Girl Power

The past six days have been an absolute whirlwind of activity in the Hackney household. My girls amaze me every day, but this week I am an especially proud Mum....

This girl, our darling middle daughter Bethany Mae....


....turned 7 on Saturday and played the perfect hostess at her first ever sleepover party. Two days earlier her and big sister Kate performed "Walk the Dinosaur" with their school at the Inverell Dance Eisteddfod complete with wild green hair, crazy caveman moves and a tonne of energy and enthusiam.....they got the biggest reaction from the audience, and have been asked back to dance at the Gala Concert finale tomorrow night!

This girl, our sweet little Mimi Rose....(with the most extravagant eyelashes ever seen on a human being)....


....fought her nerves to appear on stage at her first ever Eisteddfod. Dancing with her group in the Under 6 years Classical, she remembered all her steps beautifully and did so with the biggest smile on her face! She raced off stage full of excitement saying "that was the best dancing I ever did!" I had to agree!

And this girl, our lovely Kate, blew us all away with her achievements this week....


Wednesday: first place at the Zone Cross Country - now she's off to Regionals!
Thursday: danced her heart out with her school in "Walk the Dinosaur"
Friday: an extra long clarinet lesson and learnt 4 new keys
Saturday: recruited to the school soccer team at the last minute to play at a local carnival and came runners up
Sunday: performed a stunning routine with her ballet group at the Eisteddfod in her gorgeous red tutu.

You can understand why I am bursting with pride......:)

All this hectic-ness has thankfully taken my mind off the fact that I am NOT going to the Brisbane Scrapbook Expo next weekend....boo hoo....hopefully next year I'll be more financial.
However, this layout....

....IS going! It will be on display in the centre of the convention hall in the Inspiration Corner....(excitement!). Be sure to let me know if you see it there!

With hardly time to scratch myself on the weekend, I was pleased to achieve this....


....using one of Pip Prosser's fantastic Takeaway Packs. The perfect solution for a creative fix when time is short! Most enjoyable and very pretty....gorgeous Heidi Swapp papers....and a lovely trip down memory lane with photos of Mia's christening 4 years ago.

I'm looking forward to another Scrap With Penny class tomorrow night....I'll be back later in the week to share the photos with you.

I'll leave you with this thought:

"Memory is the land of enchantment which belongs to us forever."

Night night and thanks for stopping by.........xxx

Brisbane Show and Tell

Wow! What a blast! Brisbane Scrapbook Expo was FANtastic!!! Heaps of shopping and loads of lovely people. Time for show and tell.........

This was the class I did with the gorgeous Ngaire Bartlam - what a scream she is! And a genuine warm person too - very generous with her tips and ideas. Used loads of "stuff" from Heidi Grace Designs and the cutest butterfly punch (gotta get me one of those...). Not usually one to go for themed packs, but I loved the result...our old hay shed don't look half bad!

And a little closer (Ngaire is a KindyGlitz freak just like my 3 year old!) .......



And here's the celebrity shot!!!

I did the Clearly Full of Love class with Carolyn Lau, all the way from the US and co-owner of fab company Maya Road (pronounced My-a........you learn something new every day!). These clear albums are so cool, so are the foundations chipboard pieces we used (especially the cute little trees). Papers were from Piggy Tales. OMGoodness - we got sooooooo much stuff with this kit - I have enough chipboard to last for months!

And a couple more pages........


Here's me and Carolyn looking shiny and exhausted (well, it was the end of a very busy day) ....



I just LOVED this class - "In Magical Lands" with the very sweet and ultra-talented Loretta Grayson. She showed us how to create our own little "paper quilt" using a stack of cherryArte papers and Collections chipboard - and a sewing machine. This was so fun, and something I'm definitely going to try again.

And closer..............

Hands up who's coming with me next year???

Guess What...???

.....I think I'm going to the Scrapbook Expo in Brisbane in June!!! SO excited about this, I've never been to a scrapbook, show, convention, retreat of any kind before. Will be a very new thing for me, especially the part about leaving the family in the hands of hubby for a while.... I'll be catching up with my gorgeous good friend Ange (who suggested this) as well as scrapping buddies I've never met face to face. Woo hoo! How excitement! Are you going too? Drop me a line so we can catch up!