Just thought I'd do an interim post to round up the month of March before April starts tomorrow! I've managed to last 1/4 of a year and I'm proud of myself! Anyone interested in joining in PAD for April, come join us! Mitch, Phong & Thao you are all in - it's not negotiable! :p
March 29 - Picnic Basket Stowaway
Yes, this photo is completely staged (although, just prior to taking the photo, she had been playing with the basket and opening and shutting it)... but I figure I don't have much time left to get these cute photos of her sitting in baskets and things before she's walking about and can get out them!
March 30 - Time To Adjust The Cot
Catherine's pulling herself up to standing really easily now and I've found her like this a number of times when she's woken up from her nap... Time to adjust the cot so she doesn't fall out!
March 31 - Part 1 - Cutting Teeth
If you look *really* closely, you might see a tooth coming through there... :) Yep... at the age of 10 months and 10 days, the bottom left tooth has cut through... gummy smiles are on the way out!
March 31 - Part 2 - Do You Think She's Tired?
Bonus photo for today because I thought this shot was too cute not to share.
Found her in this position this afternoon... I don't know how that could possibly be comfortable!!!
Photo A Day - March - Rounding Up The Month
Photo A Day - March - Week 4
Let's wrap it up for another week... I decided to go for a monochrome/black and white theme this week -
March 22 - Chairs Are Tunnels
She likes crawling under chairs... and often get stuck and/or bumps her head when she decides to sit up while she's under there. On a separate note... she always wants to crawl now, so putting her to bed has become a bit of a struggle and she's constantly rolling over onto her tummy or sitting up and then she get stuck 'cos she's tired and doesn't know how to lie back down again... silly pumpkin.
March 23 - The Cutest Baby Boy
This little guy is the 4 month old baby of our friends Ko and Vinnie... He is soooo cute that he makes me clucky again... which is really insane 'cos I'm sure I'm done...
March 24 - Photoshoot With Sheye
We had our family photo shoot with Sheye Rosemeyer on this day... been planning it for weeks and I took a photo of the clothes we were wearing and the props I was bringing along (most of which we didn't end up using because we were too busy having a good time... LOL)... only giving a sneak peek of the photo I took 'cos I don't want to give too much away until we see the actual photos from Sheye... :) I've already said it a hundred times... but I can't wait!
March 25 - Making Pancakes
6:15am and we're getting stuck into making a batch of pancakes for breakfast.
March 26 - The Cat That Got The Remote
In the span of 2 weeks she's gone from crawling backwards to crawling forwards to getting up on her knees and now to pulling herself to standing...
Yesterday she pulled herself up to standing using the couch when what she *really* wanted was to get the remote control... So today, I enticed her to do the same again to recapture the moment.... doesn't she look content with herself?
As a side note, this weekend Catherine has learnt to say "Mumumum" (but not on demand... she only says it when she feels like it) and she can now wave hello and goodbye when you ask her... it is so totally adorable... You should see the way she looks at her hand when she manages to get the wave going... it's like an epiphany moment... as if she realises "Oh... that's my hand... and I can make it move like this... Cool..."
March 27 - Sleeping Babes
So after our recent trip interstate, Elizabeth's flowers have died... so she asked to go to the flower shop (aka as Bunnings) to get some new ones. So off we went and she picked up some new flowers for the garden. On the way home, both girls fell asleep in the car like 2 peas in a pod... I love it when they are both sleeping at the same time... *sigh*...
March 28 - I Love Gardening
That's what the big girl said to me today whilst at the same time being a total drama queen about the dirt... the ants... the beetle... the plants falling over... the water making her wet... Based on that I'm not quite sure what it is she actually likes about gardening!!!
But the best part of gardening with her this afternoon was that she just randomly said to me - "Mum.... I love you." And that just made me melt... and then she said "And I love Daddy .... and Catherine." And that just made me melt a little more.
(And yes - she's wearing oversized gloves in this photo)
Scrapbooking Sunday
Another week of scrapping fun around here -
This one uses Inscribed and I Love You Like from Fei Fei's Stuff... I still adore those overlays, so many different ways to use it and "I Love You Like" is currently my go-to kit because it expresses so many sentiments that I feel and uses colours that I love... 
And this LO uses Intertwined from Fei Fei's Stuff and the frames are from Conversation Piece No. 1 from Paislee Press & One Little Bird.
I've been dying to use this baroque freebie clipping mask from Paislee Press for ages and I finally found the perfect photo for it. The kit used here is Of The Essence... it's such a cool unique kit.
This LO uses the Oscraps trOpical collaboration that was free as part of the 5th birthday Scavenger Hunt celebrations... it's a really fun bright vibrant kit, perfect for summer! I think it's still available if you head over to the O and look for the Scavenger Hunt thread....
And I did this LO for the web inspired challenge at Oscraps and I used a new kit I recently bought in the birthday sales... it's Time Capsule from One Little Bird and it's such a beautiful kit. The ornate stamp used here is from The Gift from Fei Fei's Stuff. The design is loosely based on a free template from Paislee Press - Press Plate No. 19 
Thanks for looking!
Photo A Day - March - Week 3
And here's the week 3 wrap up ...
March 15 - Coffee Delivery
We got a big delivery of coffee pods for the nespresso machine that we bought a month or so ago today. Lots and lots of coffee for us... (well decaf for me while I'm breastfeeding ... :))
March 16 - Can't Say No To This Face
Catherine does this uber cute thing where she tilts her head to one side to get your attention ... she knows she's so darn cute when she does it and it totally melts me when she does it and makes me smile every single time.
March 17 - Reading Stories
While I was hanging out laundry, Elizabeth sat outside and read a book out loud to me... she makes up the story as she goes and it's so funny what she comes up with.
March 18 - Little Girl, Big Girl
I decided it was time to get some more photos of the girls together. My favourite photo from this shoot is in my blog header... but this is not a bad shot of both girls looking at the camera. (Note, the big girl decided to dress up a fairy of her own accord... then also insisted on wearing that outfit out grocery shopping later that morning!)
March 19 - Gelati
Best.Gelati.Ever. From a place in Rosalie... has amazing flavours, like fig and ricotta, lemon lime and bitters, and pannacotta! We got some to take away and got lychee, apricot (made from fresh seasonal produce!), chocolate and macadamia. Note to self... gelati is hard to photograph... it's rather unforgiving in the way that it melts so darn fast... so by the time I'd scooped out the last scoop in the dish, the first scoop was already melting! Elizabeth adores the chocolate gelati!
March 20 - Up On Her Knees
So she only just started crawling last week and a week later, she's pulling herself up onto her knees already! She's just itching to stand up on her feet...
March 21 - Gorgeous
10 months and she's gorgeous. Catherine got the "gorgeous" wooden wall hanging from her godmother Vicky for Christmas. I've had the idea of doing a shoot with her holding it for ages, but was waiting for the right time when she could sit and kinda hold it... she did pretty well ... :)
Double Digits and A Wee Bit Gorgeous...
Little Miss Catherine has hit the big figures... 10 months today!
Currently she -
- Is not a breakfast person... (getting her to eat breakfast takes *ages*!)
- Loves cruskits and jatz biscuits... broccoli and homemade oven baked chips are also popular.
- No longer hates car rides... and will fall asleep in the car if she's tired. Gone are the days of constant crying in the car and refusing to sleep in the car... thank goodness!
- Can crawl from the living room to the kitchen.
- Is a curious monkey... has already tried pulling books and dvds off shelves.
- Likes to play with the screen door.
- Is no longer sleeping in the wrap me up sleeping bag.
- As a result of the former, she often sits or tries to crawl in her sleep.
- Will now sit in the stroller when at a shopping centre (She sat in it for over an hour yesterday! Which may not seem like a big deal for most babies, but Catherine has hated the stroller from the very first day, so this is huge progress for her!)
- Will now sit in the shopping trolley for the entire duration of a grocery trip.
- Loves iphones, ipads and the remote control.
- Thinks whatever her sister has is better than what she has.
- Still loves rustling things.
- Still loves the dummy to go to sleep and is getting better at finding it when she loses it at night.
- Always wants to know where Mummy is... preferably likes to sit on her if possible.
- Thinks beatboxing is hilarious.
- Likes her baths again.
- Is pulling herself onto her knees to look at stuff.
- Loves cameras and will obliging look right at the camera for me most of the time... :)
Scrapbooking Sunday
My oh my, another week has flown by and it's Sunday again already! What a week it's been... there have been some massive 5th birthday celebrations going on at Oscraps and for the first time ever, I've been joining in the forum and in playing along with the challenges... It's been a lot of fun.
Just reminding everyone that Nina's retirement sale is still going on until the 31st of March, so you still have a week or so to grab her goodies. I did these pages for some of the challenges using her products (click on the images to go to the LO in the oscraps gallery for a list of full credits) -
I also did these LOs for the challenge -
This one I did using only freebie kits from Oscraps.
This one was for a challenge to scrap 5 words of inspiration.
And this one was for a challenge where you could only use certain elements... I used mostly Fei Fei's Stuff on this page too.
Over at Owl Tree Studio, things are starting to get buzzing too... the new forum and gallery will be going live soon... but the store is still up and running and there are some lovely things there -
These two LOs use "Uniquities" from Wild Blueberry Ink which is part of March's Hoot Club Release -
This one also makes use of JoeyLynn Design's Curvaceous Template -
And these 2 LOs are made with the Just My Luck Collaboration kit, which is free if you spend $10 or more in the store.
Could She Be Anymore Perfect?
***Biased Mummy Alert***
Isn't she just the sweetest, prettiest little thing?
For the photography-inclined, I'm feeling in the mood for a bit of change in my processing, so I just bought the Fable action set from My Four Hens Photography and ran Blush on this photo... Haven't had too much of a play yet, but I like how her actions include all the layers so you can tweak them.
Adelaide March Visit 2011 in Pictures
Just some shots from our trip to Adelaide... photos taken by me and by Phong.
And because Chu Phong hardly ever gets in the photos because (like me) he's taking the photos, he and Elizabeth have their own dedicated storyboard of craziness -
Photo A Day - March - Week 2
Okay, time to do a wrap up of the second week of March -
March 8 - Happy Towel Hoodie
We had a bit of an issue with Catherine suddenly hating baths when we were in Adelaide. When we got back to Brisbane, she was still not loving the idea of it, but a lot of singing and making sure I didn't get any water into her eyes, combined with making it a quick one made the first bath back in Brisbane a much happier experience. (Two weeks later we're back on track with her enjoying her baths again now, thank goodness.) She was really happy to get out of the bath though as you can see... :)
March 9 - Runaway Peas
Catherine is progressing well with her solids after a slow start (due to bad constipation issues). I gave her some peas to play with during dinner while I fed her rice with mushy vegetables... slippery buggers those peas are...
March 10 - Ladies Having Afternoon Tea
We caught up with Julie and Veronica on this day. Elizabeth and Veronica are totally obsessed with dress ups when they get together... they dressed up in these very fancy outfits complete with veils... Veronica isn't wearing a veil in this photo, but she was a few minutes before. Seeing both Elizabeth and her dressed up like such ladies was so cute!
March 11 - Singstar Superstar
Out of the blue Elizabeth asked (at 7am in the morning) if she could do the "singing with the blue microphone"... So out came Singstar with the Disney disk and Elizabeth was breaking out to her favourite tunes... she loves "Bippity Boppity Boo" from Cinderella, "Under the Sea" from the Little Mermaid and "I Just Can't Wait To Be King" from the Lion King. She's not too bad at it either - she manages to get a score!
March 12 - The Age of Frustration
Well this photo was just taken on the day Catherine figured out how to move forwards! But she wasn't quite going as fast she wanted to. She was just so, so frustrated and while she could move forward, it wasn't exactly coordinated. Poor poppet. However, now just 5 days later (its' the 18th today) she's really on the move... she made her way from the living room to the kitchen looking for me today!
March 13 - Master Architect
Elizabeth constructed this awesome piece of architecture on this day...
March 14 - Comfortable?
I put Catherine down for her afternoon nap and she grizzled for a minute before settling off to sleep. I went to check on her and found her like this... not sure how that could possibly be comfortable, but she was out to the world, because I took the photo with the flash going off and she didn't even stir!
Photo A Day - March - Week 1
Okay... now that I've managed to get those wedding photos done, back on to the backlog of photo-a-day photos I have... I'm still on the bandwagon and we're 2 weeks into March! Woo hoo!
March 1 - Abutilon
Phan's mum is amazing in the garden... Which makes for lots of awesome plants to "macro-fy"... :) Here is a chinese lantern flower she has blooming at the moment...
March 2 - Light Flows Through The Veins
Another gorgeous leafy plant Phan mum has growing in the garden... have no idea what it's called, but when the light shines through the leaves, the colours are divine.
March 3 - Smiles With Chu Phong
Chu Phong is usually behind the camera (much like me), so he doesn't get a lot of photos with Elizabeth... I made a conscious effort to take some shots of them together while we were visiting.
March 4 - Afternoon Light
I was trying for something magical with the gorgeous afternoon light, but I couldn't get the right angle. Having Catherine attached to me at the hip and having to the take this macro shot one handed didn't help me either... But hey, it's still a photo.
March 5 - Beautiful Girl, Beautiful Bokeh
It's not like I didn't take many photos on this day (LOL... it was the wedding day!)... impossible to narrow it down to one photo... so I thought I'd just share this one which I haven't shared yet...
March 6 - Yames the Musician
This little man (James, but he calls himself "Yames") was having a bit of a bash on the piano when he, Thomas, Chi and Mitch came around to hang out...
March 7 - Man Flu
Okay, very little effort for this photo on this day. It had been a big day of attending school interviews (in preparation for Elizabeth going to school next year) and all day Phan had been trying to pull himself together into a coherent state for each of the interviews... (He actually did really well! I don't think anyone could tell he was sick). But at the end of the day it pretty much left him basically in a comatose state on the futon sofa... So I snapped this shot of him before I went and packed all our suitcases for all of us, ready to go home on the morrow.
