Grand Opening Celebrations Start Today!




Yep, it's finally July 30th which means Pickleberrypop is now officially OPEN!
There is so much going on I don't know where to start but here's all the info you need to know.

Firstly a quote from our Picklehead Leader, Kate.

"Let me say this very loudly and very clearly for you all to share around at will! Anything that you can remotely call scrapbooking or was once scrapbooking or might one day be scrapbooking is welcome! Paper, digi, off the page, pure photographics (digital or film) graphic design... anything! I really am not going to be restrictive at all. I want to see it all, I want to learn it all! Yep we are primarily a scrapping site and mainly a digi site but I think we all have so much to learn from every other style of scrapping and other related creative things that I just think it would be a great loss to restrict people to narrow categories!"

So as you see *everyone* is welcome so I hope you drop by and say hello and show off your work in our gorgeous gallery and take a peek through our shop while you are there.

Secondly, we have come up with a gorgeous Multi-Pickle Pack for you all to download, this is a collaboration from all our designers and is called "Brand New Day", doesn't it look gorgeous?

The kit is broken up into 7 pieces, one for each contributing designer and will be available for download one piece a week for the next 7 weeks.
This week's piece will be from the very talented Annette Farrelly.

Oh and did I mention the Brand New Day kit will be absolutely FREE??? That's right a bunch of gorgeous papers and elements all for nothing! Oh and while we are talking FREE why not stop by the store and check out some the the great designer samples so you can see for yourself the quality of a designers work...again for nothing! Make sure to check out all our designs and see if you can grab that perfect kit for your next layout!

And that's not all... there will be two chats hosted in our chatroom this week, the first on Tuesday August 1st at 9pm (AEST) and another on Wednesday, August 2nd at 12 noon (AEST) these are aimed just as some fun and a way to say hello, and maybe you could win a random prize just for being there!

Our August challenges will begin on the 7th and run through to the end of August, so be sure to check out both the quote challenge and the colour challenge in a week or so when we have settled into our new home.

Last but not least I want to say again how great it is to have a new Aussie-based site to hang out on, we welcome everyone from everywhere and chats will be timed to cater for our international members when possible, we want everyone to feel welcome here!

Hope to see you there!

You Wanted It..Now It's Here........



Opens July 30th..be there..or be somewhere else a lot less fun!

A full service, Aussie based scrap site! Forums, shop, gallery, challenges and best of all great people! Not enough for you? Then how about a Mega-Multikit..absolutely FREE! With 7 parts up for grabs over 7 weeks you are sure to use this kit over and over again!

What A Week..And It's Still Only Wednesday!

It's been a somewhat stressful week, mostly stress created by myself so I have been pretty busy since Sunday re-doing a whole heap of design work which is now thankfully pretty much complete!
G has also been working late shift at work which has been quite a change for us as he has never had to work nights before. It's actually been quite enjoyable as he doesn't leave home until 2pm so we have been able to spend lots of time together and with the twins. I guess the downside is with Ab back school she has missed him a lot, she sees him briefly in the morning while she is eating breakfast and getting ready for school and then doesn't see him again until the next morning. He walked her to school this morning which apparently was the highlight of her school year thus far judging by the delight on her face when I said Daddy was taking her.
Next week should be a little better as he will finish at 3.20pm and be home not long after she gets in from school so she can catch up with him then.
Not a lot else happening actually, I got my Kasey Chambers concert tickets in the mail yesterday. so I am looking forward to that concert in November and today I discovered The Dixie Chicks are coming in October..so yep..will be going to that too! Can't wait!

Not long now until PBP is up and running..very exciting and very nerve-wracking at the same time.

From The Mouth Of Babes.....

Scar: Muuuum! Muuuuuuum.....Doey has a'mite. Doey has a'mite in ear

(translation: Mum,Mum..Joey has vegemite. Joey has vegemite in his ear)
I go over, take a look and let her know not to worry.

Me: It's not vegemite Scar, it's earwax!

Eeeeeww!

It's Coming...The Big Reveal.....




Stay tuned!

Whirlwind of Activity

It's been all go here for the last few days and frankly my head is spinning. On Saturday we sold the twins cots.. it hit me hard to think that's it for us..no more babies. G says we can always buy a new cot for another one but I don't think he believes there will be anymore babies for us either, still I can hold it over his head a while right? The two high chairs are leaving later this week too...my heart feels heavy about it all.
On Saturday night G went to his friends place so they could jam on their guitars a while. I was looking forward to a nice cosy evening on the PC doing scrap stuff....but the neighbours directly across from us decided to have a party with blaring music going on until 1am and teens/ young adults running up and down the street and banging car doors as they left and arrived. They also decided to pull up one of our trees from our front yard..yeah thanks for that!!!
So Sunday I was exhausted after very little sleep but we had lined up a babysitter already so went up to Toys R Us and started some shopping for the birthdays/Xmas seasons ahead. I usually get manic about the Toy Sales when they start at this time of year but nothing really impressed me with the catalogues this year and I didn't bother with the Kmart sale and won't be bothering with the Target one when it starts on Thursday, even Toys R Us was not that inspiring. Looks like the kids won't be getting much at all this year the way we are going!
We then headed off to the cinemas and saw Pirates of the Carribean 2, a good laugh and lots of fun and I think it was quite different from the first. Afterwards we headed out for dinner and still got home in time to put the kidlets to bed.
Monday was another busy one, Ab had a party to go to in the middle of the day so my Mum came and watched the twins so I could take Ab out. While she was at the party I went shopping (but came back empty handed!) and then that evening I went to dinner with my Mum and a bunch of her mates. We have a Girls Night Out every 2 months or so and I just make it as I can depending on G's work schedule. It was great night, we went to a place we hadn't been to before and I have to say the food was fab..though a little exxy...and it was nice and quiet so easy to chat and to have a bit of fun on the pokies after dinner.
Anyhow that leads us into today..which was quite a mixed bag. Joe hadn't been quite right yesterday, he kept getting a temp, going pale, looking flushed etc etc and then being completely fine. G said he ate all his dinner and went to bed fine last night and this morning he looked normal when he got up. He seemed more anxious for his morning cup of milk than normal but I didn't think much of it. Gave the kids their normal weetbix for breakfast and Joe wouldn't eat. I told him after a while that if he was done he could get down so he did, then he started to cough, (SPOILER WARNING: IF YOU ARE SQUEAMISH NOW IS THE TIME TO STOP READING!) put his hand to his mouth, started gagging and next thing I knew he had thrown up everywhere. Now you would think that having dealt with a very reflux baby for the first 9 months of her life I would be pretty used to vomit but wow I had forgotten just how bad milky puke is! Joe just stood there transfixed and staring in shock at what had happened while his twin sister helpfully squealed "Oh look at da mess!!" She was actually quite distressed by the whole situation but wanted it to be very known that she had not contributed to making that mess in anyway "Doey make a mess!"
I then had the pleasure of rounding out the day with treating Ab's hair for nits, learning that a friend of ours has terminal cancer and comforting Scar after she whacked her head on the floor.

Anyway..I did have good news today (coz frankly I would be in my white coat with the long sleeves on by now otherwise) firstly I won a scrap competition!! I won 100 eyelets, yep very helpful for a digi-chick like me...oh and do I have to confess I was the only person that entered the comp!?!? Ah well..a win is a win right??

Secondly and most importantly there is a new full service scrap site, based in Australia coming very very soon, and I am thrilled to bits to announce that I will be on their design team with a bunch of highly talented and very creative girls and also an inspiring Creative Team as well. There will be a gallery, forums, chats , a shop and tutorials and even more excitingly there will be an amazing megakit for FREE when we open. It's going to be massive!

Totally Stoned


G didn't finish work until a bit later and said he wanted to bring an Indian takeaway home for us for dinner for our anniversary so to go ahead and feed the kids. It was about 5.30pm and there was a couple of weird noises on the roof, I didn't think much about it, until it got louder and even though it was sporadic and would start and stop it started to freak me out, sometimes it was a small noise other times a real BANG and Abbey started to get pretty frightened too. It was dark but I went out the front about 6.15pm and looked up at the roof and couldn't see anything, looked out into the backyard still nothing..I was getting pretty sure by then it wasn't cats up there or a branch blowing along. It stopped for 15 minutes..and then started up again..I was pee-ing myself by now and knew I couldn't wait for G to get home so I called our neighbours. S was home and said she was just about to call the police as it was a kid (she suspected the troubled new kid across the street) throwing rocks at BOTH our houses. G arrived home a short time later, and I spoke with him out the front with S and her hubby J, who came out to see us, we spoke a few minutes and came inside. The police came to the door during dinner and said they would stay close by for a while but nothing else happened.
I just went outside this morning and found 14 stones in our front and back garden, all in line with having come from the house across the street (I was trying not to assume it was him just coz the neighbour thinks he is trouble and despite the fact he burned a bible out front of my house the other week with his friends) you know benefit of the doubt and all that? The good thing is the rocks are very specific type stones, not random found on the street kind, they are like smooth black landscaping stones..I might do some investigating and see who may have some of these in their garden.
I don't know why we seem to be such a target for rock throwing lately, a few weeks back we had 23 large rocks (also the landscape kind but much bigger than last night's) thrown into our backyard, we know who the culprit was and I know the kid, he's not a bad kid but perhaps he and his mates were being a bit silly that day..no harm done, I know the family and it was taken care of..but now to be attacked again!?! What if they had hit one of my cats out there?? It just shits me completely thatI was made to feel so unsafe in my own home, and frightening my kids is just plain wrong!

11 Years Ago Today...

I went online for the very first time. My cousin hooked me up with a modem one evening so he wouldn't have to keep printing out copies of BH90210 spoilers for me when I saw him, little did we know that would have such a profound effect on my life.
He took me to a chatroom on IRC, #adelaide and introduced me to a few people he knew there. During the course of chatting a lad from Cambridge, England turned up in the room and started talking...and that was that. Nine months later he arrived at Adelaide Airport and within a few hours of that first "real life" meeting we were engaged.
Now here we are 11 years later, married with 3 healthy children, a nice sized house, 2 cats and G in steady, well paid work. Most importantly I have my soul mate with me each and every day, through everything that life throws at us we have come through it stronger and more in love with each other than ever. G still manages to make me laugh everyday, I still get all tingly when he smiles at me and there is still no better feeling than being wrapped in his arms at night. I still pace the house when it's time for him to come home from work as I just can't wait to see him.
So just for a bit of fun here's our very first photo of us together in 1996...



G - I just want you to know I love you big time...but if you make fun of this blog entry when you get home from work tonight I am going to punch you SO HARD!

Next Stop....Three!

Well it's official my "babies" are 2.5 years old yesterday. Only seems 5 minutes ago they turned two, and in just a few weeks my other "baby" turns 8 years old..where is time going?
Well I haven't blogged all week as it just seemed to race past so will try a quick catch up now while Ab and G are at swimming.
The twins had their first bus ride on Wednesday which they enjoyed immensely! It was actually funny how quiet they were on the bus just taking everything in, looking out the windows and all around the inside of the bus. We went to the bigger local shopping centre and spent a couple of hours there with my Mum before heading home again. I renewed my passport, posted some cards, bought some treats for the kids, some fresh bread for lunch etc Nothing too wild really..but they sure slept good at afternoon naptime! They actually slept 3 days straight this week I think, so we aren't quite having a nap every day but pretty close to it. It's all better than the previous week when they went with NO sleep!
Yesterday we took Joe and Scar into the city for new shoes, leaving Ab behind with Nana. Of course Joe got his new shoes in 5 minutes but the girl version of the same shoe they didn't have in her size (typical) so I am hoping they can order them in for me fairly soon before she wears completely through the bottom of her current ones.
After shoe shopping we headed back towards home and decided to buy a Playstation 2. We have wanted one for ages, but couldn't justify the price but have finally given in now they are less than $190. We had been waiting for the Toy sales to start to see if anyone offered a good package with games or extra controllers but so far the best we could find was the console and a controller for $186. We ended up going store to store for hours as everyone had boxes out for this playstation deal but no-one had any stock..and for some reason the silver playstation was $10 dearer..we eventually went back and bought the silver one and they even let us have it at the cheaper price, and we got a half price controller! Sothen of course we went and splurged on games...oops!
Saturday night was spent smashing up buildings, racing cars (at which I completely suck!!) and playing 18 holes of Disney golf! Quite fun actually and Ab is so excited to have some games to play and it will help keep her occupied now she is on two weeks holidays in awful weather. It also helps her behaviour as she knows she won't get to play it if she is a crankypants!
Did some designing during the week which I was pretty happy with and am hoping to get some more done soon and will hopefully be able to show it off soon.

Love is.....

a husband who understands that my scrapping mojo comes well before any housework. When I have the design bug..I *must* design, housework will still be there later right? Not only that but he offers to bring take-away home for dinner too!!
Actually the house isn't that bad other than stacking the dishwasher and cleaning up the kids toys that is!

We had a great weekend..Saturday was D-Day..Dank,Dark,Dull, Dreary, Drizzly and Dismal. It was miserable weather so we decided not to go to town for the twins new shoes and will go this coming weekend. I cleaned our bathroom instead which made me feel heaps better as it's a hard task to do when I am home alone with the twins.

Sunday Abbey had another double swimming lesson and then G picked up my Mum and she came to watch the twins for the afternoon so we could take Abbey to the movies to see "Cars" We popped into the shops first as Joe was desperate for a new rain jacket and I hadn't found any in the nearby shops, we went up to Myers and found a nice enough jacket which we got him that was reduced from $40 to $15..BARGAIN! Best of all Joe loves it too......

Scar was happy with an Abbey hand-me-down jacket!



After the movie we decided to have a big late lunch which was really nice just the 3 of us. We don't get to treat Abbey to that kind of thing so much anymore so was nice to have time with her. It's hard to get out with her during the school holidays with the twins and the fact I don't drive so we told her it was her school holiday treat a bit early, school holidays don't start here until next week, can't wait to sleep in!

Nothing much else happening, managed to do some scrapping late last week which I will show off here at some point, it's not due to be a busy week here but we'll wait and see what crops up I guess!