In my street

I live in the suburbs, but it's pretty anonymous living here really. In my street there's a real mixture of people and housing: villa's, flats and everything in between. Today I learned that my neighbour, just 2 doors down passed away just over 2 weeks ago. I knew his name and sometimes we exchanged pleasantries like 'how are you' or 'nice day, isnt' it', but that was it. Mind you he pretty much kept to himself. But anyway, apparently he had moved to a care facility a couple of months back and he died there at age 92. I must say I was wondering where he was as I hadn't seen him in a while. But then I knew he had always wanted to visit his daughters in Australia so I thought that maybe he'd finally gone to see them as he'd been planning to for a while. It makes me sad that I had no idea he'd moved to a care facility, let alone died. Makes me realise how I miss having neighbours that you know. I barely know my next door neighbours. On one side I sort of know them and their little girl and Annabel have recently become friends (yay!) but until today I hadn't been in their house since they bought it about 2 years ago. And my neighbour on the other side (an elderly lady) I don't even know her name! How sad is that?When I grew up we had so many kids in the street. Everybody knew each other and parents would often just pop over for a coffee or something. I wish I had that here. Then again, I don't feel comfortable letting my kids play out on the street like I used to when I was little, eventhough my street is a dead-end cars still come hooning down it (esp. the guy in the flat behind my house). Don't really know where I"m going with this post. I'm just not accepting of the fact that this is a sign of the times we live in now? Each to their own? Or perhaps it has more to do with the demographic of my street? Great variety of socio-economic backgrounds, ethnicity, age, etc.

Happy Mail Day

Got the May kit for Lime Tart today. I am in heaven! Take my word for it, you will seriously want to order this kit. It is divine!

On a completely different note: how long does it take for a wiggly tooth to come out? T's tooth has been a little bit wiggly for 3 weeks now and it doesn't look like the tooth fairy will have to make an appearance any day soon. Which is just as well as I'm not quite sure what the going rate for a tooth is these days, let alone the first one. And it gives me time to actually make that little container I was going to make him to hold the tooth. I've been putting that off for at least a couple of weeks now. I'm just in denial he's really growing up...

I'm a bit slow. Lime Tart gallery has been out for a week and only now do I get around to posting a few teasers on my blog. Go here for the full monty.

I was creating with the funky and bright papers from Tinkering Ink. A bit different for me as lately the colours I seem to use are a bit more subdued.

Am very much looking forward to the delivery of the May kit! (hurry up NZ post).

Got a taste of the Freestyle Down Under event this morning. I got to do one class after all so despite the early hour I was a very happy chicca. Did Wall Art by Emily Falconbridge, very relaxed class and fun to let go of scrapping inhibitions.

Uhm, what else did I get up to over the last couple of weeks? Oh yeah, made this cute little coupon holder for a challenge I hosted on Scrapgal.

I've decided I need to show off this passion/hobby of mine and want more stuff displayed around my house or just make things for every day use. This little box is to hold all the coupons that come on the back of my supermarket receipts. Some of them are quite useful, like the 'rent one get one free dvd' one, especially considering we're just finishing the school holidays!

I've been looking at my site meter recently and was surprised to find visitors from all over the world really. My blog has been getting a few 'hits' from France recently. I don't know anybody there so was quite surprised. I'd love for any of my visitors to say 'hi' if you stop by. Just curious I guess as to who reads my blog.

In need of a clever title

Not sure what to call this post. Just a bit of 'this and that'.

The newsletter at Scrapgal has been out for a few days now so it's about time I shared my layouts for that on here too. This month's theme was "Confess", which I might add tied in nicely with No 8 Wired's dare of scrapping a secret. So yeah, I cheated and used one layout for both. Hey what can I say? My scrapping time is pretty limited so if I can cut corners I will.

Did you see the Freestyle dare we had going over on No 8 Wired? Sorry I should have posted about it 2 weeks ago. It was so cool to see everyone's interpretations. I choose to lift Wendy's layout and this is what I came up with.

If you've got the opportunity I strongly recommend you to book a class or two or three or six for this amazing event. You've got to hurry though, it's less than 2 weeks away! More info here. Not even sure if there are still places available but knowing David at KiwiScraps he'll do his best to fit you in if at all possible. The tutor line up is fantastic! Man I wish I could go, but it's not to be this time around. Hopefully I'll be able to go to the next one.


Also have to mention that Lime Tart is going to come out with a Stampers Kit! Oh yeah. There's a little competition which is about to close. If you come up with a clever kit name you get the first inaugural kit valued at AU$59.95 for free! So far we have the Full Tart, Half Tart and the Gourmet Tart for our other kits. It's up to you to come up with something for the stampers kit. I am hopeless when it comes to these things but I am sure that a clever word smith can come up with something fitting. Anyway, you have until tomorrow (April 6) to send in your suggestions to admin@limetart.com. Good luck!

Anyone else going nuts over all of the new CHA releases? I am getting so greedy when I see all the goodies. But then I look at my stash and a pang of guilt hits me. I have plenty of stuff just sitting there.... patterned paper anyone? Still I can't help it and just have to order a few bits and pieces. Which probably explains why I can't afford Freestyle, lol.
Anyway, I have a crafty couple of days planned with the kids. Thomas decided at the last minute that we need to decorate the house for Easter. Should be good fun.. or highly stressful. My 4 year old is quite a handful at the moment. We're at loggerheads most of the time. What happened to my easy going quiet child? I'd forgotten what it was like and it's quite a shock to the system I must admit. But everyone says it is normal for her to be going through this phase. Enter mantra: this too shall pass, this too shall pass....