I built a fence and painted some walls

Ok so my first post here for a while, been working on the gaming blog, but I did a couple of things in the last week. So I painted the boys walls and built a fence to keep the chickens aout of the front and top planting area of the backyard. Then snipped all their flight ffeathers off one wing each. Chicken apartheid.

Aidan's room, a nice tree frog green. one tester pot 20ml covers the whole wall, need to get another and We're all done here.

Max's room, in Picton bay blue, another testerpot and we're all done with this wall as well.

I'm building a fence yo, so chickens can stay on da uvverside.

--
Sam

Dashing toward the end of the year

Hi All,

Well, I was just starting to get into the habit of posting regularly when things went into a bit of a whirl in our lives, and the blog well and truly went on the backburner...  But we're still here and still keeping busy.  For those that know us well in real life, we're coping fine and moving foward :)

The kids haven't quite finished making their aprons, although the two girls did theirs

We also had our youngest daughter's birthday party.  She's really keen on Taekwon Do, and was turning 10, so I did my best to make a dobok (Taekwon Do uniform) and put what I'm hoping is actually the number 10 in Korean on it.

 She got her first Warhammer Fantasy army for her birthday - Dark Elves.  She's been so busy putting them together.

We raised up the shelves in our storage room, and still have some work to do to turn them into a large wall, but it's already giving the girls a whole heap more privacy.

And, what is this?  An artist busy at work?

Yup, Papa Sam is busy painting our boys walls with some test pots, so that we can see how we like the colours, then we'll be completely painting the walls and brightening up the place.  This colour is called "Tree Frog" by Resene...  Gorgeous :)  (the paint isn't bad either)  ;)

We've also put up some gorgeous blue thermal curtains in our room and the living room - it makes a huge difference to the house

Oh yeah, and I learned that I make a MEAN plate of pork ribs!  Yum!  Might I mention that this pic is dedicated to two absolutely lovely vegan regular readers I know  ;)  You know who you are....  Mmm, pork ribs marinated in ginger, garlic, soy sauce, red wine and sugar....  DELICIOUS!

As for the rest of the news from the past month or two, I spent a wonderful week in the South Island with family, getting to know parts of the country I haven't seen before and spend time with my awesome cousin and her family.  Thanks so much for having me down there to annoy you, guys!

As for Papa Sam, he's busy playing wargames most of the time, so you can find out what he's been up to on our Warhammer blog - http://napalmelfrebelscum.blogspot.co.nz/

I think that's about it...  Here's hoping I can get more posted up here again soon! 

Love to All,
Mama Fern

Teatowel aprons stage 1

Hi All,

Our kids are working on their second sewing project of the year, so I thought I'd put up a work in progress blog letting people know how they're going.

We got the plans from this site - http://polkanuts.blogspot.co.nz/2010/04/tutorial-easy-apron.html

Will post up more pics once they're done


Love to all,
Mama Fern

The Hen Den: The Day After

So it's a couple days after and Fern decided to decorate the Chook house and personalised it. So it is now called THE HEN DEN... and it can haz prty flowrz.

And the ashes of the fire the night after.... so many mites...(Shudder!)

--
Sam

Supreme Lord of Poultry and Pyro

Finished the Chicken Coop v3.0. It's basically a shed with a laying box attached and some roosts.

and some interior shots with the female models.

And I'll leave you with me burning the old chicken shed to get rid of the mites. Every single bit was infested. I had to have a long hot shower after.

I AM THE GOD OF FIRE!!!!! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!1!

The littlest things

Hi All,

Sometimes it's the littlest things in life that make you smile.  Like a warm cuddle from the child who clambers into bed in the morning, or the smell of bread baking in the kitchen.

Today, I decided to shine my sink...  Yup, you heard right, I went and made it shine, clean and bright, and it made me smile.  There's been a lot going on lately, and I've only just managed to stay on top of the housework, but I finally decided to go back to the FlyLady website (flylady.net), and start getting things back on track.  So hopefully it means I'll be getting a few more posts up here, and that I'll be getting more done around the place.

So here it is, in all its before and after glory!

Before

After

Because sometimes in life, you just have to take that first step.

Love to all,
Mama Fern

Alien pikelets and new furniture

Hi All,

Just lately, we have got the kids to try lots of things they wouldn't normally do.  For instance, they've all had a chance to light the fireplace, and we've got a ginger bug going, to make our own ginger beer.  But I have to say, our oldest boys pikelets have to be one of the cutest results from all our work lately.  I left him alone in the kitchen, with a pikelets recipe and told him to make pikelets.  Not bad for a 10 year old with no parental assistance!

Strange looking, but tasty all the same!

We spoilt ourselves with our first ever matching bedroom set (two dressers, two bedside tables and a bed frame), which has made our room feel so much more homely.  I'm absolutely adoring it!

And, we replaced the bed of our middle boy.  The youngest has to wait a little longer, but we're slowly getting them more organised.  We still have to change around his walls a little, but he's keeping his room a lot tidier as a result of the extra storage space.

Anyway, that's all from me tonight.

Love to all,
Mama Fern