Ok I can't really explain it but I am just not in a blogging frame of mind. I have a whole list of stuff to tell and show some of it from way back in the holidays (a whole 2 1/2 - 3 weeks ago). Maybe I'm still feeling at a bit of a loss because of the old blog, maybe it's stuff going on at home, maybe it's just a lack of sleep, maybe it's the weather or the time of the year... who really knows but for now I'm just going to go with it. So you will just have to be patient.
In the meantime check out TED there is some amazing stuff on there!
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Ex Libris Gypsy
New books in this house are far too rare (especially for the adults) which is why I'm feeling super lucky to have 4 on my reading pile...
I've talked about Shaun Tan before (on SSR) his work is simply awesome. His last book 'The Arrival' had no text at all, but the new one 'Tales From Outer Suburbia' is full of words... I haven't had a chance to read m(any) of them yet- But I have looked at the pictures and I have to say his diversity is just outstanding... I can't wait to have a peaceful space in time where I'm not exhausted to read it... oh yeah.... wah hahahahaha! Check out a review here.
****Edited to say; I read it, I love it! YOU should read it!****
The next two books on my stack are both scrapbooking related; 'Sharing Your Story' by Ali Edwards is about making mini albums... something I am missing doing at the moment! And The 'The Designing With Recipe Book' which arrived from Shary yesterday- this is and isn't what I expected... fortunately it's much better!! And the photography is way cool!!!
Finally 'The Creative Family' by Amanda (Soulemama) Blake Soule finally arrived... Ahhhhh.... Yum... it's a whole bunch of stuff about raising kids that I already knew and a whole bunch that I didn't know... and it's all together and focused in one place which is just what my baby addled brain needs... I wish I had it 11 years ago.
I've talked about Shaun Tan before (on SSR) his work is simply awesome. His last book 'The Arrival' had no text at all, but the new one 'Tales From Outer Suburbia' is full of words... I haven't had a chance to read m(any) of them yet- But I have looked at the pictures and I have to say his diversity is just outstanding... I can't wait to have a peaceful space in time where I'm not exhausted to read it... oh yeah.... wah hahahahaha! Check out a review here.
****Edited to say; I read it, I love it! YOU should read it!****
The next two books on my stack are both scrapbooking related; 'Sharing Your Story' by Ali Edwards is about making mini albums... something I am missing doing at the moment! And The 'The Designing With Recipe Book' which arrived from Shary yesterday- this is and isn't what I expected... fortunately it's much better!! And the photography is way cool!!!
Finally 'The Creative Family' by Amanda (Soulemama) Blake Soule finally arrived... Ahhhhh.... Yum... it's a whole bunch of stuff about raising kids that I already knew and a whole bunch that I didn't know... and it's all together and focused in one place which is just what my baby addled brain needs... I wish I had it 11 years ago.
Explore
Sunday is read blog day... I spend a decent chunk of the morning reading my fave blogs, (yeah I'll get that list up on this blog soon), and following the odd link or two. Which this morning lead me here:
Polaroid Project
How About Orange
Swissmiss
Vintage Glam
Gift Wrap-it.com
Judge a book
Yum, internet deliciousness!
Polaroid Project
How About Orange
Swissmiss
Vintage Glam
Gift Wrap-it.com
Judge a book
Yum, internet deliciousness!
Friday, October 24, 2008
Exhibition Unphotographed
I've seen a bunch of cool stuff recently that I wasn't able to take pictures of so here goes...
The photo I didn't take the other week was of a truck with a swimming pool on the back rolling down the road towards me in the car. The pool being big and wide took out a street sign which then promptly rolled across the road and landed right in front on me.
The Sunset on Monday night as I was driving up Hobsonville Rd. The sun was just about to go below the horizon and the colours were amazing... this is one of the things I really enjoyed about living at Muriwai beach.
The photos I didn't take yesterday were;
Of some Paradise Ducklings- I've never seen Paradise Duck ducklings before but I can tell you despite the fact I went past them at 100km/h I know they are seriously cute.
Of Will. Crawling, seriously crawling not the lounge lizard commando crawling that he has become so highly skilled at but real up on hands and knees crawling for the first time at Jennie and Lilly's house yesterday... way cool. There has been more today as well... it won't be long now.
I'm sure there are others but me old brain is addled. :-)
The photo I didn't take the other week was of a truck with a swimming pool on the back rolling down the road towards me in the car. The pool being big and wide took out a street sign which then promptly rolled across the road and landed right in front on me.
The Sunset on Monday night as I was driving up Hobsonville Rd. The sun was just about to go below the horizon and the colours were amazing... this is one of the things I really enjoyed about living at Muriwai beach.
The photos I didn't take yesterday were;
Of some Paradise Ducklings- I've never seen Paradise Duck ducklings before but I can tell you despite the fact I went past them at 100km/h I know they are seriously cute.
Of Will. Crawling, seriously crawling not the lounge lizard commando crawling that he has become so highly skilled at but real up on hands and knees crawling for the first time at Jennie and Lilly's house yesterday... way cool. There has been more today as well... it won't be long now.
I'm sure there are others but me old brain is addled. :-)
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Excursions Pt 2
Miss Lily has been loaned an exersaucer...
Not for always, but for having a shower or making dinner or hanging the washing I can SO see the advantages of this for our little lounge Lizard!
Will was quite enthusiastic to be back in touch with Miss L.
Fortunately for Lily he was also enthusiastic about other stuff as well.
Miss Lily kept checking me out she has such Big Blue Eyes it can be a little unnerving at times... but then she cracks a totally toothless grin and you just feel good again.
Will whispered sweet nothings or perhaps he just was keen to put Lily's head in his mouth like everything else he touches.
Like her fingers... she kind of enjoyed that though!We had a lovely time and unlike last time I got back in time to meet Merenia after school!
Excursions Pt 1
We have been out and about a whole bunch in the last 3 days I am exhausted and so I think is Will.
Tuesday; little car sold, money in bank, husband away, I went shopping; I brought 2 tops, 2 pairs of jeans; 2 pairs and sandals AND A....
..... SKIRT! Yep and I wore it too... in public no less!
Wednesday; Jozlyn, Alex, Will and I headed up to Shakespeare Regional Park to catch up with Kieran, Brody (Joz' oldest boy) and Les at Camp!
It was an awesome day!!!! Weatherwise it was primo. And in general pretty bloody good; We stopped by Starbucks on the way out for Frapachino's, as you do. Will (eventually) dropped off to sleep. We had to put Alex in the back seat first which was kind of strange. When we Will came over to Joz' house on the weekend he was totally impressed by Hunter (5) and Alex (3). He had this look on his face like "WOW small people!!" (He doesn't see many much smaller than K and M usually). But he didn't want a bar of Alex beside him in the car. When we got up to Camp Les and Kieran were both off in different directions doing orienteering. Kieran got back first and gave me a very cursory flick of a couple of fingers as a greeting... had you blinked I would have missed it. I guess that's 10 year old boys for ya. When Les arrived back he said something along the lines of 'hello strange person in a skirt'- nice! It was almost morning tea time so we hung out with everybody... the seagulls at Shakespeare KNOW by some awesome sense when the campers are eating and they all turn up. Will is SUPER IMPRESSED by seagulls- birds any day are a good thing but Seagulls um Hello???? Oh- MY- GOODNESS!
After morning tea the boys headed off to learn mountain boarding and J, W A and I went down to check out the beach. Sand is apparently not as gross as you may think...
Will also REALLY enjoyed the water. (Nb I did put a hat on him, and then I put it on again, and then I put it on again, and again, and again...)
Alex had a great time in the sand ...
and really made us laugh when he went off to do a strip and then just basked in his full glory on the sand... I can imagine why he'd think that would be pretty cool!
When we left the boys they were learning the mechanics of Mountain boarding....
Which Will apparently found a little nerve wracking.... (see there's his hat!)
By the time we got back they had it down pat and were looking pretty cool....
I love that picture because I'm in it too!!!!
Tuesday; little car sold, money in bank, husband away, I went shopping; I brought 2 tops, 2 pairs of jeans; 2 pairs and sandals AND A....
..... SKIRT! Yep and I wore it too... in public no less!
Wednesday; Jozlyn, Alex, Will and I headed up to Shakespeare Regional Park to catch up with Kieran, Brody (Joz' oldest boy) and Les at Camp!
It was an awesome day!!!! Weatherwise it was primo. And in general pretty bloody good; We stopped by Starbucks on the way out for Frapachino's, as you do. Will (eventually) dropped off to sleep. We had to put Alex in the back seat first which was kind of strange. When we Will came over to Joz' house on the weekend he was totally impressed by Hunter (5) and Alex (3). He had this look on his face like "WOW small people!!" (He doesn't see many much smaller than K and M usually). But he didn't want a bar of Alex beside him in the car. When we got up to Camp Les and Kieran were both off in different directions doing orienteering. Kieran got back first and gave me a very cursory flick of a couple of fingers as a greeting... had you blinked I would have missed it. I guess that's 10 year old boys for ya. When Les arrived back he said something along the lines of 'hello strange person in a skirt'- nice! It was almost morning tea time so we hung out with everybody... the seagulls at Shakespeare KNOW by some awesome sense when the campers are eating and they all turn up. Will is SUPER IMPRESSED by seagulls- birds any day are a good thing but Seagulls um Hello???? Oh- MY- GOODNESS!
After morning tea the boys headed off to learn mountain boarding and J, W A and I went down to check out the beach. Sand is apparently not as gross as you may think...
Will also REALLY enjoyed the water. (Nb I did put a hat on him, and then I put it on again, and then I put it on again, and again, and again...)Alex had a great time in the sand ...
and really made us laugh when he went off to do a strip and then just basked in his full glory on the sand... I can imagine why he'd think that would be pretty cool!
When we left the boys they were learning the mechanics of Mountain boarding....
Which Will apparently found a little nerve wracking.... (see there's his hat!)
By the time we got back they had it down pat and were looking pretty cool....
I love that picture because I'm in it too!!!!We had lunch with the boys... more seagulls...
.... yeah I know... can't hold the camera sideways in movie mode... Les knows some software to turn it around but he's not here so... ya get what ya get.
After lunch Joz and I headed back to school to get the rest of our children via 'The Bargain Spot' at Silverdale... and it is.
Later on yesterday Merenia and I headed over to Kieley's to round out the day and deliver her birthday pressie! (Not the funkiest of things- a DVD burner for her computer)
Will is big on pulling himself up on stuff at the moment and he did so on the coffee table there. He also did a very impressive back flip as well!
.... yeah I know... can't hold the camera sideways in movie mode... Les knows some software to turn it around but he's not here so... ya get what ya get.
After lunch Joz and I headed back to school to get the rest of our children via 'The Bargain Spot' at Silverdale... and it is.
Later on yesterday Merenia and I headed over to Kieley's to round out the day and deliver her birthday pressie! (Not the funkiest of things- a DVD burner for her computer)
Will is big on pulling himself up on stuff at the moment and he did so on the coffee table there. He also did a very impressive back flip as well!
Expired?
So here's the back story on the blog. Every so often Google who own blogger/blogspot run algorithms on blogs in an effort to try and pick up spam blogs. These blogs are then immediately 'deleted' (blogger does actually keep a copy of them for awhile at least) Unfortunately they (often by the sounds of it) get some false positives and so innocent blogs also get deleted... which is what has happened to me. Either that or in some way I have managed to violate the terms and conditions of blogspot.... about the only way I can think I *may* have done that is with a naked baby picture- child porn???
Anyway once deleted you spend hours trolling the 'help' files, join the 'help' group and look at various articles on various blogs written by other frustrated bloggers. You enter details into a online form and you wait and hope. And hope and wait...and field emails from various friends and family... and far and away Google/blogspot does hmmmm... nothing it seems...
...and then you miss blogging and so you set up a new blog... I will most likely transfer these posts over to SSR if I ever get it back and YES I have set in place a back-up system for this blog that I didn't have on the last one... and YES I will be absolutely gutted if I don't get SSR back.
Anyway once deleted you spend hours trolling the 'help' files, join the 'help' group and look at various articles on various blogs written by other frustrated bloggers. You enter details into a online form and you wait and hope. And hope and wait...and field emails from various friends and family... and far and away Google/blogspot does hmmmm... nothing it seems...
...and then you miss blogging and so you set up a new blog... I will most likely transfer these posts over to SSR if I ever get it back and YES I have set in place a back-up system for this blog that I didn't have on the last one... and YES I will be absolutely gutted if I don't get SSR back.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Many Post Monday gone awry
♥
The kids are back, school is back and work is back by all accounts the rest of this week should be 'normal' in the Stockley house. The past two weeks have been anything but.... and to be honest sitting here I don't even know where to start.Last Sunday (the 5th) after spending the better part of the day before and the morning of cleaning up Kieran's room we picked up Sylvia from camp and then we all trooped out to the airport arriving far too early... as Les' Mum says "You never know when you'll get a blow out!" We took the kids to McD's for dinner and tried the new raspberry and apple pies... ummm YUM!!!
Farewells were made and we jumped back in the car a family of three... it's not nice to say this when the kids may be reading BUT, YIPEEE!
Monday was spent at home talking about stuff and doing the odd bit of stuff.And Tuesday....
....will have to come later... I actually started writing this post on Tuesday so it was never going to be a "Many Post Monday" no matter what my intentions may have been! I have a lot to share, show and say some seriously awesome stuff and some big stuff too. But I have a bunch of stuff to do and lots of thoughts running and hiding in my head... hopefully I'll post again later... much later. When the house is in peace and I don't feel the need to be doing stuff.
♥
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Friday, October 10, 2008
And he laughed...
♥ I am trying to get to writing a big update post but yesterday tidying and sorting came first and today it's a shower and this months ATC's.
So in the meantime all I have for you is this...
So in the meantime all I have for you is this...
♥
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
A Diagnosis
+++++++++
Last night Les said something that reminded me of something I wanted to tell.
Last term at Penguins (St Johns Cadets) the topic of study was emergency first aid. This has lead to an 'expert' in our midst. I have even had to instruct the expert in no uncertain terms that should she find an associate needing first aid at her place of 'work' that she was not authorised to use her own first aid kit nor administer first aid and that she should find a 'supervisor'.
Despite the lack of patients to treat she has been keeping up her skills though as she was seen practicing CPR on a doll recently and she will oft give a diagnosis whilst watching the News and other television, for example;
"Oh I think she will have severe bleeding"
In case you though you might like to avail yourself of her services I can tell you I was reliably informed that they only killed three people during their training. (That's the whole group not just Merenia).
+++++++++
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Monday, October 6, 2008
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Saturday, October 4, 2008
Going further, being nicer, and sisters these days...
Lots of stuff going on this week in the Stockley House.... First of all Jake was here for three days and I have NO photos... mainly because they spent a lot of the week holed up in Kieran's room playing on the computer and making Lego stuff interspersed with the occasional bout of running around the garden with balls.
Will's life is currently punctuated by waving and heading off into the distance. This includes out to the front doorway to eat shoes whenever possible. Out to the kitchen to play with plastic, chase Ruby, or finally make it to that fascinating catfood dish (hasn't done it yet!!). Down the hallway... main target here is Kieran's room as he only needs to cross the threshold to find a bunch of yummy stuff to chew. If K has remembered to close the door then he'll go all the way down fortunately bypassing the toilet and bathroom for Merenia's or the scrapbooking room. I think the motivation for this is balloons. Merenia has a number of balloons in full view in her doorway- fortunately they are latex so Will should be ok with them... unlike rubber balloons, which POP into lots of little bits, latex ones go down slowly.
This exploration does have one disadvantage though....
.... hmmmm sisters these days!
While I'm on the subject of Will I'll take the time to mention a few things I haven't already...
If you happen to be in the market for one, DON'T buy one of these Highchairs they are CRAP...
One of Will's fave toys is a ball... any ball will do, big or smal,l he likes them all... this could be a part of the whole hero worship thing he has going on with the other ball loving boy in our house. This (below) is his best trick....
It's pretty cool, and very smart, his hands and legs stop the ball from getting away the only thing that holds him back is when he chucks it over his head accidentally...
Talking about Hero worship.....
Noooooooo, nooooooo, please Will not you too....
I just liked this one, Kieran was being very suspect in a corner getting his Jamas on the other day. I thought he just trying to hide his "Shiny Hiney" but no, he was putting both legs in one pant leg... bad mistake... Have you ever seen a one legged guy get a Wedgie??
On Wednesday we went to Butterfly Creek... thanks to boy genius Kieran's efforts at the Science Quiz last holidays we had a pass so I only had to pay for the girls. It was way cool....
Will thought the fish were mildly fascinating...
But the butterflys were a huge hit!
He was practically killing himself to pat small furry animals...
He was bemused by the train...
But the big kids liked it
The butterflys loved the pushchair and the toys...
And the new top I got from Kieley (Thanks babe... it's in the wash now goddamnit!)
While we are here and Merenia is being kind to her friend Alyssa. I'll tell you a story from dinner last night.
Background: Merenia has a TV in her room for the week and she's been watching old family videos.
M: "Kieran, a long time ago when we were little, you know we used to be really nice to each other. And we weren't mean like we are now." (personally I don't think they are that mean to each other but anyway...)
K: "Mumble, humph"
M: "Well I think we should go back to being like that, and just be nice to each other."
I'm not sure if Kieran replied cause I couldn't hear so well from the other room (Merenia is naturally loud) but I asked him about it later and he said.
K: "I just think she's changed a lot since yesterday. It's like she grew up while I was away or something" (He was at Jakes for a sleepover)
I always think green is my favourite colour and then I am reminded that it is SO red...
After Butterfly Creek we picked up Sylvia from the airport and came home. Wednesday was also my birthday and I got lots of good lolly type stuff, a magazine and Outrageous Fortune seasons 1 & 2 on DVD. My two best presents were the one that hasn't arrived yet, and a framed set of postage stamps... yeah I'm turning into a philatelic geek but how cool are these! Kieley framed mine for me too, I know!!!!! way cool!!!
If you look at the candles you can see that I'm either 53 or 35... take you pick I know which one I feel like lately. :-) Why 2 cakes? Les bumped into us at the supermarket and was a little bummed as he'd wanted the cake to be a surprise. I said something about knowing that he was either getting a Choc cherry gateau or a Pav... he'd been thinking of a Chocolate Mud cake all day... so 'cause his heart was set on it...
We had Meatballs for dinner, my current fave, with rice and vegies. Kieley came and we drank some alcohol and talked rubbish for a long time it was great!
Digitalmax had a special last week so I got caught up with my processing it's only 732 photos. As Sylvia's friend Lisa said "No pressure or anything" She's a scrapbooker too so she gets it.
Yesterday Will got a very early birthday present which was kind of surprising, but it's all good because with father's day and my birthday recently he's well up on the present opening gig and the resulting cloth book from Delwyn, Blondy and Joe is way cool... Thanks guys!!
We took Sylvia up to Scrapcamp on Thursday and caught up with some of the crew which was cool and then Merenia, Will and I caught up with more yesterday when we had to take the long way home due to the Motorway truck crash (it doesn't take much to break Auckland I tell you!)
And betwixt it all I made this.....
****
Will's life is currently punctuated by waving and heading off into the distance. This includes out to the front doorway to eat shoes whenever possible. Out to the kitchen to play with plastic, chase Ruby, or finally make it to that fascinating catfood dish (hasn't done it yet!!). Down the hallway... main target here is Kieran's room as he only needs to cross the threshold to find a bunch of yummy stuff to chew. If K has remembered to close the door then he'll go all the way down fortunately bypassing the toilet and bathroom for Merenia's or the scrapbooking room. I think the motivation for this is balloons. Merenia has a number of balloons in full view in her doorway- fortunately they are latex so Will should be ok with them... unlike rubber balloons, which POP into lots of little bits, latex ones go down slowly.
This exploration does have one disadvantage though....
.... hmmmm sisters these days!While I'm on the subject of Will I'll take the time to mention a few things I haven't already...
If you happen to be in the market for one, DON'T buy one of these Highchairs they are CRAP...
One of Will's fave toys is a ball... any ball will do, big or smal,l he likes them all... this could be a part of the whole hero worship thing he has going on with the other ball loving boy in our house. This (below) is his best trick....
It's pretty cool, and very smart, his hands and legs stop the ball from getting away the only thing that holds him back is when he chucks it over his head accidentally...
Talking about Hero worship.....
Noooooooo, nooooooo, please Will not you too....
I just liked this one, Kieran was being very suspect in a corner getting his Jamas on the other day. I thought he just trying to hide his "Shiny Hiney" but no, he was putting both legs in one pant leg... bad mistake... Have you ever seen a one legged guy get a Wedgie??
On Wednesday we went to Butterfly Creek... thanks to boy genius Kieran's efforts at the Science Quiz last holidays we had a pass so I only had to pay for the girls. It was way cool....I love this idea these are those ball shaped tissue paper lamp shades that have been around forever made to look like jellyfish...
Will thought the fish were mildly fascinating...
But the butterflys were a huge hit!
He was practically killing himself to pat small furry animals...
He was bemused by the train...
But the big kids liked it
The butterflys loved the pushchair and the toys...
And the new top I got from Kieley (Thanks babe... it's in the wash now goddamnit!)
While we are here and Merenia is being kind to her friend Alyssa. I'll tell you a story from dinner last night.
Background: Merenia has a TV in her room for the week and she's been watching old family videos.
M: "Kieran, a long time ago when we were little, you know we used to be really nice to each other. And we weren't mean like we are now." (personally I don't think they are that mean to each other but anyway...)
K: "Mumble, humph"
M: "Well I think we should go back to being like that, and just be nice to each other."
I'm not sure if Kieran replied cause I couldn't hear so well from the other room (Merenia is naturally loud) but I asked him about it later and he said.
K: "I just think she's changed a lot since yesterday. It's like she grew up while I was away or something" (He was at Jakes for a sleepover)
I always think green is my favourite colour and then I am reminded that it is SO red...
After Butterfly Creek we picked up Sylvia from the airport and came home. Wednesday was also my birthday and I got lots of good lolly type stuff, a magazine and Outrageous Fortune seasons 1 & 2 on DVD. My two best presents were the one that hasn't arrived yet, and a framed set of postage stamps... yeah I'm turning into a philatelic geek but how cool are these! Kieley framed mine for me too, I know!!!!! way cool!!!
If you look at the candles you can see that I'm either 53 or 35... take you pick I know which one I feel like lately. :-) Why 2 cakes? Les bumped into us at the supermarket and was a little bummed as he'd wanted the cake to be a surprise. I said something about knowing that he was either getting a Choc cherry gateau or a Pav... he'd been thinking of a Chocolate Mud cake all day... so 'cause his heart was set on it...
We had Meatballs for dinner, my current fave, with rice and vegies. Kieley came and we drank some alcohol and talked rubbish for a long time it was great!
Digitalmax had a special last week so I got caught up with my processing it's only 732 photos. As Sylvia's friend Lisa said "No pressure or anything" She's a scrapbooker too so she gets it.
Yesterday Will got a very early birthday present which was kind of surprising, but it's all good because with father's day and my birthday recently he's well up on the present opening gig and the resulting cloth book from Delwyn, Blondy and Joe is way cool... Thanks guys!!
We took Sylvia up to Scrapcamp on Thursday and caught up with some of the crew which was cool and then Merenia, Will and I caught up with more yesterday when we had to take the long way home due to the Motorway truck crash (it doesn't take much to break Auckland I tell you!)And betwixt it all I made this.....
****
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