Autumn holidays

Yes, I know, I haven't been blogging for a while, I guess all my duties kept me from it.
On my last update I wrote about DD11 going on schoolcamp. As far as she's been telling me, she had a great time. Of course, on the friday afternoon when she was on schoolcamp, there was the foxhunt. (It's a game where people dress up as characters, and groups of kids have to search them and ask for a signature, the group with the most signatures is the winner)
Well, I dressed up as an old lady, and I really had a great time. The best part of it, was of course when DD11 came behind me and asked me if I was a fox. So I turned around, and the moment I smiled at her, she recognised me! Her reaction was so much fun to see, I wish I could have made a video of it. Priceless!

Me dressed up as old lady

All the 'foxes', teachers and children after the foxhunt

As you may have figured by now, everyone had lots of fun.
(ha, how much fun can it be to tell teachers in a loud old ladies voice that kids don't learn that much at school nowadays, and that teachers can be plain stupid! no pun intended of course ;-) ).  One of them was kind enough to get me a cup of coffee, which I really appreciated.
All to soon it was time to get DD8 from school, and collect the luggage of DD11 and her friend at the other school location.
Finally the autumn holidays had started! Of course with 3 girls around there's not that much playtime, but over the weekend I managed to finish an outfit for Ellowyne, which really made me happy, as it had been bugging me for months, that I still had to sew an apron and craft a hat.

Serious Intention Ellowyne, wearing my version of the steampunk 'Like Clockwork'outfit

On monday DD11 went to a friend for a sleepover and I could collect her on tuesday late in the afternoon.
DD8 slept in DD13's room, who read her a couple of chapters of Narnia before going to sleep.
As we it was really quiet withouth DD11, DD8 asked me if we could bake together.
She took her magazines with recipes downstairs, and put them all on the kitchen counter:

We finally choose to make chocolate lollipops

She started with putting some sugar decorations in the ice cubes holder

After that we melted the chocolate, and then she added the little sticks.

After that it was time to put them in the fridge.

adding the sticks

the result

As it was tuesday, it was finally time to check on my apple vinegar, as it had been 2 weeks ago I had started preparing it. After seeving it, here is the result:

When the lollipops were ready we went to my parents, where my sister was with her DD's. They enjoyed the  lollipops too!

 

my little princess, very proud of her own 'baking'

Another thing I saw on tuesday was a bud in the plant that DD13 had been cultivating.

On wednesday it came to full bloom:

On thursday DD8 & DD11 wanted to bake rainbow cupcakes, which was a fun project that took us the best part of the morning.
But, they were very yummie!

And on friday morning I really had to get ready for our weekend away, and DD13 had to deliver a round of newspapers, before we could go.
But finally we were on our way and arrived at the campsite in Arcen in good time.
.

Tuesdays Troubles and Treasures

I had an early start today, woke up too early and got out of bed around 6 am.

I had lots of laundry hanging at the attic, so decided to start folding.
Around 7 am the attic was looking like this:

So I went to my bedroom to get dressed. (Yes, I know it isn't the FlyLady way, I should have gotten dressed first and do the folding after that, but that isn't how my mind seems to work at that hour of the day)
I think having empty laundry lines can count as the first blessing of this day.
The next great thing that happened was that DD8 had a little school outing (a trip into the forest), so she was really looking forward to it, and got dressed withouth the usual fight.....
I managed to get the girls at school in time and went back home and had a little me-time behind the pc.
Of course I still had to walk that postround, which DH had sorted for me last evening, so that was next on my program. I was so happy it wasn't much at all, compared to the usual amount of post!
When I was walking in our street, all of the sudden I saw a laundry basket which was obviously thrown out, and mixed with the plastic that was to be collected today. The laundry basket is exactly the same as the ones I have, only it was in much better condition, so I took this one home, and threw out the one that was in the worst shape. (I think someone up above just winked to me) It is a plastic laundry basket, so quite easy to clean.

Usually I bake my own GF bread, and I made the dough before starting on the last part of my postround.
When I got back from getting the girls home for lunch, I put it in the oven. (So I had a late lunch myself)

As you can see the bread turned out beautiful and I can assure you it is delicious too.
When DD8 & DD11 were back at school again, I went to the second hand shop near DD11's school and found the following treasures:

Of course the placemats need to be laundered, but I love the warm colour.
I really only just went there to look for a nice big glass jar, as I still have tons of apples to work with, and I found a recipe for apple vinegar, and needed a big glass jar for it.

This is wat it looks like right now, but it should turn into apple vinegar in 2 weeks time.

Another little job that was still waiting for me, was sewing the ribbons and elastic to DD11's points, so that is exactly what I did this afternoon, although I had to wait for her to be back home again before I could sew the elastic at the right size. She was really quite panicky when she found out she could hardly squeeze in her feet, so I called her ballet teacher about it, and she assured me it would all be allright when she would put them on at the lesson, and so it was........ DD11 told me it was a very weird feeling when she had to stand on her toes and felt her feet move further down the shoes, but she really enjoyed her first points lesson.