The World of Princesses, Fairies & Wands

Ella has entered the magical world of make believe. Branches with flowers and leaves have become wands which turn anything and everything into frogs! As these wands have been deemed outside wands we made some indoor ones this afternoon. Even little Katy got in on the act.

Tonight before bedtime, Ella and I decided to do some drawings. The idea of writing letters and names was quickly culled for drawing princesses and fairies! Here is Ella's drawing of a princess which actually looks like a person. Interestingly all of her princesses had very long legs with ballet shoes!

Born Again Heydy

Nat has been fretting about the loss of Heydy for a few days now. She feels responsible, and has come to the conclusion that it's all her fault for taking her eye off the ball at one of the myriad of playgrounds visited over the last weekend or so. On the other hand, Ella wasn't too fussed; perhaps because she knew where Heydy was hiding ...

Then, a reprieve. Today, Ella dragged a small chest of drawers all the way from Katy's room to the loungeroom. She practised opening and closing the drawers while the rest of us were busy around the house, when suddenly Heydy popped out of one of the drawers. Phew!

LOST

A small brown and cream elephant. Responds to the name Heydy. Last seen on Sunday possibly at the Belconnen Markets. Much loved companion of Ella (although amazingly she hasn't noticed Heydy has gone missing - possibly because Andy brought home from London a very cute owl which we filled with rice to be used as a doorstop however Ella seems to enjoy taking the owl into bed!!).

Reward offered!

Aoife Sleeps Over

As you may have guessed, Cath, Eoin and Aoife came down for the weekend to escape from Sydney. Cath arrived on Thursday night and we had a wonderful day together on friday involving two coffee shops and a run all without any children! It was great to have lots of conservations without any interruptions as well as to be on our own timeline.

Eoin and Aoife arrived on Friday afternoon. The visit was convenient timing for me - now there were 3 adults and 3 children! Aoife and Ella had fun together as well as their moments. We ventured out in chilly conditions to Commonwealth Park on Saturday morning for a ride, play and the essential coffee stop. After warming up back at home, it was time to explore the new play area at the old Cook School. We returned home to make pizza for dinner.

Sunday was a visit to the markets. First stop was Knead. Eoin's disappointment with the cafe was steadily rising - only one crossiant and cold chairs - that was until the coffee arrived. Needless to say Eoin ordered a second coffee within seconds of finishing the first! Then it was off to the mushroom to expend some energy.

A tired Aoife, Eoin and Cath left after lunch for the journey back to Sydney. We hope that Aoife, Cath and Eoin return soon for another visit (or perhaps we are due to go to Sydney) as although it was hard work at times negotiating between 2 toddlers we throughly enjoyed their company.

And now it's only one more sleep until Andy arrives back home!

Thanks

We had a fantastic time in Perth with Nanna and Grandpa. Lots of playing meant tired girls and grandies!

Fun Times - the girls playing and copying Amy (Nanna and Grandpa's dog) and swinging together at the local park just before the rain begins.

Our return plane trip was also tiring as the girls were awake the whole way and therefore needed loads of entertaining. Little Katy fell asleep 5 mins before landing - she was knackered! We were last off the plane and as there was a rather long walk from the plane to the terminal, we accepted the offer of a ride on the little buggy. Nanna Hogg was inside waiting and wondering where we were.

Katy's a Champion!

I know I have written this several times before but I think it's here to stay. Katy has managed to sleep through from 7pm until 6am for 6 of the last 7 nights! I actually think she has figured it out and is not just giving us false hope! Keep up the good work Katy!

Phone Conversations

On our way to pick up Cath on Thursday, Ella grab her bag which contains various goodies (usually whatever she sees that will fit in!) and on this occasion it had a toy phone in it. I was entertained for the 20min trip by Ella ringing various people on her phone. All the conversations which went along the lines of - Hi *** We are on the way to pick up Cath. Through the tunnel, round here and along. Yes (pause) Oh dear (pause) Yes we should be there in a minute. See you Tuesday.

This fits in with Ella's recent interest in role play. At Nanna and Grandpa's Katy found a stash of old nailpolish in a tin. One morning I watched Ella arrange the nailpolish bottles in a circle and naming each bottle after cousins, friends and playmates! I could hear her expressions which revealed that she does actually listen to what you say!!

A New Level

OMG!!! A new height in tantrums has emerged.....I was taken by surprise to say the least.

The setting - the local shopping centre.

The problem/trigger - Ella wanting to go to the toilet and me choosing the disabled one as I had the pram with Ella in it. She wanted to go to the girls!

Solution - Going into the girls but then going into the *wrong* cubicle only magnified the situation. Went into the *right* cubicle but now Ella was in full flight and couldn't manage to concentrate on going to the toilet so I decided it was time to go home. Situation magnified to another level. Manhandled Ella into the pram where she was bucking like she was at a rodeo!

Of course there were lots of tears and screaming/yelling too! Out to the car we went with lots of staring from members of the public and a few sorry looks. Manhandled Ella into car where she had calmed down slightly. The 5 minute drive home calmed her down another notch and the 5 minutes while I got Katy out of the car and into the house calmed her down another notch. I took her straight into the bedroom and we laid down and read some stories before Ella sobbed herself to sleep.

I woke Ella up after about an hour as Grandpa had come home to open his birthday presents and have cake. Ella was back to her normal self. She loved fooling around with Uncle Daryl too.

Later that evening Nanna and Grandpa went out for dinner with friends leaving at 6.30pm. They arrived back home at 9pm just as I was coming out of the bedroom. It was a long and teary bedtime routine with Ella and at one point waking Katy up with her crying. I thought I had seen that part coming but still couldn't avoid the storm - just had to ride it out! And I thought it was supposed to be the terrible twos??

I think this day will go down in history - like the one when Ella decided to give up her day sleeps when Katy was 5 weeks old. Lets just hope tomorrow is a better day :)

Mendips & Cheddar

While Nat & the girls are in Perth, I'm travelling around the UK. The first couple of days was working in Reading (while recovering from jetlag) followed by a night at Robin & Jo's place (a scenic 15km ride from Uni of Reading). Yesterday afternoon I came to Bristol to stay with Mark & Erica, and was informed by Mark we were doing a cycle tour for the afternoon.

The tour took us out over some big suspension bridge right next to town, and then through a whole series of country lanes, enveloped by hedgerows (see photo) into the Mendips, which is a folding series of ridges to the south of Bristol. A beautiful summer's day (almost hot at times) and not too many cars about, which made for perfect riding. Then, at the far end of the Mendips we made it to Cheddar Gorge, which was our main objective (and, disappointingly, was not actually made of cheese). The gorge was absolutely spectacular (see second photo for a snapshot) -- a long gentle downhill from the very top of the gorge, which gradually turned into a deep ravine with limestone cliffs on either side. We were spat out the bottom at Cheddar. By this time it was 5:30pm, we had been riding for 3 hours and were pretty tired and it was basically the turnaround point! So, we had a bit of a rest (a pint of bitter and some sandwiches at Axbridge) and then headed for home. Fortunately, Mark had planned an "escape route", which took us along a rail trail, avoiding all the hills, with the caveat that the last 5 miles would include quite a few busy roads. We hit the busy roads at 7:30pm on the dot -- just as the USA vs England World Cup match kicked off -- and the roads were completely empty! We were just about the only people in the country not at the pub. Made it home by about 8:30, and all pretty shattered.

Winter in Perth

So what do you do in winter while holidaying in Perth? Go swimming of course! We met up with Annwen, James, Ashley and Nathan today at Point Walter. Started at the playground then migrated down the hill for a snack and ended up in the Swan River - well Ella and Nathan did.

So what else have we been up to? Apart from discovering 3 new playgrounds without too much effort, we have visited Nayne (Great Nanna) exploring her fabulous garden and feeding the chickens. We took Nayne out for lunch and shopping. We took advantage of Grandpa's job and visited the Zoo meeting him for lunch. At the zoo was saw the new baby giraffee, the lions and tigers and attended the elephant talk which was very entertaining. The keepers have taught the elephants to do various tricks including crawling!!

Katy has done heaps of standing and invented her own new game. This involves pulling herself up on the couch (or whatever) then letting go with her hands and falling onto her bottom followed by giggling! She also managed to crawl off the bed.

We Survived!

Our flight last night to Perth went really well. As Jase said yesterday while we were having coffee with Emily a few hours prior to leaving Canberra 'The worst thing ends up being not the flight itself but the anticipation of what it will be like.' Pretty much sums it up!

We left Canberra 10 minutes late at 7.40pm. We were one of the last ones on and as we walked down the isle several people were surprised I was travelling by myself, how brave I was, how cute the girls are as well as a few 'knowing pity' looks. I eventually reached our seats and fortunately the seat next to us was free - YAH!

The first half an hour Ella played with the Qantas Mr Happy bag containing pencils and paper. Then her dinner came - lasagne which she normally loves but not this time. She picked at the bread roll, drank some juice and had a few spoonfuls of yoghurt.

After deciding that she didn't want to have any more food, I reached for the special newly-purchased-for-the-plane-trip clip textas to do some drawing. These entertained Ella for some time. Ella thought it was more fun clipping them together and taking their lids off therefore she got more textas marks on her pjs than the paper!

Meanwhile Katy was content to be sitting discovering all the things within her reach. Katy's eyes began to droop and she began sucking her pony and blanket (an indication that sleep is imminent). I was thinking whoo hoo - one nearly down by 8.45pm. Then the dinner trolley came by and instantly Katy was WIDE awake!

Time for the Winnie and Tigger DVD to come out. Ella enjoyed watching the new episodes of the Super Sleuths. My ideal plan was for Ella to fall asleep while watching this (hopefully before the DVD player ran out of batteries!) Meanwhile Katy was slowly getting more frustrated with not being able to fall asleep - the cracks were appearing! I thought a bottle may do the trick so arranged for some warm water. Made up the bottle and Katy sucked away drinking 3/4 bottle and drifted off to sleep - at 9.45!

Ella was still wide awake watching her show. Tired signs began to emerge - she started playing with the buttons on the DVD player and adjusting the screen to all different angles. Then at about 10.15pm she said she wanted to turn it off to go to sleep - a big surprise to me! We turned it off, pulled a blanket over her, cuddled her and that was that!

Looking at both girls asleep on my lap was a lovely moment and I wished I could have taken a photo. I decided I should nap too with only just over an hour till we touched down. The next challenge was how I would get the 2 sleepy girls off...luckily a air hostess came to my rescue and we disembarked last off the plane at midnight. Nanna and Grandpa were at the gate waiting for us and they got big smiles from the now awake girls!

Needless to say we are all tired today but that doesn't matter cause we get to play with Nanna all day while Grandpa is at work!

Standing

Katy is getting stronger everyday and is now frequently pulling herself up into standing position with whatever is available. Her favourite place by far is the edge of the bath!

Katy's Party

On Saturday afternoon we had a Teddy Bear's Picnic to celebrate Katy turning one! Pony played with Cami, Cuddles, Molly Cassy, Heady and Tootie while a few older teddies looked on. Fun was had by all!

Happy Birthday Chicken!

Where has the time gone? It's hard to believe that our little Katy is 1 today. See the slide show to the right for Katy's journey so far..

Weekend in Melbourne

Nat decided long ago that she would go to last weekend's ASA conference in Melbourne. Seemed like a convenient time for all of us to go with her, so I could take Ella & Katy to see their Melbourne family (mainly great-grandparents) while Nat went to the conference during the day. As an added bonus, we got to stay with Ella's best mate Sophie for the weekend, which made for lots of fun (but a fair few tears as well!).

On Friday we dropped Nat off at the train station and headed out to Mitcham to visit Great-Nana. Great-Nana is 93, but still lives all alone and had prepared us a lunch of sandwiches which Ella devoured quite happily. We stayed there until mid-afternoon, predominantly playing with dancing dogs and chickens.

Saturday saw us at Great-Granny's place. She's also 93, and lives in a nursing home. Ella and Katy played in her room for a while, and she showed them her wombats while I tried to stop the kids destroying stuff! It was the first time Katy had seen her great-grandparents, so nice for all of us.

For the rest of the weekend we hung out with Sophie and her parents (Richard & Tanya). I should point out here, that Ella & Sophie are best friends, but they vacillate between playmates and enemies, which can be stressful for poor parents trying to keep the peace! We played lots of games, went to local playgrounds, fed the ducks at the pond (see photo; unfortunately for the ducks they only had gravel to feed) and played peekaboo at the dining table (see other photo). But the absolute highlight was a special trip to the train (just Box Hill to Canterbury) which enthralled them both. When we left Sophie's (via Great-Aunty Jill's and the City to pick up Mum) both Katy & Ella slept for 2 hours straight in the car. We drove home that afternoon and are now busy recovering from the trip.