Late-afternoon rockpools

We had a lovely time yesterday at the beach, poddling round the rockpools, finding shells and sea-weed, peeking under rocks for crabs, and admiring the “beautiful patterns” left by the boat-towing cars on the sand.

Easy paper doll chains and snowflakes made with paper napkins (serviettes)

Beetle and I were trying to make paper snowflakes the other day. She is just getting the hang of using scissors now, and she has been doing a lot of practice at snipping little bits out of paper.

But we found that once a regular bit of paper was folded the four or more times required to make a decent snowflake, it was far too thick and difficult for her to cut with little safe scissors and little hands.

Beetle worked on paper folded once, but then she found some single-ply paper serviettes and started cutting those. They were super easy and soft to cut and they make a lovely square snow-flake. Not to mention being pre-folded neatly into quarters! She soon discovered that she could fold them once more, diagonally, and they were still really easy to cut. So we were very pleased.

Next I realised we could make a paper chain of dolls using the napkins. I’d demonstrated them with some junkmail, but realised they, too,  were too tricky for Beetle to cut.

I unfolded the napkin and cut it in half:

Then I zig-zag folded it into quarters, and drew the shape of the paper doll… making sure it touched the folded edges. To make it easier for her, I coloured the bits that she needed to cut out, and trimmed off the top, so only some simple cutting was required.

It worked really well and made simple paper crafts much easier for a child who is just starting with the scissors.

And it is also why I now have a very very beautiful window indeed.

Lollipops and Aunty Em’s Farm

We went on a car trip to the Waikato today to my Aunty Em’s farm.  She has the best place; every window, every wall, and most of the ceiling are covered in marvellous, glittery decorations. Oh, and the garden, too.

I imagine that a first-time visitor might be taken aback at first but you know,  it is very beautiful.

The girls mouths open wide as they walk in, looking at all the glorious things. It’s like walking into an Eye Spy book.

We stopped on the way at Candyland, a big warehouse of lollies in Taupiri, the name of which makes me hum the song from Charlie the Unicorn. The girls were more interested in sitting on a tiny, coin0-operated, ride-on plane, but were persuaded to come and look around. I let them choose a big lolliop each because I know how they work when it comes to lollipops.

They beg and beg till the lollipop is opened. Then they will have a go eating it for a few minutes, and chuck the remainder in the bin. Like, an entire lollipop minus 8 licks. Which still doesn’t take away from the BAD MUM look of a tiny toddler with an enormous lollipop. Like they’re gonna eat the whole thing.

So, after they licked the three-atom-thick layer off their lollies and discarded them, we had a lovely lunch. Billie helped herself repeatedly to a bowl of grated cheese. We helped shoo the rooster back out-of-doors when he came in to eat the dog’s food. Beetle helped Uncle Henry adjust the fountain outdoors, drenching them both in the process, and then went ’sploring in the rain in her new dry dress to find some eggs in the henhouse. Then she skipped back into the house with those three eggs in a plastic supermarket bag, and immediately pressed the button on the wall-mounted singing fish. The music roused her in her a dramatic corridor-dance that involved a great swirling of bags and cracking of eggs on the door-frame.

We left the eggs.

It was long past Billie’s nap time, so we reluctantly left, farewelled in a sudden rainstorm, rushing through the garden to the car, Uncle Henry grabbing an umbrella to shelter us while Aunty Em sheltered under a boogie board.

We waved goodbye as we backed the car through the gate, draped in bunting and gaily wrapped in rain-dripping tinsel.

It’s a wonderful place to visit.

Two Thousand and Nine

Happy New Year, everybody!

I sent out text messages last night; got one back this morning with a grizzle about being woken up at midnight. Whoops. I put mine on mute before I went to bed.

We finished 2008 with a second round of Christmas dinner.  We had a big family gathering at my parents on Christmas day; afterwards Mum and I decided we could cope with just a little more potato salad and another round of trifle. So, greedily, we arranged to have another crack at it for New Years Eve.  I even made my Very First sponge cake for the trifle, flinging together a 3-minute-sponge from the Edmonds Cook Book.  Good one, Rosie. Gold star.

And we started 2009 with a trip to the Auckland Museum. The girls had a ball, especially opening and closing the drawers-o’-critters in the Stevenson Discovery centre.

Me… I was fine with the drawers (moth, moth, beetle, moth, scoria, moth, algae, butterflies, giant cicada) then HOLY CRAP THERE’S A WHOLE PARROT IN HERE.

*mutters* stoopid pinned insects were meant to desensitise me to the dead stuff in drawers when they turn up actual MAMMALS.

Yeah I know, parrots aren’t mammals… the bottom drawer had a helpful comparative display of stoats, weasels and ferrets.

We moved along from the small dead stuff to the really big stuff and visited Sue the T-Rex, where I learned my mental image of a Tyrannosaurus’ posture was stuck in the 1970s.

After a stroll down Centennial Street and back through the Origins Gallery, the girls were getting tired, so we headed out and under a tree for a picnic lunch, and a bit of a climb.

A good start to the year.

Billie’s Stained Glass Windows

While Beetle was making her lovely canvas paintings, Billie made stained glass windows.

The detailed instructions are at Kids’ Craft Weekly, but I basically peeled back half a sheet of clear Duraseal and let Billie stick bits of cellophane, ribbon, feathers and sequins on it, then stick the other half down over the top. Then, to share the project amongst various Friends and Relations, I chopped it up and stuck the pieces between some cheap scrapbooking frames from The Warehouse.

Except  I didn’t count Great Grandparents in my estimations, so we have another round of canvas-making and window-making tomorrow…. somehow.

PS: I had to use the touchup tool on at least three chunks of banana and spaghetti on that wall, which is adjacent to the highchair. You can still see a bit on the window sill under the star. The touchup tool didn’t like those lines!

Welcome to Bethlehem

Beetle and I went for a drive tonight, with Nanny and Aunty Emily, to see Christmas Lights. We visited the “Come to Bethlehem” drive-through Christmas display at a local church.

Beetle brought with her a card she had made to give to Baby Jesus. It said, “Dear Baby Jesus. I love you so much. Love from Beetle”

She was very proud to give it to the holy family in person.

If a tree falls in the lounge when I’m cooking dinner….

The girls took the tinsel outside to decorate a bench seat on the deck. The “decorates” were taken down for a “quiet Bethlehem game” and in the process the tree lost its feng shui and fell down.

I feel pretty much like that tree at the moment.

Beetle’s beautiful Christmas gift paintings

I am so proud of Beetle.  I decided yesterday afternoon to make Christmas gifts with Beetle instead of baking an infinity of gingerbread cookies with her. (The baking can wait til next week) I remembered a stack of tiny block canvases I had tucked away somewhere, so we sat down with a half a plan.  But it came together beautifully in the end.

Yesterday, Beetle drew Christmassy illustrations with a sharpie on each of the canvases.  Then she chose one colour at a time and painted the pictures, then their backgrounds.  I painted the sides of each block while she was working on the next one.

After they were dry, I re-outlined two with the sharpie – the triangular tree and the snowman, which had gotten a bit fuzzy in the painting process.

And today, we sat down again with the glue gun, PVA and a bunch of assorted sequins and bling.  I only had a few ideas – the candycanes and feathers for the angel’s wings, but Beetle sieved through the bits and pieces and arranged things so beautifully, adding funny little touches (Baby Jesus’ teddybear, the smiling tree, Santa’s big green cupcake)

They are beautiful, and even though we both desperately wanted to keep them at first, she has chosen which set of aunties and uncles and grandparents are getting each picture.

They are treasures.

Meals Most Men Prefer

This is a list from a book I bought on Trademe – Tui’s Common Sense Cookery, from the 1950s.  “Tui” was the “Lady Editor” of the NZ Dairy Exporter – a publication my grandmother contributed to.

Bear would sooner not eat most of the suggestions on the list. Fussy.

The Glorious Clutter Wreath

The Glorious Clutter Wreath

Originally uploaded by thinkingchair

My Mum was first to make a wreath like this, wielding her hot-glue-gun with purpose, her craft-table glittering and strewn with op-shopped baubles.

But as soon as I spotted a supermarket bag full of unsorted, donated Christmas decorations outside my favourite op-shop, I knew I had to make one of my own.

Her ones are neater and more bauble-y but I quite like this one of my own. Next, to work out how to hang it, out of reach of little fingers.

How to make a Glorious Clutter Wreath.

What you need:

• A wreath. A tinselly or piney one will be better than a polystyrene blank, because if empty bits show through it doesn’t matter.
• Lots of baubles, ideally from the op-shop, or from previous years’ excessive purchasing of decorations, or a bit of both.
• Glue gun and lots of glue sticks – this project guzzles down the glue. (I had to send Bear on a mission to pick up more sticks from Mum at 10:30 last night… lucky she’s just round the corner, eh?)

What to do:

1. Glue decorations to wreath.
2. Keep gluing extra ones in the gaps
3. Stop when you run out of decorations and you start looking covetously at the decorations on your actual TREE.

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Beetle calls baubles “Christmas Poms”…. I like that.