Ribbing

At the moment sebastian and Derek are taking turns to tease each other about one direction being the other respective persons favourite band. Seb was pretty pleased with himself when he found this at the shops. I would not concede to giving him money to buy it as a joke for Derek but I was cheap enough to take a picture. He loves a good gag that boy.


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Haircut #2

9.5 months old and enjoying his second haircut. Today he had just one curl. Right atop his head, like a dr Seuss character - a bit cute








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The aftermath

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The calm before the storm

This was before the tsunami of tiredness hit



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In the spotlight

At kindy Elliot gets a day devoted to him, he gets to take in books, toys anything he wants to talk about, photos and they do this information on him.



I hope you can make out that when he grows up he wants to be a ninja. It made me laugh that he doesn't like it when everyone is noisy! He's always hated loud noise.


He really enjoyed it being in the spot light. But it was all a bit much cause he came home and had one of those I'm so tired and strung out mega meltdowns that requires a parental cup of tea or stuff* drunk afterwards.

* A stuff drink is a whiskey from new zealand incase you were wondering written from here

More ridiculous origin propaganda

This is the nba at our local shops. Hard to make out but some staff member has written on the glass window in pink sharpie "qld queenslander" so so lame


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State of origin 2

Seb was allowed to stay up and watch the origin. He was so excited. It was really sweet to listen to him joining in the commentary of the game. The queenslanders in our family didn't even make it to the first try before they'd fallen asleep and were carried to bed.





Hopefully there will be many more shared football matches I. The couch - not too many before they both wont fit on the couch together. Our first qld boy was very sassy about being a qlder and winning the next day. How does he even know how to do that??
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At the park

We walked to the park in the late afternoon sunshine. A perfect winters day for a stroll(er)


A friend we met there captured this cheeky little moment

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School holidays 1 week down

It's the middle weekend of the school holidays and I'm feeling the end of holidays blues already. It seems to be rushing along like a flooded river at it peak and its going to be gone too quickly. This last week has been nice, no rushing about just an easier pace - Tristan is particularly enjoying having things on his schedule rather than beating to the rhythm of the school drum. We went to check out the newly refurbished library I'd heard rumours that they had opened a coffee shop there and was envisaging sipping a fw while leisurely thumbing thru my newly borrowed books. But what was actually there was a play cafe for the kids in the new kids section of the library. No lattes there unless you count all the breastfeeding mums. It was really nice I was quite pleased with this shot of the boys all playing at the Lego wall especially tiny little T trying to be a big boy - he was looking at the big boys like " it goes here right guys?" Cute
There is lots of reading to be done... I borrowed the boys a book called the cautionary tale about chocolate - lessons to be learned there friends, never wish for everything you touch to be turned into chocolate. -written from here

4 thrashings I mean games

Yesterday was a soccer gala day for sebastian. He played four games of soccer from 9-3. They lost every single game, I think 1 or 2 goals were scored but not by sebastian. Derek tells me he's got a monkey on his back, but I can't see it.


Here's the team looking gallant in defeat, Derek nipped to the office at lunchtime and made them all certificates with Messi on them saying teamwork and determination, he also had a bag of lollies to keep them going.
I think he still had a fun day, it was perfect weather, cool crisp, sunny 20 degrees.
I took the boys down the street for lunch and had the best chilli from the jerky shop. $7 for a huge mug of chilli mouth watering chunks of beef, kidney beans, sour cream and corn chips on the top, so so good.

- I wrote this somewhere

A line in the sand

Drawn with this pen.
I am tired, really tired, I am unreasonable, I am snappy and grumpy and impatient. The shrieking banshee within is never far from the surface.
I am being held hostage by a baby who doesn't sleep. So this week I am trying to get it a bit better. I'm asking for 5 hrs sleep in a row, I don't feel like, that is too much to ask, well apparently it is cause it's not happening no matter how nicely I ask. So.
We have started on a better regime, I am using a book called the no cry sleep solution that really helped with sebastian too who was far worse than Tristan.
Tristan is good at going to sleep its the staying asleep part he has trouble with.
I started a sleep log with him the other night to see what was actually going on- most nights are such a blur I have no idea what happened or how many times I'd been up. It turns out 5 times awake with 3hrs being the longest stretch of sleep at any point. And daytime sleeps - I hesitate to call them that cause they were cat nap or micro naps at 20 min each, which is really convenient when you need to be dropping off and picking up at school times but not so great for a poor tired baby who can't get any decent sleep. Btwn a combination of reflux and teeth (6 of them! ) and bad cold and ear infection he hasn't had much luck lately.


This is us, on the spare bed, where I am sleeping to try and sort him out and let the patient have some good sleep. - he is wearing a pink sleeping bag and is very comfortable with his masculinity.
Day one we had 3 hrs of daytime sleep and an increase of 4 hrs over night and one less waking time, however today a busy day we missed the morning nap, had an hour at lunch then no afternoon sleep cause of school pick up and a trip to the park. So we will see where tonight leads us.


- I wrote this somewhere

Pink bun

On Thursday afternoons I am trying to have a special afternoon tea for the boys. Growing up every Thursday meant going to grandmas house and having afternoon tea with her and Pa. The spread was something to behold. Cakes, biscuits, cheese, slice, sometimes in summer - grapes. There was usually iced cakes and a fruit kind of cake, crackers and plain biscuits cream biscuits chocolate biscuits and a slice. My grandma was a great baker and most Saturday mornings should be be in the kitchen baking up a storm for the week. You could arrive to find any number of cakes in the throes of being made, cooling on the rack or already iced and in their Tupperware.





I don't cook like that mainly cause I would eat it all, seriously I would have no self control - maybe grandma didn't either ending up with type 2 diabetes. But I did find a sweet finger bun with pink icing on Thursday that seems very appropriate. Grandma sometimes bought these even with all those cakes already on the table. Mostly she bought the fruit kind with white icing and cinnamon on the top, this pink one was very good. I told the boys stories about my grandma while we ate.
And we played chess, well sebastian moved he pieces in moves he had learned at chess club the day before, I watched.

- I wrote this somewhere

Osaka

We did go to Osaka last week, just a restaurant tho, I have only recently discovered Japanese thanks to our friend Emma and Derek's gall bladder, I didn't know it could be so delightful- look at all the pretty dishes our meal was served in. And the food was delicious. We will be going back there.


- I wrote this somewhere

Recovery

I think Elliot took this, but it serves well for this post. Derek had his gallbladder taken out on Friday. It went well and we are hoping he might stop being in pain and be able to eat a few more things now. I love our health system that things like that get taken care of for free. What a great country we live in.


- I wrote this somewhere

Man of the match

The local rsl club has printed out certificates for man of the match. It conveniently has a free kids meal when one adult meal is purchased as a reward. Derek is usually in charge of choosing the man of the match but he was in hospital recovering from his surgery. All the other kids in his team had had the certificate and week after week sebastian was patiently waiting, Derek explained that he probably had to be last in fairness, and he waited. I took the blank certificate on Saturday morning ( it was freezing - the guy you see in the back had goosebumps on goosebumps and said on more than one occasion he wished he got his jumper from the car.) I gave it to the coach and didn't say anything, he chose sebastian as man of the match. Here he is doing some fist pumps in celebration.






Stoked!

Hmmm now we might have to go to the rsl for that "free kids meal". I wonder if I can cross it out and write free kids meal at sushi train instead?

He did do a great job on Saturday, he was chasing the ball and turning and tackling, all around much improved. His team has lost every game and maybe scored one ore two goals as a team. They aren't too bothered. One week it was 19-0. It was Lionel Messi's son on that team.

- I wrote this somewhere

Saturday morning ritual

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Bwhahah

The local paper arrived today with this as their front page.


Now unless I'm living in an alternate reality I believe qld lost on Wednesday. I wonder how those poor youngsters are going experiencing the pain of losing. Resilience people! That's what I'm talking about.
Now don't get me wrong I don't care a lick about state of origin. But every year it floors me that people in this state are soooo passionate about it. So much so that they publish newspapers with ridiculous stories about seven year olds predicting victory, and seemingly normal shop keepers go maroon crazy and bedeck their outlets in coloured streamers and change normal clothes for cane toad jerseys. Parochialism at its finest. And there is another two games to go.
I don't remember nsw people getting so fired up. Am I wrong?


And just for good measure - king wallet on page 3
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Not as good as you might have thought

For a while now a hot topic of discussion in our house has been the guava. What does it look like? What does it taste like? Where does it grow? When can we get some? Apple and guava juice
Is a favourite so when I saw fresh guava today at the fruit market "yippee I thought"
We are in for a treat. A fruit of deliciousness, akin to forbidden fruit from the garden of Eden


Look at that pretty coral juicy flesh, how tempting, how succulent, how revolting!



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We gave it a try but as you can see from the evidence it wasn't as good as we had hoped. in fact I could safely say we will never buy a guava again.

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Pegs

This week is the week if we were having a competition between our children that Tristan needs to start walking to be the first upright in our family. I've told him if he wants to beat sebastian to the crown today is the day to do it. But he seems only interested in the box of pegs on the deck which is affording me a lovely quiet cup of earl grey - my potion of choice.


Of course we encourage that type of competition between our offspring - pitting them against each other in a fight for our esteem and affection.
I am however reflecting on what a crazy child sebastian was and how lucky I was that he was first and not Elliot- if he'd come second I may have been beside myself with frustration. Hopefully Tristan will continue to take his time getting to where he is going. For now I'm enjoying little words that are emerging - pup pup pup for carnaby and he makes a funny little noise when he sees Elliot and only Elliot.
And whose idea was it to let a crawling baby on a filthy deck in a white suit?
Now off to organise our sunflower growing competition...

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Knowing what it's all about

I tested Tristan last night at dinner with members of the family. Along with some great eye pointing he was able to clearly identify Daddy, Bastian, Elliot and Carnaby.
He was quite pleased with himself.


He has also began to join in the boogey sessions that happen regularly here. Unfortunately the song he bops up and down in his high chair to the most is Gangnam style, ugh!

- I wrote this somewhere

Going green

On Friday morning I had the day stretched our before me. I paid some bills, replied to some emails and set about finding out about getting some soil to fill my garden bed. 10 minutes later I had a delivery of 1 cubic metre of garden soil delivered. Almost to the garden bed - several metres shy, so I had to shovel it to get the car out of the shed.


I may have not realised what 1 cubic metre of soil looked like.



This is what was left after I filled up the bed.



Here is the lemon tree



And three tomatoes that grew out of the compost.
I am hoping to grow a bit of stuff in here so watch this space
Alternatively it could be a complete disaster and I won't be able to grow anything.
Fingers and green thumbs crossed
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