email information from january

I have decided to stop doing my email diary this year as it just takes too long to go through all my sent and received emails at the end of each month. With a new baby on the way I am unlikely to keep on top of it so I will just post relevant news from emails I send to others in here and keep a record of it here instead.

So this post is a mish mash of news and events that I have relayed to others during January and would usually have been recorded in an email diary.

6th January

I was inspired by Grandma Pat taking Kt to both the state library and the museum
so I actually checked out the events section in the recent council newsletter and looked up the art gallery program.

They have different activities and workshops on different days so I signed KT up for a "clay animal" making workshop there on 15th January.

If we like and enjoy that one, we might sign up for a couple more during the
following week.

They have things like a painting patterns workshop and a handmade cards
workshop and a using watercolour workshop all for younger kids that sound
interesting.

There was even a pottery class but unfortunately it was for ages 8 and up!!!

Depending on how the weather goes we might all (J included) head over to
Alma Park Zoo because it has been several years since we have been there

14th January

Deleting comments in blogger

You can delete comments I have just done it. I am not sure about editing ... maybe you just have to delete and write a whole new comment? Haven't tried that.

If you find a post that has a comment you will see that at the end of that comment is the date when comment was written and a trash can symbol you click on the trash can signal and click on "delete comment" as well as ticking the remove forever box.

This completely removes the comment.


....

Holidays are going well ... we had a couple of great days of swimming at the
beach last week. Kt got to well and truly try out her boogie board and
she is really fantastic on it. Can steer herself really well and you
should see her legs go!

Uni is back at work again so things have slowed down a bit here ... but
we have been going to the playground the last few days ... a different one
each time.

Today Kt climbed one of the trees at scarborough beach railway playground
and got higher than she had ever been before. Thankfully she was able to
climb down herself because she was way out of my reach!!!

We have started to think about school again and while Kt missed it terribly during the first two weeks of holidays I think she forgot all about it these recent two weeks and is likely to spend the current two weeks not
wanting to go back ...

Never mind we will deal with that as we come to it.

I on the other hand am very much looking forward to the school year starting
... once the initial emotions have all been worked through. I have been making great progress on rearranging the house, but doing it uninterrupted for up to 5 hours hours a day five days a week sounds like bliss!


...I am wondering if you have in your shed at home a gardening tool of ours. Uni believes he had leant it to you once (probably a few years ago now) and so far we can't find it here anywhere, so we wondered if you might still have it?

It is a tree pruner thingy ... that allows you to reach up and trim high branches on your trees. It is like a curved saw on a long stick.

Our mango tree has gone beserk and is producing beautiful and very delicious
mangoes which up in the tree, and out of our reach, are completely at the mercy of the bats.

They usually take one bite of them and drop them to the ground and leave a wasted mango that goes squishy and smelly very quickly.

We are hoping we can cut, catch and enjoy some whole mangoes from the tree if we can locate that trimmer.

OK better keep going now ... I have been rearranging our clothes into our new wardrobe. I seem to have stirred up a lot of dust and am suffering from hayfever, I may as well finish the job now and hopefully my nose will recover by tomorrow.

This refers to new "built in" mirror wardrobe we got to replace all our old childhood storage furniture like chest of drawers, cupboards etc.

...


15th Jan

Kt and I did go to the clay animal modeling workshop today .. we actually saw you in your car on our way there.

We were both stopped at the Oxley and Anzac ave lights. You were first in line to turn right into anzac ave and we were waiting to continue along Oxley ave ... we were one car back though so I didn't think you could see us.

Kt had fun and it seemed like a very interesting class. I think we will definitely do more workshops there, if not this year then perhaps next year again.

There were about 12 kids in all and a teacher and an assistant, and there was plenty of time to get everything done.

They took them into the gallery to look at some clay animals that had been done by aboriginal artists and also got some animal books for them to refer to.

They drew a picture of some of the animals they might like to make and then headed back to the library meeting rooms to do their artwork.

I left at that point to borrow books from the library and when I came back an hour later they had done two models each and were heading back into the art gallery to play with blocks and do drawings and other play activities until their parents came back.

We got to bring one clay model home and the other larger one will be fired and we can collect it in a couple of weeks once it is ready.

...

How I announced our pregnancy to those who did not yet know

Hello and Happy New year everyone,

I had intended to do a Christmas and New year newsletter type email to everyone, but have had a lot going on at the moment and have not managed to get around to it until now. Very difficult to get things done during school holidays!

Basically the big news for us this year is that we are preparing for the birth of our second baby in May!

We have been madly rearranging the house, converting the current computer room to a baby's room and shifting the computer and office furniture elsewhere. This has involved us going through 11 years of accumulated stuff and deciding how badly it needs to be taking up valuable space in the "prime real estate" areas of our house! Just about everything we own has been moved to a new place in the process! Even with both of us working on the preparations at a steady rate I don't know if we will be ready in time!

I don't remember having to do this much work last time, but I guess we had only been in our house for 5 years then and we still had "spare" rooms at that stage ....


Just cruising along very happily at the moment because we are in the blissful stage of regular kicks, plenty of movement and a big belly (but not uncomfortably big yet) and no more morning sickness!

I hope that everyone is well and happy and has a wonderful 2010.

Will keep you posted on how things progress.


.....


18th Jan

Hi Jenny,

Thank you!

I think there are advantages to having been through it all once before ... but you certainly do go in with your eyes wide open rather than full of only dreamy and sometimes unrealistic expectations. So I guess that means I am optimistic, a bit daunted, mildly terrified, yet occasionally calm ... LOL!!!

Kt is pretty excited about it ... I was not sure how she would take the news because she always seemed to be happy about being the only kid. She has indicated some concern that I won't have time to look after her any more and that the baby will get all my attention (maturity beyond her years!). I will have to try my best to keep things balanced as much as I can ....

She has been very affectionate towards the baby (ok well actually my belly) though and is interested in what is going on in there and likes to feel kicks and hear about how things were for me when she was in my tummy! Many stories and fond memories there as you can imagine!

She stayed overnight at her grandma's house earlier in the week and when she came home she rushed over to me and said Mum I missed you and gave me a big hug and then straight away asked how Mr "bump" was and gave my belly a gentle pat!

She was also the first one (apart from me) to feel a kick ... as the baby would often liven up and start doing somersaults whenever I would give her a big hug! And there is no doubt that Kt's will be the most familiar voice for the baby ... she talks more than anyone else in the house :-D

So, so far, so good!

Ok I guess I'd better get back to paying some attention to my girl!

...

22nd Jan

I seem to be destined to have an earth baby! Kt was meant to be a virgo if you remember ... and Mr bump as Kt calls him is obviously planning to be a taurus!

...

23rd Jan

Yes not long to go now. (return to school)

I am hoping the experience will not be as gut wrenching as the last two years.

We picked up Kt's book pack from school on Thursday on our way to Alma Park Zoo.

We had a good look at it yesterday.

I always used to love all the new stationery at the beginning of the year!

She has about 4 year one books with the red and blue lines in them ... I didn't think about it previously but we will probably need to cover them with contact ... haven't done that for years!!!

I finally got the laptop out and plugged in last night, I have had it for a month now without using it! My desk has enough space on it now to sit comfortably!!!

Spent a few hours getting myself familiarized with the new machine ... still have lots to learn and only just getting the hang of selecting things and dragging and dropping etc.

Still haven't quite figured out scrolling yet .... I keep doing things by accident and then not knowing how to repeat the action!!!

Only on chapter 4 of the manual though so I should be a bit wiser in a few days!

...

30th January

School has been going well.

Swimming too although she is not keen to go anymore because sometimes it is hard. Last week they did most of the lesson trying to dive and kt had a lot of trouble with that.

I was pretty sure the teacher would not do the same thing today, but I think Kt was dreading it. As it turns out they only did one dive at the end and I would have to say it was quick, but it looked pretty good to me!

I have just this morning finished my photolog ... complete with the 2008 pictures I found.