Firstly, thanks to the lovely Tanya, Pauline, Michelle and Katie for completing my tag. Katie now has her own blog so I’ll be visiting that one too!!

Now that Australia has won the Ashes, Michael has been busily doing all those “delightful” maintenance bits around the house. He’s very vocal about his mistakes but thankfully he now says them much more softly so the boys can’t hear…only me (it’s the spooky teacher hearing thing!!)

Michael is back to work on Monday and this year will be very busy with lots of traveling in the works, and the word is we may be able to join him to the U.S. later. Yay, haven’t been since 1992 so need to catch up on friends past (Michele in SF, you know who you are) and if time permits go all the way to Alicia, Jess and Erica. But we’ll see.

Rainer is back at C&K on Mondays and Tuesdays with SEDU on Wednesdays still (but not til Feb). No word from AEIOU about the intake for this year….so, we wait. At least I had a Plan B if he didn’t get in January’s intake, I would image a lot of families just crossed their fingers.

Have been organising playdates for Mackinley this week before he starts Grade 1 (YAY) and we might have the chance to go to the museum again soon. Looking forward to that. He’s very excited about choosing the contact for his books!! He wants Star Wars but if that’s going to break the budget, we might just go for the book plates instead.

Can’t bring myself to scrap again this week. Just trying to get the family back into a routine again which is really important for Rainer and my sanity (read “control freak” here) and the house cleaned and all the CRAP (and there’s a lot of it) in the bin.

Waiting patiently for the exciting news to be made public at Scrapbook City…..I’ve been offered many bribes but no chance!! If you read this and haven’t signed up to the forum, do it now and get yourself acquainted with the layout of things before it goes ballistic!!!

Won’t be long now and then I’ll be busy again!!! Feel the strange need to paint…don’t know whether it’s the canvas kind or the wall kind.

I’ve just realised how quickly this year has flown by already (LOL!!)!!!!!!

And the inside the gorgeous Maya Road tin I altered for Scrapbook City. I used the tin, some Pink Martini papers, Maya Road ribbon and rub ons and chipboard flowers. Really pleased with the results of this one!!

and my take on Michelle’s sketch for December, photos are from my birthday at The Zoo (see a previous post) and I used the Technique Tuesday Baseboard to give the layout some dimension:

and lastly, here’s my latest entry into the Scrapboxx Newbie’s Circle Journal. It’s teeny tiny, but the theme was “Firsts” for sarah13 and this one was about our first REAL family holiday to Burleigh last September.

Thanks for visiting. More to come next entry, including my Christmas January sketch for SBC.

xx
Gi

Okay, I’ve just realised that Katie doesn’t have a blog, that I know of, so I’m going to tag Leenie and see if she’s home!!

Full house at the Midnight Crop at the store last night. I started to get set up for the first challenge and got boosted!!! Spent the rest of the night as gopher but it was great to see soooo many people at the store and online too.

Layout to come!!

Wow, what a night!!! Had a fabulous dinner with the girlies Angela, Cara and Kelly (unfortunately V couldn’t come) and my sis Nena turned up just in time to go to The Zoo.

Saw some great local talent (on stage, that is!!) and it was sooo unreal to be in a venue without being choked by cigarette smoke!! I’m sure it used to make the hangover worse!! Thank God for Tyrone Noonan!! What a voice and what a sweetie. By that time, only Ang and I were left standing (pikers!!) and when he sang “Bastard Son” from the George CD, just about the whole place piled onto the dancefloor!! JUST AMAZING!!

No hangover to report. Just very weary….

Look who’s been continually “trimming” the tree…..

and who helped me make the ice-cream cake today!!

All is still calm and all is still bright. Can hopefully drag Mackinley to Mass tomorrow morning, but you know kids “it’s booooorrrring Mum!!” God love ‘em……

Have a very MERRY CHRISTMAS everyone. Stay safe and enjoy time with your family –or at least try to stay calm.

Love
Gi

p.s. Leish’s tagged me, so stay tuned for that one!!

as well as another for Scrapbook City (unfortunately the gallery is still not letting me upload, so I’ll post here in the meantime)

I’ve got some more great paper from We R Memory Keepers and borders from Technique Tuesday that I’m itching to get to but I’ve also been organising my BIRTHDAY PARTY!! Yep, it’s THAT time of year again, and another year older (and wiser??). I’ve decided to jump the gun and celebrate early this year instead of forcing everyone to be up for it on the actual date (Wednesday, by the way – LOL).

I’ve selectively hand-picked against tough criteria (okay, the only one’s with $$ and time), these 4 girls who are going to “escort” me through dinner in the Valley and a CD launch at The Zoo. Hopefully, we can last past 10pm so I have them all on the Berocca Party Fitness Regime to last them through the night.

I’m looking forward to an awesome night and an exceptional hangover!! Thanks for visiting!!!