notjustamum

The new addition to our family.

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 21:58:18 -0500

The new addition to our family.

Kids table & gift bags. A friend made jelly shooters for the...

Thu, 14 Jul 2011 02:28:00 -0400

Kids table & gift bags. A friend made jelly shooters for the kids, they were a big hit and not just with the kids ;)

Adults Chocolate Table

Thu, 14 Jul 2011 02:22:47 -0400

Adults Chocolate Table

Making Memories for Kids

Thu, 30 Jun 2011 23:22:00 -0400

Yep, not sure were the last 3 weeks went since writing my last post, but I’m sure I did something constructive in that time.

These things would be so much easier if you didn’t have to invite people, but then I guess that defeats the purpose of having a party. The yes I am coming, no I’m not going to come I’m sure would drive a saint insane. But in the end if there is a 100 people there that really want to be there, then I am happy. The most important reason I do these events is for my kids, seeing there excited faces each morning as they count down the days to the Dinner Dance makes me realize why I put myself through all this frustration and work. We are creating memories for kids that will last them a lifetime. In the end it is well worth the effort it takes to even play a small part in creating those wonderful memories for children, not just my own.

So this week I’m going to choose to focus on those that have taken up the opportunity to create memories with me.

Dinner Dance Planing Four Weeks to Go

Fri, 10 Jun 2011 06:58:00 -0400

This past week was all about the music, and getting a play list together that everyone from one to seventy-one will enjoy. After rejecting many a top 40 song because they just didn’t seem right for little ears to hear. Example one song had the line ” Going through hoes like drano. ” I finally came up with the playlist below.

Dinner Dance Song List

Theme from the muppet show

Birdie Song (Chicken Dance)

Dingle Dangle Scarecrow

I’m a little Teapot

Hokey Pokey

Blame It On The Boogie

We Are Family

Daddy Cool

Mamma Mia

Nutbush City Limits

Stayin’ Alive

You’re The One That I Want

Beat It

Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go

Mickey

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

Gloria

Simply Irresistible

Love Shack

Venus

Footloose

9 To 5

Cotton Eye Joe

Swing The Mood

Rip It Up

S’Wonderful

Shall We Dance

Just The Way You Are

Irish Party Third Class Titanic

Mambo Italiano

We No Speak Americano

Men In Black

Unbelievable

Hey Baby

Rock This Party

Crazy In Love

Club Can’t Handle Me

Jumpstart

Barbra Streisand

G-Get Up and Dance!

Loud

Dynamite

Hello

We Run the Night

Price Tag

Telephone

Hands

Jet Lag

Rolling In the Deep

Dancing On My Own

Thank You for Being a Friend

I Could Have Danced All Night

The Party’s Over

Oh yeah, you have so not lived till you have rocked out to I’m a little teapot ;)

So now that the music is done and week 5 has passed without a hitch it is now onto week 4 and the kids gift bags, washing and ironing the table runners and hoping the rest of the decorations arrive.

Party Planing 5 Weeks to go.

Fri, 03 Jun 2011 06:50:39 -0400

Today I put in my last online order, so now I just have to sit back and wait for the parcels to arrive.

So wish it was that easy. Week Five is all about the Music and making sure that everything I have bought goes together as well in real life as it has done in my imagination. Something that doesn’t always happen.

Week Five I always find the most annoying as a lot of what I have to work out relies on knowing how many people are coming. Most people get back to me straight away, but there is always those annoying few that don’t.

On a brighter note, after all the fuss it ended up the fairy curtain light that was sent was not a 1 meter like he said but 2.2 meters and exactly the one I wanted. And considering he only charged me $75 for it, when everywhere else I looked had them for $300 I was one very happy girl.

A shopping trip to Melbourne on Wednesday was also a success Masks, candles and sandwich trays were found for half the price of that on the internet.

Now to give those who have been invited a little extra push to say yes or no, so just maybe week five can work out as well as week four has.

Dream Cubby

Fri, 03 Jun 2011 06:19:21 -0400

http://www.poshtots.com/play/pint-sized-fun/luxury-playhouses/victorian-playhouse/20/2201/1109/519/poshproductdetail.aspx

So cute the girls would have to fight me for this one.

Party Planing

Tue, 24 May 2011 02:56:20 -0400

Just when I thought everything was going so well I had a spanner thrown in the works when I found out the fairy light curtains I ordered wouldn’t be in for 2-3 months.

Seeing as I only have 7 weeks, that is not going to work. So it looks like it is back to t he drawing board :(

Time to Dance!

Mon, 16 May 2011 00:21:57 -0400

Every year I do two Dinner Dances for family and friends. Although it is a lot of work, it is also a lot of fun.

First up I pick a theme, this years Winter Dinner Dance is to be based around Musicals. Winter is a great time to have dark, rich warm colours and lots of lights.

With just under Eight weeks before the dance I have started to send out the invitations. I love smilebox for invites they are fast, cute and easy to keep a track of who you have sent them too. I have picked a black embossed design, with a photo of a single red rose and diamond ring from Phantom of the Opera. The invitation music is the theme from the movie The Duchess. Somehow the combination just works, even though it may have not been what I had in mind to start off with, I have learnt to be flexible in my thinking and keep trying different things till you find something that works.

Now that the invitations are out in cyberspace somewhere, it is time to think about the decorations and entertainment for the night.

XO XO Melle

Notjustatown

Wed, 04 May 2011 00:08:33 -0400

The fact is that no matter how many times one whines about how our town is falling apart, the fact is whining about it, is going to change nothing. As is the case in complaining to the council. You know what they say about flogging a dead horse, well that horse is the council of Greater Geelong. I’m not political what so ever, however I do believe if we want change it starts with us. Wether we are a business or resident it is all in a best interest that we live in the best place we possible can.

I am lucky in the fact that I live close enough to the city that I can walk when it is not raining. However for most people that want to go into Geelong for the day, have to pay a high price to park in town, and as for all day parking in Geelong, well you may have more luck finding a needle in a haystack.

The fact is that I may have been watching far to much tv set in New York, but I could not help but notice that taxi’s seem to be the favoured mode of transport. It got me thinking that this might be the answer to getting around the council and there lack of interest in providing parking in Geelong. How hard would it be to get one of the local taxi services on board to do a promotion to encourage people to think taxi when they want to spend the day shopping in the city?

The next big problem is, do people really want to shop in Geelong? And if not, what can be done to get people to want to shop in Geelong again?

Shopping in Reverse

Mon, 18 Apr 2011 03:26:36 -0400

This week my goal is not to go shopping. Instead I’m going to go around my house picking out stuff that I no longer need and putting it into shopping bags. At the end of the week I’ll either sale, give away, trash or donate.

Finding my inner Mary Poppin’s I had this weekend all...

Sun, 27 Mar 2011 21:29:56 -0400

Idea found in nootbook

My Version

Finding my inner Mary Poppin’s

I had this weekend all planed, however the lice found in Tam’s hair on Saturday morning changed all those plans.

After 3 hours and a many tears later we had finish the 3rd treatment on her hair for the week. So, what to do for the rest of the day???

Well.. I will be the first to admit that I am good at a lot of things, however, housework is not one of them. As much I’d like to have a beautifully clean house, this is something that regularly eludes me.

There has to be a simpler, easier way of doing things then I am now. I am also a big believer in if something is not working, change it. So with that in mind I turned to my never ending washing pile with one thought in mind. Change…

I have had the picture above sitting in a folder of my favorite ideas for a very long time but never got around to putting it into action. With a free weekend, it was time to put the idea into action.

You can find the article here > http://www.homelife.com.au/home+ideas/home+help/storage+tips+for+the+laundry+and+bathroom,4437

I Have an outside laundry, so I have placed the baskets just outside the bathroom. Let’s hope the family get the idea and use them.

In all my dreams I have never imagined myself as a domestic goddess, Mary Poppin’s maybe. ( Really who wouldn’t want to be able to just snap their fingers and the job be done.) but not a domestic goddess, it’s just not going to happen, it’s not me.

On the other hand I do imagine having a warm, welcoming house, that I can happily welcome my family and friends into without having too worry about the mess.

It is time for me to stop dreaming about it and start making it a reality.

Love Melle XO XO

This is a photo of me today 10kg lighter. When I first bought...

Sun, 06 Mar 2011 01:24:43 -0500

This is a photo of me today 10kg lighter. When I first bought this dress last year I couldn’t do the bows on the sleeves up. I hid this fact under a coat when I wore it. Today I could do up the sleeves and had no need to hide under my faithful coat. No more hiding for me, 75kg here I come.

So this was me with hubby in June 2010 at 95kg. Thanks too some...

Sun, 06 Mar 2011 01:13:00 -0500

So this was me with hubby in June 2010 at 95kg. Thanks too some inspiration from one Miss Holly, I decided this was not the real me and that something had to change.

So after a shaky start ( A miscarriage in October set me back a little, chocolate was my best friend at the time.) I have slowly become a healthier me.

For the first 3 months I put into practise the knowledge I already had and lost the first 5kg. It was at this point that I hit my first plato, it was time too try something new. As I hate the thought of giving the big companies my money, I decided that wasn’t an option. It was then I stumbled across a book called the Mommy Diet by Alison Sweeney as well as her blog. I found this was good for me, it wasn’t telling me that sugar was going to kill me or that I had to eat cardboard for the rest of my life and workout 8 hours a day. It’s just a working mum giving practical advice on how to live healthier and make treats exactly that treats and not everyday foods.

For a little more inspiration I once again got it from Holly who had joined the Michelle Bridges program. I umm’d, I are’d and then I just did it, I joined up.

That was 3 weeks ago……. and now I have finally got rid of the first 10kg.

Yay

Thank you Holly, Alison and Michelle for being my inspiration!

Melle XO XO

At the start of last year I made a promise to my then 9 year old...

Mon, 31 Jan 2011 06:29:20 -0500

Flynn, Lola & Ryder

Varboo & Blackange

At the start of last year I made a promise to my then 9 year old son Co that I’d buy him some fish. I got as far as buying the fish bowl and well what can I say life happened. Having a broken foot put me out of action for 3 month and well it was catch up from there. Anyway as it is weeks turned into months and then here we are one year on and he still had an empty bowl sitting in his bedroom. Last week I made good on my promise and went to the pet store to buy a fish for the empty bowl. Upon exiting the pet store I had the fish plus a birdcage and two finches. As I was packing the car I was wondering what on earth that had just happen. I was brought up in a none pet family so I’m a newbie to the whole having pets thing. 5 days later I realized why I hadn’t travelled this road before when one of the little finches died. Tam was in tears as this was her bird. Big fat tears rolled down her face as she said ” I know pets don’t last forever but I thought that I’d have him longer the 5 days. ” As I dried her tears I promised to go back to the pet store in the morning. Zebra finches are very social so they love having others around them. The girl in the pet shop was lovely saying there would be no charge for the new bird. We also found out that The bird we had called Flynn was really a girl and not a boy. There ended up only being two birds left, sooo I couldn’t just take one and leave the other one by it’s self…… Which meant I left with another 2 birds as well as another fish and three kids with big smiles on their little faces. So that has my introduction to having pets, all I can say is I’m very glad that the pet shop didn’t have puppies and kittens else who know how this story would have ended.

Melle

It is pretty hard to be taken as a serious Cat’s Fan when...

Mon, 13 Sep 2010 19:22:23 -0400

It is pretty hard to be taken as a serious Cat’s Fan when your front door has this on it :p

One of my loves in life is tea, and I drink alot of it. So it is...

Sun, 12 Sep 2010 08:41:17 -0400

One of my loves in life is tea, and I drink alot of it.

So it is probably fitting that I write my first post about exactly that TEA.

One of my favourite times of the week is when I walk down the waterfront and drop into The Edge for a cup of tea. I don’t normally order tea when I go out because I feel so ripped off when I hand over $4 and get given a cup of hot water and a t bag.

At The Edge however they give you a little teapot with hot water and cup on a little wooden tray, it is so very cute. I love the quiet time I spend there drinking my cup of tea and chatting to whoever I have persuaded into walking with me.

But as much as I wish I could do so, I can’t do it everyday.

So I’ve been over joyed to find that I can buy these delightful tea drop tea bags online.

I can’t wait to get my first order, so I can enjoy this indulgence everyday.