Fabulous Friday

Why?
Cos I went to the Quilt & Craft Fair in Hamilton with two close friends on Friday. No children. No work. And best of all - no deadline for coming home, LOL.
So we stayed there till the end of the show plus 5 minutes.
It was great. Lots of stalls, lots of fabulous quilts in the exhibition, and an amazing fibre arts show in the upstairs gallery.
We chatted, we gossiped, we laughed till we just about cried, we saw people we knew, we oohed and aahed over the things on display and, naturally, we shopped.

It was great, and we've promised ourselves that we're going to do it again next year.
Nothing like S.E.X. for S.A.B.L.E. to make a crafty girl happy - especially when done with friends.

So thanks for your company Sarah and Cherry, looking forward to next time!


Stash Enhancment eXpedition
Stash Accumulation Beyond Life Expectancy

while I'm on the subject...

I found some photos while uploading the ones for the previous post so I thought I'd inflict them on y'all.

That's Tamsin at age 3, ready to start preschool ballet at SABA.

On the topic of different leotards - not only does each ballet school have different colours, some of them also change when advancing from Grade 2 to Grade 3. SABA for example changes from pale blue to navy blue, while Lily Fong changes from baby pink to royal blue.

Gym clubs obviously have different leotards to save confusion at competitions. Here's Jessica's progression through the past 5 years (Acrobatics, West City, TriStar):

Also progressing is the zoom and focus capability of our camera and its operator, LOL.

This is to prove that Tamsin wasn't always long and skinny as she is now (that's my sister BTW)

and she's about 4-5 cm taller since these photos were taken in May!





Some years back, the girls got to take part in the Pumpkin Patch fashion parade at Auckland's annual Teddy Bears' Picnic held in the Domain in February. It was a lovely sunny hot summer day, and Pumpkin Patch were using the show to preview their winter range. So yes the girls got quite hot - especially as it was a 20 minute dance show done four times across the middle of the day! They had a fabulous time though and got some fantastic gear for doing it.








Last year, Jess did cheerleading and went to Australia to compete with her team at the Down Under Spirit Champs. Here she is with the trophy the team won.

This is a piece I'm really pleased with - Sweetheart Tree's Forget Me Not sampler, done for my parents 45th wedding anniversary 4(!) years ago. Yes, it's the Golden anniversay next year, along with my sister's 25th wedding anniversary, Jess' godmother's 40th birthday, Tamsin's godfather's 5oth birthday and my dad's 80th birthday. It's going to be quite a year!

To finish, I found this one of my favourite people

The torture is now over and you may leave now.

KTHXBAI

Logistics Logistics Logistics

I'm such a control freak that I'm worrying about next year already.

Yes, I'm a sad bunny - I admit it. Somebody find me the closest Control Freaks Anon meeting, please!

Anyhoo, Jess is now WAG L5 and RAD Grade 5, while Tamsin is (well, she may be WAG L2, if she gets her act together but that's another story) WAG L2 and RAD Grade 1. Which means juggling the class time clashes again.

This is not new.

In fact this will be the 4th year that I've done this - so you'd think I'd have it down pat by now. However, not only do I not have it down pat, but I now start worrying about it earlier and earlier as each year goes by.

As I said, I'm a sad control freak bunny.

The main reason for worrying about it earlier rather than later is to do with the possible need to change clubs or ballet schools to make it all fit in a way that is actually doable without resorting to transporter beams or cloning.

The trick, I've found, is to make one activity the stick in the sand around which all other activities fall into line (please excuse the mixed metaphors!) and then changing gym clubs/ ballet schools if a new one has a timetable that suits better.

In our case, the pivot point is gymnastics - particularly Jess' class times (she's happy where she is, it's working for her and it fits in well with the change of schools next year).

Fortunately her coach is also somewhat of a control freak and was able to 90% say for certain what class times she's decided on for the L5s for next year. I'm also 90% sure that Tamsin's gym class times will stay the same next year (but will check tomorrow to find out for certain).

Please cross your fingers for me that both gym coaches don't change their minds. And please also cross your fingers for me that the ballet school that girls used to go to also keeps the 2008 timetable exactly the same for 2009. Cos if they do, then next year's logistics will work out just fine thank you, even if it does mean moving ballet schools again.

I'm really hoping that it does fall into place that way for several reasons:

Jess wants to go back to the previous ballet school as her best friend is there; I'd like it as it is closer (like 5mins max away); it's cheaper that where they are now; they both need new leotards anyway (don't you love how each ballet school has its own colour leotard??); plus the girls would get to do recitals again.

Have I ever bored you with my issues about ballet recitals? Yes? No? Don't know?

Well, here's the diatribe anyway.

Much as I'm mostly happy with the girls' current ballet school, my biggest gripe is lack of advance warning (I'm a control freak and info junkie, remember) about anything - recitals in particular. So much so, that last year I pulled the girls out of ballet for Term 4 as I couldn't get any info out of Miss Lily about the recital before the end of Term 3.

This year is unfortunately no different. So I've broken my promise and the girls are out of ballet for Term 4 again.

Tamsin doesn't care as we're replacing it with beginners Rhythmic Gymnastics classes for her. Jess, while a little upset, understands my reasons and is happy to focus on upgrading her L5 gym skills without the distractions of recital.

At SABA ballet, on the other hand, recitals have happened the same way since Adam was a cowboy and even if the official information is a bit sparse (but at least there is official info), all the "old" ballet mums help the "new" ballet mums learn the ropes. Plus we've done 2 SABA recitals so I'm technically an "old" ballet mum.

You know what really bugs me about the lack of information?

It's that it can be done.

Check out the Victoria Phillips Dance school. That website has had recital details on it for the whole year already, right down to rehearsal times - to the point that it says that if you can't make the scheduled rehearsals, don't bother auditioning for the recital. Now that's the dance school for control freak evil ballet mums (i.e. me!). Shame they don't do RAD and are all the way over in Glenn Innes.

My only comfort is that I know I'm not the only mum out there facing this issue. And I'm only juggling things for 2 daughters doing the same two (related) sports. My sister has two boys doing two activities in common (water polo & swimming) and one activity each that is completely different (yachting and archery). Not only are they different activities, the venues are miles apart and require lots more personal equipment than gymsports - a whole dang boat + sails for example. Then there's Floss: 4 offspring doing completely different sports, plus it snows down there, just to add to the chaos.

DH, bless him, just carries on and earns the money that pays for it all.

All about me...

Rene had this on her Blog and I thought it would be fun to put it on mine.

1.What time did you get up this morning? 7.30am
2.Diamonds or pearls? Pearls
3.What was the last film you saw at the cinema? Mamma Mia
4.What is your favourite TV show? Mythbusters
5.What do you usually have for breakfast? Cereal
6.What is your middle name? Dora
7.What food do you dislike? Liver
8.What is your favourite CD at moment? Allegri Miserere Mei
9.What kind of car do you drive? Hyundai La Vita
10.Favourite sandwich? Cheese
11.What characteristic do you despise? Hypocrisy
12.Favourite item of clothing? Red polar fleece coat
13.If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go? Italy
14.Favourite brand of clothing? No favourite
15.Where would you retire to? Somewhere with a good LNS
16.What was your most recent memorable birthday? 40
17.Favourite sport to watch? Gymnastics
18.Furtherest place you are sending this? All round the world since it's on my blog
19.Person you expect to send it back first? Not sure
20.Are you a morning person or a night person? Both
21.What is your shoe size? 7 (37)
22.Pets? 4 cats
23.Any new and exciting news you'd like to share with us? Nope, all is nicely normal at the moment, yay!
24.What did you want to be when you were little? I had no idea whatsoever – still don’t, LOL
25.How are you today? Pretty good thanks
26.What is your favourite sweet? Anything that contains chocolate
27.What is your favourite flower? Ones with variegated petals
28.What is a day on the calendar you are looking forward to? Sept 19 – girls day out to a Craft & Quilt show
29.What are you listening to right now? Radio Hauraki
30.What was the last thing you ate? Fresh iced cinnamon buns
31.Do you wish on stars? No
32.If you were a crayon, what colour would you be? Yellow
33.How is the weather right now? Sunny with clouds and windy
34.The first person you spoke to on the phone today? Don’t know, it was a wrong number!
35.Favourite soft drink? Lemon
36.Favourite restaurant? Sangeets
37.Real hair colour? Dark brown
38.What was your favourite toy as a child? Can’t remember
39.Summer or winter? Summer
40.Hugs or kisses? Hugs
41.Chocolate or Vanilla? Chocolate
42.Coffee or tea? Neither
43.Do you want your friends to Post you back? Yes
44.When was the last time you cried? Almost this morning – a friend was upset
45.What is under your bed? Dust Bunnies
46.What did you do last night? Watched TV and did sudoku
47.What are you afraid of? My kids getting hurt
48.Salty or sweet? Sweet
49.How many keys on your key ring? 4
50.How many years at your current job? 9 months
51.Favourite day of the week? Saturday
52.How many towns have you lived in? Just Auckland, but many suburbs within that city
53.Do you make friends easily? Sometimes
54.How many people will you send this to? Everyone who reads my blog
55.How many will respond? One or two maybe - but if you do play along, post a comment and I'll come read yours :)

Surprises in the mail

Isn't it just lovely?




The wonderful Floss sent this surprise in the mail to me this week.




I'm thinking of finishing it as a bell pull, and then hang it on my computer desk where I'll see it every day.

Thanks Floss!