More favourites

My little miss is going to be one next week and I thought I needed to do an update post to share her latest 'favourites' with you.

1. Walking with things over her head. She puts towels, my clothes, blankie and anything else she can find and completely covers her head with it and takes off.  Needless to say there have been a few bumps.

Her uncle picked her up mid-walk for a photo.

2. Throwing things over her shoulders.  She sits in front of a pile of toys and throws each item one by one ever her shoulder and then is amazed that they are all behind her when she turns around.

3. She still LOVES her books.  Her favourite at the moment is 'Diary of a Wombat', by Jackie French. She turns the pages and points to all the wombats on each page.

4. Swimming!!! This girl is turning into a real water baby and now kicks and paddles her arms in a crazy sort of fashion when she is in the water.  Good thing we have our very own creek and swimming hole on our property.

Swimming in our creek

5. Sharing her food with anyone who will take it.

I'm going to add in things she has learnt or is learning too, just for my records as this seems to be the easiest way to record it until I unpack her baby book.

1. She now knows where to find other peoples mouth, nose, ears and bellybutton and she can point to her own 'boobies' (thank you daddy for teaching her that one!) I think she is starting to say 'there' when she points to them too, but I could be wrong.

2. She says 'ta' when she wants something or wants to give someone something.

'Ta' (Gimme that camera mummy!)

3. She has been walking for 3 weeks now.

4. I think she is trying to say 'car' and 'dog' (which she is a bit scared of for now).

She is such a beautiful little girl and I still can't believe I am going back to work full time and leaving her all day with daddy. I don't want to miss anything, but I also want to Daddy to get to do what I have done for the past year (and I am our best chance at earning a regular income up here!).

Sorry about the sideways photos, but I can't figure out how to rotate them right now and I don't have time to do it all over again.

Gosh, it's been awhile! Unfortunately I have lost my USB cable for the camera so I don't have updated photos to show you, but I do have a few exciting things to tell you.

Firstly, I have shown you a few photos of our 'creek' on here.  Well, it turns that the bit I thought (and was very happy with) was the creek was, infact, a small gully leading into the creek.  We actually have a proper  creek through our property with a fairly decent swimming hole.  Today, after we had done lots of hammering and sweating and measuring, Little Miss was getting a bit whiney so we took her for a swim.  She took a bit to get used to the temperature of the water, which was a bit colder than your average swimming pool, but absolutely loved it and I can see us spending a lot of time there in the future.

Secondly, there has been quite a bit of shed progress.  My dad came out and sealed the concrete floors when we were lucky enough to have a few rain free days.  We have finished putting the fibro up for the walls.  The pump is now working, but we still need to do a bit of work on the plumbing.

Thirdly, I got a phone call today and I have a permanent job!!! I'm really overwhelmed by this at the moment, because it means handing my 'mummy reigns' over to daddy for awhile.  I'm so worried about what I'll miss and how much time she will spend away from me, but I just keep telling myself that it is such a great opportunity for Daddy and for her.  I'm getting upset thinking about it right now, so I'll leave it there for now until I've had some more time to process it.  I start next week.  Eeeeeeeekkkkkkkkkk!!!!

That's about it for now.  Thanks for reading and have a splendiferous day!

P.S. I feel a bit weird posting about my happy little life and my meaningless troubles when there is so much devastation happening in Brisbane (where I lived until 4 weeks ago).  I get choked up watching the news and keeping up to date with facebook.  I think about my friends that were affected, even if only a little bit and how I wish I was there, because our house wasn't anywhere near the flood affected areas and we could have offered accommodation and food to people we know.  I really hope everyone that I know that was affected is doing ok and being looked after.  

Street sign update

A few days ago I posted about the rut I seem to be stuck in and I had a few projects to get me out of it.  I'm  pleased to report that as soon as I finished that post I took Little Miss for a walk and then Daddy came home and we went for a swim.  It seems the post worked! At least temporarily anyway.


I also got working on my street sign project that you can read about here. I now have a photo so I can stop trying to describe what it is I'm trying to do with our street number, because I was doing a terrible job of that!

This one is my pretend mother -in-law's.  I didn't look at it closely before I started cutting circles for my own and I have cut out way too many, but I'm sure I can use them all somehow.  Our number is 4 digits so I need to come up with 2 other patterns.  I'm thinking stripes for one and am hoping for suggestions for the other one.  Please?

It is difficult to photograph reflective vinyl in a dark room!

My pretend MIL is holidaying in New Zealand at the moment, so I am waiting for her to come back before I actually start sticking anything.  She is a clever lady and more often than not has a much smarter way of doing things than I do. I love to learn from watching her do anything.  Especially sewing! (I'm good at getting of topic aren't I?)


I should have more to show you in a week or so.  I haven't made it to Spotlight yet, so there has been no progress on the bunting.  I do, however, have a location and a guest list for Little Miss's 1st birthday party and I will get invitations today hopefully.

Random happenings

Well, since my last post I have thought of a few things I want to post about, but didn't get around to it, so I'll put them together here.

Firstly, I wanted to write about the amazing christmas presents we got (even though that was over a week ago).  Everyone was so thoughtful and we got so many useful things for our new house, including rugs for the floor, outdoor lights, farmers hats, a gift voucher for the good guys (how fun) and lots of other things.  BUT, there was one gift that really stood out for me and infact I burst into tears when I got it.  Daddy's sister put a lot of thought and effort into her presents this year and went with handmade presents.  She put effects on some photos with photo shop and printed them on canvas for various people.  Ours was 2 prints about 30cm square each and have a some kind of effect to make them look like they were painted.  One is of the house we just moved out of in Brisbane and the other is of the Shed house.  Now I know the house in Brisbane was just a rental, but we loved the house and it is the house that was Little Miss's home for her first year of life.  (I'm choking up as I write this, what a sook! Although, I'm also listening to Rootless Tree by Damien Rice so that's not helping my emotional state).  Anyway, I loved the present so much and I am so grateful that Little Miss has such a great, thoughtful Aunty to grow up with.   (one of two, incase my sister is reading this!)

Left: Brisbane house Right: Shed house

The present Little Miss got from her Aunty was just as amazing and thoughtful and I can't wait to get into our shed and paint the walls so I can hang these lovely prints up.  So much for not giving her name away! Oh well, I had to show you, they look so good.

Terrible photo, but each print has something on it that starts with that letter: Apple, Meerkat, Elephant, Lion, Iguana and Antelope

I have a few other things to post about, but I think I'll do them separately.

Stuck in a rut

Grrr, I think I need a good shaking and I'm hoping this post will do the trick. A few months ago, after getting into a routine with a baby and things starting to return to normal I found myself feeling a bit (incredibly) lost.  Until then I had always been either studying or working and was used to having deadlines and people relying on me to keep me focused and motivated.  I dislike the fact that it takes something like a deadline or someone else to motivate me and it's something I'm trying to fix (and getting better at), but that's how it is.  Then I really got stuck into sewing and crafting and moving and christmas and, although it sometimes took a little 'pep talk' from myself to do something, I was getting much better and feeling a lot better.  This is also one of the reasons I started blogging.  To keep me focused and motivated.

Now that we are here and Daddy is out at the shed working everyday and it's just me and Little Miss, (although her aunty has been here for the last week and that was fantastic) I feel myself getting back into my rut, which involved watching TV and sleeping when Little Miss sleeps and having no energy and not eating very well and being lazy.  I do have a few projects I could be working on and I thought that if I blogged about them I might actually do them.

Firstly, I really should organise Little Miss's 1st birthday party, which is in 2 weeks. Something I want to do for it is make a pink and red themed bunting to decorate the party and later decorate her bedroom.  I haven't started this, because I need to make a trip to spotlight to get some fabric.  I think I will do that tomorrow. I think I'll use THIS tutorial as a rough guide.

Another project is making a street number sign for the shed.  My pretend mother-in-law (daddy and I aren't married, but have been together for 10 years) made one out of pretty coloured sticky vinyl offcuts for herself and her parents and I am going to make one for us (with her suggestions and guidance along the way I hope!).  Clearly I am not doing this project justice by trying to describe it to you so I will take some photos tomorrow and re-blog about it.

Both of those projects are more than enough to keep me busy, along with visits out to the shed now that we have a playpen and can actually put Little Miss (who is now walking by the way!!!) down on the floor.  Also, as soon I get my sim card sent to me I will have people's phone numbers so that I can catch up with all the relatives I moved here to be closer to.

Here's a funny fact: We moved here to be closer to our family.  My parents are currently in Austria and Daddy's parents are currently in New Zealand.

Sorry that was such a long rambling post. Maybe this one was a bit of a selfish vent.  If you listened then thank-you!

Christmas and the last week

My titles are quite boring aren't they?! It's because I just want to get started writing and I'm too impatient to spend time coming up with something witty.  Nevermind!

So, Christmas was 2 days ago now.  We had a VERY wet day, preceded and followed by wet days! We started with getting Daddy out of bed, which took me, Little Miss, Daddy's sister and her boyfriend.  I bossed, Little Miss tried being cute with her aunty's help, and her boyfriend flew a remote control helicopter around the bed.  I think it was the helicopter that did the trick.  We then passed around presents while Little Miss ate breakfast and started saying 'ta' for the first time.  Daddy and I got some really great presents and Little Miss was absolutely spoilt.  

Waking daddy up

Testing out a present

We then had breakfast with some of Daddy's family which involved more present opening, followed by lunch with some of my family and even more present opening.  We drove through a lot of water that day and I even had to get out and wade through some water over the road and Daddy followed behind me in the car.

The evening was spent with more of Daddy's family and was a great way to end a lovely day.

Little Miss was a bit cranky for her first christmas, but she has 2 new teeth to show for it! Christmas day was the first day Little Miss took more than one step, and since then she has started walking about 10 metres at a time with no help at all.  I'm trying to think what her favourite present was, but I don't think there is a specific one.  She loves her tricycle from her Uncle and her xylophone from mummy and daddy.

Add caption

On boxing day we went to one of Daddy's aunty's for lunch.  (She lives about 1km away from our shed!) We popped into the shed to see how it was going and found it almost flooded due to so much build up of fallen leaves and rubbish, so Daddy, his sister and her boyfriend took shovels down and dug a trench.  I'm yet to see this, but they assure me it worked.  

After trench digging

We also have some new doors on the shed, but I don't have photo to share yet.  If the rain ever slows down we will get back out there and I will take some photos.

I hope anyone reading this had a lovely and slightly drier christmas than we did.  My next project (other than the shed) is Little Miss's first birthday party.  Any ideas? (don't forget to consider the rain)

The Move

Well, here we are one week after the move and I am starting to feel something.  For example: I went shopping and wasn't able to buy 3 of the 4 things I needed and my phone supplier doesn't even have a store in the town.  BUT, I am with family, which is what I wanted and it only takes 10 minutes to get anywhere and it's easy to find parks.  It will still take a bit of getting used to, but for now I have lots to keep me occupied.  

The move went smoothly, but it took a looooooooooooong time to get here.  For some reason what should have been a 12 hour drive took 16 hours, so even though we left Brisbane at 7am, we didn't' arrive in Mackay until 11pm.  Daddy's brother stayed with us after our trailer left and helped us clean so he was driving with us.  The plan was that whoever wasn't driving one of the 2 cars would be in the car with Little Miss to entertain her, however, she was an absolute angel all day (from what Daddy and her Uncle tell me; I spent most of the day driving the other car on my own) and played on her own or slept.

There's a baby in there somewhere!

Dinner in Rocky

As I'm writing this I realise I'm skipping bits out and I want to add them in, so it's a little bit random and perhaps not very chronological.  

Something I missed is that Daddy's sister and her boyfriend also came and helped us clean on the last day and stayed the night where they slept on our bare loungeroom floor (for the 4 hours that we actually got to sleep!) 

We spent the last day in our house cleaning, taking loads of rubbish to any bin we could find and packing the cars.  It rained the ENTIRE day and I was so glad the day we packed the trailer was fine.  By the time we had finished packing the cars (11:30pm) the front yard had turned to a horrible mush and we had a lot of wet towels to travel with.  

The next morning we were up at 5 to finish packing, check everything was in order and get some breakfast before leaving.  Daddy's sister and her boyfriend went home when we left to get ready to catch their plane to Mackay where we would be seeing them later that night.  We headed off and had a lovely clear day on the roads with no incidents or obstacles.  The only problem was that one of the cars was so full that the driver (and also the only person that could fit in the car) couldn't see to change into the left hand lane so we had to stick together and 'lane-spot' for each other.  There were a few nerve wrecking moments, but all turned out ok.  

Our stuff unloaded into Daddy's parents shed until ours is finished.

We have been to the shed twice since arriving and there has been more progress, which I will post about shortly (it is difficult when staying in someone else's house).  

Christmas was yesterday and I also want to post about that.  Hopefully tomorrow there will be time!