Now where was I?

Now where was I?

I seemed to have lost my train of thought in the midst of the Newborn haze.

One minute we're wondering whether there will be pink or blue tags placed on the baby's tiny ankles and less than 3 hours later Flynn Alexander comes into the world and now only 13 days later he is just so loved and firmly entrenched into our family that I just can't imagine life without him.

I loved every minute of my 4 day Hospital "Holiday".  I've had all my babies there so spending time with the lovely Midwives was like being reacquainted with a bunch of old friends. Don't ask me how I spent my time though. The Birth Registration form was handed to me the night Flynn was born and I still haven't completed it. No spare time - so it's now been passed onto the Pianoman to deal with. I think there will be a lot more of that going on.

I also think I'm going to need some lessons in time management. Remember that book I was going to take to read? Well I'm still on page 10. I seemed to have been fixated on all the spare time I would have in Hospital by myself but forgot how time-consuming a Newborn was. Yep, the hours just get whittled away staring at him and touching his hair and kissing his little face. Then there's the hours of feeding followed by more baby staring. There was time spent with the other Kids and visits from friends. And in between shuffling down the corridor for ice packs and heat packs for my "battle-weary" body, there were menu cards to fill out, meals to eat, flowers to smell, calls to take and midnight movies to watch. It was bliss.

I emerged from the hospital and felt like I was entering the twilight zone. Everything felt different and even the once green Valley had turned Brown. Apparently I missed a heatwave and some horrid Bushfires.

We are home now and all settling in well. Flynn is feeding like a trooper and sleeping well, although it did take a good week to convince him we are in the Southern hemisphere and therefore he needs to sleep more at night than during the day. I'm up a couple of times at night which is standard but he settles straight back so I'm tired but not soooooo tired. I would hate to say that having a Newborn is easy, but I can categorically say that having just 1 baby IS so much easier than having Twins.

I'm trying to take things relatively easy but with older kids there is a certain element of just having to get on with life, business as usual. The day after I got home, Flynn's first outing was to swimming lessons followed by a quick trip to the Supermarket for some necessities. We have also celebrated a Birthday with The Pianoman becoming another year older and wiser and with an extra little Soul to love I'm glad the focus was off the lame 1/2 Mississippi Cheesecake that we celebrated with. No candles.

The Kids are adjusting really well though. Eleanor dotes on him like a mini Mum and makes me nervous the way she carries him around the house. The Boys are gorgeous with him too albeit slightly rougher. They cuddle and kiss him and their main concern is whether he is getting enough milk. The School year will finish up next week and I can't wait to have the 6 week Summer Holidays with everyone at home without all the rushing around and I know the older Kids feel like they are missing out a bit being at School while we are here soaking up our time with Flynn.

And it's December! And apparently it's 2 weeks until Christmas. I'm feeling rather festive but haven't bought a single present yet! I hope there is still time and that allowances will be made for me being a tad on the slack side this year. Are you all organised?

Finally, thank you all so so much for your beautiful comments on Flynn's arrival. It's overwhelming to have such wonderful support from people I've never met but consider my friends nevertheless. I really appreciate it so much!

Add caption

I also thought I should mention that I'm now (back) on Instagram (Coalvalleyview) thanks to a suggestion by a reader who doesn't have a Blog but uses Instagram instead - thanks Sarah! I'm still getting my head around the etiquette and will try not to duplicate photos onto my Blog too much but if any of you are on Instagram too please let me know :-)

Hope you all enjoy the rest of the week!

Celebrations

There has been a lot of celebrating going on in these parts the last few weeks.

Firstly, a special little "Chicken-Whisperer" turned 8.

All she wanted was a Bird and more Blyton.

This is "Magic", a green and yellow Budgie. He is a young male as they are apparently easier to train than females. I'm not convinced this rule operates in the 'people' world. He is quite delightful and only makes a racket when the vacuum cleaner is going, which is not as often as it should be at the moment but at least my sanity will be saved :-)

She has been delighting in Enid Blyton books for some time, mostly early and first editions I pick up for a song at second hand bookstores. However, for the sake of completion I splashed out and bought her the entire set of "The Secret Seven". To my detriment though. Halfway through the first book, she comes out and tells me these books are different, that they talk differently and are set in the future where there are cars and battery torches. She prefers the older editions that haven't been changed or 'updated' to suit our modern times. It seems her school teacher would also agree about a return to the older editions. At the parent teacher interview last week, we were shown some of her creative writing and the teacher was very impressed with sentences such as this:

"Oh my oh my!", said Susan and her stick quivered as she heard the peculiar sound.

There was vanilla cake with chocolate icing and sprinkles. We were two candles short but I found two tealights to make up the short fall, which would have been a charming addition had they not been of the toxic Citronella/Anti-Mosquito variety. 

We also baked cupcakes to celebrate the occasion with the classmates. She said they had to be gluten free, sugar free, wheat free, colour free, dairy free, egg free and taste free to accommodate one class member with a very unfortunate allergy. That all sounded a bit hard so I sent some regular cupcakes along to school with an apology to go with the sugar-free snake for poor Johnny.

We celebrated with a gaggle of gorgeous 8 year old girls for afternoon tea followed by Disco Bowling. I'm sure I was still playing musical chairs and pin the tail on the donkey at my 8th Birthday Party but times are changing. Anyone else feel like 8 is the new 13?

We also celebrated the end of a successful Winter Sports season. I hope I don't sound like a bad mum for having a small excitement burst at the return of the Saturday sleep-in. 

And then last Sunday we celebrated Father's Day. There were handmade cards and gifts to open and a casual morning spent at the beach. Just the way we like it.

Finally, we are celebrating Spring!

The jonquils are on their way out and these are the last of my orange-centred Daffodils. I never know what to do with the last ones - leave them in the garden to admire, knowing they won't be replenished or pick them for the kitchen table?

In theory, by the end of this Season there should also be another family member joining us. But then again, it could well be a Summer baby. We'll have to wait and see.

I'm looking forward to seeing some more colour in the garden and the Vegie Patch produce it's first crop. 

We are also celebrating the end of another School Term and I'm so looking forward to these next two weeks of School Holidays where we can all relax after a busy Term.  

With all this celebrating going on I'm all partied out!

Hope you have a great week ahead!

It's My Party and I'll Cry If I Want To

So let's backtrack a few days to Mothers Day on Sunday when I was woken in the wee hours of the morning with 4 extra pair of legs wanting to snuggle under the covers while I bleary-eyed opened their gorgeous array of handmade and Mothers Day stall gifts. I'm not a morning person by any stretch of the imagination but their excitement was infectious and I loved every minute of it. Truly.

We had the first dusting of snow on Mt Wellington over the weekend too, so after pancakes we decided to drive up the mountain and give the little boys their first snow experience. Unfortunately the road to the summit was closed due to the unexpected snowfall so we hiked a bit by foot until we at least found some snow. It was a bit patchy but enough to delight the kids as well as make a mini snowman.

To finish off an already lovely day I was treated to a relaxing full body massage with an amazing Chinese masseuse, a Mothers Day gift from the Pianoman, which was sooooo heavenly. The Pianoman scored major brownie points as it has literally been years since I have had such an indulgence and if anyone had asked me what the ideal Mothers Day gift would be for me, I would have instantly said a Massage.

It is just as well The Pianoman scored those brownie points because yesterday it was my Birthday and my adoring Husband forgot. Not exactly the end of the world. I told him straight up that there was a pretty good chance there would be another one next year. However, it was almost worth it just to see his face turn white as the kids starting singing "Mummy is the Birthday Girl" over breakfast. Priceless!

In all our years together this has never happened. For the record, The Pianoman is the most kind and generous soul and was completely mortified. He has been given a hard time by all and sundry, mostly because it is so out of character for him. 

So how did it happen?

Well obviously he knew my Birthday was coming up. We chatted about it last week and thought of a few things we might do. There were even a few cards and presents dotted around the house from interstate family. I don't like to make a huge fuss but we usually go out for dinner or something. So when he announced at the end of last week that he had a "work" dinner on the following Wednesday evening, I simply replied "Yep, no worries" which really translates in my mind to "I wonder where he's planning on taking me". He does this sort of thing all the time. He also tries to surprise me but has never managed to pull off a real surprise because I cotton on well in advance. But since I'm a good sport I didn't bring up the topic of my Birthday again simply because I didn't want to spoil his "surprise". 

However, there was no surprise. There was in fact a real work dinner on that he had to go to. 

I still had a lovely day - a gorgeous morning tea with the Girls in Richmond and a little celebratory dinner with the kids at home. There was lots of phone calls and e-mails and extra hugs and kisses. My Husband forgot my Birthday.The Pianoman came home for lunch sporting the largest bouquet of (guilty) flowers I have ever seen as well as 2 tickets to the Uni Revue. I'm clearly not distressed by the oversight but I do intend to milk it for a bit. Just for fun. The in-laws believe 3 months of grovelling is in order. What do you think?