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Home & Family

.Everything (it’s long).

Thanks for the new baby congratulations 🙂 We are excited, although a little nervous to be doubling the child to parent ratio in our family! Yikes! I’ve been feeling okay. Tiredness as to be expected in the first few months and a little sick. It is my best pregnancy as far as being sick goes though, which I am grateful for but I do think it has a lot to do with me listening to my body and only doing what I HAVE to do to keep things semi-functioning at home. Most afternoons you will find me having a nap on the couch, I’ve been going to bed earlier and totally vegging out once the kids are in bed at night. I’m spending hardly any time on the computer as too much time in front of the screen makes me feel sick and eating when ever I feel a bit yucky is helping too – which unfortunately includes lots of carbs, fatty and creamy foods…not my usual diet at all but I’ll run with it while it’s working!  I’m itching to get back into some sewing and pattern writing…I can’t believe it has been so long since I’ve released a new pattern (forgive me!) I do have a few in the works which I’m going to make myself dig out and get working on ASAP though.

I feel like I need to do a little catch-up on the last month of happenings around here…

Poppy Tom is Lil’s latest crush. She asks to go and see him all week and loves getting piano lessons from him. We are amazed at how quickly she picks things up and seems to have an emerging musical talent shining through. Here she is playing “Happy Birthday” to Oscar and Sam on their birthday at the beginning of October.  

Oscar was so excited on his 7th birthday. We celebrated with a chocolate chess cake (made by Jaron because chocolate and I are not friends at the moment). 

For his birthday, all Oscar wanted was a Lego with “power functions” (motorized). They are pricey though and we didn’t feel right about spending such a big amount of money on a birthday present so we worked out a deal…about 8 months before Oscar’s birthday we started a jobs chart. Oscar’s jobs were simple things – set the table, make bed, take recycling out to the bin, etc. and each job was worth 20c a day (not including weekends). He had the potential to make $6 a week if he completed all of his jobs. We kept tally of his earnings and he paid 10% tithing each week. The deal was that if, by the time his birthday came around, he had not spend a single cent of his pocket money we would double what he had saved and let him choose a lego for his birthday present. It worked a treat! Jobs were done, pocket money wasn’t spent on trivial little things and he learned the valuable lessons of saving money, patience and perseverance. When his birthday came, Grandie and Nana offered to include some money into his “lego fund” as their present which mean that he could choose an even bigger lego – it totally made his week!  And the lego took a whole week to make and is still being played with every day one month later!

The kids had athletics carnival during October. Oscar was there, but I didn’t get any photos of him as I was with the kinder kids most of the time – plus, he was too fast to take any photos of 😉 He did finish the day with a first and second place but didn’t quite make his goal of getting a third place too get one of each ribbon! Lil was so excited, and Tommy even got to race in a few races! This is our last year at the kids school, next year we will be moving to a brand new school which is being built in our town. We will miss the rural setting their school is in now, but are also looking forward to settling into the new school and the adjustment shouldn’t be difficult at all as most of their friends will be moving with them.

The lovely teachers let Tommy run in one of the races, he loved the cheering crowd and was more worried about giving everyone a smile and a wave than trying to win the race!


Cade and Talissa’s big day is not far away – only 4 weeks to be exact! We are so looking forward to their wedding (and another trip to Queensland!) and helped them celebrate their engagement with a party at the park. The weather was beautiful, particularly after weeks of cold and wet weather, it couldn’t have been a more perfect day to celebrate with friends and family.

The day before the party, Filipa and I spent 7 hours cooking up a cupcake storm! 150 cupcakes later, I don’t think I’ll be able to eat another cupcake for the rest of this pregnancy – or at least bear the smell of baking cakes, but they were delicious and looked lovely. Thanks to my special friend who gave us lots of cupcake baking tips and the BEST recipe ever that kept them tasing fresh for days after.

We finished off the engagement party day with our annual Halloween Party at our lovely friends, the Webster’s house. Oscar wanted to be a lego man, so we cut the bottom off a protein powder container and spray painted it yellow – holding onto this one for later dress-up themed events as he isn’t a fan of dressing up but will happily wear this for a few minutes! Tommy wanted to be a Wiggle – easy with a red top! and Lil a fairy ballerina – easy again after quickly raiding the dress-up box!

The hay ride is always my favourite part and this year there was even a professional face painter on the scene (makes for VERY easy dressing up if you aren’t organised!). We came home with way too many lollies, rationed them out and gave the dodgy ones away to teenage boys who came trick-or-treating at our house on Wednesday night!

And if you’re still reading, I’ll leave you with my 11 week pregnant tummy. I’m secretly enjoying the excuse of calling my pot belly a pregnant belly even though I’m sure it is only slightly bigger than it was a few weeks ago! And excuse the gym clothes, it’s unlikely that you’ll see pregnant shots in them in a few months time – way too much lycra!!!!

Home & Family

.Lamby Kisses.

 My littlest brother got engaged on Tuesday.  Now i’m starting to feel old!
He proposed in the sweetest way – with a shiny ring tied around a cute, little lamb’s neck.

Sam and I were on a top-secret mission to secure the ring before they arrived.  When we arrived at the farm, the lamb had escaped and Sam chased it around the paddock. The lamb obviously didn’t know it’s important role for the day as it was totally skitz and kept trying to jump the fence of the pen inside the barn!  We had to evacuate the scene and crossed our fingers that it didn’t take off with the ring – or eat it before they arrived!

Cade tells me that crazy lamb had escaped when they got there and was frolicking around the paddock – but quickly ran to be with them when it saw they had a bottle of warm milk.  Talissa fed the lamb it’s milk and didn’t even realise there was a dimond ring tied around it’s neck until Cade pointed it out.  I think she was too infatuated with the fact that she was on a farm, wearing gumboots feeding a cute lamb.  Perfect engagement setting for country-boy meets city-girl.
 
Welcome to the family Talissa!  Another sister-in-law to add to the gang!  And she gets the dreaded “T” Triffitt name…I used to try and avoid saying “Toni Triffitt” to people on the phone because it was such a mouthful!  Bring on 1st December!!
 
Home & Family

.We went to Queensland.

We went to Queensland.  But not for 1 month. I certainly can’t blame our family holiday for my blogging absence, but I’m not really sure that I can put my finger on the reason that my desire for blogging has gone down the drain lately.  Maybe it’s the uninspiring weather, or perhaps after 5 years of blogging I was just ready for a break?  It was getting to the stage where writing a blog post seemed to require a lot of effort and I didn’t want to do it if I didn’t enjoy it.  I’m also at a crossroads as to how much family information to share on the blog.  In the last year it has been very, very little.  I’m missing having somewhere to record our day to day happenings but I just don’t feel that they fit on what the “Make It Perfect” blog has evolved to be.  I’m thinking of starting a personal family blog to keep a record of the day to day events that happen in our family and keeping this blog for my creative endeavors with a spattering of the major family events here and there.  Lots to consider and the break has been nice.
 
We DID go to Queensland!  It was amazing.  Really, the whole holiday was one big reunion and we got to spend time with family members from near and far all together in one place.  My Grandad turned 80, which is reason enough for a family reunion.  We stayed at a family-friendly holiday park in Maroochydore and the kids had the time of their lives running from cabin to cabin, playing catch and swimming, canoeing and frolicking in the river.  And the weather – oh, the weather!  I vow to take a winter break every year from now on.  What a welcome relief to go from rugging up with our jackets and scarves to wearing shorts and tshirts every single day.  So refreshing and lovely to break winter up a little bit.  We got to meet new baby Poppy with her big eyes and cute cheeks, she is a delight but even more of a delight is seeing Fil and Chris as Mama and Papa – the rock at it! There was a bigger than big 80th birthday bonfire, a 5 year old birthday celebration for Miss Lil, Poppy’s baby blessing topped off with face painting for the kids, strawberries and passion fruit galore, sea-side knitting, Aunty Cath’s hair salon, Australia Zoo, Filipa making wise use of her time feeding Poppy while being pushed around in a wheelchair!, music, laughter and love – lots of love!  
 
After our family reunion, we stayed in Queensland for another week and stayed with my sister-in-law Eve and her family.  It has been waaaay too long since we last spent time with them and was lovely for the kids to get to know their cousins better.  My in-laws gatecrashed our holiday by surprising us all with a visit all the way from New Zealand!  So much fun and what a great way to end our trip.
 
Now, this is the part where I do a big, HUGE, unordered photo dump of our holiday – enjoy!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

 
 

 

 

 

 



Home & Family

.Of late.

Lots of little things going on behind the scenes here lately…
Lilsy has been asking for a mermaid costume for about a year. I had this shiny fabric last year to make her one but it took a church Disney themed activity for me to actually do it! She loooved it and it was really quick. I had enough fabric left over to make her a pair of little green leggings to wear so that her legs blended in with the tail. She was super happy!
 
There hasn’t been a lot of fabric that has wooed me for awhile, until Erin McMorris worked her magic again with her new line “La Dee Da” – looooove it, love her style and I even managed to make Lil a new dress over the weekend out of it.
The Pernilla Dress was blocked and finished!  It’s very cute, but there were some minor finishing set-backs…I’ll take some proper pics and share soon. Plus a bit of jumbo cross-stitch and playing with polymer clay just for fun!
We’ve had a few farm days this month – one at a friend’s beautiful farm (I call it The Secret Garden) for the Serendipity photo shoot. Gumboots were absolutely necessary after a full night and morning of heavy rain – I’m loving my gummies this winter!
Then we visited Hagley Farm School with Oscar’s class for a school excursion. So cool to be going with him to the places that I went on school excursions as a kid!
And my knitting obsession continues to grow – I’m working on a Milo vest now. Beautiful pattern, I’m about half way through and only started 2 days ago!  Knitting comes in handy as we’ve got MAJOR MasterChef fever this year.  Ben (now in the top 5!) is my buddy from school and we are cheering him along every night!  He is doing an awesome job and is as kind, loving and gracious as ever.  Can you believe we used to have muffin-making competitions in lunch breaks and free periods at school during year 12!  Fun stuff!  Go Benny – we’re so proud of you!
Our special Aunty and sister, Ashleigh came for a visit last week. She is a gem to have around and we all adore her. Check out Tommy with her and Uncle Cade below – so glad my kids have family around to love them.  I’ve been catching spare snippets of time here and there, reading Bloom by Kelle Hampton. It’s a lovely read, reminding me to stop taking all of my blessings for granted.

(P.S. I Instagram under make_it_perfect.)
Hope you’ve had a great weekend! x