Rainbow dress awesomeness

 Knitting more, and finished this off in a week!  Apparently I have the knitting bug quite badly...  *ahem*  Here are my fave shots, especially "stink eye" at the bottom.  :D

I totally made this!

I recently took up knitting (like some aged housewife...wait...hang on!), nah seriously, it's very therapuetic.  By recently I mean a couple of weekends ago.  I could already make a knit and purl stitch, but that's it (and that was ages ago).  Anyhoo, with some help from lovely friends, I totally made this dress.  Which is too small, but still adorable. 

I made the kid, too!

 Here's the gorgeousness that is my next project, also a dress!

And if any readers are so inclined, I'm Selenegonecrazy on Ravelry (what can I say, I got the bug bad!).

Lolly and her doings

Lolly is just growing up by leaps and bounds at the moment, she is chock-full of adorable, smarts, and adventure.  Here are some things she is loving.

Aunty J's guitar, now living at our house.

She is enjoying dance and music, and I've been scouting around for some lessons for her.  I'd love to build on the natural interest she is showing, and don't play anything other than piano!  Both girls are loving having the piano and guitar and drums out in the lounge as a music space for the family.

YouTubery.

Lolly is in love with some YouTube favourites, like The Duck Song, anything by Eric Herman, the Butterfly Ball, and the clip to Alanis Morissette's  'You Learn' - which she calls "the one where the woman goes out and has adventures."  She recently leaned how to use a mouse (she mostly uses the iPad/iPhone so hadn't needed to) and can use the touchpad reliably now, too.

DinnerDad also introduced her to the retro joys of Hong Kong Phooey.

Lolly lurvs her older brother, Smash, and loves doing stunts with him.  Here she is about 3 feet off the ground on a ledge after we'd been out to a restaurant.  Sometimes mothers have to look away!

Stunts!

She is mad keen on drawing lately, after quite a hiatus, and is doing complex drawings of people and animals, with stories attached. 

Lolly is in love with her friends, and wants to visit friends or have friends over to play all. the. time.  She has entered a very social period, and when we have company will disappear for hours at a time, often feeling confused when she sees me (she can yell at me to "go away"), which I'm guessing is conflict over loving her separation from me, but still loving me, too.  I try to be supportive, but confess it can be hurtful and I do get grumpy with it.  I do think that support shouldn't look like letting your kid be mean to you, though!

The love she has of play with her friends is so beautiful to watch.  She loves pretend games, making up games is a new thing, too, as well as favourites like jumping on the jumpoline, swimming, sand pit play, and doing "crashes" on the walking machine (which resulted in quite the foot scrape a couple of weeks ago!).

She is just developing a favourite toy, a dog we bought at Ikea recently, which has to come with us places and come to bed every night.  She has three favourites, and a carry case for them, too.  She is still enjoying containers, and I find collections ("lections") in odd containers all over the house.  Some become important to her, others never get revisited.  It's a skilled mother who can tell the difference and knows which ones NOT to clean up at the end of a long day!

Lolly is MAD KEEN on pretend play (still), and her favourite is to be a puppy (mostly called "Greeny" as that's her favourite colour.  She loves you to feed her, pat her, and wear a pretend collar and leash.  It's about as adorable as you might imagine.

Oh, and she's still wearing her blue band on her leg, after months!!  It's her "thing."

So, there's a picture of Lolly at three years and eight months!  I love you Lol, you're the wild and crazy-wonderful ride of my life!

New Orthotics

Snail has her new orthotics!  We picked them up last week.

Cute cat pattern

New!

I won an award!

I'm Epilepsy Queensland's Carer of the Year!!

:D

DinnerDad nominated me and I actually won!

In a fit of irony, we couldn't go to the actual ceremony as we couldn't get a carer.  I was sorry to miss it, I've been feeling a tad flat lately, and a bit of fuss would have been lovely.

Still, an award!  Apparently there's a plaque, but I haven't seen it yet.  Will of course blow own trumpet and post pics when I get it.

An Award!

Things I Know: Slightly Blah Edition

Linking up with Yay for Home! and Things I Know.

I don't feel I know that much this week!  I had one of those "blah" weeks, neither here nor there, a waiting-to-pass week.  I spent too much time avoiding life and not enough time living it.  My kids spent too much time watching television and amusing themselves.  We did have a some lovely times with friends, but I was tired and felt flat anyway.  You know weeks like that, where the good stuff doesn't get in (like liquid into this chalk...).  Here are some things I know about this kind of week:

- I need more sleep.

- I also need time alone.

- See point one.

- Television can be a blessing, after all, we don't live in a tribe!

- I am heartily sick of television.

- Reading is a great way to avoid the world.  (It's also a great way to engage with it, but that wasn't the spirit this week).

- My kids remain awesome.

- Sometimes we all need some appreciation.

- Washing up is actually a demon sent from Hell to torment us.

- It's hot.

See, a lackluster collection of things from a lackluster me!  I hope I perk up by next week's Things I Know! :D

Pigtails

In lazy, but adorable, blogging: check out the pigtails on my little girl!

DinnerDad even managed to get double pigtails last weekend!!  Photos to follow.

Kitchen renovation, the show-off post :D

We finished the kitchen recently, with an unexpected fridge fail, which led to the purchase of a new fridge.  We lashed out on a side-by-side fridge (from a seconds warehouse).  It is veeerrrry noice! 

Then, another trip to Ikea later, we had somewhere to put the microwave and the whole kitchen seemed to come together.  Here's the new set-up.

Here's are some before shots to compare...

Old.

Old.

In progress...

New!

More new!

I'm enjoying having the kitchen finished off, and loving the white on white.  Although we sometimes think that we should have run those awesome red tiles all the way up that wall...  I guess you never really finish!

A poetic interlude

In posting-absence land.  Where I apparently live now.  Life is a bit sad and happy, up and down, full of small moments of horrible, and little joys. 

So I read this poem, and, not being one for poems in general (a shameful confession, I know), it accidently caught my attention all the way to the end.

So, here it is!

The Summer Day
Mary Oliver

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?



from New and Selected Poems, 1992
Beacon Press, Boston, MA


Indeed....

More from Sydney...

Here's the highlights from the rest of our trip last week.  More on iPhone, I took my good camera, but didn't get it out once!  I'm seriously out of the habit...

We caught the train in the Botanic Gardens on the Harbour.

Lolly took this!

I took this! ;)

Lolly says I must put the lizard photo in.

Sleeping through the Australia Museum.

Our luggage.

Lolly at the airport.

This is what your camera bag looks like if you have kids.

Things I Know: Mixed edition

Linking up with the wonderful Shae at Yay for Home!

Here are things I know this Friday:

I am lucky.  I get to look out my windows and see this!

Our garden from where I drink my coffee.

I can hold an enormous number of bags, stuffed toys, keys, phones, and foodstuffs at once, and still hold her hand while we cross the carpark (and in times gone past, carry her on one arm).  I can do the same, and still push a wheelchair with one hand.  I has the skillz. 

I am capable of more than I ever thought.

I still don't know what I want to do when I grow up.

Even when I'm a crappy parent, I'm still an awesome parent.

I'm tired!

Visit Shae for more fabulous Things I Know.  What do you know this Friday?

A day out with Aunt J

Aunty J!

While we were in Sydney, escaping from paint fumes, we had an awesome day out with my sister, Lolly's aunt J.  I'm sharing it here to sum up our great holiday break.

We had ice cream on the harbour.

We caught a ferry to Darling Harbour.  Lolly was not impressed: she spotted the ferris wheel at Luna Park and had a fit about wanting to go on it.  It's mystifying what kids fixate on sometimes, she was totally fine, then a second later, putting her cry on about not riding on a ferris wheel that up until that moment, she had no idea existed.  Also, it was windy.  She perked up, thank the gods.

View from the ferry...some bridge and opera house ;)

We patted a blue-tongue lizard (outside the small zoo there), stopped for lunch, then walked up to the Powerhouse Museum.  Much of it was closed, but we still had fun.  We saw (and were fascinated for ages with) this dancing robot arm.

My sister and I were somewhat mystified by this sign near one of the children's play areas...

Lolly gets museum knowledge from strange pod!

We got the monorail back to town, and went for a swim in the luxe hotel pool.

Then it was get kitted out for dinner with our awesome cousins at a fab Greek restaurant.  Lolly couldn't finish her delicious calamari, so we asked for a doggy bag, which Lolly is determined would actually have a picture of a dog on it.  The waiter was so charming, and he came out with this, apparently the chef tried his best to draw a dog on the container.  So lovely!

Lolly and her "doggy bag"

It was an awesome day. We miss our Aunt J xo

Ikea, or, The Place of Happiness.

We lurv Ikea round these parts.  [Well, I do, and Lolly.  Not DinnerDad or Smash.  Snail is neutral, but always loves a day out...].  Lolly and I found ourselves there couple of weeks ago at a gathering of lovely friends.  Here are some iPhone shots. 

With our "new friend" on the front of the trolley.

The kids played for AGES in the children's section, while some of us chatted.

Blurry but cute. Just after waking up from pretend naps.

Playing at the dining area.  All restaurants should have a kid's section!!

It was lovely to catch up with old friends.  And I got some cool stuff.  Ikea, I *heart* you!

International Space Lolly

We were at the Powerhouse Museum when we were in Sydney last week (hence the no blogging of late!).  We went with my sister, and had an ace day there (even if most of it was closed for building, and we were a couple of weeks too early for the Harry Potter exhibit!). 

This shot is in the model of the International Space Station they have there.  It spins, which is bloody disconcerting!  I love this photo, Lolly looks like she is ready to explore the mysteries of the universe.

More shots from our fab day out with my sis, and our trip, soon.

You know what's annoying?

Posting EVERY DAY in Blogtoberfest, except the LAST day, because you fell asleep putting your kid to bed after a long day, and didn't get up in time to post.

Yeah, that's annoying.

Here's a cute picture of my kid.

We made it to Sydney, more on our trip soon. 

Limbo

We're waiting on a result from the Qantas talks today to see whether or not there will be flights tomorrow.  We were booked to go down to Sydney tomorrow afternoon for the week while our house gets painted.  Apparently, houses that are being painted are not good places for three year olds to stay.  So we were off from Monday to Friday, DinnerDad to work-land, and Lolly and I for a break/adventure!

Catpuss of epic tragedy

But now it depends on Qantas.  So, we're waiting.  If we can't go, we'll stay at my Mum and Dad's.  Which will also be awesome! 

We drove my cat up there today, and OMG the tears and heartbreak from the three year old.  Lolly napped all the way home this afternoon, only to burst into tears as soon as she woke up, crying for 'catpuss'.  We had to call Nanna to check she was okay, and still Lolly sobbed into the phone.  Really, she misses Nanna as well.  It was awful sad. 

Fingers are crossed for our trip!

Birthdays

Seems we're off to a birthday party every second week lately!  The lovely J turned 3 this week, and we had a park gathering, with cake!, to go to on Monday.  It was a beautiful day, and all the kids played together while their mother's chat.  So, basically, awesome. 

Bad shot of an amazing dinosaur cake!

Roar!!

Oh joy, we all said, some taps right near where we sit (can you hear the sarcasm?).

Little friends, so gorgeous.

Happy birthday, J, and here's to many more as Lolly's dear friend.  xo