Image of the week - Endora

When I was growing up in the 1970's the show "Bewitched" was a regular on our tv screens. Who could forget Endora (Agnes Moorhead) with her bright clothes, red hair and blue eye shadow!

Strange Christmas Record Covers

You guys know how much I like finding weird retro record covers so I was pleased to discover that flickr has a group just for these:

What child is this by the Brothers Four? The day when men can have babies will be the day I turn into the Queen herself - imagine the concept - woo hoo!

Al Hirt with his Nutty Bells?

Wow - people actually do the calypso on Christmas day? I couldn't imagine dancing around my living room with family members such as my mother in law - can you?

As much as I like Ella Fitzgerald I'm wondering what on earth a crazy looking painted horse with a flower in it's mouth has to do with having a swinging Christmas - any ideas?

This lady looks very shocked at something the man has whispered in her ear, perhaps he's trying to tell her he hasn't bought her anything.

Barry Hall's christmas organ - gee I'm digging his 70's style blue disco collared suit (not)

I tell ya what, if Santa visited me on Christmas eve with a face like this I'd freak!

The Kingston Trio - ok what's the purpose of them sticking a finger in the other sibling's ear, testing for ear wax perhaps?

That's it - what do you think of those?

Personal Choice Cookbook 1969

As most of you know I do library duty most Saturday mornings. Well our head librarian has been cleaning out some of the shelves and all the old outdated books have been going in the bargain bin for people to take - I snagged this gem from 1969. It's a book containing recipes put forward from some of the well known celebrities of that era such as Barbara Cartland, Roger Moore etc. Check out some of the photos and food - priceless!








More up at my flickr.

Sore feet!

After a busy day at work I came home determined to sort out my kitchen. I am unfortunately one of those people that hates dirt and grime and unsorted junk in my cupboards.

One in particular has been used for plastic bits and pieces and after trying to find something last night and seeing how grubby it was I knew it had to be sorted. After loading everything on the bench I vacuumed it and wiped it out with a damp soapy cloth then started sorting everything out.

It's amazing how much stuff I had in there that wasn't matching. Lids without containers, containers without lids and I knew I had to be ruthless. Some of it went in the caravan pile that we could use at the beach and what wasn't useful still went in the rubbish bag.

Now next thing is to figure out how to clean the inside door of the oven...

Apart from that the husband and I have a meeting tonight and I'm wondering what the heck I've gotten myself into. I volunteered my services to organize advertising for our town's committee - gawd help me!

Dinner's done, food's on the table so I'm off to clean up the kitchen - wish me luck!

Our Fire Brigade Christmas Party

It's not often I show photos of what I've been up so this time I'm sharing what the husband and I got up to last night. The husband is one of the volunteer firemen so we attended their Christmas party - the theme was Hawaiian night and being early summer here right now that's very appropriate:

As you can see this small portion of guests were dressed up.

Two of the guys giving out presents to the lucky recipients - most of the gifts were jokes such as water pistols, horse whips etc.

My drink of choice for the night - Pina Coladas - yum!

The other award winners of the night were those who had made faux pas during the year - here they are with their medals.

mmm can't beat the perfect summer fruit - watermelon!

My younger son and I also had fun making Christmas cookies yesterday - this time we made Snickerdoodles - recipe at my home blog. This is one of our traditions we take part in each December - my three have a blast helping mix the ingredients and using spoons to eat the leftovers from the bowl.

Hope you enjoyed that snippet of what we've been up to :-)

Image of the week - the new house!

Caption: "THIS IS THE HOUSE (among others) that Sarah Jane Lapin build after parlaying a night school course into new career as a building contractor. Daughters are Claudia, 12, and Nancy, 17, pictured from the left".

Ok, points to pay attention to are:
* What song are the girls singing
* Why is the girl on the left's face look like she's going to cry?
* Why does the mother look so happy when she's got an empty cup in front of her?

It feels like summer!

I've finally ordered a Christmas tree. I'm a bit disorganised this year. Last year the husband trolled the streets in our small town and kidnapped a tiny pine tree which he bought home in the back of his wagon. You can't beat the small of pine but with it comes the mess of cleaning up the needles etc so this year I threw caution to the wind and bought a fake green one instead. My three have said as long as they have something to decorate they're happy so it should be here by this weekend.

In New Zealand at this time of year while most have winter wew have summer and right now it's way too hot for my liking! It's only early December and already it feels like summer is here in full swing. We've had a few bouts of rain which has been good for my small vege garden but unfortunately it's made the temperature waayyy too humid and sticky.

The school holidays start in about two weeks for six weeks so my three are looking forward to it and usually we go to the beach in our caravan. We have other friends who stay there also in their caravans and the husband does security over there on his time off which enables us to get extra money.

oh and if you've been a follower of my blog or you're on my blog roll and you'd like to receive a Christmas card you can email on at iluvretro@yahoo.co.nz and I'll send you one this week :-)