One lump or two?

  

I have a little boy who loves all things domestic. Sweeping, vaccume,mopping, cooking, and of course tea parties. Now I know a lot kids go through the stage of they love to cook but I'm not sure if it wasn't for living in a country that consumes as much tea as we do if he would be so inclined to play tea party as much as he does. I love that my little man enjoys a cup of tea before bed, knows that you need to serve tea with a spoon and sugar bowl and  bit of milk. This tea set is at his Nan's house and he knows right where it is. He brings out the tea set turns on the little kettle and then serves his tea. Gets everyone a cup them beings around the milk and sugar. And of course you have to do cheers before you can drink. And you must hold the cup by the handle. We get in lots of trouble if we do t use the handle. He's growing up quickly and won't always want to play tea party with his mum. So for as long as it last we will play tea party, and I will do as he says. Besides who could so no to a cup of tea made by this guy?

  

One of those days

Have you had those days where you wake up thinking today is going to be a good today. Today will bring change and will be a turning point in the way I do all things life related. Today was my day. I woke up made a healthy juice had plans to do the millions of loads of laundry I had to do and many many more productive things. Then  plans changed. I needed to take my husband to work, so I I decided to stay to use the Internet to update all my app. Then I got sidetracked talking to a friend from home and stayed way longer than I meant to but it was worth it. I quickly ran to the shops to get a few things then headed home whipped up a juice and got my little man to sleep.  Husband came home for lunch so still no work done for me. Which is ok my day wasn't to bad but then all of a sudden it got worse. Not horrible not life treating or anything just one of those times when nothing goes right. First I drop an entire bottle of vinegar we had only used a tiny bit of. glass and vinegar all over my floor. And of course my little man was in the kitchen but luckily up on the stool.  We have friends headed up and there's glass and vinegar all over my kitchen.i quickly get it cleaned up and open the windows. My son is still desperate for his popcorn snack which is what I was trying to do when I decided I no longer needed that bottle of  vinegar so I whipped up a batch of popcorn...well ok I tried I have no idea what happend but I burnt the popcorn and Burnt the pan and used up all the oil. Ugh! So I tried a new batch with butter it sorta worked but made it a bit chewy and oh I burnt some of that batch and the pan as well. Play time went well friends went home daddy left for his gig and I decided we were going to have a fun night so we at my sons request whipped up pancakes.which by the way after I was cooking them I realized I forgot the salt. Oops

Yummy buttermilk goodness. 

And who can have a bad evening when this cute guy is your kitchen help?

They must have been tasty  because he goppled up almost three of these things! 

Our evening continued to be great. Put on pjs and my son insisted to go outside.so having already decided  this would be a fun evening we headed to our park to play for a bit. I even pulled out my camera and took some fun shots of my little man doing some big kid things like climbing the rock wall all by himself! He's getting so big! Well off to bed an here's to hoping a few more things go my way tomorrow.

A little upcyle fun

I learned to sew at about age five. My grandmother insisted I hand sew a quilt. Well let's just say it's still in the box with maybe a third of the quilt sewn. I was five and left handed and she's right handed so it was hard to do. I made my first real quilt at about 7 or 8 maybe,it was a summer project. I took sewing In  high school made a few stuffed animals and a skirt that started out as ankle length but due to my extreme lack of cutting  skills ended up a bit shorter. Oops. I've enjoyed this ability I have from time to time but I like to go fast. I like quick easy to do projects.i have a two year old and I don't have a sewing machine of my own so when I get a chance to sew it's either with a few kids running around or I only get free time after bed time so not a lot of time. The other problem is money. It's expensive to start a project from scratch. Getting fabric and thread and whatever else you might need its tough. I miss my mums amazing sewing room that has basically everything you may never need in it. I'd say my skill level is average I'm confident with a pattern but I don't to much free hand experimenting. This is what I love about upcycling. You already have the fabric and a lot of the other pieces like buttons can come from just about any where. Well the other night I had some free time and the desire to do a project. So I headed over to my  best mates  and partner in crimes house. Armed with a few old sweaters and t-shirts hoping her creative juices would be flowing a bit and we could come up with something. I of course wanted to make something for my little boy and since we are headed to North America we decided to make some little leggings out of my husbands old sweaters. So we used the google and found some various tutorials and had a go. It was a slow start and we had to change the pattern a bit but it was easy and fast. Two pairs of pants in just under two hours isn't bad for two sleep deprived mummy's. They aren't perfect but I love them.

Here is pair number one. This used to be a dark green sweater I think we got from an op shop for a few dollars. The sleeves are his legs. The sleeves were quite baggy so we had to trim them down to make them more like tights than sweat pants.

 

 

Pair number two was one of my husbands favorite sweaters that ended up in the washer or dryer and shrunk. Not sure why we kept them around but sure glad we did. This was the first pair we cut, well I cut and remember me talking about my once long skirt that's now a mini skirt....well yeah I shouldn't ever be able to cut again. But they will last for the North American winter. Then they can be passed on to my little guys mini me. Such an easy and fun project. And great for boys and girls! These will be perfect for our Aussie winters with no heat in our house! Thanks best mate for all your help.shes currently working on romber suites made out of old t-shirts for my little man. Can't wait till they are finished.

Our latest project

This weekend we got a little creative in our house. We made our little guy a school shelf. We got given the shelf from our cousin friends and i was inspired. Now yes he's only 2 we aren't starting anything formal yet. We still aren't really sure what we are going to do for him for school quiet yet, and beside he's only 2 we have awhile. If we stay here In AUS paying for school is very expensive until we are residents and home schooling scares me a bit for my only child. I'm afraid he will get bored just me and him learning our ABC and shapes. And honestly I'm a little nervous about being his teacher. But I've been reading an awesome blog that has got me excited for him to start learning so we started a little school shelf. It's mostly contains Montessori style school activities right now but he loves it. We have the shelf in our room so it's  contents don't get completely trashed and there is some supervision, but he has access pretty much whenever he wants. It's amazing to see how fast he's " getting it." We have a little sheet of paper with 5 different colour squares and then a bunch of matching squares in a jar. When he first saw the jar he dumped out all the squares and Immediately started to match all the colours together.his favourite is the Popsicle sticks. We have a few cards with pictures of Popsicle sticks making different shapes and patterns. The idea is to use the Popsicle sticks in the jar to make the matching picture. It's a bit tough for him but today he did his first pattern all by himself. I was definitely  a proud mama. It's just nice for me to see him enjoying learning. I think we have a hands on learner like his mama! Still not sure how and when we are going to start any formal learning for now we are just having fun. Here's a few pictures of our little man enjoying his new shelf

The shelf all put together. I made the chalk board with chalk board paper and a small canvas so it can be taken anywhere. The baskets on the bottom were a gift from a friend who got them in china. They work perfect for his little hands.

The matching game. ( excuse the very miss shaped squares) 

Cleaning up after he's all done with the Popsicle game.

I do declare a day of rest

This week hasn't been overly busy or wild but it's been full and we've all felt it. We've had a great week playing with new friends. Walks to the library in the warm sunshine and crazy wind. Friends coming over to play and finally Christmas in October. Our little family is headed to North America over the holiday season so we decided to have an early Christmas with our Aussie family. It was everything Christmas should be, a baked dinner with pork cracklings and cauliflower with cheese sauce. A delicious dessert that may not have won awards for looks but  sure tasted amazing! A few fun gifts, a warm evening and most of all amazing friends. We are definitely blessed to have friends who lean more in to the family category  than just friends,when all those we share DNA with live on the other side of the world. The one thing Christmas did have that we could have done with out was an emotional little boy. It started with a scraped knee on the way in and ended with acting as if we were killing him every time we tried to give him some food. So last night I declared today would be a quiet day of rest. No friends over, no going anywhere just lots of snuggles and doing nothing. We did make some oat bars and jack did a great job putting in the ingredients and stirring. I think this recipe needs a bit more honey but they will still get eaten.  We also managed some outside time and 4 loads of laundry! This was a record laundry day!  But for the most part lots of napping, snuggles and rest. Jacks been unusually snugly and quiet today. I hope he's just enjoying our rest day and not getting sick.  Enjoy your Friday everyone we sure are!

The little boy who could sleep anywhere.

So my little guy has never be an amazing sleeper,but he wasn't a bad sleeper he just sleept. Any where and everywhere. As an infant he loved to sleep on us, or on his swing, or on his tummy. As he's gotten older not much has changed. Airplane seat, tuk tuk rides, on our laps, watching tv, eating,  while he was getting changed, and numerous other random places. Now he's never been a kid who would just lay down and go to sleep. These crazy sleeping places have all been after hours of not sleeping he's great at go go go. now where he got this crazy sleep ability I don't know, definitely not from his mumma. I have to go to bed 30 minutes before my husband just so I can get to sleep before he comes in and makes all kinds of strange noises. I have a very strict routine I have to do in order to go to sleep and if I wake up at anytime in the night I'm up, for hours! It's the worst thing ever, but not my little guy. He sleeps pretty solid as long as he's snuggled up close to us. Or sometimes with his face right on top of mine. He's not the worlds greatest sleeper but he's our little sleeper and he sure gives us some pretty good smiles. Today he fell asleep eating his lunch with a sandwich in his hand and after a good little cat nap he woke up and promptly started to finish eating the sandwich in his hand. So I leave you tonight with some of my favourite sleeping pictures. Sweet dreams everyone.

The broken boy and his mystery leg

So today marks a week and a half of jack having two hairline fractures in his tibia,so today we headed in to the fracture clinic for an x-ray and a check up. I was guessing they would have to put on a new cast since my silly broken boy has been running in his cast! Yep that's right running! and jumping and all around just not realising he was broken. So in we went from one long line to another. Headed to x-ray where he did amazing! Only a few tears And he even smiled for the camera! Then back to the clinic for a check up with the dr. We had the nicest dr. And she gave us some interesting news. It's not broken! Huh? I'm fact she doesn't think it was ever fractured! Oh my! So we take of his cast which he was only Slightly upset about and do a check up. The dr. Said it looked great, she felt around jack showed no signs of pain so now the test to walk on it. As soon as I put him down he was screaming and crying owie and refused to try. So we waited a few minutes and finally got him to take one step where he promptly  collapsed. After almost 2 weeks with a cast and possibly no actual fracture he's still not weight bearing. The dr. Being very confused when and checked with her boss. They agreed something's wrong but they don't know what. She has never seen a kid react like that to walking so back she headed to chat with her boss. They decided to put the cast back on and wait 2 more weeks. They are thinking he has possibly damaged his growth plate? But to test that they have to do a CT and they try not to with kids.  She threw around a few possible things with big words that I have no idea what she is talking about. But overall they are just going to wait. So jack now has a new purple cast ( his choice) and his only instructions are to walk and play as much as possible on it, should be no problem for him! We aren't sure what's going on but would appreciate all the prayers we can get for him. Hoping its just a fracture that no one can agree on. 

X-rays and plaster.

So a few days ago my son slipped on a child's toy fry pan and slipped on our tile floor. He started screaming like I've never heard before. Nothing was calming the poor guy down so after some advice from the nurse helpline off we went to the ER. We got settled quickly in to the paediatric ER unit and they gave him some  panedol with codeine to help with the pain and sent him off to play with toys to see if we could get him side tracked playing and see if we could get him to walk on it. He was having nothing to do with our tricks. He sat and played and yelled to us when he wanted up or the ball had rolled away. It was very strange to see our very active boy just sitting playing, Or watching movies. After two rounds of X-rays of his hip, knee, and ankle. They found nothing and sent us home and told us to come back if things got worse and told us to follow up with a GP in a few days. The next day he wouldn't  even try to put any weight on it. I had decided to give it that day and if by the next it wasn't better we would head back. Well that night we got a call from his ER doctor who said it looked like they might have found a small hairline fracture and asked if we could come back in in the morning. So we did we had another set of X-rays and guess what they found. Two small hairline fractures to his tibia, which explains why he was in so much pain! My poor little man. So we got a nice little plaster cast that goes from his toes to his mid thigh. And the best part is we get it for six months. I feel so bad for my little boy who's stuck on the couch all day. He gets confused when he wakes up and he can't move his leg. But there's some up sides. One it's spring here so it's warm enough to wear shorts, my house will stay cleaner with out my little man tearing the place up. It looks like we have a long six weeks of colouring, painting, and DVDs ahead of us. I might need to Invest in more kids movies. I'm very thankful for all the friends willing to help and be there as our family lives very far away during a bit of a crazy moment.

 

Super heroes don't need six packs and capes

On a crazy hot day in  Thailand I was hiding out In my air conditioning and wasting time by looking on face book and I saw a picture on a blog that a friend liked, it was a picture of a sweet boy laying in a hospital room in his mothers arms. I clicked on the blog and read about this little boy but before I new the end I had to know the beginning. In a few short simple sentences this little boy had captured my heart. I found his mothers blog and went to the start and I read, I read every blog, looked at every picture and watched every video.  I watched as this little boy preformed miracles day after day. My son clapped as he watched this little boy take his first steps and laughed as he laughed and danced with his mum. It was a little strange reading a story that i already new the tragic ending and I was surprised how much my heart was involved in a family I will never meet and a little boy I will never know. 

This little guys name is Gavin,he has an amazing story which I will try and share a bit even though I'm sure i won't do it justice and I hope I can get it all correct. This little guy had the odds stacked against him since birth but if you looked in his eyes you could tell that didn't matter for him. He had amazing patience with life taking things as they came and all on his own time. He was told he wouldn't walk, or talk, or even feed himself. Well he proved most of that to be wrong, and I'm positive if he had more time,he would of proved it all wrong. His millstones looked very different from his little brothers or my sons but that didn't matter he did it all on his,own time. As I started to read this little boys story it caused me to look inwards. This  little boy of 5 was challenging this old lady. He challenged me to slow down and look at what is important in life and not to worry so much about time. The world tells us we should be doing certain things by certain times. Our milestones never seem to stop. When we are little it's rolling over and walking. Then it's tying shoes and reading, pretty soon it's being married and having kids at certain times. It's a lot of pressure for all of us. We all feel we don't measure up but Gavin didn't care about measuring up. I live a life where a lot of people think I'm behind on my milestones. People think we should grow up and get new jobs. But thanks to gavin I feel like that no longer matters. Gavin spent his whole life  persevering trying and pushing himself. How many times have I just given up? It's to hard? I'm to tired? And about a million stupid excuses to not do about a million things in life. But as I watched this little guy try time after time to do things like hold a spoon on his own, touch a screen for he wants,climb stairs, and walk, things we all take for granted I realised its time to stop giving up on who I want to be in life. So who cares if its hard or if it hurts when I fall down a few million times bruises heal get up and try again.  Gavin shared a love and a fullness to life most people wish they had even an ounce of. I'm sad and sorry ill never get to meet this amazing little boy and I hope I can teach my son these lessons from Gavin. I pray his family continues with his love for life even in the midst of all there pain and sorrow. Gavin taught me and thousands like me to be a superhero you don't need big muscles, a fancy suit,  or the ability to fly.  All you need is to try and to never stop trying.This little boy is no longer with us on earth but he is still teaching us all how to fly like superheroes. To Kate and her whole family thank you for sharing your little super hero.

Social media and why it causes me to be less social.

I have a lot on my heart and mind tonight. We live in a tough world. There's a lot of big controversial stuff out there and thanks to the Internet and social media its all in our face. We have become a generation that freely and openly slings hate at each other and calls it our opinion and uses that to justify it. We make fun of each other via YouTube and twitter and say its ok because they put it up there. We are seeing a generation of kids who put all there self worth in how many likes they have on a picture and judge there beauty on comments received. We allow our selves to judge each other based on a snippet of ones lives we see. As a mum this is easily done. I see the other mums in all there Pinterest birthday parties and homemade laundry soaps and I get down on my self, I see friends on family Holidays and I get jealous and angry.  These things cause me to second  guess who I am and hide away, when in reality that glimpse of a perfect child is simply that a glimpse. We all have those perfect moments where our kids are quiet and cute, or playing nicely with their siblings, or doing the darnedest  things for the whole world, but it's the moment after we never see. The moment when the little sister pulls the hair, or the child throws that toy one second after we snap the picture. Those are the moments are lives are made up of that we never allow the world to see but the ones people really need to. I have a friend who is the mum of 5 amazing, crazy, gorgeous, funny, and very real kids. She is always posting the funny, awkward, and not so perfect things they do. You see photos of the smiles the hugs and the tantrums. And I love it! Why because she is real with real children and she embraces all the crazy! She shows true love to her kids and that love spills out into her everyday life. I want to be  her, well minus the 5 kids but I want to be that real and ok with it. Social media is handy for our family. We live on the other side of the world from many friends and family so thanks to blogs, and FB and such they have been able to watch my son grow up. But I have a hate side to social media, like I said before Its brings  out an ugly  side to most of us. It's allowed us to all stand up on our soapboxes and scream at one another with out having to really listen to each other. It's become a place where are publicly abused for our ideas and beliefs if you are brave enough to state them. Honestly I would love to say what I'm always feeling and thinking about where I see other people have it slightly or very wrong but that would make me no better than them.  Your not going to agree with everything everyone says and your not always right in what you think you know. we have based to much on glimpses. glimpes from the media, FB, Youtube, And twitter but none of that is the whole story. This is where love comes in, get to know people out side of social media, hear each others stories, stop judging on what you see it's not the whole story. Sit with peopel of different, cultures, beleifs snd religions, find out what they are really about. And just because some one uses different words or calls something by an unfamiliar  name doesn't mean it's not what you know, love, or believe in. I'm not perfect, my families not,perfect, we don't get it right with each other, our son, our friends, or our neighbours. I judge, I put people in boxes but I'm trying. I'm trying to ask more questions before I form an opinion. And my opinions are never written in stone. You never know when someone just might change your mind. So my friends be real with each other don't be afraid to be social with those you don't understand. And don't forget to be confidant in who you are. Don't hide because you do things differently,  Thats what makes this world amazing,. if we allow or selves to get out of our hiding places and sit with others you never know who you might encourage because they do things a bit different as well, or who might encourage you. 

The small stuff can make you sweat

I have a crazy but cute 23 months old. He spends his days exploring his surroundings by dumping every toy, block, wash cloth, and anything else he can get his hands on all over the floor. This isn't a malicious act its just him exploring figuring things out and just being a boy. Now to some this could get really annoying and trust me it does, but I decided when I  became a  mum to not sweat the small stuff. He isn't hurting any one or anything. He has his own room that most of this happens in so if people drop by we can always just shut the door. Don't get me wrong he has to clean up, well help as much as he can, but for me it's about what really matters. Does it really matter he prefers to dump his blocks all over the floor  and then put them in bags or tea cups and bring them to me to buy or eat? Nope not really. Or that his face washers or probably never actually clean due to the fact that they are mostly on the floor. Nah they are usually just used for his boogers. Now don't hear this and think I'm the most laid back non stressed mum ever cause trust me when you are folding laundry and he's unfolding it with his sticky fruit snack hands it gets a bit annoying. But those are the moments I try my best to clean off his hands and give him his own pile of laundry to fold well to more or less ball up and throw on top of my neat piles. My crazy little blonde haired boy loves to be by my side. He really just wants to help and learn. He loves doing anything I do. To bad he's not a little more coordinated with a broom.  There are defiantly days when the little things, the constant messes and cleaning up and constant string of words that nobody can understand gets to me. But I'm trying. Aren't we all to let loose and have fun with our kids. Give them memories of being allowed to be seen and heard and to be who they are. So if that means I have to cheers a hundred cups of tea, or step on a few pointy blocks then that's what I will do. Today I moved his little table out to our tiled living space and we played with different textures from our kitchen cupboards. First we smeared flour all over and drew shapes and our names. Well ok I drew his name and he drew well who knows. Then it was the grainy texture of corn meal. I don't think he was a fan of that one because it instantly got piled up in to the little holes he uses as cup holders in the table. Then came the oats which surprisingly didn't go straight into his mouth. Halfway through this adventure he went into the kitchen and brought out the whisk to help with his master piece. By the end we had flour on us, the floor, the coffee table, and some innocent utensils in the drawers. He loved it, we loved it, and after a few minutes of clean up the house was normal again. So this is me trying to not get all hot and sweaty over the small stuff. I'm not perfect but I'm trying.

My little piano man

My son has loved music and everything that goes with it since the day he was born. He entered this world as U2 was singing about how it was a beautiful day, and it in deed was a beautiful day.at 2 weeks old he would sit and stare as opa played the keyboard and sang some song about a fly and a tree and some old lady. At 4 months old he sat behind a guitar with his dad and with his little fingers loved to try and strum. Now don't get me wrong I by no means think I have a musical geniuses.  But I defiantly have a little boy that loves music. He has his favourite songs and he loves to start singing the night night song to himself when he's ready for a nap. Which is a handy clue to me that he's sleepy. He picks up on the hand motions even when I'm pretty sure no one really taught him. Now all of this I've know since forever, and I've always known its from his daddy. Some days it seems like that's all he got from his daddy. I'm reminded everyday in his looks, mannerisms,and especially attitude that he's my little male mini me. But today I discovered something he else he gets from his daddy, his love to preform. Now we've seen him form boy bands with his cousin friend, and a microphone always calms him down, but today I saw a different side to him. We were in our local little big city with some friends and there were several decorated pianos placed around the mall area to promote our  regions annual music festival ,and even with heaps of people walking by and starring all he wanted to do was play. He stood next to his daddy and danced and played along to benny and the jets on the first piano we found. And then not even the play area could keep away from piano number two. By the time we found the third one he wanted to play all on his own. He was so cute but I defiantly think its time for some lessons. Like I said I definitely don't have a musical genius on my hands. But I also know he didn't get this boldness from his mama who would hide behind her daddy's legs well into her teens when she met new people.  All I can say is I hope he looses a little of my stubbornness and gains more of his daddy's confidence. 

I'm 30 and I know it

So this past Sunday I turned 30. I didn't melt or go have a midlife crisis, I don't feel like my life has ended nor did I sit around making a list of all the things I want to do in my next 30 years. I spent my weekend with the people I'm closest to here in Australia. I spent my saturday celebrating the first year of a beautiful little girl who I get to share my birthday with. I had dinner with friends who have become my family. And I celebrated my little cousins birthday. ( I'm 4 days older than him) I spent my first week at being 30 helping my friends and work mates get to their next adventure. Not much has changed from bring 29 to 30. But I do love saying I'm 30. I'm not sure why. I didn't suddenly become any more wise and amazing than I already was.

My 20's we're a decade of change. I left my home town and totally changed my career path. I traveled to more countries than I ever thought. I made heaps of new friends who are labeled family. I got married, changed countries, added a new member to our family and even changed my hair. It was an amazing 10 years packed with so much I can't really believe it.

If asked what my 30's will look like whoa man I can't even imagine. I hope they are a little slower going than my 20's I'm getting to old to move that fast. But I sure hope it includes adding more friends from all over the world. I would like to show my son the world instead of just showing him pictures from a book. I hope to learn to love more and give of my self more. To continue to believe in who I am and always rise to a challenge and fight for what I believe in. I hope my voice becomes louder and stronger with out having to say a word.

Thank you to all who helped me usher in this new decade!

Lessons I've learned in the last week

So this week had been one of the craziest and busiest weeks I've had in a very long time. I volunteered for the job as visa gopher for our office as we are preparing for a trip to S.E. Asia for 19 people. At the start of this adventure I thought I would take a train up to the consulate and then wait to days and go up again. I was wrong, very wrong. It ended up taking me 4 days, 16 train hours and lots of patients to get the job done. But as I look back on this fun but slightly stressful time I see I have learned what could be very useful life lessons.

#1 the train ride is long and deodorant is optional for some so breathe out of your mouth.

#2 even though the consulate tells you one thing always bring extra copies of EVERYTHING!!

#3 eating while walking may save time but it just makes you tired and sick feeling

#4 no matter how hot, a large bubble tea is never needed

#5 any bag carrying that much money,papers, and passports in the summer heat is going to be hot so just pick the one that makes you look less like a tourist and more like you belong in the business district.

#6 there are never public restrooms when you need them so just act like you know what you are doing and walk in to any place of business or conservatory and act like you belong.

#7 make friends with the security guard, you never know when you need them to print out papers for you.

#8 children are only going to be sick right before you leave so never dress in what you really want to wear. Wait till after you leave then change on the train.

#9 it takes less than 16 hours to read 400 pages, buy 2 good books.

#10 never volunteer for the visa run again
( joking I've really enjoyed my adventure)