The Easter Parade Hat

Emmylou was laid low this week with a bout of tonsilitis (following hot on the heels of her little sister). She was almost ready to go back to school on Wednesday but not quite, so we had a quiet day making an Easter hat for the parade at school the next day. We did a paper version first to make sure it worked and then cut out the cupboard and cut tabs on the bottom of the crown to glue on the inside of the brim. We didn't make a top for the hat as that looked too hard.

Then we made flowers from tissue paper and pipe cleaners and she stuck them on. One flower was poked through a hole at the top for good measure. Emmylou decided to add a bunch of pipe cleaners for extra garnish. Here she is trying on the finished product, but looking a bit pale and peaky!

I couldn't go to the school parade as I had to work, but she had a lovely time.

Happy Easter everyone. Hope you have a lovely few days with the people you love.

Things making me happy

Just some random stuff that is making me happy. I seem to have lost my momentum with my blog but I guess it's just there for when I'm in the mood....it doesn't have to be something on my "to do" list. Sometimes, I just wait for inspiration to strike. As it did just now when E cried out "Look, Mummy...our first baby nasturtium!!". So....here it is. A simple, small thing I know, but it really makes me happy. All my lovely colourful petunias have gone scraggy and dead looking so after consultation with my green thumbed mother, I have hoiked most of them out. I will start again with some new baby plants. Also, my pansies are not coping with the warmer weather and I don't have time to water them EVERY morning so I might go with something more hardy like geraniums that I can neglect but still get pretty flowers from.

Recently, I have slackened off from my efforts to let the children have less time watching kids' TV/dvds and playing the computer (mostly my big girl, not the little one). But I resumed my guerilla warfare this week. My family doesn't respond well to "rules" and the Daddy is too soft to help me enforce them so I gently said one school morning that we were going to do "other fun stuff" rather than watch TV before school. (E usually gets up at 6am or earlier so is usually allowed to watch TV quietly before having breakfast and getting dressed). I put out scissors, glue, paper and magazines the night before and in the morning, told the girls we were going to cut out pictures of stuff that we would like in our life and stick them on paper to make a sort of life wish collage. That only occupied them for a little while. (Making the rainbow out of magazine pictures was much more successful. Don't know how to link to that post, though). Anyway....I also bought a packet of little coloured matchsticks and let the girls loose with them. E made pictures and G did a multi media installation!

So it made me happy to see them absorbed in creating rather than interacting with a screen.

Lastly, I don't watch that much "grown up" TV or get many DVDs out because by the time the girls are asleep, I'm just about ready for bed and can't manage to watch an hour or more of something. Scott is a night owl and had tried to get me to watch "Californication" but I thought it looked too sleazy. I gave it another try one night and, again, thought the first episode was a bit gross. All that sex with strange women put me off no end. But...I persisted and soon realised there is a lot more to the show than just the graphic sex scenes. It's funny and has it's deep moments and David Duchovny's character grew insidiously on me until I developed a bit of a crush. Yes...he's an irresponsible sex addict but he "loves the shit out of his daughter" and has a good heart and he makes me laugh. So now we have wizzed through the first season. I can manage a half hour of TV before bed without too many eyedrops and often say "Let's watch another episode!". Yep....I'm a real party girl.

After work this week, I had a rare chance to browse in the city shops as Scott was at home on duty with the girls. I decided to treat us to the next season of Hank and get a new dvd each for the girls. "Milly Molly" for E and a Hi Five dvd G has been wanting forever. It was nice to come home with a present for everyone. The budget doesn't run to presents much but it's good to lash out occasionally. So...if you want to snuggle up with someone and have a good laugh....give Hank a try. (By that I mean snuggle up with someone and watch Hank together. But I could definitely snuggle with Hank!)

Photos to go with the previous post

Hurray! I found the camera. So here are some photos to accompany the last couple of posts.
First of all... the girls with the fruits of our labours doing craft instead of watching TV. (The rainbow collage we saw on Tammie's blog but can't find the specific link to).

Then the chatterbox thing which has little sayings inside eg "I love you", "Tickle me" etc. E just loves making these with me. I should try and do some step by step pictures in case anyone didn't do them as a child. Basically, you fold in the four corners of a square piece of paper so that the outside corners end up all touching in the middle. Then flip the piece of paper over and do the same on the other side. Then fold the whole thing in half so that you have two squares on one side and two squares on the other side. Slide your pointer fingers and thumbs into the pockets under the four squares and wiggle your fingers to make the chatterbox talk and reveal the pictures you have drawn on the inside. Write the funny sayings underneath the pictures on the inside flaps. When I was a child, the favourite naughty saying to write was "You stink!" for if your brother chose it. I'm sure kids these days could come up with a whole heap worse.

Then....we have some photos of the new garden we made last weekend. It was a windy day and we had colds so the hour or two we spent outside probably contributed to my chest infection and G's middle ear infection but it was still worth it. We had so much fun and because we planted seedlings as well as nasturtium seeds, we already have picked a posy of pansies and snapdragons to give E'g grade one teacher.

Poor Kipper was chained up during proceedings and looked on woefully as we fenced off his favourite flower bed for sleeping in the sun. He had completely flattened the lovely sun jewels that my mother-in-law gave me.

Re G's middle ear infection, I have held off on the antibiotics for the first time (when a doctor has said they are needed - must be the brainwashing of my nursing training) and tried putting warm garlic oil in her ears instead, plus some panadol at night. It's only 4 weeks since the poor child had a course of antibiotics for her ears and I just hated the idea of another lot so soon. So.....we've had two nights of no ear pain which is great and I'm hoping she can avoid the antibiotics and fight the infection herself. I need her to be well by Thursday as I took both my work days off last week when I was sick and have stuff I really need to do in the office this week (like upset the owners of about-to-be-heritage listed buildings).