Happy New Year!!!!

I see I have some new followers...WELCOME!!! & sorry I have been so quiet lately, it's cos I have been so busy!
In the past few months we have had some possibly life altering decisions to make for our son; which Intermediate he should go to. It has been very stressful. After many hours of research, discussions, to-&-fro, & ballots we have decided on Farm Cove Digital area.  He is very excited as this means he will be going to Nana's school like he wanted, but not with his best friend.  It also means he will be 80% on a laptop.  We are hoping this will encourage & motivate him to do his school work more.  Part of the deal is we have to supply him with a laptop, so guess what he got for Xmas?  He can't wait until school starts & wants to go & get his uniform & stationery ASAP.  We have a carpool/bus system organised as it is to far to walk.

Obviously Daniel finished Primary school this year.  The school had a lovely graduation assembly for all the Year Six students. He will miss some of his friends (including girlfriend) for the next 2 years. They will all be back together at College soon.....
Daniel moved up to Sea Scouts at the beginning of term 4. He wasn't sure about it at first, but now loves the sailing. Apparently capsizing is "Epically EPIC!!!!"
Nicola shall be moving up to the middle school, but has been separated from her best friend for her own good.  I got very frustrated with the school & even contemplated moving her. They don't start till the 7th of Feb!!!! NO holiday programmes run that last week cos ALL the other schools have gone back.  I got a really rude email from secretary when I asked about who I should direct my complaint to, I am thinking of contacting the BOT.  I wonder how many kids will turn up a week early cos their parents didn't notice the date in tiny print on the newsletter, or people who are new to the area.  I was absolutely fuming, but don't deal well with conflict.....
Nicola was in the Howick Santa Parade again this year with Nicola & her Brownie Troupe.  She loves it.
Then see went to Brownie Regional camp with Elizabeth & Shona.  She had a fantastic time (no problems sleeping) & can't wait till the next camp.  She made lots of new friends :)
I have been having problems with dealing with someone from a certain somewhere where a woman's opinion means nothing.....makes working life very difficult.  He keeps ringing my boss to check everything I say.  After 5 years of working with this guy, my boss finally said that, yes THAT was the problem....sigh.....not like I can change!!
Scott started a new job in December.  They sent him to Oz for a training course & he won an Xbox!!  The kids were very excited as our PS3 has been broken for ages.  However we may have to ban it in the early morning as it sounds like a herd of elephants jumping upstairs!!!  The Kinex games are great fun, but hard work!!!
Christmas was odd this year.  We didn't really feel very Christmasy.  But I felt it sort of snuck up on us.  We were all involved in the RWC, then the elections & then suddenly it was Christmas!  It definitely felt low key, but the kids are happy & that's all that matters.  My home computer finally died so I got a new one, it is so quiet I can hear the hard drive spinning!!!!!  Nicola got an iPod touch from Santa & now I get nagged by text "Mum, can I have a glass of water....MUM....." Scott is building a firewall cos she is getting text bullied by a friend...sigh.....I am talking to her about how friends shouldn't make her so unhappy....Daniel took over iPod for awhile to try to get through to this kid what sh was doing to Nicola....sigh....
Because of Scott's new job the whole family has a couple of weeks on holiday together for the first time in years.  However we didn't know about it till to late to organise anything so we are planning some day trips.  The weather is disgusting!  We went to visit friends up north on the best day weather wise, but still not nice enough to go sailing.
I have not done much scrapping since camp in October, don't know why.  However since I haven't posted for so long it looks like I have done heaps!!
I did this one for the Halloween challenge at camp & won!!!!!!!!!  (Those of you who know me will know how surprised I was) I got a new trimmer! I nicked the plastic spiders from the weekends decorations (I asked Debbie first), hehe.  It is difficult to see in this pic, but the fence has bats in it, thanks Bev for letting me borrow the punch it is no longer available.

I got the photos from our family trip to South Africa in 1987 scanned & printed & took them to camp to work on.  I love this photo of our family in the back of the van at the Kruger Game Reserve.

I am really happy with this school one, quiet different from some of the others I have done.

This is the LO I did from Louise's class at camp.  Love the combination of clustered embellishments & white space.

This is another South Africa LO which I did for the October challenge at NZ Paper Chase blog

These two cuties are actually my hubby & his big bro when they were little.  I started this LO ages ago & am happy to finally finish it.

I have been giving Nicola fancy mini jewelled boxes each Christmas since she was born.  I thought it would be nice to collect something pretty for her that she can still play with.  I have been getting annoyed that we can't always find them so I bought printers tray thing to display them in, yay for Trademe.  Obviously we had to decorate it.....I did cause a problem for  myself. Nicola wanted a red roof & I don't like red & pink together so I said she could have any colour of the rainbow..."I want rainbow!"  Oops!  I did that to myself!  So here it is complete with pink walls, a cat, fence, glass, flowers AND a rainbow roof.  I think it came out pretty well.  Now we just need to hang it up & find all her boxes to put in it. 

Lets start the new year with a giggle.  I was given the link to this website & it had me laughing so hard I cried so thought I would share with you....


http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/03/spiders-are-scary-its-okay-to-be-afraid.html