a lack of photos

I have hardly taken any photos this year. 2016 has been busy and stressful - I haven't had the motivation to be honest! I went though the files from this year so far and stumbled on this. It made me laugh, so I thought I'd share. Months back, I gave Harry and Till an explicit lesson on how to clean a toilet, in the hopes I'd have slaves to perform this task forever from that moment onwards (clearly delusional right)... anyway I took photos of the entire process (step by step) with the intention of making them a Toilet Cleaning Guide, a pictorial How-to for future reference. Don't ask me what I was thinking?!!!!! That instructional placard never came to fruition and it's mostly me who cleans the toilet.

the tern dress

A new dress arrived in the mail today, posted over by Till's grandmother. When Ma saw this dress covered in white birds, she immediately thought of our lovely Norfolk terns. Till and I adore it (if only it could fit me). I asked her to pop it on so I could take a few photos for Ma and she actually obliged! When I looked at her modelling this dress, it was like I was seeing her for the first time! My lens channelled deep into those blue eyes and peered into her soul. I was struck with awe. My wonderful, precious, mysterious daughter. I made her, she's part of me. And she'll be nine in a few months: NINE!

Look at those cheeky freckles and that peachy skin. It's no wonder your Ma calls you Rose Red!

Till didn't stay poised for my camera very long and bounced off quick smart after a few snaps. Feeling warmhearted and sentimental, I wandered off outside with my camera. Sometime later I was pottering around the paddock when this gorgeous thing came around the corner with a monkey pillow draped around her neck (and wearing my boots none the less). It did make me smile!

Along with that divine dress, some lovely needlework came in today's parcel too. A full Show and Tell is coming, but here's just one photo because it stars Miss Till, and well, this is a post about her!

My beautiful, sweet pony-tail swinging, monkey-hugging moppet. You wear your heart on your sleeve and love your family with gusto! 

Always be caring and confident. Your future looks bright dear girl.

Love you Miss Till!!

PS lol, apologies for the fringe cut. Ma says I have to stay away from your fringe with scissors from now on! OK.

a story of new life & letting go of guilt

Remember Guilt free in One Three...it's my mantra this year. I'm slowly working through a list of things I need to let go. But the biggest, most suffocating guilt I've carried for the last almost eleven years is that I failed to birth my babies naturally.

I'm four foot eleven and Ben is six foot one. Someone near and dear to us has always said (in good humour) that Nelwyns* shouldn't marry Daikini's*! But we can't help who we fall in love with, right!? I certainly wouldn't have it any other way. In any case, this was my chance to breed some height into our vertically challenged family.

You can't imagine how enormous I was in the later stages of pregnancy with my first born. I was so ridiculously massive that people winced when they saw me. Stepping into the supermarket I could clear the aisle in seconds....folks would see that tummy coming towards them and run! It was apparent to everyone (all except me and my doctor surprisingly) that the baby I was carrying was indeed BIG and most definitely a Daikini! To add insult to my pregnancy discomfort, baby decided to stay snug in his cocoon for ten days past the expected due date!

Like most first timers, I had high hopes for a tranquil natural labour. I was well informed, confident and determined. A good friend tried to prepare me for a scenario that ended with a C-section delivery, but as far as I was concerned, that was her experience and I was different and without a doubt far more tenacious. *Sigh*, hindsight is a wonderful thing.

Without giving you a minute by minute run down....the gist is....what began as a text book induction extended into 48 hours of labour, culminating with an extremely wrung-out mum-to-be, a baby suffering foetal distress, a severely potent (and miscalculated) epidural and an emergency caesarian delivery. I was exhausted, bruised and battered (literally), but thanks to the marvel of modern medicine, my darling boy Harry was brought safely into the world, weighing in at a whopping nine pound one and incredibly, fifty seven centimetres in length. He never entered the birth canal...and the midwives were, on reflection, relieved he hadn't. Although I'd dilated fully, I never experienced pushing sensations of any kind. 

I know a healthy mother and baby is all that matters - I know it could have been worse. But for me (and my shell-shocked husband) it was stressful and traumatic and not such a great start to parenthood. And it damaged my state of mind in more ways than you can imagine.

For a long time afterwards, well meaning people reminded me that it didn't matter how my baby arrived in the world - a healthy baby and mum is all that matters. The logical part of my brain knew what they said was true, but my heart didn't believe it for a second. My heart, in fact, has taunted me over this failure...for years. My heart it seems is really loud, in this case its' overpowering noise drowned out any logical thoughts that filtered through. Until now.

I still get teary thinking about Harry's birth. During the first 14 months of his life I was miserable - I loved and adored my little man of course, but many days were a struggle. I was plagued by weariness, anxiety, sadness, and while I didn't know at the time, was most definitely suffering post natal depression. It was hard to articulate how I felt and even those close to me had no clue of the extent of my suffering. The only way I could explain my feelings was to say I felt as though my body started something that it never got to finish. My body knew what to do in labour, but it didn't see it through. I carried an overwhelming and crushing sense of incompleteness.

Harry is a week away from turning eleven. He is a tall, strong, healthy and wonderfully intelligent boy. Whilst I'll always carry a sadness about childbirth, I'm no longer riddled with guilt. To be honest though, making a conscious decision to ditch the guilt has been harder than I ever anticipated - when you live with certain feelings for such a long time, you come to rely on them even if they are damaging. Writing about it has helped immensely, even though my emotions are once again raw and tears have been shed, even after all this time has passed. Words as therapy? I should have done this a long time ago, but I suppose I wasn't ready.

Harry is a gift, a part of me. I'm his mum no matter what and I doubt anyone will ever ask him how he came to arrive in this world!



* Remember the movie Willow?

operation art

I've been lamenting the fact that Harry and Till don't sit and paint or draw like they used to. But you can't force creativity, right.

Today I set a trap! Call it Operation Art if you will. 

Step One 

• drag a table outside onto the verandah (a bit of fresh air always inspires me)

Step Two 

• armed with a magnifying glass and flashlight, rummage through the Abyss aka craft cupboard to locate paint sets and art paper

Step Three

• arrange all items enticingly on the table with a jar of water...and finally...

Step Four 

• step back, hide in the kitchen and WAIT

It took...oh...maybe an hour or so...but once they'd fallen into my trap, their bottoms stayed glued to that bench for quite some time - and they even returned for a second round! Hooray.

Sometimes that is all it takes. Like fish to a hook: you just need a little bait!

Does anyone else "set traps" for their kids??

Our 'screen time' manager

When I wrote about our TV-free life a few weeks ago, I mentioned we use a timer for managing screen time. Well here's how it works. To begin with we had to buy a timer that counts forwards and backwards. Importantly this timer lives on the fridge so it can be easily found when required...it goes "walkies" once in a while! Hmmmm.

Every time either Harry or Till sits down to do their music practise they grab the timer and switch it on to count up. When they want to play on their DSi's or the iPad they hit the timer switch to count down. Easy hey. Sometimes Harry will spend up to 30 minutes at the piano and maybe another 15 on guitar. Till may earn 15 to 20 minutes at the piano and she's just starting out on the flute. The 'screen time formula' is simple: time spent practising equals "screen time" earned! Just like accumulating interest on your savings really.

We aren't running a precision military operation here... so obviously there are moments when Harry and Till use their electronic devices without having "earned" the time; when the weather is awful, during the school holidays, when someone isn't feeling well etc. But on the whole, throughout the school week, this is the method we use. For us it works quite well.

Sometimes we forget about the timer, but the "music practise earns screen time" scheme still operates successfully. It kinda sounds something like this...

"Mum, can I play on the iPad?"

"Um, yes... *if you did your practise this morning before school!"*

Then after a time (as in how long it takes to chop the veggies for dinner) I just call out...

"time to switch off now" 

...and they do (a five minute heads-up helps).

How do you manage screen time?

NB. It would be helpful to own 2 timers! We rely on Harry's good memory and honesty sometimes.
* Sometimes I go to work before these things occur you see...Mum's aren't always in the loop.

TV Free

Have you ever noticed how a television commands the space it's in? Even switched off, it manages to be the centre of attention - our eyes are drawn to it. This is how it was in our house at least. Early in the year 2009 we decided to give away our TV. Some of our family and friends thought this was a pretty cuckoo thing to do! Our home at the time was very open plan and it was hard to escape the noise and distraction of the TV. I'd get all these great ideas for how I could arrange our furniture but they never worked because of where the TV needed to be placed - everything always  pointed in that direction, towards the ugly silver box. This mammoth plug-in appliance with moving pictures was dictating how my rooms could be set up and it drove me nuts!!!

But that's only part of the reason why we decided to ditch our television. At the time Harry (6 years) really liked to watch TV if it was on, although he didn't pay much attention if it was switched off. His little sister (aged 3) was a completely different kettle of fish. She loved screen time and asked for ABC Kids all the time. Yes of course we were in control, and yes we said 'no' when necessary, but still...I couldn't help but imagine how much better it would be for my kids if they didn't have access to TV at all, you know the old saying, out of sight, out of mind.

So...we did it, we booted that over-sized energy guzzling box right out the front door and on to a new home. Yes, we went TV free. And you know what? It wasn't that difficult or traumatic. Life went on - peacefully. The kids didn't complain, they hardly noticed it missing after a while. And best of all, our lounge chairs were now positioned in a conversational manner - we could sit and look at.... each other!!!!

How do I feel nearly 5 years down the track? Well if I'm truthful, I do sometimes miss TV for myself. And I must be honest now and say that a screen of sorts has re-entered our life. Ben did end up bringing a TV back to NI from a trip he made to Australia two years ago because he bought himself I mean the kids a Wii console. BUT we still don't have a TV hook-up (our house doesn't even have a working aerial). Fortunately our current residence doesn't have the same open plan issues our previous home had. That means the TV screen is positioned upstairs in a play room, well and truly out of sight. It's used purely for watching DVDs and playing the Wii (which happens rather infrequently I have to say). Once in a while Ben and I down-load programs we are keen to see but we watch them when the kids are in bed.

I'm still happy my children have a TV-free existence, in fact it's now been so long they don't know any different. I really believe they are better off for it. I love that they never see ads or news programs. I love that I don't have to worry that they might switch on the TV and see something I deem inappropriate.  And yes I think they use their spare time more creatively.  We have full control over what they do watch, whether it be a documentary or a kids movie or mini series. We (the parents) are the quality control check officers. I like that, no I LOVE that a LOT. And yes I'm probably a bit over-protective about what I think constitutes suitable viewing - I make no apologies for that.

When do Harry and Till watch DVDs or play the Wii? Well on occasion they watch a DVD during the week after school, if they've had a particularly taxing day - but those opportunities are pretty infrequent.  Often we watch a family movie on the weekend and like-wise that's when we play the Wii. Often a timer is used to manage "screen time" (that's a whole other blog post) and luckily when I say "that's enough" my kids generally accept and move on.

I'm in no way suggesting everyone should go TV free. It works for us and I thought I'd share our experience! What do you think? How do you control TV watching at your place?

NB. You know, I wrote this blog post a week ago...but didn't press "publish". I'm not sure why. I guess I thought it was a bit far out. Then I read Elaina's blog post and thought....well why the heck am I holding back? We aren't the only TV free house after all!!!!!!!!!

Blue Eyed Babe

 A Decade Has Passed...cont.

Oodles of Noodles - Harry, 9 months, February 2003

Look at those big blue eyes! They melted our hearts (still do).

Gosh how he loved food at this age (um, that hasn't changed actually). But truly, I haven't come across a baby since who could consume the food Harry did at this age. He devoured lamb chops, spaghetti bolanase, Vegemite on toast, huge bowls of mashed veggies, bananas...the list goes on. From the moment this Mr Nine Pound One arrived in the world he exhibited a ravishing appetite. And if you are impressed by his birth weight, how about his birth length....57cm!! It's no wonder he's nearly taller than me already!

A Decade Has Passed

This beautiful, clever boy is turning 10 this month. TEN for goodness sake! So, between now and his birthday (May 31st), I'm going to share with you some pictures of my Harry growing up. Get ready for a trip down memory lane!

Harry the backyard artist - age 2 years, 8 months (January 2005)

Harry leaps

Oh gosh. I know those fences aren't that high, but still.....I always worry! 

This boy just keeps going ahead in leaps and bounds. Meanwhile, my heart skips a beat, afflicted with an amalgam of fear and pride. Watching him grow and develop is such a privilege.

But why does he have grow up so fast?

Holidays: Day Three

Phew...this blogging everyday commitment is wearing me out...and I have days to go.  Whose idea was this?

OK. I'll quit whining.  Today entailed an early morning trip to the shops to buy lunch supplies, more loads of washing, kitchen cleaning, guitar and piano practice supervision and a long leisurely lunch (but we stayed sooooo long it became afternoon tea) with friends. I gave the kids 'Weat-bix' for dinner tonight, because we ate ALL afternoon at Susie's place! I bet that will get me an award for 'Parent of the Year' - but just to ease my guilt, I think I need to point out that Harry and Till didn't complain! I think they'd happily eat cereal for dinner most nights!

Here's Till and Harry eating breakfast on the verandah this morning (see I do cook nutritious meals for my kids...boiled eggs are so gourmet). Look how camera shy they are!

I asked Harry to do his guitar practice...next thing I know...he's TEACHING his sister how to play!

Did you ever make one of these plates when you were a child? I still have mine.

At Susie's place the kids pretty much played here...

 While the mummies sat here...

Drum roll please.....and to finish off....something we've been waiting for....tooth Number Two has finally vacated this space...Only a mother could love it ha ha!