Jesus loves you

I've been in desperate need of some days at home with no activities or appointments. Last week was so hectic and i'm feeling exhausted from some late nights (well late for old nanna me) and waking to Sofie who doesn't want to sleep through the night apparently, so today i made sure that other than school drop off/pick up which i can't avoid we would have a day at home.

I've caught up on the washing which was huge and organised and baked the snacks for school/work - this week on the menu is banana yoghurt muffins which thankfully only need 2 bananas because they are like gold at the moment in price thanks to Yasi, but taste bee-yoo-tiful! And i made a oat slice and some savoury scrolls.

But enough of that, today's blog is all about Sofie and her christening on Sunday. Here is the day in pictures.

Daddy and Daughter

The kids were able to be included in the service and helped pour the water!

No tears

Us and the godparents, A's aunty and A's youngest brother, missing my cousin Nat who is also a godmother

The baby girl with the christening cake, was so, so cute!

The cake and one of her gifts. 

It was a lovely ceremony and i'm glad to have it over with, its been on my to do list for months.

We had a small thing back at our place for whoever wanted to come back and we served finger foods. Found some delicious recipes, taste.com and i are now tight lol and they were so easy.

We had sausage scrolls, scotch eggs, capsicum dip, mini pizzas, marinated chicken legs, egg and lettuce sandwiches and sweet and sour meat balls.

Desserts were the beautiful cake made by Sweeter than Sugar and i made mini raspberry and custard tarts, mini baked raspberry cheesecakes, caramel kisses, mars bar slice, i attempted cake pops which tasted beautiful but looks wise were a bit of a failure hehe.

I did make slight variations to the recipes, i had loads of capsicum dip so i used that on the mini pizza bases as well instead of tomato paste and because i had the raspberries all mixed up i used that to make the little custard tarts instead and omg they are so good and so simple and i'm not the biggest fan of custard. 

Here is a few photos of some of the things i made with my hubby as my assistant:

Here is the cake pops before and after. The recipe is so, so simple literally get 2 packs of oreo cookies and blend together with a tub of cream cheese then roll into balls and decorate. I did buy the special wilton candy melts but mine wouldn't work and i was doing them at 10pm so gave up and ended up with these. Very yum though and something i plan on practising and getting better at.

The capsicum dip before and after. Another really simple dish. Literally bake some red capsicum and then blend with cream cheese and voila yummiest dip i've had in a long time.

Raspberry swirl cheesecakes, a little more time consuming but turned out so yummy. Definately adding it to the to do again list.

Mini custard tarts - easy as, especially when you buy the tart shells :)

Selection of the desserts. Drooling they all taste so, so good. 

And finishing off with Sofie Sof because i think she is the cutest thing in the world (along with her brother and sister of course)

And now i need to go research healthy recipes because i've eaten way to many sweets lately!

Yo-ho-ho- ho doin the pirate dance...

Sunday just gone we celebrated Harry turning 5 with his big 'invite all his class party' that i had promised him. 

I booked the pirate room at the local party place and ordered the cutest little pirate cupcakes as the birthday cakes, i ordered the invitations online and made up some loot boxes and that was the extent of my efforts.

BUT It was a great party and such an easy way of doing things when you just don't have the time or energy to organise and entertain all by yourself.

The kids had a great time.

Harry was super excited when he woke, and came running into our room where i was feeding Sofie and he said "Do you know what today is Mummy?"

Above are the pirate loot boxes, i just bought plain black noodle boxes and popped some pirate tattoos, and gold chocolate coins in and we had a problem with the original invites and long story short i ended up ordering a second lot that didn't come in time to hand out so i cut the pirate boys off of them and stuck them on the boxes just for a little bit more of the piratey theme. 

The cute little pirate cupcakes (un fortunately a couple of kids couldn't eat them so i got one because they were SO yummy)

The spoilt birthday boy after the party with his stash.

Caf-Pow

 Today started for me at 5:30am with both girls awake and add in a couple of Sofie feeds at 11pm and 3am, and you might say i am a little tired!

Its definitely been one of those days that i've relied heavily on the caffeine!

Its pouring with rain (AGAIN) as i type and the kids are creating mess and destruction in the lounge as per their usual afternoon routine and Sofie is napping so i'm having some ME time! 

Something that feels very rare these days.

Although actually i tell a lie, because last night i had 2 whole hours of alone, me time! (Well i shared it with a few other ladies at my sewing class) but it was wonderful to just have that break from the regular house mummy duties! 

We didn't actually get to the sewing part last night but i have my patterns cut out and pinned and next week i will get to christen my new sewing machine that is still sitting in its box in the cupboard and actually start sewing something all by myself, i'm very excited actually.

I think i'll run a nice hot bath when the husband gets home and have an early night with the littlest baby girl snuggled up with me!

Wet, Wet, Wet

It's been one of those days that you just wish you could curl up in bed with a book and some chocolate and alternate between the reading and the sleeping and the eating.

Shame life always seem to get in the way!

We are experiencing what the experts call a monsoon trough i think it is?
All i know is that its really, quite wet!

This is our backyard and the water thats collecting there...

So anyways i didn't get the lazy day at home, but I did make sure that I got the chocolate :) 

 Regardless of the inconvenience of rain, I love it and the cosy feeling i get from it and especially up here the lovely thing about the rain is that the hot weather gives us a reprieve and it becomes almost pleasant. 

Of course its going to get horridly humid once the rain disappears, but for now i'm going to enjoy it and cuddle up in bed with the baby girl and Anne of Green Gables on dvd.

New Header Design

I've been having a play with shabbyblogs.com, such beautiful designs and so easy to use.
The only thing i can't figure out is whether i can centre the image but eh i think its pretty cute as it is!

Feed me Seymour...

It was A's birthday yesterday, he was 32. It was just another day for him really with an early start at Bootcamp, work and school drop off cos i was feeling a little blah.

I haven't even bought his present as yet, such a bad wife but this is what he is getting so i think all will be forgiven once it arrives.

For our first anniversary together, many moons ago i bought him the single cooks knife and its been brilliant, we always wanted the full set but couldn't justify the expensive price tag that was on it in the shops but i found it online for half the price so i decided to splurge and get him that!

He wanted to go to dinner with his family, but his family is slightly dysfunctional (which is a whole other post/whinge) but we did manage to organise a dinner at Hogs Breath with his parents and his one lovely, normal brother and his girlfriend, the food was nice but just reinforced to us how shitty it is taking kids out at nighttime!

Now being honest and not trying to sound all "my kids are perfect" (because they are so not) but generally i think our kids are pretty good kids, they are usually well behaved and listen and respond but put them in a busy restaurant situation with a sugar hit of juice and family members they don't see all that often well basically they just drive us nuts. On top of that Sofie was very not herself and couldn't settle which isn't surprising considering the noise level and bright lights happening and H and M both pulled the i need to go to the toilet routine just as our mains arrived.

Seriously does this happen to anyone else? Without fail when we are out they will need to go poop in the toilet, they don't need a toilet break when we are home having lunch so lord knows why they do when we are out, its so annoying and so predictable that its actually funny now. 

Anyhoo, we ate to much, i got my chocolate mud cake hit and the kids enjoyed it and we came home knackered and unfortunately have to do the whole thing again tonight for A's Nanna's birthday dinner, only a different restaurant and a later time. Gotta love, people organising family dinners for meeting at 7pm, so thoughtful of them to think of the young kids.

Family fun days

We decided to have a day out with the family last weekend.

We headed to the museum, I highly recommend the Townsville Museum for something to do with the kids, its free (best of all) if you are a local and there is loads of interesting fossils, boats, artefacts, bugs and insects to keep you and them occupied for a good couple of hours.

Sofie having her first go facing out to the world!

Harry saw this chamber pot exhibit from the Pandora ship and said "Wow Mum, look at the size of that coffee cup, you can have a lot of coffee!!!" Hahaha don't think i'd be wanting coffee from it myself! 

After the museum, we decided to go stimulate the local cafe economy and had lunch at my favourite cafe in Townsville, Seriously, it is the best!

 Especially so if you love salt and pepper calamari like i do, its the yummiest i've found in my 30 short years here at the Rockpool Cafe, I go there and order the same thing every time these days.

The other meals are also great value and really big serves for the prices and its a beautiful location on the strand overlooking the rockpool and ocean!

So yeah a big 2 thumbs up for this place if you are ever in the area :) 

Overheard

Milla in the back seat of the car as Sofie who was sitting next to her was beginning the early stages of whinging.

"Sofie, don't be a pain in the arse!! Okay?"

OOPS, think i should be more careful of my choice of words these days! How do you not laugh though?

Nighty night

Walking past the kids bedroom while Daddy was doing the usual night time routine and my heart just about swelled right out of my chest, my 3 babies having a story. Too cute!

Ahh how i love the 4 of them!