Christmas Gifts 2015

Let me record, before I forget, the highlights of the Christmas gifts -Nina's poo emoji chocolate coated meringues for Ruby, Grace's 'blue Basil with black beard and beret' for Craig, Lily's pottery bells for me and, not pictured, Ruby's handmade body wash and scrubs for everyone.

Canvas

by Ruby

by Grace

by Nina

by Lily

Over the Easter break Kim got the girls to do a painting on canvas.  Thank god for Kim.  Once I was that mother who got the paints out more or less daily, made playdough weekly, did endless craft projects with the kids, sat them on my knee letting them guide the fabric through the sewing machine, displayed their work in an endless rotation on walls and on this blog.  And I didn't do it out of matyrdom or because I thought I should. I really liked that stuff.  I loved nothing more than hauling all the craft stuff onto the kitchen table and getting all the kids involved in some messy project.  It was my number one way to pass an afternoon.  When other kids came for plays it wasn't unheard of to sew bags or make potato prints, or stick bits of pasta onto cardboard and paint them.

Now it seems all my kid-crafting mojo has left me.  After more than a decade of parenting I just cant be bothered.  Painting seems like a lot of mess and hassle, and then what do we do with the finished products?  The art work on the walls has remained unchanged all year.  The idea of sorting through it fills me with ennui.

Maybe that is just the way it is - we are moving onto a new stage and lingering in the last one isn't so interesting (for me).  Unfair on Lil, who is forced to listen to chapter books when I'm sure the others still got picture books every night at her age, and who doesn't even get to watch half the favourite movies of the others because they've all grown out of them.  Movie nights on the whole are more difficult now - the tastes of a 12 year old and a 5 year old rarely intersect.  Do we just abandon the idea of a family movie and run it over two nights instead - little kids and big kids? I dunno.

I think I peaked too early, went too hard, too fast and left nothing in reserve.  

FIVE

Lily turned five. It's a big deal, five and takes us well out of the world of very early childhood. There will soon be no more kinder, no more Fridays just the two of us. Before long she'll be reading and making her own bed and expanding her world outside the family. Everything about how I feel about this has already been written - probably throughout the recorded history of humanity -in more eloquent and appropriate words than I could hope to find so I won't indulge my own somewhat divided emotions. Instead I'll record the gorgeous gifts her sisters made for her: Nina a little stuffed bunny that Lily named 'Bunette'; Ruby, who loudly declares that she 'does NOT like sewing' made a little penguin wheat pack, which Lily named 'Penguana'; Grace spent ages constructing a box, with lid, to contain her 'make your own Pikachu necklace' gift. She exhorted Lily several times to 'respect the box'.

I stole the idea for the cake from here and succumbed to Lily's penchent for pokemon with a Pikachu onesie. The big girls made up a treasure hunt for Lily to find their presents - they spent ages coming up with the rhyming clues and the collaboration was not always harmonious, but it paid off in cheap thrills for Lil. It was a kindergarten day so Lily handed out party invitations to her class and we brought in special fruit skewers (cheap thrills for the kinder kids - so easy to please at that age) and she had her little chest puffed out with pleasure and pride. It was a lovely lovely day.

Still Life

Paintings by, from top to bottom, Grace, Nina, Ruby and Lily. They all count as still life because Lily's is actually a portrait of her doll, Gretel. These say so much to me about my four girls. I love them all.

Sherlie, Peter, Stella and Miranda, Katie, Mark, Richard and Lucy

Sherlie:  Kids, we have mail! From your fourth cousin twice removed daughter's daughter's son's wife!
Stella: Mail? Yay
Miranda: Mum! UR kidding!!! I haven't seen her since I was like 1!  Thats, err, 'news flash' 16! Years! Ago!

Dearest Sherlie and Family
Here are Katie and Mark's school portraits.  please enjoy.  Thanks for being such a great husbands mothers fourth cousin twice removed.  
Love Katie Mark, Richard and Lucy XOX

Miranda:  What is this crap?!
Sherlie:  It's so sweet

Sherlie: Maybe we sbould send them our school photos!
Miranda: Mum! I don't even know Katie or Mark. I look stupid in my pictures.  What if Katie things I'm an idiot!

Lucy: Looks like Sherlie replied to our letter and photos.
Katie: Who the hell is Sherlie?
Lucy: Just your very very distant husband's mother's mother's fourth cousin twice removed.
Katie: What!? You sent her our pictures?
Lucy: Not only her! Everyone else we know too!

Dear Lucy and Katie and Mark and Richard
We loved your pictures.  I have sent you Miranda and Stella's portrait.  We would love to catch up.
Love Sherlie, Peter, Stella and Miranda
Hey it's Miranda.  pls note that I look STUPID in my pic.  DON'T JUDGE

This is where Ruby is at lately  - somewhere between a graphic novel and a doodle.   She's always loved doing these little vignette's and has a great eye for detail and ear for language.   I love that she can convey so much with a few strokes of her pen.  I like the fill-in-the-blank on Lucy's form letter - 'thanks for being such a great _________________' (husband's mother's mother's fourth etc) .  And the look that Katie gives her mother when she realises her photo has been distributed far and wide is one I'm rather too familiar with.....

Miniature replica bedroom

How cool is this? During one of the many wet days last week Ruby and Nina decided to make their room in miniature. (Ignore the untidy real room, I took some quick photos just to give a compare and contrast and didn't stop to 'style')

The miniature version is unfinished but, you know, whether it ever will be finished and when are amongst the many unknowable things in life. Certainly any suggestion by me that they finish it will guarantee they never lookat it again.

They spent hours together looking for appropriate boxes, hunting through my scraps for just the right carpet and fabrics for their quilts. It's such a delight when they work together. The absence of bickering is a balm to my soul.

Can you see the tiny Plank chair with its tiny copy of 'Wildwood'.

Charlotte and Rosemary are there, along with a selection of books, including 'Wonder' and 'Liar & Spy' and even an old Charlie & Lola.  

Disco Seven

Ruby and Nina collaborated on Grace's present, making her a stone hedgehog and a special book to hide treasures in.  They asked me for a really dull book title that no one would to read and I gave them a few ideas, but they landed on the 'History of Taxation in Australia' by B.Oring (get it?).  It reminds me of a job interview I went to as a final year law student.  I knew where I wanted to work but wasn't sure I'd get offered 'articles', as they were then known, at the law firm of my choice, so I applied for various other firms, including one that specialised in taxation law.  The interview went along these lines: 'So I see that you haven't done tax law yet?' 'Uh, no.' 'You know that we are a taxation law specialist firm?' 'Uh yes'. 'Do you intend to do tax law?' 'Um no.' 'Well I strongly recommend you do tax law.'  Silence. We looked at each other, the interviewer and I.  We'd only been in the interview for about 5 minutes and he clearly didn't know what to do, so he gave me a tour of the library - a library in which, it was abundantly apparent to us both, I would never have the opportunity to work. When a respectable amount of time had passed, he hastily made his escape, leaving me to find my own way out.   

Grace was delighted, which was good because it was a lot of work ruling all those straight lines to look like the pages of a book.  Lily did a colourful drawing of eyes? peacock feathers? a tree with leaves? None of us know, and she changes her mind frequently.

Grace had settled on a disco party, so I did my now traditional 5 minute icecream cake (gotta work fast before the icecream melts).  I have learned that hours labouring over amazing cakes is not time well spent.  Chuck some lollies and sprinkles on it and watch it get wolfed down in minutes.

Grace had a sparkly skirt and a tinsel wig which she abandoned after a few dances as it was making her head hot.  Her friends danced shyly at first and then with increasing abandon until it couldn't really be called dancing - more leaping on each other in a display reminiscent of a 'stacks on'.  We did the limbo and played muscial chairs and danced like our favourite animals and then had honey joys and lemon slice and cocktail franks and all the traditional party food (but not chocolate crackles which I cannot abide).  Grace opened her presents, we danced some more, had the cake and the party was over.

Grace at seven is such a pleasure.  She remains enthusiastic, generally happy, sweet and just the slightest bit vague.

The Museum of Felted Wool Jewellry

If you like handcrafted jewellry and sipping tea while looking at handcrafted jewellry then the 'Museum of Felted Wool Jewellry' is just the place for you!

Take a look at our beautiful jewellry while drinking free refreshments.  Try your favourite peice of jewellry on and share a laugh with a friend or family member.  Meet the crafters and have fun all day long.

Bracelet of Water

Headband of peace

Braclet of Faith

There was great debate over whether the final piece should be devoted to justice or hope.  Which would you have chosen?

I was hoping for the ring of truth but no, it turns out it's a bracelet

Have we been taking the kids to too many museums?  I guess it's not that surprising that they decided to make their own.  The opening ceremony was a song and dance routine which required a lot of chanting of 'i'm a crafter' 'yeah' and so on.  I am a crafter but I'm not sure that chanting it in a quasi-rap is quite my preferred way of expressing that fact.

Our experience with museums has been a bit mixed.  Ones aimed at kids are a hit with them but interest me less.  The ones that I want to spend hours in hold their interest for only a fraction of the time I want there.  This results in a slightly rushed and anxious visit - I don't want to dawdle over the early musical instruments when there are are ancient and modern masters to be viewed and the pin has been pulled on the Lily-grenande.