No Joke

Monkey read a 208 page joke book today, each double page spread had around 10 jokes on it. I'm his mother and his teacher and I am shocked by this... which I kind of feel bad about, you'd think I would know he could do this stuff.

He sounded out "Archeologist" and then struggled with a word further on and realised that because it was about an archeologist then the word must be tomb. Giraffe was the only one that really got him so stuck I had to help. Not bad for my little year one boy.

I was amazed, astounded, astonished. He even gave up some of his coveted internet time (where they get a bit of time on the weekend to watch their favourite you tubers play minecraft) to read.

But all of that aside... I'm not doing the maths right now but the number of mindless little kid jokes I heard today is somewhere between "That's a crazy lot of jokes" and "that's cruel and unusual punishment".

I'd burn that book tonight while he sleeps... except he's tucked it under his pillow.

No joke.

We've got the look

A week ago our homeschool group was planning a clean up day in one of the local parks. We were going to take rubbish bags and gloves and go and tidy they place up a bit. Unfortunately it was scheduled for what was supposed to be one of the hottest days of the year with an extreme UV warning...

9am:
Mummy McT: "The park activity has been cancelled because it's too dangerous to have all the kids out in the sun cleaning up the park."
Boys: "Awww, it's okay, we would just drink lots of water and we'd be fine"

10am:
Mummy McT: "Time to hang out the washing, boys"
Boys: "But mum, it's too dangerous to be outside doing stuff like that because it's so hot"
Mummy McT: *stares them in the eyes* "drink some water"

They know the Mummy Stare... unfortunately some of them have adopted it into their own repertoire of smart-a**ery and can deliver a killer comeback with a deadpan face and eyes locked on their target.

I'm sure it was passed on by genetics and is not a learned behaviour... nope, that one just couldn't be helped... now lets just pray they use it for good and not evil.

Monkey knows the power of a well timed look

"I don't like writing"

Monkey resists writing as much as possible. The funny thing is he so often writes in his own time. He's actually really enjoying having a way to express himself and it helps us to understand his emotions instead of just having a meltdown.

I'm wondering if these are admissible as writing examples to submit with our homeschooling report...

"Never believe your parents"

"Do not disturb me"

I wish I could remember what I did to deserve these beautifully written signs getting placed around my house... probably something horrible like asking him to do a little more writing for his school work.  But I can't remember, we had our cuddles, we did some exercises to let his body download the drama and we moved on.

Kids.

If you didn't laugh you'd cry.

All week it was nothing but pain to get even one sentence from him. Then, at 3:30 on Friday afternoon, he decided to write a book. Yes, a book. Just in case you weren't sure the definition of a book is "lots and lots of sentences one after the other" I had to double check with him that we both had the same definition because I honestly couldn't believe it.

I don't know if I should cheer, cry, or tear my hair out.  Maybe I should just write about it.

A Fresher Start

When we started homeschooling I figured that was a fresh start for us. Then on our 1 year anniversary we un-enrolled from the Distance Ed school we were with and started going it alone. In Qld you are supposed to register with the HEU (Home Education Unit) if you aren't using a DE school. Though the penalties for not doing so are minor, usually a reprimand with "register within this period and we won't do anything" and I'm not sure if that is even followed up on. We finished out term 3 carrying on roughly with the plan we were already working on with the DE school but with a few modifications. So now, in term 4, we are starting fresh again... so it's a fresher start or something like that.

I thought I might just throw in some links here for what we are getting up to this term. If nothing else it will help me when it comes to reporting time to look back at what I PLANNED to get done.

Our overall theme for this term is The Great Barrier Reef. Our homeschool group has 4 excursions planned to Reef HQ for specific educational tours. To go along with that I'm using some great resources from GBRMPA (which for those not in the know of reef associated acronyms is Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority). If you are interested in those you can find them here. They are awesome full unit plans that are geared towards science but there's plenty of other stuff in there.

I got these decorator test tube "vases" from Kmart.

They aren't suitable for anything too serious, but they'll work for us... until I buy a bunsen burner...

For Science we are trying out resources from Super Charged Science. I'm a bit excited about these. They are designed by an ex-NASA scientist and she "teaches" via video and there's workbooks that outline the materials you need and it's done with the intention that the homeschooling parent doesn't need to be involved if they don't want to... but I love science so I'll be getting right in there with the kiddos.

For Maths they are finishing off the workbooks that we were using with the DE school. They are standard books for their year levels so I know they are covering all the relevant topics. BUT there will be a whole lot of maths involved in Economics.

For Economics (which is technically only a subject that Lion "needs" to do for Year 5, but they are all doing it to whatever level they are capable) we are using SimCity BuildIt app. The kids started playing it and I started so I could answer Monkey's questions and check it was a safe game for them to be playing (I sacrifice so much for these kids)... but I quickly realised there's so much they are able to learn with this game. So much they are learning without even realising it and so much scope for me to use it to make learning what they need to know more fun!

Then comes PE, I don't really include it as an actual subject usually, I felt like we could for this term. Much of the PE curriculum is incorporated into day to day learning with homeschooling. They research sports the like, they borrow books from the library to find out rules, they learn about general health in day to day life and being involved in purposeful discussions about food choices etc. So why is it an actual subject for this term? Because we got this...

It's a slack line! If you don't know what a slack line is then it's kind of like tightrope walking on a ratchet strap. For now we just need to learn to balance and walk on it, so there will be no tricks, but if you look up some of the awesome videos on youtube you'll find people risking life and limb doing crazy crazy stuff on their strap.

Ours is staying low to the ground for now and we have to use a helper strap which is a bit tricky to find a height that works for all 3 of the boys... though I don't think Monkey will need it for long. That kid really is a little monkey!

For English they are still using Grammar books that we've been going on all year. Gum Drops Grammar, they are fantastic and we've found some new books that interest the boys through them. English is incorporated into various other subjects and I'm writing my own plan for that but we are also possibly participating in the young writers version of NaNoWriMo. I need to decide if I have the patience for that.

Now most of that is for the big two, Lion and Dragon. Monkey is just in Prep, the first year of school in Qld and it's still not actually compulsory just highly encouraged, so I'm just keeping him interested in learning anything at all at the moment while we work on the skills that are the foundation of his future learning, basic number and letter skills and he's started to really shoot ahead with his reading after a very rough start. I find it hard to not compare what he knows to kids in a mainstream classroom... then I remind myself that I actually think those kids are pushed too hard too soon so why would I compare my kid to them? I would love to see the younger years being much more focused on hands on learning, play based learning, fewer workbooks and more reading books. He rides along when he wants to on activities and projects his brothers are doing and he does love his Maths workbook and there are certain things that at some point he needs to learn... but when to push and when to hold myself back is probably something I'll never figure out.

So that's the plan for Term 4, 2015. I'll add more if I think of it. I'm not sure if this will be a regular feature, I guess it depends if I find it helpful to refer back to or not.

New Blog Header

Grannysaurus has been at me for AGES to update the header on the blog. Yes, the nearly two year old Butterfly wasn't even thought of yet didn't even feature in it. Yes, the nearly five year old was only five months old when the photos were taken. So FINALLY, now that I am trying to blog a bit more I decided that I would do my best to take/find photos of all four kids that could be used for a new header... because a photo of them all together is just not going to happen... ever. So, here it is.

Lion, 9yrs 3mths; Dragon, 7yrs 3mths; Monkey, 4yrs 9mths; Butterfly, 1yr 11mths.

Now I've got another 4 years before I need to do anything about updating this one... right?

The tape I used is by Hummie of Hummies World

Anzac Day 2014 *catch up*

*Catch up post* (yeah right, like I could ever catch up from how far behind I am)

Anzac day each year we go down to Anzac Park in the city at dusk for dinner and a wander around looking at the monuments and memorials (and a chance to get a few more photos of the kids). This year was no different except I had a most adorable little assistant who got me all excited for my future shoots by wanting to carry my tripod for me...

I'm thinking that I might need to do a little more training with my little assistant. Like maybe teaching her the difference between a tripod and a camera...

The boys all had their scooters to get around on but they were going too fast and weren't keen on having their photo taken. Thankfully Butterfly decided that she needed to let me get a photo of SOMEONE on a scooter. Lucky her Daddy isn't that hard to convince when she asks him to help her have a ride.

The fountain was *mostly* doing everything it was supposed to. All it's colours worked and most of the different squirty bits were squirting like they should. The kids were, as usual, fascinated with it, especially Butterfly. I think this is one of my favourite photos of the kids. Though the one I took shortly after this of Lion's silhouette coathangering Butterfly's silhouette as she tried to get away and climb down into the fountain is pretty good too.

Left to right, they are Butterfly, Lion, Dragon, Monkey.

Then, as Wolf was loading the kids into the car, I stood and waited for the lights and fountain to go through their changes for one last photo. As it finally changed to where I wanted it a group who had obviously been revealing since the pubs opened decided to jump in and try to photobomb it. Thankfully there was one soberish one who pulled the most insistent one away leaving me with just enough time to snap a couple of shots.

I'm totally not making excuses here, but....

Do you ever have those days where you wake up and immediately think "I've got this"?

"Today I will get the kitchen sparkling, I'll vacuum so the carpets won't be coated in tissues that the little one tore up a few days ago, I'll scrub the floor so it won't feel kind of... I don't know, kind of sticky but kind of gritty as well and theres another feel to them that defies explanation, also I might whip up a batch of healthy treats made with beetroot and flax seeds and my kids will totally think they are delicious and chocolate and be completely fooled and while that's baking I'll blog a bit of what we've been up to."

Then the little one starts hollering over the baby monitor "Muuuuuuuumy".

Next the 4 year old comes racing into the room dobbing at world record speeds with the brother he was dobbing on hurtling in at break neck speeds behind him explaining why it totally wasn't his fault that he smashed the 4 year old in the face with his foot and it was really all because...

Then someone starts asking for breakfast and then for me to find them paddle-pop sticks and masking tape.

They all follow right at my heels as I go get the littlest from her overnight prison and check for poop before I hug her (that girl has Houdini poop, it escapes that nappy like nobody's business).

At this point, I'm still thinking "I've got this"... but my list is more along the lines of "I will feed them a decent meal for dinner... in 12 hours... if I survive that long... if THEY survive that long... it'll be bedtime just after that, I can make it... it's only 12 hours..."

So, uh, not making excuses or anything... but we are all still alive here, and that's about where things are up to at the moment.

Here's a cute photo of the kids from the start of January.

Butterfly 18mos, Monkey 4, Dragon 7, Lion 9

We tried and tried to get them all to look in the same direction at the same time.

Butterfly did NOT want to conform... which is totally her little personality.

What goes on in my Monkey's head???

Driving home from playgroup today and I nearly had to pull over the car to console a panic stricken 3 year old (he's nearly 4, HELP!!!). He has a tiny pin prick sized sore on his foot and was sure that "Animals that eat meat will want to come and eat my leg because they will see my sore and think that it's meat!" He was particularly worried about the "zebras that are the really tall ones. Not the zebras with the stripes, the other ones (giraffes). Because they can reach their neck outside the cage and open it!" I was able to convince him that no giraffe was going to come and hunt him down and eat his leg.

So what's your greatest fear? I hope it's not escaped flesh eating zebra-giraffes!

Butterfly at 8 Months Old

I am now 8 months old (back on the 4th March). I love to do my own thing exploring all the stuff I am not supposed to get into. My teeth are so very close but STILL not getting through. I can crawl pretty fast now, and I pull myself up on EVERYTHING. I like to be the centre of attention and if I think you should be looking at me and you aren't then I will let you know!

"Am I doing this right?"

She was tired and didn't feel like sitting up by herself and kept trying to lean back and get comfy. I didn't have my usual assistant (Dragon) and had to use Monkey... which didn't work out very well.

♥♥♥

I was trying to get a photo of the rose hair clip I had made her but she couldn't take those sweet eyes off me.
♥♥♥

"MY BLING!"

When she wasn't going to cooperate I gave her my necklace to try to distract her from climbing/falling off the seat. It worked, but I couldn't get her to keep it out of her mouth for more than a few seconds!

I love her chubby little hands.

You Give Me Fever...

Scarlet fever, not quite what the original artists had in mind when they wrote the song. Two weeks before school started back for the year we had the two big ones knocked out with Scarlet Fever. It was the first week of Wolf's holidays and we were quarantined. This was our big week, the week we had planned to do adventuring every day, maybe an overnight at the beach hut with a trip out to Mt Fox. To say I was upset was an understatement. I was cranky, frustrated, upset, annoyed... I'll stop short of pulling out my thesaurus.

This was our first chance since Butterfly was born where we had Wolf and the boys off school and work at the same time. I was sooooo looking forward to this, so were the kids. Wolf's usual lack of enthusiasm for anything that might be considered "social" or "adventure" was being ignored and we were going to go and make some fantastic memories and he was going to have fun once he was out there... I knew he was!

I may sound a little callous, my kids were kinda quite sick, after all. But they weren't acting it. Knowing that physically they were still up for all this stuff and within 24 hours of the antibiotics we were seeing improvements in their physical symptoms, but we were still on a 5 day quarantine and I would NEVER willingly put other people in danger. I knew that for my normally healthy kids with no other problems that scarlet fever is pretty much a non-event if caught quickly but for others it could easily be life threatening. There are so many other health issues that can cause dangerous complications so I was not going to break our quarantine, at home we stayed. Slowly but surely the state of the house and our moods went down hill.

One of our precious friends delivered us a meal one afternoon, along with it she brought some chocolates and treats for the kids and a book that made me cry and a gingerbread house kit! She had bought it on a whim when she saw it on sale post-Christmas and hoped that it would fill in some of our house-bound time. Well, wouldn't you know it, the boys reminded me I had completely forgotten that in our pre-Christmas craziness I had purchased a gingerbread house kit and it was still sitting somewhere in it's box. The weeks before Christmas were a little crazy... I cannot even remember why, I think the baby was sick, or I was... or someone was, we've had a lot of sickness lately.

So one afternoon we sat and we decorated. Lion and Dragon took one house and Monkey and I took the other. It was fantastic! I remember buying the house thinking "Boy, I'm going to regret this!" and "This is going to end in fights and arguments and this is such a mistake." DID NOT HAPPEN. Partly, I am sure, because we had two kits but mostly it was just good kid-friendly fun. So, without further prattling on, here are the photos...

Monkey turns into such a ham sometimes, it's rare for others to get to see it or for me to catch it on camera so I LOVE this photo. Monkey and I decorated this masterpiece.

These adorable boys melt my heart. They decorated this incredible masterpiece. I piped the loops on the roof shingles, they did the rest of the piping and decorating, I was amazed at how well they handled the piping bag and how they carefully selected each decoration using the box for inspiration then adding their own touches.

Monkeys and mine on the left, Lion and Dragon's on the right. 

This wall and roof section was all I was allowed to design, Monkey is quite the artistic director. From what I have heard from photographers he has a career in food styling ahead of him if he keeps his opinionated ways.

This was a gingerbread man. Monkey kept calling him his dude. "I am going to eat my dude first".

The boys were all better soon and we planned to move as many of our activities to the next week... but it poured down all week. Like flooding type rain, not the sort of thing you can brush off and go out anyway.  Oh well, we'll just do them all when it's cooler later in the year, I wasn't looking forward to the sweltering heat anyway. Lion did have a reoccurrence (or something similar) in the first week of school that required some stronger antibiotics to make sure we knocked it out but they are the picture of health now.

Reindeer and your eternal salvation...

So we know that they all know The Boar's Head Carol and Feliz Navidad around here but another tune that always gets some time in the spotlight as Christmas approaches is "Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer" (YouTube link here).  Today my little Monkey was singing it for me.  His version saw both Grandma and Grandad get taken out by the wayward Caribou.  His version also had an interesting ending for a 3 year old singing a Christmas song.

Grandma and Grandad got run over by a reindeeeeer

And they got kiiiiiiilled
But God gave them new bodieeeeeees in heaven
And new hands and new fingeeeeeers

Wolf was, of course, thankful that we will also be getting new hands and fingers to go with our new bodies when we get to heaven.  I was just thinking that it might be time to cash in that therapy fund for this kid.

This and that

Since the arrival off Baby Butterfly we have been a bit overwhelmed. Now there is a bit of a reprieve from the constant busy-mess of life and we are feeling a little more relaxed I thought I would share some photos of what we have been up too.

Mummy made a very colourful baptism cake for Butterfly, the boys thought it was very yummy.

The boys climbed a 'Mountain' with Daddy and still had energy to be silly.

Monkey has taken charge of his new baby sister and thinks he is her protector, but sometimes she needs protecting from him.

I took Monkey out for a treat the other day, he wanted ice cream, he did a good job of finishing his and half of Daddies. He was a champion because he pushed through the pain of 'ice cream headache' to complete his task of eating more ice cream than Daddy.

Monkey also discovered that he likes turkey, he liked the size of the drumstick and asked if there was any bigger drumsticks available. I said maybe an emu, but he didn't think he would like to try emu.  You can find a picture of an Emu drumstick here.  Yum.

Mummy complains because she doesn't get in the photos, so here is one of her and her baby girl.

Speaking of food, I went out shopping the other day and saw an good special. 2 for $4, however my favourite must be everyone else's favourite, can you guess which flavour?

And finally this one taken today. Butterfly the fairy.

Trying... very, very trying.

I may have flipped out at my children this morning.  No screaming (my head hurt too much to do that to myself) but I did use *that* voice.  You know the one.  Even if you aren't sure I bet your kids know it when you use it. Anyway, I threatened them with "No Wii. No Computer.  No Board games. No Asking to borrow the iPod... until you clean up this mess!"

The mess I indicated was an assortment of junk spewing forth from every corner of the room and my pet hate... their kids chairs that they had simply tipped over to get them out of their way rather than putting them back at their table.

They are still at the stage where a big cleaning job is too daunting and they can't do it without smaller instructions so I gave the big boys a job each to get started and asked Monkey to grab his brothers uniform off the floor (because you cannot stay in your clothes any longer than is absolutely necessary so you dump them on the floor) and put it in the bathroom.  He grabbed the shirt and wandered off towards the bathroom, I knew the door was closed and he couldn't open it but figured he'd do what his brothers do and just dump it outside the door.  A few seconds pass and I can hear sobbing coming from the other end of the house.  I go off to investigate and find Monkey sobbing to himself about the closed door and desperately trying to feed the shirt inch by inch through the gap under the door.

Of course, if he wants to finish a job properly then who am I to discourage that!  I opened that door and he put the shirt in the hamper and trundled off to find some more cleaning to do... until he got distracted.

Isn't he all grown up?  This is a shirt that Dragon picked out for his second birthday and wore it every chance he got, we had to FORCE him to pass it on to a friend once it was starting to get a bit risky trying to get it off at bath time.  Now it is Monkey's shirt.  He doesn't have the same attachment to it but I love seeing him in it.  He was being rather a comedian on the day this was taken... the phrase of the day for him was a giggled "I jus' jokin' you" accompanied by this funny face.

You can't put this on facebook

Okay, I'm pretty careful about remembering that not all my facebook friends have little kids and even fewer have such a male dominated family.  They may not want to know all the gross stuff that goes on in our house that although funny, is still poop related.  As such, some things just don't go on facebook... this one had to be shared.

Monkey is getting better at manipulating his big brothers to get his way.  He's learning from their cues what his appropriate response should be.  This afternoon he walked into the middle of their room and filled his nappy.  From the gagging/choking/gasping for air sounds his brothers were making I'd say it had a good odour to it.  Their crazy reaction made Monkey's day!  He'd walk towards them and their increased wailing and backing off would just encourage him to go and try it on the other one.  Their passionate plea of "go out to mama, pleeeeeeease" was just more than one little Monkey could handle.  All of a sudden I heard the door close and his little giggle as he trapped his brothers in their room while it steadily filled with the stench of a thousand rotting eggs.

I'm not sure if I should be proud of his masterminding or horrified that my two year old has figured out for himself the basic concept of playing Dutch Oven.

Excitement!

I just got an email saying that there is a super awesome parcel on it's way to me!  Do you want to know what the best bit for you is?  It's for a FANTASTIC GIVE AWAY!

But that's all I'm telling you right now.

So, what else has been going on around here in my bloggy quietness?  Lots.  That is partly to blame for the quietness.  It's been a busy two terms at school and last holidays we were so busy with endless invitations to here and there that we didn't get much of a break.  Now we are in our second week of these holidays and I am feeling refreshed and ready to face the final chaotic term of school.  I made a purposeful decision to stay home a lot these holidays.  As much as possible to do things that included all of the kids and to spend lots of time just being together.

But, leading up to the holidays we did have a little bit of fun...

Lion's school does a school concert every second year and in the other year the do something on a much smaller scale.  This year they presented a Food & Dance Fiesta!  Each year level presented a dance and there was all sorts of food for sale and the year levels all manned stalls selling different things.  The year ones all had to bring in cupcakes to be sold at their stall which was a raging success.  Lion's class danced to "boot scootin' baby".  I was thrilled when the classes came out in lines and Lion was right at the front down the end where I was standing (I had Monkey in the pram so I could only get to the ends).  Then they decided to do a re-shuffle for some reason... Lion ended up at the back, in the middle, behind some rather tall kids.  I got rare glances of him and managed to get a couple of photos that weren't real good but hey, we got a record of the event.  After the first time through they had to come and get a parent to dance with them.  Unfortunately with Monkey in the pram (against his wishes) and Wolf at work, I couldn't be the one to go and dance with him.  He had taught Dragon some of the moves so I encouraged (bribed with an extra cupcake) Dragon to go and dance with him.  You can imaging how much of that I saw with all the parents of the kids in the front two rows dancing in front of my tiny little boys.  Oh well, I was proud of both of them for getting up there... even if I couldn't see most of it.

We went down to The Strand Ephemera to check out some of the artwork on the day before Father's Day.  The kids had a ball but I was suffering with sinus headaches from a horrid sinus infection that just wont go away.  Some of the art was good... some was just really really poor.  These are two pieces that the kids particularly enjoyed.

Last week (1st week of school holidays) Wolf had the Tuesday off so we took of up the the beach hut for the day with Grannysaurus and Cheetah.  We played in the sand, swam in the ocean, boogy boarded, went to Frosty Mango (Aunty Chimera and Little Bear joined us for that)... we had a generally awesome time.  Not many photos were taken because the photographer was having too much fun!  Mum did grab a few on my camera while I was in the ocean though.

I was so proud of my kids... and Cheetah.  We'll start at the oldest...  Cheetah had never ridden a boogy board before and was struggling to catch a wave.  Even after I explained when to push off.  I had a thought... I don't use the top of the wave to tell when to jump, I use the feeling around my ankles of the water rushing back out to sea as well as the look of the wave...  As the next lot of "big" waves were starting to roll in I quickly explained how waves work and at which point in the waves life you need to push off and all of a sudden he was riding like a pro!

Lion was dumped wave after wave.  He saw a particularly big wave coming and got a gleam in his eye... He caught it and it took him two metres and dumped him.  HARD.  His little head popped up from under the water, he spat mouthfuls of sand and sea water out and looked at me.  I thought he might be about to cry... his little voice spoke up... "that. was. AWESOME".  He grabbed his hat, wrung the water out of it, put it back on his head and took of to find his next wave.

Dragon is usually a one wave boy.  He gets dumped once and that's it.  He's sitting in the shallows and wont try again.  He was dumped over and over and over and he just kept going back for more.

Monkey is also a stick to what he knows kinda kid.  Especially in the ocean.  He got out there and was riding the boards with no one holding on to him (much to mummy's horror), he was jumping waves and pretending to fall over... he had a blast!

So there's a little of what we have been up to.  There's still so much more to share... but not today.  I hope there are still people reading this little old blog... it'd be a shame if there was no one to win the fantastic prize I'll have to give away soon!

Happy Birthday Monkey

Waaaay back on August 31st Monkey celebrated his 2nd birthday.  It was a rather confusing day for all of us... not your run of the mill birthday.  Daddy had to leave for work at 6am so we decided to leave the normal morning stuff of presents and chaos until later when daddy was able to be there and we were all awake for it.  So our day started off with a school and kindy drop off like any other Wednesday then heading to the city for morning tea at one of our favourite cafes.

 They only had pink cupcakes, he didn't seem to mind

We love this cafe.  It's a lot bit out of our way and is a lot bit more expensive than other places but it has tables that the kids can draw on, a wonderful kids menu and toys and books and really good coffee.  That wasn't why we picked it though, Monkey's great Nanny had come for a visit and she was leaving later that day from the city train station and Aunty Chimera works just down the road so she could get an hour or so off work and join us.  So we had a special birthday morning tea with Great Nanny, Grannysaurus, Aunty Chimera, Aunty Juliette and our favourite Ladybug.

"It's just what I've always wanted"

Later that evening once everyone was home from work, school and kindy we FINALLY got to the presents!  Two small gifts that his brothers picked for him while we were on our camping trip in Winton (post to follow on that trip) and some more gifts and cards from family and friends and the gift to end all gifts... the Lego Duplo fire truck he has longed for and dreamed of for what seems like forever (to a two year old).

 CANDLES!!!

That evening we had a special birthday dinner.  His only request was that he had GRABY!  He has come to love gravy, it's amazing what he'll suddenly eat if it it's smothered in gravy.  So, with his only request being "GRABY!" (yes, it's always yelled, he loves it that much) I decided that a lovely lamb roast was in order... and a store bought cake since I was making cakes for his birthday party the following day.  So, decorated with only sprinkles and his little Muttaburrasaurus figurine he bought in Winton he had cake and candles... and he was beyond thrilled!

 "Who are these people and why are they in MY photo?"

We had a small gathering the following afternoon for his birthday.  His request was for "RAAAAA caycakes" which with my mummy interpretation skills I figured out was dinosaur cupcakes.  Still, our small gathering cleared up 45 dinosaur cupcakes!

"Mummy, someone has left footprints in my cupcakes"

It was a wonderful fun filled couple of days for my little two year old... as you can tell, he had fallen in love with dinosaurs after our dinosaur hunting adventure the weekend before his birthday.  Having a birthday 24 hours after returning from camping isn't ideal... but he had a blast and I'd do it again tomorrow for him if I had to.  I love little kid birthdays, they really do seem to be magical for them.

A few of his favourite things...

It's been a while... I am going to get back into this blog, I promise.  But it's going to be slow.  I just wanted to share this little one with you.

Lion often worries.  He worries about a lot of things.  One of his worries is that Monkey doesn't like him.  Why does Monkey always want to be with Dragon, why does Monkey cuddle Dragon and not Lion, why doesn't Monkey love his as much as he loves Dragon?  I can only try to reassure him... Monkey does love you, he loves you just as much as he loves Dragon.  He just knows how to show it better to Dragon.

Lion is in drawing mood this afternoon.  He's drawing us pictures of our favourite things.  We've all received a love note from him, a picture of our favourite planet, a picture of our favourite form of transport... all very special.  Wolf has his sitting beside him on the seat as he watches TV.  I've placed mine beside me here on the computer.  Dragon has put his on the fridge with a couple of magnets.  Monkey will not let his out of his hands. When he found he didn't have pockets to put them in I suggested he put them on the fridge like Dragon's.  He shook his little head and wandered off with them clasped in his little hands.  He's been outside playing with them still held tightly in this hand or that depending on what else he needed to hold, he's attacked Dragon with a broom while holding them, he held tightly to them as Dragon chased him with the broom in retaliation.  They are so precious.  A note saying "I ♥ you", a picture of Pluto and a picture of his trike... a few of his favourite things, drawn by one of his favourite people.

Random thoughts and a random winner...

My brain is a little random today.  So I am just going to dump it all out on here and hope that helps.  It also fits with the other need for this post... picking a random winner for the Walt Disney Studios Alice in Wonderland 60th Anniversary Special Edition giveaway... but I'm going to make you wait for that.

Monkey has FINALLY cut the missing tooth from his crooked little smile.  He has had 3 bottom teeth at the front for the last 6 months.  The fourth one just wouldn't come through.  FINALLY it has shown itself and is a sharp little fang, I think it may even be responsible for his cranky moods and upset nights of late.  Even if it's not, I'm going to blame it anyway because the other option is just that my child is a little feral.

I turned 30 last week.  I don't feel old but apparently I'm pretty much geriatric now.

I'm still getting pimples.  This is beyond a joke.  They were supposed to stop after puberty.  I guess officially this is still after puberty but I was kind of expecting something a little closer to the end of puberty, not still be going at 30.  I hate pimples.

I cleaned my lounge room at least 5 times over the weekend.  Is it any wonder I can't get the house clean if I have to keep re-cleaning the same rooms over and over and over?

Last night at 10pm I was scrubbing out the cupboards under the sink... I like to live on the wild side.  I spilt half a litre of milk under the dishwasher last week and I cleaned up the milk straight away but with the dishwasher pulled out I figured I'd better clean up all the other gunk that was collected under there.  So finally last night I got around to that and when we went to put the dishwasher back we realised that when Wolf pulled it out the spot where the drain hose connects to the drain under the sink had cracked and grotty drain water had been dripping under the sink all weekend... Thus, at 10pm I had just finished cleaning under the dishwasher when we conducted emergency repairs to the connection (the dishwasher was running before we realised so it was a race against the cycle) and then commenced pulling the cupboards apart and cleaning it all out.  Admit it, you are jealous of my exciting life.

I have made white sauce approximately 9349428490 times.  I know that you NEVER walk away from it, not even for 'just a second'.  It will, without fail, be that exact second that it starts to thicken and grab at the pot and because you aren't there to stir it you'll get a million lumps that you can't get rid of.  I KNOW THIS... yet I do it every time.  I walk away... I get lumps.  Oh well, no one complains... they know better than that.

There's still more random in my brain but this will do for now, I can't keep you waiting forever.

Now, the moment you've all been waiting for...  The winner of the Walt Disney Studios Alice in Wonderland 60th Anniversary Special Edition is comment number...

The third eligible comment belonged to...

Kym from mumma's Mini Mes

Congratulations Kym, if you can email me at MummyMcTavish@gmail.com and let me know your mailing address I will pass the details on so you can be sent your copy of Alice in Wonderland.  

For the rest of you, I'm sorry but you'll have to go out and buy your own copy... or hunt down one of the other competitions running to win it ☺

It really is a wonderful family movie and we will be enjoying it over and over and over again!

'sup?

This post has been sitting in my drafts to add some photos to and then post... I'm just going to post it, okay?  I'm glad you're going with me on this one, I'm trying to get posts up, they will never be perfect so just getting them published will have to be my goal, no more languishing in the drafts for months...

Things have been changing around here.  Wolf got a new (long prayed for) job.  Wolfs new job went from being contract to permanent.  Lion started a new year at school.  Dragon started a new year/class at kindy.  Monkey has grown up so very much.  Mummy has... done stuff... or something... I can't really remember, I am having enough trouble remember which classrooms my boys need to go to and dropping the right child at kindy and at school and making sure that at least one child comes home with me...

Anyway, part of Wolf's job now is weird shifts.  His old job meant that he was around in the mornings to help (a bit) with getting us off to school before he went to work.  He was then home about three quarters through the afternoon to help with dinner, bath and bedtime.  His new job has some shifts that I don't like very much.  I enjoy the perks of these shifts like starting at 7am means he's home at 3:30pm and we get lots more play time.  Starting at 2pm means we've had the morning to play and go for a coffee if we want to.  Unfortunately it also means that I get a little stressed in the mornings if he's got to head off early.  Or I flip out in the evenings if he's going to be home after bedtime.  The big boys are very light sleepers in the early hours so they wake up when Wolf is getting ready... at 5:30am.  Which means they wake their little brother about that time too... which means I am dealing with tired cranky kids from the start.  Getting tired cranky kids ready to leave the house is not fun.  But at times it does come with some entertainment.

One particular night we finished two separate boxes of tissues so the next morning beside the bin were the two empty boxes.  Monkey thought these were great and while Mummy was busy trying to convince Dragon that he really did need to wear clothes to kindy Monkey put them on his hands and went around the house banging them together to make as much noise as he could.

Lion always wears joggers to school, Monkey found his own joggers and decided that was what he wanted to wear today so I found him some socks and we put them on him, Dragon decided that since everybody else was doing it that he wanted to wear his joggers too.  The problem with that is he never puts his socks back in the wash.  Or one goes in the wash and the other disappears.  So I went hunting for two matching socks.  After a few minutes I called to him that I was having trouble finding two socks that matched and could he just wear his clogs today?  "No mum, I want two socks that are not the same as the other one"... well, that might also account for why none of the socks I can find match, they aren't even worn as a pair!  So, you can't get more mismatched than one blue sock pulled almost to his knee and one grey sock that comes about an inch above his ankle.  I didn't explain to his teachers at kindy what was going on, they see me drop him off twice a week, they probably figure that it's lucky we remembered to turn up each day... and that I don't accidentally leave the wrong child behind.

On the way to kindy there was a general cacophony in the car, I assumed it was coming from all three boys.  We stopped at the traffic lights and I glanced back and saw Monkey sitting in his seat, worn out look on his face, fingers in his ears.  I know just how he feels.  I thought I'd have a better listen to what was bringing on this reaction from him...

Dragon was burping "baa baa black sheep"... the whole song.
Lion was baaing (yes, like a sheep) the ABCs... all of it.

I wonder what effect this will have on my little Monkey, will he go for a "can't beat 'em, join 'em" approach?  Will he be "the quiet one"?  Will he raise his voice louder still to be heard above the din?  Who knows.


*Don't forget to check out my Walt Disney Studios Alice In Wonderland 60th Anniversary Edition giveaway here.  It ends this Sunday*

I'm the princess around here.

It's hard to teach the boys how to treat girls/ladies when they really only have mummy to practice on.  Mums are just different.  You'd spit some food you don't like into your mums hand but you'd never do that to any other girl.  It's fine for your mum to help you blow your nose but you are expected to turn away if you need to blow your nose in front of any other girl.  Your mum washes your undies, cleans your school lunch box, picks your pyjamas up off the floor... not much is held back for mum.  So, it's nice that we have a small but very special supply of other princesses to help in this training.

My brother's little Ladybird was dedicated to the Lord a few weeks ago.  She's such a special little darling.  It meant that the boys got to spend some precious time with her and practice their princess care.

Ladybird is one well cared for princess.  Lion would do anything for her... he just doesn't really want that advertised.  Boys aren't supposed to get all gushy over babies... or something like that.  Dragon would love nothing more than to teach her everything she needs to know in life, especially about accessorising... he loves to see her wearing jewelry.  Monkey is her loyal protector... though we're still kind of ironing out the kinks with that one.  Currently he seems to have gone to the Slobbery Dog school of princess protection.  He'll keep any unwanted advances (or indeed any wanted ones too) away from you but he may drool all over you and possibly even crush you in his attempts to keep you safe.

Now we just need to teach them not to bow to the every whim of these princesses... Even a princess needs to be told "get your own drink" occasionally.  But thankfully Ladybird is too little for that yet.

*Don't forget to check out my Walt Disney Studios Alice In Wonderland 60th Anniversary Edition giveaway here.  It ends this Sunday*