I have been so slack!!

and so busy!!!!

I dont think i have managed to sit still for more than 5 minutes in the last couple of weeks!!!
We were frantically preparing for Christmas and making sure we were ready to go away camping! Have no idea how we managed to get through everything but we have come out the other end of it and had a fantastic time as always!!

I will get to Christmas day and camping later but an update on the last couple of weeks first ....

Amelia is continuing to be the happiest little girl i have ever known ... i aspire to have even half of her happiness!!!! She is always ready with a smile for everyone and loves snuggling up close to those she knows and loves.
Crawling isn't fast enough for her so she "run crawls" ... i have never seen little knees moving so fast: whether it is to chase the puppy around the house trying to pull his tail, or trying to get into whatever Harry is playing with! Harry loves attaching her toys to the back of his bike and making her chase him around the house! They love it and will laugh for hours playing that game.
She continues to eat everything in sight and loves trying new foods! She has for a while now eaten everything that we do which makes mealtimes alot easier in this house! She particularly likes foods that she can feed herself and HJ is always ready to pick up the scraps off the floor!!

Her routine at the moment:
7:00 - 7:30: Wake Up and get dressed
7:30ish: breakfast 2 weetbix and then some fruit
play
8:45ish: bottle
9:00ish: bed
11:30ish: wake up morning tea
out to the shops/park/play
12:30ish: lunch usually ham, chicken, fish and fruit, toast
play etc
2:30ish: bottle and bed
5:00-5:30ish wake up and arvo tea
6:00ish: dinner with us so this can be anywhere between 6 and 7ish and is whatever we are having and veges
bath or shower
7:30ish bottle and bed

Harry is continuing to be a great big brother.. we thought that once Amelia started getting into his things that everything would change but he is great!! He will just go up and "rouse" on her if she has something of his .. generally saying "Missy Moo that is one of my precious things...." and he will put it up out of her reach and go about his way!!
He has shot right up in the last couple of months and seems very tall! He is getting more confident about lots of things and is very proud that he knows the majority of his alphabet letters by sight and can tell you something they begin with ... he is also practicing writing letters.
He is loving having Daddy home on 3wks holidays and i dont know how he will cope when he has to go back to work!!

That should get us up to date and i will be back to post all the christmas excitement soon!
xx

A picnic with the kids

Tuesday morning got off to a bad start... Harry was tired and cranky and i had a very broken toe that was ridiculously sore and it was 400 degrees already so i was cranky too!! So after a few tears between the two of us Harry went into his room and read books quietly for nearly two hours ... he already knows to just walk away when Mummy is cranky!!!

Amelia was oblivious to the drama and was enjoying being able to get up to mischief without Harry and I watching her every move. After she went down for a morning sleep Harry came and gave me a big cuddle and kiss and told me he loved me and that he really wanted to do something fun today!

He chose to go down to Sandgate to have fish and chips and then a play in the park and he wanted to bring HJ (the dog). Great idea because we really needed to get out of the house but it was an extremely hot day.... so we lathered on the suncream, got our hats and water bottles and braved the heat!!

We had a great picnic lunch.. Amelia ate a whole piece of fish and didn't leave much for anyone else to eat but she was happy!!! Harry took HJ on a big walk along the water and then Amelia, HJ and i sat down under a big tree while Harry played in the park.

Then it was home for us all to have a sunny sleep in the comfort of the airconditioned house!

Thank goodness a bad day turned quickly into a great day!

December so far .....

Our cheeky little crawler ... already up to no good!!

The girls playing with Amelia's hair .... more than enough hair to get a christmas clip in!! (No matter what the lady at the shop thought!!!)

Our Christmas Tree .... Harry very proud of his work so far!

Concentrating very hard .. decorating Ma's tree

Aunty JoJo and Harry busy decorating!

Life has been chaotic in our house for the last week .... lots of play dates, christmas shopping, lunches with the girls and christmas parties!!

Harry spent a busy weekend putting up christmas trees at Ma's as well as at Aunty JoJo and Uncle Wade's house before putting ours up on the 1st December!! Definitely an expert at decorating christmas trees and remembers where he has put ALL the decorations so there is no re-arranging!!!!

We also have the christmas lights up on the house again this year and it is a big event turning them on every night!

One big development in our life has been Amelia crawling!!! She has been trying to crawl for the last month or so .. up on all fours rocking and trying to get everything co-ordinated at once but would then realise it was much easier to put her tummy back down and either roll or wriggle herself to where she needed to be!!!

And then one day it just all fell into place and the little princess we once knew has become a cheeky little monkey!! She is into everything and anything and even though we had moved everything out of her reach months ago she still manages to get into something she shouldnt be into!!

Harry has put all of his "precious" things either out of her reach or safely behind closed doors in his bedroom but then informed me he was going to teach her to paint this week ....... In his dreams!!!

We also attempted to get a Santa photo yesterday .... when the first attempt failed due to some clerical error we decided to try again after lunch .... Amelia had a great time pulling Santa's beard and eating his bell (while Santa got more and more annoyed and told us he hoped she wasn't a screamer because he had had crying kids all day!!) and the longer the photographer took the more annoyed Harry was getting so that by the time it was photo time the kids were passed it! Managed to get one photo with the kids both looking but it certainly wont be used as a christmas present so we are going to try one more time this weekend ....

So life at our house continues to be alot of fun and always chaotic but we love this time of year and we are looking forward to a great christmas with the kids as well as our family and friends!

Out to lunch with Amelia .....

As a treat my mum, sister, Amelia and i decided to go out to lunch one Friday in Joey's lunch break to Sizzler - it's a nice easy option with the greatest potato skins with bolognese sauce and cheese toast!!

Amelia is my good eater and will eat whatever is put in front of her and i knew from when we took Harry to Sizzler for his birthday that Amelia loves buffets!! You could almost see her eyes light up at the thought of all that food!!!

The worst part about Sizzler is that the highchairs dont have trays on them so after a quick wipe of the table we put some food their for Amelia to try. At first she was doing the "right" thing and picking the food up with her hands and eating it ..... then she decided that this obviously wasn't the fastest method of getting the food to her mouth so she decided to put her head down and eat the food straight off the table with her mouth .... just like a vacuum cleaner!!
My goodness me ..... here was a little girl in a beautiful dress sucking food off a table .... funniest thing we had ever seen!!

All in all it was a great lunch with the girls and i only wish we could do it more often!

The Cubby House

This project has been well and truly over a year in the making...... Trav and Harry decided they wanted to build a cubby house and so began the greatest building adventure ever seen!

Trav drew up plans and more plans until they finally decided on the final product!!

Then began the massive task of collecting supplies to build this architecturally designed cubby house.... Our garage was taken over with timber, flooring, walls and tools and so the car has spent more time on the driveway than actually in the garage.

The boys were given a deadline that it had to be finished before Harry's 4th birthday so at the end of September the building began. I think Trav went to Bunnings every afternoon for a month, we had big trucks delivering timber and we had great helpers!

Trav, Wade (brother in law) and Harry spent nearly every afternoon and most weekends working on the cubby. My sister gave up going home and expecting to see her husband because he spent more time at our house during October!! We are very grateful for all his help!!

Harry was only happy if he had a "job" to do and Jo (sister) and i were always getting asked for our opinion and when we offered it the boys would go and do the opposite of what we suggested!!! Not sure why they bothered asking us for advice!!!!

I did my fair share of helping ... I painted posts, i took photos of every stage of building and i bought beer and snacks for the workers!! A valuable helper!!!

This cubby has to be seen to be believed ... a floating timber floor inside, stainless steel balustrading, colourbond roofing, an "L" shaped deck, dulux paint to match our house colours and many other features!!

There are lots of people we need to thank ...

* Wade for all his help with the building

* All the job sites that Trav was able to get supplies from

* Sara and Aidan for the leftover timber flooring

* The Ayre's for the colourbond roofing

* Maurice for the stainless stell balustrading

* Joshy for helping Trav do the balustrading

* JD for coming over to help and drink beer with the boys

So now the fun begins ... Harry is looking forward to having friends over to play in his cubby and we will have to stay in this house forever now otherwise the cubby is coming with us (and apparently we can't afford to crane it out of the backyard so i guess we are staying here until the kids grow out of the cubby)

Our 3rd Wedding Anniversary

Our Wedding 19th Nov 2005

Airlie Beach March 2007

Brisbane January 2004

January 2004

Well today is our anniversary and for the last 3 years i have been lucky enough to be married to the greatest husband a girl could ever ask for!!

I met Travis at high school about 12 years ago and had been friends with him for years before we had our first date at an EKKA Race day 6 years ago. That day was the beginning of a wonderful relationship that has only gotten better since then!
We have been blessed to have two healthy children, we have built a beautiful house together and we have fantastic family and friends who are always there for us.
Trav makes me laugh on a daily basis and life is never boring in our house! He is not only a wonderful husband but he is a great dad! Harry and Amelia are so lucky and i love watching their eyes light up whenever he walks in the room....
I can't imagine my life without him or the kids in it and i am grateful for every morning that i get to wake up next to him!
(Thank goodness we have a cubby house now because if he doesn't fix his snoring soon he may well be moving into it!!)

I love you pig to the hills and back for the next 53 years xoxoxoxo

November So Far

Okay i will try and catch up on the crazy month that we have had so far!!
There has been blowing bubbles in the rain, a picnic in the park to say goodbye to good friends who are moving, a trip to Portside Wharf to watch Grandma Pat go on a P&O Cruise, a 4th birthday, ten pin bowling, a cubby house construction completed, board game nights, bbq's, going for family runs, baking cakes and cookies, rainy days, VERY hot days and its only the 18th November! Plus we are getting organised for Christmas before the school holidays as the shopping centres are already crazy.

The big event so far has been Harry's 4th birthday and i think i have created a birthday monster.... I love birthdays, christmas etc etc and love these events to last much longer than just the one day.
Harry's birthday went on for a week ..... It all started on the Monday with cake at kindy with his school friends, then the Tuesday Harry, Amelia and I went out for lunch at Sizzler and then pizza and cake that night, Wednesday was cake with Grandma Berns and Poppy Tattsa at their house, Saturday we went ten pin bowling and had so much fun, then Sunday was family BBQ and cake at home! Definitely had more than his fair share of birthday fun this year!!

He loves Kindy and is slowly being moved up into the pre-prep room for next year. He is at Kindy two days a week and also gets to spend a special day at Grandma Berns and Poppy Tattsa's where he gets to do all sorts of wonderful things.

Amelia is nearly 8 months old and growing up much too fast! She is a delightfully happy baby who loves nothing more than playing with Harry and tormenting poor HJ.

She loves drinking water out of her cup and we have also had to buy handles for her bottle so she can feed herself. She is a great eater and will try everything you put in front of her... I love cooking up fruit, veges and meat for her and I am almost certain she eats more than Harry does!

She is trying desperately to crawl and even though she gets herself in all the right positions she either ends up going backwards or her own special "swimming" style with arms and legs going everywhere!! But i am more than happy for her to stay sitting up and not moving (although she is great at getting where she needs to by rolling and sliding along the floor) as she gets this evil grin on her face whenever HJ walks past her and I just know he is going to be her target!!!

So that is us so far and will be an equally chaotic rest of the month .....