Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Bedtime shenanigans

Nana's visit came to an end today. Ella certainly enjoyed having her here, but her 7:30 pm flight departure time meant a break with our normal nightly schedule. Ultimately, after some prevarication, it was decided that Nat would take Katy to the airport to wave goodbye to Nana, while I would take care of Ella's dinner-bathtime-milk-play-reading-bedtime routine.

We find a stringent bedtime routine generally helps with enforcement of bedtime -- Ella knows exactly what is about to happen, so doesn't complain so much when it occurs. And tonight we sailed along pretty well, and I had her bundled her into bed to start reading stories at about the right time.

And that was when we departed from the routine. Firstly, Ella decided that she would read the book, not me. Fine, I thought. She hadn't read this one before, so she made it all up (just happened to be in tune to "two little ducks went out one day", which I thought was pretty cute). Then she started climbing off the bed, and turned around to say "Last story, go to bed NOW" pointing violently at me to accentuate her point. Hmm, perhaps she learnt that one off someone. At this point Ella stormed out of the room, and left me sitting on her bed as she shouted "see you in the morning".

Now, I'm sure a clever parent would have had a great management strategy to cope with this, but I was laughing too hard to think properly. In the end, my plan was to wait in her bedroom for her to come back. After 5 minutes, I gave up and went to look for her in the lounge-room. But she wasn't there. Wasn't in the kitchen either. Then I realised she had completed the role reversal, and was lying in my bed, pretending to be me. She continued the charade -- "back in bed, NOW" she told me, in no uncertain terms.

At this point I had no option; enforced bedtime was all that remained, and in the face of enforcement Ella wilted. We read another book (I read it this time) and the routine was complete. Fingers crossed, she appears to be asleep now ....

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Spun Out at Floriade


Nana (Nat's mum), Katy and I picked Ella up early from childcare and headed over to Floriade - the annual flower display held at Commonwealth Park. Our priority was to visit the patting farm in the kids corner. This year the farm had chickens, ducks, kittens, lambs, goats, a calf, a dog, geese and rabbits. Ella's favourite this year was the cat with her 2 kittens who were in a small cage out of reach to the kids hands. After exhausting the animals, we ventured around the masses of flower beds pointing out all the colours. This year Floriade has a giant ferris wheel, 35 metres tall. Unfortunately Nana wasn't too keen on the height of this ride so we opted to go on the teacup ride which looked much more placid. Looks can be deceiving! For a kids ride, those teacups spin pretty quickly especially when the operator gives them an extra boost as you pas him on each lap. Lets just say Nana was feeling a bit dizzy and sick!


Look at all these flowers!



The Teacup Ride!

Monday, September 28, 2009

A Lucky Escape

It is true that babies do bounce as I found out the hard way on Saturday. Katy had just dozed off to sleep in my arms so I placed her back in the rocker which was on the kitchen bench and didn't strap her in. I was cutting up potatoes for dinner when I heard this thump followed by loud crying. I turned around to discovered Katy face down on the kitchen floor. She had managed to very quickly and quietly wiggle out of the rocker and fall. Luckily her feet hit the ground first followed by her tummy and then her chin/face. Mum who was asleep at the time, woke up to the thump, cries and my swearing. Katy settled down pretty quickly and on closer inspection there were no signs of major injury.

I called Sandra (Andy's mum) to get some advise on what to do - should I take Katy to hospital or not? On answering the phone Sandra's first words were something like "Why aren't you watching the AFL?" St Kilda and Geelong were playing in the grand final with only minutes to go and St Kilda was leading by 1 pt. I should point out here that Sandra is a Geelong supporter. "No I have a bit of an emergency here" was my reply.

After various questions it was decided no trip to the hospital for Katy but just to keep a close eye on her. Had to watch for any signs of unusual drowsiness, vomiting, funny pupils, fits or unusual crying. Katy by now was asleep - tired from the shock and all the crying.

A little later we woke her up for a bath which she enjoyed and then tried to feed her. However she wasn't keen on drinking - not sure if it was a sore neck, lip or jaw. Getting a bit worried as she hadn't had any milk since 2.30pm and it was now 8pm. Sandra came around to check her out. We gave Katy some panadol and then syringed about 80ml of milk into her. Happily she drifted off to sleep.

The night wasn't as bad as expected and involved giving Katy panadol every 4 hours. She also managed to breastfeed at 11pm and 6am which was great. By Sunday morning, Katy was back to normal. The only sign of the traumatic experience was a graze on her chin and a little bruise on her bottom lip.

As for me, well I was pretty upset. In fact Andy said he was more worried about me than Katy. As time passed by and Katy began to act more like herself I became happier. Also after to talking to various people who all recalled an accident story involving them as children or their own babies I realised I wasn't a bad mother and that accidents do happen. Lest to say it gave me a big wake up call and a difference perspective on life.



Sunday, September 27, 2009

Nana Arrives

Nana arrived here on Friday night on a big plane (according to Ella). Ella and Katy have enjoyed spending time with Nana. The weather has been abysmal - it feels like we have gone back in time to the middle of winter. Cloudy, rainy and a chilling wind. Apparently it was a top of 8C today the coldest September day in 40 yrs! This means we have spent most of our time inside having cuddles, building towers, constructing a railway and drawing on the blackboard as seen below.






Friday, September 25, 2009

Spring

After noticing our Pacific Blue tree has begun to blossom Ella, Katy and I wandered around the garden taking photos of flowers. I used the macro setting on the camera which worked a treat.

Now talking about spring where has it gone? I can't believe that it's forecasted to be a maximum of 10C and 11C this weekend. I feel particularly sorry for mum who I'm picking up from the airport in an hour - she thought she had missed the Canberra winter!


Thursday, September 24, 2009

Buswash

Today Ella's childcare went on a buswash excursion! So although today isn't one of Ella's normal childcare days, we joined in on the excursion. Now what does a buswash excursion involve? Well the big orange action bus arrived at childcare and all the kids and adults piled on. Once loaded off the bus drives to the depot. We tour the depot (on the bus of course) - including driving through the bus hospital, waving at the bus doctors (mechanics who squirt us with water), going through the buswash and then driving through the bus parking tooting the horn and yelling 'wake up buses!!' Poor Katy who was peacefully sleeping got a bit of a fright with 38 kids yelling this out. The excursion took just over an hour and we finished off by singing the wheels on the bus all the way back. A great way to spend the morning.

Monday, September 21, 2009

:)

It's amazing what a good night sleep (ie 11 pm -5am with no interruptions) and a morning run will do for the energy levels and general outlook on life. The run was my first with Katy in the pram (her 2nd) and so we ventured around the Streets of Cook (our winter blob loop) so there weren't too many bumps. Pippa came along too and helped pull Katy up some of the hills. Also my calf seems to be better - touch wood....

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Which Other Side?

While eating her noodles tonight, Ella managed to accidently bite her own finger and quite hard based on the silent cry that followed. Andy comforted her by firstly giving her finger a kiss then getting the frozen peas out (which seem to always fix anything that's sore). After having the palm side of her sore finger on the peas for 15 seconds or so Andy said 'Okay now put the other side on.' Ella responds accordingly by putting the other hand on the peas. We both looked at each other and chuckled!

Friday, September 18, 2009

Double Glazing Done

3.5 months have passed since the majority of the double glazing conversion was done and now the final part has been completed. The poor carpenter had quite a task installing the new winders and sashes but after 2 days got there. Now as a result the flyscreens no longer fit so it's off to get quotes for new ones. Can't wait to open the windows up wide to let the breeze cool the bedrooms off in summer.

Perfect Night


Andy and the girls picked me up from work tonight and seeing though it was a fabulous evening we decided on the spur of the moment to have takeaway for dinner. Found a rather expensive fish n chips shop ($16 for 1 fish and chips) in Deakin and headed down to Lake Burley Griffin. As we ate our fairly average and expensive fish n chips, the setting sun provided a fantastic array of colours in the sky and on the water. If only I had our camera, I could have taken some gorgeous photos of Andy's and Ella's silhouettes as they played chasey while I fed Katy (Andy had his phone, so here is a picture after all). Really nice way to wind down after a bad day at work.

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Bounce Bounce


Q - What goes bounce bounce giggle giggle?
A - Ella on her new trampoline :)



Saturday, September 12, 2009

Dad in charge

Today Nat found herself at a conference for most of the day, so I was put in charge of both daughters for the whole day. I guess there has to be a first time for everything.

Anyway, I figured staying at home all day would be bad, so we headed off to Majura School Fete, which most of the world seemed to go to. Katy slept in the pram for half of it and sat in the baby bjorn looking at the world for the rest. Ella had ups and downs. She climbed up anything she could (well out of my reach on several occasions) managed to wet her pants while perched on top of the climbing frame and bought a half-broken animal mobile from the toy section which kept her entertained for most of the day. But the highlight was the animal petting enclosure. Here you can see her interrogating the baby alpaca, but she also liked the goats and the lambs.

Friday, September 11, 2009

Rolling Doughnuts

The doughnuts having turned into rolling! This afternoon I witnessed Katy roll from her stomach to her back (numerous times). Excitedly I got the camera, popped her onto her stomach, pressed start and recorded the rolling for Andy.  Once at home, I produced the camera and replayed Katy's achievement of the day only to be told that he had witnessed rolling this morning (Andy was on early morning feeding duty). He had just forgotten to tell me by the time I got up at 7.30am!!

Thursday, September 10, 2009

Doughnuts

While Ella was recovering from spending all morning playing with her friends at Rock Castle in Commonwealth Park, Katy and I had a few moments to ourselves.  Katy decided to have playtime on her gym mat and subsequently started to wiggle around almost completing her first doughnut! There has been loads of grabbing (or trying to) of the hanging toys. At one stage I looked down to see the ring of one of the hangy toys in her mouth! She just loves a good chew...

Sunday, September 6, 2009

It took all afternoon but we did manage to get a nice Father's Day photo....

#1 - Ella pulls up the plants while Katy loses it.

#2 - A bit of biffo from a jealous Ella.

#3 - Wrong camera setting - onya mum.

#4 - Finally - a good one!

Father's Day at Foxlow Flats

We spent most of Father's Day out at orienteering on a glorious spring day. As Andy trudged around his course, Ella, Katy and I tackled the 2km blue course. I didn't get much weight training in today as Ella walked from #1 to the second last control which I thought was a terrific effort. The highlight of the course was throwing rocks into the puddles on the track :)

21st

Here's a photo we'll save for Ella's 21st! It was captured yesterday down at the local oval in the long jump pit. While I was busy sorting Katy out, Ella had managed to take off her shoes, socks, undies and jeans and was in the process of getting her top off. Just imagine if we could all be so free spirited...


Friday, September 4, 2009

Cool Functions

I discovered a few new buttons on our camera the other day and these are the results.... notice Katy's showing off her grabbing ability.






Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Quote of the Day

I read this today...

Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass 
It's about learning to dance in the rain.