Friday 14 October 2011

Baby Shower!

Well, we had a tonne of fun at Hanna's baby shower - everyone got involved with decorating vests - dead easy to do and such a great gift for Hanna at the end of the night!!! Plus, I got to keep the fabric pens after, so I might make some cute vests for Ava too! I was so impressed by the level of creativity too - we have some seriously gifted women at church, whose creativity we need to tap into!!!


Hanna got a load of presents for the boy too, so she's all set up now - the countdown begins! She's kitted up with just about everything a new Mama needs. I hope she doesn't have to wait too long - I remember at the end just being so fed up and desperate to meet my Bubba... 9 months feels like such a long time!


All that remains to be seen now is when the little one will arrive, how heavy he'll be and, most excitingly of all, what he'll be called! Suggestions were naturally made - Noah, Elijah and Boris being the favourites... we'll just have to wait and see!

It was strange to be away from my own Bubba for the evening... it was the furthest and longest I've been apart from Ava in 11 months (I was literally only across the road) but felt like I had an arm missing! Strange how these little ones become so much a part of us.

Well, Ava's looking forward to meeting her new friend - come on Baby Borsley!

Saturday 8 October 2011

Revealing room 3... the craft room

Well, this project was tackled at the start of the summer holidays back in July. My wonderfully creative friend Nicole came over from Austria with her kids with the intent to rennovate our workshop at the end of the garden into a multipurpose craft room before the Bubba arrived...

The workshop was lovely (as you can see) a haven for all things small, scuttly or slimy - spiderswebs, dust, dingy brick - NOT the sort of place one wants to hang out, and certainly not a creative inspiration... but ever since I moved into this house I knew it would make the perfect craft room - all I needed was Nicole to come and kickstart the project into action (I was 36 weeks pregnant with Ava at the time, so wasn't exactly in a fit state to be lugging timber around!!!)

We swept out, insulated, bricked up, painted, laid carpet, polished windows, put a new door on, kitted out with IKEA furniture and created a beautiful, creative haven for me to fill with scrapbooking materials, craft books, paint, pens, wool, fabric, creative kits, glue, scissors, buttons, labels, ribbon - you name it, it's there and I LOVE it... This is it before we kitted it out with all my materials...

After 4 days of hard work, Nicole, Dave, Timo, Kaya and I stood back and admired... we filled it up with everything that I had been keeping in boxes dispersed around the house (much to Dave's relief; "We have so much space now!") so we now have lots of freed up storage room in the house as well - bonus!

Now I have a lovely space to be creative!!

Claire x

Little Boy Blue

This evening it's my friend Hanna's baby shower. She's expecting a gorgeous baby boy at the beginning of November and I'm very excited - we have lots of fun things planned for tonight and I've been scouring my favourite blogs looking for ideas and inspiration... there are so many fun things that can be done to make this a super special event. So far this is what's up...


- the infamous chocolate quiz
- baby predictions - name, date, weight
- decorating baby vests
- food, food, food
- advice book
- games galore
- pressies

and I'm sure the girls have some other tricks up their sleeves!

I'll make sure to forward some pics afterwards... seems there's babies everywhere at the moment!

Claire x

Thursday 6 October 2011

All has been quiet on the blogging front as I have adjusted to my new role as a Mother (adjusted sounds past tense - kinda like I've got it sorted now... don't be fooled!!) Ava arrived on August 22nd and is truly a gift of God. Such a joyous little bundle! I look at her and am in awe that such a perfect little person could have come from us. I am absolutely loving motherhood.

While I say that, I have to admit there is nothing else I have ever done that has left me so exhausted, uncertain and unsure... although I have always been a serious "baby-fan", the world of newborns has thrown me in at the deep end and I find myself questioning all the time...

"How do I know why she's crying?"
"When will I have one day where I'm not worrying about SOME little ailment?"
"How do I make sure I don't ruin her?!"

Oh the joys, well... I invite you along on the ride of motherhood as I make mistakes and rely on the grace of God to help me love this little Bubba well and bring her up in a way that brings glory to him.