Tuesday, January 23, 2007

A South Coast Break

Christopher and I have been away at the south coast of NSW for the past 5 days. It was 5 days of relaxing fun without having any schedules or plans. I left my watch behind each day so it wouldn't interfere with our time. We spent most of the mornings at the beach, Christopher digging rivers and building sandcastles, and I was the chief sea creature and water collector to keep the rivers flowing and the castles inhabited. There is just something about boys and sand that amazes me. I love watching Christopher dig, roll and create with it. He gets sand into places that even surprise him! Our hungry tummies usually brought us back to our caravan for lunch and a small break, then back out to the beach mid afternoon till the early evening. The beach was GORGEOUS but the water was freezing! At first I thought I just needed to persevere, and hopefully I would get used to it quickly. But my feet would cramp and go numb! I noticed some of the kids on the beach were wearing wet suits...so I didn't feel so bad then. When we returned to Canberra, I was told there were water currents traveling up from Antartica, around the south coast at the moment, so then I realised I wasn't a wimp after all! Kangaroos would meander throughout the caravan park during the day and the birds were very keen on some sunflower seeds that we had....enough so to eat from Christopher's hand. Christopher found the water cold as well, but he'd find warmer pools of water where he could lay down and roll around. We'll have to go back another time....we already miss it. These are just a few of my favourite pictures. They're a bit small but if you click on them, you'll see them in a better size.

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

4 Little Things, Time and A Pencil

A fun email circulated amongst my friends last week that I thought I'd share with you. We all had to list 4 things in several areas, about ourselves and then forward it on to 4 friends. Here are the questions and my answers:

A: FOUR JOBS I HAVE HAD IN MY LIFE:
1. Dental Assistant, Canberra
2. Dental Nursing @ University of Otago, Dept of Pediatrics, New Zealand
3. Medical Receptionist Hong Kong
4. Office Administrator for Medical Clinic in Hong Kong

B: FOUR MOVIES I WOULD WATCH OVER AND OVER:
1. Pirates of the Caribbean 1 & 2
2. The Incredibles (I have to watch it with Christopher though!)
3. Anne of Green Gables
4. Finding Neverland

C: FOUR PLACES I HAVE LIVED:
1. Canada
2. Hawaii
3. New Zealand
4. Hong Kong

D: FOUR TV SHOWS I LOVE TO WATCH
1. Greys Anatomy
2. Desperate Housewives
3. CSI
4. The Oscars

E: FOUR PLACES I HAVE BEEN ON HOLIDAY (vacation):
1. Cebu, Philippines
2. Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia
3. Phuket, Thailand (twice)
4. B.C. Canada

F: WEBSITES I VISIT DAILY (or regularly)
1. My blog
2. StampinUp.com
3. Self-Addressed.com message board
4. allrecipes.com

G: FOUR OF MY FAVOURITE FOODS:
1. Enchiladas
2. Jaffas
3. A very soft creamy brie
4. Lasagna

H: FOUR PLACES I WOULD RATHER BE RIGHT NOW:
1. In bed with a good book, on a rainy night.
2. Somewhere exotic and tropical
3. On the set of Pirates 3
4. Scrapping with Ali Edwards

TIME
Another website I check out regularly is Ali Edwards' blog. From the beginning of my scrapping days, Ali has always been an inspiration in her lifestyle and scrapping style and who she is a person. I've been SO lucky to have taken a few of her classes, one at CKU in San Jose in 2004, and two classes in August last year in Sydney. The pictures added here are of a mini album I made at one of her classes.

Ali has challenged us to think about one single word that we could sum up, embrace, focus on and or incorporate into our daily lives in 2007. So many words came to mind but I decided for me, the word is TIME. Time to grow, time to heal, time to move on, time for new things to blossom and time to manage my time more wisely. I'm supposed to create small something to remind me daily of my word, like a note to stick on a mirror. But I'm in a bit of a creative rut at the moment. I think I OD'd before Christmas and I'm still recovering. I've been doing some other things I enjoy, like watching good movies, playing games and cooking, and just hanging out with family. I have a workshop next week that I'm getting excited about. After demonstrating Christmas cards since October, I'm soooo ready to do some fresh, fun, summery cards.

THE PENCIL
At the beginning of December, I mentioned a book I was reading. "Living out Loud" by Keri Smith. I was struggling through the exercise of finding 100 uses for the pencil. I'm still struggling! Here is what I have so far. The obvious ones are: sketch, shade, doodle, scribble, write, & draw. Some other ones are: a pointer, bookmark, plant straightener, to dig small articles out from hard to reach places, back scratcher, something to chew on when deep in thought, something to flip between ones fingers during lectures or meetings, something to always carry in ones handbag, & a flag staff for sand castles. That's all I've come up with so far. I'd appreciate any input!