Gingerbread house - School holiday fun

We have finally finished our gingerbread house. It is not quite as pretty looking as I had hoped but I'm trying to be OK with that. I bought a kit from Coles and added some extra lollies. I love Freckle chocolates and so do my DDs. And the make get roof tiles.

Side view of fake chimney

The front yard has a Christmas tree, a Snowman and a Gingerbread "person". You'll just have to believe me.

The school holidays have been trying my parenting skills. The four girls are full of beans and tiring me out but we have sqeezed in some fun. The girls aren't used to be all at home for more than two days in a row and have taken a bit of time to learn to play well with others. Hopefully things will continue to improve. I'm sure people having been praying for me as then have gotten better since taking to friends from my church community group. I'll have reinforcements of the adult kind from next week as DH is taking two weeks leave.

The photoes are taken with my nice new camera in my nice new kitchen. Hopefully I'll get some kitchen photos up soon.

Back view

Getting things done.

I have been getting things done this today. Yes, it's a little sad that this is worthy of a post but it's true.
I have been having trouble getting "things" done lately. Motivation has been low.
I have folded a load of washing, and put it away. I have done two loads of washing and the first is currently drying.
DH did ironing for me last night while I went to the gym and I have put those items away. He is a gem.
I have started preparing the salad for our Community group dinner tonight.
And I made a phone call that I have been meaning to do for over a week.
Yay me.
It helps that DD#4 F is asleep and the others are at school and day care.
I still need to make something for supper. Maybe a chocolate cake.

Turns out I wasn't as ready as I thought

I managed to get C & D off to school on the first day relatively well. Photos were taken. No tears were shed.
But the rest of the day wasn't so smooth. E wanted to buy ham after dropped off dad at the train station. I wasn't planning a shopping trip but off we went. That went fine. I just strapped them both in the tolley and they can't get into too much trouble. It actually was good to buy a few things to add to our flood-emptied fridge.
But the big problem came from my one planned activity to occupy E. I thought making cupcakes would be a hit. It turned out she was too busy with TV to help at any steps other than making the icing and getting them out of the oven. Making the icing went fine. But she touched the pan on the way out of the oven. Such a bad mum. I totally forgot that she hasn't had the don't touch drummed into her quite as much as the older girls who usually help. Ouch. So much crying. She eventually cried herself to sleep after demanding a bandaid and an icepack. I know either of those things would help a burn (both would make it worse probably) but she was inconsolable.
But the cupcakes were yummy.