Want a gift from me?

Beverley is taking the lead from a blog friend to share some home made goodness - like a homemade RAK, and the idea is to pay it forward so to speak. I am on her list now and now it is time for me to share as well ...

The rules are as follows:
1. I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!
2. What I create will be just for you.
3. It’ll be done in the next couple of months.
4. You have no clue what it’s going to be. It may be a story. It may be poetry or something sewn. I may draw or paint something. I may bake something and mail them to you. Who knows? Not you, that’s for sure!
5.The catch? Oh, the catch is that you must re-post this on your blog and offer the same to the first 3 people who do the same on your blog.
The first 3 people to do so and leave a comment telling me they did win a FAB-U-LOUS homemade gift by me! I do promise fabulosity here folks… So, who’s in?

This is actually really good timing as I was wanting to do a giveaway on my blog during April - I have decided this year to make my birthday last a whole month - is that wrong? LOL! So I am just a couple of days early - but watch out over the next few weeks and I may do some other giveaways! :)

'An awesome book'

This book was the inspiration for the latest Design Team Challenge over at SBO from Vicky. And it is such a cool book by an American author Dallas Clayton - check it out here! From what I can tell I think it may only be available in the US, but I so want my own copy!

For the challenge we had to take inpiration from this book for a layout - I took this quote - "Close your eyes my child, and dream that perfect dream inside your head" - and I created this:

Actually we had been talking about dreams earlier last week. I woke to find Emma sitting beside my bed at 3am - when asked what was wrong she said she was having dreams about bad superheroes! I told her to leave the door open a bit wider and they would go away, but obviously they didn't coz she was back 30 min later! This time I told her my pillow scared them away so she took that back to bed with her, and slept soundly for the rest of the night. So the next day we talked about dreams and she decided a good thing to dream about was 'Mamma Mia'. So now we have 'Mamma Mia' dreams to keep us safe at night! :)

A chilly weekend ...

We headed away for a night with friends at the weekend, down to a little place on the Catlins coast called Pounawea. Not much there just a handful of houses, a couple of small camping grounds but some amazing coastline and scenery. It was a tad chilly, no rain but that southerly was blowing icicles (well almost) LOL! Needless to say we were all rugged up in thermals, polarfleeces and jackets!
We had a big walk on the beach in the afternoon and meet this big fella, think we woke him from his sleep, he did a bit of stretching, scratching then rolled over and had another snooze.
The kids enjoyed being towed along the beach on a big piece of driftwood - all lining up for another go ...

Pocketfuls of shells were collected ...

Went on a bushwalk on the Sunday through to a amazing waterfall at Purakaunui - where I attempted to take a cool photo with slow shutterspeed. Turned out alright but I might have to keep practicing using different settings.

And not to forget - anyone looking for some creative fun should check out this :)

Opening Saturday ...

Am very excited as a shop I feel in love with while in the UK is finally opening a store in Dunedin this weekend. A new shopping area called 'Wall Street' is opening and it has some new shops that we previously haven't had in this part of the country before - Country Road, Esprit, Levi's and my fave LUSH! They have the most gorgeous yummy soaps, bubble bar slices and bath bombs .... can't wait!

Hands up ...

... who likes Granny Smith apples with that tarty sour taste? Well I do and I found this at the supermarket yesterday ...
It is a non-alcoholic Sour Apple Fruit drink (fizzy), and man is it scrummy! Think it will be my drink of choice on a hot day - very refreshing!

Another busy weekened over with, up to Alex for FIL's surprise birthday bbq on Saturday and then home on Sunday via Gore to catch up with one of my best friends who was over from Brissy with her two kids.

Also celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary last Wednesday - man that time has flown - but as they say 'time flies when you're having fun'.

A busy weekend ...

... it all started on Friday, do you ever feel like you have blinked and years have suddenly flown by? Well that is how I felt on friday - how can my wee boy be 6 years old already? Seems like only last week we had a pirate party for when he turned 5.
Finn has grown/learnt/developed so much in the past year - for a late talker he has certainly made up for lost time! LOL!
Happy Birthday my wee man!
And this is the present he wanted Emma to get him - a Ben 10 watch!

Sunday was Taieri Wings and Wheels at the local airfield, here are some shots I got from my friends house which is just across the stream/stopbanks from the airfield ... these are the Red Checkers during their formation flying display ...

... really like how this one turned out... thought initally I had ruined the shot coz I zoomed in too far, but it turned out quite well in the end ;)

Now ... hold onto your seats ... I have had a dabble in the the world of digi scrapping! It is only a very basic layout but thanks to the tutorial videos on Two Peas I am finally understanding how this digi thing works! Now off to find some freebie kits to try out my new found digi skills - LOL!