I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and has lots of big adventures planned for 2010! I have a really good feeling about the year ahead. Lots of changes here with Eloise starting school. It might even mean more time for me once we get our new routine down pat (or am I dreaming?!)!

December slipped by in a flash and was a fun busy end to a great year with lots of laughter and celebrating. It wasn’t me that had the busy social calendar it was the newly five year old!  The montage below shows just a few little snippets from our crazy December.

Top row: Rohan played ‘Santa’ at his work Christmas function and Caitlin was in on the secret calling him ‘Santa Daddy’; Eloise at her kindergarten ‘graduation’ complete with cardboard mortarboard. It was also dress-up day so she wasn’t ‘Eloise’ she was Barbie Thumbelina; more Christmas party fun

Middle Row: Eloise turned five! She had a brilliant party with her friends in the Enchanted Forest at The Magic Castle; Caitlin enjoying some post Wiggles concert icecream in Acland Street; Eloise backstage at the dress rehearsal for her ballet concert

Bottom Row: Eloise enjoying the last day of kindy; Eloise’s highlight was having Murray read out her sign on stage at the Wiggles Big Big Show; Christmas snow in Montmorency, the Recheilt Street lights!

Zine giveaway: Thank you for your lovely comments, I am chuffed that someone is enjoying my little collection of ‘stuff’! I actually have enough Zine’s left to give to all of you that left a comment. I think I have everyone’s address except yours Ali, so if you can email me your snail mail I will send it out in the next week.

I had a lovely surprise this week when I went to check the post office box. Thank you Norma for the beautiful vintage Christmas card and teeny tiny felt bears. Such a thoughtful gesture and I am glad you enjoy my posts enough to come back! I really enjoy sharing the things I find.

I am looking forward to a fun blogging year ahead and hope to be much more prolific than in 2009! Maybe I need to ‘nablopomo‘ more often! Hmmm something to think about…

…but it’s the closest weekend to the 1st of December and two little girls (and one big girl!) couldn’t wait any longer!

I bought the ‘Eloise & Skipperdee Go Caroling’ ornament pictured above the year my Eloise was born. It’s become one of our favourites! (released in 2004 as part of the Heirloom ornament collection by Carlton Cards)

This delicate tree ornament was given to me by my mother inlaw last year. It’s gorgeous and made out of translucent papers. It’s one of a pair of ‘Dancing Fairies’ designed Danish designer Jette Frölich.

We don’t do a colour theme. Our tree is full of ornaments we’ve collected over the years including a couple from my childhood. Lots of surprises hidden in the branches that the girls love finding. They buy one new ornament each year to add to the tree. This year in typical almost five year old fashion, Eloise chose this one. ‘Don’t mess with the dress’ (you’ll get it if you’ve seen the movie haha).

Almost December. So exciting!

…right now…maybe not with the heat we’ve been having…but a nice 25degrees and a gentle sea breeze…yes that would be nice!

{Tathra Beach September 2009}

We lost power on the weekend. At about 1am loud buzzing and zapping noises, big orange glow, sparks flying out where the street wires meet our house. Scary! Caitlin woke up terrified as she has developed a fear of storms and thought it was thunder (Even went to bed tonight still saying ‘no thunder?’ poor poppet). So by candlelight at 1am on Sunday morning I was making some of these hand shadow puppets on the wall complete with silly voices. She seemed to appreciate it, and it even got her giggling her adorable almost two year old hearty chuckle.

This old card is just smaller than A4 and has no details on it other than shown.

If you place your hands as shown in these pictures, and hold them in front of a light, their shadows will make the many creatures shown here.

Sitting here uninspired, tired and in all honesty feeling like grabbing a peppermint tea and watching some crap TV! But I am sooooo close to completing my NaBloPoMo challenge that I refuse to fail! One week to go! It’s been an interesting exercise so far. I blog mostly at night and I have found it’s the ‘forgetting to take photos during the day’ that makes me falter. That is something I really must get better at organising in between kindy pickup/dropoff, dance classes, work, Christmas shopping, toddler melodramas and trips to the park! Hmmmm what can I scan tonight….

The girls have a little desk in my studio space where they like to sit and create their masterpieces. I often find random artwork taped to the walls and furniture, my very own gallery complete with two mini curators! This treasure above was left for me the other day! Eloise is into drawing ‘hearts’ at the moment and I often make the mistake of asking ‘and what’s that’ which is greeted by an exasperated ‘it’s a love heart Mummy’ complete with rolled eyes. Ahhh silly me! (They’re love hearts around the top of the carriage, just in case you’re like me haha). She’s starting to get more detail into her drawings and it’s so interesting to see the way she thinks. She can be so slap happy sometimes. She does not care about what she uses, but it’s usually the closest thing she can find even if it’s a blunt pencil or a half dried out texta. But she is lucky. She can be creative, free and unrestricted. I try to just let her go and not influence her (besides, she’d get cranky at me if I started to tell her what to do!). I love watching the process!

The artwork above was really interesting to watch. On her own initiative she decided to trace around scraps of paper, bottle tops, small objects she could find within arms reach, and then used the shape to determine what it would be: an alien, a person with a spotty guitar, a hand with a face and legs, a platypus…and she seemed to have a lot of fun in the process and was really proud of her masterpiece! Usually she writes her name everywhere, sometimes it’s only her name on the paper, over and over again…sometimes right way around, sometimes backwards, sometimes upside down and sometimes the ‘E’s have half a dozen cross strokes! I’m now watching Caitlin start to obsessively scribble, and waiting for the first recognisable face or person to appear. I’ve always been fascinated by children’s artwork, and it’s incredibly exciting to watch my own! A little window into what’s going on inside their head.