two old friends

I got Catherine a barbie for christmas, and now my old barbies are making friends with the new one. And I decided to look out my old barbie clothes, alot them hand made, including a couple from my friend Luarna when she was young. I don't know if you remember making this skirt Luarna, but I still have it and now its being played with all over again>

Also, my friend Teresa and I cellebrated our 20 years of friendship this year, and at the very last moment we cellebrated by making and decorating a cake. Execpt Teresa had to rush off to midnight mass so she left her figuirine a bit rushed. "Please don't put this on face book" she said. So I asked her if I could put it on my blog and here it is. Next year we will cellebrate our 21st and give it another go and try and give ourselves more time. We decided to do me and her sitting back to back. I did her, and she did me. Cute!

dough decorations

I've had 2 of those days of what I always thought motherhood would actually be, but hasn't really been. I've finished all my "real" work, and I couldn't care less. I spent the last two days making inexpensive crafts with Catherine. I showed her how to make snow flakes out of paper, and paper chain angels, and today, apart from making scones, we also made some dough decorations which we will paint and varnish tomorrow. It was pretty cool, coz I joined in a made a chair and even a christmas tree for her dolls house!

The recipe for dough is:

1 cup flour

1/2 cup salt

1/2 cup water

some oil.

Put over a heat, and heat untill it combines, isn't sticky, but not hard.

Mold dough.

Cook at a low temperature for an hour (or so).

ho ho ho - roped in again :)

Well, another Christmas here, and another opportunity to get roped in by your church to do nativity scenes! Well, they only really asked me to draw in the outline, but call me vain... I just decided I should paint it in myself. It only ended up taking an hour or two, and ended up ok.


I've been blogging less lately. Mainly because I felt the need less and less to be introspective. Mainly because I've discovered some Philosophy lectures on the internet and it's made me think about things other than myself. It's also helped me come to terms with my self worth. Ie. what is the value of a human being above and beyond what they can contribute financially to the economy.

If I never made another dime, do I still have rights? Am I still of worth?

And other interesting stuff like how do I know what reality is. How do I know you even exist... how do I know I exist. Kinda fun things to think about and help to stop caring about how ppl may judge you for things you can't help.

dreamin dreamin

You know what? sometimes I dream of the perfect life. Or actually, just a different life. I dream of "independence". Living in a little flat supporting myself. It's probably really ungrateful, probably stupid too, to dream of living beneath my current situation, but to be honest, I feel like a bit of a looser still living at home with "Mummy". I dream of having my own freezer, and scouring the grocery leaflets to see what's on special, and cooking and freezing econimical meals to save money. I actually dream of paying my own bills, buying my own food, putting pennies aside for birthdays and christmas and making popcorn christmas decorations. I have friends who are just getting by, and I'm jealous. Stupid huh? But they get the satifaction of knowing that they managed on their own. They scrimped and saved, bought their own house, and they'll be able to look back at the tough times and be proud of how they made it through.

And this is the best blog entry I have ever read. What a dream! But I know the truth. The only difference between me and her is a little thing called "gratitude". And if I'm really honest with myself, sometimes when I really start to day dream about the things I'd like it starts to go a bit like this "I'd have to move out then build some compost bins (just like the ones we have), and dig up the lawn and make a garden (a bit like the one we have), and I'd like a gas stove (like ours) and I'd definitely have to have to have a garage full of tools (like the one I have now) and...... DOH! what's wrong with me??? I'm pretty much set up right now! I guess it's just true... the grass is always greener....

happy birthday... oh... and Merry Christmas!

Like our budget advent calender? I was going to purchase one, but decided against it... then Catherine has started asking me the last 2 days if Santa is coming tomorrow... so I made this. We will be crossing each day off I guess. Not that I couldn't have afforded to spend $3 on a proper one.... I didn't want to be in debt this year, so I saved up for Christmas by about March this time! But I'm putting into practice the truth thathat ya don't need money to be happy. A calender for christmas written in vivid is just fine, and I'm sure Catherine's gonna love it.

As for other stuff, I just had my 32nd birthday. I spent the day up at the bach and took a photo of me and my birthday rose. The story goes that Dad took a bunch of these to Mum at the hospital when I was born, and the matron commented on Dad's roses out of all the storebought bunches. I thought better get a photo of them in case they die or something, then I've got a record... coz actually, I don't even know their name!

Also, at the bach I took a photo of this letterbox. There were heaps of other cool ones, but felt a bit rude stopping the car to photograph them. People might wonder what I'm doing! But this is one of my favourite things about rural kiwi life... interesting letterboxes!