WHAT'S COOKING?

If you're looking for something to do with the kids in the lead-up to Christmas here's an easy idea.

Buy a packet of Sweet Short Pastry sheets from the supermarket - any brand.

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C.

Dig out your cookie cutters (find the kids old playdough cutters or use or a glass). Cut the patry into shapes.

Sprinkle with grated chocolate or sprinkles or sugar (brown or castor sugar).

Bake for 10 minutes.

Easy peasy. 2 sheets of pastry makes zillions. They taste and look just like shortbread with abolutely no hassle.

Elliot (6) made these this morning.

THESE BOOTS WEREN'T MADE FOR WALKING

More embellishment (and another boot). I've been told I should sell them but that kind of misses the point - about scrapping generally. It's an act of love. You couldn't sell them!

BOOTS IN PROGRESS

I haven't done much scrapping lately. Apart from a couple of circle journal pages I haven't had the inclination.

Until now.

I opened the latest Up2Scrap magazine and was blown away by Lara's altered gumboots. I think it wasn't so much the art work but the idea. SHE ALTERED GUMBOOTS. That's what I love about Lara - she is an original. She doesn't always do what everyone else does.

I had to email Lara to tell her that not only did I love her idea but I raced out to our tool shed and found some old gumboots and started making some myself. (They started out black.) Later I realised I had not read the rest of Up2Scrap - it was sitting on the kitchen bench having only made it to the gumboot page.

















So here are my 'boots in progress' - still lots of embellishments to do.

And the verdict from my family:

Caitlin - "You are so weird, Mum. But I want the blue one!"
Elliot - "Awesome!"
Darryn - no words, just a strange look as though I might be coming down with something!

SAY WHAT?

Here's one for Janine....

One day the new entrants teacher was reading the story of Chicken Little to her class. She came to the part where Chicken Little warns the farmer.

She read... "and Chicken Little went up to the Farmer and said, "The sky is falling!"
The teacher then asked the class "And what do you think the Farmer said?"

One little girl raised her hand and said "I think he said, 'Holy Sh*t. A talking chicken!' "

The teacher was unable to teach for 10 minutes.

HOW MANY HOURS SLEEP?

How many hours sleep do you need?

Last night I had 5 hours sleep. 2 am - 7am. Not a usual situation. Brought about by a client function at Darryn 's work. But it got me thinking. My optimum is 9 hours sleep - 10pm-7am. That rarely happens. But I do usually get 8 hours. When my kids were little I worked out that I could function if I got 7 hours a night (albeit broken sleep). When I had my scrapbooking business (Tuatara Tales) I usually had 6 hours sleep! Not good.

I've noticed that when I read profiles of high achievers they appear to need less sleep than we mere mortals. Many CEO's I've talked to only seem to need 4-5 hours sleep.

What do you need?

BAD BLOGGER

A bad blogger, apparently, is one who doesn't post too often. Lately some people may have begun to describe me as one.

But I say there is no such thing as a bad blogger, just a person having a life! A busy life. Like I've had this week: running kids to school; to after school activities; going to the gym every day; going to a parents evenings at school; a meeting or two; housework; garden stuff; dinner out; cooking for visitors; having a mammogram; getting the icemaker on the new fridge fixed; posting Christmas parcels to the US; completing a circle journal page. You know. Busy people. Life stuff. No blogging.