Blog Summary

1. Animal Towel Folding
I actually used this one 3 or 4 times to entertain Beata's Kids when they were here

2. Food Art
I still make faces out of my food and still love getting cards like that too.. mostly from Kellie ...love the sprouts with santa hats!

3. Failed Fireballs
Nah I wasn't giong to try this one again.. it was far to dangerous

4. Quick t-shirt folding
This one still comes in handy, I still do it when I am folding the laundry

5. Forking Good Trick
A good trick that I forget to do but am not in pubs much these says anyway

6. Speed Igloo building
I didn't make an igloo this year but I am tempted when I am around snow, I have still yet to build a really good igloo

7. Twisted Balloons
I still have some balloons and have used my new found talents on a couple of occasions

8. Sock Monkey
Ahh the sock monkey of strength and wisdom, he is very useful and now residing with my brother. I think I would do this one again... i have enough old socks!

9. Hair enough
I was rubbish doing Kimmy's hair, i don't think I had enough patience, like with my own hair

10. Log Cabin Holiday Essentials
Chopping firewood was hard work but I could do it if need be and casting a fishing rod is too tricky for me I'll leave that to Steve but Texas Hold'em I'm getting really good at and I love it, I've even won a few games!

11. Potato canon
I think Steve had more fun than I did on this but it was pretty powerful and a really good laugh.. still a bit dangerous though, I gave it to the boys to play with

12. Scrapbooking
I really liked scrapbooking and have been meaning to carry on this creative outlet but it hasn't happened

13. Secret Hollow Book
I still have it on my shelf with something secret inside ;)

14. Stonehenge
Aw my brother sent me this and I still have it, reminds me of home.

15. Yorkshire Puds
I can do these yorkshire puds now, they are a bit tricky and my friend Sarah is awesome at them and my aunty is good at them too now... so no shortage of yorkshire puds for me now!

16. Let's go fly a kite
This was fun, the kids of the beached lived it as well as the adults, Steve I think liked it more that I did

17. The Secret
I try and do the secret now and again and I still have my mood board I keep adding too...actually 4 of the things I put on there last year has already come true!

18. Packing and Moving
Ok this wasn't much of a blog but I think I have it down to a fine art!

19. Hard Drive Upgrade
Any excuse to play with my mac, I love geeking out and managed to sell it for $750 after that otherwise it would just be a pretty mac with no hard drive!

20. The Power of Photoshop
This was more about understanding the RAW mode on my camera and the CR2 file in Photoshop manipulation, I'm still playing around with this

21. Mac Fix & New Tricks
New mac with fun new features and trying to rescue my old mac, I'm a geek so I love problem solving with these type of things

22. Poster Pics
A friend in need or some sort of decor and homely feel to her flat let me create this poster

23. Green Fingers
Wow I still have the plants they are growing madly and we have found the right spots for them, we actually have 6 plants now but they do need a lot of attention. Oh actually we did get a lemon tree and managed to kill that one. I'm planning to repot the Dracaena this weekend as its growing madly.. I think I have got green fingers after all!

24. Feng Shui-ing my home
Everything seemed in place we also added some pictures with red in it for prosperity and Steve's mum gave a me water feature for Christmas, it is supposed to be able to create wealth and good fortune. Southeast Sector: Overall Wealth, Prosperity and Abundance

25. Accessorizing our new flat
I am still loving our flat, it does feel homely and I like the colours I chose

26. Pictures
Its always handy to learn about how to frame and hang pictures, the bamboo ones I took were free as the colour came so bad but I put them up anyway and people seem to like!

27. Drag Racing
That was a fun event, so loud and cool to be by a race track but I think I still prefer formula one.

28. The Great Outdoors
I used my bike 4 times over the summer but am determined to use it more this summer and go boating more.. I mean thats why I moved here.. for the great outdoors!

29. Pork Pies
There were a disasters, I just buy them from Park Royal now

30. 20 things about San Francisco!
I loved San Fran, may even go again one day and now I know where Alcatraz is.

31. Trolling & Fly fishing
The fly fishing looked really cool but hard to do and the trolling was a bit boring but great to sit back and relax on the boat, catching a fish was just a bonus

32. Diabolo, Camping, Star Gazing
I didn't get to spend too much time on this and I was happy to get it spinning, I think I might give it another go sometime. Car camping was cool and I can still remember a couple of the stars

33. Origami
I discovered I was pretty rubbish at Orgami, we have paper planes in the office and I always get stick half way through, make up the rest of the folds and then it doesn't fly

34. Neuro-Linguistic Programming
Believe it or not, I am still listening to Paul McKenna... you never know

35. Learning Dutch... isn't it weird!
The only one I remembered was 'godverdome' - still handy though

36. DIY Pot Pourri
I still have my Pot Porri, I think it smells foul but some people seem to like it.

37. Wii Workout
It's been a while since I was on the Wii but I intend to start my routine soon!

38. Driving Range
I haven't been back since, I'm not sure I enjoyed it cos I got a blister and it hurt my hand, less balls next time I think

39. How to tie a noose
Haven't used this one thankfully, I think I can still remember how to do it though

40. The World's Biggest Walk
I should do more hikes and charity walks... maybe this summer

41. Volleyball
I should try beach volleyball this summer too now I know whats going on

42. Learning to play the guitar
I didn't carry on too much, it felt too big and I couldn't change chords quick enough, maybe I'll have a go at the Ukelele

43. Roadsense
Ha I didn't do much revising after that and I still passed my knowledge test with 92% last month

44. Snow Globe
Some people thought it was neat, very easy to do but it started leaking so I threw it away

45. Cribbage
Good game, I need to play more to get into it but I always end up fighting over new card games somehow

46. Candle Making
This was neat but a bit messy and candles are so cheap to buy

47. Mount Baker
Great, now I can look out of my window and say I have been there

48. Pumpkin Carving
Wow that was a lot of effort but worth it, I think I will do one every year!

49. 5 pin bowling
This is rubbish compared to 10 pin bowling but it seems to be popular here

50. Communication, Mentoring & Child Safety
I am still yet to finish my application for my Big Sister Volunteer work but the training was useful and made me more aware of how you communicate.

51. Christmasyfying the flat
I kinda like making flat look christmassy and building the tree

52. Snow Shoeing
This was great fun especially in a group, I wanna buy some snow shoes but I doubt I will go much but at least I will have them, I love the winter cabin trips and hope there are more to come.


So there you have it! 52 Random Things, I have learned a lot looking back through the list although it didn't feel like it. I was tempted to continue but there is a lot of pressure involved in finding something every week but I might update this site as if I do manage to learn something new.

Snow Shoeing

The last blog of the year! So I won't be updating this every week from now on but I might add a post if I do something new and maybe a run down of events in the next blog from last year.

Snow shoeing was really fun, I love going through the trees as its so beautiful, we went up a hill though and I nearly had a cardiac arrest!

This is what they look like nowadays


Me in snow shoes...


Ah taking a break with some Baileys Caramel Hot Chocolate


Snow shoeing through the forest



Tony & Sarah

5 pin bowling

It's like a dwarf version of 10 pin bowling, not quite as much fun and it wasn't electronic scoring so it was hard to add up the scores when pissed. Each pin has a value 5 for the head pin, 3 for the ones either side and 2 for the end ones, you get 3 goes a turn for 10 frames but nothing extra for the last frame if you get a strike.

Communication, Mentoring & Child Safety

This week I attending a training session in preparation for my volunteer work as a Big Sister and learned a lot about Communication, Mentoring & Child Safety... here are some things I learned

M - Make it special
E - Encourage and build self esteem
N - Never say never - model positive behaviour / attitudes
T - Teachable moments - look for them and act accordingly
O - Open new doors - new ideas, skills, dreams
R - Reliable - be there and do what you say you will do
I - Instill a sense of wonder, motivate and stimulate thought
N - Notice their individuality and make comments
G - Go for it and have fun!

Active Listening
F.E.L.O.R.
F - Face the person
E - Eye contact
L - Listen
O - Open posture
R - Respond

"I" Messages
Neutral description of your behaviour - "When you..."
Feelings of Emotions - "I feel..."
Effect or Reason - "Because..."
What you would lke from them instead - "So I need..."

We did a role play, this is an example

Q: WHAT IF you arranged to meet your adolescent-aged Little Sister at the beach at 5pm but it is now 5.30pm and she is half an hour late?

A: When you are late, I feel worried and let down as I don't feel the friendship is important to you. So I need you to call if you are going to be late and make an effort to be on time.

We also covered the following topics
Building Self Esteem
Effective Mentoring
Setting Boundaries
Saviour Syndrome
Good Role Modelling
Suspcisions of child abuse and how to report it
Child Safety

Christmasyfying the flat

The tree was a bit of a mission as it was too big and we only used half and had to use some creativity to get it to stand up straight and raise it up a bit but we assembled it and it worked in end

I also personalised some stockings
Put a bow on the front door
Put some ornaments around the flat

Assembling the tree...


Discovering it was too big, not just the height but the gerth, it would take up the whole flat!


Ahhh our Christmas tree complete with baubles and lights

Snow Globe

I made my own snow globe, not quite a Christmas theme but it works!

Cribbage

I learned a new card game, its based on working out the best scenarios, a bit too much counting while drinking but I quite liked it.



The objective of the game is to be the first player to score a target number of points, typically 61 or 121. Points are scored for card combinations that add up to fifteen, pairs (plus triples and quadruples), runs and flushes.