Mirror Mirror

An exciting start to a very big week.


Last Monday the twincesses and I were invited to a screening of Mirror Mirror. As this involved a trip on the train to London there was a huge amount of excitement!
It also required a rather early start, hence the less than enthusiastic faces.

The screening took place at London Soho Hotel, sounded easy enough to find but having enough to contend with being alone with the girls, google streetview was scrutinised the night before. Does anyone else do this before going to a new place?

The hotel is incredibly chic and the girls were really fascinated by the most enormous cat in the entrance. As we walked in I actually wondered at the sanity of holding an event for small children somewhere with such immaculate surfaces and beautiful art. As it happens we were directed into an equally beautiful, slightly less daunting room, laid out with a colouring table, soft drinks, balloons and biscuits.


The girls both had their faces painted, "with lipstick Mummy" and Bunny Lashes bagged the Prince for his first dance. And his second and his third and his fourth...



I think he was mighty relieved when it was time to watch the film, poor chap. Although he did get 'twinned' before we left.



The film was a very modern but charming take on Snow White. Julia Roberts as the wicked Queen is superbly vile, scathing and has crinkles. Lily Collins is picture perfect with more than smidgen of modern day kick ass who saves the hapless Prince.
Not before he is bewitched by a potion of puppy love; the girls laughed all day about this part.
Fiesty leading ladies, beautiful costumes, lots of laughs and a scary dragon; we loved it! It will definately be part our of ever growing collection.



Happily full of cupcakes, goody bags in hand we made our way down Oxford Street in the scorching sun. Our balloon hats didn't make it very far *sad faces all round* but a much longed for trip on the top of a double decker bus (at the front no less) soon brought the smiles back. Honestly, it was sweltering on there; you could barely breath but they sat there beaming as though they were enroute to the flipping moon!

A few more hours pottering topped off by a Mr Whippy in the park where we very gratefully took our shoes off and it was time to brave the underground again to go home. For me it was the first of three trips to London last week. The next one was very, very exciting.

Sailors and Lions and Clowns, oh my!

A few weeks ago I took up an offer from the very kind Merry Raymond who was asking for people to review some Hama beads from her shop. I was able to pick whichever set I thought my girls would like so I opted for a marvellous looking Puppet Theatre set. As you can see,the twin bunnies were a tad excited when it arrived.

I picked this set for two reasons, one because bunny lashes is absolutely nuts about Lions and two, because being a larger kit and having two children on the front I thought that it would be something they could do together and not fight over...

First things first, in the box are two bags of beads,(five thousand in total) four sticks with discs on, a set of sticky pads, one board to make the chosen design or pattern, a sheet of ironing paper and a colour sheet with four characters and instruction booklet. This particular set also comes with a very colourful cardboard puppet theatre so you may create theatrical masterpieces once you have made your figures.

 For anyone that isn't familiar with Hama beads the concept is very simple. The image is made with the corresponding beads on the picture. It requires a small amount of dexterity and a little bit more counting. Once your creation is complete you place the ironing paper over the design and iron carefully over it until the heat fuses the beads together. Once it is cool you can remove it from the board.

With this kit you make a front and back for your character and attach them to the sticks using the double sided tape.

Whilst there was never any shadow of a doubt as to which character would be chosen by one twin, Bunny Dimples just could not make up her mind.

Decisions, decisions.

Both girls were eager to get started but I hadn't read the details of the kit properly and was rather dissapointed to find that there was only one board supplied.This was, of course, my fault entirely but I do feel that as the box depicts two children and it is a large kit with four characters to make that perhaps two boards would be more practical.

I put a teatowel on a baking tray to stop the board moving around and the beads ending up all over the floor and decanted a few of each bag into plastic tubs to make them easier to get at.




One twin grasped the concept fairly quickly and finished her sailor pretty easily. The other one did not. Not at all. She refused to finish it and couldn't be coaxed back to the table for all the tea in china. Despite finding the process easy the other twin also refused to do anymore so her poor sailor has just a front.

I have to admit that I was genuinely surprised by their reaction to it, I thought it was a really lovely kit. The characters are bright and engaging and the cardboard Theatre lots of fun.
The girls absolutely love crafting and making things and so far this is the only thing that they haven't really enjoyed very much. I think that it may be due to the constraints of making the characters. They have subsequently made their own designs and enjoyed that much more.

To sum up, I think that Hama beads are great fun. This kit at £13.99 is very reasonably priced and I think for the right child it would offer many hours of fun (read peace and quiet for parents). There is such a huge range to choose from and larger beads for smaller fingers.

I have not put the kit away, it remains on the bookcase and I am keeping my fingers crossed that they return to it and finish it. If they don't I may very well do it for them!

Love,

SILENT SUNDAY

Happy Fathers Day!

Am not quite sure what prompted me to post after so many weeks; it's been a strange year and I am trying to put into words why I haven't blogged for a while but haven't quite managed it yet. (Hopefully I will soon...)

I have however, managed to do some crafty things with the girls for Fathers Day. They had such fun  making everything. As with all of the special days, I really object to mass produced rubbish. After lots of browsing I found so many lovely things for us to make; there really are some generous and very talented folk out there!

I thought this idea from Amy at The Ideas Room was super. We adapted it a bit as I wanted to treat Mr Bunny to a taste of home. So some Australian beer was ordered and the girls coloured in the little shirts and ties to add to them.

I picked up the wine carrier for nothing at the supermarket and mixed the paint from some leftover pots.
Then I stood back and let them at it. There was the odd splatter on the cheeks of one and the other one had it in her nostrils ( you don't have to ask) but they actually did a really good job of it and didn't fling it around the room at all!

Once it was dry they put the bottles in and I made a label for it. I think it looks fab; Mr Bunny certainly looked pleased with it!

We also filled a large jar with sweets to go on his desk. I cannot lie; this did involve a small amount of sampling by the twins. Obviously they had to make sure they were nice before they parted with them. The labels came from the Martha Stewart website. She has some very clever ideas and lots of free printables too.

We also made him a little book of vouchers for car washing, lawn mowing, foot rubs and other such Daddy treats. I did the ribbon and the girls did the stamping and punching.

Vouchers from Martha Stewart

After the big clean up and lunch they made handprints and I framed them for Mr Bunny to hang in his study. I couldn't for the life of me find a twin handprint poem so I re jigged one that I found online. I think this gave Daddy the biggest smile of all.

Add to that a much deserved lie in, big brekkie, relative peace and quiet, managing to escape without the twins this afternoon,  followed by a huge roast I think it's safe to say that we have a happy Daddy!
Hope you all had a lovely day, whatever you did.

Love,

The Gallery - Tomorrow

I have been thinking all day about this weeks theme at The Gallery.
At first I couldn't think of anything particularly inspiring other than the things I do on a daily basis. More laundry, thinking of something for dinner again. Opening bills with huge amounts of inserts and adverts that I never read, the usual mundane motions that I go through whilst I try to retain some semblance of myself.
Now, after dinner, the twins are in bed and the house has stopped moving. I have a chance to hear my thoughts in more than just 'must do' snippets.
I am able to think what tomorrow means to me.
For the most part I hope that tomorrow brings no news, nothing of any major importance. I am content for tomorrow to be, for the most part as mundane as today. I don't mean that I wouldn't like a little glamour but in the absence of that I will settle for everyone being just where they should be. Everyone I love being safe and I hope that tomorrow my little girls face will not be quite so sore!

I hope that I will get a call from number one son finally. He has been in China for a week and I haven't heard his voice since I hugged him at the departure gate last Friday. I know he's in once piece; he has sent me text messages but nothing compares to hearing him.

When I go to bed at night I hope that tomorrow I will get to see and hug my Grandma again. She has been in a nursing home for three weeks now and she isn't very happy. I would love to have her live with us but we have absolutely no room. Add to this the amount of care she needs now she is unable to move at all and it just isn't possible. I am sorry about this every day. I hope I can see her again and that I get to say to her, " see you tomorrow" for a while longer yet.

Love,

SILENT SUNDAY

So where DID the week go?

I can't believe it's almost Thursday. I do look forward to them as it's the only day off from the twins I get.
My sanity or 'Twin Free Thursday' as it's known.

But I was full of good intentions to do so much this week. I made lists, set Calendar reminders and found lovely reasonable pictures.
In fact, I had so many things to blog about that I actually ended up doing none of them; consequently my little page has remained unloved this week.'sniff'

I had promised myself to join in with MochaBeenieMummy again on Silent Sunday. It's great fun to do, doesn't require you to be a fabulous writer or photographer ( although the standard of piccies is remarkable most weeks and puts my efforts to shame!) There are some lovely bloggy ladies who take part too.

So why didn't I?

It started with Sunday; which was spent watching number two son dance his little Tap shoes off at a fabby masterclass in London. It reqired a horribly early start and we didn't get home until quite late. It's a whole other post altogether as I was actually meant to leave him at his class and take the underground to a Vintage Fair.
(Something else I meant to blog about but haven't managed)

Then I wanted to take part in Magpie Monday. Missielizzie and I definately share a love of charity shop finds and I have lots of them to share at the moment. But Monday was spent doing huge amounts of laundry as being away on Sunday meant that the beds weren't done.

Is there a pattern here?

The Gallery is another blog event that I have wanted to take part in for a while but always either miss it or don't have the right type of picture!
This weeks theme was trees but I have been so cold this week that I haven't really been in the mood to venture out to take any. The lovely Tara assured me on Twitter that the beauty of it is that you can join in anytime so I am absolutely determined to do so next week, on Wednesday...

I have been a little busy though, besides administering love, mummy hugs and clean pj's to the small people I have started to write my very first tutorial.
I hope it will be simple to follow and someone will actually try it and let me know if it's not a dreadful disaster? I have made a couple of these lovely necklaces for the twins last Birthday

 Aren't they pretty? Which is more than can be said for the face Dimples is pulling at lashes. 'ahem'..moving swiftly on.

I plan to make some more to match their new summer frocks this year and I think it might be fun to make some up using some Vintage beads if you have any that are beyond repair? (Of course, I could never advocate breaking up the precious Vintage ones!!)

So that's about the week sewn up. Not much accomplished but onwards and upwards,
Hope you all are faring much better,
Love

Handing down the wisdom

I love how my elder children have taken to having twin sisters!
They have fed, bathed, changed, pacified and loved them in equal amounts. They have become very close to both of them despite being thrown up on, jumped on, pooped on and generally behaved like another set of parents. I really don't know how I could have coped in the early days without them.

I know that over the last four years the girls have learnt a huge amount from their big brothers. Number one son teaches them Chinese over the dinner table and tells them about Internationl Politics. Number two son teaches them dance steps and dances with them around the dining room; a lot! They get to play on his drums, keyboard and all of the other instruments strewn around his room. For all of this I am truly grateful. It does this mummas heart good to see that despite the fifteen year gap they all are genuinely fond of each other.

However,

I cannot say that I ever expected my four year old to hand me a plastic play cup and say

" MUMMY, HERE'S AN EMPTY CUP OF CARE"

Gee, thanks Emile...

Children, aren't they a treasure

Love

Maybe it's Maybelline?

Happy Happy Mummy!

I am a very happy mummy today!

#2 son decided to take a day from College and #1 son arrived home for two days so
I have a full nest, BLISS!!!

Hope you're all having a lovely Monday too,

Love,

 

Great Grandma Hugs