Join us as Three Li’l Princesses hosts a Royal Wedding Pyjama Party in the palace on Friday from 7pm. It’s a chance for those princesses and queens who can’t go to the `actual’ wedding party for Kate and Wills to have a wine and gossip in our gowns (ah, dressing gowns) and slippers (just so you know, we’re not talking Cinderella slippers, either) as we watch the real thing on tellie.
Simply click on the link below on the wedding night and start chatting. Feel free to come and go as you please. We’re all mums, so we understand that getting children to bed comes first.
If you have an iPhone you can also download a free app to use with the blog at the iPhone app store or on www.coveritlive.com
Today is an historic day. It’s the day Kate and Wills tie the knot. I was only a year older than you Ella, when Will’s mum and dad created headlines doing the same thing. So today, to mark the occasion, I’m sharing the story of the day your Dad and I said “I do’’.
Oh, and by the way, your Dad informed me yesterday that your genealogy-obsessed Uncle Kim has discovered he and your Dad are Prince William’s 13th cousins (on the Spencer side, thank goodness). We’re now wondering where our wedding invite is!
Me, looking for your Dad!
I awoke to a letter on my pillow and my soon-to-be husband (your Dad) gone. We couldn’t spend the night apart, so we made a vow – our first for the weekend – that your Dad would get up early so I didn’t see him before the big event. Me, being the suspicious one, and your Dad not caring either way.
We’d whisked the family and closest friends away to Tassie’s West Coast to a fishing village called Strahan. It was partly to make it a relaxing holiday with those who meant the most to us and partly to stop sticky beaks.
I spent the morning having my hair done in a simple up-do by my wonderful hairdresser. My natural-looking makeup was done by yours truly (until last year, I was a Mary Kay consultant for 14-odd years). I wanted your Dad to see ME, not some overly made up person, as I walked down that aisle.
Being the list-keeping, ultra-organised person that I am, this wedding was planned with military precision. All, that was, but the weather. It had been perfect in the days leading up to the event, but decided to become rather grey and gloomy as the time approached.
The ceremony was to take place on the balcony of the Macquarie Restaurant, overlooking the bay, the famous Abt Railway and the township itself. A spectacular view. Then, just as I was about to walk down the “aisle’’ and out onto the balcony, the music started playing and the clouds parted. It was magic.
Cousin Ned asked four times during the ceremony if we were ready for the rings yet.
The ceremony went better than I could have hoped for. Your Pop and I couldn’t hold back the tears as we approached your Dad, who had waited so patiently for his late bride. It was rare for me not to be on time but, according to photographer Grant, was expected. During the ceremony, this time it was your Dad who would shed the happy tears as he barely finished his vows.
We then had stunning photos taken at the Abt railway station, on the beach, the pier and the balcony itself with your cousins Ned (as page boy) and Sam (as flower girl). Our guests didn’t have to travel anywhere – they were already at the restaurant. They just needed to drink and be merry.
And merry they were. After the speeches (including a speech from your Mum), the gorgeous seafood buffet (if only I’d felt like eating) and cutting of the cake (which your Mum designed), the frivolity began.
As you can probably tell, we found some pretty ingenious ways of cutting costs. Another of those was to do away with flowers on the tables and replace them with goldfish. The fish cost something like $20 to hire and you paid $2 for each fish killed. So there was great amusement when one guest pretended to eat a goldfish, much to the horror of another guest.
Cousins Ned and Sam getting bored in the background.
As the night wore on, so did the stories. Unfortunately, I can’t share them all in such a public forum for fear of retribution! Maybe they’ll make some good bedtime stories one day.
Apologies for the quality – it's a photo of a photo.
This photo was one of the last for the night and was taken overlooking Strahan’s annual Christmas carols, which were being held on the pier. A year later I went on to host and sing an original song at that Carols event. It was the perfect way to spend our first wedding anniversary. I might even share the video of that song one day. Maybe.
Ella and Holly, we thought everything was “so complete’’ that day. Having you two in our lives makes us realise it was far from it. Our lives are so much richer for the two of you.
Love you both. xx
If you’d like to be part of the Royal Wedding meme, simply:
Link up your wedding story (old or new) or your story about preparing for your big day with the linky tool below.
Grab the button, created by the wonderful Lisa Warren from Life As We Know It, to add to your post.
Link back to Three Li’l Princesses’ Royal Wedding meme
Spread the comment love by commenting on at least three other wedding stories.
An optional step, but feel free to take part in our Royal Wedding Pyjama Party tonight. We’ll share some laughs, gossip about the wedding (of course) and chat about the wedding stories linked up here.
Are you a blogger or thinking about getting into blogging?
SINCE starting this blog in 2010 and my business blog a year later, I’ve been asked quite a few times how you start a blog and does it cost a lot.
The answer is: no, it doesn’t cost a lot. While it cost me about $110, you can actually start a blog with Blogspot or WordPress.org for free. However, the advice I received early on was to fork out the money for a self-hosted site if you’re serious about blogging. It’ll save you a mountain of work later on – especially if you’re looking to turn it into a business blog later on.
Here’s how I created my mummy blog:
Buy a domain. I went through Hostgator* to get my domain name for this site for $US15 and CrazyDomains* to get my business site, due to wanting the .com.au.
Buy a hosting package. We did so with Hostgator* and bought the Baby Plan. Cost: about $100/year (there is a discount on the price at the time of writing this). The reason for choosing Hostgator came down to the fact it had some of the best reviews on the net. Every host had negatives!
Once you’re in your cPanel, click on WordPress and download.
In WordPress, click on “appearance’’ and “themes’’ and start clicking through to find the theme that best suits what you’re hoping to achieve. This blog uses Pagelines and my business blog uses Genesis. But if I was starting out again and didn’t have funds for a designer, I’d opt for the Divi* theme from Elegant Themes. It’s divine – and super easy to use.
Download plug-ins from the WordPress.org site to make your blog more user friendly. I suggest: Akismet (to help prevent spam), All In One SEO Pack (makes all that SEO stuff simply), Fast Secure Contact Form (to put on your Contact Me page), ReplyMe (when you reply to a comment on your blog, it is automatically sent to their email), Social Media Widget (this helps apply all your social media links to your sidebar to make connecting with you easier),
Consider using Feedburner. This allows people to view your content via RSS or email subscription. However, I do want to add that since writing this post, most people now use an email marketing system for greater flexibility in building an email list and marketing. When you’re starting out, I highly recommend Mailchimp*. As your email list grow, other options include Infusionsoft* – which I now use.
Join Google Analytics. This will give you a daily, weekly, monthly and annual look at your traffic stats – how many visitors, what pages they’re looking at, how they came to find your site. Invaluable information.
Create some pages within your blog – preferable an About Me page, a Contactpage and Advertisepage. You can do this under “Pages’’ and “Add New’’.
If you’re looking to use advertising on your site, sign up with Nuffnang.
Through your HostGator cPanel create an email address. For eg, mine is kellie (at) threelilprincesses (dot) com A word of warning, always obfuscate your email address as I’ve shown it here, otherwise the spam bots will pick it up.
Click “Posts’’ and “Add New’’ in WordPress and start typing away. To learn more about content, visit my blogging series.
Once you’re done, add a photo using Picmonkey* to create it, fill in your SEO fields, add some tags and categories, proof read your post once more, then press “Publish’’.
Lastly, respond to comments on your own blog and get offsite and comment on other bloggers’ posts. It’s the best way to start making new friends. And remember, have fun!
If you have trouble with any of the above, don’t hesitate to leave a comment and I’ll help walk you through it. Also, if you’ve noticed something on my blog that you’d like to know more about, feel free to ask. I’m more than happy to share my experiences.
If you’re a blogger, share some of your favourite plug-ins or steps you took to create your blog? If you’re not a blogger, have you ever considered starting your own blog?
If you’d like more, you can also go through the entire free 30-day blogging challenge here which will help you set up your blog, Facebook and Twitter accounts for business.
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Click the image below to learn how to make money from blogging in this 7-day mini course
As a disclaimer, the * links is a referral link. So if you decide to work with the company in the future, I may receive a commission. However, it doesn’t mean you will be charged any extra for using their services.
THE long weekend for the O’Briens was mainly spent a-huntin’. It began by hunting for choccie throughout the house, which resulted in numerous high pitched squeals. And that was just from me.
The night before Easter Bunny’s arrival, the Bloke in The Shed and I placed eggs around the house, each with a clue to the whereabouts of the next egg in the hunt. Because Ella can’t yet read, I drew pictures of the locations – the bath, her kitchen, the drawers.
Julian had this to say on Facebook afterwards: “Just set up the Easter egg hunt under Kel’s instruction. Poor Ella, think she’s gonna need a bloody GPS in the morning’’.
He can’t deny though, that it helped make the excitement of Easter morning last that much longer. The highlight was later that day witnessing Ella view the video of the morning’s hunt. She continually kept telling the video version of herself where the eggs were. “No Ella, look in the other drawer. Yes, that one. Quick, open it. Yay! Well done, Ella.’’
That afternoon, we headed off to visit her Nan who was camping at Wing’s Wildlife Park in Tassie’s North-West community, Gunns Plains. As the name suggests, the park has wildlife, with everything from buffalo to wombats and monkeys.
Oh, and devils, of course.
And a goat.
Here we went a-huntin’ once more, which resulted in numerous high pitched squeals – again. The first squeal was from Ella when a roaming rooster started chasing her after she decided to “feed the birds’’.
The experience didn’t quite live up to the Mary Poppins moment.
Then there was the turkey, which could obviously smell that we’d just devoured one of its mates for lunch. Not a happy camper.
The next squeal was courtesy of the Bloke in The Shed, and Collingwood supporter, who found a plaque dedicated to him.
The highlight, apart from some rather hungry looking Tassie Devils, was a kangaroo with a joey in her pouch. Ella, quite loudly, informed everyone how: “it’s got a baby hanging out of its bum, hasn’t it Mum?’’. Ah, not quite, darling.
So, how did you spend the long weekend? Did you go camping, visit a local attraction, spend it with friends and family or relax at home (if you can call staying at home with kids relaxing!)?
Because Three Li’l Princesses is made up of, well, “princesses’’ and we have our own online Palace, we’re throwing a Royal Wedding Pyjama Party tonight from 7pm.
It’s a chance for those princesses and queens who can’t go to the `actual’ wedding party for Kate and Wills to have a wine and gossip in our gowns (ah, dressing gowns) and slippers (just so you know, we’re not talking Cinderella slippers, either) as we watch the real thing on tellie. No makeup or up-dos required.
You can pop in and out of the party throughout the night (no pass out stamp required). For Royals tragics, there’s the option to join as a panellist and spread your Royal knowledge. Just let me know prior to the night so I can shoot you an email with the panellist details. My email is kellie (at) threelilprincesses (dot) com.
I’m hoping it’ll be a chance for bloggers and non-bloggers to “meet’’ some new friends! Because that’s what happens when you go to weddings, right?
What are you like in social situations? Do you hide in the corner hoping someone will approach you or are you the life of the party?
PS. For bloggers, Three Li’l Princesses is hosting a Royal Wedding meme today. Just write a post about your wedding day (or how you’re planning for your upcoming big day) and link it up once the meme’s live.
MUMS supporting mums is the theme behind this gorgeous giveaway in the lead up to the day when soggy toast and snotty kisses reign supreme. Of course, we all know its mum’s day every day. But who are we kidding? We still want to be spoilt, right?
How do these take your fancy? Read each review, discover what the mummy businesses are offering in the giveaway, visit their sites and then abide by our easy entry details to score the lot.
Chai Station's Plunger Chai
CHAI STATION
Chai Stovetop
I’ve long been a fan of India’s answer to the latte – chai tea. Since Chai Station sent through some of its divine hand blended chai teas, I’ve been in heaven. Finally, I don’t have to head out to enjoy a decent cup. You have no idea how great that is. And these chais are as good, if not better, than anything I’ve tasted in quite a while.
The beauty of these chai blends is you can brew them on the stovetop, in a modern plunger or a teapot. The Stove Top would be my favourite, with a real sweet spicy taste that takes you directly to India, thanks to the simple blends of cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, ginger and Ceylon tea.
I allowed the Plunger Chai Tea to sit in the plunger for quite a while and it created such a heady brew, thanks to the additions of peppercorn and liquorice root. The surprise among its range is the Green Tea Chai, which provides all the antioxidant and health benefits of green tea, with the spicy taste of chai. Here it’s hard to mistake the additions of jasmine.
The biggest issue was allowing three-year-old Ella a taste – she now insists on her own “chai’’. Although, it does mean 10 minutes of peace as we both indulge in the flavours from this Melbourne company’s range.
GIVEAWAY: Chai Station is giving away Value Pack 12 (valued at $74.95), which includes four 100g packs of each of the Stovetop, Plunger and Green chai teas – that’s plenty of chai for yourself and enough to share among family and friends.
The BellyCo belly wraps are still making their way in the post, so I’ll give you a good review of the BellyCo original once it arrives. In the meantime, I have to say I’m rather impressed with the idea behind this creation.
In those weeks and months after first popping out Baby Holly, I was so conscious of everything “coming back together’’. We’re so willing to look after ourselves during pregnancy, we sometimes become a little lax afterwards. This can result in body and back ache.
According to the site, belly wrapping is an ancient practice for restoring the stomach to pre-pregnancy shape and size and has also been shown to provide additional support to the legs and back. For breastfeeding mums, like me, it also helps posture during feeding to avoid that all too common back and shoulder pain by keeping your back straight. Other benefits include minimising swelling, reducing discomfort, assisting in accelerating the healing process, especially for women after a c-section and may help minimise postnatal stretch marks.
As well as the original BellyCo ($49.95), it’s also released the BellyCo ECO belly wrap (RRP: $59.95), which feels similar to cashmere thanks to the bamboo fabric. It’s highly durable and odour resistant, not to mention keeping you cool in summer and warm in winter. All materials are bio-degradable, non-toxic, medical grade and non-allergenic – good for the environment and good for you.
GIVEAWAY: BellyCo is giving away a BellyCo ECO belly wrap (RRP: $59.95), for women recovering after giving birth or breastfeeding mums. If you can’t use it yourself, you’re sure to know a friend or family member who would benefit.
There’s nothing I love more than slipping into beautiful sleepwear. But, if truth be told, once the girls came along, the standard of my sleepwear slid. Hello, puppy dog flannel pyjamas! So I felt all feminine and beautiful again when I slipped into Skirties Sleepwear’s chic Tracy lace top and matching shorts.
This set is truly stunning. The jersey knit fabric (95% cotton, 5% spandex) feels so soft and light against the skin and the soft pink colour further adds to that feeling of beauty. There’s a comfy elastic waistband, tie on waist and matching pink stretch lace trim. The lace trim is just so sweet. Both top and bottoms are loose fitting, so there’s an element of freedom, but they also have plenty of stretch.
What I love most about the top is the shape – it’s cut high at the sides and hangs low at the back and front. And, according to Ella, I look beautiful. What more of a recommendation do you need?
I’m also eyeing off a couple of the others in this Australian designed and owned range to snuggle up in of a night. The Kylie nightie is gorgeous, while the Kim ¾ tee would be ideal for the cooler nights. There are also plenty of other nighties, PJ shorts, pyjama pants and tops to choose from.
GIVEAWAY: Skirties Sleepwear is giving away a Tracy lace top with pink shorts (RRP: $55). Note, these can be purchased separately. The set will be in size M.
EVEN on days when I don’t manage much makeup, I still make an effort with a bit of lipstick. However, there’s long been frustration with wax lipsticks not lasting long enough and you wonder why you bother. When I stumbled across SeneGence’s LipSense Collection I became rather excited.
When I was sent the Pink Champagne, I couldn’t help but think “this is MY colour”. The idea with SenGence’s premier product, LipSense, is that it’s not only long lasting – between four and 18 hours – but non drying. It attests to being smudge proof, waterproof and kiss proof – I tried out the latter and believe me, it’s true! There’s also no lead or wax.
And sure, Christina Aguilera might be a big fan, but don’t trust her word. I’m telling you ladies, this is semi permanent colour that lives up to its word. It’s nice to find something that doesn’t smear, fade, feather or transfer onto your coffee cup while drinking with friends. Always a good look, right?
This is how it works. You make sure your lips are perfectly clean (not even foundation), then apply the lip colour in one sweep. If you go over the lines (yes, even us adults can manage that), then there’s LipSense Ooops Remover. Genius. Then, before doing the all-important lip smacking, pop LipSense Glossy Gloss over the top, which helps your colour’s longevity. SeneGence is a party plan company and Sharryn is always looking for distributors nationally.
GIVEAWAY: SenGence is giving away its premier product, LipSense Collection (RRP: 66). It includes a LipSense shade in Pink Champagne, LipSense Oops Remover and LipSense Glossy Gloss. The items can be purchased separately, but work best together.
So, to go in the draw to win ALL FOUR prizes from our wonderful mummy businesses, simply leave a comment telling us what your wish is for Mother’s Day (it can be simple or elaborate, we don’t mind!). The giveaway is open to Australian residents only and will be drawn randomly on Monday, May 3 at 9am.
If you’re still on the hunt for something for your own Mum this Mother’s Day, consider supporting one of these mummy businesses. I highly recommend them.
Want more entries? Then here’s how you can up your chances in the draw. Each task is worth one extra entry.
Click the Facebook button below and share this giveaway with your Facebook friends. Then leave a separate comment saying something along the lines of “I’ve shared this on Facebook’’.
Click the Twitter button below and share this giveaway with your Twitter followers (Twitter handle is @ThreeLil). Then leave a separate comment saying something along the lines of “I’ve shared this on Twitter’’.
