Ice bad, snow good

No photos to share. The week has lived up to its business. And to top it off snow on Tuesday night which turned into freezing rain and didn't really last. Then FROST and ice. To the point that by yesterday morning our front stairs were covered in a layer of ice. Of course I spent all Thursday morning warning everyone to be careful, then racing out the door myself slipped and fell on the front steps landing hard on my back and my tail bone. So I am hobbling around like an old lady. I have a severly bruised tail bone, bruises on my back and my ribbs and my whole neck is out of whack. Popping pain killers like there's no tomorrow. Had to take Kit and Ella to their technical rehersal for ballet last night...they went until 9:30 at night...on poor Ella's birthday. So that's the bad.

But today it was made all better by a snow day. A forced day of rest which is what we all needed. Actually it started off not so restful (I had to be at the chiropractors at 7 am, then I had to go to my last pottery class to finish some glazing) but I was home by lunch time and already the snow was heavy. The kids had had a relaxing morning playing Wii and were quite happy to watch a silly Christmas movie and cut out snowflakes with me. Then out they went to play in the snow and now we can sit by the fire tonight and just relax. No activities tonight, not swimming or gymnastics ...not even the ballet dress rehersal which was cancelled. Until we get back into the ballet tomorrow morning bright and early. Photos of my litle nutcracker performers will follow I promise. Hopefully I can sneak off to do some more glazing while they have their performances tomorrow and by the time we watch them on Sunday afternoon they'll have ironed out all the problems. Lets just hope all this wonderful white snow can stick around for 6 days!

BOO!

Last night was , of course, Halloween. It was kind of fun having it on a Friday night, but very strange that it was so light (daylight savings was supposed to have ended 2 weeks ago!)

Ella dressed up as a red devil again. We couldn't find her horns so they were drawn on.She'd been wearing her hair in little plaits most of the week to get it all crinkly and frizzy!
Kit was back and forth on what he wanted to wear, but at the very last minute he decided to go with the costume he had planned last week-a celtic warrior. Of course he left it so late that I had a split second to do his tattoos and hair.To him it's all about waving the sword around anyway.Remi also rehashed his costume from last year and went as a dwarf again.It is an unbelievably hideous mask-especially when he'd poke his tongue out the eye hole!

This year we were invited to the neighbourhood pumpkin carving competition, but didn't get organised enough to bring up a pumpkin. It was fun anyway and all the kids got prizes for pumpkins or costumes.

Ella's friend from school was there with her family. I love little neighbourhood get togethers like that.

Kids of all ages running around together (it was a dead end street). Kids they know from school, and the really cute little ones. After that we went out trick or treating...we had to wait for it to get a little dark. Kit got tired very quickly and so we went back quite early really. Remi had gone off to his friends and they'd gone out together and Oscar (who was bah humbugging at home) finally got his act together and went out with some friends (dressed more or less as himself). The older 2 didn't get home until nearly 9. They had enormous bags of stash. And then the mad "candy trading event" began, with Matt imposing candy taxes on everyone's stash. Fun!

Hope you had a fun Halloween where ever you are.
(oh and daylight savings ends tonight, and I am so looking forward to that extra hour sleep!)

Plummeting

Well we have truely been hit with atumnal weather this week. Sub zero temps in the mornings and cool days. Lurvely.

I have been making the most of my few days free with no school volunteering to catch up with some scrapbooking. I do albums for each of the kids which they love and I love and...ahem...I'm only 2 years behind. It was getting to the stage where I was running out of room to store all the masses and masses of photos I have, so I am going to knuckle down and get it done before it gets beyond too freezing up in my uninsulated, unheated attic room. I'm lucky to have it though as the mess I make when I spread everything out is rather all consuming. But if I had to pack it up each time after use I'd never get it out in the first place.

I do love getting to know all my papers and stamps and stickers etc again. It's like reconnecting with old friends. And I spent all day yesterday working away up there and got Remi's album form May 06 to Oct 06...hmmm...may take me a while to catch up.

No photos though. (I am too scared of taking more;). Truely I will try to get out with the kids and get some of them in the piles and piles of leaves that are around. The wind came in yesterday and the ground is littered with colour.

Unfortunately the rest of this week will be busy with volunteering and on Friday my pottery class where we will be glazing (yay), so it may be a while before I make it back up to my room at the top.

Hope you are all having a wonderfully creative week!

Proper fall weather

Cool crisp weather, a busy Saturday and some photos of us messing around in the yard.

Playing on the swing.Even Honey was getting in on the act.A bit of baseball...Remi in his soccer refereeing uniform.

Two gorgeous boys.

A gorgeous sunset with my mate the Heron. He hangs around all the time, and is very possessive about a stick in the water that he stands on.And of course the Halloween decorations on our porch.My bat wreath.Cob webs.

That time of year again.

Pumpkin decorating time for the annual cub scout pumpkin competition.Kit's pumpkin.

And Ella's.


Unfortunately they changed the rules on siblings entering this year and Ella couldn't (she was devastated) , but we left it out anyway and everyone loved it.

Kit didn't win a prize either (it's always stiff competition), but we had fun doing it.

The view from my chair

Do you remember these hexagons? Started in a frenzy last year?

Well I have been working this week to stitch them together and realised that I needed more. So I have been working away at my little coloured hexagons again.
I start with all my colours of wool like paint colours, all messily out in front of me and just mix until I get the desired effect.

And what better place to do it than on the veranda in the gorgeous late afternoon October sun. The view from my chair not so shabby...

Well actually I had to stand up for some of those, but I had to capture the loveliness of it all.

The kids have had a 4 day weekend. We went Halloween decoration shopping and decorated on Thursday (haven't carved the pumpkins yet as they'll rot as it's been so warm). Friday I left the boys at home to be vegitons and took Ella to my pottery class with me. She made two pots and declared that she'd rather go to school on Saturday if she could come along every week. Yesterday Matt took her and Kit too a Korean birthday party for a one year old (daughter of a guy Matt used to work with). It was at a Korean restaurant in Flushing Queens and they had a ball. Ella game home with 3 gifts of her own! Her she is making watches with her set she got.

Today we are off to Bear Mountain on the Hudson in NY. We love going there. They do a big Oktober fest this time every year. We didn't make it there last year, so we are keen to get out today. And it's another gorgeous day.

And tomorrow Matt had the day off for Columbus day, but not the kids, so we are going to have a "date day" together.

hanging on

I am still here. As expected it was a busy weekend. We had 11 teenage boys plus coaches and some parents here on Saturday to watch the rugby. It may be a rugby team, but some of them have never seen a game before. It was great. They're nice boys, and at half time, and after the game they all went out to play ruggers in the yard. Good clean fun. Kit had the younger brother of one of the guys over at the same time. He was supposed to keep Kit out of the way of the big boys, but both Remi and Kit wanted to get right in there. They both watched the game and then got in amongst it with the big boys- Remi even got winded. Fortunately Ella and the hamsters stepped in and Kit's friend had a wonderful time.
Here is a sideways photo of a hamster with a foil hat.

It's sideways because I'm sick and it's too much effort to turn it. Remi and Oscar were both sick on Sunday (when we had our block party) and Monday, and I had caught it by Tuesday. I'm so mad. I do not want to be sick and I have so much to do still. I'm hoping by tomorrow I'll feel a bit better so I can go to my pottery class.

I don't have the energy to spin right now, but I have been using my time when I'm not sleeping, knitting this scarf from my first spun balls. (once again a sideways photo).

I bought this green dyed fleece ages ago with a view to knit it into this scarf (pattern in a spinning magazine-I modified it a bit to fit the wool better). I had planned to spin it all on the drop spindle. It's so much quicker with the wheel, but I still haven't got the tension quite right and it's not as soft as when I use the spindle. And unfortunately I ran out of the green, so I'm going into some orange that I spun.
Chels, if you like it (I think it's your colours), it's yours in thanks for my wheel.

Random

Today I bought a little digi camera to replace my other one that died (sob). It's a super thin, fit in your back pocket number. A pentax. I wanted to have one that the kids could take away; that they could use (they're not allowed to touch my big canon rebel). So I gave it to them tonight and here are the random photos they took. I don't really know who took what, but they are fun. (oh yeah, it's Friday night "rock band" night-video to come later)