Author: Clare at CatsEatDogs

My favorite books of the year 2015.

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I don’t read lots of books because I am a ridiculously slow reader, but I have read some really good books this year.  So I thought I would share them with you on this rainy, stormy Christmas Eve eve! Three of my favorite novels have been ‘All the Light We Cannot See’ by Anthony Doerr, ‘The Martian’ by Andy Weir (I still haven’t seen the film, but then I do know how it ends!) and ‘The Heart Goes Last’ by Margaret Atwood (I whizzed through this one in three weeks – see, that is me reading fast!!). Three of the best non fiction books for me this year were ‘Big Magic’ by Elizabeth Gilbert, ‘Everyday Superfood’ by Jamie Oliver and out of a ton of art books this one is a beauty, ‘Drawing and Painting Beautiful Faces’ by Jane Davenport. We do tend to read lots of kids books because I still read to my youngest every night.  Favorite children’s books have been ‘The Chronicles of Narnia’ by C.S. Lewis, the ‘Harry Potter’ books by …

Weekly Photos 51/52.

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A week to Christmas!  Oh my.  Are you all ready?  I pretty much am, presents are almost wrapped and food is bought. 1. I made some balm for Christmas presents and it smells divine.  Just the right amount of citrus and calming clary sage.  I might need to make some for me! 2. I visited my friend’s new lovely salon this week. 3 and 4. Time to make gingerbread houses!  The kids make them every year and I am so pleased that at 11 and 14 years, they still want to make these sweet masterpieces.  One was made with graham crackers and the other one was made the traditional method with cut out gingerbread cookies which we made the day before. Fun! 5. I picked up this smashing bag at a flea market on Sunday, it is a 1950’s Olson Travel hand luggage bag and it is in great shape. Hurrah for bargains and gingerbread houses!  Have a lovely week and happy Monday x

Through The Lens Thursday #51. Alive.

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This week’s prompt is ‘alive’.  This tree is alive and it has made it through the year ready to grace our living room again. We bought it last year at this time and it has lived outside happily ready to be decorated for Christmas for the second year. We used to have an artificial tree which over the years got scrappier and more sorry looking, then last year it ended up with water in it’s storage box and ended up rather moldy.  So that was the end of that.  The intention was to buy another artificial tree, but we ended up at a tree lot with living trees rather than poor old hacked down dying trees. We all liked this one, decided to call him ‘Fat Albert’ and brought him home. I took these two photos of our Christmas tree today at the same time using different settings on my camera in the spirit of ‘Through the Lens Thursday’ which is a weekly project to practice using our DSLR cameras on the manual setting.  I …

A Christmas holiday coloring sheet. Star Mandala.

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As we are hurtling towards the Christmas period at great speed with a glass in one hand and wrapping paper in the other, I thought you might enjoy a coloring sheet.  Feel free to print it off and grab your pens or paints or crayons or all of the above and relax for a few minutes and colour some lovely stars.  Click here to get the printable or on the above image. Here are a few ideas for your coloring- Make all the stars a different colour. Only colour or paint around the stars and leave them white. Start with dark colours and work your way out from the middle using lighter and lighter colours and create an ombre star mandala. Make a different pattern in each star. Join all the stars together with a line then colour them in. Print the sheet onto card stock, cut it up and make a puzzle from it. Print onto card stock, fold in half and give as a card (I did that, they are cute ‘coloring in’ …

One+Four=Life. Weekly Photos 50/52

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This week saw the annual elementary school ‘Winter Sing’ which comprises of each grade singing two songs to celebrate the holiday/Christmas/Winter season.  The kids all had a good time and they all sang songs no-one in the world has ever heard of with great gusto. It is so nice to see all the kids work together and help each other. I would just love to see them singing their little Jingle Bell hearts out, but alas no, we just get a collection of obscure and undefinable songs.  Is this an American thing?  Do your kids have recitals at Christmas?  Any songs you recognise? I recently signed up for the Get Messy art journaling lifetime of inspiration and prompts and journaling pals.  Art journaling is something I have always been intimidated by and I wasn’t sure if I would like it or not, turns out, I do!  I am still a little unsure and the blank page is often a scary monster, but once I dive in, I have a great time and get lots of …

Through the Lens Thursday #50. Packed.

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Blimey, we are at week 50 already!  I found out today that this year has 53 weeks and not 52, I thought all years had 52 weeks, I thought it was the rule.  Apparently not.  There I was thinking we had two weeks left and as if by magic another one appears!  Hello week 53 and welcome to 2015. This week’s Through the Lens Thursday prompt is ‘Packed’.  Through the Lens Thursday is a year long weekly project hosted by Greta at GFunkified blog to improve our photography skills using our big girl cameras and not just the phone. I usually just snap away on the phone and I need to keep practicing my ‘proper’ camera skills. Today I made mince pies with homemade mincemeat which I made from this Jamie Oliver recipe.  I packed in the mincemeat for a nice generous filling. Now I am trying not to eat them all! I hope your Thursday is going well!

Five things about me in mugs and cups

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This picture is inspired by the December Reflections prompt for today – ‘5 things about me’.  I suppose this is ‘five mugs about me’. I was grabbing a mug for my tea and wondering whether to grab my usual mug or go for the big tea mug. Big tea it was, then I saw my thrifted Pyrex mug which I like when I just want a small mug of tea and the slightly see through Pyrex reminds me of my Grandma who had mugs like this one. I began to wonder, does everyone have the mugs and cups they like for specific drinks and quantity of said drink?  Or am I just a little bit odd?  What do my mug choices tell you about  me? Anything?  What do your mug choices say about you? My coffee cup is just for coffee and I use it every day but I don’t even like it very much. It is a good size and keeps the coffee warm longer, although I am not mad about the crazy eyes! …

One+Four=Life. Weekly Photos 49/52.

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Frosty mornings are upon us and last week was chock full of them.  By the afternoon it is usually milder though when the sun has been out all day.  I like the crunchy mornings with hats and gloves and a brisk walk to school. At the weekend we went to the Farmer’s Market at Schlafly Brewery and picked up some lovely mushrooms from Ozark Forest Mushroom farm. These are heading for a noodle soup. I also bought some dried serrano chili peppers from them which I will throw into soups and roasting veg. This photo just cracks me up!  My cousin sent it to my now 11 year old for his birthday, it is hilarious!  A balloon in the shape of a bull.  Ha! These cakes were for the birthday boy this weekend.  I used this feature from Frankie magazine as inspiration.  I used vanilla cake for the ‘bun’ and brownie for the ‘burger!  The ‘lettuce’ is green taffy rolled flat and the ‘ketchup’ is red icing. Simple and effective, just how I like things …

Through The Lens Thursday #49. View.

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For this week’s prompt, I took a photo of my neighbor’s magnolia tree. I was hanging out the washing and noticed it budding against the blue and white sky and thought, that is a good ‘view’. I am not sure that it should be in bud in December but who am I to question nature’s ways? I messed about with the camera settings and ended up with a little bit of a washed out picture which I liked. Next week’s prompt is ‘packed’. Happy Thursday!

Four Christmas Books for Children

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Reading to kids is the best thing I think, I am reading the Harry Potter series to my youngest who is 10 and we love it.  I read them to my teen when he was younger, but I am happily reading them again.  I will be sad when both of my kids are too big for reading aloud, maybe I should offer to read at the library or the kindergarten classes at school?! The other thing I miss as they get older is picture books, I love love love picture books and still have a little browse when I am in the library.  I will flick through and admire the illustrations and stories and maybe even borrow one or two. It is with great pleasure that I present to you a small selection of Christmas/Holiday books for the kids (big and small) in your life. First up is Samurai Santa by Rubin Pingk which I chose on the illustrations alone!  Turns out Samurai Santa can throw a snowball as well as any naughty ninja.   …