TropicalSoup

Smoke and mirrors

Around here, if Cole and Immy want to distract me from something - like (hypothetically of course!) trying to figure out who has cut all the pictures out of my latest magazine (and very nicely done, whichever small child it is...let's just stick to the mags mama has already read, okay?)...then this is the technique currently used. Do you think it will help distract everyone from the fact that it's just gone midnight and I technically didn't post today, thanks to being asleep or in pain for most of it?

OOh look...small kids and baby are pulling funny faces....what missing blog post? Yep, should work a treat!

Cushions round one

So here are the cushions that I was talking about yesterday. I'm sort of kind of happy with them...I am much happier with the backing for the two oblong ones (stone coloured linen blend)than with the (a little too bright) blue calico weight cotton that I used to back the square ones, but fairly certain I can't be bothered changing that! I think things will look better and more pulled together in this room after a few more cushions, and maybe a smallish throw quilt? I don't know...I'll let it percolate a while I think. And once I get a few more things in there sorted out, I'll take some proper photos of the room rather than just crazy closeups of red armchairs and leather modulars!

Now I really need to get started on the munchkins' quilts...if only I could decide on a general pattern for each!

Stitching deer

This is what i managed to do today whilst the littles were at preschool, and again after everyone else was tucked up in bed (well except for D, he was busy yelling at the tv and giving the ref pointers). They are in the process of becoming cushions for the lounge...I was hoping to get them all finished tonight, but since I need to butcher a few old cushion inners to make new ones (the fabric store in town didn't have a particular size - in fact they only had 3 sizes. damn) that can wait. Hopefully tomorrow. I am loving the fabrics though - Deer Valley by Joel Dewberry. If it looks a little familiar, I used one of the other colourways of this collection for mum's cushion last month (I just couldn't help myself and bought all three colourways. so so bad).

But wait, there's more!

Just when you thought that yesterday couldn't get any better, Cole and Imogen were introduced to the joys of swimming lessons! Those of you who know my two - or who have been following along - know that in water and under water are two of my littles' favourite places to be. And swimming lessons are definitely a hit...the 45 minute play in the water afterwards didn't hurt either! It was a little weird for me to not be in the water with them, but lovely to have an opportunity to just observe for a change, and to take a few photos. (and realise that the Kiwi Winter tans have definitely taken over from the sunkissed Seychelles versions we used to sport!)

I love that Cole was all business, and insisted on wearing his new goggles at.all.times. Including going to the loo. I love that Immy treated her goggles as an accessory for 95% of the time, perched up on her forehead like the big girls wore them and preferring to swim ungoggled like her mama. And that her onepiece (her first ever! She usually only wears bikini bottoms for swimming) is still a little big and wrinkly on her...reminds me just how little these two still are, even though they seem so grown up some days.

Just as they were about to get changed to leave, I asked if we could get a pic of how they felt about swimming lessons...sums it all up, really!

So what now?

I am home. Alone. By myself. Wow.

Cole and Immy started at the preschool around the corner this morning, after we went for a *look see* yesterday afternoon...and only managed to leave an hour later, there were so many fun things to do (and even then I had to carry Cole out because he was keen to stage a sit-in).

Ten minutes after we all arrived today I was told by my munchkins I could leave now, thankyouverymuch! This is of course fabulous and wonderful and as it should be - small people keen and excited and enthusiastic to be where they are - and I am so thrilled for them. Though that's not to say I didn't have a wee chin-wobble of my own as I left the building...much as I need some time to be just me, especially after being sick and just plain worn out for so long, and as much as they have been crying out for a wider social circle of kids their own age and new adventures, it's hard to let go, even a little. And really, this is only 3 mornings a week, it's not exactly boarding school! But, it is (I hope) a chance for them to play and run and climb and hang out with other kids and learn new things, and for me a chance to figure out who I am again. And quilt. Weehaa as Immy would say!

Of course the problem now is...what do I do for the next 90 minutes? I've already been for a big walk (I love flat neighbourhoods and the really long way home from preschool!), sorted and started on laundry, cleaned the kitchen and made all the beds...hmm, maybe I'll even get a shower and some time in the sewing room. And I get this 4 times a week?!? Oh my, that's some serious excitement...

...of course, I'm really hanging out for 12.30 too! I can't wait to hear all about it, and hang out with my littles again.

(Don't you love this pic? I was trying to get a first-day-of-Topkids photo, but they were too busy gassing about all the things they were planning on doing at 'cool!)

The forest next door

We are very lucky that our new home is - quite literally - just around the corner from the magnificent and more than somewhat famous Whakarewarewa forest (aka The Redwoods).  Come for a stroll with us...

 

The poor little Maclaren was forced to endure the off roading after we discovered a particularly nasty puncture in the Mountain Buggy. This was as *off road* as it had to endure though!

 

 

A sweet carved fantail.

For reference - see my head there? I'm standing up! And they're on one log!! Danger Mouse and Captain Fearless strike again!

...this is going to be a regular playground for us, I can just tell...imagine how much fun it will be once we get on to the actual tracks!!

Cute is:

...giving Daddy tips on effective stretching techniques before his leg of the Round Lake Rotorua relay yesterday:

...the victory pose (enacted after every race, regardless of placement):

...so very many races down this little nook whilst we wait for Daddy's turn:

...flowers in her hair (and her yelling: Go go Daddy! You can make it!)

Cute is not:

having a migraine all day today. the end.

Boxy

A couple of little makeup/odds-and-ends bags that I (finally) made my sisters for their birthday last month. They measure about 6 inches long each.

The birds and the bees

 

Imogen: Mama, yesterday when you were a tiny baby you climbed into my mouth and I swallowed you down my throat and that is how you grew into my belly.

Cole: and then I had a turn and swallowed you into my belly too.

I haven't had the heart to correct them, but can you tell that there is much interest in babies and taking turns around here lately? (And no, no announcements on the baby front, though the cluckiness hasn't been helped at all by the gorgeous wee babes we've met recently.) I love how - as far as a three year old is concerned - the time-space continuum is really just a bunch of letters with 2 m's in it!

The scrap / stash dichotomy

lol, sounds like I'm writing a thesis on the subject...then again, if qualification was based on fabric accumulation (in both the scrap and stash categories), I would so be a shoe in. But I digress.

So, I have a hypothetical...at what point does fabric in your stash make the leap over to scrap? Is it as soon as you've cut a piece out of it, or once it reaches (shrinks to) a particular size? And how orderly are you with your scraps? All in one wrinkly heap? Colour coded? Colour coded and sized? I know there seem to be as many techniques as there are sewists, but I've never been entirely happy with my system, and trying to figure out how to do a nicer job of it in this room. (FYI my previous method was the highly acclaimed though not particularly user-friendly chuck-it-all-in-a-basket-and-hope-for-the-best method.) I guess it all depends on how small a piece you'll save as scraps too....hmmm...

oh and ps. today's eye candy isn't scraps (what are you? nuts?! lol), well, except for the Garden Party fabrics (that's from a quilt I made for last Christmas as a gift and you'll see later this month after I get to see it in the flesh!) just the 4 drawers of fabric loveliness I've unpacked so far. Just so happens to be most of the new and scrummy stuff...