Things I'm Loving 11.2.11

♥ Little Lifesaver ♥

Never really seen Noah wear a singlet before. But the boy looks goooooooooood. Kinda Pop Eye meets Baywatch dontcha think? We had to explain that a 'lifesaver' had nothing to do with a 'lightsaber' though - LOL!

♥ Sunflowers ♥

These puppies are up there with jasmine, daphne and roses as my favourite flowers. Grown in our garden, even better! It's taken four months for them to flower, and we only got two good sunflowers but we'll take it!

♥ Car Crazy ♥

This week it's all about the car. Mylo has been itching to get into the car and drive at every opportunity. So much so that the other morning, he brought me his shoes over as in 'Mum please put on my shoes so I can go in the car' and then proceeded to say 'car' and then 'in the car?' 

♥ Is it a bird, is it a plane? ♥

Actually what I really want to say is: 'Is it a dress, is it a nightie?' This was a lovely gift from Mark's parents. It is the loveliest fabric - colour and texture. Technically, according to the label it's a nightie. But I almost think you could get away with it as a dress? I'm kinda game to give it a go. What do you think? Could I get away with it? Or is it too nightie-ish?

♥ But definitely a plane ♥


Yesterday Daddy took Noah on an impromptu trip to the airport to see the new 777-300ER on its special one-off trip to Wellington to showcase the 5 new planes Air NZ are about to launch. He was made up. And seeing the black All Blacks plane at the airport at the same time...mint.

♥ Dan and Camilla ♥

That's not a typo. I didn't mean Charles and Camilla, although this IS about the royals. Dan is a friend of ours from way back - one of Mark's best mates from his days working at Kuoni Travel in the UK. Our fondest memories of Dan are from our trip together to Sri Lanka and the Maldives back in 2001, after the boys jointly won a trip there and the girlfriends (me and Heidi) tagged along for the ride.

Well, last week I saw via Dan's Facebook that his younger sister Camilla has just landed herself a major break, playing the part of Kate Middleton in the Lifetime movie being made about William and Kate. She's starring alongside a Kiwi guy, Nico Evers-Swindell, cousin of the famous rowing twins. I can see why they've picked her for the role can't you?! Definite likeness.

It's so nice to see an unknown actress trying to make it good in Hollywood getting a break like this!

♥ Even in the Small Things ♥

He is Faithful. To cut a long story short, I've been trying to find a Microsoft Money software box around the house that I KNEW I had.

I knew I had seen it a couple of weeks ago when I was tidying up the spare room cupboard in anticipation of our English contingent arriving. But when I went to look for it in the obvious places the past few nights, it was NOWHERE to be found. Believe me, I've been hunting high and low for the past 3 nights, and pretty well turned the house upside down looking. Why this disc is so important (well that's a whole other story), but I was getting REALLY REALLY P.O.-ed especially since I knew I had seen it just recently. Yes my poor mummy memory ain't what it used to be, but I still KNEW I'd seen it. Anyway, after hunting high and low through cupboards, drawers, under beds and even in the garage for about the fifteenth time tonight, I stopped long enough to say a quick prayer, more out of frustration than anything. Along the lines of 'God, please just help me find the blimin box, I'm soooo sick of looking and quite frankly I'm just want to give up!'. Within two minutes, I'd found the box. But I had to smile, as it didn't even have the disc I needed inside, it was just the empty box. But I couldn't really be mad, cos He really had helped me do what I'd asked. It wasn't His fault the disc was otherwise misplaced.

Fast forward two hours: I went into another cupboard looking for something completely unrelated. And there, staring me in the face was the disc under a pile of other stuff I just happened to lift up looking for this other thing. Oh boy.

He IS Faithful.

♥ We are Loving ♥

This is not just a me, so much as a WE! Whilst lying in bed the other night, I was scrolling through Facebook on the iPhone and discovered this gem. I laughed so hard that I woke up a 'just asleep' Mark. He was not best pleased. Until I showed him the clip. And even he agreed it was worth being woken up for.






And I guess the fact we have a Darth Vader mad kid in our house right now adds a whole heap to the appeal of the clip. B.r.i.l.l.i.a.n.t.

♥ Out of the mouths ♥

And finally, heard in my kitchen this morning. Me: 'Noah can you get the milk out of the fridge?' Noah: 'I sure can sweetheart'. Way to make Mummy's day!

Once again I'm linking up to Paisley Jade's Things I'm Loving linky:






I wholeheartedly believe that no matter what is happening in your life, there is always something that you can be thankful for... no matter how simple it is.

What's new with you kiddo?

Is it really possible you've only been alive for 504 days?

Five hundred days of magic and wonder.

Of laughter and exasperation. There have been both tears of joy and ones of frustration.

We've grown to love the total pickle-ish-ess-ness of your personality. Oh how you make us laugh. You have the funniest expressions.

And I don't think I've ever seen anyone able to scowl quite as well as you can.

We love your obsession with cars and wheels. And doors. And anything with buttons to press.

And balls, let's not forget balls!

We love your independence, wanting to feed yourself. And we love how much you love fruit - and how (well how can I say this delicately?) interesting that makes your nappies.

We love how you have embraced baby sign language and can tell us so many things:

• More - one finger  pointing into other open palm 
• Please - flat palm patting chest
• Milk - one hand squeezed together as if milking a cow  
• Eat - fingers and thumb pressed together at mouth

And you always tell us when you have Finished - frantic shaking of hands as if trying to dry them off. We love that you can ask us 'Where?' something is, and how you can point to where your eyes, ears, nose, mouth, hair and puku (Maori word for tummy) is.

We love how you wave night night and bye bye and blow kisses to us all.

We love how your vocabulary is starting to grow and you can say cat, ball, bike, car and vroom-vroom now.  But your favourite two words at the moment are definitely bubble and pop.

Maybe that's why we thought it'd be fun for Grandad to buy you a little bubble fountain so you could say bubble and pop to your heart's content.

We love how you have taken to riding your little trike around following Noah on his running bike, and how you think you're definitely big enough to have light saber battles with your big brother.

And that you're big enough to do anything that he's doing for that matter....

It's so sweet how much you want to be a part of the action. We need to work on the 'sharing' part a little, but that will come in time. With lots of gentle reminding.

We love how much you love your bunny (if you can call dragging him around in your mouth love that is!).

And how you love cuddling any soft toys. It is so cute how you bring them to your chest in a giant bear hug and cuddle them into your neck so there is absolutely no doubt how much you love them.

We loved Noah so much when he arrived, that I wondered how it could be possible to love another little person as much. But you have taught us a very important lesson about love.

Love doesn't divide, it multiplies.

So here we are. 500 days into a wider, deeper love than we ever knew could exist.

Face it kiddo, we love everything about you.

Saints Alive - that were good!

Take 4 people.

 A mummy and a daddy.

And their mummy and daddy visiting from far, far away.

Make it Friday night. Seven thirty would be a good time.

Give them an easy-to-find car park right across the road. Which will surprise them no end given its Sevens night in Wellington and the city is heaving.

Give them a quiet area of the restaurant far away from the noise of the bar and a table by the window. It will have a view of the new waka to be unveiled at Sunday's Waitangi celebrations, and a cheeky outlook onto the big screen showing the Sevens.

Take some tempura lime and chilli prawns for starters.

Followed by 2 massive 400g prime rib steaks, a venison Wellington, and a fish,crayfish and scallop selection. Don't forget the shoestring fries with aioli.

Give them a break after dinner, to chat some more while they consider if there could possibly be room for dessert. They'll work out there's really not much so they'll just share one Boca Negra - chocolate fudge cake with Pinot Noir strawberries between them all.

What does all this add up to? A night they will never forget at Saint Johns Bar. They'll declare it the best meal they've had in ages. And they'll be right.

Things I'm Loving 4.2.11

♥ On the wall ♥

It's really not until the artwork is on the wall that I feel I can truly say the bathroom is finished. But now it is. And I'm loving Santorini Version 2 so much better than Version 1. It only took me two years to get around to turning it into a work of art that I love, but I got there in the end. I'm also stoked at how the sky in the word art photo so closely matches the shade on the wall (Resene Zircon) and also the blues of the other Santorini picture. Nice one.

♥ Vanilla Rooibos Tea ♥

Discovered thanks to Paisley Jade's Things I'm  Loving post last week - and I'm now officially addicted. The fact that it's caffeine free - even better!

♥ Bubbly Bubbles ♥

I've never been much of a bubbly drinker, preferring still whites like sav, reisling or gewurtzraminer as my drink of choice. That was until this summer. My mum quite likes a medium bubbly wine, and after we'd open a bottle to have with dinner over our holiday, I found mysellf needing to finish off the bottle each night - well no-one wants to drink flat bubbly the next day now do they?! It's no wonder I came back from the holiday a couple of kilos heavier!

Last week I found a low alcohol, eco friendly bubbly that Banrock Station do called Frizzante, yummo.











And tonight, people, because I know you all want to know I'm drinking Yellowtail Rose Bubbles. And even better, now I've found a resealable lid I don't have to drink the lot in one go! Although it was fun.

♥ Couch Potatoes ♥

It's rare to see the two boys sitting so still so close together. And it was probably only because Kung Fu Panda was distracting them that it even happened. But what was even lovelier to see is that they're actually cuddled up next to Grandad in this pic. Although I'm not allowed to show you.. he wouldn't let me post a picture of him half naked on the blog (read: shirt off the summer heat!

 ♥ New Treasures ♥

I love new bling. And my dad-in-law is otherwise known as Mr. Bargain Hunter extraordinaire. Every two years when they make the trip out to NZ, I'm treated to some amazing treasures, found at a fraction of their value in various nooks and crannies. Talk about feeling like royalty!

 ♥ Lemon Larry  ♥

I love watching this guy. I have to laugh and shake my head at how one could find this even remotely tasty. Don't get me wrong, I love the taste of lemon in things, it's one of my favourite flavours. But I'm still not sure I could ever munch away happily on lemon skin like this guy does. Or is he happy - cue bottom right photo!

 ♥ Internet Tethering ♥

Say what?! Unless you have an iPhone, this will probably not interest you in the slightest. But I was mildly (read muchly) excited to realise that you can use your iPhone as a wireless connection to the Internet when you don't have any other Internet access (like for when we're at the beach house in a couple of weeks' time). The joys of technology! All you have to do on your iPhone is go to Settings: General: Network: Internet Tethering: Turn On.

Then connect up your iPhone to your laptop via USB and Bluetooth, find your iPhone in your Network connections and voila - instant Internet access. How. Cool. Is. That. 

Yes, I realise my fascination with techie geeky things is probably not shared by many.

 ♥ Awesome Teachers ♥

I love our daycare teachers. And they love our kids. We mentioned our concerns about Noah being a bit bereft once all his friends have moved on to school. And the teachers had already recognised it, talked about it, and have a plan of action in place. Earlier this week they took Noah aside and told him that he was going to the 'Number One' boy, their 2-I-C, and that as the oldest he would have special responsibilities like helping hang up artwork, and helping transition the little kids over from the younger side when they turn three. A similar thing happened to another boy this time last year, and the teachers found this was a great way to bring out his leadership skills and make him feel like he was really special as the oldest at the centre. I remember the young boy they're talking about. Particularly I remember how much Noah and all his friends really looked up to this boy so it gives me hope that although things are changing, it can still be a really positive time for Noah. Thank you Lord for already answering our prayers.

♥ Friendship ♥

Where did the past three years ago? These photos taken on Aarnav's happy last day at daycare on Tuesday.

And these photos taken about 2.5 years ago on a weekend outing to Staglands. Go well good friends to your new school days.

Once again linking up to Paisley Jade's Things I'm Loving linky this week...in her words...

I wholeheartedly believe that no matter what is happening in your life, there is always something that you can be thankful for... no matter how simple it is. 

How To: Make My Photobook (Part 2)

Part 1 was all about creating your collages in Picasa. If you missed it, click here. Now we're going to set up the photobook in Snapfish for printing.

Snapfish is one of many different online photo companies around the world. But if it's not available in your location, there will be something very similar.

So without further ado, Part 2:

In Snapfish, you have various options for photo layouts and size of photobook.I personally like the symmetry of a square book (options are 20 x 20cm or 30 x 30cm). I chose to make the custom 30 x 30 cm hard cover book. I think the beautiful collages you will have created look so much better displayed in a large book.

Your blank photobook will initially look like this.

Once your blank photobook has loaded, you then need to upload all the photo collages you want to use into an album. When uploading photos from your computer onto Snapfish, make sure that you use the drop-down for Advanced Settings and choose the 'Large Print Upload' option. This will keep the best possible resolution for your collages.

Once you have all the photos uploaded to an album, click on Add All.

If you have the photos in the exact order you want and don't envisage changing pages around, you can click on the Autofill button before leaving the page and it will fill up your photobook pages in the order of the photos.

Once back at the photobook page, you need to change your Layout to One per Page by looking through the '1 photo' layout options. If you hover over the full page, it will give you the 'Apply to Every Page' option.

Once you have applied the full page layout design, your pages will look like this.

As I mentioned in my Photobook: Part 1, it's really important that you now click on the Safe Area icon. This will show you where the margins are on the page to ensure that your collage pictures and text aren't cut off during the printing process.

That would be a travesty after all your hard work! But hopefully, if you've left a nice white margin around the edge of each collage as instructed in Part 1, you'll be fine - like this example below!

You can save your photobook and come back to it any number of times, but just make sure you save the project before you exit.

With regard to the photobook back and front covers, you can add a photo as normal, and add Snapfish's text over the top. But what I chose to do (since the Snapfish text options are more limited, was just upload my own picture that already had text embedded in the photo and simply ignored their text boxes.

As I've mentioned before, it's also worth signing up to receive the email offers from Snapfish so that if you wait for a deal, you will often get up to 50% off the normal product price.

Here's the link to my completed Exploring Beauty 2010 photobook online at Snapfish.

With regard to delivery options, it's usually cheaper to go for a 'pick-up' at local retailer rather than delivery to a residential address. Check out your closest retail locations when you place your order.

I've also had requests from people to share some of the backgrounds that I've used in my photobooks, and I now have some Web albums saved with these files. I have approximately 200-odd backgrounds in 7 albums. The background files within each album can be downloaded individually or as a whole album. If you'd like to access these, just email me using the link on the right hand side of the blog, or leave me your email address via a comment below and I'll send you the web addresses.

As always, I'm happy to answer any questions. I hope you have fun creating!