Notes from the side of a volcano

It's a dog's life

Dogwash time.

First they throw warm water on me, then to add insult to injury they stand around laughing at me.

I can't think why.

 

 

It's Saturday afternoon ....

..and that means ...yes, Bernard has taken to his bed again. This time it is a cold.

Next time I have a cold I shall have to tell him to stay home from work and do everything here and see how that goes down.

Still, clearly he has a "man cold" which is much worse than that us feeble women get since Daughter-Two also has the cold and there is no sign of HER wanting to go to bed. Lots of signs of her feeling bad (a bit whiney, a bit over-anxious and generally behaving completely out of character but she still wants to be doing things all the time, usually with input from me).

I could have done with a break this weekend after yesterday, which went something like this:

8.15 am Leave house with the dog and Daughter-two after rousing Daughter-One and getting her off to school. Get down the bottom of the steps to the street while distractedly thinking I have forgotten something. Look at Daughter-two and realise she is not wearing her glasses. Usually I leave them next to schoolbag the night before but Bernard had come home early enough the nght before to take over an afternoon walk and bathtime.

Leave Daughter-Two and dog on street while I run through house searching in vain for glasses. Go back down steps and ask Daughter-Two if she knew where Bernard put them.

"They got knocked off in the park when I was playing" she says

"Did Daddy pick them up"

"um .. no"

"Are they still in the park?"

"Um ... yes"

Run with dog and Daughter-two to park.

"Can you remember where you were when they fell off?"

"Um..nooooooo"

The dog didn't even attempt to help, but just lay down on the grass. Which was long and very wet. But incredibly Daughter-Two suddenly spotted one very small, very wet pair of glasses in the grass. And she wasn't even late for school.

9.00 am get home and spend two hours booking study course for Daughter-One, dentist appointments for both daughters and numerous other tedious tasks. Then spend hours working on an alpha for the store.

2.45 rush off to school to collect Daughter-Two. Am standing opposite the door as she comes out, bouncing and acting like seeing me is the most unexpected and wonderful surprise ever. I give her the sort of animated, loving "hellooooo" that mothers only give to their children - just as the Dad who normally chats to me as we both wait by the door arrives. "Err .. hello" he replies.

Awkward.

9.30pm Daughter-One arrives home from friend's place, the same place she left my croc-jandals she was borrowing two weeks ago.

"Did you bring my crocs back?" I ask

"Yes .. well, I brought one back".

Which is great isn't it? Because one solitary croc is really so much more useful than no crocs.

Despite the best efforts of those around me, I did manage to get some work done this week and even finally managed to finish another set of Worn Page edges for the store at Designer Digitals. (available Sunday 29th EST)

 

 

 

PS that house on the other side of the hill that I failed to photograph last week? It sold at auction today for $1.4 million.

The good news is that it is going to be restored and not knocked down.

Photography 101

I had some great photos to share this week. Unfortunately I failed Photography 101 - make sure you replace the CF card in the camera after downloading photos.

Daughter-one wanted photos of some art she had created during the week so in between designing and cooking dinner I quickly downloaded them off the camera but forgot to put the card back in.

So the photos I "took" of the incredible old house on the other side of the hill that Daughter-One and I walked through on Saturday actually do not exist.

It's like that old question: if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound? If an idiot takes a photo with a camera with no CF card did she really take any photos?

Well, it felt like I did and there were some good ones! Really.

An old man lived in this house for years fending off real estate agents with warning signs, hiding behind tattered, rotted curtains and working on his family tree. Apparently when the got into the house after he died, they found a huge family tree on the wall tracing his ancestors back to Shakespeare. The house has been cleared out now apart from some files of papers. Most of the walls are covered with bookshelves, which he seems to have accessed via rickety ladders.

As Daughter-One and I walked in (part of the gawping crowds taking advantage of the open home) I said "he would have hated this" and a woman turned around and said "I was just thinking the same thing".

I do have some photos on disk somewhere of this house, but here are some off the net:

 

 

 

Daughter-Two and Bernard went through after us on arriving home from art class. Apparently she spent the whole time looking for cupboards that may lead to Narnia.

The CF card incident pretty much sums up the week.

Last Saturday we were supposed to be going to a party. The first one for  .. well, years. I was looking forward to this, but Bernard took to his bed and we couldn't go. I know he was really sick because he didn't have any dinner.

However, he was well enough the next day to drive to Cambridge, as promised. Daughter-Two was going on for days about how she was going to visit her "jolly old Nanas, they are so jolly" and he couldn't face disappointing her.

A grand time was had by all, with Daughter-Two making good use of my mother's rotary clothesline in true kiwi fashion:

 

 

 

Since it is Bernard's birthday later this week (or so I am told, as I tend to forget it) his mother made him a cake.

The rest of the week was taken up with visits to work, working on TV stuff and not as much designing or scrapping as I would hope. Although I did sell another two layouts to a magazine.

However, I had some products nearly finished and they have gone into the store at Designer Digitals this week:

 

 

 

And there is a freebie from me this week too:

 

You can find it here.

You can't walk away

I made the mistake a couple of weeks ago of looking at the garden and deciding that there was no choice except to clear it up myself (I tried asking Bernard but that just resulted in a few of the rampant agapanthus heads being hacked off and lots of slimy leaves left rotting on the paths waiting for someone to do a slip-on-the-banana-skin type fall).

I really wish someone would discover a commercial use for agapanthus. We would be set for life. But in the meantime, every year the seed heads must be hacked off before yet more agapanthus (agapanthi??) try to force their way through the already cracked concrete paths and brick walls and we end up like the house next door. Empty for 2 years, it now just needs a handsome prince to come hacking his way through the overgrowth in search of sleeping beauty. (I could tell him now, he'd be wasting his time, all he'd find to kiss is a rat).

So I set to, pulling up agapanthus and grass from the paths and weeds from the flower beds,  beheading the seeded agapanthus and sweeping piles of fallen leaves and cabbage tree fronds from the steps. And I kept at it until I could barely walk, staggered into the house past Bernard, grunted at him and fell onto the bed. Then I got up and took Daughter-Two bowling because I had promised to.

As a result I descended into two weeks of fibromyalgia hell. Teach me to get cocky just because I have been feeling fine for an unusually long time. All my pressure points are incredibly sore, I ache all over, want to fall asleep at midday and I wake every morning feeling like an arthritic 99 year old who has been hit by a train. Fortunately I can see the light at the end of the tunnel now. I only hope it's not the train returning.

I fear I shall have to scour the local paper for "retired man seeks gardening work" ads.

One of the few things that help when I ache this bad, is a really hot bath. So I have been having lots of them. Daughter-Two called out to me the other day wanting to read me her latest story. "Oh good" she said (when she tracked me down in the bathroom). "You're in the bath. That means you can't walk away"

Ouch. Seems she has noticed that I too often ask her to read to me while I wander about tidying up or sweeping the floor. Not quite the captive audience she prefers.

Still, she had a captive audience yesterday at the school assembly. I was there because her class was putting on a performance of "Octopus's Garden".

 

But before that happened, there was a nice surprise when she got an award for her good behaviour in class and her wonderful story-writing.

 

 

Bernard came too, arriving panting just as she walked up to collect her certificate.

Now, for days I have been fretting over the key situation and planned this weekend to get more keys cut. You see, Bernard lent his key to his mother when we were away on holiday and forgot to get it back. Then he borrowed my keys which I then could not find. So we have been relying on the spare key which lives in a secret spot. I KNEW that disaster was brewing and, sure enough, when we got back from the Assembly the spare key was gone. I could see it through the window on the kitchen table where Daughter-one had left it after letting herself in earlier that day.

Still, all clouds have a silver lining. Look at what happened while we waited for the locksmith to arrive since there was nothing else to do:

That's not something you see often.

And we got the locksmith to quote for fancy new deadlocks too.

The same day, my Shutterfly albums arrived. They are fantastic:

 

 

 

It is such a thrill to see such lovely, "real" books. Mind you, it's not a cheap thrill. The exchange rate is a killer (the New Zealand dollar has dropped from US80cents to US50cents). So getting two 86 page books printed was horrendously expensive. REALLY horrendously expensive.

I must start investigating whether there are any good Australian book printing services. (Suggestions eagerly received).

Surprisingly, there are a few new products going into the store at Designer Digitals this weekend:

 

 

 

 

And here are the layouts:

 

Daughter-Two met someone very special today.

She was a bit concerned that he must have had a very cramped flight over from Sodor if he had to fit into one of the seats that she remembered from our recent plane flights.

"Oh no" I said, "he will have come over on a ship that left from the Sodor docks".

Totally happy with that explanation.

Totally happy all day, in fact!

Unfortunately it was wet and grey with some very dark storm clouds overhead when we arrived. But the sun came out later and we avoided getting wet for once.

 

After greeting Thomas and sitting first in his first class carriage (and then riding in his wagon) we also rode on the long steam train ride. She was able to practise her royal wave.

 

 

In between all this, we also wandered down the road to the "farm park" where she was able to pet some very tame farm animals. They say "never work with children and animals" and most of my photos came out like this:

But I did some some goodies, like these:

 

And also this:

Which was followed by this:

which was followed by some very muddy hoofprints on my white top.

Meanwhile, here in the real world, some new products are in the store at Designer Digitals today:

 

 

 

And somehow I managed to fit in some scrapping of my own:

 

I used the new "Top of the World" kit (of course!). Daughter-Two calls her swing and tree house up the hill her "top of the world playground".

For this layout I used my "Summer Breeze" and "Forecast" kits (plus the great sketchy frames by Anna Aspnes, also at Designer Digitals):

It's never too late to learn

For instance, this week I have learnt a number of (mainly laundry related) things.

1. Always check the pockets of trousers before you throw them in the wash, even if it is just the capris you were wearing yesterday that you grab on impulse as you pass by with the washing basket. Because you may find yourself an hour later turning the house upside down as you search for your cellphone, only to remember you had it last in the pocket of those capris.

2. Cellphones do not like being washed then dried in the dryer. At all.

3. If you really must splash bleach over the bath toys soaking in the tub, don't do it while wearing the nice new dark brown trousers you just bought. Tie-dyeing is so last century.

4. If your teenage daughter takes to wearing a really rather cool black fluffy scarf on the cool mornings, it is you who will end up with sellotape wrapped around your hand getting all the black hairs off her favourite tee-shirt.

Currently I am trying to learn how to correctly upload my layouts to a photo book printing site so I can print a book each for the daughters of our USA trip. It's taking a while.

In the meantime, here are a few of the last layouts:

 

 

 

 

I was really happy with the cover and title page:

 

And new in the store at Designer Digitals this week I have these:

 

 

Plus, if you have PS or PSE, you can use these great templates to make your own ripped and stitched pieces to co-ordinate with your layout using any paper:

 

And you can do the same with this new product, to make worn frames from any paper:

 

And finally, I used my original "Sparkles" a lot, so I added another set: