ANOTHER TWOFER

DECEMBER 9 (sort of!) - FRUIT MINCE

Well I'm cheating actually, as I was out from 9am to 9pm yesterday, one thing after another but nothing I could photograph (swimming - no cameras allowed, meetings etc.) so this is a photo of the big batch of fruit mince I finally whipped up this afternoon!  I will macerate it for a few days and next week I will make enough mince pies to feed an army!  I have been perfecting my recipe over the last few years so I will use this photo in my recipe book!

DEC 10 - RONIN'S PRESCHOOL CONCERT

We all trotted along to Ronin's preschool Christmas Concert today, not that there was much "Christmassy" about it, apart from the Aussie version of Jingle Bells involving a large cardboard ute and kids pretending to be kelpies......  MIL was most peed off about the non-religious program despite my trying to explain that it is an "end of year concert" displaying what they had learned during the year..... Anyway it was quite hysterical and Ronin loved the dancing part.  I've included some more photos down further here.  I was most interested to see that all the little girls new the words to the songs and when included all the AUSLAN (sign language) actions but the boys just sat there trancelike through those ones LOL!!!  Obviously a gender thing!  We were supposed to attend a family picnic and disco this evening but Ronin didn't want to go back, and after two flat-out days we were happy to go with that and stay home and put up the new tree!  I've included some photos of the tree, and also one of Chris and Taylor putting the star on top.  It was nice to do it with him home for a change!!!

SCRAPBOOKING

I'm sharing a couple of layouts from the current newsletter from The Scrap Heap - www.thescrapheap.com.au

This first one was a challenge set by the lovely Chrissy Berry to use the colours Blue and Brown.  I love these Basic Grey papers and rub-ons!  The photo is a great family self-portrait of Chris's brother Ron, his lovely partner Belinda and their gorgeous girl Rhylie.

The second one was for a flower theme, once again using new Basic Green papers, the photo is my favourite one taken by SIL Debbie of her beautiful baby Regan.

Here are the extra photos I promised, the new tree comes with LED lights, it's a bit shorter and comes in 3 pieces, so it takes a little longer to erect, but it is much sturdier and nicer looking so we are all very happy now!

I love the photo of Ronin with his hands on his head.  The teacher rattles her tambourine at any time and the children all immediately stop and be quiet and put their hands on their heads (in theory anyway!).  He is usually pretty quick at it too!

We had a great weekend last weekend too.  I took Taylor and 3 friends to see "High School Musical 3" at the movies.  I was told by Taylor that I was not allowed in to the cinema, and my reaction to that was horror!  How could I get to see it myself without using them as an excuse to be there? So they kindly let me attend as long as I didn't sit with them.  I sat up the back in the disabled area and I must say that it was much better than being with that bunch of noisy girls (I guess they were annoying, the lady behind them moved half an hour in!).  The cinema itself was scarily full of tween to teen girls and their friends, mothers, Aunts etc. (obviously also needing the validation of taking a child!).  A few men and boys trickled in furtively once the lights had gone down LOL!  I really enjoyed the movie, it was more in the tradition of the first of the series, in that it revolves around a High School Musical, it is located in the school and centres mostly on the relationship between Troy and Gabriella, and now also the challenges and decisions facing them as their high school years draw to a close.  The music is great, the production numbers awesome and I was back to being a 17 year old girl again, madly in love with Zac Efron, at least for an hour or so!!!  I give it 4 stars!

That's it for me for the moment.  More cooking and craft tomorrow, so no doubt more photos!

See you then!

Tracey xx