Snippets Of Daily Life

Middle (then aged 8) happily engrossed in his favourite activity

So, it's been almost a week since I posted - apologies.  As it turns out, scheduling one's posts during a launch week is quite the prudent thing to do, especially if you're like me, with the kind of luck that makes Murphy rub his hands with glee.  Of course, I did not do this!  There was one thing after another this week - bam, bam, BAM.  So here I am, late to my own party!

This is just a quick check in - it's 12:36 am here at the moment - to keep you up to speed with what's been happening around these parts.

We visited Eldest's potential high school on Monday.  For those not familiar, Eldest is autistic and due to start high school at the beginning of February 2012.  Until now, he has been in supported education (ie, a special ed class within a mainstream school) but the places simply do not exist for a similar set up at the high school level, so it's pretty likely he'll enter eighth grade as a mainstream student, the first time he's ever done this.  This is real heart-seizure kind of stuff for us, but of course we're thankful his development in recent years may have placed him out of contention for a special ed class placement.  He'll always have a disability, but so far he's coping well enough in school to survive with minimal intervention.  It also afforded us the opportunity to check out the school from a 'non-disability' standpoint for when Middle and Youngest take the leap into the bigger fishpond in 2013 and 2015 respectively.  Eldest also has an NEP (Negotiated Education Plan / Individual Education Plan) scheduled for tomorrow so we have lots to talk over.

Middle took a long overdue visit to a podiatrist on Friday.  Apparently he has one of the worst cases of 'flat feet' the podiatrist had ever seen, but to be fair, the young lad looked fresh out of university so perhaps not the best indicator :P Middle will be fitted for an orthotic shoe insert in a couple of weeks and will require more expensive shoes from now on.  This little exercise (the consult, the shoe insert, the return visit and the shopping expedition to procure the new shoes) will put us out of pocket around $300, with a 'rinse and repeat' due somewhere between 6 and 12 months from now.  Again, mighty thankful we have money saved for this kind of thing.

Charlie the Wonderdog saw the vet this week.  Dog's memories are short, I discovered - the last time he'd been on the vet's table was while he still had his, uh, 'bits' intact over a year ago and he spent the entire time showing us the whites of his eyes and shivering like a mad thing.  He did well though and the visit was just for his most recent shots, but there went another $86!  Coincidentally, we'd just finished counting up our coin jar stash the night before and had 'found' $84.  Providence perhaps?

I have been making a very conscious effort to expand my culinary repertoire this week.  Full report in my next Menu Plan Monday post but so far, the big hits of the week have been the homemade Thai Red Curry sauce and tonight's Bacon & Herb Stuffing.  Both used FRESH herbs!  These usually wilt away to nothing in the bottom of my crisper before I get off my backside to cook with them!

I'm really hoping for a quieter week.  With far less expenditure thanks!

No Bag? No Problem!

Isn't this a cute idea?




I have a sudden urge to go buy a case of bandannas!

Homeschooling Is Beginning To Sound Better With Every Lunchbox I Pack

So the random picture? It's a cake. And I made it over a year ago, for Boof's 8th birthday, but never got around to posting a picture before. I was looking for a pic to head up this post and came across it and thought why not? It's about the most creative thing I've ever done in the kitchen and trust me, it wasn't even that much of a victory because I cheated. I used a couple of bought madeira cakes and a whole bunch of chocolate coins and plastic chains and called it a day. Surprisingly, it seemed to work. I especially liked the part that said I needed one little triangle of a Toblerone because I got to eat the rest of the bar. Arrggh, me hearties!

I had a big long post planned out but not more than five minutes ago I discovered all of the following in the space of approximiately 53 seconds:

• We're out of eggs (I was throwing together some cupcakes for school lunches).
• We're out of small change (I was going to my fallback plan of a lunch order).
• I thus still need to make sandwiches/pack lunchboxes x 3 - so back to making cupcakes.
• Now I have to research egg substitutes for the cake mix (What? You thought I would bake from scratch at 10:30 pm? No chance!)
• Paid a bill I thought was overdue. Discovered Talented Hubby's delightful trick of writing when it was due on the calendar an entire day early, little scamp that he is (Did he think I was going to forget to pay it or somethi--- oh, wait. Good call, you're forgiven)
  
• Realised I forgot my (older, wiser) sister's birthday. I'm sorry C!
  
• Remembered TH is out of clean work shirts.
• TH is on call tonight - so I can't even iron damp and let dry overnight (one must be dry and ready to go in case he's called in).
• Discovered an appointment for tomorrow at 10 am - here at the house - that I'd completely forgotten about. Had planned to go out. Considered rescheduling. Too much hassle. Will keep appointment tomorrow, sigh.
• Looked around the (open plan) family room/main living area. One corner is clean but I doubt I can make appointment lady sit there facing the wall (to shield her from the rest of the mess), so I'll have to clean up a bit between now and then.
• God bless the five new podcasts I just put on my iPod this afternoon.
• I'm not going to bed very early tonight, am I? Sigh.

Until tomorrow. If I live.

P.S. The dog ate FOUR pairs of underwear today. He stole them from the washing basket in the hall. They're not the first casualties either...

Ahhhh, Twilight. And Sonic. And Sweet Tea.

I'm coming down off a post-Twilight euphoric daze. Yesterday Talented Hubby, groaning all the while, took me to Blockbuster so I could rent the movie. There was one small problem though - I hadn't yet finished the book. So that's what I did most of yesterday afternoon. I finally finished reading at 9:07 pm. And by 9:09 pm I was happily scrolling through the opening credits.

First impressions? Book was definitely better than the movie, but then most of them are. This first movie, I'm told, had a small budget. I think you could tell. The moving lines behind the characters as they ran made me giggle. Not to mention the poorly-disguised 'I look like I'm running but really I'm on a cable' thing. But the absolute highest point of hilarity for me was All The Whiteness.

Now I get they're supposed to be vampires. And apparently there's a law somewhere that states all representations of vampires on film need to have an 'Elizabethan arsenic' feel to them. But come on! The girls managed to look fair-skinned but not abnormally so - why not the boys? They (Edward, Jasper, Carlisle, Emmett, James) all looked like a Kitchenaid mixer had exploded flour all over them. Methinks a better disguise - especially considering most of them had decades to perfect their blending in techniques - may have included a little rouge. To me, preppily-dressed folk with powder-white faces stand out like a sore thumb. Now, if you dressed the Cullens in goth regalia to go along with their white faces, they'd blend right into most high schools in the world!

That said - I loved it, LOL. And there's a whole other post in the works about the intricacies of Edward's appeal. I am tragically invested and I don't care who knows it.

New bloggy friend Stefne (with her darned insightful, imaginatively-titled blog) and I had an impressive Twilight debriefing session via Twitter and Messenger this morning. Chief among our concerns - and I can't be the ONLY person ever to have thought of this, so excuse the crass-ness - was the question of what happens when Bella, uh, experiences her 'delicate time' of the month. Any takers? LOL. It's on the same level as the 'how do you pee in space?' question. There has to be an answer to this one.

Moving right along...

Lots of crazy stuff happening about the place here. The inlaws are coming to stay tomorrow for two nights. We love them, so this is a good thing. And this time - woot! - we can actually offer them more than a leaky old air mattress as we recently purchased a sofa bed. Oh, the luxury!

And of course, there's our trip coming up. While my physical presence may be on the steps of the Opera House, my heart is busy planning a (mythical, at this stage anyway) trip to the States. I am starting a list of culinary delights I mean to try if I ever get there (seriously, brutal flight prices from Australia pretty much eliminates the kids' inheritance, so perhaps never would be a good estimate?) On the list so far? Sonic in Texas and sweet tea anywhere else in the 'south'.

Hey...wouldn't it be great if I had someone from each state in the US nominate some sort of legendary local food item for my list? Jump in in the comments! Spread the word!

Can't Blog. Have Discovered "Twilight"

Okay, so I'm a year or two behind the rest of the known world, but I've always been a slow starter!

I would also like to take this opportunity to "thank" Stefne Miller for pushing me over the cliff edge in regards to this book. Dishes are once again being ignored, as is Mt Washmore. Of course I'd heard of it before last week - hard to ignore all the soulful Edward posters in the stores and the recent release of "Twilight" the movie down here - but I pooh-poohed the entire phenomenon in much the same way as I scoffed at Harry Potter.

Well, Ms Meyer, you win. Your publisher's freaky viral marketing and the fact that Forks high school is the new Hogwarts sucked me RIGHT THE WAY IN.

I didn't even wait for a library copy - I bought a new book on a whim when I saw it on the store shelf last Friday. Co-incidentally mere HOURS after Stefne lauded Edward's praises to me from the Twittertops.

I am embarrassingly enthralled.

Baaaaaaa! (that's a sheep, folks)

A Kitchen Win And A New Friend - I Love How The World Works!

Yesterday was a good day.

Firstly, though perhaps not life-changing (or is it?), I had a new recipe win. This doesn't happen terribly often around here, but when it does, by golly it's like God The Master Chef himself comes to hang out and chop some onions with me in my kitchen.

The story goes like this. There's a chain of pasta restaurants down here in Australia called, unimaginatively, Fasta Pasta. A while back, when the kids could finally hold a fork without trying to stab a sibling, we decided to upgrade our eating out experiences from the Golden Arches to something a little nicer. Not too high-brow, since we were (are) still on a budget, but somewhere that we could sit down in as a family and share a delicious, good value meal that came to the table on REAL HONEST TO GOODNESS PLATES. Fasta Pasta fit the bill and for a while, my dish du jour was always the classic Chicken Parmigiana.

And then I found a new love.

The Pollo Delizia was the answer to a question my husband posed. "Hon, is it possible to come to this place and NOT order the very same thing each and every time?"

I branched out, and was thus hooked.

The problem with this new, delectable dish was that I couldn't reproduce it (to justice, anyway) at home. I tried, believe me. I kind of had an idea in my mind of what would go into it, but I knew I was missing something. I even went out to lunch a couple of times with my girlfriends, praising (and eating) the Pollo Delizia each time, and wishing aloud I had the guts to ask for the recipe. I was always too chicken to do that in person.

Then one day - this week to be exact - I caved, emailing the head office and literally begging for the recipe. I was going insane trying to recreate it. To be honest, I wasn't entirely sure I'd be successful, considering restaurants tend to like to keep their recipes close to their chests, but you know, I kind of figured 'why not?' and jumped.

The wonderful, awesome Sarah, from the Fasta Pasta marketing division, took pity on me and sent the recipe a mere two days later. I whooped with glee!

I tried to wait until the next week's menu rotation (beginning Monday), I really did, but the culinary awesomeness was calling me so I made a special trip to the supermarket yesterday to pick up the ingredients. We cooked it for dinner last night.

OH. MY. WORD.

I am a kitchen genius. It actually worked! To appreciate the thrill of that statement, you really need to have been in attendance the many, many other times I have tried to do a copycat/new recipe and failed miserably - suffice it to say, I can count on my ten fingers the times I've been so enamoured with a brand new recipe that I've instantly known I'd be cooking this for my grandkids one day. Cooking just doesn't work that way for me! I ate so much I was very nearly ill but I don't care because GOSHDARNDANGITWORKED and I didn't burn the food, or myself, or have the whole thing fall apart at the end. I cannot tell you how excited I was!

So there was that. Enough of a good day right there.

The rest of the 'good' part of yesterday actually happened earlier that afternoon, after our trip to the supermarket. Earlier in the week we'd gotten a flyer in the mailbox about a garage sale being held nearby, with proceeds to aid a sick little baby girl. The sweet girl first came to our attention when she was featured on a current affairs program in my city a couple of weeks beforehand - in that story, a charity tin raising money for an upcoming trip to the States for her medical treatment had been swiped, low-life style, from the counter of a local business. Thankfully, after the story aired, the money was replaced by kind-hearted community members, but of course they still needed a lot of money for the trip, so they were fundraising through garage sales and business donations.

Anyhoo, I walked Moo around the corner to the garage sale yesterday and was surprised to find the very same baby (and her parents) in attendance - and it turns out, the sale was at their house and all this time they'd lived just a few houses down from us.

I had a lovely conversation with the mother and got to meet baby Hayley - who is, I should point out, the most angelic little snippet you ever did see. She has a very rare medical condition - only ten or so kids in Australia have it - and so far, she's doing 'okay but not okay' (in the words of her mother - I wish I could name the condition, but it's one of those obscure collection of words you instantly forget the second you hear them). The first three months of her 5 month life were spent in the hospital. The trip to the States is to attend a conference on her rare condition. I guess because so few kids have the condition, there's no specialist they can see down here in Australia.

Baby Hayley has been on my mind ever since. Sometimes I marvel at life's little 'coincidences'. I had been planning to attend the garage sale earlier in the morning but the day kind of got away from me and after lunch I expected them to be wrapping up - so I was surprised to drive past after our trip to the store and see things still going strong. Hayley's mum said the morning had been freakishly busy, so had I gone when I intended, I daresay I would have missed out on a really sweet conversation. And I just can't get over the fact that the family lives on my street. We might never have crossed paths had it not been for the providential run of events.

Please keep baby Hayley and her family in your thoughts and prayers. They leave in two weeks and will be gone for a month to attend the conference and to hang out as a family with Hayley and their 2 yo daughter doing fun holiday stuff. On their return, Hayley undergoes an operation.

I just want to do MORE, you know? But I'm feeling very blessed today to have met the family :)

May Sucks, The Dog Is Crazy And I Love Containers Too

I'm in this weird limbo of emotional blankness right now, hence the lack of posting. There was a lot going on around (the real) Lizzie's Home for the first part of May and then Mother's Day hit and I worked myself into a tizz again. Up I went again in the wake of that, and down I came again this past weekend - the 17th marked what would have been my mother's 58th birthday. I don't think I'll be fully recovered until June - there's still the anniversary of her death (30th) and then the day of her funeral (June 6) to contend with. Honestly? May just plain SUCKS for me (with a bright spark for my own Mother's Day celebration with my kids, of course).

Most everything else is puttering along just fine. Charlie continues to be the source of both frustration and hilarity. His two favourite activities in the world include chasing the birds away from his dry food bowl outside - his brain must think he's flying, but his feet just can't keep up, so he usually trips - and devising ways to get into the loungeroom, something he's been banned from since day one. We have a great house for a dog, with tiles everywhere except the bedrooms - and the loungeroom. At six months old I guess you could say his sneakiness is akin to a 10 year old boy hopped up on red food colouring, LOL.

I was working on the sewing nook last night, with the nearby door to the tiled kitchen open so I could keep an eye on him. It was like a weird cross-species game of "What's The Time Mr Wolf?" - I'd look away, put a book on a shelf or something, and when I glanced back, he'd be an inch into the room. Again, I look away to do something and when I look back, he's in the door three inches. This went on for some time until he was fully in on the carpet, just stretched-out all comfy, a stupid dog grin on his face as if to say, "Nee-ner!" Not once did I see the little imp actually move.

Talented Hubby has returned to work after several weeks off. That man works so hard - I mean, it doesn't seem like it, since he just had most of a month off, LOL, but during non-leave stretches he works like the blazes. Apart from his day job, his joint-photography exhibition opened this week and he's expecting some sales to come from that (if you get the fancy to check out more of TH's work, you can see it here).

Kids are all doing great - Jay has his 'exam' for the nationwide literacy and numeracy testing this past week. For the benefit of my international readers, the Australian government tests each child in primary (elementary) school at year levels 3, 5 and 7 - the same test, over the same days, across the country - to see where they are 'at' with their reading/communicative and numeracy skills. The general aim is, I suspect, to 'catch' kids who are falling behind before they get too far behind, and it provides general information about how your child compares to his classmates, year level (both in his state and nationwide) and other useful stuff like that. Jay, being special needs, is exempt from participating (and so missed the Year 3 test) but this year his teachers all thought he would be perfectly fine and honestly, TH and I were very curious. By all accounts he did wonderfully well ("Mum, I finished the sums in ten minutes and they said you could have 50 minutes to complete them!") and going by what we already know about his academic performance so far, he's expected to be slightly above average, compared to other REGULAR, NON-SPECIAL NEEDS children of his age. Little man, we've had some dark days, but stuff like this makes Mama's heart burst. Mwah.

And so here I am, anxiously awaiting a text message from the Janome dealer (why a text? They offered it as an option so I took it - the library texts me when a book is ready for pickup, the Blood Service texts to remind me about appointments - thank God - so it makes perfect sense to me that a sewing machine retailer would act similarly, LOL). Soon as that baby arrives I'm all over it. In the meantime, I 'nest', preparing a sewing nook.

Laura at I'm an Organizing Junkie would be so proud of me. Containers and tubs feature prominently, :P (pics soon).

(Talented Hubby just called from work. He's had a difficult start to the day. As always, I continue to be in awe of how he manages to handle it all...)

And with that, I'm off to continue cleaning. Baby (sewing machine) must have a pretty place to sleep, LOL...

Randomness. Yes, Again.

Tonight marks the second night we've spent as a 'two child family'. Jay has been on camp since yesterday morning and to say that we were a little apprehensive about letting him go would be putting it mildly.

This is Jay's second camp - for his first last year (Grade 4), Daddy went along, which erased our concern, and it was also just the one night, with this week's camp being two nights.

I'm such a mother hen sometimes, I know :)

There hasn't been a heck of a lot going on around here otherwise. Moo has had her swimming lessons every day this week (part of the school curriculum down here, for one week every year) which has meant a packed swimming bag every day - I'm kind of over that :P

Talented Hubby has been on annual leave, but he returns to work on Saturday. He's not looking foward to it, LOL.

A local fabric store in my area is changing premises and I was able to snaffle up some really great bargains when I went out shopping with a friend on Tuesday - all fabric was $1 per metre (some was quilting fabric upwards of $11 per metre), all ribbon spools (whether they had half a metre or fifteen metres on them) were 50c. I replenished the ribbon stash quite admirably with that. I walked out of the store with over $70 worth of gear, for $38, including five laundry sacks for $3 each that I would have had to make myself (and these ones are far prettier!). I love days like that.

As you might have guessed, I'm trying to work out what I want to do by way of a blog design here. At the moment I'm just using a basic Blogger template but I've got a couple of other designs in the works in case I get bored. What can I say? It happens with remarkable frequency :P

Something far more brainy tomorrow, I promise...

Ack! I Can't Catch A Break This Week!

I'm sick.

And... I have a sore leg/foot that, for the life of me, I can't remember injuring.

And... I sent my girl-child (a mere 7½ years old) away on a two night school camp this morning (oh dear God the planning that went into that! Every scrap of clothing and every other item had to be individually named. In the end I threw each day's clothing into a big ziplock, wrote "Thursday" and "Friday" on the front, plus a third baggie for "Spare clothing", and hoped for the best. I am absolutely certain she'll forget something, but anyhoo).

And... Boof has had his curriculum-based swimming lessons each day this week - public schools here (at least in my state) set aside a week of lessons once a year, about 1.5 hrs each lesson (ie, one lesson a day). This means a packed swimming bag every day, which means remembering to dry out/wash swimming gear each night. Added to this is Jay's regular Friday swimming lesson (he goes with his class to a special needs swim lesson).

And... Jay goes on camp NEXT week (also for two nights) but is going alone for the first time (staff at the school are going and are brilliant). So there's planning for that.

And... also had Jay's NEP (negotiated education plan) meeting today - he's doing really, really well (for those not aware, an NEP is like a step up from a parent-teacher interview and is geared toward keeping everyone on the same page regarding the unique approach to teaching each special needs kid can bring) Jay's average to above-average when compared to other kids (in the general school population) with most of the 'needs' part of his 'special needs' relating to social issues rather than academic ones. The teachers and aides continue to rave about what a fantastic student he is which makes us ridiculously happy. They're also gearing him up for inclusion this year in the standardised national literacy and numeracy testing for his year level (grade 5). This testing was introduced a few years ago in Australia (to be done at year levels 3, 5 and 7) and Boof did it last year (grade 3 for him then) so we know what to expect, but still, it's a unique experience and also essentially an 'exam', so we have lots to talk to Jay about regarding it. Jay was exempt from his Year 3 testing due to his disability but everyone thinks he'll do fantastically this year so it will be really interesting to see where Jay lies on the scale. Numbers, he knows back to front and sideways. Literacy is also really good but he could have issues with misunderstanding the question (numbers are like a language to him, with finite answers - written language not so much, although he's well above average in the 'finite' aspects of it, like spelling). All in all though, we're incredibly proud of Jay.

And... speaking of Jay, we're looking to the immediate future and how to broach the subject of his disability to him. Until this point, we have not spoken directly to him about autism. There are a whole raft of reasons why, which I won't go into now, but suffice it to say that all three kids are getting older and offhand comments have shown up here and there which indicate that it's 'time' to begin explaining it to him. So that we have answers (in 'his' way of understanding them) on hand, we're paying a visit to the Autism Association in my state early next week to snaffle some of their library books and his class teacher is running us up a little binder with explanations of various things in age (and disability) appropriate terms.

And... this all signifies a fairly huge turning point for us. Puberty is right around the corner, which scares us horrendously I should point out, and the older Jay gets, the more necessary it will become to explain certain behaviours he has to him and to the younger two. We don't feel right doing that before we've spoken to Jay about it all, so here we are. I'm petrified. He'll either be very 'meh' about it, or he'll be insanely curious and totally confused. There's no middle ground with Jay, which is why its even more important that we do this initial 'you have autism' conversation in the right way, with the right resources to hand. For the most part we're pretty instinctual parents, but for this, if we make a mistake, it could come back to bite us in the rear.

AND ALSO... I'm like the world's worst guest blogger. I'm doing Kitchen of the Week over at Happy To Be At Home and with everything that has been going on, I've not had much of a chance to write up my days and send them in to the wonderful Toni. They're coming! But it will probably be a case of Days 2, 3 and 4 all in the one post, LOL. It's a bit hard to concentrate on max ibuprofen. Writing this post is the longest I've sat down since Sunday.

And approximately twice as long as I've slept since then also.

Dear Big Man Upstairs

Thankyou for getting us home safely today, despite nearly drowning from the downpour you sent down just as we got into the car. This is on top of the near-constant rain since Thursday. We're in a drought down here, so every drop counts. But you know that already.

While we're on the subject of weather, how about we dial down the sun about twenty degrees at the height of summer? Awesome. Looking forward to swanning about town in a sweater next February instead of wringing the sweat out of my hair. Honestly, we melt down here. We're closer to Antarctica than most of the world, so what's up with that?

Also thankyou for the dog who, after a two hour car ride, a two hour nap when we got home (and, for that matter, a two hour nap before we left), relieved himself on floor. Apparently six hours is about all Charlie's bladder can hold. Good to know. But this floor of mine hasn't been so clean (from all the repeated mopping up of wee) in years. Are you trying to tell me something? You sneaky deity you!

Thankyou for alerting me to the fact that my mother-in-law owns the same brand of sewing machine I'm looking to purchase. Hers is a much better model, of course, with a whizz-bang touch screen and more stitches than is decent, but I can deal with that. We benefit from her quilts anyway.

Thankyou for prompting us to arrive at KFC (don't judge me! We've been away!) at precisely the time the line exploded and the trainee started work.

Thankyou for pimples at age 29-years-and-7-months. Way to go on the humility front.

Thankyou for giving Talented Hubby a matching pimple. Makes me feel a little better, given that he's 31 and all.

Thankyou also for not giving me the beard TH has to cover his up.

Thankyou for the golden ray of sunshine you sent down on Talented Hubby's ebay auctions today - you know, the ones that just netted him an amount equal to my Dream Sewing Machine Fund (which will take me a year to save) - in one swoop. Thankyou for patience and sweet-spiritedness, which I'm trying really, really hard to exercise today.

(Seriously though, thankyou for the photography talent that earned him the money to purchase the then-new cameras that he just sold, and the even-newer camera a few weeks ago. For all my grumbling, I'm very, very proud of TH :)

Thankyou for ebay Turbo Lister. But please make it easier to use next time, 'kay?

Thankyou for double-ended clothes pegs. Just because.

Amen.

Fascinating, I Know

Auuugh. I've started this post a hundred times already and it pretty much boils down to the same thing each time I've tried - nothing interesting has happened at Lizzie's Home (the real one) in days. Therefore, I will NOT be posting about the following trivialities:

• The dog, who continues to eat socks (although we fixed his little red wagon by getting the shoe cabinet/cupboard/chest of drawers thingamajig - thwarting his plans to have a side order of Doc Martens with his white cotton anklets).
  
  
• The last-minute trip to the inlaws' place, which was almost going to be that same day but which I managed to get an extra day's grace over. We can therefore take clean clothes instead of dirty ones. Chalk one up to the Be Better Prepared, Darn It! side.
  
  
• The family trip into the city yesterday, because I'm still recovering from All The Crazy. Both from my kids AND from the city-dwellers. It's official. I'm a suburbanite for life (interestingly, Jay and Moo saw their first homeless person. He pulled a tent out of some bushes in front of the art gallery where we were waiting for Daddy, hoisted a stripey bag over his shoulders (Aussies - you know? The ones that are in all the cheapie shops?) and off he wandered. The kids didn't ask, and I didn't elaborate. I did, however, 'take a few moments' for the man in question).
  
  
• The fact that I made the most awesome pizza ever on Sunday night and I had the foresight to make a LOT extra - enough for everyone to have their fill for that dinner and two days' worth of lunches afterward. Sure, buying the ingredients costs twice what a 2 x $5 Pizza Hut special would but I get a kick out of the from-scratch dough working the way it should. I know - I'm a cheap date, LOL.
  
  
• That I took a SALAD ON A PICNIC. When everyone else was eating cold, delicious-smelling pizza. I even used one of those fancy-schmancy Tupperware thingies with the inserts to keep the wet stuff wet and the crisp stuff crisp. AND I boiled an egg. AND I took my own dressing (okay, so I also ate a small piece of pizza, but in my defence it was homemade and I had already been rather virtuous, so...)
  
  
• The thirty-six podcasts I just downloaded. I adore my iPod, LOL.
  
  
• Or the fact that I'm having a 'wet cement' kind of day - you know, when no matter how hard you try your feet still seem to be stuck in place and you get nowhere, fast?

Adequate sleep should help with the posting soon enough, LOL...

So Waiting On The Easter Egg Thing Was A Bad Idea

I'm an idiot.

Why on earth did I think there'd be ANY Easter eggs left on the shelves the afternoon before Easter Sunday? Um, only the fact that I know without a shadow of a doubt that come Tuesday (when shops re-open down here after the public holidays tomorrow and Monday) there will be a whole section of 50% off eggs. If I didn't know any better, I'd swear the retailers took lots off the shelves on purpose today so they'd have lots to sell (at deep discount, but whatever) on Tuesday. I was only in these same stores on Thursday and everything was stocked to the ceiling. Auuugh!

So I did what any enterprising mother would do - I faked it.

At the supermarket tonight I grabbed all manner of treats (most not related to Easter at all, but the kids won't notice) and a three wine gift bags (minus the wine) and when all's said and done, I'll have an awesome little giftbag for each of the kids.

Mother ingenuity? Tick!

But remind me next year to get in early, 'kay? The crowds were HORRIBLE today.

Last Minute? It's What I Do Best

It's Easter Saturday and like any procrastinator worth her salt, I am yet to buy a scrap of chocolate. Not that we go nuts on that score anyway, but we do make up a little basket or gift bag for each of the kids, to be 'discovered' on Easter Sunday.

Waiting until the last minute serves two purposes. First, it removes the temptation from my perspective! Having easy access to many delectable treats is BAD - and if I know its in the house, the chocolate bunny's days are limited. And also, many stores today are heavily discounting their Easter goodies (nothing like the half-off sales that will hit from Tuesday onward, but still). So off I go today.

The Passion of the Christ is on tonight as well but the TV execs must have assumed its appeal has waned somewhat because it's not being screened until 11:40 pm and won't end till 2:10 am. Good grief. I watched it all the way through for the first time last year and loved it, so I was looking forward to it again this year. Yeah, I could go and rent it, but everyone else would have the same idea and most stores only carry the one copy of this five-year-old movie anymore so I'd probably miss out this weekend :) Is it strange that I intend buying snacks and snuggling my way through the film on the couch? It'll be nice :)

Happy Easter everyone :)

Coming To You Live From My Loungeroom

Well okay, not live. I'm twenty paces south of my loungeroom presently, at the dining table, bloggin' away. Soon to be leaving to pick up the kids.

Cleaning the clutter out of the loungeroom today. A joyless job, but something that needs to be done nonetheless. Have eleventy-two thousand recipe magazines as well as at least twice that many Better Homes & Gardens - will have to do something about that eventually (r-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-p) but for now they're residing in several cheap cardboard magazine holders. Least they look neater now.

I am in a decorating mood and can't do anything about it, which is exceedingly frustrating. Small hiccup re Ikea furniture. Still love the pieces I picked out, still working out how to cross ALL the t's and dot ALL the i's but with any luck, still do-able. I also want to paint. Every room in the house, but only one wall in each. I got me a thing for 'feature walls' this week. Sick of looking at cream walls. I blame the internet for that.

Ever have a day when you feel like just standing in the middle of the room and screaming and screaming because by gosh, someone better hear what you're trying to say or you'll go stark raving mad?

Yup.

On a completely unrelated note, strawberry YoGo tastes wrong, all wrong.

You may return to your regularly scheduled programs now.

I Might Never Leave Ikea At This Rate

I've got just a few minutes before I have to rush off to drop the kids at school. Okay, that's a lie, I don't really have the time, but I'm slurping down my morning cup of tea and what goes better with a cup of tea than early-morning sleep-deprived blogging? I thought so.

In related news, I almost ran out of teabags last night. I know. Shocking. Happy to report a mercy dash was made to the store and the tea canister replenished before any further damage was done to family or home.

This is one of my favourite weeks. Every three weeks, Talented Hubby has four days in a row off from work, and those days fall during the school week, so we have the house to ourselves from 9-3 or so. It's not as suggestive as it sounds. No, really. Well maybe sometimes, but.....

We need some new furniture, but we have a set budget and need the furniture to both fit the budget and achieve our main objectives. Much of which centres around reducing the entrance hall clutter and/or creating some sort of useable office-y space in our loungeroom. Our home is open-plan, with our kitchen, dining 'room', existing computer desk, and TV viewing area (couches etc) occupying four 'corners' of a larger square. But we also have a separate L-shaped loungeroom, currently 98% devoid of furniture, where junk and paperwork kind of gets stacked against walls and left to die a slow death. In short, the entire room is basically useless to us right now. And though we certainly won't be buying another television to replace the one that broke in there a few months back, or probably even a sofa, I've had it in my head for a while now to 'properly' set it up as an office/craft/playroom kind of deal. But again, limited budget. And I don't have separate storage for my (albeit smallish) craft supplies so that'll have to be factored in as well.

The Ikea catalogue has taken pride of place on our kitchen bench this last week, that's for sure.

So that's what we're off to do today - furniture window-shopping-with-possible-chance-of-purchase-if-we-find-the-right-piece. We have Option A (outfitting the entrance hall) or Option B (the loungeroom office-y conversion) but the funds probably won't stretch to both, so we'll have to make a decision about which way to go. Making it easier, the entrance hall has an awkward shape - we walk straight ahead but turn two tight-ish corners to get into our open plan main living area - and any pieces of furniture would have to be exactly the right size and shape in order not to restrict traffic flow through to the back of the house. Ikea has been a bit depressing in this regard. And my number one choice - a hall table not at Ikea - turned out to be too long for the space. Darn it, because it was beautiful. Sigh.

Looks like it's the office conversion!

It's Friday? Really? I've Needed A Friday Since Last Tuesday

Bullety! (I'm tired. It's totally warranted.)

• I am such a doofus. I've just read back over my Ultimate Blog Party post and realised I haven't given a draw time/date to the House Detox/recipe card file giveaway. Duh. So let's make that Sunday around noon my time okay? That'd put it sometime in the late evening on Saturday for most of the USA. The winner will be chosen by random generator and contacted via email.
  
  
• Two of the Piglets had their school sports day today. Eight hundred screaming children let loose on an oval and encouraged to run. Ears still bleeding. Also slightly sunburned, darn it (me, not the kids - no, I slathered them up good). Used sunscreen but was only just hitting the reapply time when I was due to leave so didn't bother. Least I'm not beet-red, I guess.
  
  
• Talented Hubby on afternoon shift this week. This week leaves me solo-parenting from Sunday night through till the next Saturday morning - TH goes to work before they get home from school, returns while they're sleeping, and is still sleeping himself when they leave for school the next day. This happens every third week. Of course, this time around it would have to be the Week O' Crazy. Back-talkin', limit-pushin' offspring included at no extra cost. Mummy's nerves are FRAYED.
  
  
• The Dog (I refuse to use his real name this week, the little gremlin) has totally ruined at least fifty percent of my socks. While they are still on my feet. He waits until I am engrossed in something (ie, totally ignoring him) then he stealth-crawls under the dining table (where I usually blog) and bites my toes. Sometimes he doesn't let go when I yelp so my involuntary reaction is to jerk my foot away, while he stays stationary. Several torn socks later, I have learned to just go 'with' the attack, swallow the pain and hope he loses interest, which, since he's a puppy, tends to be about twelve seconds later. Oh, and he has bitten a hole through the mesh security screen door. My dog bites through metal. Which makes him totally hardcore. No wonder my toes hurt.
  
  
• I would give my left kidney for a straight 8 hour stretch of sleep. 7 hours and I'd shave my head bald. It would be worth it.
  
  
• I saw my Lovely Lady Doctor recently for my Not So Lovely Lady Parts Visit. If there was such a thing a professional BFF, she would be it. The day I knew she'd be my doctor as long as humanly possible? She swore at me. Over the out of pocket cost for an MRI she thought might be useful for determining why I was (then) having so many headaches (for those not aware, Aussies are all covered by Medicare whether they also hold private health insurance or not. Though most 'extra' procedures require some out of pocket costs, it appears to be nothing like the scary stories I hear out of the US. Here, an MRI might cost you $150 with a $50 Medicare rebate. A trip to the doctor is 'free' if they bulk-bill Medicare or you pay your bill - my clinic charges $45 up front - and then you present your paid bill to a Medicare office for a $25 or so rebate). Anyhow, she expressed disgust at how much I was being asked to pay and told me that was ridiculous for an 'exploratory' procedure and not to worry about it (had the headaches not later been found to be hormonally-triggered, of course she would have re-pushed for the MRI). What impressed me most about Lady Doctor wasn't that she swore, but that she obviously had no 'doctor is the authority' barrier that so many health professionals have - and in the years since, she has expressed such genuine caring toward my family and I that I can't imagine having anyone else looking out for us. HOWEVER - she is insanely popular within the medical practice she works at for this very reason - it is impossible to get an appointment with her with less than 3 weeks notice. Clearly this puts her outside of the realm of most illnesses likely to befall the family. Lady scrapin', however, comes with its own little reminder letter in the mail, LOL - plenty of time to schedule an appointment!
  
  
• On a whim this week, I dropped into this local store. Now the website really doesn't do it justice, but the store itself is filled with french and romantic inspired recycled timber furniture, all really classic solid pieces, as well as country homewares and knick knacks and it is all totally my style. It has been an uphill battle to replace our outdated furniture over the years - we're currently decorated in a mismatched collection of Early Australian Bachelor and High School Woodshop - but we suddenly find ourselves with a small amount of cash to spend this month. I was looking over the Ikea catalogue, mentally adding up components to create the entrance/hall storage combo I need, and really only went into Favourite Store On Earth to drool over pieces I couldn't afford. BUT - I discovered a few pieces in there that (once you take into consideration drawer and cupboard inserts, baskets etc) are on par with Ikea prices so now we're looking more closely at updating to Grown Up Furniture. I spied a hall table that would be awesome but is too long for the space we have. I haven't totally exhausted my options though - and I'll be dragging poor Talented Hubby along with me for another visit this coming week :)

I really, really hope I get a sleep in tomorrow...

Strangely Enough, I Am Not Missing Wordpress, And Other Random Thoughts

Sure, I lost half my subscribers and ALL the comments made on any of the posts for that year (the manual transferring of posts back here worked well - but didn't extend to comments) but it really has made life simpler.

Still, for some unfathomable reason, lizzieshome.com is still viewable and has been for the last week or two since I finally got access again to finish bringing all the content back here. I have no idea why - I didn't renew hosting (obviously) for another year so are they hosting it for free? I'm lost - but I think I'll give it another month and then delete the old blog altogether.

I'm such a dork - you know how I blathered on about my recipe card file hack in this post? Well almost immediately after posting I decided I didn't like the photo storage box idea. The width was right, but the length was a little impractical - I mean, I'd have to be one serious cook to fill an entire photo storage box with recipes! If I removed the spare cards sitting in the back, everything fell over. Not so good. So I went out today and bought this:

It's as ugly as all get-up, but it will do. It's not very long (deep?), so everything stays standing up nicely. You can see I've also re-labelled all the tabs to fit in with my own recipe categories.

Told you - dork, LOL.

I'm really in the mood to do a little op-shopping (thrift store browsing). It's frustraing, because there aren't any near me and though I can reach at least five with a short bus ride, now that we have Charlie, it's a lot harder to leave the house for any length of time. I think I might have to snaffle a day the week after next, when Talented Hubby moves to his week of afternoons...that way Charlie will only be alone for an hour. Right, pencilling that in. I'm going to be looking for older cookbooks (but not the seventies!) and household books in general. I find op-shopping a little easier to do than garage-sale browsing - for starters, there's less of a 'yard sale culture' where I am in summer. Secondly, I find it a little weird to be poring over people's old stuff while they're right there staring at you. Then I feel guilty for not buying anything, so inevitably I'll pick up some ugly item. There are two major stores on my usual 'day out' jaunt (both Salvation Army), a Goodwill, a Save The Children and a St Vinnies. The nicer stores have the higher prices, which is a bit maddening, but its the real treasures in the little stores I'm after :)

Well, that's it from me tonight - I have an shirt to iron for TH to wear to work tomorrow, and the kitchen to clear up. One of these days I'll get organized enough to post before 11pm at night, LOL.

Maybe.

Laundry...And A Bonus

Saturday mornings are busy around here.

I have a mound of laundry to do, as I slacked off a bit during the week due to other priorities. The whole house needs a once-over, and at some point the kids and I are walking to the library/small suburban shopping centre to run some errands.

I'm slowly adding things back to the sidebars, though it is taking me a bit longer than I anticipated :) All this adding via HTML takes ages! Although I must admit, what initially scared me witless (ie, poking around in the HTML box) now illicits more of an 'eh' response, so I must be getting better at it :P And I love how I can make things look exactly as I want them to look

We got a lovely surprise a couple of days ago. My sister, who was/is the executor of my mother's will, called to let us know that we'd be getting another $400-$500 within about the next month or so - something to do with being able to claim back part of the tax we'd paid on the payout of her superannuation (retirement fund). It's tax time here in Australia and we usually get a combination of payments via our tax return and other government payments - all of which we've already designated a purpose, LOL. But that extra few hundred dollars from my mother's estate pretty much means the difference between being able to replace the couches we're (literally) taking to the dump this weekend, or buying beanbags for the loungeroom. Which, you know, doesn't really fit in with the whole 'parlor' idea I was going for in there :)

Well, I'm off to reboot laundry - joy!

Cheers,
Lizzie

(clipart © www.cutecolors.com)

Just Call Me Rocker

This is not normally something I'd admit to, but about once, oh, every thousand years or so, I return to a part of my youth I've long since covered up with housework, meal planning and wiping mucous-y noses.

Back in the day, I had an Atari 2600. I remember my siblings being insanely jealous because officially it was given to me as a birthday present. I also remember such games gems as Yars Revenge (please, if you remember this game, leave me a comment! Nobody else I've ever come across remembers it!) and a weird pixelated tennis game that the game developers of today probably look back on with a mixture of mirth and bewilderment. It was the modern technology of the eighties! You know, when computer screens were about four inches square?

I married a man who likes his games. Currently we have a PlayStation 2, but 99% of the games that happen across our threshold (most are rented, and these days, even those are only occasionally) bore me to tears. Either that, or I'm not co-ordinated enough to master them. But I prefer the former :P

During the last school holidays, we stayed with relatives, and their eldest son is a gaming nut. It was during this stay that the kids discovered Guitar Hero II and promptly set about saving their pocket money upon our return home. A Guitar Hero II pack with guitar controller and game retails for around $120 here, but amazingly, all three kids were willing to put in $30 each. Given their good attitude, good saving record and willingness to pool their money (usually fiercely guarded!) Hubs and I put in the last $30. Officially, we are no longer a family.

We are a BAND.

Ahem.

At first Miss Butterfingers (aka, me) couldn't make my fingers go where I wanted them to go. The game requires good co-ordination, not a strong point with me. But then one afternoon, when my chores were done and the kids were still in school, I had some time to spare, and sat down with Hubs for a bit of a spin on the gee-tar. And I actually managed to hit a few notes. Before I knew it I was leapin' round the loungeroom, looking like an absolute goose, but strangely having a large dose of fun.

I rocked.

Okay, so I'm still set on 'easy', but tonight I managed to complete a whole song (Foo Fighters' "Monkey Wrench" for those of you playing at home) without a single mistake. Not one.

There may have been a teeny tear of pride slip down my cheek.

Either that, or a tear of frustration over spending two hours and sixty-two takes to do it.

Cheers,
Lizzie

A Stitch In Time

(design courtesy of www.sewterific.com/basketbonnets)

In a fit of creativity, I've decided to give redwork embroidery a go.

My MIL is here for a visit this week (hence the lack of posts, sorry!) and at my request she brought down some of her embroidery patterns, which will be perfect for redwork. I spent about ten minutes practicing colonial knots, but apart from that, redwork is so self-explanatory even I'd have trouble mucking it up, LOL. I've gotten quite excited about some of the designs MIL had and can totally see myself curling up on the couch of an evening, stitching away :) It's been a long time since I've felt craft-inclined!

We've had a good weekend. Today Hubs, his mum and I went to our local mega-hardware store and picked up a few things, and I got a little daisy bush to plant in our garden. Seeing how good it looks in the ground, I think I'm going to have to appeal to Hubs to get a few more. It's a cute little pink variety. This week is showing a hint of the spring weather to come, so prime planting weather in my area. I want to find some English lavender but the pickings at the garden centre adjacent the hardware store were slim today.

Tomorrow the three of us are heading into the city to go to a large outlet shopping centre and Ikea. We have a small shopping list of things to look out for.

No Menu Plan Monday post this week - I'm eating out of the fridge and pantry and doing a bit of a hodge-podge of meals while MIL is here. Also, with the new blog design, I'm still trying to work out how to link directly to a post, rather than my home page (if you drag the cursor over this post heading, you'll notice you can't click to bring it up on a separate page). Even though I use Blogger and there's an option in the settings to allow you to bring the post up in a new window, I haven't yet figured out if switching to an Old Blogger format messed with that. I could link directly to my home page in the meantime but I'd rather not :)

I haven't had much of a chance to add new stuff to the sidebars this weekend, but toward the end of the week I hope to have everything all finished.

Hope everyone's weekend was lovely!

Cheers,
Lizzie