Is there any other way to spend Christmas hols in NZ

Why is this picture so blurry??

Today the pool but tomorrow will be the beach (Ocean beach) where two girls. one mama and one Dad and one dog will be spending the day. The days are so hot and gorgeous hubby has just announced he has the day off so there is only one thing to do!

Cherry

My first post christmas post..

We had a great Christmas spent with gorgeous hubbys family out in the wilds of Waipukarau farmland. Gorgeous heaven on earth farm.. We all enjoyed

sumptous plates of lamb, turkey ham and all the greens you can think of, followed by pavlovas(mine) the biggest Christmas pudding youve ever seen, trifle, strawberries...hmm I think thats all!!

Of course no Kiwi Christmas is complete without a walk to the river and a game of cricket to work off the food.

Sadly I am taking down carefully and methodically and wrapping up my decorations. (i want to find them easily next year!!)

Not so sadly I am in the throes of making two patchwork Christmas trees I saw over the festive season. My post Christmas decoration making is always strong at this time of the year!! I have to go with it until it passes!

Very very hot weather we are having here. Weve been eating juicy strawberries and the last of the apricots before the birds scoff them. Its a great time of year.

We have two holidays planned. Both camping by different beaches. One at Mahia because the dolphon Moko is there. The girls have heard all about how their grandfather swum with Opo the dolphin when he was a boy and now they will get the chance with Moko. Gorgeous hubby has already had the pleasure of his company with his Job. Lucky!!

The other camping trip we have planned is to Arapauanui beach. Great spot. I cannot wait!! Although we have yet to book for either, Betterget a hurry on!

I hop Santa made a fortuitous visit to you and yours. I am certainly enjoying catching up on my favourite bloggy Christmases.

Love from the sunny Hawkes Bay'

Cherry

Thank you Santa!! Christmas eve day

Fresh strawberries for the pavlovas tomorrow..thank you Santa!!

Not one but two perfect pavlovas for lunch tomorrow, even in my horrible unpredictable oven. Thank you Santa!!

My Granddad Eric and my Dad (below) never miss you more Dad than at christmas and the run up to Christmas. Thank you for being a great Dad on earth for 39 years. I miss you so much right now!

And lastly. rain wonderful rain to wet these parched Hawkes Bay lands. So sorely needed for our farmers. Thank you Santa!!

Where ever you are have a happy joyous Christmas tomorrow. And remember the reason for the season!

Lots of Christmas hugs

Love Cherry

NOT FLyboy afterall..

No I read it wrong..fancy working with a pattern for months and not ever seeing the title read :flyFOOT !! Having just made this discovery at 1.15 AM in a fit of sleepnessness I feel bound to share this information. I also feel bound to say that when I googled this block the searches came up with .."the flyfoot OR swastica pattern" Im quite mortified now. One pattern I did see (actually it was a graph so it wasnt the best representation) was of putting a simpler plainer block inbetween the swas...err..flyfoot blocks.
I really need to hit the pillows now,
Goodnight
Cherry

flyboy progress..

Jusr when I thought these blocks were beginning to not remind me of certain unmentionable nazis, gorgeous hubby says to me "so your still doing the swastika quilt then?"

Arrrr..maybe if I put sashings between it? Or should I just sew it all together when Im finished and not fuss over it so much? End is a long way off on this one anyway..

Patching away furiously, love Cherry

Computer Virus has kept me away..

But now its time to catch up again with whats been up around here. Firstly although I love and adore the primitive decorating style I cant quite help myself from buying Christmas decorations like shoes for our tree. I bought two different ones for the girls when I happened upon a 50% off Christmas decs sale at Farmers the other day. I loved the shoes and gave them to the girls..Its a shoe Alex said in a dissapointed tone. Oh well cant win em all!!

Yah school holidays are here!!! Yah Yah Yah!! I love everything about the girls school activiites. I help out all over the place, working bees, car pools, reading help etc etc. I LOVE the girls after school activiites. I am the mum who does the wardrobes

the costumes, the makeup, the prompts, the hair. I do door sales, fundraising spend 80 per cent of time driving between rehearsals, venues shows. And I love it all!!!! But by December I. AM. POOPED. I have nothing left!! Completely drained of all enthusiasm and ideas, I couldnt sew together a costume or primp up some hair if I was paid!! So YAH YAh YAH the holidays. Sleep ins, pjs til noon, mussed up hair all day. Fantastic. I am however rearing to go with Christmas Joy and seasonal bottling and jam making tasks. And because as usual I have began writing before the photos had downloaded I am now stuck with phpts everywhere and text not where I wanted it. SO the top pic is of my apricots bottled. Im not doind a lot of preserved (canned if you are an American) apricots. The jam however is a favourite so I must do some more of this before or soon after Christmas .

The photos above them are my girls schools end of year presentations. Little Laex wona class prize. (above) I think I squealed aloud when they called out her name ! (embarressing parent I know) Then they gave out a new cup for Year three creative writing and my heart was in my mouth because Georgia is the top creative writer, but then I remembered the girl who was on a par with Georgia but was pout up a class earlier this year. And she got it. (I hope I didnt go awww out loud..did I!?)

The juniors for which georgia will not be next year did a song the silly hat song. They all had to wear silly hats. Just pulled out the wearable art ones I made earlier in the year for the library programme. Glad they came in handy again!

I have been using my triangle template to make and cut out what seems like squillions of stars for my Flyboy quilt. Handsewing these is sometimes enjoyable sometime tedious but I am getting them done and if I can mark quarter inch lines on them will be an excellant sewing idea to take with me when we go camping these holidays. Ill post some pictures next time.

Im so enjoying everyones blogs this Christmas, all the decs. I am such a fan of the old primitive look and cant get enough of these blogs at Christmas. I must set up a list for like minded people.

Its windy here again. The wind is driving us all crazy. Hubby is forever seen scooping up leaces out of the pool and swearing quietly under his breath. He goes away for work and wont be back until Christmas eve day. so Ill be able to buy his gift while he is gone. Hes really going out in the wops and so wont be near any stores to buy me anything. I dont want anything!!!

Have a great five days to go!!

love Cherry

Organic Apricot jam

..well ALMOST organic. Im

very excited about this very first batch of Jam. Not just because it is the first seasonal batch of anything this summer but because our neighbours apricot tree that overhangs our fence has been quite barren for two yers and i have never in the six years here had enough apricots to do anything with other than nibble. SO! Some of the apricots were a bit short of ripe but my daughters friends mother who is a food technologist, brewer and winemaker told me that under ripe fruit release pectin that is missing in ripe friut so that should ensure a good set. I never knew! Tomorrow i might buy some roadside apricots and preserve some apricots. My preserving MOJo has hit a high note now and Im so happy to be productive again!

have a happy preservative day

Cherry

Too Busy to blog..

Im such a boring old unreliable blogger I know, but life seems to have been going at full pace lately. Not that im caught up . Oh No!! As I type I have a house that after the weekend looks as if a mini hurricane, a team of drunken sailors and a girly sleepover have all taken place. Im not sure where to start really. The tree needs watering as do my few indoor plants, my two outdoor yuccas inpots and every surface needs a good wipe.

Christmas is approaching and although I have done most of the shopping and most of the handmade goodies these are also by no means finished. I really want to get a handle on things before the school holidays start at midday on Thursday. (no hope there!!)

Also thanks to the myriad of christmas related finances i am feeling very short of cash. Im always too scared to see just how bad things are and tend to kust wait for the dreaded declined typo in the eftpos machine!! Scaredy cat i know!

SO I am giving myself a real kick and am following up some homemade recipes again. I am particularly keen to try the orange coconut cream cake from Rhondas must read blog youll find it here. Also I have crock pot recipe from another blog here. Mmm Morracan chicken sounds good. The added advantage is I can serve it up with rice and my kids will normally mop up anything so long as rice is the side dish!

A very lovely friend gave us their old juicer and I am looking forward to using this on the seasons apples after xmas as cidar. I really LOVED radars series on tvnz lately and if you did too and wanted his recipes then tune in to here keywords radar.

The weather has shifted a bit. We actually had a couple of drab and cold days and nights! made the lit up Chritmas tree that much more illuminated in the daytime. I try to have the lights on when I am am upstairs and I love the smell of the pine. It resonates of all the Christmases I can ever remember. I love our tree but I cant seem to take a photo that ever does it justice. Ill have to try again tonight. What good is a blog at Christmas if I cant post a decent tree photo?

I really must go put my ipod on to full throttle and make a start on this house. I have til lunchtime as the school is having a fun sports day after lunch.

Take care,

have a happy 9 days to go Christmas

Love Cherry

And here it is...

As promised here is the photo of my quilt. It looks quite good and Meekhoef out tortie is eyeing it up as a propective new bed. Cats and quilts, just go together like crackers and cheese!!!

have a great quilty day

Cherry

tree ornies and a finish!!!

Well, I had planned to post a pic of my finished quilt. But this post somehow just blasted it away!! Ill post it next. Gosh these blog posts can be soooo infuriating when they just dont want to co operate, and today ive had heaps of problems.






So instead Ill post some pics of our tree ornaments: The first is Alexxs for this year. I buy them one that symblises something special to them. This year it is a ballerina dressed in the same colours she wore at the recital. She also got some ballet shoes in that colour attached to the bouquet and they are on there as well.

This is just a gorgeous felted angel and baby that I have decided are Mary and jesus. I bought this from a temporary craft fair that opens this time of year. Its so well done. I was given another angel like this and I think they are too gorgeous.

This Maori ornament just took my eye as totallu unique. It is from the same fair as the angel and I love it. Infact I might buy another for a good firend whoes into tree decs like me. Someone did say to me that i could make it quite easily given the fact that i make lots of decs plus I do a lot of wooden peg dolls, but maybe next year/

So thats all Ill leave now, try to recover my lost photo and post once more!!!!

Cheers from Cherry

A hot and sticky Christmas

I seem to always be moaning about the weather in all my latest posts, but I cannot stress to you enough just how hot it is this November and now December. In November (which is still officially Spring) the temperatures were mid to late 20s every day with humidity at night and now in December we are in the 30 with 32 yesterday and goodness knows how much today its as least as hot again as yesterday. So we decided as Georgias singing teacher was sick that we would pick up our tree as gorgeous hubby is working tomorrow. At 3.30 it was searingly hot and lugging the tree up, putting on all the lights etc, we were hot and bothered and sweaty and all the needle stick to your skin and then of course you get an itchy rash from that....It must be so much easier in the winter chill!!! I left the girls to it with the decs and christmas music unfortunately our good christmas cd is scratched and now missing so we had to endure Love to Sing Christmas songs written for kindergarteners, but I mean you have to have SOME atmosphere dont you?

As normal I have been hit by the last minute find a pattern, decide its great for a friend and then sweat out hours of toil to get it done before the impulse passes. And this stocking for the stitcher was that. I stayed up late and then finished it off today, leaving housework, cooking, laundry in my wake. Actually I was a bit disappointed as I had expected it to be bigger and so I cant get all the notions and extra fat eigths in it I was expecting to.

I think thought it would still be agoood decoration on its own.

On the garden front many of my watermelon seeds saved from our almost failed crop last year have come up and are almost ready to plant out. This despite the fact that Alex decided to water them last night with the hot dishwashing water!!They must be a good hardy breed!! It stilll amzes me despite the fact that I am a farmers daughter, that one water melon can produce so many seeds that can them grow more huge plants. I dont know it just seems less obvious whenn you buy a packet of seeds or a plant, but knowing where they came from eating their mama, I can see this great huge expansion of seeds and watermelons forever more stratching into the future. Isnt nature just amzing wehen you actually stop and think about it, which is after all what simple living is all about :). We have been having strawberries every day from out plants and the herbs are going mad. Weve eaten some of our lovely almost organic silverbeet, which was picked fresh and eaten soon after so very little global footprinting there not to mention the food miles. Again very satisfying. Ive also planted Roma tomatoes for drying and then when the tomatoe season starts for real they are very cheap to buy the bottling sort around here. PYO for under a dollar a kilo. Which we make sauce from (ketchup), relish, pasta sauces (this is why Im attempting to grow a lot of basil). I bought two medium punnets of raspberries to freeze and will be doing a lot more as the season progresses. Soon there will be just everything to freeze, bottle, dry and preserve... Hawkes bay really is the fruit bowl of NZ!!

Happy Hot days,

Cherry