I used to be able to count them...

but not anymore :-)

Her freckles look so delicious on her, they might as well be chocolate sprinkles.

She has a bob

and she's not afraid to use it.

I was hoping to get some pics to show her cute new haircut...but considering she only has bum-fluff for hair and she insisted on wearing a hair band with ladybugs on it, you can hardly tell.

It was also drizzling rain and she was being a right wench, but that's beside the point.

Last night she was doing the usual trying to talk her way out of something, Steve and I looked at each other and agreed the bob only seemed to add to her case :-)

I think it's similar to the Suri Cruise look only we've added a twist with the comb over in front...I'm positive it's going to be the next big thing :-)

Silly as a wheel

That's what Isaac told me this afternoon.

It could just be mummy's intuition, but I'd say her silliness has something to do with the estimated 5 kilos of chocolate she's consumed since yesterday morning at 6am.

Chocolate status as of Easter Monday evening:

Isaac: Eaten his one chocolate bunny, but has stashed other eggs and mini eggs around his room for the 12 month chocolate drought he anticipates till next Easter ("but when does the Easter bunny come again, mum? Before my birthday?" "No mate, not till next year - after your birthday and after Christmas". He looked at me, blue eyes as big as saucers, completely horrified).

Cassidy: Most of her stash consumed before 9am Sunday morning. There is only one foot left of a bunny in a bowl in the fridge (I saw her try to take a little nibble of it this afternoon, but I think I actually heard her little tummy revolt and she thought better of it).

Needless to say, she has spent most of the weekend like she has injected sugar directly into her veins. In the photo above, Isaac was trying to get her involved in some sort of game but she seemed physically incapable of ignoring the chocolate voices inside her head.

We of course, try to instill the true meaning of Easter in our children. At one point yesterday I found a book on the floor that the "Easter bunny" had given to Cassidy as part of her stash. I held it up to her and said, "Oh wow, Cassidy, where did this beautiful new book come from?"

She looked at me completely deadpan and dis-interested and said, "I don't know mum. The big rabbit bought it, I guess".

Guess the "big rabbit" really shouldn't have bothered to fight the queue in Bookworld.

My little Keira

The other day when I couldn't resist a quick slip into Pumpkin Patch (as you do!) I found this hat for Cassidy.

I knew she would love it and love it she does. I have always referred to these hats as "Keira" hats because I often see Keira Knightly sporting one similar in the gossip mags. So they must be trendy. Or maybe Keira just has really bad hair days.

Either way, I bought her the Keira hat and today she put it on whilst in the nicky-noo-nar (hence all the close ups). Only when it was just about all over did she succumb herself to having "just undiethss on mum". If anyone knows how to keep clothes on a three year old, please let me know, I'm getting desperate.

She insists on wearing at at a jaunty angle, I think so she can actually see out from underneath it. Can't wait for winter so I can dress up my little dolly with a skirt and tights to match :)

For Jen

Another pic :-)

A little bit pathetic

I fully acknowledge that at the moment, I am a little bit pathetic. I accept that and I'm okay with it.

I have a heavy cold. I am one of those people that when I get a cold, I'm convinced I'm not going to see in the new day. Now I know this is usually a man's department :-) but I have always dealt with colds poorly. I want endless cups of tea, codral cold and flu, to stay in bed and eat my Nonna's soup.

Unfortuntely there's noone here to make me tea, I'm out of codral, Isaac's home on student free so bed is not an option and Nonna has gone away in the caravan. So I am sinking lower into my rapidly ascending pathetic state.

I think my poor unsuspecting sister is going to take pity on me and come over later and make me some soup. I hope I'm still here to enjoy it...

:-) :-)

Before I was struck down by the Black Plague I got all inspired and made some easter cupcakes. I think I'll make some more with the kids tomorrow and let them decorate them....they may not be edible by the time they're done but at least they'll have fun!

If you can''t beat em, join em.

Walking through Coles doing the groceries. Isaac decided to show off his knowledge about rhyming words that he has been learning at prep.

Isaac: Cat and bat. Sheep and sleep. Rain and train.

Cassidy (who had been watching his face and listening very intently): Fish and pull ups!

Isaac and I looked at each other and lost it. The old lady walking past that heard lost it too. You can trust Cassidy to come up with the weirdest combo of words imaginable. I think she thought the game was not about rhyming, but just naming un-related inanimate objects.

Cassidy, always happy to be the clown, spent the rest of the shopping trip dissolving into giggles and saying to anyone that passed, "fish and pull ups!". I think people were wondering what on earth she was on.

Fast forward to that night.

Steve and I are in our ensuite getting ready for bed.

I look up and see a moth (I'm not a big fan of moths or anything that flies really).

Me: That moth has been in here for a few days. Aren't they only supposed to live for one day?He must have decided to live in here to avoid the elements and try to live longer.

Steve: But then all the other moths he knew would be dead and none of the new ones would believe that he had lived longer anyway.

-------

I ask you. You see what I have to live with??

One year to go before I'm officially old...

me modelling my new "beautiful big girl mummy clips" and my rainbow

necklace from Cassidy and a new bra from Rod and Heid :-)

playing their favourite new game of bouncing one another on the trampoline

Annaliese being lovely; my daughter being a toad with a mouthfull of lollies

me and two of my loves :-)

I snapped this as she walked toward me singing a little impromptu "happy birthday to mummy"...isn't she beautiful.

I must have just realised there was pav and got a little excited. I love pav :-)

or turn twenty eight, however you want to put it :-)

I had a wonderful day, thanks so much for all the cards, texts and emails!

Few eggs short of a basket

Note the miss doing the telltale "nah-nah-na-nah-nah" finger

point when Isaac tipped backwards out of the basket

Complete fruit loops my two.

This morning when they were getting ready to go shopping with daddy, a raucous game of "boats" in my washing baskets broke out. The type with much laughing, yelling and rapidly ascending volume. Where mum is watching thinking it's all fun and games till someone loses an eye.

From boats it moved to a Lunar Jim space shuttle when they realised they could put one basket on top of each other (Isaac loves the ABC Kids morning show, Lunar Jim. I can hear all the mums saying "lets get lunar!")

The thought was tempting to get them both in there and thread some string around through the holes of the basket to sew them in, but I refrained :-) Steve took them shopping for my birthday and as they were leaving Cassidy whispered in my ear with the kind of kid-whisper that makes your ear wet:

"It's okay mum. The boys don't know about shopping but I will help them".

Ah, that's my girl.

In somewhat denial that I am turning 27 tomorrow. I can remember my mum being 27 which isn't a good sign. Also I have always had an issue with that line from the movie "My best friend's wedding" where they say if we get to 28 and we've never married, we'll marry each other. That just stayed with me as some sort of benchmark that 28 must be really old if that was their cutoff. Like, bugger it, we didn't meet anyone better so you'll have to do because I'm 28 now and life as we know it is over. Anyway, I digress.

Cassidy couldn't contain her excitement when they got home and held my face to force me to look into her shopping bag. I closed my eyes as best I could but I have a strong inkling I'm getting some jelly beans and "beautiful big girl mummy" hair clips from her tomorrow :-)

A slight relapse...

I'm hoping there's a pill I can take or this could get very time consuming.

Blogging does take out the creativity that I used to expel scrapbooking so it's like I've reached the limit of some sort of internal creativity tupperware container and a little bit is leaking out of the steam release cap on the top (how's that for a mum analogy? :)

Don't worry I'm sure it will be over soon.

Photo taken in the studio on the day with Ivy. I would usually have to drag Cassidy into the studio with her grabbing onto furniture to try to "save herself" on the way, but of course since Ivy was in there it was okay :)

make mummy melt why dontcha...

I had made some cupcakes. Steve was picking the kids up from school/kindy and I had to go out in the meantime. I left two cupcakes on the bench with a note that said "mummy loves you xxx"

Later when I came home...

Isaac: Mummy did you leave that note for me? Can you read it to me? (the look on his face telling me that daddy had already read it to him)

Me: "Mummy loves you"

Isaac: And what are those crosses?

Me: Kiss kiss kiss

Isaac (sighing and looking at me sideways) I just love it when you leave me notes with kisses on them.

----------

Somehow we got onto talking about my birthday.....

Cassidy: When is your birthday mummy?

Me: On Sunday.

Cassidy: Yay! We need to go to the shops so I can get you some beautiful big girl mummy clips and some balloons (Cassidy loves balloons. To her it's just not a birthday of there's no balloons).

---------

My goodness how they drive me nuts and my goodness how I love them.

I can wait to turn twenty seven but I can't wait for my beautiful big girl mummy clips :-)

A slight deviation...

...in my very time saving and sensible solution of giving up scrapbooking and using my blog to make memories for my kids.

For some reason I had a weird moment and saw something vintage. Something that these photos alone wouldn't let me bring to fruition. I saw pictures of myself in my mind, of me licking beaters somewhere like this from the early eighties, taped in a yellow album somewhere. Maybe at my Nonna's? I don't know but what started with me fiddling for a few minutes (read: procrastinating about all the proofing I have to do) turned into a good 45 minutes to make this.

Photoshop made me do it.

I will now return to my regulary scheduled program of blogging.

The cautious biker

Grandpa dropped round specially today to take Isaac for a spin on the bike. For a while now, Bruce and Steve have been telling him he can ride when he feet touch the footrests and, unfortunately for mummy, that day came :-)

In typical Isaac fashion he was a little unsure at first and went through his list of Isaac Safety 101 questions until he was sure he was going to live through the experience (Cassidy was still asleep so he wasn't able to do the usual method of using her as a crash test dummy).

But as it seems to do for boys in a way I will never understand - the need for speed soon took over. The vice like grip on Grandpa's jacket loosened enough to give us a little wave on each lap round the block and you could see the grin from the other side of the road.

Somehow I don't think he'll settle for being the passenger on a bike for much longer.

Maybe I can talk them into a quad. Quad. That means four wheels instead of two, right? I'm all for more surface tension :-)

Jekyll and Hyde

It started fine..."Cass, can mummy take a picture of you in your ladybug shirt?"

But quickly turned to, "No, my ladybug doesn't want her photo taken!"




She turned sweet again when I said she could put her lipgloss on...

"Mummy, take a photo of me and baby now".

"Okay..." ..(looking through the viewfinder and seeing the look of death)..."are you going to smile?'

"No".

Right. Smiling is overrated after all....

I saw this top in Target this week and had to get it for her..she loves anything with a cute picture and I'm not really into Barbie or Dora, so ladybugs it is!

She's really a size three but there was only a two left and I bought it anyway because it was so cute (besides it shows off the chubby bits I like to bite better).

Brown eyed girl

With all the blue eyes we have around this place spending a day looking into some beautiful brown ones was a sure treat.

And what a time we had when the precious Miss Ivy came to play. Cassidy had someone new and smaller to boss, ("Iby! Come here Iby!") the cat had someone new to run from, and Kate had someone willing for a cuddle.

As Ivish is rather easy on the eye, I cajoled her ("let's just wipe that chocolate off your mouth before you go home sweetheart") into coming into the studio for a few shots. And I do mean a few. Once she realised my intentions, she was out the door like a rocket and it took a tad more chocolate to bring her back. As I said to her mummy, I am sure the child thinks the world is completely made up of insane camera wielding women.

So here's one more that even her mummy hasn't seen yet (insert wicked laugh here!).
Sheye has posted all the other pics I sent her on her blog if you want to see more of the delicious Ivy - I mean, who wouldn't??

Say it like it is

I've decided I need one of these shirts.

and that Cassidy needs this one.

Bad blogger

I just love this image...it's so her (she had just collected the eggs from the hen house)

captain Isaac rowed everyone around in the canoe

snuggles with "Mallorin" in daddy's shirt :-)

you go to the farm....you get dirty.

According to one of my "friends" :-) Apparently one week is too long not to have posted.

Life just gets away on me.

This whole school thing has thrown us into some sort of alternate universe. The one where you actually need to be somewhere at a certain time. The one where everyone is required to be dressed. The one where at least two members of our family need to be fed by 7.30am. The one where I barely get home and the morning disaray un-disarayed and it's time to leave to go pick him up.

Days are flying by like seconds at the moment and during some of those days I'm sure I haven't been to the loo. On one of those days I left the house in a fairly light weight top with no bra (the old "I'll grab one from the laundry on the way out" mistake) and did the school run. Luckily it wasn't cold.

So it's not a pretty picture, but I take comfort in the fact that I arrive at school with a whole gaggle of other half-dressed, rushed, making the scary mum NRMA ad face at their children that refuse toget out of the car. It's like a whole new family :-)

Throw in a few appointments and proofing for me, a birthday party for a school friend, Steve and I using a voucher that was about to expire for a night at Montville, grocery shopping, Steve's yearly checkup for his back op and garden work on the weekend and there you have it. The world's most boring and uneventful week. Look no further, you saw it here first folks.

:-)

Pics are from the weekend before last...beautiful afternoon at Harry and Merrilyn's.