Dream big, little one ~ Custom skate deck art

This one was a big nerve-wracking to make, it was a gift for my niece's first birthday. Firstly, we were ordered to not bring gifts (lol! like I'm going to promise that) so we decided on something that cost nothing but time and would be super special and grow with her.

So my husband and I joined forces and planned a bird and dreamcatcher design with the words "Dream Big". This is a standard full-sized wooden skate deck, painted, inked and drawn with a variety of different mediums.

DIY Birthday party stage 2 - activities & games

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Birthday Party stage 2 involves the games. All these games are recyclable, diy, customisable and nearly free (or totally free, depending on your stash).

Top: colour in.
Easy friggin peasy guys! I found some free colour in pictures of Transformers and dinosaurs, changed the black to a medium gray (so they are nicer to colour) and printed them.

Middle: Pin the tail on the dinosaur.
Cardboard from a box, with butcher paper glued over the front, painted by hand. Add a matching cardboard tail and ta- da! Inspired by: Paper and Cake

Bottom left: Target game. (Tutorial)
Disclaimer! IF you include this in your party be prepared for it to be hijacked by the adults. Oh, and leave it till last as the kids love it too!
Cardboard from a box, softdrink box, tissue box, cracker box, white glue, tape, paint, pom poms, plastic cups, balloons. Pom pom shooter tutorial over at Come Together Kids

Bottom right: Ring toss.
Cardboard, cardboard tube from a aluminum foil pack, cheap paper plates, glue, staples, paint. NOTE: I found the single plates did not work very well, so I stapled two plates together, one upside down on the other. Inspired by A Little Learning For Two

Along with the DIY photo booth there was barely enough time for the kids to play with everything. They had a ball and a bunch of the adults got involved too. Laughter and merriment was the order of the day!

Time flies, allow me to recap...

In attempting to find where the time has gone, I felt compelled to make a list. I have had 2 months free of study and swore to myself that after Christmas I would devote plenty of time to my own artwork and build a nice little library of work. While I did manage to complete 3 new pen drawings and an inked drawing, I didn't manage anywhere near what I planned. My wall is still full of post-its with ideas, plans and random names for artwork :(

In no particular order:

• Hosted Christmas dinner
• Prepared my son for his first year of school including all prerequisite uniform, stationery, backpack, lunchbox, textbook and accessory shopping. That quite frankly deserved a month all to itself
• Hosted and promoted my first blog giveaway on two blogs
• Opened an Etsy store
• Sewed a panne velvet quilt
• Baked a three tier chocolate cake, shortbread, sugar cookies, marshmallow slice, chocolate coated marshmallows and pretzels for dozens
• Sewed 7 baby dresses, 5 headbands and made a dozen hairclips
• Sewed a dinosaur pillow, wrist cuffs and made a customised dinosaur dig
• Painted 5 shirts, a golf towel and made tulle pom poms for decorations
• Put together 8 baby and child gift hampers for donation
• Did the Christmas shopping!
• Took the kids for a photo with Santa, attended a Christmas concert and a graduation
• Made a flogger and tickler
• Had a short holiday - the first as a family of four
• Painted a swan portrait
• Played with a DSLR camera for the first time
• Had a Christmas party and organised a Secret Santa
• Kept blogging AND Facebooking :)
• Participated in various Etsy treasury-making and promotion
• Watched my son ride his first big-boy bike and scooter, saw my daughter stand for the first time, cut new teeth and do a handstand
• Got my hair done, woot!
• Read at least six new books - that's right, start to finish, I feel your envy :)
• Lost weight, not quite as much as I would have liked but I haven't regained any. Don't let the door hit you in the ass, weight!
• Drew pictures, played Search and Find, built transformers and read stories with my son
• Cuddled, sang to and played with my daughter
• Spent time with my husband, we even saw at least one good dvd (though the rest were crap, thanks Hollywood)
• Took on extra page-layout work, voluntary work and I-don't-get-paid-for-this extensive promoting, networking and random business crap that's supposed to make people notice me
• Laughed, cried, was amazed and schocked
• Spent too much time anxious or depressed, but got over it
• Did all the regular stuff that helps keep the home and family going

None of this was done alone, were it not for my husband taking kid-duty while I worked or my kids being so well behaved and quiet while I converse with clients or finish artwork I never would have made a quarter of this list. I still wish I could find more time to work on my own stuff but perhaps that's something I have to work on this year.

How has your summer (or winter) been so far? Have you achieved what you wanted?

Don't forget you can always fit in those missed projects in the future!

Someone link me a quest helper!

Holy crap, who knew shopping for school supplies was so hard?! Spare me some sympathy though, it's my first year of school-supply shopping so I'm completely out of my depth.

The brave soul that I am, I figured 'to hell with the pre-packed school list, I can get a better deal if I shop on my own'. Famous. Last. Words. Do you know how hard it is to find Clag paste in the right size? And scrapbooks, seriously. Finding a scrapbook ANYWHERE is like making the first manned mission to Mars and getting one for a decent price is nigh fucking impossible.

I finally gathered together my little jewels, I swear it's harder than a level 85 end-game WoW quest to hunt down and hoard all those little beauties but gather I did! And the best part? Now I get to name every single piece. Oh joy!

Bandaged hand = quiet play time

So I have spent most of this week with my hand smothered in tiger balm and wrapped up with a bandage. Probably an RSI injury but I will know more next week after some tests.

So, what do you do with a wrapped up hand and a pushy little kid?? Whip out the cars, dinosaurs and pirates. Yep pirates too. You can just see a blurry Xavier in the background with his own bandaged hand so he can me like me :D.

 

Apparently the little green dinosaur did something nasty enough to warrant the attention of a pirate cop. Lighting McQueen can be seen fleeing the scene of dino's escape attempt.

Fun times!

A wonderful way to start the day

This morning when we woke up my first thoughts were of a yummy breakfast. One that I don't have to cook! Since the weather has been outrageously hot over the last few days I thought a McDonalds breakfast would be great. Plus, our local restaurant has a wicked playground.

So we trooped down to McDonalds, indulged in some yummy food and then gave Xavier free reign in the playground. To my surprise it was air conditioned too so the temperature was pure bliss.I got to relax in the cool, Xavier got to explore the playground (which included kid-sized helicopters so he was in heaven) and we all got a yummy meal with no washing up.

Not bad for $20 and an hour of play.

The little things really do make a difference. Xavier was happy for the rest of the day and Stephen was thrilled he got a dose of hotcakes without having to ask!