Sniff, sniff, what's that smell?...

...ahhh, the sweet, sweet smell of a dehydrating pine tree mingled with the glorious aroma of overheated tinsel. Summer is here and Christmas is on it's way. I must say this end of the year is my favourite. It's something about the anticipation. The knowledge that just around the corner and perhaps down the road a little are many a quality day spent relaxing in the hot sun, stuffing our faces with Christmas food and hanging out in beautiful beachy or bushy places. When my teacher husband hangs up his chalk just before Santa arrives it seems like a glorious forever before the fun will end. It's all sunshine and lollypops until the fun suckers start reminding us to stock up on back to school stuff.
I got a taster of Summer fun on Sunday when we had a little road trip down the beach. We woke up to a beautiful, warm market free day and upon the mention of heading to the beach my little boy rushed to the linen press bundled up four towels (and strangely, a beanie?!) and stood jiggling with excitement at the back door. How could we not do it? So, off we went to my childhood favourite beach place, Queenscliff.
It's still a beautiful place but with the Sorrento ferry came a whole lot of Prue's and Trude's (what ever happened to Kath and Kim?). They take away from the old fishing town charm and have forever priced us out of the real estate market for my idyllic beach house. But, there's always a but, they did set up some swanky shops and brought some lovely coffee and super awesome hot chocolate (try the place on the corner, you won't forget it).
After a picnic complete with compulsory anodised travel cups (see pic above) and some serious sunscreening (WHY am I sunburnt??) we headed onto the ouchy hot sand. It took me a while to wind down, but I knew I'd got there when my creative brain started to ponder a story about a mouse and a lighthouse, complete with a head full of illustrations. I didn't even flinch when my cheeky/naughty daughter threw a spadeful of sand at me.
We finally managed to extract our two little water babies from the brisk Victorian ocean with the promise of an icecream. I never leave my beloved Queenscliff without stopping for a lick at the Scandanavian icecream shop. It's been there forever. Well almost, and they do the best choc-dipped waffle cones filled with scrumptious icy goodness. I opted for a Baileys and scorched almond number, my husband did the obligatory boysonberry in a plain waffle cone. Yes, a plain one, amid a sea of choc dipped sweeties covered in sprinkles, nuts or freckles. Bizarre, I know. My son faithfully followed in the footsteps of my childhood self  by slurping up a psychadelic, swirly bubblegum number and my daughter, all class and sophistication, went with vanilla in a cup.
We tied off the trip nicely with a trundle through two local op shops, both old school and run by friendly Nanna's. I scored some old sewing patterns and golden books for my eagerly anticipated Christmas wrapping, a pair of red, patent leather boots for my daughter (she hasn't had them off) and a VW t shirt for my son. Gold. The kids were mighty pleased with the freebies toys, too. Ta, Nanna's.

On the sunny, buntyandsars side fo life I've been rather busy. Sometimes it feels like I'm doing a full time job as a Mum (which it SO is) while fitting in a part time one, too. But I love my buntyandsars-ing so much, it's worth it! I took advantage of my Mumness the other day and did some serious brainstorming with my Mum's group. Now I've got half a sketch book filled with lightbulb moments and I can't wait to polish them up for you lucky folk. The one in the pic is a hairclip concept. I'm in the process of filling several pages with designs and after a hot day trawling the shops on Friday, complete with some very helpful and some equally unhelpful shop ladies, I found the perfect clips at the right price. You just never know, this one may even be ready for the Daylesford Twighight market on the 18th.
I've also started some tentative research into publishing my children's book. It's all there in my head and it's beautiful. The illustrations are lively and whimsical, the story is catchy and endearing and the object itself is lovely,  bound flawlessly and printed onto the kind of touchable paper you can't help but bury your nose in for a big deep smell. I think I will head down the self publishing path at this stage but I'm open to any suggestions or advice I can get so that I can scratch out a path through this uber complicated book making path. So please, leave me a message if you think you can help coax my big dream into reality.
For now I've got some serious daydreaming at my twinkly Christmas lights to get on with. You never know, I may even dream up some more magnificent buntyandsars goodies.