Look! Here comes a new year!

Another wonderfully crazy-busy day. Caught up with old friends in the morning and then had a BBQ with my cousin, her husband and their two boys in the evening. Xander had a fabulous time with Liam, playing with their new hose / slide contraption. Holidays are great!

Now I'm off to be completely tragic and go to bed, hours before midnight. Sleep is too precious to waste it staying up and watching fireworks! Happy New Year everyone. :)

GOMA

We went to Goma. It was fun, but I'm far too tired to write about it, so here are some pics.

Xander found this group of kids and started carolling for them - the song he was singing was Bucko and Champs' "Deck the Shed with Bits of Wattle". I don't think they knew what to make of him!

Another busy day... it was finally fine enough to take the Christmas bikes to the park. We met my cousins from Sydney, plus Sam, Katherine and Mum at the park, which explains why there are extra people in the park photos.

We had a fabulous dinner at an Indian restaurant that my dear grandfather hosted for his whole family. On the way home from the dinner Jeremy was singing Xander a song about him being a "Crazy Xander" and Xander very seriously told him "no, it's 'tired Xander'"! The kids finally made it to bed at ten. Ouch.

Family + friends = fun

We had a lovely morning this morning at my sister-in-law's 30th birthday party.

It was great to catch up with some old friends and meet their cute kids. Katherine very kindly made sure most of the food was coeliac friendly - it was a real treat for us to be able to have lots of options in the food department! The kids were so excited about the chocolate dipped cherries (YUM!) and ate ....um, let's just say... alot. I'm not sure Xander's hands and face will ever be de-stickied!

This afternoon we really enjoyed having an early dinner with some good friends who are going to be moving overseas soon. The kids had a fabulous time together. We'll miss them!

Boxing day

We went to Mum and Dad's to open presents on Boxing day - lots of fun!

We are loving having little Sam (and his mum and dad) up from Canberra at the moment. He's growing up so fast, but still loves cuddles and kisses, which the big kids really enjoy!

This is Miri's favourite way to 'sit' on someone's lap. I think it's because her enormous brain needs the extra blood flow. Or not.

Christmas craziness

A couple of shots from Christmas day. We had a very busy morning - at church by 8am, then home for presents and off to a lovely lunch at my grandfather's house (with assorted family members). Xander told Jeremy at bedtime on Christmas eve that what he reeeaaally really wanted was a Buzz Lightyear toy like Sebastien and Amos (two friends). This was the first mention he made of such a desire, and fortunately I had decided on a whim that that would be his main present... phew!! We've asked him not to wait till after the shops are shut on Xmas eve to let us know what he wants next year!

Xmas begins

We went to Lynn's place this morning to open presents. Miri was a bit under the weather with her (maybe) chickenpox, but we had fun!

A picture is worth a thousand words...

... and I have a fabulous new camera, so I have ALOT to say now!
Here's 3 from the last 24 hrs...

Xanderisms

At Miriam's birthday afternoon tea last week, Xander was struggling to open one of her presents (it was well sticky taped). After huffing and puffing for awhile he announced "There'd better be something worthwhile in here!"



The other day we had this exchange:

Xander: "I feel like a girl, but I know I'm not."

Me: (um.....) "Oh right. What makes you feel like a girl, Xander?"

Xander: "Because I have eyebrows."



Some responsible adult should really take that boy in hand.

Still breathing... I think.

No posts for a very long time here - that either means I've gone and got a real life, or that little miss M has decided that sleeping is for pathetic loser babies and I'm too exhausted to look after my family, let alone contemplate blogging. (Unfortunately it wasn't the getting a life one.)

Her sleep has improved alot in the last week or so, which I am SO GRATEFUL for! I've actually got energy to see people - we've organised a playdate for next week, and we had a lovely morning at the pool today with some playgroup friends. Ah, life feels so much better when I'm getting enough sleep!

At the moment I'm uploading a pile of photos to a photobook site - I'm hoping to take advantage of the amazing exchange rate (with the US at least) and finally get our photos printed up into books. I love looking through our photos - so many funny and happy memories.

Just for fun - here are 2 pics, just to show how FREAKISHLY SIMILAR my 2 girls look!

This looks fun!

Natural dye for playdough - better put it on the must do list :)

Spiffing

I'm trying to fix up the words of an ancient song that a friend of mine and I wrote when I was at Uni. It's a kind of paraphrase of Colossians 1 and 2. I need a two syllable word for "good" to use in a substitute for the word "gospel".

I consulted my good friend thesaurus.com. What do you think of "gnarly news"? Doesn't really work does it?!

For now I think I'm going with "awesome". Any other ideas?

5 things I'm thinking about at the moment

1. The necessary, frustrating but instructing inefficiency of family life.
2. The way we (adults) teach kids to share, and insist that they share, but don't do it ourselves.
3. That life is not a zero sum game (thanks C!).
4. How I can take better photos of my kids without investing too much time in learning how to take better photos (ha!)
5. Greed, materialism and the internet community - particularly the way the eco-friendly / online / handmade thing makes it "ok" to not be content with what you have and makes lusting for more a good / normal thing to do.


I'm also thinking about a whole lot of less deep things.

How about you? What's on your mind?

Fat baby

The other day we were going about our business when Xander yelled out "Mum! Miri's neck didn't grow yet!!". I'm pretty sure it's actually there somewhere - just well hidden under a few inches of gorgeous baby fat!

Xander gets Biblical

This morning JoJo came upstairs all upset because X had tipped bubble mixture on her head (it was dripping down her face onto her clothes). Apparently X was trying to annoint her with oil - I guess this is what happens when you read your kids too many Bible stories!

Holiday pics

Last week we went away for a week to the Sunshine Coast (which was fairly cloudy and chilly!). We all got sick but being sick somewhere other than here was enough of a novelty that it was still a fun week. The kids had a ball and we all loved spending a bit more time with my brother and SIL (and their cute baby boy) and my parents.

My favourite pic from our holiday.

Miri and Sam started to pay some attention to each other.

The big kids.

The five of us getting hypothermia at the beach.

I love great quotes :)

"To run and work the law commands, but gives us neither feet nor hands. But better news the gospel brings, it bids us fly and gives us wings."

~John Berridge

Hmmm

Just saw an ad for white Tim Tams. WHITE!!! TIM TAMS!! YUM! How amazing would that be?

Then it occured to me that they're not gluten free white Tim Tams.... oh no! It's one thing to realise you can't eat the things you love anymore, but for some reason I haven't really realised there will be amazing NEW things I can't try... waaaahhahaha.

Oh well, maybe they really will invent gf white Tim Tams one day - until then I'll dream about them. Or maybe I should get myself a real problem!

5 reasons I know I'm getting old

1. I like eating ginger
2. I have to know what the weather forecast is
3. I have no idea what young people these days are talking about
4. I talk about "young people these days"
5. All my TV and radio input comes via the ABC. I have managed to avoid Newsradio so far though, so maybe I'm not as far gone as I thought.

Round and round

A special moment tonight - J and I sang our first canon together. We sang that lovely song "Round and round the earth is turning, turning always round to morning, and from morning round to night" which I taught the kids a couple of nights ago. Fun :)

Flat

J has been on at me for ages about getting some stencils, so today I finally cut up a cereal box and she chose some shapes for me to cut out with my frighteningly sharp paper knife. It scares me using that thing!

The kids had a ball using the stencils with their felt pens - even X managed ok and was very proud of his efforts. I'm linking this to the Unplug Your Kids monthly project (this month's theme is "flat") because stencils are flat :)

I had to include this pic - this is X's new "smile for the camera" face! Hilarious!

Dinner tonight

In the slow cooker at the moment I have a big chunk of lamb, a handful of rosemary, a chopped onion, 3 carrots, potatoes, lemon juice and a splash of white wine. Should be good I think, although I never think the slow cooker gives as a good a flavour as the oven / stove.

Last night we had Indonesian style (allegedly) beef in coconut milk. Even Jeremy said he liked it! (J isn't overly critical, he just doesn't normally notice what he eats - this can be a good thing!) I'm trying to use the slow cooker more after my sister told me it would change my life (or something like that).

From the mouths of 5 year olds...

Joanna told me last night that sometimes I'm like a stepmother (she's been really into fairy tales, so think stepmother of the Cinderella variety). Apparently it's because she gets given so much work to do. Ha!

I guess I shouldn't expect that mother of the year nomination any time soon then?

What's working, what's not

Aaages ago I wrote this post about what was working for us and what wasn't and I promised myself I'd revisit it.

It was interesting re-reading it because my worries about J's eating (she now insists on being Joanna, not JoJo!) are largely resolved, partly because of her coeliac diagnosis - which happened about 2 months after I wrote that post. On the other hand I am going OUT OF MY MIND with X's eating. We are currently giving him gluten so that we can get him properly tested for CD ... I'm almost hoping he has it because if it does it might provide an easy solution to some of his eating / mood issues. Bad mother alert!

So...

What's working:

* I kind of hate to be part of the cleaning cult, but I've signed up for the Flylady emails and even though I don't do alot of it, the basic stuff is SO helpful for me.
* I'm trying to be more realistic about what I can actually manage in a week (ie not much!).
* Bizarrely, I find that overall it's a good thing that I have to drop J off and pick her up at school each day. I often have to wake M up for the car trip which isn't fun, but it give the day a bit more shape. I'd really love to be a free and easy no routines person, but I'm just so not.
* J being around to help with the kids' bedtime. This is so much better than when he was working.
Unfortunately that's kind of the end of what working at the moment - things haven't been the easiest lately!

What's not:

* X waking up TOO EARLY every day. He wakes up really hungry so won't go back to sleep and is too irresponsible to be up and about without an adult. Much as I don't want to be up at the crack of dawn, I don't have the heart to make a boy crying for food stay in his bedroom.
* The older 2 kids waking up at night. Most nights one or the other is awake at least once, which is a bit much given that I'm already up to M twice at the moment. Also, they often wake her up. Arghhh!
* Sleep deprivation (me). Can't imagine why.
* J working insanely incredibly hard.
* Too much time wasted on computer (me).
* Not being able to get to the physio (hello, joint pain my old friend)
* Not being able to get any exercise (J leaves too early for me to go for a walk before he leaves and X is too heavy for me to push in the pram).

Ok there's more but I'll leave it there before I get too sorry for myself!

Rhyme time

At the moment Mr X is obsessed with rhymes. A recent conversation went something like this...

X: HEY MUM!!
Me: Yes X?
X: Curtain rhymes with burtain!
Me: Oh wow, you're right, who would have thought?
X: And airconditioner rhymes with bairconditioner!!

Hmmmm.

More cooking

Since Joanna's coeliac diagnosis I spend ALOT of time cooking. Bought gluten free food is hideously expensive (I'm talking about products that use gf flours, not the stuff that just happens to be gf) and not usually very nice.

In a typical week I now cook breakfast 4 or 5 mornings a week (only boiled eggs or pancakes - nothing too exciting!) and try to plan dinner to have enough left over to do lunch the next day. I go through cycles of being ok with all the extra work (extra when compared to my previous gluten consuming life) and cycles of feeling like I would rather gouge my own eyeballs out with a rusty fish hook than cook anything. ever. again.

I try to keep extreme fed-up-ed-ness away by trying new recipes fairly often. I find that I'm particularly keen to find good recipes to replace foods that Joanna might otherwise not get to have.

We had these burgers tonight with the bread rolls from this book (best gf bread recipe I've found, and boy have I tried a few!) and it was great, except that I'm pretty sure I'm not tolerating the xanthan gum in the bread recipe well. Arghh! The bread still tastes good without it, but doesn't have much spring to it. Looks like we'll have to put up with that though.

I've also cooked a few things from the Women's Weekly Gluten and Allergy free cookbook - the banana bread and the pizza scrolls are really great.

I'm always on the lookout for new things to try - does anyone know of anything that's worth a go?

Dizzy

I did a somersault this morning for the first time in I don't know how many years. I think it will take me awhile to recover. Better call the Australian Gymnastics squad and let them know I won't be taking up that position after all.

An epiphany

Having a three year old boy is almost exactly like having a pet. A cute, lovable, insane, incredibly naughty pet. I'm hoping he morphs into a real person sometime in the next few years.

5 things I like about text messages

1. You don't need to have a good reason to text someone
2. You can contact someone without having a long conversation
3. They're portable (provided you remember to charge your battery!)
4. You can stay in touch with people who don't feel like having phone coversations (eg overdue pregnant friends.... I know I didn't answer the phone for days at a time when I was overdue!)
5. You can get away with terrible spelling

Want to add anything?

Three months!!

The newest member of our family is three months old today (unless you count the cockroaches, dust mites etc - which are sort of family members in that they live in our house and eat our food - which are probably less than 3 months old) and being the bad bad blogger that I am I haven't even posted about her yet.

She is the most gorgeous and lovely baby... no, I'm not biased, she really is! She's cuddly and smiley and happy (or maybe it's that the general cacophony around here drowns out her crying so I don't notice it) and generally good fun to have around. Mind you she doesn't have much to complain about - her older brother and sister make it their life mission to keep her happy and entertained.

She's just learned to grab things (usually with a look of great surprise on her face that there is SOMETHING IN HER HAND!) and loves lying under her toy frame or in the bouncer, swatting at the toys. She's quite happy to do this for a long long time - I'm hoping this is because of her placid nature, not just because she has the memory of a goldfish and doesn't realise she should actually be incredibly bored. She adores the baby in the mirror and reserves her best smiles and squeals for her. I'm sure she thinks she can talk - she will have quite a prolonged conversation with anyone who's up for it (esp the baby in the mirror) and actually says "goo" which I think is funny!

Oh yes and she has a name - Miriam Susanna, which I like (obviously) although I have had some strange reactions from other people (including a long story about someone's horrified reaction when someobody else called their daughter Miriam - not sure quite what they expected me to say!!). What else? She is a giant baby (7kg exactly at 12 weeks) and has a very pointy head which I'm sure is because she needs the extra brain space.

Ok enough blathering on, here are some pics. I'm currently between computers with regards to pics, so these will all be recentish ones. Maybe I'll post some newborny ones later.

Smiley

Struggling to lift her massive cheeks

Something useful...

Well I thought I'd break my blog drought with something really worth reading, maybe some pictures of the new baby, or thoughts about JoJo starting school or some other big event.

Not going to happen though sorry, because today I'm excited because I have finally realised one of my unfulfilled dreams. I finally remembered to search the net for useful things to do with dryer lint, and it turns out there are quite a few things you can do with the stuff... make play clay, make fire starters (bound to come in handy for all those fires I love to start), stuff draught stoppers, add to compost, line pot plant containers, the list is endless. Actually I'm pretty sure that is the end of the list.

Who knows? Maybe I'll do some of them. I lead an exciting life and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.