The Storm and a Wedding Day

On Saturday, The Bloke and I were heading off to celebrate a family wedding in South Melbourne and looking forward to a night in a fancy-pants hotel followed by a lovely sleep-in, late checkout and a leisurely brunch before heading home to the hills.

I had somehow pulled off the seemingly impossible task of arranging to have all 3 kids looked after overnight, and it was to be our first night away together in about 4 years.

I had my hair done, bought a new frock, and was feeling very glam and excited as we set off. We were so thrilled to be able to share in this very special family wedding.

Then the storm hit.

We were on Toorak Road when the hailstorm hit us, we pulled over and sheltered in the car. The hailstones were about as big as large marbles and sounded very scary hitting the car, I was terrified our windows were going to break. After the storm eased, we spent the next 30 minutes or so trying to find a road that was not flooded that would get us to the Church on time. We were having no luck, everywhere was flooded.

We were trying Swan Street when my sister called (she was at our place looking after the Junior Crafter and Poor Point 3). My sister took the kids into the hallway and shut all the doors to protect them from flying glass as the windows were broken by hailstones larger than golfballs. She said the windows were smashed, there was glass everywhere and rain pouring in. At one point she opened the hall door into the kitchen to see what was going on and a large hailstone flew in a broken window past her head and down the hallway!

This photo was taken by my neighbour

We turned around and came home immediately, but I knew it would be at least an hour before we made it home. I called my brother who was only 5 minutes away and he went straight to our house and started the clean up and boarding up the windows.

We arrived home to find:
11 broken windows (in our house and bungalow)
Weatherboards damaged by hail
The shed wall damaged by hail
Our Colourbond roof looks like someone has taken to it with a large hammer
Skylight broken and leaking water into the bathroom

My car (which was in the driveway) has hail damage to 7 panels, but luckily no broken windows so it is still driveable.

I am still unable to contact my insurance company.

We didn't make it to the wedding. We called the hotel and told them what had happened and asked if they might transfer our booking to another night (they sounded doubtful and said they would call me back this week). We ordered take away and stayed in feeling very grateful that it wasn't worse, devastated that we missed the wedding and just a tiny bit disappointed about missing our night away.

I called the mother of the groom and explained what had happened and was relieved to find out that the wedding went off without a hitch and the happy couple still enjoyed their special day despite the storm going on outside.
Congratulations Pete & Beck, we wish you a lifetime of love and happiness, and wish we could have been there.

The First Birthday

My little man, referred to on this blog as Poor Point 3 or PP3, had his first birthday last week! We celebrated at home with a little afternoon tea for family and one or two close friends, it was lovely (apart from my constant state of shock that an entire year has gone by since he arrived!). Although I shouldn't really be surprised, he arrived after a 2 hour labour and his nickname at home is 'Speedy'!

The Birthday Cake, made by me.

PP3 is the sunniest, happiest little boy you would ever see. He is already walking, he is trying to talk and already has lots of words tucked away in his vocabulary, his favourites being 'more', 'book' 'milk' and 'Dee' which for some reason is the word he uses to refer to both his big brother and big sister (neither of whose names sound remotely like 'Dee').

Happy Birthday my gorgeous boy xx

Cooking up a storm

Today I've been cooking up a storm:

Beer bread, the easiest bread recipe I've ever made, less than 5 minutes and it was in the oven!

Sweet Potato & Chick Pea Dip, this is a really healthy snack for the kids to have with crackers and carrot sticks, and it's so yummy.

I also made these scrum-diddly-umptious Strawberry Muffins and I just couldn't wait to share this super easy recipe with you, link to recipe here.

Thanks also for all your kind messages re my last post, Poor Point 3 is now completely recovered and sleeping soundly once more :)

Somebody cheer me up!

Oh it's been a long week here at Chateau Craft Gypsy. I have been nursing a sick baby, and trying (in vain) to entertain two bored school holidayers who can't have a friend over (might wake sleeping sick baby) can't go out anywhere (sick baby needs to stay home and rest) and can't do anything exciting like sewing or baking (mummy needs to look after the sick baby).

I haven't been crafting, or blogging, or sleeping or anything else I might vaguely enjoy, and last night couldn't go to the Northern Craft Bonanza because said sick baby just needed some mummy-TLC, so is it okay if I just come in here feeling a little sad and sorry for myself?

(I know it's not really that bad, it's just been a loooooong week and I'm soooooo tired.Forgive my little whinge)

Crafternoon

Had a lovely day on Friday not doing Craft with Liesl. We had planned to do some crafting. I had carefully (and rather ambitiously, as it turns out) packed my Janome and a fairly large container of WIPs into my car, along with a fruit platter and my 3 children who were looking forward to a playdate with Argy & Bargy...wait....aaaaah, now I see the problem. We were outnumbered.

Between us we have 5 delightful young 'uns, who all had a fabulous day eating and drinking and playing ball, chasey, piano, cars, trains, farms and hide and seek. However, I do believe in all our planning we failed to notice one vital factor: It turns out that 5 small children on a playdate and a Crafternoon cannot coexist without disrupting the Space-Time Continuum. Who knew?

However, we managed to admire each other's WIPs talked about my woeful attempts to learn to crochet, and we chatted about all the crafting we would like to be doing,

 partake of some delicious Hoppo Bumpo biscuits and a latte,

and we were even invited back despite this disaster created by Poor Point 3 at lunch!

Going home to Mother

I'm off to my Mum's for a lovely girly (child free!) sleepover! The Bloke Who Lives At My Place will be spending some quality time with his little 'uns: The Junior Crafter, Captain Underpants and Poor Point 3, while I will be spending some quality time catching up on some much needed sleep.

Mum and I are going out for lunch, then doing a little spot of shopping, then home to unpack a few boxes (Mum has just moved back into her house after a housefire earlier this year), and spend a little girly time together. I'm hoping Mum will teach me to crochet so I can have a go at one of these. And then I'm having a very early night and hopefully a lovely sleep in...I think the last time I had a decent sleep was around 2001!

Oh happy day!

Guess who's going on a road trip to Daylesford tomorrow? Yes, little ol' me (ok, less of the 'old' methinks. Just because there was a birthday last week, no need to get too excited.)
The Bloke Who Lives At My Place will be spending some quality time with The Junior Crafter and Mr 400 Questions Per Day, while PP3 and I will be driving to Daylesford with my gorgeous and dear friend Leigh.
On my itinerary:

• Daylesford Makers Market of course!
• The Mill Markets There was too much to see last time, it requires a 2nd visit
• Red Pepper Gallery Just to drool over artwork I wish I could afford, if you get the chance this place is really worth a look.
• Lark Just because!
• A spot of lunch somewhere nice, with maybe a little glass of something bubbly...
• Some 'me' time, and some girly time with a great friend
• And, of course, looking forward to seeing some yo-yo wearing friends while I'm there!

Giveaway Winner!

The winner of my first giveaway according to random.org is Jo. Jo, drop me an email thecraftgypsy(at)iprimus(dot)com(dot)au with your postal details and a little parcel of goodies will be heading your way!

Thank you to everyone who took the time to leave wonderful suggestions to help me on my way to making my first quilt. I'm inspired by all the ideas, and will hopefully be making a decision sometime soon - I'll keep you posted.

Apologies for the tardiness of my giveaway draw, this week has seen me bravely fighting my way out from under the MOUNTAIN of washing created by our camping trip last weekend, my efforts handicapped somewhat by a teething baby (ie NO SLEEP).

Hope you are all having a wonderful weekend.

Everything's coming up MilHouse! Blogtober day 23

My lovely stepdad called in yesterday to deliver a little gift for me, "an early birthday present" he said:

Aren't I lucky? My very own iPhone :)  I'm still trying to work out how to operate it properly - thank goodness for my good friend Google or I'd still be trying to work out how (and where!) to insert the sim card. Clearly a challenge set by the cruel people at Apple to weed out those of us not clever enough to own an iPhone. If you don't own an iPhone and haven't the faintest idea what I'm talking about, click here and see where the sim card goes. Then tell me if you would have worked that out on your own.


Also, today my goodies arrived from Vic over at Punky and Me. I was lucky enough to win her very first Best of the Fest Giveaway!

Picture from here

Thanks so muc Vic, I love it all, can't wait to get started on the book tonight.


And, just when I thought my day couldn't get much better, the bloke who lives at my place brought me home one of these...

Hope you enjoyed your Friday as much as I did.

Too much craft? Blogtober day 10

No such thing!

Today Poor Point 3 and I went to the fabulous Northside Makers Market and checked out all the handmade goodies.I met Cam (Curlypops) and Cathy (Tinniegirl) saw their wonderful creations in person, they are really fabulous (the girls and the creations!).

From there we went to the CraftExpo at the Exhibition Buildings where I stocked up on some supplies, added to my stash, learnt to make fabric covered buttons (easy peasy! Who would have thought?), and bought some liquid which will apparently make printer ink colourfast on fabric for a little project I'm working on for a christmas present. Poor Point 3 amused himself by flirting shamelessly with every person who laid eyes on him.

And since I was 2/3 childless it was a relaxed and enjoyable day out! Came home to dinner on the table, so thanks to the Bloke Who Lives at My Place for topping off a perfect day :)

Let's start at the very beginning...

...it's a very fine place to start.

So I'm totally new to blogging, but have been crafting for quite some time. Although I do consider myself a 'beginner' in crafting as I'm still experimenting, trying new things and generally finding my crafting feet. So I will attempt to publish new craft projects as I do them, but will also randomly publish projects I have already completed.
I have three young children, Princess Z aged 7, Mr Jumping Bean aged almost 4, and Poor Point 3 aged 6 months, so forgive me if my posts are spasmodic and/or slap dash at times!
Crafting and being creative is the thing I do to keep me sane, have a break from my everyday life and to have some all important ME TIME! I love it.
My gorgeous friend Sam recently moved overseas and bequeathed me her Janome, so I dived into 2 terms of beginner sewing lessons and now the Janome and I are in love and are quickly becoming inseperable. I am about to attempt a quilt *gasp* for Princess Z, so will keep you updated on the progress of this project.

TheCraftGypsy
xx