Just about to put up the photos of Hong Kong, but had to also include first my naughty Amy with her haircut…before and after…Amy cut her hair a few weeks ago. She was playing with the Barbie Fashion Face and ended up giving her a very short fringe. With blonde hair all over the place, I didn’t notice the big chunk out of Amy’s hair until much later. We went to the hairdresser (or haircut dresser as Amy calls it) and asked for a fix-it-up job. She came away with this very cute style.

and our abundant lemon tree. In the 4 years we have been here (4 yrs today in actual fact!) it has never had a lemon, but I have been giving it a bit of extra water and here it is….

and one of the birthday girl, Jess when she turned 6 a few weeks ago. She had a chocolate mud cake with a mirror disco ball on the top (from Adas and Lin) at her party, and this one I made later on when The Knights came for dinner.

Amy has been accepted in preschool for next year. She just got her ‘report’ from Possums and it said that in group time she needs to be quiet and not chat to Sam so much!

Justin bought a new car on the weekend. Picking it up today and I bags driving it home!

later..xx

Will write about Hong Kong adventures when I get the photos up. In the meantime…other news.

James and Sascha’s beautiful baby has arrived. A week early, and by caeser, gorgeous Emma Kaye is here. And SHE HAS RED HAIR – go figure, that random gene that got me Meg has hit again!!

Jess has had me giggling lately with a few funny things she’s said. She asks me if I like watching “The Bald and the Beautiful”, and then told me very matter of factly that a circle has another name – Sophia (aka sphere). She still things God is ‘Gawd’ too. She makes me laugh 🙂

Later!

Have you seen this yet?

I’m reading a good book at the moment and am dying to get into it while I have a minute, but HAVE to blog first. It has been too long inbetween drinks!!

In a nutshell, my time and energy has been going into this new job. I’ve been in it about 6 weeks and to start with it was an enormous transition from being at home and in control of daily life, to leaving early and letting Justin take on a lot of the homey stuff. We are getting into a good routine now, but at first I was going to file for divorce! It was tough. Anyhoo, the job is plodding along and I have been busy writing policy and clinical procedure for my new department. New Department as in ME. I am the only one, but working with doctors and nurses and being a the hospital is great fun. i get to meet Sim for lunch mostly twice a week when we can arrange it, and working with the doctors and nurses is a lot of fun. Once it gets into full swing it is going to be awesome.

In point form to get through the rest of the exciting htings…

* Emma had a baby boy on 15th May – William
* Mothers Day in Berrima with James and Sascha (plus Kaye and Brian) meeting all the canberra connection was great fun. Weather was suberb.
* Sascha has about a month to go before number 3 scholtens arrives.
* Rowena and James and a little bay boy on Wednesday, Nicholas Isaac. We all breathed a huge sigh of relief at his safe arrival. It is about 18 months since Thomas was stillborn, so having Nicholas here is a wonderful blessing.
* Simone’s 35th Birthday party, tracksuit theme, was a hit. Nothing better then partying in the most comfy clothes you own.
* Kate Lisa and I are off to Hong Kong this week. Shopping, shopping, eating and shopping. Bring it!
* Mum and Dad are somewhere like Istanbul, Budapest or Belgium. Must check the itinerary!
* Holly makes her First Communion this month. We have been in preparations and she is presented to the parish at Mass this weekend.
* Soccer on the weekends is proving to be great fun. It is very social for me as the girls play in teams with their friends so I get to be on the sidelines, cheering and gas bagging at the same time. I am loving it.
* Swimming lessons are continuing. Holly is now in K10 which means a 45 min lessons and just laps of the pool. Her teacher raves about her butterfly. Meg is in K7 and has lovely freestyle technique. Jess just went up to K5 and is now in the deep end which gave her quite a shock on Friday when she got in! She is getting better at going further with freestyle, but Jess is our lazy bones, and why swim, when you can push off the bottom to propel yourself?
* Kids had a sleep over last night at Grandmas, s Justin and I headed out for dinner. We tried 2 restaurants, walked out of both because it was too noisy (old farts we are) and ended up at a quiet Indian Restaurant eating butter chicken and lamb rogan josh.
* I deactivated my facebook account for awhile. It was all getting too much. I might go back one day 🙂

That is enough for now. Things to do while the kids are still away. I just made Justin come for a walk with me. It is 3 degrees and very foggy, but it was nice to be out in the fresh air together.

Back soon x

The wee wee problem has not been fixed and I am giving up. We tried our best, but Amy is no where near ready for no nappies at night. There were a few nights that she was dry, but only because i got up several times to put her on the toilet. When I didn’t, she wet the bed, then put herself on the floor to sleep. It is getting too cold in the night to keep up these shenanigan. Also she still will only poop in the nappy. When she didn’t wear one for 5 days, she just didn’t poop. Now this is not good. No matter how many times I put on the loo and bribed her with wonderful things, it wasn’t going to happen. She flatly refuses. In exasperation yesterday, I put a nappy on her and within 5 minutes she had filled it and was feeling much better!

So that is why we are not pushing this issue anymore. She isn’t ready and I don’t want to give her a psychosis.

In other news….Meg finally lost her second top tooth. She looks hilarious – all red hair, freckles and gaps. I had Holly at the orthodontist last week and his exact words were…”Oh what a mess”. Upshot of that is to wait 12 months for the baby teeth to be out, then an expander on the top teeth cemented in for 6 months, followed by years of braces. Not that I am surprised. I had braces for well over 2.5 years and her teeth and a bit better than mine at the same age.

School back next week but before that we have an ANZAC Biscuit Bake-Off on Sunday at mums. The challenge has been called and we are all baking our best bikkies. I have had a few goes (thanks to Adas for the recipe) and the first batch were a bit hard and crunchy. Justin said that this was the first time he could use food as a weapon. How rude!! Next couple of lots have been much better. I have to stop eating them however. My waistline will never recover.

Soccer starts tomorrow for the girls. Jess is in the Pee Wee’s, Meg Under 8’s and Holly Under10’s. Of course all at different times and possibly different ovals. I guess that is better than at the same time but different ovals! I’m grateful for small things.

Have a great weekend.

After all the washing, a day of dealing with my stoopid computer and almost putting Miss 3 on E-Bay, last night we were actually successful with her. I remade the bed, plastic sheet and all, and we had a good talk about what was going to happen. Off she went to sleep and at 10pm I woke her to go to the toilet. I then woke up this morning at 5am and she hadn’t been in, so either A) she had done it! or B) she’d been lying in a pool of wee all night.

I went in and she was DRY! So I gathered her up and put her on the loo again and then she got into bed with us. It was great and I was so proud of her. Golly, such a topic of conversation!!

The incentives are still in place for the next step – Babycino at McDonalds – but we are still waiting for that movement! I’ll keep you posted 😉

You know when you wake up and just know that it is going to one of those days. I am there. Reasons for my angst…

Last night sat up and watched some of the Biggest Loser finale and recorded the ending – went over time, didn’t it ..and we missed the winner!

We are desperate to get Amy toilet trained. She is 3 and a half for goodness sake, but also the most stubborn child of ours. She wears a nappy to bed and it is always full in the morning. She times it so that her bowel movements are always in the nappy. She has never done a poo on the toilet and pretty much refuses. We are over it, so last night in all of Justin’s wisdom, he set a cold turkey ban on night nappies. I put a waterproof sheet on the bed and thought that maybe, just maybe, she might get through, but was cross because this was a dumb idea and I would be the one left cleaning up the mess. Helllllloo, guess what happened? 11.15pm and Amy wakes me up with soaking clothes. I have to get up, I have to remake the bed, I have to do the washing. Justin gets the glare and the cold shoulder!

Putting out said washing and some of the other things are clearly not cleaned properly – redo the bloody washing.

In amongst all that is bootcamp which was really tough this morning so I am tired and sore, the kids are non-stop bickering and we have an awfully messy house. I have to go into work today to see my new office space and get a run down of what is going to happen, and I am freaking out about the parking, the drive to work and leaving Justin in change of the kids.

Woe is me. I’m just a bit over done. Rant over….

Wow it has gone fast! Seems not long ago I was writing that school holidays were over and term was beginning.

So over the past few weeks…

We had a lovely 5 days in Perth for the wedding of Justin’s cousin Ben. Weather was warm, we got to go out on Adas’s boat and sail on the Swan River and dabble our feet a few times in the ocean. The wedding itself was gorgeous and the reception was great fun. It is always nice to get to Perth because Adas and Lin look after us so well. I got to have a few sleep-ins and nights out (‘Chicago’ at the Burswood Casino) and it was Lin’s Birthday so it was great to be there to celebrate that.

Kate was good enough to be the nanny while we were away. She ran a tight ship and the girls were mostly well behaved, and it was so much appreciated. She was then able to stay the next week into Easter, which meant a few more nights out and gatherings together. Good times.

I can’t remember if I wrote that Holly made it into the PSSA for swimming. She came first in her heat, but didn’t make it to the next round as it was based on times and she wasn’t the fastest. Nonetheless we were very proud of her.

Cross Country running was then on at school and Kate and Mum were on hand to cheer them on. Holly came 3rd, Meggie 2nd and Jess “somewhere in the pack” in their respective age groups.

On the job front, I have accepted the new position and I start last week of April. I am not so worried about the work, but actually how I am going to get everyone where they need to go in the mornings. I have had a good run the last few years with being able to get the kids to school etc, but now I have to start at 8.30am so this means a big shift in the way things are going to be organised. I guess it will take some time to get used to Justin taking on more of the “kid” responsibility, but I am sure he is up for the job as it means a lot to me and my career.

Amy is still talking in the third person. “Amy is hungry”. “Amy is cranky”, “Amy just saw a blue truck” etc. Since returning form Perth where she had us both with undivided attention 24hrs a day, she has become very clingy and won’t leave us alone. She chucked a major tantrum when I left her a Possums yesterday, and wouldn’t stay over at Jacob’s for his 4th birthday on the weekend. Hopefully she is going to snap out of this soon, cause it is wearing very thin!

Holly is making the Sacrament of Penance tomorrow Night. First confession we called it. In June she’ll be doing her First Communion but I don’t know if they wear the white dress anymore. Must look into it.

Lots of babies waiting in the wings at the moment. It was nice to see Sascha looking so well at 6 months pregnant. Emma is blooming with not long to go (will she make it to the baby shower Sim and I have organised for her????) and Rowena is 29 weeks. I’d better get cracking with some blankets!

Happy Easter just gone!

Today was my turn to do roster duty at Amy’s playschool. Jess used to call it “Judy” and we’d always wonder who this Judy woman was! So anyway, it was a good chance to see the littlies in action. As the teacher said to me this morning, Sam and Amy would be content all day if they had food, things to play with and each other. There is such a wide range of maturity levels and capabilities. I thought Amy was “up” there, but perhaps not after hearing this conversation…

Teacher: What are you going to be when you grow up?
Boy: Monster Truck Driver
Girl: Trickery (ie a Magician)
Boy: A scientist
Amy: A butterfly
Sam: A ballerina.

Oh dear! At least they are having fun 🙂

Some other news just to hand is that the Hospital job that has been going to happen for the past year, has finally happened. I got a call yesterday about it and they are considering only my “expression of Interest” and when could I start? After some negotiating with Justin, and then with them about the hours I think we have come to some agreement. Exciting times as this is a new position and it is basically building this new department form scratch. Scary and daunting as well, but I think I am up for it.

Holly has hounded me for a ‘party’ with some friends including a bunch of boys. She has a mad crush on a particular boy which is very much reciprocated, so I am entering unchartered territory here. We are keeping the communication lines open and she knows how to behave, so I have agreed to this little shindig. They want music, movies and pizza. Sounds OK to me!! I will be keeping a very close eye on that bunch though 🙂

Time is ticking away. My day off is quickly drawing to a close, so better get a move on with some housework.

Holly’s swimming efforts at the school carnival have landed her a place on the school team for PSSA. This is an event for the Local region where the fastest swimmers from the school carnivals take part. It is next Friday.

Then at swimming tonight, she went up a level to K10.

All good!!