Family games night...

Tonight we had a family games night. We played dominoes, memory and some puzzles.

Megan loved it as usual, and Alex stayed and played for much longer than I had anticipated.

It wasn't planned or requested, but was great quality time. I love it when that happens....

We will be back...

Well, we did it... survived our first camping trip during ridiculously hot weather and the threat of possible bushfires looming in the background.

The kids loved the whole experience. They did get hot, but it was a great reason to spend loads of time in the pool. (I couldn't convince them into the river, despite my best efforts)

The tent experience was enlightening for us. Mike and I have both been camping before, but testing this particular tent out with the kids showed us that what we have doesn't cut it and we are now researching other brands and designs.

I had thought we had grossly over-packed the amount of camping "stuff", but most of it was used or the potential to use it was there.

We had friends staying nearby which turned out to be fantastic. I had always thought that holidays with friends kind of defeats the purpose of going away- you can spend time with them at home, why travel to hang out? But spending an evening with friends while the kids entertained each other was a great break for us as parents.

Taking the kids' bikes was a GREAT idea, too. Whenever they got underfoot, or bored, we sent them out on their bikes to do laps of the caravan park. Thankfully it was a small, quiet caravan park so they passed us often enough for us to keep an eye on them.

So, all in all, it was a great few days away. Just long enough to enjoy, despite the weather, and we are already planning our next sojourn. Hopefully it will become a regular event on our calendar and maybe even an Easter trip is on the cards.

(I had hoped to add some photos from our time away, but Blogger is being a pain and not letting me upload. Visit me over at http://instagram.com/linbritt/ if you have an Instagram account for the few pics uploaded there. I think the time has come to move on to another spot in cyber-space!)

Our first family CAMPING trip...

Tomorrow we leave for our very first family 'camping' trip. We have been on holidays in motel rooms, hotel rooms and caravan park cabins but never in a tent!

The kids are very excited and Megan has been counting down until we go.

We are packing what we think we will need and even what we think we will probably not need! Since this is our first time in this tent, we are unsure of lots of things.

Unsure of what the kids will be like in such a confined space, not having the freedom they have at home.

I am looking forward to the closeness that camping in a tent will provide, however. There will be no TV distractions, early to bed and early to wake.

The only thing worrying me is the 40 degree weather we will be expereincing while we are away. Keeing the kids hydrated and out of the sun will be our biggest challenge during our trip.

Fun will have to come second!!

Time for Christmas...

Christmas Day was a different pace here this year.

There was time to sleep in.....  well...  past 8am anyway.

Time for a leisurely late breakfast...just the four of us.

Time to open gifts one at a time and appreciate them, play with them.

Noticing the time passing and enjoying each other's company.

There were (almost) no fights or tears today. Possibly because the kids didn't hear the word "No" much today.

Chocolate was eaten throughout the day.

Lunch and dinner was leftovers from the big family get together yesterday.

And then even more chocolate was eaten.

Today was nice.

Just what Christmas is supposed to be.

The joy of giving...

Our Family Activity Advent Calendar has been doing OK in it's inaugural year. We've forgotten to look at the activity a few times and totally ditched some when we simply ran out of time. But there was one particular task that I was very keen to add and made sure we didn't miss.

  I love the idea of the kids donating something of their own before Christmas. Partly to make room for new gifts received, but more importantly to recognise that there are other families with a lot less than us and its nice to give for the sake of giving.

My mum often talks to the kids about the "Smith kids" who are from the Smith Family (charity). Megan and Alex think that the kids on the Smith Family ads are real kids who don't have toys and clothes like they do. I know it's not entirely true, but it has given a very real face to a difficult to understand topic.

So when we pulled out today's advent calendar card and it said donate a toy and book, Megan got really excited. She chose her book and toy carefully and wanted to find more and more to give. I really didn't want her to give away the 'Meg and Mog' book because I had searched the Internet especially for it when we first had Megan. But it was her choice and I think she chose it because she likes the story and wanted the Smith kids to enjoy it too.

Alex didn't really understand so just randomly chose a book and toy, but I hope he remember it for next year when he may understand a bit more.

So the gifts are boxed, ready to pass onto the Smith family charity (I'll make a point of donating to them so that I can say they items DID go to the Smith Family!)

And I'm looking forward to keeping this tradition up for years to come.

The Long-Awaited Dinosaur Party

The Dinosaur Party finally arrived!

I had a hard time giving Alex his birthday presents today, since his actual birthday is more than 2 weeks away. But he is still at an age where he doesn't realise that today isn't his birthdate, despite being able to recite his birthday as "at Christmas Eve". And we are having family over for Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve, so it would be confusing for the little guy to get birthday and Christmas presents on the same day.

The theme has been discussed and planned for close to 6 months and since Alex kept changing his mind about what he wanted, we picked something from his list that we thought would be easy enough to organise.

However, we didn't take into account the busy and expensive time of year, so some of the things we wanted to do were just not possible (head over to my Dinosaur Party Pinterest board to see all the lovely things that endless money and time would have provided!)

But all in all, Alex was happy and that's all the matters!!

The Stegosaurus cake was a hit with old and young- for decoration and taste, and I love sharing that the cake inside is a 79c packet mix from Safeway! Alex's first choice of Stegosaurus colour was pink, then purple, then green, then orange. We went with orange (even though the photo looks peachy-pink).

We have lots of fun planning food around the party theme and this time was no different!

 

 

I really loved the Dinosaur outfit I made for Alex, even though he wasn't as impressed. Today was the only day ever that he didn't feel like roaring like a dinosaur!! Oh well, he can wear it around the house!

 

And the effort we went to to make these guys was a waste, coz they weren't used in the way we had planned and weren't quite as impressive as the look here (plus Mr T-Rex got eaten by the dogs)

In the end, we had 2 kids hyped up on sugar which is always a sign of a good party. Everyone was well fed, had fun and is now completely tuckered out!

No more party planning for a while... except that Christmas Eve dinner... and Megan is making requests for her "number 5 birthday" already...

Oh well, at least Pinterest takes the hard work out of finidng ideas!!

Family Activity Advent Calendar....

I love the lead up to Christmas. The excitement, the waiting...it all adds to the fun. So I love the idea of advent calendars that count down to Christmas Day.

The kids have their first chocolate advent calendar this year and I found on Pinterest a cool "activity advent calender" that I added to my Christmas Pinterest Board, so I thought I'd have a go at making one (in fact I think I like mine better!),

 

Once I finally got all the materials and got going, it was great fun! And choosing the activites was cool too. The Pinterest page had some ideas that we used and we came up with a few of our own as well. We strategically placed the activities in the calendar so that busy days weren't made busier with tasks and those that needed a bit more time and effort were done on the weekends. I even made a few spares so that we can change things around next year.



Here are the activities we have used this year...

1. Decorate the Christmas tree
2. Hang lights on the house
3. Colour a Christmas picture
4. Listen to a Chrostmas CD
5. Make Christmas Cards
6. Make a new Christmas decoration
7. Write a letter to Santa
8. Sing a Christmas Song to someone
9. Take photos for Christmas cards
10. Make hot chocolate and stir with candy canes
11. Read a Christmas Story
12. Wrap presents
13. Choose a toy and book to donate (this is my favourite
14. Cut out paper snowflakes
15. Have a sleepover in front of the tree
16. Make Gingerbread men
17. Draw and Christmas Picture
18. Take a gift to your teacher
19. Drive around and look at Christmas Lights
20. Go and visit Santa Clause (at the shops)
21. Make reindeer food (I love doing this with the kids at school)
22. Watch a Christmas movie & eat popcorn
23. Make a treat and take it to a friend
24. Read the "Night before Christmas"

SPARES: visit the Myer Christmas Windows, make a stained glass window (another favourite that I do at school!)

 

I'm really looking forward to doing each of these activities with the kids and hope it helps build the excitement towards the big day!

 

Movie night...

We've been doing movie night for about 2 months now, and this is something I needed to blog about coz its one of the things that I really want to remember.

Channel 7 have been kindly showing great kids movies at 6:30pm every Saturday night. Perfect timing for our little ones. The movies usually finish at about 8:30 (sometimes 9pm for a longer movie or one with more ads!) so the kids think they are staying up REALLY late!

We've had special movie food-popcorn and a milkshake. The kids think its fantastic and hey, if you can't have junk food at the movies, when can you, right?

So far there has been lots of Disney Pixar films shown, which are my favourite. We've seen the likes of Toy Story 1, 2 & 3, the Incredibles, Finding Nemo, Up and loads more. Hopefully they will start to head into Christmas movies now that we are almost in December.

Luckily we have a good stash of kids DVDs so if anything undesirable is scheduled, we can change things up and the kids will be none the wiser. (I have my fingers crossed for the Tinkerbell series soon...I love them!)

I know this new tradition won't last forever, in fact it will probably only last until Channel 7 realised there is something better to show than old cartoons!

But for now it's lovely to snuggle on the couch, in our PJs and watch some awesome animated movies.

A family past-time...

My family on my Dad's side has always played cards. My Nana, the Matriarch at almost 90, is the family teacher and has passed her love onto her four boys, her ten grandchildren and now onto the next generation. She always says, "I teach them the games and then they beat me at them!"

We know a variety of games, and some are much more skilled than others. But whenever we get together with a bit of spare time (which is almost never!), the cards invariably come out.

When I was playing Gin Rummy with Nana a few weeks ago, the kids wanted to join in. At four and almost three years of age, pretty much everything in my small repertoirre was beyond them.

So we taught them SNAP! It was a very slow, deliberately leading game, but the kids loved the competition of it and Alex's attention was captured for at least 8 or 9 minutes!!!

From my point of view, the games were always for fun, although getting loads of draw fours in Uno can start to increase my blood pressure! And if things ever got too intense, Nana would always come out with her trade mark line of "We're not playing for sheep stations". It's become a family joke now!

I'm hoping that the kids' interest will stick around long enough to teach them a few more basic games, along with teaching them the important lesson of losing gracefully!

Our Vegie Patch...



Anything that starts with a trip to Bunnings and jumping in puddles, has to be awesome!!!

Our vegie patch has been a bit hit and miss so far, but now that we know what grows well, what takes too long and what we don't eat, we are wiser gardeners!

Megan has loved going and picking lettuce anytime I've needed it. And Alex has dragged us over the broccolli heads almost every day telling us "It's growing!". So instead of just doing it all myself, I thought I'd better let the kids join in.

I've read in so many places that a good way to get kids to eat vegies is to get them to grow them, so that was the plan. The kids have been great with watering the plants whenever they think of it...usually with a scoop of water from the dog bowl, though!

Alex helped with the seeds, which was perfect for his micro-second attention span, and Megan helped plant out the seedlings.

Rockmelon seeds...I think!



3-4 week old seedlings from seeds we scooped out of a capsicum and a pumpkin, in my awesome lidded seed raisers
(They are old supermarket-bought salad containers!!)



Megan seems a bit more knowledgable in the whole gardening caper, either because she is interested or because she is that little a bit older. Whatever the reason, she is a great help!

In go the broccoli seedlings



Currently we are growing... capsicum, tomatoes, parsley, chives, rosemary, thyme, oregano, corriander, broccoli, carrots, lettuce, spinach, zuccini, cucumber, celery, watermelon, rockmelon, pumpkin, cauliflower, cabbage, spring onions and mushrooms. I've got my heart set on a few fruit trees as well. I don't think we will actually grow enough to cut out fruit/vegie purchases completely, but surely it will help a bit, and it's fun!

 

And in a few months, we will get more of these!!



Guilt...

I'm pretty sure my trusty Parenting Manual (haha!) didn't have a chapter on guilt. It didn't talk about how it creeps up on you and sticks around much longer than it should!

It's funny how guilt works. Feeling guilty for the things I don't do, rather then the things I do do. For example... I don't feel guilty for making the kids eat vegetables, or cleaning up after themselves, or getting them to use their manners when talking to others.

But I do feel guilty for NOT taking them to a park on a nice day, and NOT buying them that toy that they just can't live without, and the lastest is NOT continuing with swimming lessons.

When push came to shove, we just couldn't manage $300 for a term's worth of 30min lessons. The kids grumbled for about 5mins and then got over it. Pity I can't, and guilt wont let me.

What if they go swimming over the Summer and get into trouble. Swimming lessons maybe, possibly, might have helped.

Swimming is such an integral part of the Austrlaian Lifestyle, I don't want them to miss out on their "culture" (or the closest our family has to one).

Swimming is something that I love and the kids do too, so we could do it all together.

Now, nothing is stopping me from taking them to the local pool or the beach and swimming with them myself...

....it's just that GUILT is that little voice in my head telling me I'm such a bad parent for canelling their lessons!

Family photos...

Every now and again I try to get a nice family photo. It rarely works...or more accurately, I'm rarely happy with them.

I did plan on going to a park to take them today, but it was too cold and I chickened out. However we I took some at home instead and they have turned out alright.

 

I love the greenery behind us...but I would have liked it to be a bit further away so it had that nice blurry effect. Oh well, next time!!

 

Think Alex was getting sick of smiling by now!

I think I've picked out which ones will be printed and put into frames.


And then the kids needed to have their picture taken by themselves, so I got these gems as well!

 

 

 

 

 

This is my favourite!

A different kind of reading...

 

I loved talking books as a kid. I loved listening for the chime to know when to turn the page! (The stories were good too!)

 

The ones I used to have were on cassette tape and things have moved on from there. I'm sure they will be available to download to iPods and MP3 players, if they aren't already.

 

Though we have had a few of these book/CD packs for a while, we have never really encouraged the kids to enjoy them, until today.

 

Since Alex has been having long afternoon sleeps, Megan has been using this time as quiet time. And to jazz this time up a bit (and keep her entertained for longer), Mike pulled out his old CD walkman and we hooked up some old computer speakers to it...and voila!

 

 

Megan sat and listened to Disney princess, Toy Story and Sesame St stories for more than an hour, in her room with her door closed (so it didn't wake Alex..and we didn't disturb her **wink, wink**)

 

It also rekindled my own love of reading along with the CD, so I sat and read a few with Megan as well!

 

 

 

Girlie time...

 

This week, I got to take Megan to the movies for the first time. We have held off until now coz I really didn't think she'd sit still well enough for even a kids film. But with only one seat change, and minimal talking, she did really well.

There were lots of questions and loads of preparing from me...lots of seats, have to be quiet, big screen, loud noises/music, etc. I've found that giving the kids a heads up in these new situations means they know what to expect to some extent.

We went to see the latest Tinkerbell movie, which I LOVED!! (I have a bit of a soft spot for Tink!) Megan loves Tink too, but I think the big winner for her was the snacks. She requested popcorn...where she got the idea from I don't know, TV I suppose.

And when she saw the size of the box she was over the moon. A "special drink" (lemonade) to top it all off and she was sold on the whole experience!!

Not sure if Alex would be as co-operative, but Megan and I will be back to the cinemas again...soon I hope!

It's holidays.....

I love school holidays because....

• Even though the kids still get up at 6:30am EVERY MORNING, we don't have to get dressed or eat brekkie in a hurry coz we probably aren't going anywhere.
• When they do get up at 6:30am EVERY MORNING and ask to turn the TV on, it means a sleep in for us.
• When Megan asks where are we going today, I usually get to answer "nowhere" and that's a good thing.
• We can have picnics outside on weekdays, just coz.
• Our enormous list of things to do, actually gets done! Well...mostly...
• The kids get to be kids and play outside (only really true for these and occasionally the Easter holidays...the others are usually too wet or too hot)
• Megan calls these days Family Time days :)
• I get to appreciate time with my family
• and by the end of the holidays....I get to appreciate my job!!!

Spring...!!

I happily waved goodbye to Winter yesterday, and welcome Spring with open arms today. I didn't have high hopes for the warm weather, but was pleasantly surprised.

With sunshine and warm days, I can legitamately kick the kids outside and say "Stay out there and get fresh air."

They happily potter around, pull out EVERY outside toy from the toy box and then play with the same 2 or 3 they always do. Then of course, they leave all those toys scattered around the garden, to be sneakily carried away by our plastic-loving dogs to quietly chew and ruin under a bush!

Sunshine also lends itself to picnics and lazing around, both of which I suggest at every glimpse of blue sky. Today was no exception :)

Here are some selfies (self-portraits) we took at lunchtime today, under the lovely Spring sky.

Look at that Sun glare...Proof!!!

Except this time the glare chopped my head off!

Got him!!!!!!!

So beautiful...

Always a character....that rubber face should get him into Showbiz!

Mucking around :)

Really like this one....

What are the chances of another day like this for Father's Day tomorrow???!!!??!!?!?!?!?!

Photo journalling...

Here is what has been going on for us in the last few weeks... told in in pictures!



We went to the Icehouse in Docklands a few weeks ago.
The kids had a ball and we were itching to get skates on. We will be back!!

Megan's hair is very slow growing, so we are impressed by the length at the moment

 

Gymnastics is the flavour of the month at the moment- spurred on more by the Olympics.
So we joined Kindergym and the kids are loving it.



Megan's drawings are getting more and more recognisable

No amount of alpahbet pasta is convincing either of them to eat dinner

When mum is too slow to get out of bed on the weekend, Alex is happy to get his own!

The dawn of a new era....

It's begun!! And I'm a bit excited about it, too! Tonight was the first time that we got out the Leggo. Yippee!!

Megan wanted to make a city out of a large cardboard box that she found. The first suggestion was to use blocks... but of course we needed trees for our city. What to do?

Hubby remembered the big stash of Leggo in the cupboard from when he was a kid.  The kids were intrigued and both hubby and I were happy to dive in and start building. 

There's nothing like that clink and crunch of Leggo and you dig for a piece!!!!!!!

Fairy Garden...

We have a fairy garden...and we are a bit excited!!

Our day's entertainment for the last day of the Easter holidays was to visit a favourite park of ours. With beautiful big oak(?) trees to wander around, we collected a huge supply of bits and pieces to do 'something' with.

When we arrived home, we surprisingly found some fairies had moved into our side garden. How co-incidental!! So we supplied them with our finds from our walk and I think that are quite happy with their set-up (not really sure though....they stop talking when we show up!)