Well like some of you, I have let the holiday mode slip into my blogging routine… I have had this post open for several days just sitting here with a title waiting to be written. Thought I better make a start on it! lol

I hope everyone has had a nice break and for those of you still on holiday, good on you!

We had a lovely relaxing break but are now back in the swing of it. Mind you, with being a Mum the work never really ends does it!?! hehe

We spent Boxing day at my sister’s, catching up with Dad and having a sunny BBQ lunch. Was a lovely day just to chill after the nice but chaotic Christmas day. As I said in my last post, I was lucky enough to receive a camera for Christmas so I have taken oodles of photos (can’t wait to get some time to scrap them) over the past few weeks.

Then we were lucky enough to spend several lovely days at Moana (Lake Brunner) on the West Coast where family have a holiday home. My friend Jess came and stayed with us too which was nice. We had stunning weather, which doesn’t always happen on the West Coast (especially when they hear we are heading over!). Unfortunately we had to cut out holiday short as Grace just would not settle there, she woke heaps at night so we decided to come home. Funnily enough she was back to normal the first night back! lol

New Year’s Eve was uneventful for us which was great, in past years there have been dramas that we would rather not have. This year Craig and I stayed home and watched “Sound of Music” :p lol

During our holiday break we had several more BBQ’s and the girls enjoyed there paddling pool on some of the hot days.

We started Grace on solids on Boxing day and she has been going great guns since, it has helped a bit with her night sleeping too. Finally some 7 hour stretch’s! Just had to take this photo of her covered in carrot! lol

Grace caught up on her email! LOL :p Craig was so proud!

We had friends over for a lovely dinner… and I just wanted to share this lovely photo I took of Dad with Grace.

I think that almost covers our holidays… phew now to try and scrap the photos! Hope you are all busy creating? I’m working on a mini album present that I will photograph ASAP and share.

Take Care!

It’s Christmas eve and I’m sitting here watching the end of a favourite Christmas movie "Home Alone", the to-do list has been all crossed off, the festive food is in the fridge, the pressies are wrapped under the tree and I have a nice box of chocolates beside me. What better time to wish each and every one of my loyal blog readers a fantastic and merry Christmas tomorrow. May your day be filled with family, friends, good food, fun and laughter. May you look inside your heart and find something really nice that you can do for a friend or family member tomorrow just to say "I care".

Christmas starts in our family with a midnight Christmas eve carols service at the beautiful stone church at the end of my family’s street. We don’t go to church in our family normally but this service is special. Every year I sit there in the peaceful candlelit church and think how blessed I am to be me. I find it to be the perfect start to Christmas day. It reminds us of the reason for the season and is the perfect time to reflect and centre yourself on what’s important.

Tomorrow we shall start the day with breakfast in bed, lot’s of cuddles with Grace and some pressies for her. Throughout the day we will share the festivities with family and friends and just have a relaxing day. Hopefully the weather will be better than forecast as we decided on a simple BBQ lunch with everyone bringing something. Thank you to everyone who suggested ideas for us, we have taken bits and pieces from the ideas.

Before I buzz off I must share this great little story a friend of mine shared with me. Perfect for us scrapbookers!

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Twas the night before Christmas, I’m glued to the tree. I’m wondering what Santa brought just for me.Could it be cardstock or chipboard or lace? Or a Cricut, I said with a smile on my face.

And that’s when I heard him,"Hi Santa," I said

"You know…good little girls should be in their beds"

"I know I should Santa, and now I’ve got caught. But I was just so excited to see what you brought"

"Well let’s take a look in this room where you work." He shook his head quickly, right and left with a jerk. I heard him exclaim as he put it in gear.

"You’ve got enough crap, I’ll see you next year!"

Well I’m a bit bored so thought I might as well catch up on a blog entry. We had a nice long weekend here in Canterbury. A hectic week in the Christchurch social calendar. I did miss seeing all of the lovely outfits and hats at Cup day but wasn’t to worried that I didn’t get to go.

Friday was my Nana’s birthday and we spent the afternoon at her place. Even though she has Alzheimer’s it was nice that she was able to partake in the celebrations. She always loves seeing her great granddaughters too.

Here are some yummy Lemon & Passionfruit cream cheese cupcakes I made in place of a birthday cake, they were simply delish.

The cuzzies in there little dresses. Vicki she now fits the dress and it look so cute!

Then on Saturday it was so hot, 31C at 6pm so the weather man said! We pottered about home, cleaned the garage out and just tried to keep cool. I let Grace explore the garden under a bush in the shade.

Her first time on the lawn.

I also got a bit carried away with the camera and took heaps of pictures of Grace playing. Great to scrapbook one day! hehe

How’s everyone going with the Jessica Sprague course? I must admit I haven’t got very far at all. I can’t believe how much printing needs to be done and my printer doesn’t seem to give the best quality.

Well here we are again, yet another Wednesday rolls on by! It’s certainly getting to that busy time of the year, I’ve noticed that most of the shops either have their Christmas decorations up or are putting them up. I had the realisation yesterday that Christmas is only 6 weeks away! Yikes! I’ve found that having a baby means you seem to focus more on week to week rather than looking to far ahead, so I confess Christmas has crept up on me this year at an alarming rate. I still feel like I’m back in September!

1. Firstly I want to Woo Hoot about the lovely weekend away we had with my sister and her family. As said in a previous post it was most relaxing, I managed to have a first bubble bath since Grace was born! Bliss!!

2. The FANTASTIC weather we have been having this week, I have been enjoying sitting in the sun reading whilst Grace naps.

3. My newly sown vege garden is starting to really take off. I so enjoy spending some time in the fresh air watering and weeding in the warm evenings. I can’t wait for the harvest.

4. Starting Jessica Sprague’s "Stories in Hand"  course, I have been ready up on the info sent out and it looks so much fun! Nice change to be follow someone else’s ideas in a class. It’s been years since I have taken one. I hope everyone who is doing the class will post pics of there projects as we go.

We had a lovely weekend and spent it at Gore Bay, it’s on the coast between Christchurch and Kaikoura. I had never been there but gosh it was nice. A rugged coastline with sparkly blue water, fresh air and peacefulness. We rented this great beach house with my sister. The only problem was we weren’t there for long enough, shall definitely be booking a long weekend again.

  Here’s some rock art that my sister and I made on a beach walk.

The cuzzies hanging out! And no they weren’t meant to look like twins it was just a fluke! hehe

Gosh, where to start! It’s been awhile again since I updated. Craig keeps checking my blog stats and I do amazingly still have some loyal blog readers. Thank you for sticking with it!

I guess firstly I hope you all had a great Mother’s Day. We were away for Mother’s Day but I we had Mum over for brunch before we went so that was nice. I created this wee gift box and matching card for her. Inside the box was a lovely brown toned necklace.

I even got a gift for Mother’s day gift from Craig, we had been having many discussions over whether it counted as bubs is still unborn but in the end I think I convinced him hehe Heck I’m still looking after bubs, and getting the side effects of pregnancy hehe So thanks Craig for my lovely gift! I promise to treat you when Father’s day rolls around.

As I mentioned we were away  over Mother’s Day, we had decided earlier in the year to plan a holiday down south before bubs is born. It was great to just hang out with Craig and explore this great country. We headed down to Queenstown for 3 nights then headed over to Dunedin for a further two nights. It was nice to be away but as always I was happy when we got home. We are both such home bodies! hehe The weather wasn’t very great but the autumn leaves down that way are truly stunning at this time of year. I really enjoyed taking them all in. If nothing else it was great to have the break before our lives change forever

Loved the amazing colour of this tree in Arrowtown.

The view from out Motel window, I like the mix of evergreen and deciduous trees.

The view from the Crown Range

Craig playing with his new toy!

The famous Cardrona Hotel

I think our favourite bit of the trip was our day trip to Wanaka via the Crown Range. It was a frosty sunny morning and the view was simply stunning! Craig was very happy to testing out his new video camera. Apparently a must have with a new baby but I think it’s more for him though hehe

Lake Wanaka

We then headed over to Dunedin via Roxborough etc. We stopped at the Clyde Dam and several other stops on the way. I was amazed at the size of the dam, it’s huge! Also the drive around Lake Dunstan was lovely.

We originally wanted to go to Dunedin to see the new Chinese garden that was supposed to be completed in April but is now scheduled for a June opening. It did look cool from the road though so will be heading down with bubs. We did explore the city this time on foot more, which was great. I really love the amazing buildings down there, the architecture  in that city is stunning!

The famous train station in Dunedin, crappy picture but it reminds me how great the building is.

We also wanted to go to the butterfly house at the museum, but by this point in the trip I was feeling knackered so we wandered around the botanic gardens instead. We came across the aviaries with a huge array of tropical and native birds. Well worth a look.

It was a fun trip and the sites were great, its certainly a beautiful country!

I will end this post here and do another one tonight about the past week.