Sugar & Spice
August 30, 2008 
And all things nice…..
Time to load the lovely parcel I received in the TNN Yarn Swap methinks 
This was what my parcel contained, a lovely Sugar & Spice themed yarn & Stitch Markers – I love it all & am currently starting on the Pattern supplied ~Monica~ from knitty.com
I will post pics as I progress as there’s not much on the needles right now 
Carwash Time…
August 30, 2008 
Carwash time Uh, no, BATH TIME!
A little boy wandered out the door & down the drive to help daddy wash the car, but interest was quickly lost when he spotted a bucket full of water!
This wasn’t any old bucket, it was a bucket filled with warm soapy water – ahhh, the temptation was just too much for a boy who loves the bath, so the scantilly clad child climbed in the bucket ;)
Looked like lots of fun, but at 5 in the evening, it got chilly pretty quick, so off for the real thing to wash away that nasty carwash stuff.
Looks like the Tubtrug on this weeks shopping list for my washing will come into good use for outdoor baths this summer 
~Yarn Swap Fun~
August 26, 2008 
A fun Swap I recently took part in on TNN, it was something that the lovely Kelly came up with, it looks like she’s started something 
The swap was to be done to a theme of your choice and consisted of 5 parts.
*100g Hand Dyed Yarn
*A Pattern
*A piece of Knitting Paraphernalia
*A Recipe
*A small Gift
I only participated the once (you could choose to send more than one, resulting in receiving as many as you sent), but I think next time I’ll challenge myself & try two
My Theme was Barbie’s Mariposa
(Clever me forgot to take a photo of the whole package 
before sending, so this is a pic from my recipient)
I Dyed the wool with Cake Gels, attempting to catch some of those vibrant pinks, purples & greens that you see in the movie, I also added a darker shade to contrast hoping to replicate the what looks like a deep purple in Mariposa’s wings, it was Black Cake Gel with a little Fuschia added & it turned a very deep purply-brown. I loved the end results as I wound it up & almost couldn’t part with it
My Knitting Paraphernalia was a set of 3.75mm DPNs & the Pattern was Twinkletoes Ballet Style Slippers & the Receipe was for Butterfly Cakes
My gift was a set of Swarovski Crytal Stitch Markers in Shades of purples.
Finally the Machine works!
I’ve been giving my sewing machine the evil eye from a distance, it sits on my dining table & its been playing up from the day I got it 
(its less than 6mths old).
You see, the tension has never quite been right no matter what I did to it, so I played with the tension – no luck.
Put it back on the table for another week & deconstructed it & managed to fix the needle position which was also never correct (roll eyes), it was constantly hitting the foot & it wasn’t bent needles… the I played with the tension & whoopee! it worked just for all of an evening!
Last deconstruction – so I try to put the little lever behind the tension dial in a different position - when I pulled it apart slowly the first time I saw how it came out & put it back the same way – but I put it back together & set all the tension back to normal & we have perfection!
The darn stupid people who put it together put the tension arm in incorrectly at the factory – what happened to QC??!! 
I really hadn’t wanted to have it sent away because a) I figured they’d find a reason to charge me for a service or b) it would be gone for some time & I needed to get things done.
Thankfully I used to watch my dad do allsorts when I was a kid, so have a little mechanical inclination
’bout time I updated!
We’ll I’ve been super-slack & haven’t updated this in ages.
The kids are just growing too fast, Ashton turned 1 in July, we just had family around for a birthday dinner & he enjoyed his cake - Devils Food Cake in the form of a duck!
He’s been walking since he was about 10mths, 2wks & now is a climber who also loves light switches & power sockets – arggghhh!!! – so I now have to invest in more of those socket thingies because our old ones from Paijes days have perished away. He also now has 6 teeth, a 7th has just cut through & looks like no.8 won’t bee too far behind, but I am soooo over teething! I think its time to invest in a teething necklace & see if it works
(Corn freak No.2 – both kids will eat corn or peas till it comes out their ears!)
Paije is a funny little thing – more like a teenager than an almost 4yr old though She has become very affectionate lately & always kissing us & telling us she loves us, also still gets along very well with her brother, apart from when she pushes him away from her or locks him out of her bedroom. She will be 4 at the end of September – I’ve already had to send off her enrolement forms for school 
! we want to try to get her into Opaheke School & being out of zone I had to apply now for them to put her enrolement to Ballot for an early Sept Ballot, I just pray she gets in, so fingers crossed!
Anyway, her current “things” are High School Musical & Ben10 – so I’ve been slowly getting an education on how many/what aliens Ben10 turns into & also hearing her wandering around the house singing to HSM – and to the PussyCat Dolls – here’s the 4yrs old who walks around singing “when I grow up I wanna have Boobies” & shaking her booty & stripping off in time to the music, can you guess that Daddy turns on MTV & leaves it to go when Mummy is not home from work? You can probably also tell Daddy sings with her because its really ” I wanna have groupies”
Ashton is also getting very good at shaking his booty too he has much better Rhythm than Paije, just the tiniest amount of music needs to come on & he starts shaking it & the shoulders & head bob away, its so cute!
