Ah, Chelsea...

Just a sweet little video about poo I thought you guys might like to see! ;)

Oliver's First Birthday

Oliver is 1 year old today! Seems like we've had him for a lot longer than that! :P



He got a big juicy bone as a treat for his special day. I think he was pretty pleased.

He's a pretty good dog, he has his moments and I have mine (where I think it would be easier and cleaner not to have a dog!), but we're preserving. He still jumps up to greet people though. Usually putting dirty paw marks all over our visitors pants. And it's not just one jump, it's continual jumping that gets a bit annoying. He knows not to do it to us but obviously we missed the whole 'don't jump on guests' bit of his training!



He's not allowed inside as he can't be trusted with food/toys/furniture/bins/anything-we-want-to-keep-nice etc, so he lives on the patio. We gave him an old couch of ours that used to live in my studio before I got my shelves. He loves it! This is where he sleeps, all rugged up with a fleecy blanket and his winter jacket.



We tried putting a kids jumper on under the jacket to give him a bit of extra warmth, but the little bugger can wriggle out of it, even when the jacket is over the top! I don't know how, but he does it every time now. So we don't worry so much about the jumper! :P

Hopefully this year will be a bit smoother with him as we slowly get out of the puppy phase. I would say he destroyed at least one toy a week over the last year. Maybe some days more like one toy a day. So we'll see how the stats work out next birthday!

Kids update

I got to spend a bit more time on my nine little bears last night. They're looking really good, and are almost finished. I'm hoping to get some time to put the finishing touches on them over the weekend. If so, that will mean that I managed to make nine bears in two weeks. Pretty cool if I can pull it off!

But, seeing as the bears are still a few days away, I thought I'd do an update on the kids again.



Byron is now 6 weeks old, and has just starting smiling really frequently! Its the most gorgeous thing - he puts his whole mouth into it! His night sleeping was getting really good there for a few days with only two feeds overnight. But last night we went back to four, and now I am exhausted!





Chelsea is almost 20months old. (Which somehow seems so much older than 19months to me!). She's still a bit naughty with Byron. I got this awesome picture of her giving Byron a cuddle last week, only to have her bite him on the head shortly after it was taken! For the most part she takes out her frustrations on the dog, but he doesn't seem to mind. I think if anything, having Byron come along has helped her relationship with Oliver. She spends a lot more time actually playing with him, and can hold her own when he gets a bit puppy-excited with her!





And lastly, we got couple of new additions to the household (because we didn't have enough already :P) - guinea pigs! This sweet little bundle of fluff is baby Alice. We got her to keep our old old guinea pig company after her sister and cage-mate of 4 years died last week.



A friend of ours was looking after the guinea pigs for us after we had cats attack them at our last house, but they've had to move up north to help out with the building repairs after cyclone Yasi hit the day after Byron was born. So we took the guinea pig back again.

I've had guinea pigs as pets since I was a little girl. And my mum had guinea pigs all through her childhood as well. So I'm quite happy to have them back again. The trick now is keeping them safe from a very, VERY interested Oliver!

Byron at one month old

I'm a little late with my one-month-old post for Byron, and thought that I might include an update of Chels and the dog as well (for those of you who have been asking after them as well!).

Chelsea is doing well. She is definitely not as violent with Byron as she was in the first few weeks. She likes to rub his head and say 'ohhhh', and pat him tummy when he's crying. Which is a darn sight better than dropping brooms on his head, scratching him with one of my stray cotter-pins and trying to pull out his hair...



She has been especially sulky lately though, which is a challenge for Mark and I. We're hoping she will grow out of it soon. VERY soon! Last week I tripped over her cabbage patch doll, and was caught off guard by some very pretty 'makeup'. I don't know when she decided to do this to her baby doll! Probably while I was busy with Byron on one of the many occasions! :P




Byron is doing well. He gained another 500g last week, bringing him up to 5.7kg or 12lb, 9oz! Chelsea weighed this much when she was three months old! He's getting into a pattern with his sleeping now too, which is good for me as I can start to predict when he'll wake for feeds. He's not so obliging with his smiles though. Chelsea was giving out smiles quite readily at this age, but you have to work really hard to get one from Byron! And even then, they're only fleeting. I hope to catch one on camera soon.



And lastly - Mr Oliver... what can I say about him...

He has been quite naughty lately as well. He's just starting barking a lot. At everything and anything. At the worst possible times (ie. 2am in the morning after I've just gotten Byron back to sleep or 8pm in the evening after we've just gotten Chelsea to sleep!). So poor Mr Oliver has had his bed/house relocated to a special spot in the back corner of the yard. Mark has done an awesome job propping his house up off the ground and away from damp, and making him his own covered area to keep the sun and rain off. We're hoping that having him sleep away from our neighbours fence will prevent a lot of his need to bark. Fingers crossed!

Beagalier puppy chases bubbles and steals toys

Now that I've figured out this whole 'uploading videos' thing, I thought I'd share this one of Chelsea and Oliver yesterday afternoon. It's nothing amazingly exciting, but cute enough.

Oliver LOVES bubbles, and will dance around and try to pop them all in his mouth. When that gets boring he decides to steal some of Chelsea's toys. There are certain toys that she knows he's not allowed to have!

Later today I should have some photos of my latest bear up too. He's a BIG BIG boy, standing in at 26" tall, and when sitting he spans a massive 22" from side to side!

Something else from the 'to be completed' bag

Little Maximus here is another creation found at the bottom of my 'to be completed' bag of creatures. He was completely cut out, pinned together and half sewn, so I finished him off and decided to do his face a little differently (especially as there wasn't any scope to change his pattern like I've been meaning to at this stage!). So I gave him a slightly more Anime/cartoon look with his high-set nose and beady little eyes. He's also the first guinea pig to have whiskers - which kind of makes him look a little cat-like! :P





We got a brief moment of no rain this afternoon for me to take photos. Not exactly clear skys, but enough sun to get decent photos! Oliver was SOOOO excited to have someone in the backyard that he was rather difficult to control. Eventually he got the message that I was busy, and he backed off. And he didn't try to snatch Maximus once! (must be all the training I've been putting into his not snatching Chelsea's toys - mind you, that's still a bit of a battleground! If he thinks no one is watching he'll still quite happily sneak inside, grab whatever she's left lying closest to the door way and run to the far corner of the yard to munch on it. Usually resulting in the destruction of that particular toy, or the need for it to have a very good soaking/machine wash!).


It wasn't all discipline for poor Oliver though. We played fetch half a dozen times till he decided that wasn't doing it for him any more and went off to make his own fun! And here I was feeling all guilty that we weren't spending enough time with him... ! :P

Bessie (and the never ending rain!)

In my internet wanderings last week I came across a sweet little lady bear called Bessie, and just had to have her! She arrived today bringing with her the most amazing aroma! I am guessing this has to do with whatever it was she was dyed with - My husband thinks its cinnamon, but I can't decide what I think it is! It reminds me of those gorgeous handmade baked goods stalls at early morning markets, or the quintessential 'grandmother's house' of your earliest memories...



Bessie is made by Di Paulovich of Woollybuttbears, a fellow Australian bear artist. If you like little Bessie as much as I do, she has another little guy - Robin Love - in the same style available at present as well.

Bessie was such a nice surprise to wake to this morning, on yet another soggy, rainy day here in Brisbane. We're all incredibly sick of the rain that seems to have been here forever (well, at least the better part of the last 3 months anyway!), and I'm sure many of you will have heard of the devastating floods in the northern part of our state. There are many people here who would like to see some sun I think!




(Even Oliver seems a bit depressed by the weather! There's nothing else for him to do but sleep all day, only venturing out into the rain and soggy backyard when he needs to go to the toilet!)

Gelli Baff!!!

I love this stuff! It feels amazing. It was one of Chelsea's 'Santa' gifts - but was probably more for me than her!



You take a normal everyday clamshell wading pool and half fill it with water...



...sprinkle in the blue powder (which smells like blueberry jelly crystals!)...



...wait a few minutes...



...and you have some goo to play in!!! Oliver even got in on the action! Chelsea didn't stay in it for long. She wasn't impressed. So I took over and used it as a foot-spa for a while! Just divine!

Australia Summer Storms

I'm not quite sure if I've complained about the weather here in 'Sunny Queensland' over the last few weeks or not... if not, I'll fill you all in now! The weather has been crap. And that's an understatement! The nightly weather reports show the forecast for the next 7 days - and it has been solid rain graphics for weeks now.

This week it was solid storm graphics, complete with the little bolts of lightning coming down from the cartoony grey clouds. I saw this, but dismissed it! The days had actually been quite nice for a change, and I managed to get some washing done. Then yesterday afternoon I got an emergency alert phone message explaining that severe hail storms were on their way. I went outside and the sky was clear, no clouds, soft wind blowing... for all intensive purposes a beautiful summer day. About an hour later I could hear soft rumbling noises in the background. The sky was still clear and bright, so I dismissed it as neighbourhood noise.



About half an hour after that, the sky changed colour. The air had that electric feel to it and the rumbling noise was louder. Chelsea and I went outside and sure enough some ominous looking clouds were heading over. I quickly grabbed the washing off the line and took some photos. This is looking from our side gate towards the neighbours house across the road. Within about 2mins of taking this photo Mark got home from work and the clouds opened.



We had so much rain in such a short period of time that our back patio flooded (much to Chelsea's amusement, but not Olivers!). Oliver is a bit of a Princess dog and doesn't like loud noises or getting wet, so he took refuge inside, behind the couch!


It was all over within half an hour or so, and we got lucky that the hail stones were only pebble sized. But it had obviously damaged the power lines somewhere, and we went without electricity from 5:30pm till 12pm. Right on dinner time! And Chelsea's bed time. So we all had a rather miserable night last night. And tempted as I was I decided not to try and finish my bear by candle light... goodness knows what he would have looked like by the light of day! :P So hopefully, if I can stop rambling on here, I can go do a bit more work on him tonight!

Oliver's Christmas outfit

Chelsea and I went to the shops today. For bread and milk. We came back with about ten bags of other stuff! Christmas goodies, toys, santa gifts, hair accessories... oh, and an outfit for Oliver!



He didn't really like it :P




Also finished three more SPuNGieS today. These guys are just too much fun to make!

Abrialii Lavender

This is Abrialii - so named as this is a stunning variety of the lavender flower, matching the colouring on this big panda's belly and head. Abrialii is my latest bear, and is currently available. I must admit I'm a little smitten with her too! She's a lovely big girl, standing in at 22" (57cm) tall. I decided to get some photos of Chelsea with her too, to show just how big she is. At least this time Chelsea decided to cooperate! She was a little distracted by Oliver trying to jump up on the table too though.






































Which he is not supposed to be doing! We took him to the vet to get desexed yesterday. He was gone all day, and despite myself I actually missed him! It was nice to be able to get down in the garden and do some weeding without having to deal with him trying to sit in my lap at the same time, but the backyard just seemed a bit empty. Chelsea and I collected him yesterday afternoon, and we were given strict instructions not to let him run around or jump in case he opened up his stitches. That was basically impossible! He was so happy to be home that he was jumping all over the place. He did have a bit of a rest this morning though - and I managed to capture this pic of him, before he came bounding out of his kennel and jumping all over the place again! :P




Then, during Abrialii's photo shoot, he and Chelsea decided it would be a great idea to try and climb the ladder! I think she's a bad influence on him! At least she didn't get very high. And he just stayed at the bottom as a sort of 'look out' I suppose! I really don't know how we're supposed to keep him quiet for another 9 days!!!

A real life 'who done it'

This is what my poor husband woke up to this morning (while I enjoyed a little bit of extra sleep!).

Chelsea was still asleep too, so the only one who could have possibly done such an act of destruction is the innocent looking Oliver! It was a really heavy pot too, wedged right in the corner so Chelsea wouldn't bump into it - so we're not sure how Oliver managed to knock it down. But unless we have vandalising possums or destructive fruit bats coming in under the patio at night, it looks like the blame falls on the dog!

Oliver

Some of you might remember this bear... Acorn. I made her while experimenting with different shapes to get different looks a while back. Anyway, I mention this particular bear, as she was part of something very new for me - a swap! I was contacted by a lovely collector who was already looking after another of my bears, who asked if I would be happy to swap Acorn for a sketch of Oliver. After seeing her work I was very excited to have a piece of her art in exchange for a piece of mine.

The sketch arrived this morning. I'd only just woken up (the postman was very early today!), and Mark hadn't yet left for work, so he got to check it out when I opened it. I think it is fair to say that we are both blown away by it! It's stunning!



I am sure that Janie would be happy to take any commissioned orders as well if you have a beloved doggy you'd like immortalised!

Another girly bear

This lovely lady in pink is Shelby. (named by my little sister shown in the post below). Click on each of the little photos above to get a better look at her if you so desire. She was made to fit those gorgeous handmade pink overalls. I bought them at the same time as I purchased Gracie's little dress.

I am really happy with Shelby. I am experimenting a bit at the moment with keeping my bear's faces furry - but still feminine. I think if I hadn't designed Shelby specifically to fit the hot-pink overalls, she probably would have been a he... but the addition of the head bow really softened her look a lot. And I think she makes a handsome girl.



Chelsea and Oliver thought so too...