We are still here!

so its be a little crazy around here lately! Our big girl turned 4 this weekend just gone and it was lots of fun letting her be a princess for the day.




It was so hot we gave up on all other party activities and set up a slide and a paddling pool at the beach park where we had the party and let the kids go...


Cheeky thingwas already asking what she could do for her next birthday on the way home. In fact nearly everything that comes out of her mouth reminds me that she really isnt my baby anymore.


She is growing to be beutifully mannered, though temperamental at times, clever and good hearted (most of the time). She is definately got the maternal touch and babies her sister like she is her second mama.

looking forward to seeing what this year teaches us about who she is and what she will do.

Not me monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

I am not constructing my second post for the day just because I have some great material for NMM this week... nope not me.
Oh and i have not taken nearly a week to actually finish and post the previous post either. I am not that busy and over extended that I couldn't complete one blog post even though I really wanted to... nope, not me.

I did not spot a mysterious object in amongst our 'clean' washing as i was opening the machine only to realise my daughter who happens to put everything the undresses from in the washing basket, apparently had added soiled nappies to that list. If i had though, I most certainly would not have just re washed the load a few times until there was no trace of said 'object' and then rewashed 3 times with napisan and hot water... nope i would not show such blatant disregard for the sanctity of my washing machine! or the environmental cost of so many rewashes. No, not me!

I did not ignore the obvious fact my children were playing instead of sleeping after I put them to bed in hopes they may sleep in a little later that 545am... I was not highly impressed that it worked and considering doing it again even thought my nearly four year old couldn't keep her eyes open and 5 in the afternoon the next day... Nope, not me! i would most certainly put my children's well being ahead of my own never ending desire for more sleep...

I also did not leave my daughters 4th birthday party planning, including invitations until the week of her birthday... NOPE! not me, I am always organised and plan elaborate celebrations with hand crafted invites and matching name cards at the table set with each child's personalised party gift along with matching decor and .... oh, alright, we are having a BBQ at the park... i mean Nope, not ME!

I almost forgot... I did not in below mentioned emergency situation dial '911' when he emergency number in austrlia is 000, even though i have dialed 000 5 or more times before, and had the number drilled in since kindergarten... nope, not me. (luckily, you know, if i had done that, the call would play a friendly little message like "you have dialled emergency assistance, the number is 000, putting you through now" thus making said dialer realise their error.
This would not prove that i spend to much time reading american cops and cops wives' blogs :) and watching american TV... NOpe, certainly not me!

first day at school... public v private?

One happy little kindy kid... She has been counting the sleeps until she could go to school


She absolutely loves getting dressed in her 'nuniform'...

Unleashing the poser with in!


One more bonus of havin a shift workin cop daddy is he gets to come for our first day of school!
And pick up too! (In the background is mrs groves who i am trying to teach grace to stop calling Mrs gross, but i think the whole class has got her name wrong as i have heard others doing it too)



I made the decision a long time ago to send y kids to public schol at least for primary school (first seven years). Finances has a little to do with it (about $60 a year vs $4000) but mostly it comes down to the options available. The best performing schools in our state are the private catholic schools, but I cant stand the religious factor. I mean i am a Christian and i love going to church but there are so many rules and regulations and routines in catholicism that i dont feel bring us any closer to God, but anyway that is a whole differet topic. Digressing... for that reason idont want to send my girls to a catholic school.
The Christian schools in our state whos beliefs are most aligned to ours are all strictly christian enrolments only by pastoral reference and i dont feel that segregating my children from the world they will evenually have to interact with will benifit them. I truly belive when our beliefs are challenged we are sharpened and grow, and the opportunity to share Christ and our testimony with friends is paramount in our walk with God.
There are baptist schools who's doctrine is good and enrol all students but the ones in our area don't fare much better academically than the public schools and i just cant justify so much extra money when i feel i can teach Christian values and lead my children in finding a relationship with God at home...

So we have done our research and got grace into a great schol in our area, and i plan to chec out their teachers each year and keep up with the programming so i can make sure we discuss any conflicting things that come up values and beliefs wise and plan to make a decision about highschool a bit further down the track. that said, If being in that environment has a negative impact on the girls we will find the money to send them to a Christian school.

I would love to hear what you all think/what your experiences have been

Grace-isms

a few from the files

"Mum its raining out...do you have an under-brella"

"no its not a tramp-olene mum its a Jumpolene" well yes that would make more sense

"Mum where is Jesus"... "does that mean he is riding in the back of our car right now"

and after hearing alot that Jesus is in our heart and not know the difference between her heart and other insides
"But i Neeeeed more food because when i eat my food then Jesus can get it and he might be hungry"

An the latest one....When about to call our friend who has just had another baby...
"mum, Aunty Carly has 3 babies...(me well kind of)...We need another one too. Me:you will have to talk to you dad about that one Grace: NO, we can just borrow another mummy to grow one coz i dont want you to go to the hospital again and then we can have another brother or sister and the other mummy can go home.
Nice Plan Grace :)

Thanks wa police!

...so D spoke to his squad supervisor and he has organised for duncan to work monday at a station instead of on saturday night so he can come to Graces concert... I cant believe how much effort they are willing to go to. Today i am very glad the WA police promote and actually live up to being a family friendly career choice.

Today i am not so stoked to be a cops wife...

The first real downfall to being a cops wife strikes. We have just realised that Duncans squad have been assigned to an event on the 19th of this month, which is the same night as our (nearly) 4-year-old's first dance recital/ballet concert, which the whole family has already bought tickets for. She is so excited and dances around the house after every saturday practice.
How are we going to explain the empty seat where her Daddy should be. "Daddy has to work so we have money to buy all the things we need" just isnt gonna cut it on this one :(

Some family highlights

With both of us on shift work, we really try to make the most of out family time together as it can be a sparse at times,
Pose much?
Super golf. i have a theory, anyone really good at anything says they started at 3. So we are starting Grace in everything so she can be great at anything she wants! No but really, she likes golf, like her Daddy...

Guess what else they like...

Especially when they get to make them for themselves...


(self explanatory really, that one)


We have been practicing writing letters for Daddy when he is not at home.


Hanging out in the pool at home with poppy (or the spa coz its warmer)

And Nan,



At the park...



with Aunty Tess



And Uncle Andy and our friends



And attempting to get some photos for christmas cards...

but hiding in the ferns was aparently much more amusing, so we tried again



and again



And again



and again



and again



i guess we will just have to try again

Not (my child) Monday

Before i start, i will say, i must be a little ahead of the pack because I have done a couple of these, but just as not me monday from the point of view of Jaeda, my youngest. This post I will write about what my children have (not)done.
Daddys Bible-

Need i say more than this was not my youngest child... certainly not

It was not my oldest child who thought it appropriate and warrented to wake up the whole house before the sun came up on the only sleep in day we get each fortnight, by yelling and crying because she couldnt find the little plastic dinosaur she got in a party bag at daycare that day! Nope she is much more reasonable and considerate and not that attatched to ridiculously unimportant and inanimate objects.

The childrens church have been learning a a song for the fruit of the spirit. Grace is the youngest in the 'big kids church' but loves it. They have been learning the song that goes...the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience and kindness and goodness...etc. It was most certainly not my child singing the whole week " the fruit of the spitit is love-your-peas, patience and kind-of goodness". Nope she is the child of leaders in the church and would most certaily know these things properly by now!

After dinner out at a silver service resturant, it was not my child who, while waiting for her dinner, properly declared "i need a towel" while looking haughtily down to her lap where the napkin had been placed for her by the waiter at the resturant. Nope not my child. She certaily knows the difference between wait staff and her mother... RIGHT?

Miss confidence, Grace also did not suffer from stage fright at the beggining of her ballet routine either! not my child! i wish i kept videoing, because if that had been my child she might have kept that up for about a minute and a half and it would have been funniest home videos worthy!

One proud mama (and papa n granny n grandpa!)

WARNING- pointless boasting about my own child ahead...


Grace has been doing ballet lessons for one term. She is the newest and youngest in her class but miss proper has to get it right so formal lessons suit her- she loves it and she is doing really well. i didnt realise how much they are learning.. i was so absorbed in watching her perform that i forgot to video when she did her solo (i dont know the french terms) where she did a skip along on toes, a turn and reach out with one arm and one leg pointed back. She did it perfectly (without bias parent opinion) Lord only knows what she wll be capable of when she is 10, or evn 4 for that matter.

...well I did warn you.






They all got a trophy for passing thier first exam. Grace wanted to sleep next to it last night!



one unfortunate thing about ballet is the whole fairy magic theme is like impossible to avoid, but it has become a bit of a teaching point. Grace now understand we dont need to do magic, God can do miracles and we must pray not try and do things in our own strength or with the help of any magic etc. I didn't really want to expose her to magic type stuff, especially becasue it is hard to teach about one thing that is real that you can't see and say another thing you cant see is pretend. Cant shelter them forever i guess. But the dancing is cute!...

My brave little girl

I thought i would treat the girls to a day out (well a morning anyway) so i took them to a play centre near here.

I ran into a friend there and all was good, until grace was playing chasey with some kids in the playgym and tripped. I knew it wasnt good, so i grabbed j with one arm and grace with the other and the look on the parents faces sitting down said it all. Im not sure if they were horrified coz i was rholding J by one arm letting her feet just touch the ground to get to a place where i could see, or if they were horrified because of the sheer amound of blood on my other child.
Either way, J was fine so i am not to worried about those parents, but Grace was far from fine.




She had managed to faceplant the ledge just a bit higher than a regular step that was perfectly distanced from her when she fell and who-knows-how but ended up with a 2cm split in her top lip






Some ice, a nap, baby nurofen and hi 5 later she is Ok now, but i think that when it really hurt everyone was saying "You are so brave, your such a brave girl" now she thinks brave means IN A LOT OF PAIN. When it hurts a lot she seems to get real sad looking and says 'im so brave mummy im so brave. and after i gave her the icy she says, its ok im not brave anymore...

the cutest thin is the only thing she was sad about the whole way home is that she didnt get to say bye to the little grls she was playing with. She said " i want to play with her next time, she's a beautiful girl is she mummy" (she means isnt she). im a bit sad that i never saw her little friend. Grace very rarely calls someone her friend, let alone someone she just met.

Pictorial Not Me Monday

I did not do lots of slightly crazy things this week, but most recently I did not make my child pretend to dance like a ballerina in her book so i could get rediculously cute pictures of her in her new dancing costume... nope...


not me...
I did not randomly teach myself to make balloon animals for my own amusement at her birthday party...



and I did not put off baking until it was necessary for me to make cupcakes at midnight... but if i did they would have turned out like this
I did not have a nervous breakdown in the car on the way to the park we were having the party at because fishpond sized rain drops started falling on my windscreen even though the sky looked like this 5 minutes later...


AND i didnt forget half the food and make my most obliging husband go back home to get it...




Or have another nervous breakdown because one particularly selfish family had unneccesarily spread their belongings under the only two gazebos at the park. Nope not me, i would not be upset over silly little thigs like that!




And one for the birthday girl... HI I AM GRACE AND I AM 3, and I did not start out super grumpy at my party,

monopolise peoples attention then cheer up and then announce to the rest of the world my sister was the stroppy one...

Well she was, but not me.

And I did not run out of space on my doodlebear that nan got for my birthday, and when really wanting to stencil a flower on i did not resort to putting it on it's bottom, and Im sure my Mama would have been far to mature to take this photo...
This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.