In The Spotlight

Every now and again my roving spotlight will come to land on a particularly clever blog. Or perhaps witty, honest, colourful. This new to me blog will become my must read, any new posts are quickly clicked upon and enjoyed as I am so eager to find out what new words they have to share.

Today, my 2 new must reads are in my own back yard of Christchurch, New Zealand. They happen to be dear friends, and they happen to both have taken up blogging recently all upon their own accord.

Let me introduce them to you...

HollyMayB has been in my life for a little over 4 years. She is a strong woman full of wisdom and insight that I don't possess. We go to the same church together, have coffee during the week, and have littlies roughly the same age. She is ridiculously talented when it comes to the crochet hook or the sewing machine. Seriously. She makes everything look so effortless and professional. I am thoroughly jealous of her in that department! (!!!!) Holly's blog is full of everything wonderful. Her sewing, crochet, son, marriage, environment. Everything is shared with honesty and a dose of humor and I love to open up her blog and be inspired and learn. (Also, whenever I post something new in my blog and there is a typo or spelling mistake I will hear about it from Holly ;) )

My favourite post of Holly's: Mama Love. The hilarious morning of a happy chucker.

Amy the Crafty Fox is such a good friend. She's the kind of person who will think of you when you're off in another world doing your own thing. She will buy you gifts, send you lovely text messages, and just make you feel like a thoroughly crap friend in general because she's so onto it and awesome (and I'm not). Amy was at the birth of my daughter (although she just missed the actual birth) and was a total star applying hot towels, making toast, filling the birth pool and all the other things that she did that went unseen. She also took a fair bit of verbal flack from me and laughed about it the next day :) Amy is a Project Queen. Seriously. Every time she pops up in my blog dashboard I'm excited to see what she's created now. Her and her husband are a great working team, they produce things of the highest creative and professional level around. I adore those two, and I am thrilled that she has started a new blog to share with the world.

My favourite post of Amy's: Re Upholstering. Did you know I was talking to someone about reupholstering my couches and they linked me to AMYS blog because of this amazing tutorial!??! I laughed and laughed and laughed (because it was so awesome) because someone was referring Me to Amy's blog! So cool!!

So please, go over and check out 2 of my dearest real life and blog friends that I have to offer :)

Bloggy Party!

I met up with 10 Christchurch bloggers last night at Miriams house for a Secret Santa party! Let me tell you, I was crazy nervous, but even more excited! I have been following all these ladies for months and months, its nice to finally meet them and put a face and voice to their text on screen! Funny how you create your own expectations of people, many of them blew those out of the water (in a great way!).

The evening was filled with delicious baking, fun crafted presents and lots of laughter!

Again, I really honestly couldn't believe how lovely everyone was. I guess I wouldn't bother reading their blogs if they weren't lovely.

We were supposed to trade a handmade / baked / opshopped gift and I mega failed on this. I was supposed to make for Max and I had all these plans and dreams which I left until the last minute, then I had to take Camilla to the doctors and that stuffed up all my plans so I had to do a quick dash to the supermarket on my way to the party, excuses excuses. Either way, the gift I gave was crap compared to what I received. Guilt much!?

Miriam was my Secret Santa and she gave me a great book on eating for kids, a goodnight story book for Camilla, pretty pretty story pages about birdies loving their Mamas that I'm going to put on the wall in Millas bedroom, a personalised singlet and for me, pretty pretty crane earrings that I had previously admired elsewhere in the blogland!

Big thankyous to Juliet for organising everything and for the party photos!!

Juliet. Miriam. Max. Holly. Hannah. Kirsty. Nin. Deb

About Catherine

Holy Moley.

Please go and visit my friend Catherine over on her Wordpress.

I use the term "friend" loosely. Really, I hardly know her, but I caught one of her links she posted on Facebook to her blog and I am HOOKED, now I wish I knew her much much better (claim to fame?). She's an artist with raw talent. Her whole blog is a collection of poetry and lyrics and it is beautiful. I could read and read and read all day long.

Seriously, why are you still reading my blog? Get over there now.

Kiwi Mummy Blogs

YAY! I have found other blogs to read!

I stumbled across a great site; www.kiwimummyblogs.co.nz

And whats cooler, my blog is on their reading site! When I post anything it will appear on their website and other people can read it! This is the first time my blog has ever gone public (outside of facebook and people who know me) even though I have some international readers, I'm not sure how they found me, I have never advertised like this!

If you're interested in Mumblogs, head over and check out the other awesome and honest kiwi ladies.

It's honestly a breath of fresh air to read some kiwi blogs - reading perfect American blogs with a pretty dressed up family, amazing crafts and adventures sometimes gets a bit weary.

Also, if you've been enjoying my updates, head over to my husbands blog which he has just started using again and bookmark it! Its so interesting reading things from a males perspective.

The Journey Blog

I would like to introduce you to a new blog, and I would really like it if you clicked THIS link and went and visited right now.

This blog (The Journey) belongs to Katie, who started Amazima ministries. She's Christian, she's American and she is young.

Katie trained as a teacher and then moved to Uganda and started an orphanage there. She now has 14 beautiful girls of all ages under her care. Some she has officially adopted, others are in the process of being adopted. She feeds them, cares for them, teaches them, disciplines them, and loves them; She is their mother now.

I am so crazy ridiculously inspired by her and their new home. What a wonderful thing to invite people into your home. Check out her blog, read their families adventures, and while you're there why not send an encouraging email or flick them some money!? :)

Colour My World

I can't wait to get all of our things out of storage and into my hands! Lately I have really been missing my craft boxes of goodness. I packed them away thinking I would only miss them for a few weeks, but those weeks turned into months and now I'm pining after them!

I love Color Me Katie's blog. She's an artist / photographer and everything she does is about colour. It's so inspirational! I particularly love this post she did, here are some photos from it. You should definitely check out her blog!

Welcome!

The old Wordpress has gone, and the new has come! To celebrate, I've made a super fun back ground and header and am feeling very inspired to make this one better than ever!! Unfortunately I am not able to transfer my old posts over, so we are starting fresh. Feel free to check out my wordpress page though if you are new to me :)

My Dad returned from a 4 week trip to Africa this week, so today I was sporting my brand new Africa tights! Yes, they have dancing African people on them. They are absolutely crazy, and I love them to pieces.

Also, I picked up these cool (and uber cheap shoes) today from Kmart. Did you know that Kmart had such a massive selection of cheap shoes!? I'm so glad I discovered it, there's so many different styles I want now!