Merry Christmas

Have a Merry Christmas

and a 

Happy New Year

xxxx

Be safe, be kind, be happy :)

trudy_n xoxx

♥ ♥ I'll be back in 2013 ♥ ♥

5 more sleeps.....

5 more sleeps until Santa comes!!  And there's still a fair bit to do.  I haven't quite finished the Christmas shopping, although, it's mainly just stocking fillers I need to get.

Some of my shopping needing to be wrapped....stashed in my closet.

Not only do I need to finish shopping - I need to get wrapping and I'm so worried I'll forget to get more sticky tape that I've left myself about 4 notes to get some.  So far, I've forgotten every time I've gone to the shop.  Next time maybe!

Macy sound asleep on the couch, recovering from last night!

Macy had a sleepover last night with 4 of her primary school friends.  They had a great night, a bit of singing, some games, munchies and a movie and surprisingly, they were all asleep before midnight!  Thank goodness.  Today, I took them for a swim in our pool - well, it's the pool where I work but it's mine (and others) for the summer!!!  They had a cool time playing, swimming, diving and floating.  The water was 23 degrees so really nice.

Our pool......

Christmas card update....I have received 2 more....that's a grand total of 6 cards this year!  One from the McKean's in Victoria and a beautiful handmade card from a good friend.  I thought I'd share a photo of it with you :)

Handmade by Kim :)

Macy did really well at the end of year assembly - Celebration Time at her school this year.  It's her last year of primary school and she left DPS on a high note.  She received 2 trophies, one, a cultural award the other, a leadership award, and certificates for being a school council member and a leaving certificate.  So, to honour her, she's the star of our fridge!!  The fridge of fame.  Well done Macy - you make us so proud xxxxx

The fridge of fame....the place to be.

Well, my stockings are hung by the chimney with care - now it's just the countdown to the big day.  My menu is all done, I've worked out how my table will look and I'm ready to join the hoards of shoppers at the supermarket on Christmas Eve - the supermarket I go to opens at 6am so I'm going bright and early.

Enjoying the mad rush if you're still shopping, take care driving and be patient waiting for car parks :)

I'll be back over the next day or two for my final blog of the year!!  Bet you can all hardly wait.....it's a bit like waiting for Santa!!!

Love trudy_n xoxx

The tree......

15 days to go until Christmas day....it's fast approaching!!!  I love, love, love Christmas!  I love everything about it - the decorations, the food, the get togethers, the music, celebrating Christ's birthday, family time and Christmas movies.  So, with much fun and excitement yesterday Macy and I put up the tree.  Each year we have a colour scheme for the tree and for the other decorations in the house. And the unveiling of my tree is anticipated by many....well, some people are interested in it!  And this year I must say, I'm pretty happy with the finished product!  Yay me!!!  
Here it is.....

Our beautiful tree

Tree at night....pretty.

We were going for a more vintage look so the colour this year is....antique gold.  It's the first time I haven't used tinsel on the tree but we used beads and ribbon and chose baubles of dull gold, a few glittery ones and chose glittery bows and stars.  I'm really happy with it this year :)  We've used antique red as the accent colour in the lounge room - just a few baubles here and there with some dull gold tinsel and I've decorated the door wreath with red this year too.  Oooh, I love it!!! 

There's plenty to love about the Christmas season.  One of my favourite things at the moment is hearing Macy every morning tell me what chocolate she got in her advent calendar. This morning was a reindeer with no antlers, lol. I've always bought her an advent calendar but I'm pretty sure this is the first year she hasn't eaten all the chocolates for fun.

I'm quite into Christmas music, much to Honey's disgust!  So I've finally bought the Mariah Carey Christmas CD and can't wait to put it on when I'm doing some baking.  I've got a few CD's in my Christmas collection now, proud to say :)

Another thing I love is planning the Christmas menu.  We went to Christchurch to Mum and Dad's last year so I didn't have to do any cooking but this year we are having some friends around who can't be with their family this year and my big bro and nephew so I get to plan the menu!!!  We've decided this year to have a barbecue so I get to make some yummy salads.  My sister taught me how to make a delicious pasta salad a few years ago so we'll definitely be having that, along with potato salad (Grandma's recipe), coleslaw and Macy's Greek salad.  On the barbecue, we'll have steak, bangers, chicken breasts with feta or pesto stuffing and chicken kebabs....my mouth is dribbling!!!  And for dessert, the good old trifle and pav, an ice-cream bomb at the kids request and goodness knows what else.  And for Christmas day breakfast this year we're going to have croissants.....a first for us.  We usually just eat cereal but this year I thought we'd do something a bit fancy!

Along with Christmas in New Zealand comes summer, yay!!!  It usually decides to heat up around now and today is no exception here in Masterton.  It's a beautiful day.  But along with the beautiful hot days comes.....hay fever!  And it's rampant in this household.  We sneeze, we snot, we itch, we cough, we have sore eyes.  There's tissues everywhere and bottles of eye drops on the bench, in the car, in my bag.....you get the idea!!!  Even poor Chilli Pop has sore eyes from all of the pollen.

Well, I guess I should go and fold some washing, stare at my tree, go over my Christmas shopping list - check it once, check it twice!!  

Have a great day and get into the Christmas spirit!

Sing some carols, do something nice for someone or write a letter to Santa :)

trudy_n xoxx

P.S  I'm up to 4 Christmas cards now....today I got one from the people who deliver the free weekly newspaper.  4 baby, 4!!!  What?????  That counts ;)

P.P.S  I'm trying to sort out the comment problem.....make sure you use the drop down box and choose anonymous if you aren't a member of google so that your comment shows up and sign your name in your comment.  Comments are being lost in cyberspace and I'm pretty sure this is the reason.  Please let me know via facebook if you try to leave a message and it doesn't show up :)

Bits 'n Pieces

I'm baaacckkk!  Due to a slight (actually huge!) technical hitch, I couldn't access my blog for days on end....so I decided to give you a bits 'n pieces post about recent goings on.  Probably the most exciting news is that I'm on holiday!!  Woo hoo.  School finished on Saturday and doesn't go back until February so I'm lucky to have a huge holiday to rest, relax, read, sleep and....well, that's all the plans I've made so far :) Anyway, enough showing off, here's some happenings......

I finally found a wooden tray (within my budget) to put on my dining table.  I've used little plates, jugs and jars to hold my candles and as I find more little knick knacks, I'll add to it.  I love the little pink teapot spoon holder....Grandma gave me that xxx

Macy's school held their annual food fair a week or so ago and her class sold hangi.  Mace designed the sign and with the super powers of Macy and Molly (her bff) combined, they had it painted in no time.  Guess she gets her signwriting talent from her daddy.  And they raised a lot of money as the hangi was in hot demand and sold out .  Well done!

I taught myself how to waterfall braid via youtube and on Macy's head lol, and was pleased to be asked to do the hair of a beautiful young lady for her ballroom dancing social at school. She was completely happy so that's good enough for me :)

Happy 2nd birthday to our boy El Tonto Hosea or simply, Tonto.  Here he is enjoying his birthday biscuit in the sunshine.  He's a clever boy who is learning to sing on command (seriously), can spin around and say his prayers.  Impressive.

Macy had her final game of mod softball.  Sadly, they lost but they all played hard, got some good hits and a few catches.  Big thanks to Mrs W for all her coaching skills and for getting out of bed every Saturday morning and for giving up another one of her lunch times for practice.

The Mother plant

Stalk jammed into pot

Stalk stuck in the garden

  If you're my facebook buddy, you may remember me loading a few pictures of a huge yukka that somebody gave to us.  Sadly, it started to die.  So, me, being the brilliant gardener that I am (yeah right) told Honey to chop it off and see what happened.........well, you can see what's happening!!!  We cut it off and stuck the stalks in the garden and one in a pot and now we have over 100 yukka shoots.  Cool!  We love yukkas so soon, I'll be transplanting them into pots and garden and hopefully, they will keep growing.  And keep giving new shoots :)

Ever since my sister went to Hawaii and brought me back some peanut m&m's, I've dreamed of little else!  Slight exaggeration but still, I knew I needed to eat them again, lol.  So I was so excited when I went to Star Movies, our friendly local DVD store :)  and saw that they are selling a whole lot of American confectionery and yes, peanut butter m&m's are there!!!!  Now, at $2.50 a small bag, they aren't cheap but they are delicious and the change jar has been taking a beating as I dip my hand in so I can buy a yummy little packet when we get our DVD's each Saturday.  I am in no way wanting you to go and buy some.....because you may buy the last packet, lol.

Happy 4th birthday to Mr Chilli Popodopolus also known as Chilli!  This is Macy's baby and the first dog we have had as a family.  He's a lovely lil fulla and loves his Mr Fuzzy BlueMan toy :)

It's that time of year.......Christmas is on it's way...yippee!!!!!  And I have 3 Christmas cards! 1 more than last year already!  Maybe this year I'll get 4 cards!  We'll be putting up our tree on Saturday (soooo excited) and then it will really feel like the Christmas season.

So, it's been a busy and interesting couple of weeks and I'm glad to be back blogging.  I hope you've all been okay and that you're starting to get geared up for Christmas, holidays and summer.

I'll be back soon (technology permitting)

I've missed you, lol

trudy_n