer about the timing as I was going to and see some of the MAC girls, but it didn't happen oh well :).

We are going camping on the weekend too.. don't know if I'm actually looking forward to it though, as I can tell I'm going to get REALLY bored, we are going to Hawthorn Bridge, and I'm not 100% sure where that is exactly, but I know that there really isn't a lot to do. I'm not one to be sitting around doing nothing, and with no power my laptop is not going to be of much use :(. I was hoping that the new Digital Scrapbooking mag would be here by now but not yet... I suppose I'll find something to do ;)... hopefully I can take some good photos.

Not a lot going on in the layout department.

I had to redo the last one I did as I wasn't really happy with it. I do like this one better. Any CC is most welcome though.

And going through my photo folders I can across this scanned one. I thought it was such a happy photo I had to scrap it... even though the quality is pretty bad.... Ahhhh I love my Canon350D (even though this was taken with the film equivalent, scanning does not do any favours ;) )

Anyway, have to go and make Julieanne her breakfast.

TFL & TTFN

We had some rain!!

Last night, it was fantastic! Not many puddles on the ground, but it was so dry I'm not really surprised. The size of the cracks we have in the yard are huge, and I think it's going to take a lot more of the wet stuff to see improvement...

On another note, I thought that I'd better let you all know what I actually do when I go to work (not that that is very often lol). I actually do invoicing at a bulb mail order company, I know not very exciting is it, but as it's only seasonal it suits me perfectly ;). Business has been slow lately so I don't think it's going to last much longer, and the days are getting less frequent to. Oh well, I just need to figure out something else to do. I'm seriously thinking about doing a web course at the local TAFE.....

Oh, and I forgot to post a pic of the pottery that we did the other week. Not a fantastic photo, lol, I had no where to set it up so had to put them on the floor... as you can see, lots of colours ;)

Julieanne and I also did some painting on the weekend (no not the house although that does need to be done and the paint is in the shed!!). She got this preprinted canvas for her birthday, and has been asking ever since if she could paint it. I didn't want to start until I knew we had time to finish it lol. Anyway, finally got round to it when Wayne was a work on Saturday. I must say that it was a bit of a challenge trying to get the colours mixed right. The set only came with the basic blue, red, green, yellow etc pains, and of course Julieanne wanted it to look like the picture it came with so they all needed to be mixed up... well I tried ;)

We didn't end up doing the best job on it, lots of going out of lines, but it looked ok when we'd finished (I put the faces in after it had dried ;) )

She now wants to hang it in the living room...I think that I might just put it in her bedroom. Speaking of which, I put her princess blind on the window today (another present from for said birthday!) and boy was that a saga and a half. I thought that it would just fit in the hole, but no had to trim it up and all... not too mention that I was having major issues trying to find the tools for the job, and then when finding them find that they are covered in grease... grrr was not happy. But if you want the job done you have to do it yourself... or well I do in this house, Wayne would have left it for another 6 months!! ;). I'm sure that she is going to love it though (when she finally gets home, she's at a friends now).

Oh and finally I did manage another LO, not too sure about it though (perfectionist coming out again), and it turned out a heap different from how I'd planned but they always do. CC VERY welcome :)

Credits: Anna Aspnes: Ephemerosa papers, Hipster Plume 1 Brushes. Void Brushes: Butterfly brush. Nancie Rowe Janitz: Shmootzy Frames2. Fonts: Avant Garde, 28 days later, Selfish.

TFL and TTFN :)

Another quicky ;)

Just some tulips that I got MYSELF from work on valentines day lol.... And a very disheveled looking Julieanne in the background, it was hot, but it has been for the last few weeks and I'm so VERY sick of it... roll on winter!!

And here's a layout I did of Julieanne and they way she sings (or used to :() the wrong words to one of her fav songs. Credits can be found here.

Work is a little on the dismal side lately too... just 2 days this week, how sad is that?!? lol, well it gave me time to give my blog another overhaul... the last one was just a little to messy for me... let me know what you think.

Oh and a quick thanks to Mel, for letting me know what probably caused my candle reflections on my birthday photos. It's my uv filter... lol, now to remember to take it off ;)

TTFN

Just a test

Ok it looks like it's working woo hoo. I've just installed Picasa and I just found out I can post to blogger directly from it, and this is a psd file!! How easy is that. Anyway this was a birthday card I was working on for Julieanne.. but it never got finished lol... terrible aren't I? Credits Altered photography kit by Denise Docherty, frame by Rhonna Farrer, star brush by Anna Aspnes, background paper Dianne Rigdon Loving Hands.

Ok if this works, there may just be some more regular posts happening!

Change of plan....

well I was going to spend tonight doing a layout, as Wayne is out, and Julieanne has gone to bed. But after doing my blog list (which seems to be getting bigger by the day!) I thought that I really should put a bit more effort into mine lol. Not that I have a lot to say....

Went back to work (well if you can call it that ;) ) last week and we still have to see how long it's going to last. The lack of rain here over the last few years has really seemed to have had an impact on the gardening industry... well from what I can see anyway. Not that I'm complaining about the lack of work lol....

Last weekend we went to Hawthorn Bridge with some friends.... not 100% sure where it actually is, but we went through Neerim Sth to get there, and came back through Warragul as we got lost lol.. It was a nice spot, but I'm not a huge motorbike fan, and there was a few of them there... and busy! I suppose the 38 degrees that they had forcasted had something to do with that. Here's a photo of a dragonfly that I got... really need a macro!


It was Julieanne's birthday last Thursday she turned 6! I can't believe that 6 years have already gone.... bit depressing actually.... But that's life isn't it? Really that IS life lol.



Now can someone please tell me WHY I get these annoying spots in all my candle photos!? I've done a search and really can't find an explanation for it... what to I need to do to stop it.. and does anyone else have this issue? I've only noticed it over the past few months, don't know why.

We had her party yesterday at Robert Gordon in Pakenham, and I must say that it went better than I thought it would... We've never had a party for her with her friends before, and I wasn't too sure of what to expect. Her friends were very good though, and I hope that they enjoyed painting their mugs.. I'll go and pick them up on Thursday and see what the results are like... lol... even Wayne had a go at it ;).


Not a hole lot happening on the layout front (so hurry up and finish this post will i?) but here is just a one I did of Julieanne the other day at Inverloch... just love how she can amuse herself.


Credits can be seen here (just coz I'm too lazy to do them again ;) ), and it got LO of the week at DD which I was pretty chuffed about lol. Speaking of DD, they had a 25% off sale on the weekend, so I couldn't help myself and had to get some stuff... sad to say that it's still sitting zipped in my download folder :(.. also ideabooks4u had 15% off so just HAD to get a couple of bookies too ;).. can't wait till they get here.

Ok, will leave it there CSI Miami is about to start (no way near as good as the original! Come on Grissom!!!), and I want to at least attempt to start something lol.

Oh and here is one comet pick from that last post that mysteriously deleted my photos..... do we need to get Mulder and Scully in on the case maybe?!

TFL... TTFN :)

Holidays are over

well for Julieanne they are ;). She went back to school on Wednesday and is now in grade one! Where did the time go? She seems to be loving it, so that is always a good start lol.

Umm what else has been happening? We had Australia day last Friday, so it was a long weekend. We really wanted to do something, and in the end we ended up going to Inverloch Saturday. We stayed the night and and came home Sunday afternoon, just in time to go to my sisters for an afternoon lunch thing she was having for mums birthday which was on Monday. We only stayed a couple of hours as we had to drop Stewart off at home, but that was ok. Then after dropping him off the in laws rang and said they were at Dromana and asked us to head down there for dinner. The weather wasn't the best, but it's always nice just to get away.

I'd felt bad all through the holidays because I didn't get to do anything with Julieanne. So on Monday we headed off to Robert Gordon Pottery so we could paint some mugs. In the end Julieanne wanted to paint a dog bowl for mum (because being the terrible daughter that I am I haven't got her a present yet!), and after that she painted a cake plate (for my birthday next week), I just did a mug, and boy was it hard to do something creative with out it involving the computer.. major lack of mojo there! I get to pick them up today, as they all needed to get fired, and can't wait to see what they look like lol.

Julieanne enjoyed it there, so now we have decided to have her birthday party there as well. They don't do parties as such, but are happy for groups to visit for their birthday... so now all I have to do is wait and hope that a few more of her friends can make it. Handed out the invites on Wednesday and so far one has said she is coming......

Credits: Fit for a Princess quick album by Anna Aspnes available from here (just love this and it makes it sooooo easy ;) ). Fonts Al Sandra and Avant Garde.

Oh and I did these layouts for a challenge we were having at MAC.

The first is of Jude and Deb at our MAC get together last year. Judy seems like such a wonderful mother I thought the quote very fitting... and I used to love that "touched by an angel" show it came from lol..... maybe it was her Irish accent... love Irish ;)

Credits: Deb kit by Judes Digitalscraps available here. I'm not the best at using a full kit (just tend to use the papers) but gave it a go anyway lol. Fonts are Al heavenly and avant garde (again!).

This one I did using a minikit that Lis was kind enough to share with us, called Blue. I know that she doesn't like this photo, but I thought it was just a nice soft happy look that matched the quote ;)

Credits: Blue by Lis S and fonts are al sandra and avant garde.

Thanks girls for sharing your wonderful talent with us :).

Ummm I think that's about it.... oh no wait! Does anyone know why my photos from my previous post aren't showing up anymore? Do I really have to upload them again? Or is there some miracle fix it on blogger lol... sure...

TTFN

Just some photos...

Of the McNaught's comet last night.. They are pretty bad, being very blurry and noisy, but it was too dark for me to focus on anything (how does everyone else do it?!), and I had to bump my ISO way up lol.. Anyway, you get the idea ;)

Tagged!

And I thought that I'd better do another post ;)

First off, did anyone see the comet McNaught last night? We heard them talking about it on the radio last night in bed (yes Wayne has to have the radio on before going to sleep, lol, I'm used to it now...), so we had to go out and have a look. There in the south western Sky we could see the tail of it... didn't manage to see the actual comet though as I think that we were too late for that. It did inspire me to get out dh's telescope that he got for fathers day last year.... not that I could see much. I think that I had the wrong lens on, I changed it, but that even made things worse! Mental note: next time, be prepared lol. There's some info on this site..... I had to go to the SA one, as the VIC one didn't seem as good (but that could have just been me not knowing the right place to look lol).

Not a lot else happening around here... have to pick up Julieanne's school books tomorrow, which is a little depressing as the holidays have nearly come to an end way to quick... I really didn't get to do as much with her as I would have liked, but the money just hasn't been there, which is always a bit of a downer... Also been attempting to figure out The Sims 2.... gee is that a huge game.. Julieanne loves making the families, and I think that our poor desktop is going to struggle under the weight of them all lol. All I want to do is figure out how to make a proper house!

I've managed a couple of layouts....

Stewart on his skimboard. Credits: Fonts: John Handy, 2peas rubber ducky. Brushes by Jason Gaylor (worn 3) Anna Aspnes (avant garde hipster 1) and Veronica Ponce (from designing with digital magazine). Paper used as overlay by Anna Aspnes (ska8ter Dude). Texture by Nancie Rowe Janitz.

This was done for a challenge that Anna Aspnes posted on her blog... and challenge it was lol, still not happy with it, but I did do it. Credits: Fonts: Al sandra, Kartica. Paper by Anna Aspnes from Artistique kit. Framing Brushes by Jason Gaylor. Photo from stock.xchng.

And lastly this one of Wayne... he'd kill me if he saw this here, but he won't so it's ok ;). Credits: fonts: ITC avant garde book, 2peas favorite things. Brushes by Anna Aspnes (sk8terboy) and Jason Gaylor (worn1).

Ok, now to the tagging... thank you Sharon :P. As stated in earlier posts I'm not going to tag anyone else, but I will do it.

I'm supposed to state 5 cool things about me, which is going to be a little hard as I'm definitely NOT cool... as Wayne will be happy to tell you roflol, but what does he know.. I mean LOOK at him!!?

1. I tend to pick up things fast, and am self taught in a lot of things that I do.

2. I love to read (well I think it's cool ;) )

3. I was born in The Netherlands

4. I did a cartwheel a few months ago and it didn't kill me!

5. I'm extremely lucky to have the life that I have :)

Ok, so they may not be "real" cool, but they will do...

TTFN

me?

Thanks Lis for the link :)

Finally.......

First off: Happy New Year everyone!!

Well, where do I start? I hope that you all had a fantastic Christmas, and a wonderful New Year. Ours was very nice, not too much hassle at all, as it can sometimes get....

Christmas Eve was spent at my sisters. They have just bought a new house, and she was very eager to hold our yearly family Christmas Eve night there. Julieanne was very excited to be going, as they have also just got 2 new puppies... talk about biting off more than you can chew! lol. It was a good night though.. .although the drive home was a little scary... the weather turned VERY ugly there for a while, but we do need the rain :)

Christmas day started with Julieanne getting up around 7.30, not too bad really. Then she realised that no-one else was up and went back to bed. I felt sorry for her then and had to get up so she could at least open up something. She scored well, getting 2 Bratz dolls, a Cabbage Patch kid and a mp4 player (the best purchase ever! lol)

It was then off to Wayne's brothers for lunch. They seem to do it every year and Lisa's (SIL) parents are there too... it's always pretty good, with lots of photos being taken, although this year I might not be the only one snapping away. Waynes' mum got a new digital sony cybercam, and she seems to be enjoying it wonderfully... shame there might actually be some photos of me taken!

Stewart ended up getting a new skim board from them, but more on that later ;).

We didn't end up staying for the usual lunch-turn-into-dinner thing, and were home by 7, which was nice as Stewart still had to open the presents here for him. He also ended up with an mp4 (love it lol) also a Simpsons Chess board, Rubik (sp?) cube and dvds.

Boxing day (the 26th), we travelled up to Healeville to Waynes Aunts house. I must say that she did a FANTABULOUS job of decorating. She is the most creative person I know, and I sooooo want her to get into digiscrapping.... I'm sure that everything she touches turns out stunning!

They own this restaurant in Healesville, and have asked me to take some photos for the website, and do a new flyer for them.. .I'm very honoured, but still feel like my stuff is way not good enough, but I'll give it a go I suppose.. I really should get onto it really...

New Years Eve we went to some friends house for a bbq. Her parents were there as well, and some people had a little too much to drink, making for some awkward moments, but all in all it was ok. I guess I should start drinking just to fit in more ;). Julieanne did get a little upset later because she didn't see any good fireworks, so we had to explain that the don't have really good ones in the suburbs, just some small backyard stuff.

Wednesday was a really hot one (we've had a few of those lately), and the kids were desperate to cool down... We've got a spare tank that catches the rain of our garage for the garden, so we decided to use that to set up a waterslide for them.. .I know we are in water restrictions, but this is water that can't be used for anything else anyway.. .It's had bore water mixed with it... The kids had a ball. I remember when I was little, and when we had the black plastic slide, it was so much fun, I'm glad that they got to experience it for a little while at least.

The next day, was another hot one. So we decided to go to the beach. We packed our stuff (and boy does that take awhile lol) and headed off to Dromana. It was packed! And the beach that we ended up at got deep very quickly... not my ideal spot. We lasted there a couple of hours and decided to go home. Good thing we took the long way and went through Flinders, as we found a lovely beach there, with hardly any people, long shallows and some rock pools! The beach wasn't the cleanest (seaweed was everywhere), but we all agreed that it was better than the Dromana one. Julieanne even found a starfish near the rock pools.

Friday came round and, yep once again, the temperature was going over the mid thirties. We rang my BIL and asked him if he wanted to go to the beach (this is the most we have EVER been in the nearly 12 years me and Wayne have been together! lOL), he said yep, so we headed up to Mordialloc where he lives. The beach there was fantastic, lots of shallows and lots of areas for Stewart to use his new skimboard! I got a HEAP of photos of crashes, but missed most of the really good ones lol. Wayne had a go, and fell off, and even Julieanne had a turn sitting on it, and getting pulled around while hanging onto a noodle ;). She also got some new swimmers and loved posing in them. I really wanted to get her a one piece, but this two piece was so cute I couldn't help myself.

On Sunday we were asked if we'd like to go to Matthew (SIL's nephew) birthday party at the funpark in Whittlesea. The weather was shocking, but it turned out to be a good day, I think that if it had of been a better day weather wise, the park would have been packed. I went on the bumper boat things and got totally saturated! I really didn't think I was going to get that wet, but everyone seemed to be picking on me and squirting us. Julieanne loved the go karts and the toboggan, I'm sure that she is going to be a daredevil.. funny girl that she is. Bugs frighten her silly, but she loves fast moving things lol. I got some great photos of them in the go karts too. Julieanne does her peace signs back-to-front, so it looks like she is giving the fingers.. .at least I hope it's not intentional...... lol

Well not a lot happening on the layout front, but I did manage to do these. The first one is of Julieanne's Christmas concert, done in fotofusion and a scraplift of this one by Anna Aspnes. Did not do it justice by half! fonts: helvetica, 2peas billboard, paper by Denise Docherty from blended Autumn, and paper and elements by Shabby Princess, holiday magic. Frame brush by Jason Gaylor.

I also finally manged to get some of our holiday photos done. These were from Wet and Wild, and I'd have to say that it was one of the best days we had.

Again, another fotofusion layout ;). fonts: itc avant garde book, 2peas rubberducky. Overlay by Nancie Rowe Janitz.

Phew... that was a post and a half!! I really should keep on top of it shouldn't I? lol, don't see it happening anytime soon though. Thanks for getting this far (even if you did skim it lol)

TTFN