wordful wednesday - our family friendly pin up girl

at the risk of making my blog all about one child, i just had to toot the family horn one more time...

it's not every day your child makes page 3 of the national daily paper

so so proud...



for more wordful wednesday, visit angie over @ seven clown circus

my page 3 girl (in the wholesome non-tabloidee kinda way!)

the buzz continues around here after cross eyed mary's win at rockquest on friday night.

yesterday (sunday) there was a photo shoot in civic square for our morning paper 'the dominion post' - wellington's equivalent of the washington post (well, sorta).

me being the total cheapskate that i am, photographed the photographer!

my girl sure can strike a pose

even when no-one else is...

i think this is my favourite, and not because i'd unwittingly captured the photographer's 'builders' crack!!!'

the feedback's been amazing! i think every second person reads the paper in this town

my daughter the rockstar

remember last year when she won the female musicianship award in the wellington regional finals of rockquest? that was with her college band 'flamingo pink'.

this year cross eyed mary entered the hutt valley competition. the heats were held yesterday afternoon, and the finals last night.

i just love how she's so happy to pose for me in the middle of a hall full of strangers.

side thought: if i pulled a face like that, i'd look like a 3-week old prune.

this face makes me want to hug the body attached to it, but there's a limit to how much the rockstar will indulge the mother... this is my favourite action shot of the night

party tricks (twirling drum sticks)
oh to have the confidence to twirl, NOT drop and keep playing
i'm in AWE

leader singer oli doing her thing

awards won by cross eyed mary at the end of the night included:

the APRA award for best lyrics
"the song i wrote won! MY song!"

they also won the award for best song (which isn't the same song they won the lyrics award for). which made every song they sung a winner!

then they announced the places
3rd got called
2nd got called


are we gonna win???

only one band member per group was allowed on stage

[i really want to win, but i'm stealing myself against NOT winning]

WE WON!!!!!!!!!!!!!
FIRST PLACE!!!!!!!!!!

and then the local paparazzi swarmed

sure we have paparazzi.....just look

see? there they are still!

the radio station sponsoring the event and C4 (our local equivalent of MTV)
they're gonna be on TV!!!

the guy my daughter is looking all 'gaga' at is the lead singer of this band. they're a kiwi group who's made it big! listen to the song if you have time, it's very cool.

doing a 'wave'

the lead singer's big sis stepped in as bassist (2nd from R).

under the rules, you have to be in school 15 hours a week to participate, and CEM's regular bassist is not. it must have been hard for her to watch, but rules are rules!

winners are grinners! (name that movie). as i write this, I still have a ridiculous grin on my face. of course, miss 17 has been learning to ride her motor bike (in class) all day and has ANOTHER gig tonight.

all in a weekend for her...

the weekend where summer officially ended

a little scrapping to start:

this one for 'triple the sketch' one year anniversary and blog hop!

sketchbook friday night challenge
these pics were taken during our 2003 USA/canada trip.
i felt so sorry for cruella. first of all, she was frying in the almost 100 degree heat!
plus she had to be nasty, whereas all the other disney characters oozed love and affection!
and this one for creative scrappers
heretoformentioned disney characters oozing love and affection!
the girls are now TWICE the age they were in these pics
time sure does fly...

i received this 'lemonade stand' award from someone i've never bloggy met before!
so sweet - thanks krissy!
i think i'm meant to share it with TEN others!
a job for next weekend me thinks

this is the old navy yoga hoodie i won from jaime over at handful of blessings (during the SITS spring fling). because we don't have gap here, she let me choose an item online, then posted it to me! how sweet is that! thanks jaime :)
jaime is one of SEVERAL triplet bloggers i keep stumbling across - a year of blogging and i've never met one, and all of a sudden, i'm finding them everywhere!

• i won the friday night challenge (last week) over at sketchbook. i'll show you my RAK (hehe) when it gets here

• we got 3rd in a travel quiz last week that was run by our travel agents. food and plonk provided. totally free and just for fun; and it was. my parents came too!
  

• the hubs and i are off to another pub quiz/school fundraiser tonight (shocking, i know)

• i'm participating in a card swap that's been organised by my fave things swap pal ann. between blogging and card swapping, i think i know someone in every state!

• school holidays start on friday, which is also good friday. even though i'm still working, i love the school holidays!

• tara brought the kids over yesterday and we had a movie afternoon. we watched 'wall-e' in HD on our new tv. it was AWESOME!!!

• daylight saving finished last night, which i guess means summer is officially over. boo hoo!

• thoughts on my job so far:
  not good: not finding the time to exercise
  good: but i walk up the hill home from the train every day!
  great: find myself being EXTREMELY disciplined with meals, given that i work 5 hours straight and need to eat efficiently at my desk, ie leftovers!
  
  not good: shopping time has been cut to practically ZERO!
  good: not spending any money, and EARNING money! (that's a win, win right there)
  
  good: i love my new job
  great: they love me too!
  
  good: my car is staying in the garage most of the day as i get a ride into town with the hubs.
  great: we're saving on gas!
  
  so it's all happy happy right now, however i realise there'll be days when things don't go so well; sick kids, getting behind with house and family stuff, but for now - it's all good!

• have you ever heard of the armageddon expo? it's a science expo that has an almost cult-like following. it features guest appearances from d-list stars such as kevin sorbo from hercules and peter davison - doctor who from 1982 through 1984.

miss 17 and her mate (who is also the lead singer in their band 'cross eyed mary') who i shall call 'giggles' for the purposes of this post - decided to make a TARDIS. they spent EIGHT hours in the garage and this is what they came up with...how cute is that?

i JUST got back from dropping them in town at the EXPO. i swear they GIGGLED the entire way. they're entering the fancy dress event later in the afternoon.

i shall report on their progress!

and a question to finish.

i have really not had much luck with search dialogue boxes on my blog and i wanted to list my 'labels' to make it easier to find old posts, but i have so many labels, i wondered if there was a way to list only SOME of the labels?

...or do i have to go back and unlabel/simplify the labels on all my posts?

just wondering!!!

happy sunday!

wordful wednesday - phil and don, eat your heart out

First of all, i didn't take this photo, OR do the awesome photoshop work on it (one of the other band parents did), so full credit and thanks to "G"!

this was taken at the weekend where the girls played TWO gigs in two different parts of town; a summer carnival and a street fair. miss 17 has recently started doing back-up vocals (in addition to her kick-arse drumming!)

while she can dance, act and rock - singing hasn't always been her strong suit, however with a tonne of support from her band and the extended band family, she's really starting to enjoy it.

this is such a great pic - i wish i took it myself!

see angie at seven clown circus for more wordful wednesday

partridge family move over

as christmas approaches, a flurry of end-of-year concerts descends and proud parents everywhere get to sit in accoustically-challenged turn-of-the-century school and town halls and take bad video of their kids, while wiping tears from their eyes.

so who am i to break with tradition, eh?

apologies in advance for the poor quality. it was recorded on my little point and shoot. i have asked santa for a new camcorder.

here's miss 12 at her singing debut. she was so nervous i thought she would pass out.

here she's employing the 'stare-at-the-roof-and-get-through-it' technique

but by her second song, she was a little more relaxed. this pic was taken on the canon with the big flash. what a difference!

this is her 2nd song, so she'd warmed up a bit.

anyone with a pre-teen who hasn't been living under a rock will recognise this song.




here's my show pony 17 year old with her school of rock band, 'cross-eyed mary'. this was their 'triumphant return' gig (the first one as a 4-piece). they dropped a guitarist (not on her head), but a long story nonetheless.

she's playing my favourite of their songs "just for you".



then there's this one; once i realised you had to zoom BEFORE you hit the record button. DOH!!!


then there's miss 10 at her keyboard concert. short and sweet. it was all over before i even had a chance to hit the record button.

here's the 'supper' table. note the complete absence of anything home-made. we had planned to take care of that...but left them on the counter at home. miss 12's fresh chocolate chunk cookies

and some random photos to finish. i'm just loving these long summer nights. my favourite part of summer. dinner's over, there are no after-school (or dinner) activities, and the sun is STILL out. apparently we're in for a 'scorcher' - YEEHAH!!!ever noticed how cats always look slightly perturbed at the affection that's being shown towards them?

cross-eyed mary rocks the nation, and my mental family

miss 16's band went on a mini tour the last 5 days of the school holidays (last week). they belong to the school of rock, whose founder works tirelessly for young musicians in the area. because they have permanent premises, kids lucky enough to belong to the school quickly move beyond the 'garage' phase with their band, hosting gigs and even recording CDs.

their band is very popular - being all girl rockers probably helps with their cool factor!

she handed over her camera and these are some of the shots she came back with. these two were taken in the auckland domain soundshell. it was apparently very cold!

what a cool structure! they don't build 'em like that anymore!
this was taken at their first gig in wanganui. photoshopped the original. clearly you have to have shoulder length hair to be a TRUE rock chick!
i would pass out if i did that...
i used pioneer woman's hard light on this one

(and some other stuff i can't remember)

here's the original
these next photos are funny, although DH was 'not amused' at all! it's mothers' day on sunday (as i've already mentioned) and because his mum's in a dementia unit he thought that he would include a family photo in the card to help jog her memory. DH announced this at the dinner table, and with everyone going off in different directions, we didn't really have much time to pull it all together (clearly).

my awful teenagers both planned planed to ruin the shot, by (1) doing the bunny ears behind me (what is she 8?!?) AND (2) by pulling my hood up at the EXACT moment the timer went off. as you can see, i had no idea it was going to happen...

hmmmmmmmmmmm...

shortly after this DH got the shits and left to play squash, but thankfully, we had already got this one below. the canon's battery was dead, so we had to use my new compact, which is working out well, but doesn't produce the best shots inside at night (or maybe i should just keep practising!)getting everyone in the same place at the same time for more than a couple of hours is becoming a real mission. i realise this is a fact of life with teenagers and a large busy family, but i'm not ready to let all that family time go yet!

so, when DH and i decided to take the younger two to the rugby this friday and the older two wanted to come too, i was VERY excited! i can't remember the last time the 6 of us went out like that. can't wait.