Black Cat Boogie

Well we entered that strange world of school productions this week - Monday and Tuesday night saw Miss Millie take the stage as one of the 'alley cats' for her schools production 'Best Foot Forward'!!! I was SO proud of her - she was one of the kids at the front and remembered all her steps - one thing I will say about Millie is when she commits to something, she gives it 110% and didn't seemed fazed by the large audience (she is the one on the right with the white leotard on).
There is something about little people and performing which make me smile, the excitement of performing and their families watching, all the buildup and rehearsals and then the moment when they actually take the stage and get caught in the moment - I had the odd giggle as they are just so darned cute and funny but just so amazed at this young person who is just into life in such a HUGE way and wants to try and do everthing that comes her way - so cool!!!
Well we are settled into the rental we have secured while the house is being built - hope to get the final price to build this week - seems to have taken ages to get to this point and to be honest I think I will let Aaron look at the final bill - it might just put me off!!!! The kids seemed to have moved really well except for our wee guy who seems to think he is back at when he was a newborn and not going to bed until 11pm at night - little rascal!!!!
School holidays for the next 2 weeks and have got the odd thing planned for the kids but generally just some down time for Millie - she was really sick about 3 weeks ago to the point of being off school for 2 days and sleeping the day away - which she has never done before - and with the school production on two nights this week, is a bit tired so lots of sleep ins I think!!

Ciao for now
Meg

I was just thinking

as I sit here in bed typing this post listening to talkback (I know I'm a geek!!) as they are talking about and playing all sorts of music from a long time ago and it made me wonder in 30 or 40 years time what music will I be listening to and will the music I choose to listen to now will be considered 'classics'? I think there are some that will - like U2, who I love love love and even now it brings tears to my eyes - okay maybe not that bad- that I missed out on their concert when they came to NZ last year but our wee guy was only like 12 weeks old and it was going to be too hard a trip on him so we made the not so difficult decision in hindsight that we would not travel and see them, there will always be another opportunity but your children are only young once and there are some things you just have to forgo - which leads me to the fact that our wee guy is 1 next month! Holy heck where did that go - was it really nearly 11 months ago (actually I was probably sitting in bed then with a very pregnant stomach providing somewhere for the laptop to rest typing a post! It is amazing that the time leading up to that wee person joining us in the world seems to take SOOOOOOO long to be here but when you are well on the other side and they are trying to walk - yes walk I tell you- you realise that those photos are so precious, that journalling so important to record and then it makes you realise that scrapbooking is a wonderful process to be involved in!
Well it is only 6 more days and we have to leave this house and move into our rental house while our new house is being built - I was packing tonight (I am so over brown boxes and trying to make things fit into them - and it suddenly occurred to me that this is our last weekend in this house. ever. forever. And that makes me sad, really sad as this house has been a wonderful family home to us, it is the only house that my 3 children have ever lived in, Aaron and I got engaged in this house, we have brought our children home from the hospital to this house, the girls both had their first birthdays and learned to walk, I welcomed my sister back from living in Wellington after a refocus in her life and then farewelled her again, and probably the thing that this house has done is provide a shelter for our family, many of our friends when they needed a shoulder to cry on or a smile to celebrate with - I know that you take your memories with you but when I turn the key in the lock for the last time on Friday I will be sad, and I will reflect and I will take photos to remind us of our first family home................

Ciao
Meg

Being thankful......

So I have been reading Janines blog - on it she asks what are the little things that make us an individual's happy and it got me to thinking - do we only need the big things in our lives to make us happy or can we be content with the small things? For me it is a mixture of the two - I love when my three little munchkins sleep in to at least 7am and that Paige leaves her jammies on and doesn't climb into bed with us like a wee ice chip (sigh - what is it with 2 year olds and the inability to remain fully clothed.....) but then I also love when we do something big like booking our flights to Melbourne for my friend Minka's wedding, or choosing all the 'inside bits' for our new house - maybe it is human nature to always want more, improve what we have etc but on the flip side of the coin is this a bad thing if wanting more means improving our minds with study or a new hobby and is there anything wrong with wanting to strive and work hard in life to be able to improve our quality of life? No wrong or right answer with this one in my personal option but definitely a very debatable topic for all that!!!

I have heard over the last couple of days of a couple of incidents that have occurred in the industry which really sadden me - this is a drum that is often heard but I have always had the belief that scrapbooking is about preserving memories, giving ourselves a creative outlet and as is so often the case, the amazing opportunity to meet like minded people and there are so many amazing friendships that have come from chance meetings from events and forum and blogs that exist in the 'industry'. So when I hear stories of less than kind comments, mean spiritedness and just general 'tall poppy' syndrome it really does make me think of the old saying that 'If you have nothing nice to say, then perhaps refrain from saying anything at all'.

Don't get me wrong, everyone is entitled to their opinion, it's healthy and wouldn't the world be a boring place if we all thought the same things and performed the same actions, but there is a line between opinion and nastiness which usually occurs at the expense of certain individuals who work very hard to make a place for themselves in the world and who without them the scrapbooking industry would not be as colourful. I know that it all sounds very cryptic and that is not the intention of this post, but I do think that perhaps as a community we should celebrate our successes more and well focus less on what we don't like ................

On a separate note - go the kiwis in the yachting!!!

Ciao
Meg