Sick family update...

For those of you who are concerned:

• Joanna is fully recovered
• Ben was a lot better by this afternoon (he felt well enough to go outside and play in the sandpit and tree house) - not quite back to normal, but getting there
• Naomi is still extra tired
• Peter is feeling tired but his belly doesn't seem to be overly affected
• I thought I was getting a bit better half way through today, but then got a bit worse again as the afternoon wore on

Tree house additions...

A couple of months ago I built a tree house for the kids... and said that I needed to construct a rope ladder for it. I didn't have any dowel to use for the rungs, so nothing happened for a while. A couple of weeks ago I got the dowel, and yesterday I finally got around to actually putting the ladder together. Today, I tied it up in the tree, along with a pulley system so the kids can lift stuff up into the tree house. Both were a big hit with all the kids - they had lots of fun climbing up and down and lifting leaves up into the house!

Family portraits

On Christmas day we took the opportunity to take family photos. Here they are:

us

van Gemsts

Colyers

Christmas day

Christmas day seems like sooo long ago now. We had a really good day...special breakfast (cinnamon brioche and brioche with berries), Church, present opening...followed by lunch (with the van Gemsts and Colyers)...some DVD watching (the kid's watched Toy Story 2 which Ben had got as a present) and game playing (the adults played one of Bill's games).

I can see the light at the end of the tunnel!

Writing about sickness reminded me that in the business of the last couple of weeks, i have yet to mention that i have an actual surgery date for getting my tonsils out! The date is the 14th of January. So after 4.5 years of almost constant antibiotic consumption, I will finally get a permanent solution to the problem. (I just have to get through the 2 weeks of pain post surgery)

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sick family

It looks like all of us have caught the bug joanna and Ben have. I think i've had it for a few days already but thought the symptoms were my IBS flaring due to my really busy lead up to Christmas. Peter and Naomi have now also come down with the common symptoms. Hopefully we are all over it before we leave for our beach holiday next week.

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sick kids

Joanna was feeling off colour all of Christmas day...threw up in her bed that night...and has been feeling really tired and hasn't been eating much since.
Ben woke up this morning complaining of a sore belly...ate 1/2 a slice of toast + some milk...belly then evacuated its contents.

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blogging void

Like most bloggers I've been extremely quiet in the busyness of the lead up to Christmas. Here's a summary of what has been going on:
Last week we went to the dinosaur exhibition at the museum. The kids had lots of fun with all the interactive parts.
I also spent a couple of days last week cooking stuff in preparation for Christmas day.
On boxing day we left for Taupo for a couple of nights while Peter and Bill went bushwalking/tramping.

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mobile blogging

Just installed a blogger app on my phone so i can easily post blogs from my phone.

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And then there were three...

Our sick chook was dispatched last night. It was no longer able to stand, so it wasn't going to recover, and today was rubbish collection day, so we thought we should move it along. The kids were playing round the other side of the house when we did it - until Joanna wondered around and asked what we were doing. She wasn't upset at all - she actually thought it was a bit funny, so I had to tell her that it's not really funny to have to kill one of our chickens...

One sick chook...

A week or two ago, we noticed that the chooks' legs were looking a little scaly. Mel discovered that that probably meant they had mites, so we got some Pestene, which is supposed to get rid of them (the mites, not the chooks!). One of them was worse than the others and we had to separate it so that it wasn't hen-pecked to death (quite literally - chickens aren't nice to each other!). Unfortunately, it seems to have gone downhill... it hasn't eaten for a couple of days and is now very weak. Unless it starts eating soon, I think it will be shuffling off to wherever chooks end up when they stop breathing. I'm not particularly keen to accelerate that process, but it may have to be done - the poor thing is suffering :(

exercise

Simone has just posted about here exercise plan for the holidays. Now my problem is, that I don't have a plan. I've had to suspend my gym membership for the school holidays, as although Naomi and Joanna can still go to the creche, I have no options for Ben.

My ideas for exercising over this time includes going running, doing some weights (we have a couple of 5kg dumbells at home), and maybe some pilates too (mat work, which I also have a resistance band to increase intensity with). I also got some 'Playground pump' cards at the start of the year (I haven't used them yet), which I'm thinking I can take the kids to the park and do some exercise while we are there (although this requires either a quiet park or a certain amount of confidence to do it in front of other adults).

Running will have to be done when somebody else is around to look after the kids, which will mean either early mornings or after they've gone to bed.

Weights and pilates mainly just require me prioritising time in my day to do it.

And doing the 'Playground pump' workouts, means organising to make trips to the park with the kids (which I'm sure they will love!).

Now I should sit down and actually plan when I'm going to do all this exercise I would like to do. Otherwise the 1st of February will roll around and I won't have done anything and will be feeling the effects really bad.

Hamilton is not boring!

After a sunny, hot day, with a maximum of 30.3 degrees yesterday, today is a cool, cloudy and rainy 19.8 degrees (forecast to get to 22). Which I actually don't mind, as it meant I was about to get out in the garden this morning and do some much needed weeding (and hopefully some planting this afternoon sometime). It has been too hot recently to do any gardening during the day, only being suitable to be outside after the kids are in bed, by which time I'm feeling tired, with no energy for gardening. So the salad garden has finally been weeded and half mulched (to reduce the number of weeds which return), and some more salad greens seeds planted. I had been hoping to have an abundant supply of salad greens for Christmas, but I think I might have left planting them too late (which I kind of knew when I initially planted it, it happened a couple of weeks later than what I intended due to being busy/sick/tired etc.)

Wow!

It does actually get hot here... this is the first time we've topped 30C in the last couple of years. And yes, it does feel rather warm...

It's a heatwave!

Outside temperature = 28.4 degrees (forecast to get to 29)

Temperature at the sunny end of our house = 31 degrees

Temperature at the opposite end of the house = 27.2 degrees

Humidity = 25%

So if you stay still in the shade and don't do anything, it is warm, but not uncomfortable (with a fan on to circulate the air). If you start trying to do do any physical activity and definitely if you try and go outside in the sun...you bake!

Style

I've just finished watching the second series of 'Masterchef Australia'. For those of you who have watched it, you will know that Donna Hay was a semi-regular judge on the show. I really like Donna Hay's recipes and how beautiful she can make the food look (although if you study some of her food photography closely, you will notice that sometimes all the ingredients aren't in the dish like the recipe says). But after watching this series, I have come to the conclusion that although she may be amazing at styling food, she needs someone to give her a bit of advice on style in the clothing department (maybe Trinny and Susannah might be able to help).

Anybody else agree?

Taste of summer...

As I just mentioned in my previous post, I made Raspberry sorbet this morning. This is the first of a number of ice creams/gelatos/sorbets that I am planning on making this week. I've borrowed my friends ice cream maker and it is all systems go to make:

• Blueberry sorbet - made with fresh, locally grown, new season blueberries
• Peanut butter ice cream - we made this one last year and even though Peter was the biggest skeptic of it last year (before he had tasted it), it was the first flavour he requested I make this time!
• Honey ice cream
• and hopefully one more flavour, I can't decide between 'Wild berry gelato', 'coconut milk ice cream', or something with chocolate in it!

Productive morning

Not having to get up and get Ben to school by 8.30am has totally changed our mornings. I was able to sleep in for an hour and then during the morning I managed to make Raspberry sorbet; put ingredients for Apricot, Date and Walnut bread in the breadmaker to bake; and do 3 loads of washing.

I wonder what I will manage to do tomorrow...

Washing machine fixed...

A little while ago I wrote about trying to fix our washing machine ourself...Well unfortunately that didn't work and yesterday I took the plunge and called the appliance repair people. Today they came and our bank account in now less $200 - for this we got a new drain pump (the old one had burnt out). And by getting it fixed now we have saved ourselves doing more damage and having to pay and extra $200 (as if we had left it, the burnt out motor can end up shorting and blowing up the electronic controls!). It was very quick and easy to fix and the repair guy said that our machine is a dream to fix - with the error codes it displays reducing the diagnostic work required and also it is a fairly simple machine parts wise - nothing too complicated. So now we will be able to cope with the demands of washing clothes for a household of 10 for the next couple of weeks!

Last day of school...

I'm about to go pick up Ben from school for the last day this year. He is now on holidays till the 1st of February.

Joanna finishes kindy for the year on Thursday, but goes back on the 18th of January.

Summer fruit....I love it!

Plums, apricots, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries...I love to snack on them, bake with them, make yummy desserts with them, eat them on my cereal at breakfast. So much more exciting and tasty that boring apples, oranges and bananas. The kids seem to feel the same way too, although they are still partial to bananas.

Busy week

This week has been a very busy week...Each day this week, we have had an extra activity (not part of our usual weekly routine) to attend.

• Monday - parent information seminar at school (about nutrition, which all the kids at school have been learning about in class)
• Tuesday - sharing afternoon at school (parents go and children present what they have been learning in class that term)
• Wednesday - Kindy committee meeting (this is once a month and just happend to fall in this busy week)
• Thursday - Tonight we have the annual Kindy Christmas picnic (Kindy families all bring their picnic dinner to kindy and we all eat together - the kids also sing a few songs)

Urge to declutter

I must be starting to feel a bit better...I am starting to get a strong urge to de-clutter our house. There seems to be stuff everywhere (kind of expected in with 3 kids in the house) - and a number of things that are no longer required (exersaucer, high chair, office chair, baby clothes...). There is also the extra motivation that Peter's sister and family are visiting us over Christmas (10 people living in 94sqm for a couple of weeks), so there isn't any room for unnecessary cluttter. Just don't know if I should be.