Winter sunshine productivity

Yep, the sun has been shining down, everyone is recovered and we have all been busy, busy, busy. I finally finished this little corduroy bunny for a friend's baby boy. I even managed a little embroidery so all the big brothers know who this bunny belongs too.

Legoman was inspired to do a little deconstruction. He is itching to take the back of our house apart piece by piece, sometimes I humour him and let him destroy things. In this case, some rafters and lattice on our silly little deck that block the light and don't really offer much else. ( Except perhaps structural support, hoping the whole thing doesn't keel over now).

I do like being able to see more of that wonderful old frangipani tree. When we renovate, the lounge room will extend out to the cubby door and we are thinking of putting a big fixed pane window in to enjoy looking out onto that lovely tree. In the meantime, I need to finish painting that back wall of the house in just one shade of grey.

We also started work on the back garden. This potentially snake infested prairie that was a for a short time our chook run, was next on the list. (Our chooks were foxed about this time last year, we will probably get some more after we renovate). There is a nasty raised garden bed under here that we are going to dig out, this will give us more lawn and then we will put some thought into some new planting along the back fence.

And would you believe it but the minute there is rampant  destruction, neighbourhood boys are flushed out and ready to wield mattocks. We need all the enthusiastic ten year olds we can get, there is a vast quantity of CARPET under all the dirt. We have already found masses of it already, if you are lucky it comes out in a sheet, otherwise it seems to come out one unravelled strand at a time.

And it wasn't all work and no play either. Since we had all this spare wood from the deck decon lying around, surely something could be done.

How about making a start on a treehouse platform thingy, for crazy wild stunt swinging.

Hard to get a good shot when they are having this much fun.

Next weekend, there is going to be a whole lotta digging going on over here at Betsy's.

Australia day heroes

It was a public holiday today, a day off work and school to celebrate the greatness of our wonderful country. Apparently that necessitated  an entire post school afternoon of costume design and production. Actually the whole week involved intense discussions about planning the ultimate water bomb fight, secret codes for signaling the start of the bombing and requirements of action hero costume production for said fight.

I have mentioned before that our street really gets into parties. Last year two local streets combined to celebrate Australia Day with a barbie on the lawn which later degenerated into a waterfight between the Menace brothers and some older kids. So this year, they were planning a revenge assault, covert of course.
My stash of lycra, sequin and satin fabrics was raided, copious safety pins used and look what we knocked together while grieving the fact that holidays were over and school was back.

This was the trial run with the water blasting machines. Before we prepared the water bombs. Let me just say that there was no time for photos at the actual party but copious water bombs were dispatched and our old street is the perfect slope for a slip and slide. And not the shop bought kind, the original slip and slide with 3 tarps joined together and a whole bottle of diswashing liquid.  If only I had managed to get that photo of Roboboy skidding down on his knees, cape flying behind him.

I did manage to nab this one though. Can I preface it by mentioning that dirt is really good for the  immune system.

It has been raining a lot here this week. Some areas of Queensland have flooded, again. Many children have been cooped up in new classrooms going slightly crazy. This started out as a simple play in a puddle across the road in gumboots. And then the Menace brothers came home from school.

Then all of a sudden there is a mud pit, sliding area, mud pies, gumboots being used as mud carrying vessels and mud body paint. All over. I suspect the Menace brother's mother was wishing she had chosen after school sports that day. Or perhaps even that we had not moved in 18 months ago.

Me, I'm just hoping all that mud washes out of that brand new school uniform. The socks unfortunately could not be salvaged. But the memories........ priceless.

Holiday Hijinks

Well we seem to be settling into our school holiday groove. While I was looking forward to 6 weeks without clock watching, I was more than a little worried how my kidlets were going to go spending all day together. So far there have been some moments of pure joy like this one,  kicking back on the home made- lets- destroy- the- lounge and make a fort. Must check for pirates.

Yikes, I think I see some. What are they doing to those babies?

Now that is just a tad concerning. Surely they are not going to eat them without sauce.

Aaargh I see, lets have a duel then shall we. With that oldest Menace brother neighbour popping over, there is never a dull moment. See even his budgie Buddy is happy to get into the pirate theme and do the parrot on shoulder thing.

Since we've got all day, lets make a whole rainbow of playdoh colours.

Buddy was a little threatened by his playdoh replica and proceeded to try and pick off his embellishments.

While Liongirl napped, Roboboy worked on the architectural plans for his house. He likes to talk out loud to himself to problem solve what else he needs. There was a long dialogue about where to put his best friend for a sleepover. Should it be on the top of the 4 story bunk bed or perhaps they could share a bed. Could boys actually get married? His poor best friend is a little stressed as Roboboy had written  him a note about getting married and the best friend really just wants to marry a girl in their class. Best friends mother stepped in and pointed out that "marry" was not actually spelt  " Maree" and therefore Roboboy must have been meaning something else entirely. Phew, crisis averted. The bachelor pad appears to have  a sustainable vege garden, bowling alley,waterslide, aeroplane runway and elevator shaft running through the middle.

Ok plans are done, lets knock up a quick castle.

Parents won't agree to an i phone? Just whip your own up. Complete with i pad and docking pod to charge the phone up.

And if things are getting a little dull, there is always a Tupperware container cupboard to sort and tidy. We need some more space for the pyrex.

And finally with a mere 5 days to go, we popped down to our local park to find a dead stick to drag home.  Yes that corner of the lounge room is still half undercoat half custard. Resolutions will be made shortly.

We also found PROOF that Christmas is imminent. Stay posted for photographic evidence and other festivities.

Mud pies and thrifty buys

We have had the busiest sunniest weekend in the world. What could be a better start to the weekend than a vintage garage sale hosted by the queen of cupcakes and vintage fabric, miss Laura from Kit & Nancy.  She and a few other vintage lovers had a massive cleanout and I was more than happy to come and relieve her of a few unwanted tablecloths, teatowels and pillowcases. Oh yes, and that lovely piece of milk glass.

Another friend  had a little pile of Enid Blytons that had to come straight home for Roboboy. There was also a lovely metal outdoor chair in the perfect size for Liongirl, once I whip up some cushions for it I'll share a photo.

I had a surge of sewing focus last night at midnight and savagely snipped into this pile. A St George teatowel,   a very stained tablecloth and some dotty fabric are on their way to adorning my lounge.

I also had a little moment at Spotlight the other day. Legoman was kind enough to let me know that there was a 30 % off sale on everything in store so I could pop in my way home from work. I did actually need some fabric for my sewing group so could justify most of this little pile.

And what about the mud pies? Well, it's actually a pizza pie and Roboboy had not yet sprinkled on the grass cheese when this photo was taken.

We've been having a grand old time mucking around with this stuff all day. Roboboy is working his standard "I really want to be in a Target catalogue" pose. Goes so well with the giant mountain of dirt.

We have made quite massive progress in our garden today. This laundry tub was salvaged from underneath Betsy and finally has been planted out with some herbs.

And the mere sight of a trailer load of dirt just flushed out  those Menace brothers from two doors down. They even brought their own shovels and helped us fill and plant out our vege garden bed.

 There was much discussion about  planting based on the merits of vegetables in Plants vs Zombies and significant disappointment over the fact that we have no pea shooters, hypnotic mushrooms or cherry bombs. We did plant corn ( which provides a catapult and cannon apparently), carrots, lettuce, and cherry tomatoes. The "burpless" cucumbers had everyone picturing little rows of normal cucumbers burping away. Actually maybe that was just me. Photos of our stellar efforts including possum proofing coming soon.

Linking in with Sophie for some weekend vintage thrifty sharing.

Spelunking in the suburbs

Firstly, if you are like me you will be wanting to know what the heck spelunking is.  Legoman, while often unable find the salt directly in front of him in the pantry, is a wealth of information about all things trivial, particularly with interesting names. I am informed that spelunking is a much more interesting word than caving or cave exploration.

Secondly, if you are like me you will be wondering where on earth are there caves in suburban Brisbane? Well, let me fill you in on our adventure filled Sunday. Last weekend, while scoping out the lookout at Mt Gravatt mountain, Legoman discovered a geocache nearby. The cache description stated to never look for this one at night, and that it was not safe for children. We figured in broad daylight we would press on and I would turn back with the kids if it became too rugged.

We easily found the cache and then turned around and saw this huge hole. About 3 m deep we of course had to climb down and have a look. Unfortunately, being a cave and all it was too dark to see much. So an expedition was planned with our neighbours the Menace brothers  for the following weekend. Backpacks were stocked with provisions, torches, rescue rope and maps. The Menace brothers being the oldest were straight in.

Liongirl, who had dressed for caving with boots, fairy skirt and pet lamb, was given the coveted job of winding up the battery free Ikea torch.

When we got to the bottom this time, we were prepared for some serious exploration.

I had felt a breeze down there last week and suspected a connection to a larger cave we had found. Sure enough, there was a tunnel and the boys were off.

A few minutes later and we stepped out into a massive cavern with several light well holes filled with ferns. Hence the suggestion not to go geocaching around these parts in the dark. Yep, the tiny figures at the bottom are the dads.

And we found the other bigger cave entrance, no warning signs, no barricades, no theme park entrance ticket booth.  Just pure unadulterated boy's own adventure stuff with the possibility of spiders, bats,  a cave in, skeletons and treasure. For the record we only saw some dead huntsmen spiders and a small frog.

But it was so super exciting, we had to go all the way back through and up our original rope.

And then we packed up all our gear and talked about caving, and talked some more and then we were all so hyped up we thought we had best find some more geocaches. The caves must be known to locals as there was evidence of a fire within the large one and they are quite close to some houses that back onto the forest, but I am still amazed that they were not closed to the public for safety reasons.

 We were thankful for the opportunity to take a risk and sail unchartered waters so to speak. I think that opportunities like these  are particularly important to boys who thrive on quests and adventure and whose everyday lives are often so safe and sanitized that they can only obtain this kind of adventure in a computer generated world.

After all this we were pretty worn out so it was straight up to the cafe for Lemonade icypoles.

There is nothing better than  adventuring in your own backyard with neighbourhood mates. We feel so lucky to live where we do and have a neighbourhood of like minded kids and parents. And we are getting really excited about Halloween as our whole street gets right into this celebration as well.