Whoopee!

Woke up this morning, went online and discovered I'm May winner for the Goals Challenge at Scrapitude! Wow! Gobsmacked is the word but very pleased! Hopefully this might peppered up my scrapping mojo as it's gone! Tried to scrap last nite but just couldn't so gave up and watched a triple dose of CSI instead! Currently waiting for 2 scrapping books from Amazon too so that might give me the added boost then! Anyway, here's the winning LO! Did a lot of stitching on that LO, discovered a nice stitch design and it sewed onto the paper perfectly. There was a slight hiccup on the side of the photo where the thread came off but decided to leave it as it and going over it would mar the design! Made use of my new Sassafralass doodled stamps and have to say they rock!

Brought the boys out to watch The Wild at the movie. Zac sat quiet throughout so that's a good sign. Reminded me a little of Madagascar. Don't ask me what happened in the middle as I closed my eyes for a while and conked out completely! :( Anyway, kept the boys occupied for a while!

Will try and scrap a bit tonite! Got some stuff that needs to be done and I'm still waffling about it!

Half term!

Gosh, it's half term this week for the boys! As Zac is down with flu, decided to stay at home so that he can recover properly. Hence they had a lttle treat, got them the Chicken Little dvd and they had fun watching it! We saw it at the movie months ago and they enjoyed it. We are now waiting for Ice Age 2 to come out as that is another amusing one too!

I can now reveal the last of my scraplift challenge at Scrapitude as it's now over. It has been fun scrapping as I've tried to lift an element off the LO as opposed to lifting it entirely which I'm not comfortable in doing so. Hence it has been great fun and so easy and fast to complete! Here's a LO I've done with my best pals in Singapore. Met those gals while teaching in a primary school and we become great friends and shared a common interest - food! We used to scour the best places for good food and most of the time in hot sweaty environment but the food made it up! There were 6 of us but over the years, 3 of us have moved overseas. Each time I go back, I try to meet up with those still there. Will probably see Agnes and Melissa when I go back this July. As for Ellen, one of my closest friends, might see her in the UK when she comes over this Sept. She currently lives in Shanghai, China. Oh and the title 'Charbohs' (in my chinese dialect) means Ladies. It's a nickname for us Gals!

World of Chocolate!

Had guests over last nite. Dominique, Mike's colleague and also a Malaysian friend is leaving for greener pastures in Denmark (where her boyfriend lives!) She was working in hubby's engineering firm but decided she had enough as they weren't utilising her knowledge and instead was making her do admin stuff! Anyway, the fault lies more in her so-called mentor who a NATO (No Action, Talk Only!) He is technically unsound but has the gift of the gap. She just had enough and will now be working for a well-known engineering firm in Denmark which will see her doing a lot of travelling! Lucky her!

It's Sunday morning and the boys woke up mega early at 7am!!! Somehow they seem to know it's the weekend and are up early just to torment us! Most of the time I've to drag them out of bed during school days!

We decided to bring them to Cadbury World. The weather was fine but windy and certainly not ideal for cycling in the park. We got there early at 9.45am and had a good 2 hrs wandering around the chocolate factory, gathering free chocolates and buying even more! There were some interactive areas as well as opportunities to play with chocolate and the kids enjoyed the visit!

As we were driving back home, decided to stop at the chinese supermarket in the Birmingham town centre. However, most of the small lanes leading to the town centre were blocked. Being nosy, decided to ask a policeman what was going on. In a very serious voice, he say 'Gay Parade'. I just had to laugh!!! Well, I shouldn't but I couldn't help it. Mmmm wondered what the Parade was like......

On the creative front, finished 3 rounds of Scraplift challenge. It has been fun and it was lovely to see how people interpreted scraplifts! In one of the rounds, the original bore no resemblance to the last LO created!!! Here's 2 of the LOs created, made use of my yummy new papers from Cactus Pink Candi and K&Co K-Ology papers!

Oh dear, bought 2 scrapbooking books from Memory Makers, Simply Graphic and What about the Words? Fortunately was able to have a peek into those books and they were so interesting! Got them off Amazon with free postage and packaging too! Can't wait to have a good browse through!

Oh, had an email off Cherry Arte saying they have accepted my LO for their gallery using the Angel papers! Cool! That brings the total to 2 now as I had one accepted by A2Z Essentials for one of my LOs using their papers! Just as good as being published!!! :)

So Much To Do And No Time To Do It!

Sigh! Since becoming a SAHM, I realised that time flies ever so quickly! It's almost the weekend again, not to mention half term for the kiddos! They have one week off so I've to rack my brains on entertainment! Quite a number of families are going off for holiday but seeing that we went in April and will be going again in July, can't really take off this time!!! Thankfully, will bring them out for activities. Let's hope the weather isn't too bad! Definitely will bring them out to the cinema to watch a couple of cartoon movies, get the Chicken Little DVD, might bring them out to Cadbury World too and probably to the park. Can't contain my excitement that in another 7 weeks time, we'll be flying off to the Far East!!! Food and sunshine.... bliss! Can't wait to bring the kids out for a swim in an outdoor swimming pool... it's shucks here as all the public pools are indoor and I really hate swimming indoors! Not to mention spending an entire week fishing in Indonesia, totally going back to basics without any mod cons!!! Just pure unadulterated fishing and eating fresh fish for every meal.... what more can you ask for! The boys will love it to bits!

Gosh, got tons of DT assignments to do! Best get on it instead of waffling here!!!

Happenings!

Woo Hoo! The last two days have seen pizza boxes with stash arriving, mainly yummy delicious papers from Cactus Pink Candi, K&CO K-Ology and Homegrown kit - BG Baby Girl papers! I'm not into embellishments so much but have a weakness for papers! Got some rolling alpha stamps too for journalling from ProvoCraft. Cool! Now to find the time to have a play with them!!!
On the car front, received a call from Renault today that my car was ready for collection! Two days ahead of schedule! Hence went down to collect it and was surprised to find it visibly clean. Mats have been vacuumed too! What a service! The repair work was also fantastic too! Wow! Have to say that the customer service is exceptionally fantastic!!! Missed my car... it's funny how you become so accustomed to a car that you find it difficult to drive in another car. I don't touch hubby's car as I find it far too big (Audi A4) for my liking even though it's automatic! Besides, he has this thing about cars so I avoid having to do anything with it!

On the creative front, finished up doing a LO for the Goals challenge at Scrapitude! It's gonna be harder as I plough along, trying to scrap my goals for this year which I made at the beginning of the year. Anyway, there's certain guidelines to doing the LO and each month is different! This time around, it had to be monocromatic with 1 sheet of patterned paper, library card, journalling and metal embellishment. Finally came up with this!

New Car!

At least for just 5 days until mine is repaired! Have to say that I'm suitably impressed with the Renault customer service. Everything seems to be taken care of so easily and I didn't have to repeat myself as all that I reported was already recorded and dealt with efficiency! When I sent my car in today for repairs, my courtesy car was already waiting for me in the carpark! Wow! But I've to say, the company sure know how to take care of their customers!!!

I remember when I wanted to buy my first car, I had my eye on VW Polo but after test driving it, wasn't impressed. Then hubby brought me to try Peugeot and finally Renault. I fell in love with the Renault car that I drove after discovering the amount of gadgets in there... (I'm a gadget freak!) For the price I was prepared to pay, I had electric windows, a radio gadget at the side of the driving wheel, free insurance, CD player (at that time in 2001, most cars were offering free cassette/radio). The Polo didn't even had electric windows! Obviously went for the the car that gave me the best deal. I'm not bothered about what car I drive as the purpose of a car to me is to be able to drive me from point A to B without hassle and that means not a petrol gazzling one too! Just luv my car as it's so economical... once managed to survive a full month on a full tank (oh well, I used it these days to ferry my kiddies around!)

Now to get used to the new car and the gear...

On the scrapping side, finally completed my last round of Scraplift and it was actually a lift of my LO which I'm flattered! Here's my interpretation:

Picture of my darling boys in their Chinese New Year outfits! They were so reluctant to wear it but as it was a tradition, they had to even if it was just a few minutes to pose for pictures!

My next scrapping LO is to do my goals that I'm signed up for at Scrapitude due in the 25th May. Got an idea what I'm gonna do now!

Time Out!

Went for an all day crop today from 11-6pm. There weren't much people today and Scrapajacks were there. Was very restrained and bought only a chalk ink to replace my rapidly fading olive pastel pad. However, did buy from Martha her secondhand QK single dies, small tags and daisy. She had a tab set to sell but I just need one not 4!!!

Managed to produce 3 LOs today, 1 for a Scraplift challenge and 2 others for a DT assignment. Had to really think hard for the LOs as the colour were bright but then managed to find the photos to fit and am quite pleased with the result. Just need to put some finishing touches to it! They can't be revealed just yet!

Didn't manage to do my A-Z album pictures but as they are of a smaller sized, I should be able to get them done in the next few days.

Will now reveal the LOs done in past Scraplift challenges as they are already revealed on the Scrapitude site. Couldn't help using my eyelets thanx to my crop-a-dile! Effortless and ever so easy to set eyelets now!!!

Oh Dear!

1 am:

Ended up buying the K&Co K-Ology papers as they reminded me so much of Indian prints. Shouldn't have as I'm in the process of cutting down my stash but I've this weakness for pretty papers. As a little girl, I had already exhibited fondness of any lovely papers and used to collect sheets of them! I used to hang out at this paper shop in Singapore and bought any paper with textures. Sigh, especially knowing I will have 2 pizza boxes of kits coming from the US with even more papers....

Spent the entire afternoon yesterday listing my stuff on Ebay (at the expense of scrapping!) Anyway, so far I've a few people watching some items. Have to say that opening the sales worldwide have generated more interest. I don't really mind sending stuff overseas as long as postage is covered by the buyer. Afterall, I'm always buying from the US!!! Hopefully come Sunday most of the 1st batch will be gone! My next mission is to sort out some of the patterned papers in my accordian file, those that I have already used and there's loads of leftovers!!! Might just pack them into a kit for quick sale!

Looking forward to the all day crop on Sunday. Hopefully will be able to catch up on my A-Z album as well as doing some DT assignments. Have been asked to be a Guest DT on a forum (won't mention it yet) and hoping I will do justice to the papers given. Not my kind of colours but hey, nothing like a good challenge! Over at The Scrapper's Loft, been assigned to write on the retro look as the theme is based on Retro/Vintage/Chic look! Not having any 60s/70s photos with me, will try to adapt the look to modern photos. Looking forward to that!!!

11pm

As luck would have it, postie knocked on the door to let me know of a parcel at 8am...my Back Porch Memories kit. What I was more interested was my new tool known as the Crop-a-Dile, basically an eyelet setter with a big difference! It can set eyelets/snaps with relative ease, just a squeeze of the handle and on any material. I tried it with a LO this afternoon and couldn't believe how silent it set the eyelet and how little force it took! I'm totally in love with this baby! Tried it on a chipboard and it punched a hole easily and set the eyelet even easier!!!! This has to be one of the best tool ever! The only setback is that it doesn't allow one to set an eyelet in the middle of a LO but hey, I was more interested that it could do any materials with ease! I will still keep my Provocraft silent setter for that purpose!

Oliver called his nan this morning to ask her if she could have him and Zac overnite. She agreed and I took them round to her place at 6pm. Left childless for the nite, hubby and I checked out the Indian restaurant near our place. It has won awards for its cuisine and we were not disappointed! Food was absolutely delicious if not pricey but how often do we eat out sans kids?!! They do takeaway too so will be keeping their menu in my drawer!

2 LOs came for me for the Scraplift challenge at Scrapitude. Completed one and will do the other tomorrow at a crop. Woo Hoo, whole day out scrapping with my heart's content without the kids! What ecstasy! Better get packing then.....

Much ado about Nothing!

What do you know it's Friday again! Where has time flown?

On the mundane side, Oliver is beginning to lose his concentration in school and starting to play up again... perhaps he needs another dose of osteopatic treatment again to relieve his internal chi! I feel bad that I'm partly to be blame, if only I had opted for c-section, he wouldn't have been stuck in me for so long and be distressed! Blame the darn midwives who constantly kept assuring me that I would deliver naturally until it took a very senior midwife who decided he wasn't coming out naturally and consulted the surgeon. As a result, he was delivered by Keilland forcep delivery (only performed by surgeons but very seldom used these days). I never attributed his hyperactive behaviour to the trauma he suffered at birth until my aunt who witnessed him asked me about his birth. She's into natural healing and healty food and recommended seeing an osteopath doctor. Well, she examined him (basically put her hands on his body to feel the fluid within him) and said his fluid wasn't flowing properly and this resulted in his hyperactive behaviour as it was his way of relieving the pressure within him. Have to say her hands did wonders as he was much calmer after that! Since then I've taken him for monthly sessions which has helped considerably. I stopped going when I was told he was ok. Then darn hubby brought him for the MMR jabs which again resulted in his hyperactivity... you could see his actions... he just couldn't even sit still to watch TV! So off he went for treatment again where the doc confirmed that my suspicions and sorted him out. Anyway, his teacher complained about him having short spells of concentration again, so need to get his internals sorted once again. Also read about a kinda vitamin called Eye-Q that helps improved concentration so might try and get some for him. The joys of having kids! No problem with the 2nd boy as he was plucked off from the womb so didn't suffered any trauma. You can see a big difference between the two at the same age!!!

As for creating, completed my rounds on the scraplift challenge so I can now reveal the LOs:

Well, have just signed up for more challenges so can't wait to create more LOs!

Fastidious!

That's me! Bought a pair of lovely sandals with intricate stitches and beads and wore it for 2 days and found it extremely uncomfortable! What a pity as the sandal was so lovely but it's a no go for me if I don't find it comfortable at all.... my feet went cramped up after walking in them... somehow, it's very tight (I've very broad pair of feet!). So today, went back to the store to exchange them. Spent half an hour trying to decide between 2 pairs, where one was very plain but super duper comfortable and the other, was asthetically lovely but not as comfy as the other one. Went for the latter as I didn't want to end up owning so many similar pairs of sandals. Let's hope it walks better than the last one!

Spent the afternoon listing my items on Ebay. About time I reckon as I've got 2 boxes sitting on the floor in my craft area and I've vowed to get rid of my unwanted, unused craft items before buying any further new stash! Once I got started, it was easy. The difficulty was finding a balance in adding the postage as I didn't want to go over the top... which I know some ebay sellers do... ridiculous amounts they charge sometimes! Will be listing more tomorrow!

On the creative side, made a card for my nephew as it is his birthday today.... yeah, as usual, late in sending it! Anyway, gonna give him some cash... what do you get for a 15 yr old these days...

Bummer!

Had a slight car accident yesterday! Banged into the rear of a car. We were both on the side road waiting to go into the main road. I saw her pulling out and so I turned to look to see if I could go. When it was clear, I accelerated and then heard a massive bang... flippin cow had not gone and was still hanging about! Anyway manoeveured to the side and exchanged details. Her left rear was badly dented while my front bumper sustained a crack near the license plate. Didn't help that it was drizzling as well! Shook me up the whole day.... there goes my no claims bonus not to mention an increase in premiums come October!

Anyway, went to the Renault assessment centre in Wednesbury for them to take a look. Sustained about £400-500 worth of damages... have to change the entire front bumper, license plate too. I've to pay £100 and the rest will be taken care by the insurance. What a bummer!!!

On the creativity side, took part in 3 '48hr scraplift challenge' at Scrapitude (hang out there pretty frequently these days). Basically there's 4 to a team and the first person scraplift a LO she find in the gallery and her scraplifted LO is passed to the next person to scraplift and so on till the last person. Then the entire LOs are revealed to see how each has progressed from the original one. Fun activity and very easy to scrap! Here's one of them that I did!

What a Day!

Where has time gone? Can't believe it's already Friday! I find it ironic that when you are not working, time seems to fly so quickly but if you are at work, time literally crawls! Anyway, it was a bright sunny day today and after going to Moms & Toddlers, decided pop into Birmingham town centre. Headed straight for WH Smith to see if I could spend my birthday voucher on some scrapping products but alas! the selection was absolutely awful! Hence decided to save it for another day. Walked around and ended up buying a new pair of shoes... the first this year! I'm a shoe and handbag person, not really into clothes but luv shoes and handbags! I was drawn to it as it has stitches design (mmm an inspiration for a LO?) with beads and sequins... very unusual and very feminine!

Zac was with me as he has no preschool today due to a funeral! Decided against a pushchair and he was fine except he got bored at times when I was browsing around. Anyway, went past the famous BULL in the Bullring and of course he had to climb on it! We went to Borders and somehow he got lost! He was behind me when I went to the magazine section and then when I realised he didn't come around, went to look for him and he was gone! God, imagine trying to find a lost child in that place... Had a quick look in Borders but didn't see him and was about to go out when someone called me. Poor soul was crying his eyes out and was a little hysterical but I calmed him down. Anyway, he was back to his normal self in no time and later even chat up a girl who was having a fag outside the store while I was browsing a book (with my eye on him this time!)

Did a bit of organisation today... sorted out my fabric strips into the ribbon cardboard notches that I bought off a forum, and my fibres too. Stayed off the PC until late afternoon when my son wanted to play CBeebies online. I think I spend far too much time online and as a result, don't get much done in a day! Well, I gotta declutter the house before July so had better get my butt moving!

On the creative side, went on a creative mode and did 2 LOs yesterday using my Urban Lily Urban Boy papers. They are so like Cherry Arte papers, so easy to play with!

Gone in a Flash- this LO was inspired by the Freestyle book especially the stripes running across the page.

Soccer Fun - wanted to do this LO to depict my son's first attempt at sports. Enrolled him for soccer, more as a fun activity not to be taken seriously, and he has a good workout every Tuesday afternoon!

Ohhh, Bonanza is this weekend. Bonanza is a scrapping retreat with classes and crop room for scrapmad devotees. I went last year and came back with a splitting headache so decided against it this time. And to think I only live about 10 mins away from the NEC (where it is held!) Checked the classes this year and wasn't lulled by any of them. Anyway, shan't be tempted by more scrapping goodies as I'm trying to reduce the obscene amount of stash I have at the moment and certainly don't need any new ones!

I guess it's back to sorting my fibres now.......

Another Challenge!

Doing another scraplifting challenge, this time with my team at UKScrappers. Decided to do a group activity. Well, as moi was first on the list, spent the solitary afternoon creating a LO (again can't be shown just yet). Have to say it was enjoyable and great relief to be able to scrap without interruption!

Gosh, the half term will be upon us at the end of the month. Seems to me the kids are out of school more than they are in! Anyway, just can't wait for July to come! Missing home so badly and can't wait to get away from cooking.... beginning to dislike it so much and it would be good to be able to tuck into my fav dishes intead of cracking my brains as to what to cook each day!!! Just miss the lifestyle, the weather and the food so badly!!!!

Right, need to get my grey cells working as I've been given an assignment at Homegrown for the newsletter! One of my goals is to be organised, to get ahead of schedule instead of behind it. Best get cracking!!!

Rats!

Urgh! Been spotted running wildly in the back garden! No wonder the sensor light at the back keeps coming on and when I look out, don't see a cat but hubby has spotted a enormous one running across the garden. He has resorted to buying rat poison and therefore I can't let the boys out there for the time being. It's killing them when it's nice and sunny and they can't go out to the garden to play! The joys of living in an urban area... not!

On the creative side, the cyber crop ended on Sun and I might have done more than a dozen LOs... was completely scrapped out! Here's some of my favourites:

The requirements were to create a LO using only cardstock or patterned paper and embellishments. Decided to make use of my fabric strips and have to say, am quite pleased with the result! Was particularly inspired by the Freestyle book as well!

This was based on a class using scraps as the background. Used papers from Spring Fling by Blond Moments. Enjoyed doing this LO as it was a good way of using scraps which I have tons of them!

Currently involved in a Scrapping the Scraplift challenge at Scrapitude. Basically it's scraplifing a LO and passing it on to the next person who scraplift it and it gets passed on. At the end, we see how the original LO differs from the last LO created. Got my LO to scraplift and managed to complete it and send it off! Had great fun doing it! Unfortunately can't show it just yet!

National Scrapbooking Day

Yeah, it does exist but only to scrapbookers! The morning started awful for me... woke up with a splitting headache and decided to have a lie-in instead. There goes my plan for an all day crop. Anyway, woke up later and felt better but decided to stay indoors instead. Thankfully, Oliver was at his nan's so only had Zac to handle.

Decided to take part in a cyber crop that was going on at Scraptitude forum. Challenges and classes started from 1400 onwards. It's ongoing for the weekend and all creations have to be uploaded by 2359 on Sunday! So far managed to complete 2 classes and 1 challenge:

This LO was done based on a sketch that was given. Did this pretty quickly. Well at least this will be part of my France album which I need to make a start!

This LO was created based on requirement to use only cardstock, at least 3 of them. Hence, decided to make use of my stamps and inks. There's Technique Tuesday Functuation stamps, Heidi Swapp Daisy stamps as well as Sassafralass Stitched Borders stamps.

This was done during a class by Karen (K3 on the board). Thought I used this picture as it was lying in my photo holder. Used the new Urban Lily Gypsy papers... luv those papers as they are so bright and funky! Will stick that up on a wall!

Well, will continue to do more challenges.

Gorgeous Day!

Wow! Sun was out today and it was warm! Oliver was off school due to his school being used as a polling station (as if they can't find any other venue and have to disrupt school time!!!) Luckily Zac's preschool wasn't disrupted. After dropping Zac off, went off to Melbricks Garden Centre to mootch around the craft area. Ohhh they have since upgraded that section and it's now selling quite a fair bit of scrapping stuff, mostly Making Memories and Paper Mania (Docraft's own brand). I picked up a pack of white textured cardstock as I do use them a fair bit and also a box of 10mm size brads from Dovecraft. I was very restricted in my purchase!

Ohhh, some lovely stash from Papermaze arrived today! Yummy papers from Urban Lily latest collection and the Freestyle book! God that book absolutely rock! It's so my style of scrapping and I'll be picking up some great ideas from there for sure! It takes playing with papers to a new level and show there is really no limit to scrapping! That's why I do it.... there is no rules, no regulations and no one way of doing it. You do whatever you want to a piece of paper and photograph! And the gals at Freestyle shows you exactly that!!!

Spend the afternoon with the boys doing painting, finger painting to be exact! Got them to paint their hands and stick it onto paper. I'll be doing a LO with those hands! They had fun getting themselves dirty. Made them do it at the 'treehouse' (it's actually a garden jungle gym but treehouse has a nicer ring to it!) Later they had their ice lolly there too.

Had to play with my stash and did a LO (entitled Lunch @ Treehouse) using the Urban Lily Gypsy papers. Been having a scrapper's block the last few days and took some inspiration from the Freestyle book. Went for a simple style using colour blocking and doodling inspired by Brenda-Mae Teo (pg 50 of Freestyle). Picture of the boys having their lunch at the treehouse in the garden. Actually not a treehouse but so-called as it almost resembles one and the boys love it as their little hideaway! It was such a sunny day and they had no inclination of coming indoors to have their lunch so lunch had to go to them instead! Conchos on the LO reads Lunch (not sure why it doesn't show up in the scan!). Gosh, got loads of photos to scrap but lacking inspiration!!!

Heavens!

Was woken up by the doorbell at 10 to six this morning by the postie! Why on earth he has to come so early is beyond comprehension but he brought me new stash! Woo Hoo! Firstly, the new Splendor range from Rhonna Farrer from PaperArts (knew I would succumb eventually). Then the new Cathy Zielske book from Artbase. It's annoying when you can't get everything from the same store and have to shop at different stores for supplies... adds to the cost of postage! Anyway, expecting a couple more in the next few days namely Urban Lily Collection 3 , Boys and Gypsy ranges as well as the Freestyle book! Oh and a couple more stamps from Sassafralass latest stamp collection... yeah, I'm a stamp addict.

Due to a funeral at my son's pre-school, his class was cancelled this afternoon which is so annoying... there is only so much you can do to occupy a highly charged energetic little boy and I was exhausted by the time I had to do the school run to pick my eldest! I usually used the precious 2 1/2 hrs that I have for myself to create LOs. Needless to say, I did keep him entertain for an hour and then managed to do a bit of creative art albeit a simple one! Will upload later as I need to include a bit of journalling.

Managed to print off some photos of recent events. I still need to do my France vacation album which I think I will do it simple. Might try and get some advice from Cathy Z book and create a super duper clean & simple album.

Tia Bennett is the guest designer at Homegrown Scrapbooks this month and she has set a challenge to use finger painting on a LO. This has given me an idea to incorporate Ollie & Zac's hands as well as mine.... be interesting to see how the LO turns out. Will do so tomorrow as Ollie's off school due to his school being used as a polling station!

Right, Desperate Housewives is on and so is CSI! Have to luv those American programmes....

Back to reality

Now that Bank Holiday is over, it's back to reality again... but not quite! As it's polling day on Thursday, my eldest doesn't have any school as his school is being used as a polling station. Now the youngest doesn't have preschool on Wednesday b'cos there is a funeral going on! Seems like they spend more time out of school than in it!

It has to be real dedication on my part, chauffering my sons to their activities. Oliver is currently having soccer training every Tuesday afternoon from 1630-1730. Today was no exception except the weather was terribly foul... drizzling coupled with cold wind. Anyway, brought him there but that's where dedication ended! Hurried back to the car and waited... no way was I gonna stand and watch him play soccer in the chilly wind... even Zac was whining to go back to the car!

On the creative side, haven't done anything so far! I think age is catching up on me as I had a couple of late nites (like 3amish) and somehow this has affected me real bad! I'm totally knackered by nitefall. Not to mention that I try to catch CSI on TV so scrapping at nite doesn't exist anymore! Need to start scrapping as I'm getting rather crappy not producing any new LO and having all the scrummy, lovely papers in sight!

Now that we are into May, I'm on a mission to declutter the house. There's far too much rubbish around and this isn't good feng shui. Yes, I do follow it a little, but most of it is actual common sense! Hence, declutter is top on my list especially my craft area! It's more a case of out with the old and in with the new!!!

Happy Birthday

To me that it! Gosh, I'm halfway past my prime! But do I feel my age...NO! Do I look my age...NO! Enough said!

Well, the day started with a good lie-in for me! Since having kids, these days, lie-ins are a thing of a past. Kids just don't understand it and once they open their eyes, they jump out of bed immediately! It's even worst when during the weekends or holidays... somehow they just seem to know they have no school and get up even earlier! While some moms think that b'cos there's no school, they don't need to get up early, I beg to differ as my rascals wake up even earlier than normal school days e.g 7am!!! Funnily how I've to drag them out of bed on days when they have to go to school!

As for birthday gifts, got cards from my hubby and kids, my fav chocos (Mingles), flowers (a rarity with hubby!) and some cash! Ideally would luv to have a new laptop but since he has just paid our air tix to Singapore, didn't feel like I should demand more.... then again, what I want I usually get in the end so with perfect timing, might be able to needle him out of a laptop when we are in Singapore as it's one of THE best place to get electronic products!!! Just have to fine-tune my persuasion skill!

Didn't really do much today as hubby suddenly got into this head that he wanted to have decking in the garden and since B&Q (DIY store) was having a sale (how coincidentally!), he just had to get it. So he spend the whole day sawing and getting the groundwork ready for decking. Pity the weather didn't help him much as it was alternating between raining and being sunny at times. Typical of hubby.... he CANNOT sit still and do nothing. Constantly have to find something to do in the house... it's like he's there but not really there....it would have been nice if he took some time to play with the boys as I do get really knackered trying to keep them entertained the whole day! Then again, both DH and I have this ping pong game with the boys...oh well, that's another story......

Oh there's a tradition in our family regarding birthdays... we always get a cake, not just any cake but a Chinese birthday cake from a Chinese bakery in Chinatown. What I like about the cake is the lightness... a sponge cake that is deliciously covered with fresh fruits and cream. It doesn't give you the heavy feeling after eating it (not like the ones that are sold in the supermarkets). And it's taste absolutely lovely. Here's a picture of my cake:
Yeah, a birthday isn't complete without a cake!

Hubby did arrange for the boys to be at his mom's while he took me out for dinner. I decided on Japanese and we had Teppanyaki at a Jap restaurant in the Mailbox! It's where the food is literally cooked in front of you and both of us chose the seafood option! We both went for the set menu. It was literally an 8 course meal: Salad, spring roll & teriyaki chicken, miso soup as appetiser. Then the main course consisted of fried rice, seafood platter of scallop, king prawn, salmon, and chicken. Followed by dessert of ice-cream! I was almost bursting at the seams when I finished! Hubby tried the Japanese beer, Ashahi which happened to be very strong. I took my usual sparkling water. I'm not a drinker and don't really like the taste of alcohol at all and will only drink on very special occasion (probably about twice a year!) Hence, I had to drive home but then again, I'm very used to that!