A Place We will Miss

Since Ben was 7 1/2 months old he has been attending daycare. He had a 6 month break as he turned 2, whilst I was at home on maternity leave with Alex, but after that he has been there until this day.
Alex joined him when he was 7 1/2 months too.

We chose this daycare as we felt it had a homely feel to it, plus Ben took an instant liking to it on the times we visited prior to him starting. He was always fascinated by what was going on and all the pictures on the wall, all the other places we visited, he never seemed that interested in them.
We have never for a moment regretted sending our boys here, this has been the 2nd place for them to grow up, the place where they do all their messy play, learn to share with more than just 2 other people and learn where they fit in with a big group.


Daycare have always been very accommodating to our needs, always being able to help us when we have required extra sessions, be it for 2 weeks or 6 months.

When Alex was first born I could ring them at 8.30 to see if they had space for Ben and he was usually there playing by 9.15.So he did quite a few extra days when Alex first arrived. It was great to have that outlet for both myself and Ben.
He got to play and have lots of attention and I got to have one on one time with Alex, or more time to sleep!

The current owners took over a month or so before Ben first started and lots has changed whilst we have been there. The rooms inside have become even bright and colourful than I remember them on our first visit.
There are so many little corners for the kids to hide in, escape to or even discover. The walls are always covered in pictures and stories of what everyone has been up to in the centre and it is always fun to find out what has been happening.
The boys have their little set routine and are so good with what happens when they arrive and leave. It makes collecting them and dropping them off so enjoyable.
So thank you so much to Glenda and her wonderful team at 'Under 5' Care and Learning.

My sons have grown so much with all your love and care.

We shall miss you all very much, we are very grateful for everything you have ever done for our family, your support and your open door to our family.

Favourite Food for Alex

Alex has taken quite a shine to Nutella. A hazelnut chocolate spread.
As the following show, he can quite happily eat it all day! Regardless of whether there is any bread around or not!




Mmm, Nutella is dreamy........can I have this every meal time?

Family Time with the Camera

Alex got very clingy the other night and it was such a cute picture, so Steve got the camera out.


Then Ben decided it was his turn to take some pictures. He is actually getting really good with the camera, ok it is pretty straight forward, place mummy or daddy in the window and press the button. Still the following 2 pictures were pretty good for a 4 year old.

As for Alex, well he just liked the pile of wet washing. He tried to sit on the side of the plastic tub and fell backwards, I just managed to shot this before he rolled over and climbed off.

SOLD

The sign says it all.......

Oh Whoops...

A word of warning from ones that know....if you are ever going to play with the digital camera and see why it won't hold the flash setting you want or anything like that, then please, please download all pictures currently stored on the camera.
This way you do not run the risk of loosing the pictures and video of your son's 4th Birthday, or the cute pictures of your 2 year old son, or the picture of the vegetables that have successfully grown in the garden.

Steve is still feeling really P*#%^! about that one, as it seems he may have accidentally, and I do believe him, wiped all the above from the camera.

Oh well such is life.

Where were you 2?

Yes it is that fateful day 6 years on and the question many will always ask is...Where were you?

I was in Hong Kong, having just flown in from New Zealand the evening before. It was 9pm in the evening and we had had a full day sight seeing and were having a quiet evening in the hotel room on the 23rd floor!
They interrupted the tv programme to show us CNN news and then we tuned into CNN to watch everything unfold.

Our biggest worry was the fact we were due to leave Hong Kong on the Thursday and fly to London! And of course London suddenly went into high security alert and shut!

So the next few days were a little weird not knowing if we could continue our holiday or not.

We got to London ok on the Friday but spent the rest of our 6 week holiday in England watching the news and wishing to go home really soon so we could get away from it all in New Zealand.

I have friends in OH and CA but I know they were all ok. All my family were either in NZ or UK so no worries there, but I felt for the people in New York.

Like everyone else I can not believe it happened, but I hope people have been able to get some sort of life back together 6 years later.

Sick Again!

No raging temperature to go with it, just 1 very grumpy little boy with raging conjunctivitis again!
He still has a runny nose and this is not helping as he is obviously wiping his nose with his hand and then wiping his eyes and hey presto...yucky eyes and a grumpy child.

So back to the eye drops again!

Haircuts

The boys have been going to a Barber for quite a while now. They just use the local one that Daddy uses. Alan's Barber Shop in Onehunga.

Ben has been really good at sitting on his own for his haircut for a while, but today was the first time that Alex actually sat on his own.

Pictures of my big boys getting their haircut.

Oh and they were both lucky enough to score a free lollipop for being such good boys.

Unconditional

The Lawyer's office called today to say that they have had verbal communication from the vendor's Lawyer to say all is fine with the 2 reports they wanted and so we have gone unconditional on the house.
Yea we have sold our house.

We have somewhere to live

So we finally couldn't wait any longer at 6.30 so we called the lady to see if we had been successful.

We have somewhere to live in Hamilton.
Yea for us, now all we need is for our house to go unconditional and we will be all sorted.

Finding Somewhere To Live

So we spent Thursday evening checking out Trade Me website for all the rental porperties in Hamilton.
We called the people about the ones we liked and we were successful in setting up about 3 viewings for saturday morning.
On Friday evening we double checked the web for any late postings, got a few calls from people we had left messages with and by Saturday morning we had 5 places to view.

So we travelled to Hamilton first thing Saturday morning and it was a good journey, apart from the part where Alex got all antsy in his seat and then threw up 10 minutes outside of Hamilton.
Yes I had taken a complete change of clothes for them both, but didn't think we would be using them within the first 2 hours!
Anyway, we successfully arrived at the first property and found a very nice old villa.
Lovely big bedrooms, new bathroom and kitchen and a huge barn like garage with so much storage.
Little things that bugged us was that there was no power sockets in one of the bedrooms! not sure on that one and also the lounge had some fixed benches in it with red cushions, this would make it very difficult to fit our furniture in.
So we left to view another, and told them we would call if interested further.
On driving to the next house we were able to drive past one of the other ones to view and called the guy and cancelled as it was not suitable.

The next house was ok, nice 4 bedrooms, but old and would have bugged me because it felt like the whole place just needed a good paint, and I don't think it was going to happen soon, so that one was off.

Someone from my Antenatal Coffee group has also just moved to Hamilton so we went and visited her after we had had a picnic lunch in the park.
Great to catch up with someone you know and I think she loved having someone just drop by, as she said, there is no one to just drop by at the moment.
Then we zoomed back down to view the last 2 houses, which were in the same street actually.
The first one was nice. 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, lounge and a seperate dining come sitting area. Nice fenced garden and generally clean with carpet throughout.
We both liked this one and actually spent 10 minutes trying to work out where we would put things.
The other one in the same street was no good, dark and small with only really 2 bedrooms and a small study, although they said it was 3 bedrooms!
Yea right as long as it was only a small person sleeping in there.

So we went back up to the other house and called the owners to say we wanted it.
The guy came out, let us have another look through and got us to fill out the papers, happily accepted a cheque for 6 weeks rent and then said he would have to give us a definite answer on Sunday when his wife was back because she was the one who dealt with this side of things, they have 5 rental properties.

So we drove away knowing that probably about 80% chance of it being ours.
So fingers and toes crossed they got in touch and let us have the place.

Daylight Saving Time

For many years people have been mumbling every March that Daylight Saving should be extended.
We always have so many more glorious days after the clocks have changed to winter time.

So a year or 2 ago an 2 MP's (Peter Dunn and Mark Holmes) ran with the idea of extending our daylight savings by about 3 weeks.
This would give people extra time to spend evenings outside, which is good for everyone getting more fresh air, but also good for the enviroment as there would be less surge on the electricty grid as everyone got home.
It would also be good for New Zealand's tourist industry as there would be longer hours for people to visit and enjoy beautiful areas within NZ.
It would also make people think that our summer had extended, because people always seem to think that summer has ended when the clocks change.

So the MP's took this to parliament at the beginning of this year, as the clocks were about to change and put their arguement forward, along with a petition signed by over 42,000 people.
They got all the backing they required and was......SUCCESSFUL

So March next year our change over from summer to winter will happen 3 weeks later than previous years.
So on Sept 30 2007, our summer daylight saving time will start and will continue right through till April 6, 2008.

This apparently does still not bring us into line with other countries and the amount of daylight savings weeks they have, but it does bring us closer.
We will extend from 24 weeks (as set in 1990) to 27 weeks.
The US has 34 weeks and Great Britain has 31, so at least we are getting closer.

So well done that person. I think New Zealand will benefit from this incredible change and so will the people.

A Mouse Trap Story

A mouse looked through the crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife open a package. What food might this contain?" The mouse wondered?
He was devastated to discover it was a mousetrap. Retreating to the farmyard, the mouse proclaimed the warning :
There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!"
The chicken clucked and scratched, raised her head and said,
"Mr. Mouse, I can tell this is a grave concern to you, but it is of no consequence to me. I cannot be bothered by it."

The mouse turned to the pig and told him,
"There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!"
The pig sympathized, but said, "I am so very sorry, Mr. Mouse, but there is nothing I can do about it but pray. Be assured you are in my prayers."

The mouse turned to the cow and said
"There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!"
The cow said, "Wow, Mr. Mouse. I'm sorry for you, but it's no skin off my nose."

So, the mouse returned to the house, head down and dejected, to face the farmer's mousetrap alone.
That very night a sound was heard throughout the house, like the sound of a mousetrap catching
its prey.
The farmer's wife rushed to see what was caught.
In the darkness, she did not see it was a venomous snake whose tail the trap had caught.
The snake bit the farmer's wife.
The farmer rushed her to the hospital, and she returned home with a fever.

Everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup's main ingredient.

But his wife's sickness continued, so friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock.
To feed them, the farmer butchered the pig.

The farmer's wife did not get well; she died!

So many people came for her funeral, the farmer had the cow slaughtered to provide enough meat for all of them.

The mouse looked upon it all from his crack in the wall with great sadness.

So, the next time you hear someone is facing a problem and think it doesn't concern you,
remember when one of us is threatened, we are all at risk.
We are all involved in this journey called life.
We must keep an eye out for one another and make an extra effort to encourage one another.

EACH OF US IS A VITAL THREAD IN ANOTHER PERSON'S TAPESTRY; OUR LIVES ARE WOVEN TOGETHER FOR A REASON.

One of the best things to hold onto in this world is a FRIEND ! ! !

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to our darling big boy Ben, 4 today.
Also happy 21st birthday to my future cousin-in-law, Daniel, he marries my cousin Kerry on Nov 17, 2007
Also to my best friend Debbie, an old school friend Kirsty and Oliver, the little boy from my antenatal group who shares his birthday with Ben.

Happy Birthday to you all, hope you have a great day.

Sick Boy Again

So as the party finished on Sunday I happen to notice Alex's eye...full blown raging conjunctivitis. At least we have a reason for the significantly high temps. Only bugger of it is that we have to go back to the emergency doctor as you can only get drugs for this through them, not straight from a pharmacy.
So to begin with we thought we would wait and visit our own doctor first thing the next day, but with another temp of 39.6, we decided we couldn't wait.
So 7.45 at night, I am having cute little conversations with Alex as we wait to see the doctor, again!
Luckily he was fab, told us of this bug going round and Alex had all the classic symptoms, so 1 script for eye drops and antibugs later and we are sailing.
Alex is just such an angel, before we got home he had already told me that he would sit on the side in the kitchen, that he would put his dummy beside him and that daddy would give him his medicine and that mummy would put the stuff in his eyes.
And true to his word we have had no trouble getting any of this stuff into him, he has been very cooperative with it all.

Birthday Party

So we invited a few little friends over and had a little party to celebrate Ben's 4th Birthday.
We did nothing too special, just as it happens to turn out, the same as last year, a little trip on a model train.
Everyone really enjoyed it, weather turned out great and then it was back home for a little party tea and cake.

The kids all got on so well and were racing all around the house.
They all particularly enjoyed playing hide n seek. So it was really cute to capture Ben and Alex both taking a turn at seeking.
They both took it so seriously and stood with their hands over their faces whilst counting to 10.

Carrot

Back in January we successfully pulled down the plum tree in the garden.

In it's place we put a small vegetable garden. We didn't put in anything special this year, we were more interested to see if we could actually grow anything, plus we had a feeling we wouldn't be here.

We have tried to keep Ben interested in this at times, and he actually enjoyed helping daddy plant all the seeds.

So it was wonderful yesterday morning when he came running to find me with a baby carrot that they had just harvested.

Think this is probably the only thing we will get out of the little garden, not sure if anything else has actually grown, but hey 1 carrot is good.

Sick Car

So here we are running all over the house on Sunday morning, trying to get it looking ok for the open home. Our hearts are really not in it and the boys are driving us mad.
We have got the Real Estate people coming at 10.30 with the new owners who want to do their building inspection prior to the open home and at 9.30 I am ready to cancel the whole thing.
I have got ants running up the wall in the kitchen, seems there is something they like about the kitchen window which is attracting them in droves, wish I knew what it was as the place is spotless and they seem to be out looking for stuff rather than actually finding anything and sending out the troops.

I can't believe we manage to pull it off, but only just, I am still on my hands and knees cleaning the floor as they arrive to inspect the place.
So while I finish off Steve puts the boys in the car ready for us to just nip to the supermarket for the little things we have forgotten for the party today.
All ready and set to go, we say bye and jump in the car.
Real shame the car doesn't actually want to go anywhere!!!

So there we are, someone walking up the driveway to see the house and us sat in the garage cursing the car.
So plan 2 comes into action.
Again I jump into Grandma's car with a child and go to the supermarket and yet again Steve calls the Roadside Rescue and waits for them to come and visit us.

Out arrives the same man as last night, who then apologises for not checking properly the night before. Does the little check he should have done yesterday and annouces that sadly we need a new battery.
Funny thing is this doesn't shock us, as there is something about the car that hasn't seemed right for a week or 2, but with the service due next month we just thought it was getting ready for a good tune up.

All this and then it starts to rain! Wouldn't mind except we are meant to be going on a train ride this afternoon.

Disaster

I don't know so much that yesterday was a complete disaster, but everything sure as hell went hay wire if it could!!
It started late on Friday evening when the Real Estate Office called to confirm our Open Home for this weekend. I know what you are thinking, you have sold why run an open home? Well until it goes unconditional in 7 working days time, we still need to cover ourselves in case it all fell over. Not that we are too worried as the only things they had to sort was a builders report and a LIM report from the council. As mentioned before, we are not worried about the LIM and we are sure there is nothing they will find in a builders inspection.
Anyway, so they tell us everything is all set for the showing on SUNDAY at 11.
No I say, we have a 4 year old birthday party that day, we can't accomodate an open home as well. Luckily Jane calls a little later and apologises and smooths it all out. But the open home is still on the Sunday.

So on Saturday morning we go off and do our weekly shopping, but Alex just doesn't seem himself, a real handfull in the shop and half a sleep by the time we get home at 11, so I take him into bed and there is where he stayes for the next 3 hours!
This is the first thing to jump out at me, the next was the raging temp he had when he woke up! About 38.7, so we do the usual of stripping him off, juice and Panadol and I spend the next hour or so sitting with a clinging little boy.
As I am preparing dinner Steve thinks he should see a doctor, because he had only not long ago finished antibugs for an ear infection and if it was relapse we wanted to get on top of it straight away. Ok I say we will go after dinner.
Anyway, after dinner Ben kicks up a huge fuss and so we have to have a family trip out to the emergency medical centre otherwise we will never hear the end of it from Ben.

This was a good idea until we got to the garage where we happen to notice the light is on inside the car! Our first thought is that Ben, who had just been outside, had obviously been playing with the car door and not closed it properly, unfortunately when we try to go we find this to not be the case. ONE DEAD BATTERY.
Don't you just love little boys for playing, we think Ben must have switched the inside light to ON earlier in the day and we hadn't noticed and then it drained the battery, very weird, but hey seemed good idea at the time.
So Steve and Ben called the State Roadside Rescue and I take Alex to the doctors. Thank god for Grandma and Grandad's car, that is with us until they get back here in 2 weeks time.

One very high temp later but no other symptoms, they tell us to keep going with the Panadol and have a good night. Yea right, shall I call you at 3am when he is screaming the house down!?

We get home just in time to see the nice man start our car and laugh a long with us at what a delight little kids are.
Alex decides then that he is feeling alright and really wants to get in the bath, so I let him splash for 2 minutes, unfortunately I don't think it did him much good because 5 mintues after getting out he is shaking away and has a temp of 39.7!
All I can think about is "why does someone always have to be sick when there is a child's birthday in the family" can see Ben's party tomorrow being really great with Alex sick!

Lucky for us though he finally settled and crashed for the whole night, which was good.

Moon Eclipse

Last Tuesday (28th) the Southern Hemisphere had the wonderful pleasure of a total eclipse of the moon at about 9 in the evening.

It was quite spectacular in between the odd bit of fast moving cloud that kept coming over.

Now I thought I would try and capture some pictures of this on the digital, of course I had a feeling I wouldn't get much with just our little camera, and also I had never really taken any nights shots before.

So I was well impressed with what I actually got, although I did learn alot along the way, like you have to give the camera time to actually register the picture before you move, although the results I got from moving are actually way cool.

So this little collection of snaps shows you some of my more spectacular shots I managed to create (moving by accident of course) and also the one or two that actually show you the eclipse.

No this is not cloud around the moon, this is what happens when you move before the picture is complete.

Waitakere Tramline

Because we have been spending so much time sorting the house out, we decided to pre plan something special for the boys as they have been so good during our house selling time.

So last weekend we went on this little adventure because it was a train of sorts and trains go down very nicely in this house. It was nice to see the dam at the end but not our main reason for taking the trip.

Nestled in the beautiful Waitakere Ranges, approximately 30 minutes from Auckland's CBD is the Waitakere Tramline.
Built in the early 1900's for the construction of the Waitakere Dam, this 2-foot gauge tramline is a working piece of history.
The upper 2.5 km portion of the line has been retained by Watercare for maintenance of the pipeline. The lower 3.5 km portion, was removed around 1927.
This tramline takes you on the 2.5 km portion so you can visit the dam at the end.

During the journey, we past through two tunnels, one was very long, about 1 km, can't say the boys were too thrilled with this small dark tunnel that seemed to go on for ever, but they liked the small amount of glowworms that we got to see just before the end of the tunnel, Alex said they looked like stars. They did enjoy going over the small bridges and viaducts though.
When we stop at the end of the line you had the opportunity to walk up the steps and onto the top of the dam. There was a lot of steps, a little steep and seemed to go up and up.

Once at the top it was just 20m to the edge of the dam, which looked so nice on one side all that water, the other side took a bit of getting use to, because it just dropped down to the bottom and believe me it was a long way down!

Can you spot the train in the trees?

Where were you?

I can not believe that it has been 10 years since the unfortunate death of Lady Diana.
I think it will always be one of those topics that people will always say 'Where were you when...?" just like 9/11.

So where was I 10 years ago....?

I was in England. It was a public holiday weekend and mum and I had some family friends visiting for the weekend.
I remember mum kept coming into my room really early in the morning, but I couldn't be bothered to turn over and see what she wanted, so I ignored her, although on about the 3rd visit I finally turned over and asked her what she wanted? (It was a public holiday so why did I need to wake up early?)
That is when she said "Lady Diana has died!"
So after informing me of what she knew, we woke our visitors up, mainly because Sky was hooked up in the room they were sleeping in and we needed to turn it on and see what was happening.
And that is pretty much how we spent the rest of the day, with the tv on watching the unfolding events as we learnt she was hurt, to she was critical to she had died, to when she would come back to England to whether Charles would go and fetch her!
You have to remember that England woke to this news, as it had all happened during the night. So spending the day was probably what most of England did that day.

The rest of that following week was quite a blur, so much news coverage, so much planning going on.
I actually worked on the day of the funeral and I was scrubbed in a case right up until the start of the funeral, but then I got to watch the last part and the procession up the motorway to her final resting place on the tv in the tea room.

The whole week was so surreal and something I will never forget, a little like 9/11 (I was in Hong Kong and London, but that is another story!)

So if you have 2 minutes, take the time to remember where you were, what you were doing and look at where you are now?

Me, in 10 years I have moved to New Zealand, had several different jobs within the same company, met Steve, brought a house and sold one too! Had my parents move to NZ and almost my brother (2 1/2 weeks till they get here) had 2 gorgeous sons, Ben, 4 next week and Alex 2 1/4 and now we are about to commence a new part of our family's journey by moving to Hamilton.
So compared to where I was 10 years ago and what I am doing now, a lot has happened.

The House

You can read the whole story here, but in a nut shell it will tell you that

WE HAVE SOLD OUR HOUSE !!

Blogging

I have just been surfing back through my own blog!!
I have been blogging for just over 2 years now.
It is quite fun going back and seeing what I wrote, what pictures I put on there and what everyone looks like. This is particularly interesting as I started blogging when Alex was only 9 weeks old and he is now 2, so lots of changes in the pictures for the boys.
If you have your own blog, then take the time sometime to revisit it and see what was happening to you this time last year or even the year before.

You will have quite a laugh.

Miracles

A little girl went to her bedroom and pulled a glass jar from its hiding place in the closet.
She poured the change out on the floor and counted it carefully. Three times, even.
The total had to be exactly perfect. No chance here for mistakes.
Carefully placing the coins back in the jar and twisting on the cap, she slipped out the back door and made her way 6 blocks to Rexall's Drug Store with the big red Indian Chief sign above the door.
She waited patiently for the pharmacist to give her some attention, but he was too busy at this moment. Tess twisted her feet to make a scuffing noise. Nothing.
She cleared her throat with the most disgusting sound she could muster.
No good.
Finally she took a quarter from her jar and banged it on the glass counter. That did it!
"And what do you want?" the pharmacist asked in an annoyed tone of voice. I'm talking to my brother from Chicago whom I haven't seen in ages," he said without waiting for a reply to his question
"Well, I want to talk to you about my brother," Tess answered back in the same annoyed tone. "He's really, really sick..and I want to buy a miracle."
"I beg your pardon?" said the pharmacist.
"His name is Andrew and he has something bad growing inside his head and my Daddy says only a miracle can save him now. So how much does a miracle cost?"
"We don't sell miracles here, little girl. I'm sorry but I can't help you," the pharmacist said, softening a little.
"Listen, I have the money to pay for it. If it isn't enough, I will get the rest. Just tell me how much it costs?"

The pharmacist's brother was a well dressed man. He stooped down and asked the little girl, "What kind of a miracle does your brother need?"
" I don't know," Tess replied with her eyes welling up. I just know he's really sick and Mommy says he needs an operation. But my Daddy can't pay for it, so I want to use my money."
"How much do you have?" asked the man from Chicago .
"One dollar and eleven cents," Tess answered barely audibly.
"And it's all the money I have, but I can get some more if I need to."
"Well, what a coincidence," smiled the man.
"A dollar and eleven cents.....the exact price of a miracle for little brothers."
He took her money in one hand and with the other hand he grasped her mitten and said "Take me to where you live. I want to see your brother and meet your parents. Let's see if I have the miracle you need."
That well dressed man was Dr. Carlton Armstrong, a surgeon, specializing in neuro-surgery.

The operation was completed free of charge and it wasn't long until Andrew was home again and doing well.
Mom and Dad were happily talking about the chain of events that had led them to this place. "That surgery," her Mom whispered, "was a real miracle. I wonder how much it would have cost?"
Tess smiled.
She knew exactly how much a miracle cost...one dollar and eleven cents....plus the faith of a little child.

In our lives, we never know how many miracles we will need.
A miracle is not the suspension of natural law, but the operation of a higher law.
I know you'll keep the ball moving!
Here it goes.
Throw it back to someone who means something to you!

A ball is a circle, no beginning, no end.
It keeps us together like our Circle of Friends.
But the treasure inside for you to see is the treasure of friendship you've granted to me.
Today I pass the friendship ball to you.
Pass it on to someone who is a friend to you.

MY OATH TO YOU...
When you are sad.....I will dry your tears.
When you are scared.....I will comfort your fears.
When you are worried.....I will give you hope.
When you are confused.....I will help you cope.
And when you are lost....And can't see the light, I shall be your beacon.....Shining ever so bright.

This is my oath.....I pledge till the end.
Why you may ask?

Because you're my friend.

Alex

Yesterday Alex managed to be very cute, not so cute and back to really cute, but hey that is the life of a typical 2 year old

He started off by being so cute sitting and reading to himself from his favourite book of the moment "Little Bear Lost"
You could hear him telling himself the story of how Little Bear was found in the picnic basket. So cute.
Unfortunately this didn't last too long....whilst cleaning for the open home, Alex decided to draw in pencil all over the wall (must be something in the water, as Ben did exactly the same thing at Daycare on Friday. That is another story and I will fill you in when I get the pictures!)

So we made him help us clean it off the wall.

Then later in the day, when he had woken from his afternoon nap, he snuggled up with daddy and ate a big plate of fruit. He just loves Kiwi fruit and grapes.

Independent Alex

The following is a Teacher story sent to us from Alex's Daycare.

A Learning and Teaching Story for Alex Trotter
Teacher: Glenda
Date: 23 August 2007

Alex you really impress me with your perseverance and independence.
For several days now I have noticed that when you get out of bed in the afternoon you sit on the mat and try very hard to put on your own socks and shoes.
This is a very complex business and I have known you to sit for at least ten minutes trying to get it right. I showed you how the heel part of the sock has to go around the back and you have nearly mastered that.
Next the shoes have a tongue inside them that make it hard to push your foot down inside. Luckily once we get that bit right you can do the Velcro fastening yourself. Today you even had them on the correct feet

Well done Alex. I love the way you don’t sit around expecting an adult to do everything for you. Most other two year olds would just wander off bare footed.

Teachers Response:
Alex is patient and keen to be responsible for himself.
He is showing a desire to be independent and keeps trying without showing frustration.
Keep encouraging and praising Alex for his efforts in self care.

Paul Potts

WOW
To anyone in England, I do realise that this is an old name to you, to everyone else around the world, this name is just beginning to mean something.
We found out about this guy here in NZ at the end of July, when they covered the promotion of his first album.
Suddenly on the tv screens you had Paul's first audition video being shown, the one where he walks on stage, in a wrinkled suit, very nervous and announced he would sing opera. The one where the judges just looked at each other as if to say 'oh great, 2 minutes of pain' and ended in tears, smiling at each other and nodding. The one where the judges tell him his days of selling mobile phones is numbered because he is about to become a megastar!

It gives me shivers just thinking about it. It was amazing, it can make me all choked up just watching it, and believe me I have watched it on the official website several times. On there you will find his semi final performance, his final performance and everything he has been doing since that magical week in June.


It is one of those feel good stories that everyone always wishes for, always hopes would happen to them and always makes them say 'they deserved it' when it happens to someone else.

Paul Potts, you deserved this. Well done.

Jokes

Now I like jokes just as much as the next guy, so to come across a blog site that just lists jokes is the best.
Sometimes I find them not so funny, but others days they really make me smile :)

Seeing as I think you should smile and laugh often, then this site is just what everyone needs.

Family Blogging

Seems I have started something within my own family. In the last week my little brother and my mother have both got into blogging, my brother in a serious way and my mum is just starting out.

So let me tell you a little about my family.
Well you have me, Kathryn, nearly 37 years old, Registered Nurse who lives in New Zealand after moving here, on my own just under 10 years ago. I am the partner of Steve, for almost 8 years now, wow where does the time go?
He is the one that has just secured a new job in Hamilton, about 1 1/2 hours south of Auckland, thus the reason why we are moving in October to Hamilton (you can check out our moving status here).
We met at work, of all places! And actually worked in the same department (Operating Theatres) for nearly 2 years before I finally agreed to go out with him, much to the happiness of the whole theatre department who were sick of us not actually getting our act together. Don't you just love doctors and nurses for match making!

We are lucky enough to have 2 lovely little rascals called Ben and Alex. Ben is just turning 4 and Alex is 2 1/4. You could never ask for 2 children so different, but then if they were the same life would be so boring!

Then you have my baby brother, Iain. He has just turned 35 and emigrates to New Zealand on 14th September with his wife Claire and their 2 little rascals Ellis(6) and Harvey(3)
They are going to be living in Rotorua, about an hour away from us in Hamilton, so I am sure we will get to see them often, especially as our boys are all about the same age, it will be so cool for the 4 cousins to get to know each other etc.
You can check out what Iain and crew are doing here.

Then you have our parents, who at present are in Dubai, UAE. They also live in Rotorua (emigrated out here in 2001) but are currently in Dubai for a little while. You can check out what they are up to here.

So that is us, at present.
My baby brother has actually challenged me to a "blog off" He is a head of me in the design stakes, but I think I am a head with hands down as I am keeping 2 blogs going at once and he only has 1.
Be interesting to see what he comes up with on his blog.

Spelling Test for Bloggers

Found this small spelling test on another blog I follow.

Go and have a look, only 15 questions on spelling. I got 2 wrong, which was good, especially as I always try to make sure everything is spelt correctly

I Scored a 87%!

Mingle² - Free Online Dating

Pictures

The middle of August in New Zealand is winter, and yes we have our fair share of crap weather, but then slipped into the middle of it all you get a day like today. The sky is so blue, the sun is warm and your spirit gets raised at least 200%.

This is what makes it so nice living here over the UK, you don't get days like this in the middle of winter in England. As our front deck gets all the sun all day, then it was silly not to have a bench or 2 out there to enjoy the sunshine with. We regularly have lunch out there. Show me a child that can resist bubbles. Ben and Alex love them, but then so does mummy.Ben decided to help me with the washing. How could I not let him help me hang things up? At least they were pegged up, I can work on the straightness another time(I know picky picky at least he is helping) This is what I like to see....a man on his knees working!

Toilet Training

Our biggest fight with Ben at present is getting toilet training sorted. We have only been going at this since January!

He is dry during the day with the exception of #2's. Try as we might we can not get him to use the toilet or to even register with us that he needs to go or has even been.

So imagine our delight this morning when he came running through the house saying he needed to go toilet.

And that is exactly what he did, sat on the toilet and did his business.

Of course there were huge cheers, lots of Hi 5's and the promise of a big reward from the toy shop.

We are not going to mention it to him again, maybe if we just get on with things he will go again tomorrow all by himself? I do hope so, as at the rate we are going Alex is going to be ready to be trained and we won't have finished with Ben!

Whilst the Open Home was on we took the boys to the aformentioned toy shop. Ben is into Dora and Thomas the Train. Seeing as there was nothing little in the Thomas range that he needed, he came away with a Dora jigsaw puzzle as his big reward for todays efforts.

Mowing

When we got home from work today, Steve went and finished mowing the remaining little sections in the garden ready for the Open Home tomorrow.

He had a little helper in this project, one who seems to love the mower!

So there is Alex with his own little mower, assisting daddy to the best of his ability, just such a shame his mower doesn't actually cut anything! Would be so helpful if it did.

It was so funny watching him help daddy, as everytime Steve turned the mower off to empty the catcher bin, Alex would stop as well and turn the knob on his mower, at the same time as announcing to daddy 'I turn mower off too' then he would help empty the bin into the bag and then help put the catcher back on the mower.

He helped daddy do the whole lawn out the back.

New Word

Ben has a new word, well he gets them occassionally.
The new word of the moment is 'but'!
It is used in just about every conversation you have with him now, he always manages to answer you with 'but mum' or 'but I' or even 'but this'

His other favorite word at present is 'just'
You ask him to do something and you will be greated with 'I just' as in 'I just do this' or 'I just got to'

Sometimes it is cute, othertimes it is so annoying, but then that is the life with a 4 year old.

Blogging

Everynow and then when I have finished posting, I will click the button at the top of the blog page that says 'next blog'
I have found some wonderful blogs by doing this.

My favourite would have to be The McNulty Quads, a wonderful couple who had quads May 2006, 3 girls and a boy. Their whole story is on the blog, so if you have the time it is a wonderful read.
Through keeping up to date with what the McNulty's are up to I came across another blog of a couple in Texas who has just had quads, The Steece's, although these little darlings were only born Aug 1, 2007, so at present are only 2 weeks old.
They have 3 boys and a girl. Again their whole story is on the blog and if you have the time is lovely to read.

So the next time you have nothing to do (yea right!) why not use the 'next blog' button at the top of the page and see where it takes you and what you might find.

Brushing Teeth

It seems to have taken forever to get the boys to really be into brushing their teeth.

Now I do realise that this will be an ongoing battle for the rest of their born life, whilst they live at home. I will always be nagging them about it, well, until they get girlfriends and then I will be for ever complaining that I can't get anytime in the bathroom!

Anyway, we are still having trouble getting them to brush their teeth twice a day, but at least we seem to have conquered bedtimes.

Photographer

On Tuesday the photographer came to the house from the Real Estate Agent.
I had of course spent the last 2 days running around trying to make the place look nice. Now I didn't want the place to look perfect (impossible) but I at least wanted it to look nice and welcoming. Seeing as people would look at these pictures to decide if they wanted to attend the Open Home.

I got a little stressed as the man arrived, but then I lost it completely when Steve pointed out to me that I didn't want to go into the boys room?! In the 5 minutes before the man got there they had decided to play Hide & Seek in their room! Consequently mummy had a momentary breakdown, threw Alex out the door and just sobbed.
I recovered quite quickly, but I was still not a happy person, so I followed the photographer around the house making sure he got some good shots of our house.

On Friday they let us know that it was now listed on the website. It was really weird listening to someone else promote your house.

Sick Boy!!!

Late Saturday night I went and checked the boys before going to bed myself.

And what do I find....a little man (Alex) with a raging temperature, 39.5 deg. So a quick whip out of bed, strip him off, give him panadol and lots of juice.

An hour later the temperature hadn't broken but he was nicely asleep in his bed and in fact that is where he stayed until about 4am, when he came to find mummy.

He snuggled in with me and then about 6am he was running a temp again, back up there in the 39's, so more stripping off, more panadol, more juice and more sitting with him.

He stayed quite active during the day, even though his temp never came down below about 38.2 deg. He even took a really nice nap in the afternoon.

But when he woke up he was not a happy chappy, and for 2 hours was grizzly, moaning and crying. He already had a lovely cough, which the doctor had said was viral and would just have to do its course on its own, but I had a feeling something else was bubbling in there somewhere. So I eventually decided to take him to the emergency doctor.

Now every mother will tell you, you don't take your child to the emergency doctor at 5pm on a Sunday night. Worst time of the week to go, but in fact it was really not bad, only about 3 other people waiting and when we had finished there was no one waiting!

Wish I could have said the same for the Chemist, seems it was the only open Chemist in the area and so everyone was going there to get their scripts filled.

But with raging ear infections in both ears, we had to be there. Needed those antibiotics!

We dosed him up at 6 when we got home and we woke him up at midnight to get more into him, by 7am today he was a different person, thank god for the power of antibiotics. Luckily that meant he was fine to go to Daycare. What a cruel mother I am.

Sleeping

I can't say that we did anything really wild yesterday. Ben had an unexpected play date with his little friend Kaitlyn, but that was about all.

So after dinner, whilst watching the news, Ben snuggled with me and consequently fell a sleep.

Kindergarten

In New Zealand kids can go to Kindergarten sometime after they turn 3, now the age that they actually get to go can vary varstly between suburbs within one town, just by how many children in the area are registered for Kindy.
You can register children at 2, and so we did with Ben. We just have with Alex as well.

Now we always knew that the chances of Ben ever actually attending a Kindy in Auckland was very slim as I currently work 3 days a week and they like you to commit to at least 3 afternoons, usually between 12.15 and 2.45.
Thus the problem, because of the times and with me working, he was never going to go because it was not convenient, but with moving to Hamilton we are pretty sure that he will attend down there because I won't be working to begin with and therefore he won't be attending daycare, and I really want him to have something to do, mainly for my sanity, I don't think I will survive with both of them at home 24/7!

Well the Kindy that we have been registered at, has changed the age, due to huge numbers enrolling and Ben is still not in there yet, YET being the word.
Here we are, just under 10 weeks until we are all totally moved and now the Kindy have got in touch to say would we like Ben to go 3 afternoons a week? As of next week!
Talk about notice, they call on Friday and ask if I would like him to go on Tuesday.

Of course we have had to decline the position, but considering we have been waiting since January for a place, I just knew it would come up just as we moved!