Christmas - Part one: The festivities & family time.

Our festive days were filled with food, family and fabulousness. I hope that yours were, too.

The weather has been very up and down, but I'll be back with a part two (the crafty part), as soon as the sun comes out long enough to take some photos. I've also got a new wee project to announce. Good times.
In the meantime, we're busy playing with our new toys, eating the leftovers (still!), and wishing there was more family around during the rest of the year! See you soon x

Sweetness.

Yesterday was a flurry of last-minute Christmas baking/food crafting. I can quite honestly say I've not been around that much coconut in all my days.
We decided to package up wee parcels of homemade sweets for the families on Abraham's side, and this is what we are putting in them:

- Apricot balls. Recipe is from Tiny Happy. (These are gluten free/vegan, such a good recipe to have up ones sleeve for family with allergies!)

- Chocolate truffles. Recipe from PaisleyJade. I made a double batch, adding choc chips to one batch, and covering those in melted dark choc, and adding choc and glazed cherry pieces to the other and rolling them in cocoa powder.

- Shortbread. Another recipe from Tiny Happy. I'd never made shortbread before (I'd never made any of these things, actually..) but I'm pretty stoked with how it turned out. Might just be added to the 'go-to' recipe folder.

- Peppermint bark. Another recipe from PaisleyJade. What can I say, everyone seems to be doing it - and now I can see why.

- I also made the Oddfellow log recipe on Paisley Jade, but those are still setting. Fingers crossed they've worked out okay.

- And, I also made some, very spicy, crackers. No intentionally. I was a little heavy on the cayenne pepper, resulting in crackers that reallllly need to be dipped, or cheesed. Hoping the Boxing day crew will forgive me for that one. At least they look good, right?

Today's last few jobs are tidying, and making lemon sour cream cake and roast veg salad, then I'm done and dusted! Woo! I can't wait.

Sooo, wishing you all a fantabulous Christmas with your beloved ones. May your festive days be filled with love, warmth and cake. I'll see you in a few days time xx

Beach weather.. finally.

The weather has been decidedly un-Summery the past few weeks. We've had a lot of rain (though not as much as some place, poor Nelson..) and most days have had a bit of a cloudy gloom to them.
This hasn't been such good timing because my sister has been home from London for the month, and was really hoping to work on her tan. Hah. Perhaps she is to blame for it all? Murphy's law and all that?
Either way, we were stoked to have a sunny afternoon this week, and spent it wandering down on the beach. The boys (and the non-pregnant adult) did a lot of running and jumping, looking for sticks, and wading in the shallows. I did a lot of waddling behind, with the camera. It was all followed up with an ice cream, and some bare-bum swinging, just the way it should be.

I'm pleased to announce that I finished all of my Christmas crafting late last week, and have all but finished the shopping, too. I have a few things left to wrap, and then I'm all set! Phew!
(Not mentioning the one gift that hasn't arrived on the courier.. hmm.. not impressed.)
In a bit of a last minute decision, we've decided to make presents for all of Abraham's side of the family that we'll see on the day, too. So I'm preparing myself for an evening of baking sweets tonight.
Wish my luck, and hopefully I'll have enough success to show you the results tomorrow!

Growing. and Tiny happiness.

My garden is bringing me so much joy at the moment.
I'm far from a green-thumbed expert, but I feel like I've made huge progress this season - good, edible, progress. I'm loving dining on brocolli (as big as my face! Yes, I am a nerd..), courgettes, peas, beans, lettuce, rhubarb, strawberries, basil, mint and pak choy. And I feel ridiculous amounts of excitement at the thought of the eggplant and tomatoes that are so close to being ready (and the Winter fruits that are just beginning their lives as flowers.. oh boy!).
This growing stuff is quite addictive!






Another thing that could get quite addictive, is Melissa's amazing printed fabric. Look at it! Squee!
I've been meaning to buy some, to use for baby clothes, for awhile now. So, when M announced a sale, I was there in a flash.
I envision little loungey pants, with this fabric as the cuffs and pockets. I'm pretty sure there will need to be matching onesies, too. I'll be making a girly set, as well as a slightly boyish one.. this whole not knowing thing is pretty exciting, but it sure has its disadvantages! So hard to know what to make!

Weekending.

Phew! It's Tuesday today, and I'm having another one of those weeks where I feel like I'm at least two days behind everyone else. I think the combination of December busy-ness and pregnant tired-ness has me struggling to keep up.

On Friday evening, we had our Playcentre Christmas party.
It was a glorious mix of food, festivity and crazy kids. We had a visit from a very Scottish-sounding Santa, trips on a vintage fire engine (during which Otto screamed at the top of his lungs to 'hop off now, Mama! Hop offffffff!), a sausage sizzle, and plenty of nibbles. Just the way a Christmas party should be.

Saturday continued with the festive activities, we watched the local Santa parade.
The boys rode the tandem trike (one of the best second hand purchases I've had in awhile!) and we wandered down to the end of our street, where the parade was set to pass by. We munched on the handed-out jelly beans, waved and yelled Christmas greetings to everyone we recognised, and then strolled home again.
I really hope all of our Christmas outings this year are as cruisy as these two!

We ended out Saturday up at my parents house. The boys ventured into the swimming pool, but I wasn't quite brave enough! The weather hasn't been particularly hot and Summery enough for me to shed my clothes yet, but I have no doubt it'll get there soon. In the meantime, I'm loving watching the growing confidence that the boys have in the water. Pretty neat, alright.

Frugal Fashion Friday - and an octopus.

Sunglasses- Le Spec $15 from glasses place at BayFair
Necklace - $15 from For Arts Sake in Ohope
Singlet - $10 Glassons
Skirt - $25 Kmart

Bump - 22 weeks worth of baby.
Octopus - disguising the phone charger, and my unsightly broken drawers.

I'm loving the long-skirt trend that seems to be happening this Summer. I've never really been a huge maxi wearing (dresses, or skirts..) but with the combination of bump and heat, they seem to work so well. I'm very thankful that they're about this season.
(It sort of makes up for the fact that fashion seems to have done a u-turn on the length of tops, and made everything cropped... just in time for me to need tunic lengths. Typical!)

We've had a busy week with ultrasounds, Santa parades, Christmas parties and spending time with my sister. Hopefully I'll be back with photos of them in the next few days.
December just seems to be flyyyying by.

A little festive.

Things are starting to get a little festive round these parts.
Well, as festive as they get! I'm not big on Christmas decorations, and these vintage ones are the only ones that I find myself able to get excited about.

The Christmas crafting is in full-swing, and I'm slowly getting things ticked off my list. I'm aiming to finish at least one thing every two days, but I somehow seem to also be adding about one new thing to the list every two days (?!) so time might still be a little tight. At last count I still needed to sew a further 8 or 9 things. Yikes.

How's your crafting coming along, ladies?

A rusty Puerperium.

I made a wee cardigan last week.
Cause, you know, that's what I should be doing three weeks before xmas... nevermind about the mountain of things on my Christmas crafting list?!
But really, I couldn't resist. I saw a picture of one that another blogger had made, and was instantly sold on making one of my own.

I didn't have any money for yarn, so I used something I had in my stash already. I found a giant bag of this wool at the op shops some time ago. ( I'm guessing it used to be a very large men's jumper in a past life..). I decided it was 'unisex' enough, and set to work.

The pattern was wonderfully simple and knitted up really quickly. I can see many more of these in my future.

I did break my destash rule by buying buttons, for only the second time ever. Seven matching, wooden, buttons are hard to find in my stash.
But I think spending $7.50 total on a handknit jumper is still pretty a-okay. Can't wait to take pictures of the little munchkin all snuggled up in it.

Stuff and things.

Phwoar, it's been a little quiet around here. There's good reason for that though - we've been busy:

- Busy getting naked and eating sweet treats...



-Busy growing some wriggly babies...
(21 weeks this week!)

- Busy knitting things for wriggly bebes.. and sewing things for bigger, wriggly people's xmas pressies..

- And busy growing, and eating, some delicious Summery food.

We just ate dinner outside - risotto with chorizo and courgettes and beans from the garden. Might go and steal a few strawberries for dessert.
So darn good!  Best way to celebrate the first day of Summer!