Busy, busy, busy

How is it that in the month leading up to Christmas, time starts going faster and there are suddenly a million things to do and no time to do them? It's about this time of year that I start remembering all my New Year's resolutions from last Christmas/New Year when I resolved to make gifts throughout the year and be organised and have everything done by the end of November. Ha! Fat chance, lol!
I do have some Christmas gifts organised - the littlest person in the house is mostly sorted (barring finishing the crochet dolls blanket I'm making her, which I'm stitching together right now) and I have a few things for the next smallest person in the house, but the boys are proving to be a challenge. Fin just had his birthday and we went halves with him in an iPod Touch, and he also got some iTunes vouchers for his birthday and a book, so I'm a bit stumped with him. Ollie I have nothing for yet. Gaaaaaah! Panic is beginning to set in!

In the meantime here are a few pics of what I've been up to recently:

Not terribly exciting, but I finally got around to overlocking the edge of my new tablecloth - I really should hem it, but it's ok as is for the meantime.

  And I just had to share the stunning view from our living room - these were taken at sunset one day last week. I love how the mountains in the distance (they're the Kaikouras in the South Island) correspond with the cityscape of Island Bay.

We now have a teenager in the house!

Fin's birthday was on Friday (the 3rd) and he turned 13!! Yikes - I'm a bit horrified that my baby is now thirteen years old. It just seems like yesterday that I was 13 and starting high school, never mind having a child who is 13 and will be heading off to high school next year!

He had a great time with his friends, going bowling and then stopping in at McDonalds for dinner (their choice - blerk!) then home to do teenagery boy things, like hang out on the tramp and chase each other around the backyard.

Here are a few birthday pics (not very exciting and he's still in his school uniform as we hadn't been home since the end of his school day).



The less-than-impressive 'cake'



Can't keep his hands off his new 'toy'!

I've been hearing some horror stories about teenagers lately so am feeling a bit freaked out about this new phase we're entering into. Hopefully he'll ease us into it (although I don't fancy my chances if recent events and behaviour are anything to go by!).

Busy weekend

Well, I am still exhausted after a very busy weekend. It all started with me crazily trying to finish knitting a test knit for the fabulous tikki (Georgie Hallam) - Darwinia. I adore this pattern and love the finished babydoll that was completed at 2:30am on Saturday morning (although I count it as being finished on Friday night as it would have been had I not been interrupted by all the children's activities that required far too much of my time and attention on Friday afternoon!). It was knit with Bendigo Woollen Mills cotton in Damask Rose (now discontinued). More pictures (and details) on my Ravelry page.

Is this not the cutest wee babydoll/dress??? The newly turned three year old modelling it is pretty cute too of course (although I may be slightly biased ;-) )

Then, Saturday started bright and early as we anxiously checked the skies to see what the day's weather would bring, as we had planned to have Tessa's birthday party (a Teddy Bear's picnic) at our local park, down by the beach. Sadly the weather was marginal (and windy) so we opted to make the decision to have her party at our house instead. This, of course, resulted in a mad flurry of activity as we raced around tidying, cleaning and preparing. Kim disappeared part of the way through this activity, taking Tessa with him, to get some bits and pieces - including the all important cake, which he assured me was under control. He'd told me earlier in the week that he'd take care of the cake, so that would be one less thing I'd need to stress about - but of course that just led to me stressing about what we'd end up with, lol!

Anyhoo, they were supposed to be back by 10:30am (party at 11am) to put finishing touches on everything and greet guests, but ended up arriving at about 11:05am, after one of the guests had already arrived. Older children were then sent off to a bedroom to quickly wrap some Bear Hunt 'treasures' and then hide them in the backyard.

The party was lots of fun, with a wee Bear Hunt, and lots of trampoline jumping, swinging, toy playing with and eating going on.

 The boys

Julia's Tim 'resting' with Jasper!

 The girls (well, some of them)

The food

The birthday girl

And of course, the cake and beautiful cupcakes that were organised by my lovely friend Jamara and some other friends who all conspired to surprise us with them (with Kim in cohoots with them!)!!

Delicious chocolate crackles made by the lovely Julia

All in all it was a fabulous day, made so by the generosity of so many people - mwah! to you all :-)

And then, I was at work at 7am the next morning, so no rest for the wicked! Whilst at work I got a phone call from my dear friend Justine, who along with her gorgeous family (partner Paul, and two boys, Luca whos' nearly 18 and Connor who's nearly 15) has just begun a nine month long trip WWOOFing around the North Island. Justine was ringing to confirm that they were arriving at our place at around 3 that afternoon to stay that night - I, of course, had completely forgotten!!

This meant that I couldn't go out to Tessa's friend Lucy's birthday party out in Upper Hutt that we'd planned to make it to as soon as I finished work at 2pm. We will make a special trip out there soon though, to take Lucy her birthday pressie and see them one last time before they move to the warmer climate and busy metropolis of Auckland.

Justine, Paul and the boys duly arrived at our place and we spent the afternoon and evening catching up and having a lovely time together. I have to say it's a bit scary seeing how big Justine's boys have grown! At nearly 18, Luca is SO tall - he towers above all the adults, and Connor will probably do the same (and is already taller than me). Justine is a week older than me - so that just makes me feel old as her kids are no longer boys, but young men. And quite terrifying to think I am old enough to actually have kids that age!!

They left on Monday late morning and I sadly (and slightly jealously) farewelled them and returned to my messy house to face the clean up of the weekend's activities and reflect on the many wonderful events (and the odd drama) that occurred over the previous few days. One image that keeps flashing back into my head was when Julia's wee man Tim was on the tramp and just sort of walked right off it!! He'd put his arm out to lean on the net - but we have no net, so the poor wee guy just fell right off :(  He was fine after a few sad minutes, but gave us all a bit of a heart attack!

I did take some gorgeous photos of Justine and her family but won't put them up here in case they're not keen on me publishing photos of them (will update with pics, if they're ok with it).

Tessa Turns Three - my baby is growing up!!



9/11/2007  5lb14oz



9/11/2010



Three years have gone by in the blink of an eye - I can't believe my baby is now three whole years old!  We've had a wonderful day today and the weather Gods have played along as well. We started the day with a sleep in from Tess, and then a quick present opening ceremony before the big kids dashed off to school and work. (please excuse the terrible photo of me - I had literally been out of bed about 15 minutes!)

Wellington has had a scorcher of a day and we made the most of it. Tess and I headed down to Oriental Bay and met up with my friend Ange and her gorgeous wee boy Tyler in the morning and the pair of them played happily at the park and on the beach until we had to go our separate ways. Tess was delighted with the really cute wee handbag and ballerina figurine that Tyler gave her.

Then Tess and I met up with my dear friend and Tess's unofficial godmother, Nicki and had a lovely late morning tea with her at The Parade Cafe, which is now situated in an old tugboat and firmly fixed to the rocks so there's no nasty rocking as you attempt to negotiate coffees and fluffies (yes, plural - the first was unceremoniously tipped all over Tess, the chair and the floor!). Tess was spoiled by Nicki - receiving two awesome gifts, a wooden alphabet puzzle and a wooden dominos set.

 

We had a lovely time all morning, then headed home for a quick lunch then headed off to kindy for more fun in the sun for Tess. She managed to get completely soaked at kindy and had a quick shower when we got home!

Then, after all of that, the day was not over. We had a futsal game to watch (and Ollie's team won!) and then



That's Ollie with the orange top on just before he scored a goal!



we headed over to Kim's mother's (Yiayia) house to celebrate with a wee cake and some more presents! Yiayia has just had knee replacement surgery, so isn't able to move too quickly at the moment - but Tess just spent the whole time dancing around her, lol!

So that was our day! Busy and long, but sunny and fun. Just like our life over the last three years ...

Coco Kids 1st Birthday celebrations

We've had a very big week at Coco Kids, with Craft 2.0 happening on Saturday, and we celebrated our 1st birthday on Monday the 1st of November. So much has happened since we launched Coco Kids on the 1st of November 2009! We've added many different items to our range of custom knitting items and knitted thousands of metres of yarn since then. It's been fantastic working with Kate and Julia - they're such lovely, talented and productive knitters and I'm proud to call them my friends.

Tonight we go live at 8pm on the Coco Kids blog with our 1st birthday sale. Make sure you head over there and check it out - there are loads of gorgeous items to choose from. 

Today I finished another fabric Kaia Babydoll in a size 2 (which will be available on the Coco Kids blog tonight ;-) ). I have a few different fabric choices, and will be making up quite a few of these over the coming weeks - so keep checking back under either the Coco Kids For Sale tab or my one on here.