Robots and Spaceships and Aliens oh my!

It's been a while! So, what have I been up to. I made another baby quilt, this one for my lovely friend Harriet's teeny weeny new boy, the very gorgeous William.

Isn't he scrummy? Also how gorgeous is this picture. You can completely see the total adoration, and it still doesn't quite capture it. That house is bursting with love.

Here's the blanket - I'm very pleased with this one, the fabric was such a good find, boys are difficult to shop for!

 The two materials came as a set too, perfect for a matching front and back piece. There was also a third pattern, like the front with the squares, but the pattern was much larger and so would have been great for a big blanket, but not a baby one. I'm very fussy about fabric. Even though the blankets are (so far) all for babies, I don't like picking a fabric that's too babyish, as my way, the babies don't out grow the patterns too quickly! My boys each have one, Ethan's was made by his auntie Sheri, and has dinosaur patterns, and Sam's was made by my mum and has animals and palm trees and stuff.

Last weekend we took Ethan for a treat day - I read an article recently about how sometimes we can get so caught up on telling off our kids, that they don't hear as many I love yous, and recommended treat days where the child gets to make the decisions and you get to just have a good time with them. I'm making it sound hippyish, but that's basically the gist, and really, it's about quality time together, with the focus on one child (the article recommended taking the child out without siblings if possible). It's supposed to also help 'reset' the child's behaviour and your responses to it, sort of a clean slate.

 So Ethan chose Sundown Adventureland, a children's theme park about an hour away. We've been before with school so he was very excited to go, and asked if Daddy and Sam could come too, and off we went.

 First came the Santa ride. It's open all year round and Rich was very excited, as he is a massive Christmas lover. The boys were excited too, and we went on it twice. There are actually two Santa rides there, but the second one only opens at the beginning of November. The boys were not impressed.

 Santa's sleigh crossing the moon! The whole park is (dated) animatronics, so it all moves.

 Santa's map. I'm not sure he's getting the best time with this route.

 

 On the tractor ride, and apparently not impressed with my photography skills.

 Getting onto the Robin Hood ride. There aren't any pictures of the ride in progress as I was too gobsmacked by the animatronics. At one point you're practically flashed by Maid Marion!

Attempting to release King Arthur's sword. There were lots of other rides and play areas, but I'm terrible in that I always forget to take pictures and end up with random insights to the day :)

So here's the skinny - I'd definitely recommend it, it was perfect for the kids, the rides were not in the slightest scary or fast, and it's not too expensive. £11 for adults and kids, and under 2's are free. There are 2 indoor play areas with food available, again, fairly cheap, and really good. Best of all, once you're in, the only things you pay for are food (although you can bring your own) and the gift shop, assuming you want to stop there. That too is reasonable.

All in all it was a brilliant day, we had loads of fun, there was no tellings off from us, and his behaviour was brilliant, with no whining, which recently had become pretty epic. A win I think!

Next time - an update Sam's Loki jacket for Halloween, it's going well so far!

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!

My Birthday!

 My birthday is here! I was spoilt rotten, surely the point of birthdays? Yesterday we went to the Browns for family lunch, and it was a triple birthday, for Stella (sister in law), Seth (nephew) and I (village idiot). I provided the cake, and for the first time I made a lemon cake! I've always gone chocolate before because, well, pretty self-explanatory really, but I learnt on Saturday that Seth doesn't like it - and he couldn't have a cake he doesn't like for his birthday lunch! I adjusted an orange cake recipe that I found in my Be-Ro book, and nervously baked. It turned out pretty delicious! Seth declared it nice, and it didn't last, so that's a win! I also had a request for another one from Zachary (another nephew) and Joanne (sister in law) said she's pay for it in a shop, high compliments! The thing that amazed me was how flat it baked, it'd be great for layer cakes!

Whilst there I was given lots of lovely gifts, including a dessert recipe book, bath stuff, candle, chocolates, and a wee owl pillow. I was also very kindly given money towards...

 Ta-da! I've been without a proper camera for yonks, and now I have this pretty purple swirly one! You can hope that most of the blog photos will now be better quality!

Then there was Rich's not-so-surprise gift -

 

It's so shiny! The case and screen cover he ordered for it haven't arrived yet, and I'm so terrified to scratch it that it's currently spending it's spare time in one of Sam's (clean) socks.

This afternoon we did a spot of shopping and Rich spotted this for me, a lovely new winter coat, and bought it for me! We also picked up a new long jumper/ jumper dress, but I've not got a picture.

This evening we all went for dinner at Silkwood Farm, which is in fact not a farm, but a restaurant. I had the amazing carvery, Rich had fish and chips, and the boys had chicken nuggets and chips, lemonade and a lot of fun in the play area. The best thing about Silkwood Farm is that they do Cake away. If you don't have room for their massive desserts, they'll box it up for you to take home for later. And so I did. Chocolate cheesecake. It was delicious, and there's still half left!

I have had lots of lovely cards and messages, and a package from Jess which included a book and chocolate, She knows me so well :) Thank you to all my lovely friends and family who've given me a lovely birthday!

P.S. If you're wondering about the medical appointment, it went very well, I am fine, all things done that needed sorting!

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!

Why I love Rich

Probably about time for some husband mush right?

Just over seven years ago. Ah, so young. I was skinny, he had a fuller head of hair ;) This man is far and away my better half, and for reasons best known to himself, he likes me a fair bit too! Here are a few reasons why he is the bomb...

He does the washing up. I don't mind (much) doing the housework, it's not something I particularly enjoy, but for now, it's mostly my responsibility. However, I HATE washing up. I don't know why, as when I do do it, it's not exactly a long job, and I can listen to the radio and stuff, but looking at a sink of dishes makes me sad. So he does them.

He works insanely hard. I don't pretend to understand his job, but I know it's very target driven and that can be quite stressful. He often comes home mentally exhausted, but still has time to play with the boys. Or do the washing up.

The kids. Oh, how he loves these 2 rascally boys of ours. He is their favourite person in the world. When Ethan was very small, Rich started to get up on a Saturday morning with him so I could rest. This then extended to taking him to do the weekly shop while I slept. so not only did I get to rest, but the shopping was done too! When Sam was born, and big enough to be away from my chest for more than 20 minutes, he took them both. Trooper.

I love this picture. It's in Porthmadog, one of our favourite places. We had our honeymoon there and it's a great holiday spot. They sat here after fish and chips watching the fish in the estuary.


He appreciates my geekery. He loved Harry Potter Night. And after yesterday's le sigh about The Hunger Games dvd, he told me to buy it. I don't think he'd read it yet, but I had mentioned it to him a couple of days ago. He also told me we had enough in the pot for me to buy some new clothes,  and though the shopping was a slight disaster, the thought was there.

He also actively encourages the making of mars bar cake. This is a delicious but not always good thing. That really needs to stop now.

It's my birthday on Monday, and he spent a week or so (I had no idea) researching new phone contracts for me so I can get a new iPhone, as mine is starting to play up. also I've dropped it several times and it has a small crack in the screen, but we don't need to talk about that. It was a surprise, but when he was ill I answered the phone to a man from 3 who told me all about it, and even though he was sick, he was genuinely upset that the surprise had been ruined, bless him.

He puts up with my mood swings. I have a medical appointment on Monday (happy birthday to me!) which I'm uneasy about (nothing serious, all routine, but a new medical team so I don't know how they'll be about things) and so my moods have been even more swingy that usual, and he is brilliant about it. He's also booked the day off work so he can come with me.

He is silly. we have ridiculous inside jokes and watch stupid films. anyone else would probably roll their eyes at us. I don't care, we're hilarious ;)

There are many many reasons why he is awesome, but I'll stop there for now as he does check in and we don't want to give him a big head. Perhaps in another post I'll tell you about how we got started and the washing machine that got us back together. Love you Rich! x

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!

First Day at School, and a not quite so sucessful second morning.

Yesterday was Ethan's first day at school, and he was very excited! He's got a new classroom (his nursery class was at the same school) and teacher, and some of his friends are there. I asked him what he wants be be when he's a grown up. His answer this year? Batman. I suppose it's attainable, batman is after all a regular guy under all the gadgets, no superpowers!

 He's not particularly impressed that he has to sit and his table and do a pencil skills worksheet before he can play though. He gets to have lunch at school though, which he's very excited about.

He also gets to do PE. Yesterday we took his PE bag in to school and he was quite upset that he doesn't get to bring it home everyday. He came home absolutely exhausted and fell asleep in the car on the way to do the shopping, which will hopefully not be a regular occurrence! He also got a treat in the afternoon for going to school so well, a Batman jumper he's been after for a while, nicely tied in with his goals!

Today has been a different story. He was not excited, he was grumpy. My guess is he was still tired as he woke up in the night too and they are both early risers. His lunch was not right, even though he chose crackers cheese and mini sausages instead of a sandwich last night. He didn't want his coat, but then cried because his ears were cold. He wanted to be carried to school. He most definitely did NOT want to sit and do his worksheet (tracing circles today) because that would take him up til register time and he wanted to play. Because it's Thursday, Rich was working from home and so came on the school run with us, so then he was upset because Daddy had to go (not Mummy you'll notice. what am I chopped liver?!) When we left he was sitting on one of the teachers lap crying. It'll be a long day all round I fear.

Also we decided to take Sam in his reins rather than the pushchair. This was a Mistake - note the capitalisation! He normally stays in the pushchair just outside the door, but of course came in and then wanted to play. When we left, he started to scream. He screamed all the way home (sounds worse than it is, it's a 3 minute walk) and then threw himself on the floor and screamed for 30 minutes. It took cuddles from Daddy (again, he wouldn't have me - chopped liver) and his dummy to calm him down, but only when he decided.

I think today might be a 2 nap day. possibly 3 if you count Ethan, as I doubt he'll make it to bedtime. Le sigh. Oh well, perhaps they'll surprise me and it'll be fine. Perhaps I'll be blessed with massive reserves of patience today (please please!). Maybe it'll be fine. Maybe I should go and make dinner now (9:45) so that it's one less thing to worry about later. Yes, I think that's the one that will come true.

In other news, yesterday I noticed in Asda that The Hunger Games is out on DVD. In a special edition double disc with mockingjay necklace. I already have a mockingjay pin on my bag, so I don't need it do I. Le sigh nouveau.

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!

An eventful few days, or, my sons, aka Casper, and my niece, aka the heart-stopper.

Warning - this post contains talk of vomit, and the close call of a child. But don't worry, she was fine, and completely unharmed - no gore.

"MUMMY! My tummy hurts!" followed by wracking sobs.

It's about the worst thing to be heard as you're drifting off to sleep at 11:45 on a Sunday night. It's only pipped to the post by being woken by the sound of a quietly sobbing child, who then proceeds to throw up everywhere before you get them to the bathroom. I only narrowly avoided that this time as Ethan had forewarned me of feeling sick, the sob-and-puke is his go to sick move.

Hand on heart, I'd rather be ill myself for 24 hours than have a late night sick child. Nothing can prepare you for the panic of a child about to vomit on the top bunk. Do you attempt to grab them and run to the bathroom? (this was tonight's choice, but has had little success in the past) or do you let them (continue to) throw up where they are, and hope to contain it to one area? This prevents The Trail, buy goes against the nature of preventing a giant mountain of laundry.

Poor Whitey White Bear. He has now been initiated into the Fraternity of Daz.

He looks so melancholy, poor chap. Side note, we've had Megamind on several times recently, and I can no longer say the word melancholy (at about 1:05) properly.

So by Monday lunchtime all was sorted. Ethan was tired, quiet and still the colour of Casper, but not throwing up anymore. 

Tuesday dawned with everyone bright and happy, and we went off to visit Amy, Hayley and Austin for the last day of the holidays. After lunch we decided to go to the pond across the road where there's a small field to run on. When we got there a tractor was cutting the grass, going around the edges in ever decreasing circles. Sam almost burst with excitement at seeing a tractor, and so the children played in the middle and the plan in my head was to simply move to the cut part after the tractor did another lap, where we would then have enough room. 

Hayley had a different plan. She began running to the bottom of the field, so Amy and I shouted to her to come back. She paused, turned, saw us calling her back, and carried on. At this point, the tractor turned back towards the bottom, and we got a bit worried. When Hayley still didn't return to us, Amy started to get upset (hint, this is an understatement.) and her shouts got more panicked, but she was holding Austin and didn't know what to do, so I started running. Here was our mistake - you see, Amy runs. Most mornings. I do not run. ever. I'm going to guess there was about 200m between Hayley and me, and let's face it, I'm not going to be outrunning any tractors. However, I could hear Amy starting to sob in her shouts and so I just went for it. 

It was genuinely the most terrifying moment ever, I don't know if the tractor driver saw what was going on and if he did whether he understood. Perhaps from his perspective he could see Hayley, and where he would be driving and knew it would be fine, but we definitely could NOT see that. The tractor passed and it looked like it was within a foot or 2, though when I got to Hayley I saw that he'd swerved and missed a large patch of grass, so I'm guessing now that he saw and calculated, and wasn't even particularly concerned he might hit her, as he knew he wouldn't.

Hayley laughed. We did not. But the important thing was that she was fine, and I'm pretty sure after Amy's dressing down she's learnt her lesson. I felt like I was going to collapse and die on the spot. While walking back up to the house, I could see my foot prints in the long grass, and they were very far apart, I was really pushing it! For the rest of the day, my legs felt like jelly. Driving home was interesting! 

So, Tuesday early evening, we get home. I order pizza as a last summer holidays huzzah, and while we're waiting for it to be delivered, Sam throws up everywhere. Ill child at night/Casper part 2. Only it's worse in three ways. Firstly, because Sam refuses to throw up if he can help it, so it ends up being some kind of horrific choke-fest with each episode. Secondly, we were literally almost out the door to pick Rich up from the station. Thirdly Rich got it too this time, a few hours after Sam. I was using hand sanitiser like it was going out of business, and fingers crossed am so far unscathed. Sam managed to turn it around really quickly, and by 7am was fine again. Rich, not so much.

This morning Ethan started reception at school, but more about that later, as this has become a bit epic and the car seat still needs cleaning. Oh yes, that happened. I'm exhausted.

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!

Harry Potter night, or, how I am a massive Potterhead.

So about two weeks ago Rich noticed that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - part 2 was coming onto Sky Premiere last night, so, like the HP geeks we are, he set it to record at 4pm and we made plans to watch part 1 and 2 once the boys were in bed. Not too geeky you might say. Except in the two weeks in between, we slowly made plans.

First it was an off-hand remark from Rich that, since there is always a Christmas scene in Harry Potter, I should get some mince pies in (I love them more than is normal). Then I thought I'd make some, because hello, it's August. Then it was what food we'd get in for a treat. Then yesterday morning I thought, stuff it, we're doing Harry Potter night right!

From the top, Butterbeer and Firewhiskey, Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans, mince pies, cauldron cakes, and Chocolate Cockroach Cluster.

 Mince pies, made by my own fair hand from this recipe. I added an egg after reading the comments so I could roll it out. It wasn't exactly pretty, but tastes amazing and had I had some icing sugar to sprinkle it would have hidden a multitude of cracks, wrinkles and uneven egg brushing.

 Cauldron Cakes. By this point I was really running out of time, and so again, not the prettiest, but to be honest I was looking at it more as a practise run! I piped melted white chocolate into swirls for the steam, let them harden in the fridge, then poked them into the (delicious, cheap, shop bought -gasp!) mini cupcakes. In transferring the swirls, all of them warped a bit, and several flopped completely. I'd recommend using a high quality white chocolate, or milk or dark, as my cheap white chocolate did not re-harden well at all. If I'd had more time, I'd have removed the cake cases and dipped the entire thing in chocolate - hello sugar rush - to be more cauldron-y (it's a word), but as it was I just piped a rim around the top. The cheap cakes (Sainsburys btw) already had mini sugar stars on which fit the theme.

 Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans. Simple this one. I found this image via google, printed it off and cut it out, then stuck it on a sandwich bag full of Jelly Bellys. No risk of earwax flavour, though there is a rank liquorice one. I picked them out.

 Chocolate Cockroach Clusters. AKA Mars bar cakes. These are simple and delicious. 4 mars bars, 4oz butter, 4oz rice crispies. And a whole bunch of chocolate for the tops. Melt the mars bars and butter, and mix in the crispies. Makes 18 cupcakes, chill, top with chocolate. It's actually better done in a tray, but I wanted easy access! These ones look slightly grey from condensation by the way, they aren't gross. I ran out of time (surprise!) again and so put them into the freezer to harden up in time. It was unnecessary, we nearly broke teeth on the chocolate.

 Butterbeer, AKA white grape Shloer. We decided against concocting actual Butterbeer, as every recipe I've ever seen looks like it tastes disgusting. Also the time thing again. And we love Shloer. Bonus - it was on offer. I downloaded (free) the label here.

 Ogden's old Firewhiskey. AKA Rosé Shloer. I found this label on Aviary, at first I was annoyed because it was really too big for the bottle, and I couldn't find a (quick) way to shrink it, but I actually like the way it made the bottle look a different shape. I simply taped the pictures onto the bottles. I do not own these images, obviously.

I had more planned, Fizzing Whizzbee's for one, but I couldn't find the supplies I needed in the short time I had.

So there you have it, quick and fairly easy Potter night. Again, a lot more attention to detail would have been possible if I hadn't decided to go for it with only 5 hours to do it in, while parenting two small boys. But a small bit of geekdom is better than none :)

Neville, for no real reason except it's him :)

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!

Cannon Hall Farm

 Amy and I took the kids here yesterday and had a blast. They had all sorts going on, sheep racing, ferret racing, hamster racing, and a falconry show. They had a cute petting area with the fluffiest bunny in the world -

 And Sam squealed over and over in delight at being allowed to touch a guinea pig, though I managed to catch a sane-looking expression.

 

There were plenty of birds and animals to see too, but I didn't get many pictures as I was a little busy shepherding Sam, as I decided to let him out on reins rather than be stuck in the pushchair the whole day. There was an especially cute runty piglet keeping up with his siblings, and some pygmy goats with giant pregnant bellies who I sympathised with.

 We only had one proper ouch incident, Austin poked a finger through the cage of giant chickens and got pecked, poor thing! There are also lots of great play areas which the kids were desperate to get into. Then, at the end of the day we decided to go back to the falconry holding area to see all the birds on display, and one of the handlers had one out for kids to hold! eek! Amy and I the kids were really excited, and got to hold Bubbles, this small owl whose breed I don't remember.

 Clearly only meant for short distance letter deliveries ;)

Then Amy and I were talking about holding one (he brought out a medium sized one for the older kids to hold) and Amy said "you'll never get your hand in that glove" and as I was saying "I'll make it fit!" (anyone sensing my desperation?) The guy said he'd get out a big glove and oh, by the way, did I want to hold that one or any of the others? *Inner squeal!* And I could even hold Claude if I wanted. GASP. Seriously. Here's Claude -

 

Isn't she gorgeous? look at those eyes! 

And here am I, holding Claude

Do ignore the body, and focus on the face, can you tell that inside I'm squealing and flailing? I loved it.

After the birds we went for ice creams and headed home, just as raindrops started falling. All in all, a pretty awesome day! I'd definitely recommend it to anyone with kids.

Today's plan, errands and maybe fitting in the park, but basically getting out of the house, as the boys are not in a play well at home mood. Wish me luck.

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!

The things you see when you're out without a gun!

This is one of my Granny's sayings. Usually it referred to someone who was dressed eccentrically or revealingly, or behaving ridiculously or inappropriately. We saw a few instances where she'd have said it today!

Amy, Mum and I were in town and first saw a girl probably about 18 with her (presumed) boyfriend and mum. She was wearing patterned tights that looked kind of lacy, and double denim-ing it up like a pro. Only, from the back you couldn't tell there were 2 kinds of denim, as her denim shirt was butt-skimmingly low enough to completely obscure her denim hot pants. I say hot pants, more like the most uncomfortable knickers in the world, they were that small!

Now, we actually didn't talk about the girl much, we were busy chatting about the dynamic between her and her mum. Mum was absolutely agog that anyone would allow their daughter to wear such (a lack of) clothes, and suggested that had we tried to leave the house like that she'd have had a fit. At this point Amy and I burst out laughing at the absurdity of the idea of leaving the house alive dressed like that, and Amy said we'd never have tried, at which point I said in an imitation of mum, "Oh, you want to wear that? fine, you can be buried in it!"

I tried to get a stealthy picture a la daddy cool in Asda as the shorts were absurdly tiny, but my phone camera wouldn't load fast enough and they were gone. Plus, mum said she wouldn't want to put a picture up anyway, as it was too much!

We had a lovely time shopping in Created in Yorkshire, a fab craft shop in The Ridings in Wakefield. It's a small co-operative that we were tipped off to as a friend is selling her wares there! Everything was gorgeous, and I bought this stained glass angel Christmas tree decoration. Yes, in August. We love Christmas in our house!

It was all so lovely though, I wanted to buy ALL the things, including a gorgeous canvas with embroidered poppies in black, with red felted petals, it was beautiful, I was very tempted to ask for the price. I've got a feeling I'll be back there again.

Then we came across crazy incident number 2. As we were getting in the lift to leave, a very elderly lady in a wheel chair was being pushed out, by a FIVE YEAR OLD girl. She was on the wrong floor so we tried to steer her right, but it turned out she was in the wrong lift too. It turned out that her son (the little girl's dad) had refused to go in the lift (a fear) and the little girl needed the toilet. He got the Grandma to take her, only she was in a wheelchair that couldn't be self propelled as it had little wheels, and she looked as if she couldn't have pushed herself anyway. So the 5 year old - who seemed younger even than that - was pushing her, and had gotten in the wrong lift. We managed to figure out where they needed to go, though only because she knew she'd parked in shop mobility, and only one car park has it. In the end we took them right to their car, as we couldn't find the son who'd apparently waited by the lift. It's scary to think what could have happened, as they were both clearly quite vulnerable. Let's just say we weren't exactly thinking too kind thoughts about the Dad/Son guy in that situation!

After we finished our tour of the lifts and car parks, we went to Lidl so Hayley could spend her birthday money on Dolls house sets, and I picked up some bargain birthday presents for a couple of Ethan's friends. However the best part was spotting this on the sign outside - apologies for the terrible reflective picture:

 

The Ultimate Zombie Apocalypse Weapon! Cut down the undead while maintaining a safe distance from the splatter of unwanted zombie juice! 3 year Guarantee, if you live that long! Also chops down trees for fortifying your home/bunker. Buy now and be prepared!

We also had plans to visit the Hepworth Gallery, but it was shamefully cast aside to fit in shopping for the adults, shopping for the kids, and an eyebrow threading for Amy. Another time perhaps. 

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!

Roundup

 So in the last little while we've had:

  Sam waving back at Sir Chris Hoy on his lap of honour after winning gold.

 My sister Amy and I making pool noodle horses for the jousting at Hayley's (my niece) birthday party.

 "I call it Nude Descending a Staircase" Sam thinking he is Calvin of Calvin and Hobbes

 Ethan and Sam meeting Peppa Pig in Asda. Sam was completely amazed, Ethan was amazed and slightly scared!

 My boys cuddling :) of course 30 seconds from this they were wrestling like you wouldn't believe, but there we are.

 Sam and his amazing climbing abilities. I keep having to find new 'out of reach' spots! Here he's waving about a homemade wand (yes another one!) that I thought I'd tucked away on a blocked off windowsill. He climbed up a chair, then a table to get to it. This one was destined to be a surprise for another child, until I found out they already had one!

So once again I had a sad lonely wand sitting about my house! I was just waiting to see if anyone wanted it when today we went to Rich's parents for dinner and to celebrate Mel's birthday (sister in law). She'd asked for no present (what?!) so we'd just given her some money - you can't have nothing! Only then she mentioned that she'd seen the other wand on facebook and really liked it. So I snuck out and went home, did a quick age wash to finish it (luckily it dries almost instantly) and hastily wrapped it in brown paper and a ribbon. 

She actually squealed when she opened it, I love that part!

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!

Ollivander Update!

The magical post made it through the muggle system, Hooray! Seriously, sometimes I think it'd be more reliable to invest in (and then train of course) an owl.

Robyn was, I'm told, absolutely thrilled :) I love it, I got to make kids happy with just normal (ok, slightly on the geek side, but that just makes it better!) childhood things!

To be honest, the pictures speak for themselves without my waffling, so here goes...

 Look at that grin!

 Finding the wax seal

 

Is that not the happiest excited face you've ever seen?

After doing Robyn's wand and letter, I saw on facebook that another friend, Rachel, was doing a Harry Potter week in the summer holidays with her kids and they were making wands, so I offered to send them Ollivander letters too, congratulating them on their wandmaking.

 This is Izzy, who also happens to be friends with Robyn, so in her letter I mentioned that she shouldn't tell muggles, but that I'd already written to Robyn so it was ok to tell her ;)

And this is Alex (7), who apparently, along with his little brother Sam (5) was completely taken in by it all, love it! Rachel told me that Sam also quietly asked her if the wands would work when they were finished, bless him!

While pilfering (with permission!) these pictures from facebook, I've also seen that Robyn has instructed her mum to buy a frame for her letter! Makes me feel like I really did a great job!

Thanks to Rach and Mel for letting me share pictures of your gorgeous children x

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!

Being Garrick Ollivander

So, I have a bit of a thing about making stuff - I love to fiddle, make, draw, paint, sew, pretty much anything that keeps my hands busy. Not long ago I found Instructables and I love it! So many projects!

One of the first ones I spotted that I wanted to make was the Harry Potter wand tutorial. I am a Potter Geek, I had just finished the whole set again (I've lost count how many times, I just love them!), and I loved the idea that I could make it in under an hour, and with stuff I already had around the house - Those kinds of crafts are great, impromptu quickies. So, I got cracking a couple of weeks ago and...

Ta-da! The tutorial is really easy, and I think an older child would be more than able to manage it, Though it does use hot glue, so they'd probably need help with that. Basically it's a long thin cone of paper filled with the hot glue. The filling part was tricky trying to work the glue right down into the cone as it does cool quite fast - I held the outside of the wand against a hot iron to remelt some of the glue and forced it down with a spare glue stick from the packet, and still had a small air pocket in the middle!

The tutorial was for a generic wand, but I'm a bit of a perfectionist, so I went online to find pictures of the wands from the movies. I wanted to make Neville's as I love the character, but it looked quite tricky, so I chose to try Hermione's first:

Which was really really easy. The pattern around it is just glue gun glue squirted round it And then I painted the whole thing with acrylic paint, and did a dark wash (watered down paint painted on then rubbed off so the crevices look darker) to age/distress it a bit, and basically stop it being one flat colour. It's slightly greeny brown, because that's what the pictures looked like!

Now here comes the fun part. A friend, Mel, tweeted that her daughter Robyn is Harry Potter obsessed, and was spending the day being Hermione (her favourite character) having plaited her wet hair the night before to make it curly. It made me smile as it was totally something I would have done on a whim as a child (Had HP been around then!) and I kept remembering it for a day or two. Then I remembered my Hermione wand sat on the top of the kitchen cupboard, not quite finished, looking a bit abandoned. So I offered it to Mel, and offered to do a letter from Mr Ollivander to go with it. Cue craft number 2, wizard's stationery in the Oven! All I did was print up a letter unique to Robyn, including how the wand she had was broken by her sister, and the properties that her wand has - Mel checked what wand had chosen Robyn on Pottermore and I matched it as well as I could (I had to change the length slightly as the wand was already finished and a bit long). Then I soaked the paper in very strong coffee. We don't drink coffee so it was good to get my moneys worth out of the sad little jar that I'd bought to have in the cupboard in case of builders and parents of the children's friends, but had never been opened!

I actually tried 3 different letters (again, perfectionist). The first I soaked and tore the edges slightly to age it, then tried to dry it on a baking tray. The raw edges baked to the foil and it ripped coming off. Rubbish. I tried a second torn edged one and dried it on the oven shelf like this:

 But it just didn't look right, and I tried again with the straight edged version you can see up there. The problem with putting it straight on the shelves is that the water evaporates unevenly, giving you stripes from the rack, which I really did not like at all. Gah! I actually re-soaked that one - I'd run out of copies as we've got no printer at the moment - and dried it on an upside down baking tray, and huzzah! It worked! But I still wasn't done, as it dried quite warped and wrinkled, and very brittle. I was actually too scared fold it into the (also coffee stained) envelope! I tried steam ironing it, so it was flatter and not quite so totally dried out to a crisp. It worked really well and left the paper just feeling like stiff paper (or parchment, which was what I was going for) rather than crunchy dried out leaves.

 Then I decided I wanted to put a wax seal on it. Much harder than I thought. It's incredibly easy to do, if you have a stamp for the seal, or something you can improvise to a stamp. I did not, but I couldn't not do it after I'd decided I wanted to! I spent maybe an hour melting wax and shoving stuff in it to try and find something like the design I had in my head, and had to keep simplifying it or changing it, but I'm happy with how it worked out. If I do it again I think I'll go rubber stamp shopping first to see if I can find anything I like, because I made this with 3 different implements (read household objects) and was a right faff. In the end I wanted it to look at least vaguely like a wand casting a round spell, as the circle would therefore also be an O. I think it turned out ok, I did the same seal on the back of the envelope as well.

 So, there you have it! I wrapped the wand in a piece of purple velvety fabric and made a cardboard box (not nearly pretty enough for a picture) to protect it in the post, then put both the box and the letter in a jiffy bag, which I made 2 more 'parchment' labels for, adding a HP twist to the address with the location of Robyn's bedroom, and a scrawl on the back saying "Owl injured in transit, use Muggle post" and now all there is to be done is take it to the post office.

I'm really excited to hear and hopefully see in pictures how Robyn reacts when it gets there, I really enjoyed doing it so hopefully she'll love it!

Things I have learnt:
Don't use your ironing board as a surface. I practised making the wax seal on it as our table space is limited, and I slipped and smeared crayon wax on it. I needed a new ironing board cover already so I'm not too cross, but now I really need a new one.

Don't use crayons for wax seals. They melt to a very thin liquid which doesn't led itself to stamping, as it cools hard quite slowly. Candle wax is better. Sealing wax is obviously best, but you'd have to buy it, as it isn't the kind of thing that is just lying about the house. And I'm cheap ;)

My next planned project:
Thor helmet for Ethan and Loki costume for Sam. It's for Halloween so likely won't be finished for a while and probably not started for a bit either!

Update: This blog has now moved to www.undomesticaited.wordpress.com - Hope to see you over there!