Lulu Carter

forgot like us to order those card on time?

Take one white wall, one tripod, one sheet, a willing family and take some photos. Charlies window of tolerance was slim but we actually really like the photo we chose. Its a bit more realistic shall we say, and seemingly appropriate for the christmas craziness! 

Adjust the photo in photoshop ( I only have photoshop elements which is fine) and, when you're happy, add what you want to say.

Race to the nearest officeworks and get them printed on card and guiloteened. 

Take some very nice glitter - Martha Stewart is my favourite.

Run the glue around the edge of each card and sprinkle liberally with the glitter. Use a plate! This is lovely fine glitter and it goes everywhere.

Done.

Merry Christmas

xx

 

 

easy peasy advent

Its here and yet despit my good intentions I decided totally forgot to buy the Lego advent calender. Cue a little last minute panic.

Solve it and go one better? Yes!

Race out and buy a box of Lego. We went for the $17 box so two storm troopers and two clones. Two kids sharing here!

I opened the box and wrapped a couple of pieces to be opened each day saving the telltale helmets and body parts until the 22nd and 23rd. If your kids are like mine theyll take one look at those helmets and pants and know exactly whos coming!

I stuck a plastic ziplock to the fridge so each day they can put the parts in ready for the end game.

On christmas eve they get the instructions. Its great! No suger, didn't cost a bomb and they are bonkers with excitement.

1st birthday

I cannot believe my sweet little guy is one already. I remember walking in to school the week after he was born with him tucked up in a ball against my shoulder, like a baby possum, held with one hand. He was so so tiny and its pretty amusing that now people stop and ask me how old he is only to exclaim "but he's huge". All I can say is his brothers must have been absolute tankers because this boy is not even 10 kilos yet.

I still suffer that surge of wanting to eat him up when he grins at me but we never really grow out of that do we? He has realised he can chase me around slug style when he wants something and grabs hold of my foot or leg until I pick him up. He has also worked out that he is just as capable as us at blowing raspberries on tummies and he collapses in fits of giggles when he manages a huge farty sound on somebodies belly. Hysterical. Really. 

He throws his ball and slugs around after it then throws it again. This game goes on and on and he loves it when Oliver gets down on the floor and plays this game with him. Climbing up against things is offering a whole new world of possibilites but sometimes he forgets to line his feet up properly first so it can be a challenge. Sometimes though, he does it perfectly and finds he can reach into the centre of the coffee table. I learnt this today when he sent Ashleighs Canon hurling to the ground. Hmm.

We play growling games. Yes we really do. In fact its how he and I get about in the car mostly. He growls. I repeat it. He growls a different tune. I repeat it. This can go on forever. Probably a bad habit to get in to but I can't tell you how FUNNY this kid is.

On Sunday he woke before midday from his nap. He then flatly refused to go back to sleep yet sailed through his birthday in the park with his party hat on and a cuddle and grin for everyone. 

The park? I have never ran a party outside the home before and I wont be again. Even though it was a small gathering by party standards, being unable to set up until the day and actually set up a good hour before your guests arrive because you need to get the right spot ( in our case the right tree) put crazy pressure on to get things finished ahead of time. We then took a car load up as well as walking the pram loaded up with supplies and me carrying the cake on its pedestal up to the park. The cake weighs as much as Charlie I'm sure. My arms were down to my ankles by the time we got up there! It became such a rush that I didnt get a wide shot of the tree with the garlands up and the table set underneath which is such a shame because it looked SO PRETTY. Honestly I would have got married under that tree.

I knew when we decided to have the party in the park I needed a tree for decorating and there is only one 'good' tree in our park, and I wantd Charlie to be sitting for cake and photos.

On ebay I bought a white Ikea Antilop highchair for $8. A quick scrub and it was ready to go.

I bought tissue paper and cardstock and make tassels and sewed randomly cut shapes onto thread. 

A sheet of Heather Bailey felt in white became a party hat after it was brushed with fabric stiffener on the inside overnight. I put a second coat on for good measure. He kept it on the entire party! I was amazed. The pompom was made using some leftover orange cascade 220 and glued on top. The trim was bought in New York at Purl Soho because I loved the colour so it was nice to use it on something special. If you need a cone template for making party hats there is one here.

I had wanted to make a 'happy birthday' banner but ran out of time so cut out scallops and painted letters on then then taped them to the highchair.

The spotty cake idea was from here and the stripes are all over Pinterest. I used a silicone pop cake mold and they did over cook a little on their bottoms so had to be trimmed. Also next time I will make more spots because there were a lot of blank spaces when slicing the cake despite having 6-7 balls in each cake. I didn't use packet mix despite making a huge amount of cake and using a million eggs. I thought about it but I decided I didnt want to eat packet, I'm sure the other adults didnt want to eat packet and most importantly I didnt want Charlies first birthday cake indulgence to be anything other than home made. The spotty cake was sandwiched with buttercream then covered in rolled fondant. The stripes cake was covered in buttercream because I didnt think the kids would all want to eat fondant.

The pinata was great although I filled it with far too many sweets. And they wouldnt share -little monkeys.

Getting us all dressed nicely for a famiy photo completely slipped my mind when I was racing around like a crazy person cutting the crusts off finger sandwiches and dipping marshmallows in chocolate and sprinkle. A little bit of renactment coming up for us I think.

It was lovely! I am so pleased it was a gorgeous afternoon and so pleased it is over. Its time to jump on the christmas crazy train isnt it!!

 

 

 

spooking it

Happy Halloween! 

Halloween makes me feel a bit of a phoney but Australia has embraced this tradition that does not belong to us and, well, I'm going along. In fact I'm shamefully delighted ( I lodged an official complaint when the book parade was cancelled this year in favor of colonial day, due to the lack of character costuming opportunities so I'll take it where I can get it) . Yesterday, after foraging in the roof storage for our selection of rubber bugs, snakes and the like with no luck, I ventured down to the dollar shop for some new props. There must have been forty people between me and the halloween product. Unbelieveable. With elbows sharpedend I eventually got to the cobwebs.

When I was a kid we went 'trick or treating' but lets face it, more often than not you were met with a humph. Some years we all got in on it though and I distinctly remember a shaving cream in letterbox situation that had some boys at school in deep trouble. But trick or treating was not a regular thing. Its taken this many decades to become mainstream for the kids today. 

Tonight was a full on costumed, decorated houses extravaganza. So. Much. Fun. A woman from school glued fangs on to her teeth. There were red contacts on some familiar faces and an awful lot of skeletons and some pirates from The Black Pearl. Even a zombie bride. We let the team down with last minute mind changing over costumes from the boys, a baby who simply refused to wear his bandit mask after I gave up trying to get him to wear his pumpkin head piece ( kids!) and in the end I am sorry to say I walked the streets in my bright yellow saltwaters and not a medusa hairdo in sight.

 

*Scaredy cat and mice templates from Martha Stewart

*Sweets in plastic bags then bundled in orange tissue and tied with twine

Next year I will:

Make a giant yarn cobwed like Dana

Whip up some freaky pants bunting 

Make the costumes well ahead of time and let it be know that "this is what you are wearing kids"

Keep hoping that Australia will shift position so we can enjoy spooking in the dark and a cold christmas. Yeah ok. That ones a fantasy

 

HAVE A HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

"

family daze

Did you have a happy fathers day? Ours began with the usual. The night before, the boys came to me in a panic asking what "have we got Dad"? I showed them what I, the fascilitator of all occassions success or failure, had bought. Actually what their father had bought as he'd been totally indecisive with me about what he fancied for fathers day and I'd got fed up with it and announced he'd get diddly squat. Hmm.

I showed them the shirts, wrapped them because they were busy freaking out over their identical drawings on their hand made cards, and organised a hiding spot. They decided my hiding spot was not up to scratch and, when I wasnt looking, moved it to a better one.

Alright then.

On Sunday we woke to no Daddy. He had raced off to the airport because his parents needed to catch their flight back to melbourne. A bowling tournament commitment I believe.

While he was gone, Henry and I went crazy making crepes, caramelising strawberries and bananas to go with the crepes and decorating the kitchen table. Oliver sauntered out in time to greet Ashleigh and dig in to his breakfast.

There is something I'm not doing right isnt there? Somewhere along the line between toddlers who love to dust and make beds to practically adolescents who step out of their knickers and walk away, the wheels have fallen off. Crashed into the gutter leaving the house proud in feotal position by the side of the road,wine in hand.

Oliver turned nine on Friday. He did so without one single gift handmade by me. Now there is a slippery slope if ever I felt one. 

I think the entire restaurant singing 'Happy Birthday' to him and his local football team dining at the next table was the best gift he could have had though.

He seems taller. I bought him size ten pajamas from Boden and they fit him. I couldnt believe it.

Sunday we got dressed up and went off to Rozelle for some family photos. This is something we have been meaning to do since Henry was a baby. I imagine being married to a cinematographer/photgrapher is not unlike being married to a builder or landscape gardener. Your own is never done.

Well tripod in hand and Ashleigh in shoot mode, we stood and posed and turned and froze and sat and stood and looked this way and that. We dont quite have the shot I wanted and we certainly dont have enough with him in them, but there was only so many times he was going to focus, set the timer and run to us.

But it went well.

Until I realised that there was not one shot of Ashleigh with his three boys and he should have told me to put my feet together. Nothing is ever perfect though is it?

I think we do perfectly well being not remotely perfect. Somehow it fits.

xxxx

rough love or confused positioning

Something weird and unpleasant is happening in our home at the moment and I'm not sure how it has festered into this 'situation' we are seemingly in.

Oliver is feeling out of place. I think Oliver is feeling out of place. Actually I'm not at all sure as he seems to love Charlie with the force of nature that comes in the form of  love for a child. Except that Charie is our child and his brother. Something has shifted. Possibly shifting for some time but now we've hit the wall.

When Olie was a baby, my mother remarked that he had an incredible sense of self. He does and it will hopefully steady him when life throws arrows at him which it is guaranteed to do at some point. The problem with that level of confidence is that he believes he is in control and has control when really he is still a little boy. 

I am teetering on the knife edge between letting it sort itself out and banning him from being near the baby. Totally shit if you ask me.

I have absolutely no doubt whatsoever that he would do anything for Charlie. I am also beginning to have no doubt that he would do anything to Charlie. And I don't think its because he is jealous neceassarily. More that he loves him so much, SO much, that he can't control the impulses to go too far. Taking that tickle to the next level of poking those fingers in as far as possible, stroking him on the forehead that morphs into rough rubbing of the forehead. Little things that turn suddenly into something aggresive and scary. Charlie has begun to look at Oliver with a mixture of adoration and caution. Its heartbreaking. This week has seen Charlie react with fear to for the first time since he came into our lives. Both times it was Oliver using a booming voice and a sudden table smack or appearing suddenly right in Charlies face and shouting a word. I know that at nine months Charlie is in the fear learning curve, but it was a very sudden development.

This baby of ours does not cry unless really pushed (extremely over tired, waited more than long enough for his dinner) and I think he has been pushed. The other night, after he was wondersuited up for bed, Oliver and I were sitting with him and suddenly he went crazy with crying. Oliver was as far across the room as humanly possible in a blink, squawking that he was only patting him. I thought he must have squeezed Charlies arm. The next morning I found a full set of teeth marks on Charlie. I was absolutely floored. I dont think he meant to bite him at all. I think that when he is busy 'loving' Charlie, the impulse to go further, to want to eat him up and love him to pieces, must swell up in him and he does things without realising it.

Any kind of sibbling issues were well off the page as far as we were concerned. Henry was delighted with his "baby Oggy George" and we thought both boys were so much older, there was no reason for any kind of jealousy to occur.

Now the big question is, of course, do we ignore things? How much? We have spoken to him, consequences have been dished out and he appears to be mortified and understanding. Without putting Charlie at risk, do we just stand back and let Oliver come to terms with his emotions? Have you experienced anything like this?

lately

Charlie moved to the big table. His excitement was so much fun.

I did something radical. Well for me anyway-there was a lot of hair on the floor!

Can I just say this habit we all have of trying to take our own photos? Crazy. Arms were not meant to bend that way while trying to take aim and touch the button your phone. Ouch

Sleep is achieved with coverage. Actually makes it an easy clue when we're out as he starts draping things over his face. Funny kid.

This is getting there. The quilting has begun.

I cant beleive this happened so fast! I found myself looking at 1st birthday cards and had to stop myself. I want to savour every single moment with this litte guy. I'd forgotten how fast it whips by. I'm so glad I dont have to race off to an office or set and miss it all.

These portraits have become a case of"quick get the shot no no no please dont move ok grab the (insert appropriate letter/number)" etc

I bought this cut and sew picture book from Spoonflower. I was a little nervice expecting it to be quite bright and stiff but it is absolutely divine! Soft and vintage in appearance. I put a piece of cotton batting inside each 'page' to make it more baby squish and suck friendly.

School Spring Fete sweat shop.

There has been gorgeous sunshine these last few days so baby and I have been doing some park lolling. I'm sure thats a technical term....

This is the cardigan I finished the other night. All the details are on my ravelry page. I want you to know that I love it. LOVE IT. Yes I know it needs some buttons : )

 xx

Where

Oh wow HELLO!! I've missed you here. 

I'm not even going to try to say I dont know how the empty space here happened. I know how exactly how it went down.

I weaned a baby onto food (which was such a big deal and I wasnt ready but he clearly was and loves everything), finished a sesquicentenial quilt for the boys school ( I'll post some photos later but its out and hanging and everyone loves it so phew), spent a lot of time moonlighting over at In Alfie's Room and did a spot of knitting. And Pinterest. Man oh man do I get stuck inside the vortex of Pinterest. Wow.

I cannot tell you how many times I have made and devoured this caramel slice recently. Pinterest is my recipe google. Guru.....?

We finally admitted that this little person was about to bust hulk style out of his moses basket. One last sleep heavily photographed. I believe I sobbed just a little. Milestones and all that....

Into a cot. Not 'The Cot' but one that fits behind the door until further notice. He wasnt quite sure what to do with the space. Laughed like a crazy baby for quite some time. Again-heavily photographed.

I knitted this vest (which took forever in 4ply) only to decide that I could not send him out in public looking like Wallace's understudy.

So I knit him a cardigan. Rather similar effect yes?

I've been sewing fitted sheets. Never in my dreams did I think I'd make sheets, but it is a ridiculously fast domestic goddess act. The practical things can be the most satisfying cant they?

I spend a lot of time making tickle hands. And singing in kooky voices. The things I do for a grin from this kid!

I learnt that photoshoots are getting challenging. Yes I wrestled with a seven month old over felt letters. He won.

But I dont care cause he's the sweetest thing on the planet.

And I have realised that I am happiest with black or blue on my nails. A maintenace nightmare but I love seeing my fingers all dark and moody. Butter London has a lot to answer for. Another addiction! Sheesh.

So I would understand if you thought after all those pics that I'm only here to show off the now giant baby right?! 

Nah. That was just a bonus : )

Henry went on his first big school camp. Henry has also decided to start behaving like a teenager which I guess makes him a tweenie yes? 

Oliver seems to be going through some family position reckoning which I hadnt banked on AT ALL. I thought the age gap was so stupendously huge that there would be no bumps. Wrong.

So we are all good. Cabin fever, teething and hormonal tweenies but good. Chocolate fixes everything. And I need a haircut but thats normal.

How are you??

xxxx

 

this moment

 This morning I heard familiar words. Words that have been read a thousand times to the reader in this photo. Its a beautiful thing.

Enjoy many more "moments" over at Soule Mama.

 

It was bound to happen

Cake decorated for me by my beautiful boys.

Cake eaten by all.

xx