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January 2nd, 2009
08:09 pm
Here we are, back in the land of How Things Never Change. I just found my daughter sitting in an entire bottle of bubble bath that just happened to be within arms reach when she was at the basin brushing her teeth. I guess her arms have grown a couple of centimetres recently.
We are home by ourselves tonight as Ben & Brayden have gone to the beach camping tonight with a few other friends and their kids. It's been such a full on couple of weeks that I'm not sure Brayden even remembers what his own bed feels like, but these things happen at this time of year!
So our break in Perth was really good, although I didn't get to do nearly as much relaxing as I would have hoped. This was fairly predictable, but I was hopeful nevertheless! It did feel good not to be running around after the kids were in bed tidying up and doing dishes etc though. I just left all of the mess and sat on the couch....was lovely! We had a pool and an outdoor spa, though we only used the pool given my present condition. The kids loved feeding the horses and the chooks, and I loved having something to feed all of the food scraps to! Spent the early part of last week doing the last of our xmas shopping for each other (the kids were taken care of), which wasn't too difficult considering we had both cars. Wednesday night was the traditional xmas eve family feast at Ben's mums which was great - the kids got to open a present each from Ben's aunty & uncle (who never had kids of their own so spoil ours rotten), which they both loved and which kept them occupied while the adults socialised. Our Secret Santa was lots of fun, although I was one of the first ones to choose and the present I got (and really liked) got claimed by someone else and the second one I got I didn't like as much. Had to put the kids to sleep in the same room which definitely gave me a taste of things to come in the next month or so....nightmare!! So not looking forward to them sharing, but we don't have a choice unfortunately. Anyway, it was a very late night and by the time we got home, transferred the kids, finished off a bit of wrapping, tidied up, filled stockings and carted all the presents from their hiding places to under the tree, it was almost 2am by the time I got to bed. It was about the same time last year after Ben & I finished putting the swing set/slide together and I thought this year would be different...pfft!
Christmas Day was great...so much fun...the kids are at such great ages for it...especially Brayden, and we were all very much in the xmas spirit. Tahni was first to surface and as we were also upstairs, she sat on our bed going through the contents of her stocking before we heard the squeals from Brayden about half an hr later. I think it went something like "Oh my goodness goshness! Mummy look what Father Christmas did to our Christmas tree!" So cute. I was hoping to get downstairs before he woke up to get it on video camera but was too late unfortunately. We were so engrossed in what Tahni was doing that we didn't hear his door open. Anyway the contents of their stocking kept them occupied for long enough for us all to have some breakfast & freshen up before we started with the loot under the tree. Fortunately they are also not quite at the ages when they just CAN'T POSSIBLY WAIT...not sure that we will have the same success this year though! They loved all of their presents and it was nice for them to have some new things to play with finally! We obviously didn't take any of their regular toys with us, so they had been a bit bored at times and we had to resort to a couple of cheap colouring books etc pre-xmas. Ben's mum & grandma came about mid-morning, we all had lunch together and they stayed till about 4pm, then just the four of us spent the rest of the afternoon going for a swim and relaxing. It was very different for me not being with my family and I did miss it, especially the kids being able to share their excitement with Harlee & Mia, but on the other hand it was nice to just be together as a family too and not be totally run off our feet. I am looking forward to staying home next year though...sorry, THIS year!, and being with everyone. The weather was just right the whole time - nice and mild, and it appears we timed it just right. Was 39 the day after we left and has stayed hot ever since, with the forecast the same for the next week too. Not quite as bad here thankfully, but still hot. We didn't get any of the storms that they had down here the day after we left, just really strong winds. Someone was definitely on our side!
Boxing Day we took the kids to Whiteman Park and rode the steam train, checked out the Wildlife Park and had some lunch, which was more nice family time. It did get quite warm though and we were all pretty exhausted by the end of it. Especially me in my waddling, swollen-feet state. On Saturday I had hoped to be able to spend the day packing and getting ready to go home at a nice leisurely pace, but ended up having visitors (Perth friends & fam) ALLL day....the last of which didn't leave until nearly 11pm that night, so there went that idea! Hence by the time we finally got going after a completely crazy, hectic & stressful morning, it was after 1pm. I beat Ben home by about 45 minutes, then when we got home we had to do a quick unpack and re-pack and head out to my mum & dads so they could see the kids and give them their xmas presents. We had worked out this was really the only day we could do it, unless we waited until this coming weekend. We had just hoped to get there in time for lunch, not dinner! Both the kids had had decent sleeps in the car, so it wasn't too bad. We had a bbq for tea, the kids opened their last presents (finally), and we all stayed the night and headed home early the next morning, as I had a docs appt at 9.30am. Crazy, crazy! I was very pleased to discover though that not only had I not put on any weight, I'd actually lost about 200g...yay! Baby is on the smallish side, but I'm not really concerned about that! He/she is growing well, just heading for probably around 7lb at this stage. Tahni was 7lb 1oz, so this goes a bit further to confirming my suspicions that it is another girl.
Tues & Wed were spent up to my eyeballs in washing, unpacking, shopping and trying to find homes for the mountain of STUFF we brought home. I didn't get a chance to de-clutter the kids rooms and get rid of their old toys before we left, so I have to try and do that over the weekend. At which point we will begin the process of moving Tahni into Brayden's room *shudder*. She will go in there in her cot at first, until they both get used to the idea, then we'll put her 'big bed' in there. I hate the fact that there will be no more sleep-ins by either one of them which they currently do have if they've had a big day or big few days for whatever reason, as the minute one is awake the other one will also be awake, but these things happen when bedrooms are shared. Mum will just have to deal with it! When we were away (on xmas eve in fact), Tahni decided she would discover how to climb out of the porta-cot which made life VERY interesting...especially considering she was upstairs...but thankfully she hasn't done it since we got home.
New Years Eve was a very quiet one obviously....we just got the kids into bed and then settled back with some munchies and movies and drinks...Ben with his usual Turkey & coke and me with my sparkling grape juice :( He fell asleep at about 11.45pm but I kept watching the movie and woke him up so he could mumble happy new year to me, then go back to sleep. And I followed about 5 mins later, so that was that! New years day we went out to the farm again as Ben wanted to take his bike for a bit of a ride, and it turned out Amber, Chris & Mia were also going out for lunch and mum & dad were babysitting Harlee as well, so we had everyone there (except Matt), which was nice. We ended up staying the night again and came home just before lunch today, and there goes another week! I'm just about to have an icecream, put my feet up, watch a movie and enjoy the peace and quiet that has been sadly lacking in my life of late! Kids are back at Timbertots next week, and life will return to normal - for 6 weeks or so anyway! I have sooooo much to do before the baby arrives...but looking forward to doing it all nevertheless. Also can't wait for a nice 'holiday' in hospital again! Maybe not looking forward to transitioning Tahni quite as much (she had her first go at wearing her knickers the other day - toilet training is definitely not the easiest process when you are 7 mths pregnant!), but it all has to be done so no avoiding it.
Loz & Gav are attending Southbound this weekend and we will hopefully be able to catch up with them on Sunday, which will be fantastic, and also looking forward to seeing the Selman's when they are in West Oz again at the end of the month....lots to look forward to!
Oh yeah, and we had more people look through our house today (BAD day to do it hahah..what a pigsty), and they seemed really keen so we will see what comes of that. The downside to this being the fact that there is NOWHERE to rent/buy/build in Manji at the moment, so if it does sell, what the hell do we do??? Guess we'll cross that bridge if we need to.
Hope everyone has a happy & healthy 2009!
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