Self portrait

I am inspired today by Tara Whitney and her post on self portraits. Here is one of me, taken a few days ago. I plan to try a first thing in the morning shot like Tara's too, I love that idea.

Role Reversal

For the third Wednesday in a row I am at work whilst my husband is at home looking after the kids. Its quite strange to be driving out in the morning and leaving them all behind, but, it is fantastic to come home at night and find dinner cooking, and household chores sort of done :-)

Next Wednesday will feel strange, as the kids are back at school and I will have to cook dinner myself.

Eleven

Its the worst kind of unfair, to be so excited about your approaching birthday, to be so looking forward to it, then on the day to just feel so lousy you cant really enjoy it.

Poor little sweet pea just couldn't muster up much enthusiasm for anything today. Happy birthday sweet girl. I hope you feel better in the morning, and we will have all of your birthday specialties again when you are up to it xxx

Its love

Friday saw me skipping down the steps to Teds Camera Store in the city, and skipping out with a new Nikkor 50mm 1.8 lens, and a Lowepro Terraclime camera bag. The lens is so fast, and so clear, its love I tell ya, love!

Snowball

You know what it is like, its your FIL's 70th birthday, he wants a small family dinner, and you offer to host it in the knowledge that there will be 6 kids and 8 adults and that you can quite happily (ie in a mostly stress free manner) deal with it. You can cater for that much food in your kitchen, you can supply that amount of plates, cutlery and glassware, hell you can even stretch a bit to do something a little special.

And then, you know what it is like when you get a phone call from someone suggesting that maybe we should also invite X, and then Y, and then ... what the heck invite the whole alphabet, Joc won't mind!

And before you know it the small family dinner you are hosting is a full on surprise party.

Mmmm

So as of last night that is where I am at. All of FIL's siblings and their partners will also be attending, which adds another 10 people, so a sit down dinner is out, we just dont have enough chairs, and we will take it buffet style. Also need to get some more wine glasses.

So the more the merrier... just have to remember to breathe, and let go of my perfectionism, who cares if the cutlery doesn't match? ;-)

Right now ...

you are changing from day to day.
you like to make us both a hot drink after the girls go to bed.
you are spending a lot of time reading car magazines, and playing car racing games on the wii and computer.
you like to tell your sisters what to do.
you will eat anything that catches your eye... make that everything that catches your eye.
you are taller than me.
you are taller than Aunty Nessa (she is so peeved).
you play your electric guitar more than your acoustic.
your voice is almost broken.
you use too much of my expensive hair paste.
you dont want to have your hair cut too short.
you are not enjoying football as much as you used to.
you need to wear your glasses more often.
you love to tease me.
you get "grown up" jokes more often.
you ride your bike to and from school (when you dont have a flat tyre).
you are not very good at completing your homework.
you are very very good at maths.
you think English lessons are a waste of time.
you like reading the same books as me.
you like listening to Fallout Boy and Nickleback.
your best friend is Tom.
you will be 14 in three months.
you wear size 10 shoes.

Love you kid xxx

School Holidays

Today felt like the first day of the school holidays for me YAY, even though the kids have been off school since Thursday (and Pumpkin had been home most of last week sick). It was great to be able to cruise around in my pj's most of the day and not rush to do anything.

The kids have been watching episodes of Charmed while I have been messing around on the computer and cooking. We had cinnamon scrolls for morning tea - YUM, and we have a Chocolate Cake to work our way through later courtesy of The Pioneer Woman.

Also on a positive note I had my hair cut short two weeks ago, and today I finally got the hang of styling it the way I want it!! I was so frustrated with it, and was thinking of going longer again, but now I think I will stay with it a bit longer. It is so much easier to look after than it was long, and it looks much healthier too. Maybe I will post a photo if I can get one I like, or maybe I will be too shy and you will just have to imagine.

xxx

Visitors

I had a lovely weekend with my visitors, my gorgeous sister and her family. Its so fun to see her with her kids. Its sort of strange to me to see my baby sister with babies of her own, she still doesn't seem old enough in my mind to be a mama!

Her oldest boy is four and suffering a serious case of hero worship - he followed my almost 14 year old son around the entire weekend, he slept in his room, kicked the footy with him, played on the wii with him, and generally did whatever my son was doing. Apparantly all of the kids in his preschool class know all about "my cousin" and what he does, and we are guessing that news this week will involve a long detailed explanation of the time he spent with us on the weekend, although the only person likely to be mentioned will be my eldest :-)

Her middle child, and only daughter is a sweet, funny headstrong little one, whose affection for our dollhouse was immeditate and strong. The funniest thing she kept doing was throwing the dollhouse resident pooch out the window to the porch, because "dogs not allowed in the house", that really made me laugh!

And then there was baby pudge, whose smile is to die for. He wasn't the happiest little chap as he is getting a mouthful of teeth right now, but we caught glimpses of his good humour, and that was enough. He is all together too cute!

From the peanut gallery

Last night while sweating and huffing my way through a workout video I heard this gem from my 13 year old

"looks like you didn't get the six pack gene mum"

Wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry, but in the end what can you do but laugh!