One of those days.

At one point this afternoon I was one the phone about a forum I'm involved in that was down, had an electrician here rewiring some lights the possums had knocked out, Lolly screaming for a boob, and Snail on the couch recovering from a major seizure.  I also tripped over the dog.

Oh yeah.

So here is a photo of Lolly conked on our couch at 6.30pm.  Aww... an early night, you think.  Oh no, this is just a NAP, she's still awake now!  ...slightly manic laugh trailing off into brittle silence...

Dora and a Backpack

Further to my post about television, I have to add that Lolly has gone crazy for Dora the Explorer and Go, Diego, Go!!  Seriously crazy.  She has been sick for a few days with a virus, and quite a bad fever and fever rash, so there's been lots of television round these parts since Sunday.  Dora is quite lovely, a little irritating for grown ups, but I can totally see the attraction for Lolly, it's almost perfectly at her developmental stage, she LOVES it!

She has a Backyardigan's backpack that we got from the Ekka this year, and it has undergone a revival as "Backpack!!".  She wears it round the house and puts things in it, just like Dora.  Too cute.  Here, she's showing DinnerDad some stuff from her backpack.

Here is the cute face that goes with the backpack! 

So Dora definately needs to go on the television list :D

Getting Rid of it All...or at least Some...

We have been clearing and cleaning around here lately, in preparation for doing up our house.  Part of this big clear out involved taking everything out of our shed.  And it's a big shed.  It was stuffed with all of our stuff (okay, mostly my stuff) which has been there, virtually untouched, since we moved in here years ago.  A lot of it was rusty and mouldy and a lot of it was just old and not needed anymore. 

There were couches and clothes and chairs and the top of a bar, and bits and peices everywhere!  We filled an eight square metre skip with all this stuff!!!  I say we, but I mean DinnerDad and Smash.  The girls and I went down at the end of things to poke in the boxes and pick what to keep.  Apparently the spider population down in that shed was tres impressive.  I was somewhat relieved to miss it.  ;)

Here it is, full to the brim with our crap.  That's 8 square meters of crap!

In the process, DinnerDad and Smash cleaned out the garage - wow, it's tidy in there!  Notice the awesome motorbike :D

The giant shed, now a gardener's dream!

In order to get the stuff from the shed to the skip, DinnerDad and Smash spend a good while tidying up the "road" part of the garden that goes round the back, from our driveway.  It was seriously overgrown, wish I had a before pic!  Actually, this shot of Mr Possum Catcher letting the possum go was of the very spot I was standing to take the After shot below, but before the tidy up, which gives you an idea of how bad it had gotten. 

Here's our dog speeding down the newly tidy "road".   In case you're interested, our house is up one level to the right, and to the left is a very overgrown second level of "road" and bush down a gully.  

That is a LOT of crap we threw out! I am feeling very environmentally irresponsible, having just that sheer amount of stuff to throw out!  That is just so much consumption, most of it gone to waste.  I suppose I used it at one point in life...

I've kept some things - some boxes of books to sell, and my comic collection, which I'm also getting up for sale at some stage.  And my diaries, stuff from school days, memory stuff that I need to sort and file.   We do feel lighter!

Little visitors

Last week we had some excitement round casa Selene...we finally booked a possum catcher to come and nab our roof-dwelling possums and fix the hole in our roof!  He came and set three traps, and the next day, excitment!

Lolly holding up one of her building blocks to "catch possums in the roof"!

She's actually facing the wrong way, which is even more adorable!

 Wow!

Lolly checks the bubba out carefully.

Too cute!

 Because the only issue was some missing tiles that we fixed, and the regulations about releasing possums as a protected species, we let them go in our yard (we have a big yard lol).

Mr Possum letting them go.

Mumma possum went for a quiet hidey hole, but teenaged possum went right up a tree!

We heard them that night trying to bust back in, but they can't now, so they've probably set up somewhere nearby in the bushland in our yard.  It was very excitement and Lolly enjoyed herself greatly!

Dig!

Lolly and I are sick, she is very low with a fever, poor love, so just a couple of photos of our garden digging yesterday (when she was sick, but much more herself).

Lovely girl.

Digging with Dadda.

One of our roses!

Short today, remind me to write more on my research of the usefulness (or otherwise) of treating children's fever with drugs in a future post, I found some interesting stuff in my web travels this morning! 

Still, at least I posted something :D

Handy things for the kid in the chair :D

Over the years we've come across a few things that help us out with the realities of Snail's disability, so here are some of them!

These plates - OMG I can't tell you how great they are.  The bowl is pretty awesome, too.  Under the plate is a fitting for the large suction cup that sticks to the table.  The suction cup and curved edge mean she can much more easily feed herself, though she does grump about this a LOT :D  They also go through the dishwasher.  We have two, and use them every meal, they've lasted really well.

These bendable spoons, though we did notice that going through the dishwasher wasn't a good idea, as water got down the handle :(  Still, she did handle the spoon well and it's a great idea.  We have a fork as well, but don't use it much as it's very large, a bit big for her mouth.

Brolly sheets.  These rock!

These are funky and not just white :D  I have two, which I find is plenty for normal washing.  They are really effective, and save heaps of washing as they protect the sheets underneath.  We also have these chair pads, which we use in the car (since we upgraded the seat of the wheelchair to a waterproof fabric, we don't need em in the chair anymore - thank the gods!)

And the waterproof doona cover, which saves constantly having to wash the doona itself!

I found these at a local baby shop - they fit round the popper juice box, which Snail can never hold herself due to her hands of crushing :D  They stop the squeeze of death.

And these are our sippy cup of choice, the Sistema Dinkee cup.  We sneakily swap the cup with handles to match with the top with a straw at the shop, lol.  Don't tell anyone :D

My final tip is for carrying medication with you when you have a toddler too.  Snail has Midazolam for seizures, and we take one vial with us when we go out.  I worry heaps about Lolly getting into it, but so far this has worked.  We wrap it in alfoil, then put it inside a sealable plastic bag, then put that inside a zip up sunglasses case!  It's portable, easy to find, and I feel that it would take Lolly long enough to get inside it for me to find her and stop her!  I'm on the lookout for a better solution now Lolly is getting older, something that can lock, but that I can still open relatively easily if I need to use it.

Blogtoberfest!

I am commiting this year to doing a post a day in October, via the fab Blogtoberfest!  Check it out here at tinniegirl.

If you'd like to join up, head on over and add yourself to the list! 

I've really enjoyed blogging more often lately, as well as commenting and participating on other people's blogs, and wanted the challenge of posting something every day.  So here we go!  Well, as of yesterday, there we went :D  Happy Blogtoberfest!