Award winning blogging...LOL

A week ago I was lucky enough to have a "gorgeous blogger" award passed onto me by Hearts and Hands so now I am finally blogging it, and I also have to tell you all 6 things you may not know about me, before I pass the award along to someone else...

I am really struggling with this because I think I am pretty open and have no secretive things about me LOL

1.  My children have never had hair cuts. Yup this one's for you Sazz.

It seems like such a small thing to make a decision about, yet its one of the parenting choices that has copped us the most flack, the most questions and of course the most confusion over whether they are boys or girls...because of course it matters if you can tell, right?

Way back when Jet was first born I thought that I would keep his hair short and that my hairdresser friend Kim could cut it, because she cut my hair and I loved the look of her son's cropped short hair. Fast forward a year and Jet was finally growing hair LOL, he started to get a little mullet, his fringe grew into his eyes and the grandparents were forever at us to cut his fringe. Perhaps it began as an act of rebellion? Who knows...but at some point we decided that our children would have long hair until at which point they wanted to get it cut. It doesn't feel right to take charge of their bodies and decide for them how they must look and how they must wear their hair.

And really, what's the big fucking deal? Why on earth does that challenge people so much? Plus they don't want to cut their hair, so its a win win for me!

2.  I'm scared of thunder, lightning, the dark, and things that go bump in the night.

I haven't always been, and I can remember sitting at the window in the blackness of night watching huge lightning flashes with my big bro... But now it gives me the creeps and makes me jumpy.

I *think* my fear of loud noises and the dark started around the time that I first moved out of home. I didn't find out until a few years after I moved out, but there was a ghost in the flat where we lived. I never saw it, but my mum and my bro did....and now that I think back, I think I heard it.

I would hear loud scraping noises and just weird shit, but there was nothing ever there...

And then when I moved out I was all alone most nights and it was winter....windy windy weather and my bedroom wall was next to a gate and it would creak and bang.... ick...

3.  When I was younger I wanted to be an artist when I grew up. LOL

My older sister is an artist and of course totally cool so when I was a kid I wanted to be her... She is 14yrs older than me and always seemed to be doing cool stuff, so of course I wanted to be just like her.

While I dabble with painting a little over the years, and still do now and then (though its been well over a year now I think) I just don't think I have *it* whatever that is, LOL. Thankfully I discovered knitting, crochet and felting as a creative outlet!

My older bro, who was always a computer geek, ended up getting all arty LOL and so now he is at uni studying art...yk, what I thought I would be doing (which is even funnier considering I think if I was to study, other than with the ABA, I'd probably do something computer related...) Anyway, I shall give my bro a plug, these are his websites... his personal arty website and the website for the studio where he keeps his works.

4.  I first learnt how to crochet so that I would have something in common with my MIL, because we never had anything to talk about and it was really freakin awkward....I tried knitting first but I couldn't get the hang of it LOL

5.  I'm a yarn snob.... I never thought I'd be a yarn snob. I would see other people raving about their skeins of yarn that cost $20+ and shuddered at spending over $5 on a ball of wool, I mean its just yarn ffs, its not like it matters! And  acrylic is just as good as wool don't you know!

....and then I bought one of those $20+ skeins of yarn, errr it does matter, and no... HELL NO, acrylic is not anywhere just as good. (it has cry in its name for a reason! ROFL)

6.  I have a madeit store, and an etsy store, but they are both empty LOL. One day I may stock more woolly things in there, for now they are just holding the space for me ;p


After much umming and ahhing (#7 I am very indecisive LOL) I have decided to pass the award along to Nat at Bustin' Out Babies so that I can learn more about her :)

Meh times in April-land...

As a few certain peoples will have noticed my inline time has dramatically decreased in the last few weeks, which is weird because its also been a time when I've been feeling incredibly isolated...but then I sort of isolate myself more by not going online and talking to people. (Can you even get more isolated when all your friends live in the puter?)

I am struggling to parent effieciently at the moment, Jamie is working half earlies and half lates each weekend for a month, we're halfway and I am just dying here. The kids are noticeably more feral when he works early, they wake up earlier and so I am running on around 4hrs sleep and I am crashing...

I feel so annoyed, depressed, low, angry, frustrated, down...stuck....alone... I don't think there's ever been a time when I've felt more socially awkward in my life, because I want to make friends here, where I need them, friends that I can call on when times are shit (yk, for actual help as opposed to a verbal venting), but I don't know how to... (And please please don't reply and say oh making friends is easy, you just need to get out more and talk to people...)
I go to ABA and I get myself all excited and hyped up and think yay, normal people like me...and then I get there...and I don't know how to talk to people, I can't do small talk, and so I am just there, hanging around like an awkward and silent bad smell.
I went to a JB meet recently, cos yk, it would be great to know people that live slightly closer than Melbourne, and barely even talked to the 'new' people, staying with the familiar friends.

I look around and everyone else has their families and their community of friends, and I've got neither... I can't even crack into the fucking homeschool community that's apparently around here.

So much to say, so little brain power...

I've been awake since around 3am, running on 2hrs sleep, have had a blog post swirling around my head...but I just can't get it out. Ridiculous really...the reason I am struggling to get the words together are because I am tired...and I don't want to offend people...ROFL. 
Gah... I've been reading little snippets here and there around the internet about breastfeeding older babies and night weaning, and I don't like it, but I don't know how to say I don't like it without feeling like I am attacking people.
I feel like despite it being known that feeding on demand, and for comfort, is hugely important for little babies, that people are far less comfortable with demand feeding older babies, or allowing older babies to feed for comfort and I don't understand why.
It seems there is a magic age, somewhere around 2 (and I can't help but wonder if its because of the WHO code), that all of a sudden we can't trust our babies to know what they are doing in regards to feeding like we did when they were little (remember feeding round the clock at 2/4/6mths and being told it was normal, and this too shall pass, the baby knows what its doing etc), instead of it being normal and okay all of a sudden we're looking for ways to cut back the feeds or to give comfort in another way. Why would you want to undermine the breastfeeding relationship by doing the very opposite of what you do when you're establishing that relationship?


Hmm...guess that post came out anyway...


In other news, this slack blogger has been uber quite because most of my energy has been directed at Indy's diet of late. I can't remember if I mentioned it here or not, we have put him onto the Specific Carbohydrate Diet to work on his gut health...which also happens to be the reason I have had so little sleep... He snuck some bread yesterday, not allowed on the diet at all, and last night woke in a huge rage...I'd say it was the bread coming out...ugh.

Very excited!!!!!!!!! :D

We put 'the pic' of Sunny into the framers about a month ago and because they had just come back from holidays there was a huge backlog and ours was only ready to be picked up this week.We got it today and it looks great!!!

Its hanging above our kitchen table so its straight ahead as you walk in our front door, love it :)

Indy's birthday weekend part 2 (LOTS of pics)

The birthday celebrations continued on the Sunday (being his actual birthday) and we were up early for some present opening -

After a quick game of Snakes and Ladders the boys showed off their ring slings, made for them by Sazz. Jet was quite the poser and insisted on photos from all angles, while Indy quickly got shy -

After lunch we ventured out for some fresh air and decided to take the boys to Tower Hill and try out another walking track that we hadn't been on before -

We were lucky enough to see koalas and kangaroos, there was a joey with the kangaroos but when it saw us coming it dove for the safety of it's mumma's pouch -

Despite being local and having visited Tower Hill many times before we had never been into the gift shop before, so popped in for a quick squiz this time and bought 2 puppets - a koala and an echidna, the boys love them and Indy has slept with them since -

When we got home Indy made a cake while Jet and I looked on -

Then I decorated it and Indy blew the candle out, while Sunny practised his latest trick -

The birthday celebrations concluded today with Indy taking cupcakes to playgroup to share with his little friends, unfortunately I forgot to send the camera along with them though, oops!
Jamie and I are all birthdayed out and are very happy that it is another 6mths until Jet's birthday, I think we will need the whole 6mths to recuperate from so much birthday activity in one month!

Crazy birthday weekend part 1

The Sunday just gone (20th Sept) was Indy's 3rd birthday. So as seems to be a tradition for us now, we gathered with some family and friends on the Saturday to celebrate.
We had planned for the day to be at a playground so the kids could run themselves ragged and get lots of fresh air, but alas, the Warny weather lived up to its reputation. Despite the previous day being glorious and sunny, it rained just an hour before the party was due to start and we had to quickly call everyone to tell them to come to our house instead. Oh well, it was a great day anyway :)

I made Indy a Lightning McQueen cake, the Cars movie is a favourite here, and I was up half the night Friday trying to bake it right. My first attempt ended in a insanely risen, burnt lump of cake, that slightly resembled a car, but tasted like crap. So roll on midnight and attempt #2. Thank fuck it worked, because I was one stressed mumma!!
I was up early after just a few hours sleep on the Saturday ready to ice it, which was a bit scary at first, but I think it turned out great :)



Highlights of the day were of course the presents, he got LOTS (and this doesn't even include the ones we gave him!! Think we might be having a cull soon...)
Jet took great pleasure in helping Indy open them all -



And then it was time for cake!! (I nearly cried when I had to cut it LOL)



We had a lovely (and tiring) day and would like to say thankyou in particular to our luffly Franga friends who travelled all the way down here on a shitty bus to spend the day with us xox
They even posted some of their great pics here and here if you want to see more :)


Part 2 coming soon!

Placenta Burial

Just over a week ago, to mark the first anniversary of Sunny letting his placenta go, we buried it and planted a tree above it.


Jamie rinsed the placenta while Sunny sussed everything out and watched us getting everything ready -





Ruby watched on from Indy's bedroom window -



Placenta in pot -



Sunny looks at his placenta one last time -



And Jamie plants the tree -



We all watered it a little -





And now the 'Placenta Tree' (a lemon/lime tree) sits in our backyard :) -



More pics just for extra cuteness -

birthday time again!

This times its Indy's turn, he will be 3 on Sunday :)
Just like we did for Sunny and Jet's birthdays we'll be gathering with family and friends to celebrate...hopefully this time the weather will be fine enough this time to do it at the playground instead of at home.

So tonight I will be baking a car cake, which tomorrow will be transformed into Lightning McQueen (ka chow!), then the gathering. On Sunday I'm not entirely sure what we will be doing, we'll be letting him make his own cake, but other than that, haven't decided yet. Thinking about a drive to Port Campbell....

Then next week we'll be cooking up a storm of soup ready to put Indy onto the Specific Carbohydrate Diet. We've had concerns about his poo for quite a while, its just not right, so we're going to give this diet a go. I have started another blog to journal our progress so that this blog doesn't get taken over by poo reports LOL, so the other blog is over here: http://ourscdjournal.blogspot.com 

In other news, we buried Sunny's placenta last weekend and planted a lemon/lime tree over it and I have just uploaded some pics of that, so hopefully will get those up in the not too distant future!