They are trying to send me to an early grave...

Or Why My Children are the DEVIL.

Here is the vacuum cleaner in the backyard. I spent the afternoon vacuuming the patio. As you do when you are totally knackered and about to have a nice sit down with a cup of tea and admire the turnips you just picked.They look quite cute and harmless don't they - my children. Little innocent people, running around with their umbrella hats on.
Only they came up with something better than rain. So much better. They came up with snow.
Yes, they emptied the entire contents of a bean bag onto the patio, and the first that hubby and I knew of it was them shrieking 'snow, snow,' and Miss Four asking when Santa Claus was coming.

Of course they chose a day when the wind was sitting on 30kmph and gusting up to 50kmph. Thus creating snowdrifts ALL OVER THE GARDEN.

This stuff is impossible to pick up, too light to sweep and at the same time so static that they cling to everything. Thank goodness we've got a Dyson, so it was able to suck them up, and then we could empty the barrel back into the bean bag - along with quite a few unfortunate ants. It still took hours, and the wretched little things are going to haunt me for months to come.

SIGH.

Stavros Flatly - Britains Got Talent 2009

If you haven't seen, or heard of Stavros Flatly then click on the You Tube link below. I laughed. A lot.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gHvATmUsSg

Rainey Day Morning Tea

Weather not so good, kids bored. Always makes for a horrible day. So we ended up in the kitchen and the kids made scones.

Then we had a very civilized morning tea with nice cups (henley shape, pole star, different colours). Note gigantic pile of washing to be folded in background. If you'd like to come over and fold it for me please email. And dead flower arrangement from work to congratulate me on leaving (thanks work :-))

Naturally, I had not had time to get dressed yet (yes, those are my pjs). And don't tell me you don't have mornings where you are so run off your feet you don't have time to get dressed. Well okay so you don't plaster them all over the internet, but I have attention seeking issues. We all know this.Note unwashed hair and gigantic bottom. Yes, that is all my own bottom. Its taken me years to perfect.

And really, at the end of it all, everyone was totally underwhelmed.
But it wasted a couple of hours and I discovered that gluten free flour makes completely crap tasting scones (yes, we've gone gluten free - I cannot describe how this pains me).

Sore Throat & Still in Pyjamas.

Yes, I have a sore throat and a very unnatural urge not to talk much. This is why today's cup of tea looks like a urine sample. Its peppermint tea. Designed to soothe. The cup is in the Gainsborough shape, design called Rose Spray. The backstamp dates this set to between 1945 - 1966. And yes, the handle is a bugger to hold, but you do look dainty doing it.
Operation Clear Out Study is moving along. Okay, so its not exactly got much further, but I have put some books in a pile and realised my copy of The Artist's Way has gone mouldy. This is probably a bad sign.

Its a lovely day and I should be in the garden planting peas instead of feeling vile on the couch. I hate being poorly.

Teacuppery

Yesterday's cup of tea. Now in focus!

Its a Shelley (naturally) and this cup is the Mayfair shape cup which was produced between 1932 - 1940 in mallard green with extensive gilding. Not bad for 70+ years.

Today's Cup of Tea

Here is today's cup of tea. Will look up design name and shape later as have headache due to sleep deprivation and need to go and do something about pigsty of study: see below.
Do not want to think about the number of unpaid bills in there. Anyone got a light?

Easter Monday

Just because there weren't enough calories in all that chocolate.

Children had hysterics due to meal not being MacDonalds and thus no toy.

Merry Easter

Easter feast started simply enough with beans from the garden.Purple beans and rattlesnake beans - in case you were wondering why they aren't green.

Things quickly spun out of control with custard (at the back), bread sauce (front left) and blackberry and apple pie filling (right) with apples from a friends tree.
Naturally the chef kept up her strength with cups of tea... (that is a blue Pole Star shelley teacup in the Queen Anne shape circa 1920 - just in case you were wondering). And seasonal refreshments.
Yes, baking, I am domesticity itself.

Guests arrived...
Lunch was ready... (yes, the chef had moved on from cups of tea to something bubblier).
Pie was eaten...And then everyone ran around and got super-excited about having a tent in the back-yard.Despite his best efforts, he did not eat any chocolate.

Its got Man Flu

Man Flu is a crippling and debilitating disorder indiscriminately striking down male members of the human species without warning. The illness is often referred to pejoratively by female members of the species who are in fact immune from the illness as man flu is now known to exclusively attack the XY chromosome carrier. If Man Flu is kind enough not to kill the infected party it will definitely leave him weak, sick, hurting everywhere and in dire need of TLC.

Medical professionals now also widely recognise that self diagnosis by the sufferer is the best means of identification as the symptoms of Man Flu are far more severe than the simple common cold which predominantly targets the XX chromosome holders (i.e. females). This goes some way to explain the cynicism some women display towards their male counterparts.

Definition taken from... http://www.manflu.info/

Hubby is presently at Stage 2...

Stage 2 - It's not a cold, it's the 'flu. Your beloved will barely be able to lift his fingers to work the remote control by now. There will be dramatic displays of coughing and chest holding. He will present a red and sniffly nose, and a phantom fever. Do not mention (begin sarcasm) Man 'Flu (end sarcasm). Instead continue to serve comfort food and provide him with a selection of men's magazines (such as FHM or Maxim) to take his mind off the illness ravaging his poor body. You may also be required to gently dab his forehead with a lightly dampened sponge or massage his feet. This life threatening stage may last from three to five days.

Easter Saturday

Yup, a classy road trip with pie stop for lunch.

Never let it be said that we don't travel in style!Easter is a laid-back affair for us this year. This is actually the first time we've managed to leave the house since Thursday. So I expect we'll be going completely stir-crazy by Monday - when the rain arrives.

Puppy Love

He's getting bigger. But still SO cute and presently obsessed with hunting down and ripping apart knickers. Anyone's will do. Clean or dirty, not fussed. Lovely.

Because I am actually civilised sometimes...

My afternoon tea...The only item made after 1967 is the silver tea-strainer (oh and the horrible purple cushion). Even the tray, the coffee table and the couch are all vintage. How's that for environmentally-friendly recycling??

Several people have asked where exactly I found the photo below. It was sent to me. People see things like this and send them to me. I try not to wonder why.

Well, that takes care of Christmas Pressies for all the boys...

Maybe I should include a gift voucher for a spot of waxing.

Damn you Coffee Cart and your ill fitting lids. Damn You To Hell.

A really shit Tuesday....

Okay, so this was my day last Tuesday. I'm sorry its taken me a week to put this post up, but its taken that long to edit out most of the swearwords!

It started late on Monday...

Monday 9.30pm Put clean sheets on bed – am delighted by thoughts of lovely sleep on clean sheets – put puppy on bed – puppy wees on undersheet where duvet is enticingly turned back.

Tuesday 6.41am Squabbling children arise
6.45 Puppy wees on floor
8.35 Am informed that dear work friend has died of cancer after long long battle.
9.30 Children refuse to let up in constant nagging/fighting cycle
10 Start to try to get children to put shoes and socks on
10.30 Get them all plus puppy in the car – only half an hour late for playgroup
10.35 Can’t find car keys
10.49 Lift up teatowel on benchtop searching for keys and find huge roach
10.51 Finish beating roach to pulp
11.10 Give up on car keys and decide to take entire family up to shops for a coffee and something nice for lunch – don’t care what, anything to distract the little buggers
11.11 Inform children – tantrums commence
11.35 Tantrums subside
12.15 Make it up to the shops after long, wearing walk (I mean its only 750m how can it take 40mins??) – small crowd forms around puppy – answer stupid questions… yes he is cute, yes he is a puppy, no he isn’t a girl (SEE HE HAS A PENIS – a penis so hairy that the vet gave it a trim for him, yes a penis hair trim – she even had a scientific word for it. Vets never cease to amaze me), no he has never bitten anyone (which is a lie, he was chewing my hair at around 6.15am when Hubby dumped him on the bed before sprinting out the door)
12.36 Leave children in charge of puppy and crowd control and go to order Hot Chocolates
12.37 Find I have an empty wallet
12.38 Back in café after sprint to ATM (non my-bank so I paid TWO DOLLARS for the privledge) and fly past Bakers Delight where they foolishly tried to press sourdough bread upon me (not literally).
12.39 Take hot choccies out to children who have given up on me and are introducing themselves to total strangers, luring them in with the puppy.
12.41 Miss Four pours hot choccie over freshly bought cheesymite scroll
12.41 Tide of milk reaches Miss Three's cheesymite scroll
12.51 Tantrums abate when café lady abandons customers to restore calm
1.15 Buy milk, post books flogged on ebay for $7.50 each thankyouverymuch
1.34 Sun comes out, breeze drops and temp soars to 34 degrees
1.37 Begin slow, horrible trip home
1.43 Walk up my street carrying puppy, Miss Three, handbag, fetching shoulder bag with cupcakes on it containing 2L of Very Heavy Milk (because they were out of 1L cartons) and holding Miss Fours hand as she sobbed - "Are we there yet?"
1.45 Arrive home, fling children into bedrooms for ‘naps’, hide down far end of house enduring dead possum stench and sobbing over the end of Oprah (because it was all about army fellows coming home to their wives – and I am a sook)
2.15 Naked Miss Three arrives to inform me she has done a poo – congratulate her heartily – until she tells me it was in her bed.
2.16 I can’t appall you with the things I had to deal with for the next half an hour
2.31 Puppy wees on floor
3.01 Handyman turns up after FOUR MONTHS to measure up for replacing eaves – makes sarcastic comment about puppy and Ella – inform him she died – he slinks away.
3.30 Make steamed chicken dim sum for afternoon tea. Miss Four's verdict “This is shit” after she’d spat it on the floor. Yay, her vocabulary is coming along so nicely.
5.30 Hubby arrives home with freshly purchased teaset from auctioneers – where incidentally the computer system had gone tits up, so he fixed it for them. They offered him a job. He told them his hourly rate, they withdrew the offer.
5.40 Realise tea set is in really crap condition – much more crap than told. Have been had.
5.45 Get invoice for teacup from NZ – pay it via international bank transfer which cost an extra $24 thus making my BARGAIN teacup really fucking expensive
5.47 Realise really fucking expensive teacup does not match crap teaset – almost identical but NOT QUITE. Debate whether to tell husband or not. Elect not. Cunning plan to match teacup to parts of teaset and flog on ebay thereby making back money spent totally and utterly down the gurgler.
5.50 Puppy wees on floor, children have hysterics for no clear reason, Hubby loses temper and goes to buy Thai takeaway
5.51 Realise Miss Four is covered in hives – fill her up with clarantyne and mourn the fact its the non-drowsy version.
6.30 Stand outside waiting for puppy to wee - get eaten by sandflies
6.40 Give up on puppy
6.41 Puppy wees on floor
7.30 Stand outside waiting for puppy to wee - debate squeezing it out of the wretched animal - get eaten by mosquitos.
7.40 Give up on puppy
7.41 Puppy wees and poos on floor
9.03 Realise I haven’t washed puppy-wee bedsheets yet.

sigh.

Teacuppery

So, anyone who's a regular visitor may have noticed that I slip in the odd photo of Very Cool Teacups. I usually call the post Teacup Pron (pron instead of porn so I don't get sleazy people googling... uh oh). I agree this is an immensely stupid title for a post and promise to stop it.

Titles aside, the collection and flogging of vintage & antique (email me if you can tell me the difference!) teacups made by a china company called Shelley is a passion that has kept me happily time-wasting (and not writing books for example) for quite some time. I now feel the need to illuminate the internet about it all, so now and then I'll put putting up a post about various cups in my collection.

I use my cups. In fact the screamies use them as well. Yes, nothing is quite like watching a three and a four year old sipping weak tea from porcelain teacups, with utterly perfect manners. I'll try and get a photo - have finally figured out how to get photos from phone to blog (now to tackle messagebank). The kids can use any cup in my collection (as can any guest in my home) however, I do steer the littlies towards a few white elephants I have in my collection - from getting stiffed on ebay, ones that arrived cracked, or one of a couple of sets of six I have.

So, my all time favourite pattern is Shelley's Spots (often mis-named Polka Dots) on a cup that is in the 'henley' shape. This is my divine blue spots trio.
And my green trio - blue at the back - the reason they look different is because the gold is painted on the rim differently.
Recently I got hold of a duo in turquoise and a duo in melon, only red, pink, yellow, black with white spots and hazelnut with white spots to go!

Trust me its better than poo...

One of my delightful children has taken to decorating her bedroom with excrement - I now cannot sleep unless everything around me reeks of bleach AND if I knew where to send her back I WOULD.

However, there are laws about selling children on ebay, so instead I've been chatting to a shrink about it. One of things we're trying is playing with clay. I'll let you figure out the thinking behind that yourselves...
As usual nobody has a clue how it got on the dog...
He's so CUTE... And his white smudge on his nose is going.

Followup...

Hair cut, spent yesterday being as be-lovelied as I can be and spending money on clothes. Not sure how I managed to have such a gigantic forehead though.Note remains of hot chocolate in car seat cup holder. Never let it be said that my children don't travel in style.