October 2011Life Love and Hiccups: October 2011
Life Love and HiccupsLife Love and HiccupsLife Love and HiccupsLife Love and Hiccups

Monday 31 October 2011

Winner of The Fabulous Summer Living Dress Give away

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Congratulations to Kylie Ofiu who is the lucky winner of the Summer Living gorgeous Mother and Daughter dress Giveaway.

Kylie was the winner as drawn by Random Org.

Kylie - please send me an email to lifelovehiccups@optusnet.com.au with your postal address so that we can organise to get your prize to you.

Thanks to everyone who entered and keep an eye out for some more fabulous giveaways coming very soon.

*Please note the winner has 7 days to make contact with me or the giveaway will be drawn again.

Seas and Greetings - 55 days to Christmas

Pin It I was blown away when someone told me yesterday that there are only 55 days until Christmas. How quickly has that snuck up on us? Weren't we just celebrating Christmas? Didn't I just pack away the tree? Crap - I only just paid of the credit card and fit back into my pants from my last Christmas blowout!

I adore Christmas - every little fabulous bit of it! In our home, the entire month of November is usually spent preparing for it and then every day in December is spent celebrating it.

So to get myself in the spirit and inspired to start organising myself, I spent last night trawling through Pinterest for Christmas Ideas. As we live by the beach and celebrate Christmas beachy style - all the pictures I selected have a coastal theme.

Here are some of my favourite finds - I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed searching for them.
 




  {via}

Today I am linking up with Tina Gray {dot} Me for Ooh, that's Pinteresting! and Clean & Scentsible's Creative Spark, & Serenity Now's Weekend Bloggy Read

Sunday 30 October 2011

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner - Target $50 Shopping Voucher Winner

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Congratulations to Sapna who is the lucky winner of the Target $50 Gift voucher. Sapna was the winner as drawn by Random Org and has been contacted by email.

Tomorrow night the winner of the Summer Living Dress will be drawn so make sure you stop back in to check if you have won.

Please note the winner has 7 days to make contact with me or the giveaway will be drawn again.

Saturday 29 October 2011

So I have a little crush on the Sensei!

Pin It I am slightly embarrassed to be admitting to this, but in the nature of keeping it real I am going to go ahead and lighten my load..... I have a little crush on my son's Karate teacher.

This morning, when I was at Karate with my boys, I was sitting with a couple of friends - Mick and Nick ( I know it rhymes) who also have boys in the class.

I was sitting there quietly observing and sipping on my soy latte, whilst half heartily joining in the chatter.

Quite the innocent scene huh? Well it was until my pathetic little secret was revealed.
One of the Dads started a conversation directly with me that went kind of like this:

Nick: So Sonia... are the boys enjoying the classes?
Me: uh huh!
Nick: Yeah mine to. Its amazing how much they get into it isn't it?
Me: mmmm *nodding*
Nick: The guys really like the Sensei don't they?
Me: yeahhhh *my eyes have not yet moved away from the action of the class*
Nick: He's great with the kids isn't he?
Me: yup great *still nodding but not looking away from the class*
Nick: I guess it helps that he's so good looking too yeah?
Me: *silence from me apart from the sizzling noise as a hot flush spreads up my neck and stains my cheeks*
Nick: So is that why none of the mum's just leave their kids and come back and get them later?

I looked up at both Nick and Mick and they both looked back at me with huge grins on their faces. I did my best beetroot impersonation and turned my attention to the ladies in the room..
Admittedly there were a lot of woman there watching their kids take the lesson. I scanned my eyes slowly from one woman to the next and followed their gaze...

Whilst at first glance it appeared they were concentrating on watching their kids participating, a more focused look at them revealed that their eyes weren't actually fixed upon their little cherubs, nope they too just like me were watching the hunky young instructor.

I looked back at Nick and Mick and burst out laughing. "ah yeah he's not bad" I said "But he really is so good with the kids!"

When another girlfriend walked in and sat down next to us, I told her I had just been sprung crushing on the Sensei. Cath laughed out loud and said "yeah I spent the first 2 terms crushing on him too - what's not too like!"

So my friends, it seems the kids are not the only ones that thoroughly enjoy our Saturday mornings at Karate class.

A bit later on today and my hubby had just gotten home from work. I filled him in on the mornings events and when he enquired about Karate I told him that all the women have a crush on the Sensei.

His eyes narrowed and looked me questioningly "do you?" he asked.
"umm well kind of.... but he has to be half my age for sure, and its really only cause he is so good with the kids" I mumbled. Here comes that hot flush again.

So now I am sitting in my office writing this post and feeling really kinda embarrassed, like a school girl who just had her diary read out loud by her classmates.

Why would I have a crush on my kids Karate teacher?

Well I have it all figured out.

It is because when I was thirteen I had the most massive thing for Daniel (Ralph Macchio) from the Karate kid.


Oh this guy used to rock my boat. I had posters all over my walls of him and I spent hours listening to 'Glory of love' and daydreaming that I was Elizabeth Shue in the movie and it was me that he was fighting for.  I even wrote Sonia 4 Daniel on my pencil case (I liked his movie name better than his real name).

So there you have it - I don't really lust after my son's Sensei (well not much anyway). I am just allowing myself to take a weekly stroll back down memory lane.

**Note to my hubby:
Don't worry huni - Sensei has nothing on you, you are still my number one crush. xxx

Do you have a secret crush? Come on - spill it! :)

Friday 28 October 2011

Pick Your Towel Up! - My Sneaky Tip to Keep you Sane

Pin It 4 Males in the house often equals BIG mess. For an OCD freak like me that means BIG meltdowns.
One of the things that drive me the craziest is picking wet towels up off the bathroom floor.

What is it with Testosterone and Towels?
Is it too hard to ask that you hang your wet towel back up to dry??

And of course when ever I groaned in my best naggy voice "who left their towel on the floor"? I was always met with mumbled nothings, blank looks and shrugging shoulders.

Well here's the bit where I pat myself on the back. I figured out a way to control the towel toss AND nab the guilty culprit.

I went and bought 6 new towels (gotta love an excuse to shop) in 3 different colours - 2 of each colour.

Then I assigned each boy with their own colour. They have the same colour towel in their bathroom upstairs and the downstairs one too and they are responsible for ensuring their colour towel is hanging back up when they are finished with it.

No more shrugging shoulders cause now I know EXACTLY who left their towel on the bathroom floor.

Ahh Mums - we are not just pretty faces, we have devious minds to match too.

I am actually smirking and doing the tongue out of the side of my mouth thingy as I write this. I tend to do that when I am excited.



Thursday 27 October 2011

A Truce in The Pressie Revenge War

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I love pressies! I love everything (usually) about them - the gift wrapping, the card, the sentiment and of course the gift itself..... Most of the time anyway.

A few years ago my dear Hubby had the brilliant idea of giving me a hedge trimmer for my birthday. WTF? Nope not for down there *blush*, a proper electric hedge trimmer for the garden.

I kid you not. I remember sitting in bed rubbing my hands in anticipation as I waited for Hubby and the boys to come in to give me my birthday surprise. And surprised I was when I saw the size of the box they walked in with. It was humongous! And I can still remember my excitement as I ripped the paper off to reveal ... the mother of all gifts.

All eyes were on me as they waited for my grin to affirm that they had done good. They got a grin alright. In fact I remember laughing myself silly as I struggled to open the box to reveal my 'real' gift that I was sure was hidden inside this trick packaging.

Sadly it wasn't a trick - they were serious! He had given the loving mother of his children, the one who squeezed 3 melons out of a mouse hole, a friggin hedge trimmer for her birthday.

By now you have most likely learnt that one of my not so savoury personality traits is my ability to hold grudges. So revenge on my behalf came fast and swift in the form of a pair of Pyjamas with "Yes Dear" written across the front. Better yet, timed with the arrival of those PJs was the mysterious vanishing of all his other Jimmy Jams and he was forced to wear them night after night as a constant reminder of his wife's wrath. But with those PJs came something far more sinister, a declaration of war .... a present war.

As cunning as I thought I was and as stealth as I had delivered my revenge, nothing and I mean nothing could prepare me for my Mother's Day gift this year. This was when he dropped the mother of all bombs...

A Meat Slicer !!!!!!! No trick box, no jokes a bloody meat slicer.

We have been engaged in this battle for some time now. In fact I even managed to trick my mother into innocently acting on my behalf by convincing her to buy him a Slow Cooker for his birthday. "Really it's what he wants" I recall telling her. Unfortunately for me that one backfired - he did really want one. The upside of my miscalculated strike is we have enjoyed many a delicious meal from that gift.

Fast track to today - it's not my birthday nor is it Mother's Day. So when my hubby came home from work and said he had a gift for me, I was sure he was going to hand over a chainsaw, a set of jumper leads or something as equally gob smacking. But no, it seems my gorgeous man is attempting to call a truce in this long standing present war.

At first glance, my gift in it's box looked liked something you would put in your bedside drawer - you know the drawer that's off limits to the kids. But on closer inspection, the thoughtful guy had bought me something quirky and totally fabulous.


He worries about me gabbing away on my iPhone all day, so this groovy little thing is a hand piece you plug into your phone and talk through like you would a normal old chunka lunka phone but without frying your brain cells with radiation.


I am ever so thankful that he has waved the white flag - could this be the end of this exhausting fight. Bloody brilliant peace offering I say and bonus points for getting me a pink one.

I guess I'll have to rethink that 'Make your own Umbrella Kit' I had my eye on for him for Christmas.


What is the most unusual or out there gift you have given or received?
Linking up with Kate Says Stuff for Thankful Thursdays.

Wednesday 26 October 2011

How to Shut Them Up.... For a little while

Pin It We all have those days where the kids just won't be quiet. The million and one questions, the nagging, the fighting, the squealing, the never ending demands of food, the tv is on, the radio is blaring, the dogs are barking - the constant noise just does your head in and you just want to scream at the top of your lungs SHUT UP!!!!!!

Breathe Sonia, just Breathe!

In our house of 3 boys, quiet is well... quiet doesn't really reside here. Even nightime brings it's own noise with all the farting and snoring that creeps out of the bedrooms, crawls along the walls and finds its way to me, the one lying awake trying to get some sleep.

But every now and then we get some quieter moments, usually in the evening and mostly on a Sunday night when they are just too damn exhausted to make much of a racket. Oh how I cherish those evenings.

*Cue the wicked cackle*

There is nothing better than a weekend of fun and activities to wear them down. Follow it up with a messy outdoor free for all Sunday night dinner to fill their tums and render them too full to speak. Oh my evil genius mind be settled.

This is when we at least get a glimpse of what quiet sort of looks like.

So here is our weekend in pictures.


Flynn went to the party dressed as Harry Potter, but after getting there and realising he was the ONLY boy, he decided a prince was much better, He ditched the hat and glasses and let his ladies serve him cake.






Linking up with My Little Drummer Boys for  Wordless Wednesday.

Tuesday 25 October 2011

It's 'Only' Me ?????

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Last night I left a message on a friend's phone. It went something along the lines like this;

"Hi hun - it's only me. Give me a call back when you get a chance."

On the surface that message sounded perfectly normal, but when I hung up it struck me - Why do I always say it's only me, like I am not at all important?

Now I know it would be arrogant to say the least if I said "Hi it's the fabulous Sonia here so you just have to call me back". That would be completely egotistical and I would not be at all offended if the receiver deleted my message and my number at the same time.

But it got me to thinking, is the use of the words 'only me' a subconscious way of putting myself down? When did my ego become so fragile? I do not expect to be the centre of this friend's universe by any means, but 'Only Me'???? When did I start considering myself to be so UNimportant?

Maybe I am reading too much into things today - perhaps it is just one of those blah kinds of days and I am being melancholy and overly dramatic.

Even so, I know one thing though - next time I leave a message for someone, I will omit the 'only' and change it to "Hi - it's me" instead. As for 'Fabulous me' ??? I'll let them decide that for themselves as I have enough going on in my own head to worry about what other people think of me.


Linking up with the gorgeous Fi at My Mummydaze for the 52 Week Project and adorable Jess at Diary of a SAHM for I Blog on Tuesdays


Monday 24 October 2011

Ooh That's Pinteresting - Cocktail hour

Pin It I have know idea what is in them, but they look so damn delicious I would drink them anyway.
All this warm weather has me dreaming of cocktails..... So what better way to celebrate the sunshine than drooling over these ones.









Linking up with Tina Gray {dot me} for Ooh That's Pinteresting. Happy Monday everyone!