Lest We Forget

They shall not grow old
as we that are left grow old
Age shall not weary them
nor the years condemn
At the going down of the sun
and in the morning
We will remember them.
Lest We Forget

I hope you'll forgive my melancholy and reminisces this morning. I know it is two days until ANZAC Day however, the spirit of the day is alive and well within me today.
Yesterday I spoke to Miss Six's Year 2 class about her family connections to Gallipoli. (For those of you who are reading this who are not familiar with the Australian observance of ANZAC Day you can find more information here.)
Having a connection to Gallipoli has opened her eyes and her heart. I'll tell you a bit about this further but first allow me my ramblings.
ANZAC Day has always been an important day to me. I spent a large part of my childhood living with my grandmother and she would take me to the parades. I was a Brownie, and then a Girl Guide and later I was an army cadet. We marched at parades every year. My grandmother would always be there to watch. As I got older I moved away and Granny stopped going to the parades but I knew that she would be at home watching the Brisbane parade on the tv. I always called her on that day as it was a special day for her. She told me that on ANZAC Day she always felt my grandfather beside her. My grandfather fought in New Guinea during WW2. He went away to war and left his young bride and children at home. It must have been a heartwrenching time for them all. I have the knife he carried in his kit that he ate his meals with - my grandmother's name is etched into the handle. It was his reminder of home each time he ate a meal.
I spoke to my mother yesterday and she told me that my grandfather never spoke about his time away fighting. He would only say that the family should honour those poor buggers that died to preserve the freedom of this country.

Then two years ago today, we lost my grandmother. I miss her so very, very much. When I attended the Anzac service two days later, I felt her beside me holding my hand. My tears flowed freely.

This morning, I attended my daughter's school ANZAC remembrance ceremony. I can honestly say that this was one of the most moving services I have attended. Even the speakers had tears in their eyes. The parents did not have a dry eye to be seen.
I am so proud of my daughter. She did not fidget. She listened closely. And she sang beautifully. I pray that the spirit of the Anzac is instilled in her - as it is in me.
I am so grateful for all of those who have risked (and lost) their lives to grant our country the freedom that it enjoys.
Please let me share the stories of two:

George William Rose
Great Britain and Australia entered the war in August 1914. In September 1914, at the age of just 18, George enlisted in the 5th Light Horse based in Brisbane. His brigade shipped out of Sydney on December 20th 1914 bound for Egypt. They arrived there in February 1915. The 5th Light Horse didn't participate in the original landing at ANZAC cove on 25th April 1915 as the powers to be felt that the horses wouldn't be any good in the terrain. However in May 1915 some of the 5th Light Horse were sent to Gallipoli to reinforce the remaining troops. George was in the 2nd Reinforcements on 11 November. On the 29th November, George lost his life. Just over 2 weeks later the allied forces withdrew from Gallipoli. George was just 19.

Sidney Ide You can see a layout about him here.
Sidney Ide was my grandfather. He enlisted in January 1942 and joined the 2/32 Regiment. His brother Alfred also joined the same regiment around the same time. Sidney was discharged in January 1946 just over 4 years later. During his service time he spent almost half of it fighting in New Guinea. The other half training in jungle warfare here in Australia. Sidney was one of 6 boys. Of those 6 boys - 5 went to war. Miraculously all 5 came home to their families.

I'm going away on Friday for a couple of days (and looking forward to it). This will be the first parade that I will have missed in many, many years. I think I'll set my alarm early and go to the Dawn Service though.
So on this Anzac Day I wish to say - I will remember them.

New Arrivals in our lives

It is always hard to think of an exciting title for a blog post you know. I'm not too creative with it. But this past week or so has seen some new arrivals and new achievement in our lives.
First off, after the sudden death of our beloved bantam Fleur (Sharyn, she was the black one) from suspected snake bite we decided to increase our little group of bantam hens. We looked for at least 3 weeks but couldn't find any suitable bantams and then one day we tried a produce store in a neighbouring place and the MOTH and Miss Six found Opal to bring home to us. Opal is what is called a 'Utility'. This means her size is between bantam and normal size for a chicken. So a few days later, I suggested we call into another produce store that we often overlooked. The first thing we saw when we walked in were the Silkies. Now I have always wanted a Silkie (and a Frizzle... but I'm still looking for one of those). So we looked around and then went off to the movies with Miss Six (who thoroughly enjoyed Horton Hears a Who but I had to keep prodding the MOTH to stop him snoring). On our way home, we called into the produce store and came out with Suki (she's mine), two bantam chicks and a duckling. Suki is much larger than all our other chickens so after some research we have discovered that in Australia you can get two sizes of Silkies. We've got the larger size by the looks of it. But we love Suki and her little blue earrings. She's pretty quiet and Miss Six loves to carry her and Opal around.

Right beside my recliner chair (where I do my laptop scrapping) is now a large box with a light set up over it and in said box resides Dibble (the duck - who we think is a drake), Whitney and Matilda (the bantam chicks). We have no way of knowing their gender at this stage but are seriously hoping that they are hens. They make a lot of noise but they have bonded so well. Dibble has been seen to protect the chicks from the other chickens when we take them out to the yard for some exercise.
Miss Ava was thoroughly entranced with them when we were all outside beside the pond the other day.

Here's some photos for you

This is all the girls together. Suki is the grey one and Opal is the little black one. Believe it or not, Opal is named after a fairy in one of Miss Six's books.
btw - the frames on these photos are by Aja Abney from her MaryAnn Rose kit. (Thanks Aja for a gorgeous kit that I can use in so many ways).



Another new arrival in our lives is a new friend for Miss Six. We tease her and call him her boyfriend based on the fact that they are firm friends... and he is a boy. lol
He lives up the end of the cul-de-sac from us and they get on famously despite the fact that he is two years older than her and male. They play so well together. One minute they are up in the tree in our backyard playing spaceships (or something) and the next they are running around the garden looking for fairies. I'm encouraging this friendship as they seem happy to play together and his parents are lovely people.

In other news - Miss Six has had her hair chopped off. It was getting ratty on the ends and damaged. It has taken me two years to get the courage and to get past the fear of grandparents to take this huge step. I thought Daddy was going to be a little upset but it is something that needed to be done. Miss Six bought her hair home for Daddy to keep. But she looks so grown up now.


The cut off plait has also been to school for Miss Six's News Day (fancy name for Show and Tell). I got my hair chopped off at the same time but (unlike Miss Six) nobody has even noticed that I got my hair off. lol Just as well I'm not vain.

I won't share any layouts this time as this post is long enough already. I've been scrapping every night and enjoying it. I get a bit upset with myself because sometimes I feel that I could have created a layout a bit better but in the long run it is another photo scrapped. So I need to look at it like that. I get a little overawed sometimes at the talent in the ScrapArtist gallery though and secretly dream of creating amazing layouts like that. But Miss Six loves gallery browsing with me and loves to see the layouts that I create so that makes it worth my while.
Not much gallery browsing for me this week though as I'm now on dialup speeds. It's just painful waiting for pages to load. So I guess I'll be getting more scrapping and less spending done this week!!

Corn Cracking and Mood Rings

It's been another eventful week in our household. (Apart from me being sick of course). I felt like a real heel when I rang work to tell them that I couldn't do my Friday night sleepover because my head just wouldn't stop pounding. We were hoping to go away for the weekend but because I wasn't that well we decided against it and stayed home. I have to admit it was a wise choice. When we were doing the grocery shopping I thought I was going to pass out and I found it hard to walk a straight line. By Sunday evening my ears were aching. Went to the doctor on Tuesday and I've got a middle ear infection! blech!
Sooo.....
Sunday morning found us heading out to the Rathdowney Heritage Festival. We got out there (on time we thought) to find we were actually late. lol So we were racing around and getting dressed into our costumes for the Grand Parade. Parade over and we were going to head back to The Man of the House's parents place to change and then come back when SIL (aka Granny Mallinson) stopped us and asked us to help with the corn grinding exhibit. So over we went and shelled and ground corn for the next hour or so until the main crowd died down. Then we could go home and get changed and come back to check everything else out. Miss Six had a blast at the Picnic Games. She was winning her sack race by a mile and then took a tumble just before the finish line. She wasn't upset though - every participant got a chocolate!

Oh!! The mood ring! Nearly forgot about it. Well on Monday, we went to the Qld Museum and Science Centre. At the gift shop I decided to by a mood ring. I've watched it go through a range of colours but it mainly stays a pretty blue which either means that I'm lovable (the MOTH says 'yeh right') or romantic (won't tell you what he said about that). However, I seem to be unclassifiable most of the time as the ring goes a lovely grey/green colour more often than not. And it's not on the mood chart. Wonder what that means??

This week, I've been trying to scrap every night. Miss Six talked me into buying the wonderful collab kit by Madame Mim and Milla Designs (Enchanted Forest) and I've been creating fairy layouts this week. So I'll share a few layouts... and some photos from Sunday.


My 'heritage' family

Doing the Corn thing

And now some layouts

Twice in a week... I'm on a roll

I often wish I was one of those witty type of people that write satirically funny blog posts. I so enjoy reading them but I'm not able to write like that.

So as I write this post, I am sitting at my desktop computer in the kitchen/dining area and watching my granddaughter scoot around the kitchen in her walker. She's so much happier when she's upright. I'm looking around at my kitchen and I can see that the dishes need doing, the table needs tidying up and the floor needs a sweep. The washing has just finished. I really should hang that out or tomorrow when I go hunting for some clean underwear I could be in a bit of trouble.
Reminiscing for a minute.... I remember when I was a Brownie (oh so many, many moons ago) and we were told the story about how Brownies came about. It went something like, a poor woman who had two lazy children really needed someone to help with her housework and she was crying one day and the Brownies heard her. They came in at night and cleaned her home whilst she slept. This went on for some time and then one day the children decided to take over from the Brownies and do the housework for their mother. I remember as a child taking this story very seriously and I would creep out of bed at the unearthly hour (for me) of 6am and get up and set the table for breakfast and do some of the housework for my Granny. I didn't realise until I was much older that she actually woke up around 4.30am and used to listen to me doing all this... Anyway, I digress.
What I really want right now is a Brownie. One who will do my dishes and sweep my floor. And if they get time (and can do it without waking me) vacuum the carpets.
I'm past hoping that Mr18 will do any of this for me. Yeh right!!! And Miss 6 makes more mess than she cleans at this point in her life - but has fun doing it!!

My head is stuffed up today and my throat hurts. I just want to do some scrap therapy. At least I don't have to cook dinner tonight. We have made it a weekly ritual now of having takeaway or eating out on Wednesday evenings after we drop Miss Ava back to her mother. Tonight we have to take Miss Mum home as well as her car decided to die on her last night.
I've been digi shopping today. I have a love/hate relationship with the ScrapArtist designers right now (and new releases are 20% off). They are putting out some seriously awesome stuff. I've already spent a bit today and I still have heaps on my wish list. Then I saw the new collab over at SBG... I just have to have it. I've seen layouts in the SA gallery using it and I decided that I had to have it before it was even released.
Now I'm deciding if I really need to spend the money. I'm steadily eating into the last of my designing money that I made with my sales ... but I'm having a good time doing it!
Here's a couple of my latest layouts. (Oh and I had some great news last week. I've been selected to be a Guest Goddess at ScrapArtist in June. I can't wait!)
Credits can be found here.




Okay... I've checked and I can't see any Brownies lurking amongst the dust bunnies behind the door. Guess I'm gonna have to go do this housework myself!!