Bye 2012

Tonight we are going out to a BBQ so I figured I would be best writing this post before we went out.

All over the blogosphere people are wrapping up the year, posting the best and worst and highlighting the posts that summed up significant parts of their lives. I'm not doing that. I think I'm happy enough with 2012 as I have blogged it.

I've taken down and put away the Christmas tree. I have packed up some of Girl Child's presents. She seems to be able to leave a trail of destruction mess in her wake no matter what she is doing.

While I want to start the new year afresh, I have not managed to clean everything I wanted to. I have whipper snipped and pulled weeds in the garden. I think you may be able to see a slight improvement. I have cleaned some of the inside of the house. New year, fresh start sounds good. I'll take it being a pseudo clean/fresh start.

I hope you are happy with your New Year plans. Whether you are out and about or at home with your loved ones. Here are some fireworks to get you in the mood.

Image found at http://weheartit.com/entry/3541971

NaBloPoMo is almost over

Which means 2012 is almost done. There is only today and tomorrow to go. After that we will go back to regular programming (intermittent posts).

Tomorrow lots of people will be making New Years Resolutions. I haven't really thought about them. Given it seems most people break them fairly early on the the year I really don't do them. There's no reason to set myself up for failure.

This year somebody (sorry I can't remember who) asked us to think about one word for 2012. I chose Open. I meant open to possibilities, open to friends and family. I didn't really embrace everything this year but I was definitely more willing to consider things.

Things of note were:

• Start studying to re-skill into a different field of work,
• Applying to be on the relief work list and getting a day of work,
• Mr E. and I went up in a hot air balloon, and
• I bought some some new clothes (which means I no longer wear jeans and T-shirts all the time).

These things pretty much all happened in the last half of the year. I can't remember much of the first half of the year. Maybe next year I'll be able to remember more things.

Anxiety

Not mine, Girl Child's. As a toddler she was fearless but somewhere along the way she became anxious.

It shows in the fact that she had nightmares for nights after Bunny B died. But it is mostly showing by her refusal to ride the bike she got for Christmas. This is the bike she chose and which has been sitting in the garage since August. You see it's a bike with 20 inch wheels and that is bigger than the bike she learnt to ride on. So she has been refusing to ride the new bike. I finally convinced her to give it a go yesterday and once she got over her fear she did well. She does well if you can convince her to actually try. But that's often a hard thing.

She has only has one stack while riding. That was about 3 weeks ago and she grazed both knees and palms. I think it's the part of the reason she's avoiding the new bike. She is worried but nothing we say or do seem to make her feel better. Today, we returned to the bike shop to check the brakes were okay. Girl was convinced that the back pedal brakes weren't working properly. They are. The guys at the bike shop were great and let her try a couple of other bikes. But she got scared and refused to try. While she eventually did ride her bike around at the bike shop, she has refused to ride it at home. I'm hoping she will ride it again soon.

Boy Child has anxiety, too. He has difficulty asking for things in shops. He needs someone to be with him. Apparently he stutters when he has to ask for something. I knew he got nervous but I don't remember being aware of the stuttering. You give him explicit instructions of what may happen (but because you cant foretell everything) any little thing that deviates from the way the event plays out in his head makes him anxious. We know he needs to be able to do this so every so often we make him have a go. But I wonder if it's worth the effort.

Do you deal with anxiety at your place? Any brilliant ideas for me?

I was planning on an early night

With everyone at home and no place to be time has be quite flexible. I'm very lucky because our children sleep in. So when they are late to bed they are also late to rise which means the whole family been keeping strange hours. Dinner has been late (up to 10 pm) and then that makes bed time even later.

So today we had dinner at a normal time (for us anyway). Girl Child was sent to bed much earlier than she has been so I should get my self to bed soon. Or else I will be grumpy when I get woken early. Because I haven't been getting enough sleep means my head has been hurting a little. I need 8 to 10 hours sleep a day to function. And that hasn't been happening. So tonight I'm going to try and get some extra sleep. And I'll be sleeping without any vodka (on my head or ingested)

For the record I have no idea if the tea tree oil and vodka concoction works as I can't find any lice (alive or dead) or nits in my hair. Thank goodness.

Here I am posting almost an hour earlier than for the last few days. Now it's bedtime. Night, all.

The return of the nits

Girl Child had one adult size louse today and a few eggs. She has decided that she got reinfected from me. So I googled head lice treatment and have made one the is made of vodka and tea tree oil. You are supposed to leave it on for 12 hours so I'll be sleeping in it. Girl Child blames me because almost every night since the Bunny B died she has had a nightmare and ended up in our bed.

Mr E. has also coated his hair in the new mixture. If we actually have nits, hopefully this will work. I can check his hair but apparently nobody in the family seems to be able to check mine. Maybe the reason Girl Child has so few is because of the tea tree oil in her detangler and shampoo. Or she got them today when we went to the movies with friends. Because her hair is so thick it takes hours to go through it all. We were lucky that a robicomb generally had worked in her hair but today it broke after I dropped it.

I'll let you know if the vodka concoction works. Although I think drinking alcohol would improve my mood more than having it in my hair. Cheers!

Boxing Day 2012

Because we were away yesterday we didn't have a fridge full of leftovers. Sometimes it doesn't seem like Christmas without ham etc in the fridge. So in order to remedy that situation Mr E. does the whole baked Christmas food on Boxing Day.

So tonight for dinner we had turkey, pork and baked ham with roast vegetables. Of course this means that we will now be eating Christmas meat into January. But that's our tradition and I'm good with that.

Tonight I took the kids out to look at Christmas lights. Three of our neighbors have really gone all out. In fact even though we drove around for about 45 minutes they were up there with the best.

So tomorrow we are almost back to real life again just with added toys and Christmas food. I'm looking forward to ham on toast for breakfast.

Christmas Day

Did your day meet your expectations? Ours did. While we spent almost 8 hours on the road to spend about 6 or so hours with my extended family it was a good day.

We were with family. We shared presents, food and conversation. Boy Child broadened his tastes by trying seafood and discovering that he likes Balmain Bugs. He'd drowned the oyster in so much lemon juice that was all he could taste when he tried it. He wasn't that impressed by prawns. I think his 'it was alright' comment really means I'd eat them if I had to but I could be wrong.

As usual, we had a hot lunch of turkey, ham and pork. And vegetables of course. This year it was followed by pavlova nests and brandy snap baskets with berries and cream, cheesecake and a mango version of tiramisu for dessert. There were also gingerbread men ice cream sandwiches as dessert for the children.

Most of the children in my extended family are girls so Girl Child had lots of people to play with. The dolls she got for Christmas were a big hit. Actually all the presents seemed to be well received. Lots of fun was had playing with them.

How was your day? I hope it was stress free.

Christmas Eve 2012

So the presents are wrapped (mostly), the Christmas food has been purchased and it's really, truly looking like Christmas.

I had to brave the shops today because when I attempted to fix the flat tyre on Girl Child's Christmas bike yesterday I stuffed up and punctured the new tube. So I went out to compete with the hordes and bought two new tubes just in case I managed to stuff it up again. I also bought a couple of little gifts to supplement the gift cards that I am giving some of the family. I figure that a gift card isn't really exciting when you are a child. Luckily, I did have some ideas and hope the extra little things will make up for the less than exciting gift cards.


Once I was home with the tubes, I managed to put the new one in, in much less time than I managed to mutilate damage the tube in yesterday's attempt. Girl child has taken her new bike for a small spin but she thinks it will take a little while to get used to it. I'm just happy that she has learnt to ride this year. Maybe next year we will be able ride to and from school. I definitely need the exercise - probably more so after Christmas.

Check out this Christmas tree.

It's a Christmas tree for Variety Australia. If they get 10,000 shares today then Variety Australia will get $10,000. Here's the link. You can share it on Twitter and Facebook.

Mr E. is teasing me because I am writing this post far earlier than most this December. If it wasn't for the Carols (and the wrapping) I could go to bed early. He thinks 6:30 would be appropriate. I guess I've been a bit grumpy.


I hope you are having a lovely Christmas Eve. I will be busy later watching Carols by Candlelight and eating shortbread. Maybe I'll even finish wrapping presents.

I'm grateful - 23 December 2012

This week Maxabella is grateful for promise. I thought I would link up with her and everyone else today.

 

I'm grateful for easy Christmas shopping. The shops seem to be less frantic than I remember from previous years. I'm very happy because it has my lack of preparedness this Silly Season much easier to deal with.

I'm grateful that our Boy Bunny seems to be coping well without his sister. Girl Child seems to be okay as well. In fact, I feel as though I have taken B's loss the hardest out of my family. Thank you so much for the kind the comments on my previous post. I'm grateful for blogging commenters who are understanding and sympathetic.

I'm grateful that NaBloPoMo is almost over. While I have been blogging every day I'm not sure that you actually want to read the random stuff in my head every day. Although I must admit feeling as though I have to blog has been beneficial exercising my blogging muscles. I am not grateful that my poor time management skills mean I have been going to bed very late (for me) and this has made me grumpy and is making my head hurt again.

I'm grateful that Maxabella runs these grateful posts every week. I need to remember to acknowledge the good things in my life. I'm sure there are other things I am grateful for this week but I really need to go to bed. Good night!

 

I'm very sad

This afternoon our girl bunny (B) passed away. I had noticed she was sick on Wednesday and I took her to A's check up at the vet. Because we had caught her illness early it looked as though she wouldn't get too sick.

Last night she started to be less interested in her food and I made sure she was drinking enough by giving her extra water. Today she seemed even less inclined to eat so I started syringe feeding her. I managed to get a vet appointment and they said we were doing everything right. I took her home and fed her before I had to go out. She seemed okay and even ate some food from my hand. I was gone for maybe two and a half hours. I got everything ready to feed her and I went to get her only to find she had died.

She was a part of our family for almost two years. I can only hope that A stays well and that he doesn't get depressed because his sister is gone.

Here is our girl bunny B in happier times.

Rest in peace, little one. We will miss you.

School is over for the year.

We have been given and read the children’s reports. They were what we expected, with no surprises - pleasant or otherwise. The kids don’t go back to school for six and a half weeks. In the scheme of things that really isn’t very long (well not compared to other places – some places have up to 14 weeks holiday for summer!) although it can seem to drag.

This time around though Mr E is off work for 4 weeks so that will certainly change the dynamics of the holidays.  Then there is my Christmas present from the family.  They are sending me away to a health spa / resort for 5 whole nights!  I’m excited but a little nervous as well. I’ve never been to one before and I’ve never been away from the family for that long either. It will be interesting to see how we all go.

This week I also had my first day actually working as a Learning Support Assistant (LSA).  It was in the Learning Support Unit (LSU)  of the school where I did my prac.  I was very excited to get some work. I’m quite lucky as the team there seem to like me and the teacher of the LSU knows me from when our children were at the same school and we were both volunteering for the School Board and Parents and Citizens (P&C) Association.  Her youngest is 3 years ahead of Boy Child. Obviously I made a good impression on her back then and with my prac and the day of work this week.  She said she would request me whenever the permanent LSA in the LSU is away. It would be great for me if that works out. I also have a few schools to visit and introduce myself to the staff next year. While Girl Child’s school would be convenient, I’m not sure I would get any hours there due to some differences of opinion with certain people on some issues. Plus a few people have mentioned that it’s better to not work where your children to go school as that avoids even the perception of a conflict of interest.  That said if I was offered work there I’m not sure what I would say.  That is something I will have to think about in the New Year.  Maybe after I’ve had my health spa and have been relaxed and rejuvenated.

400 posts. Woot!

I'm very happy to say that this is my 400th post. So I thought we should celebrate.

Image found at http://weheartit.com/entry/3553040

Image found at http://weheartit.com/entry/3541971

I don't think 400 posts in 3 years and a bit years is too bad. I'm certainly no Leanne (from Deep Fruit Fruit) but I have certainly slowed down since I started blogging when I managed 195 posts in my first year. I'm still here and I'm glad about that.

I owe you all a big thank you for hanging out with me over time. Thanks everyone who has read Whining at the World. A special thanks to those who have commented on my posts. Here's to you all. Pick your favorite tipple and I'll toast you.

Cheers!

A Bunny Update

Today was the day of reckoning for A (our boy bunny). Despite him eating by himself last week he had to show a significant improvement today at the vets or there would be dire consequences. Thankfully he decided to stop playing dead. The vet was so impressed with him she took him out to say hi to the student vet who had seen him on two of his previous visits to show her how much he had improved.

He still has a slight head tilt but is much happier and at home is running around. Today he even climbed up the ladder in the outdoor hutch. He hasn't even tried that since I first noticed that he was sick. So that was a huge achievement.

Unfortunately, B (our girl bunny) was falling over this morning. So she went to the vet as well. She has the same illness as he does. As yet she doesn't have the head tilt so we have caught it early. Hopefully with the antibiotics she will recover more quickly than A did. Plus she loves her food so she may not stop eating as he did.

So here's to twice daily antibiotics for both bunnies for 4 weeks getting them both over this.

The bunnies before they got sick

 

Dear Santa

On the weekend, the lovely Lisa - aka as Mum of Adult Kids, tagged me in the Christmas wish list 'blog-a-long' started by Jess over at Essentially Jess, encouraging bloggers to play along and share their Christmas wish lists. The lists can be serious, or not so.

Given Jess is the I Blog On Tuesdays (IBOT) girl and I have never played along, I thought I should give it a go even if it is the last one for the year.

Dear Santa,

This year I've tried really hard to be nice. It may not have would been obvious to others but I hope you noticed. I gave up caffeine and didn't take up alcohol although at times I did consider it. I did not disown my children or husband despite being tempted to do so on occasion. I managed to have a mid life crisis and while I decided to change careers I did not go out and buy a red sports car (because as we all know red goes faster) or decide to dump my husband and take up with someone half my age. I hope that these things have all kept me off the naughty list this year.

In return for my good behavior I would really like the following:

• Housework, laundry and gardening fairies. If you can only manage one type, I think the housework fairies would be kept the busiest so they would be excellent.
• A self cleaning house would be great if you are running a little low on fairies. I'm not too fussed either way.
• An automatic cut off switch for my children for times when when they would like to backchat or exclaim loudly that they hate me or that I have ruined their lives. Note: this applies mostly to one child but if it was installed in both that would be a bonus in case the other child starts to get ideas.
• Jamie Oliver to actually come to my place and cook his 15 and / or 30 minute meals for dinner. Some cooking lessons would be great while he was at it.
• A holiday house in Queensland, the south coast of NSW and a few others scattered around the world. Mortgage free, of course.

Thanks Santa.

E.

There you go. My first ever foray into I BOT.

I also have to tag 5 people for this so I am going to chose:

 

Suzi

Anna

Madmother


Kirrily

Anella

I hope you play along.

 

Christmas shopping

Mr E. and I went Christmas Shopping, today. We bought presents for 5 of the 6 kids in my extended family. We also bought presents for Girl Child and Boy Child from some interstate relatives. So all in all we bought 8 presents and had lunch in just over two hours. Not a bad effort.

I still have to get one present but so far I haven't found anything that meets the interests of that child. As we seemed to hit all the likely stores in the local mall today, I will be branching out further. I have a day of work on Thursday and A (the bunny) has an appointment with the vet on Wednesday, I will be venturing out tomorrow or Friday.

After that I just need to do the wrapping. I wish mine would look this good.

Image from here

Hope your shopping is going well.

 

I've got nothing (a grateful post)

I've been sitting here trying to write this post for over an hour. I don't want to write about the latest shooting in the United States. I don't want to think about those families who have lost loved ones. So I'm trying not to. My goal is not to minimse the grief and horror being felt the world over rather to protect myself.

I'm tired and grumpy and on edge. The events in the US have just made my edginess worse. So I concentrate on the little things. I'm going to bed earlier than I have for many nights and hope that I'll be feeling better in the morning. I know for the families affected by the tragedy they won't feel better tomorrow. And for that I'm very sorry.

But I'm also grateful to have my family whole and undamaged. Which makes me feel guilty. I'm sure I'm not the only one struggling with those conflicting emotions.

I'm linking up with Maxabella's grateful linky.

 

I've been neglecting my blogging

You may have noticed some very short posts while I have been off having a social life. As requested by Suzi (check out her blog Under the Windmills) I thought I'd give you some details on what I have been up too.

On Thursday, a group of friends and I went out for a combined fortieth birthday and end of year dinner. We are friends who have children at the same school and we try to have morning tea / coffee every few weeks and have managed to make it out to dinner a few times as well this year.

Our Thursday dinner was an early celebration for someone's fortieth birthday. We went to a brasserie where none of us had been before. The majority of the food was tapas and pizza and out of the three main meals only one was gluten free. Luckily for me it was nice. The birthday girl has very simple taste but the rest of our group shared tapas and pizza. They had also brought cake and we sang Happy Birthday.

This was the warm up for the karaoke which started at 9. The birthday girl went home early and the others were excited about karaoke. There was a lot of choice but eventually my friends decided they would sing Barbie Girl by Aqua. Someone was apparently holding out for Mmm Bop by Hanson - I'm thinking that was not a popular choice. I was the designated driver so I was sober and I abstained from embarrassing myself in public. My musicality is limited and I didn't want to burst anyone's ear drums.

It turned out that Barbie Girl was only a practice but despite the karaoke prize of $1,000 we decided to leave as it was about 11. We had a nice evening and made detour for Sundaes on the way home as I wanted desert. Surprisingly, despite drinking 3 bottles of wine between 3 (3 of us weren't drinking at all) no one seemed worse for wear the following day. I did however, resort to drinking caffeine on Friday.

On Friday, I attended two assemblies. One at Boy Child's school where he received an achievement award for Japanese and Girl Child's assembly where the choir were running it. She had two speaking parts and the choir sang two songs. At that one they also farewelled the teachers who will not be returning in the new year. A huge loss will be the teacher librarian. She has also been great at motivating the children and she has been running the choir with the help of Girl Child's teacher. Unfortunately for us, this lovely lady will be moving to Sydney in the new year. She will be sorely missed.

Last night Mr E. and I went to the movies. We saw Skyfall.

Image from: http://www.skyfall-movie.com/

It was good. It was action packed but a bit slow in parts. I'm not really a Bond fan but i did enjoy it. We were disappointed that the movie theatre had no frozen coke. Popcorn and frozen coke are my two staples when it comes to watching movies. They had popcorn so it wasn't all bad. Despite it only being about 20 minutes drive fro home the last time I remember being at that movie theatre was about 12 years ago and Boy Child had whooping cough. This time around he was looking after Girl Child so we could go on a date.

So that's what I've been doing. Because I've been social I've not been getting enough sleep and even though I'm at home tonight I'm up too late yet again. I'm going to remedy that now. Good Night, all. Sleep well.

 

Tonight I've been on a date

With my husband. These things don't often happen around these parts and for me to have been out two nights is a row is highly unusual. Tonight we went and saw Skyfall (in case you've missed it, Skyfall is the latest James Bond movie starring Daniel Craig). It was good. having a date with Mr E. was also good as I can't remember the last time the two of us were out together at night for a social occasion.

Any way it's almost midnight (again!) so I need to get to bed. I'll fill you in on my two nights out tomorrow.

I've been out at a dinner

So this is a very short post.

Good night!

 

News...

I took A (our boy bunny) to the vet today. While he is eating and drinking on his own, he isn't out of the woods yet. He played dead most of the time while he was there. Thankfully I had recorded him running around yesterday on my phone so the vet could see. Because of his head tilt he has damaged the cornea of the eye that is facing the ground. So he needs eyedrops twice a day to hopefully fix that.

Despite me calling and leaving to messages on Friday A's vet didn't get either of them. So in answer to the questions I had asked, Yes he needs to stay on one of the antibiotics he was on and he will need that morning and night for about four weeks. He doesn't need the other antibiotic again unless his condition worsens. He needs to be seen by the vet every week to ensure he is improving (or at least not going backwards).

However, if he hasn't made visible progress at each appointment then he may be better off being put down. Unfortunately, that is still hanging over his head. He looks so much better though.

Last Tuesday

Today after the vet

In other news I have a day of work next week at the school where I did my prac. I'm excited but a little scared too. Thankfully I know the teacher I'll be working with and I spent two days in that class so I already know the children.

I bought some shortbread today. Girl Child took it upon herself to decorate the tree. I knew it was small but it is only just over a metre even with the star on top.

Christmas spirit seems to have landed. It may be because of the tree but I'd bet it was because of the shortbread and chocolate coated almonds.

 

There is only two weeks until Christmas

We don't have our tree up. I haven't started my Christmas baking (I'm a shortbread and mince pie girl) which is part of the reason we haven't put up the tree as yet. The other part is that we are discussing whether we should get a new tree this year as our old one is 14 years old. It is very small and it has fibre optics. At the bottom of the tree there is a coloured lens thingy (real technical term there) that rotates so the colours change and looks pretty but it makes a grinding noise when switched on.

I only have presents for Girl Child and Mr E. Hers is a bike we've had on the garage for months (since before her birthday in August) and he bought his gift on line himself.

So I really need to get my butt into gear. The rabbit sees the vet again tomorrow. He is getting better and I haven't had to feed him since yesterday afternoon. Prior to that I was feeding him every hour to every few hours during the day depending how much he ate and how sick he was. What the vet says tomorrow will help us decide whether we are going to visit family interstate for Christmas. I'm hoping that he is well enough to be able to leave for 24 or hours so we can go away.

Regardless of going away or not, I need to buy gifts, bake and get a tree up. I need to find my Christmas Spirit, fast.

 

The December social whirl continues

Last week Girl Child had a choir performance at a nursing home and the her school end of year concert. Mr E. attended two work Christmas parties in the one day. On the weekend, Boy Child had his dining in night and parade. 

Now it's my turn. I have a dinner this week for someone's birthday and a Christmas lunch on the weekend. Boy Child is getting an award from school so I'm attending that this week as well. There is also the check up for Bunny A. He is eating on his own, at times. But probably not enough at this point and I'm hoping things with him will keep improving.

 

I'm lucky that I really don't have much on. I'm grateful as well. While I'm not one who thrives on the social stuff, I'm grateful that I have people who want to spend time with me. I'm happy to have the opportunity to celebrate my children and their achievements. That's definitely a privilege and worth sharing.

 

How is your social life in December?

Big weekend

I may have mentioned that Boy Child joined Cadets a few months ago. This weekend was his dining in night, sleep over on base and then passing out / end of year parade. Just for reference nobody literally passed at the parade although I'm pretty sure it has happened at some.

So the Dining In Night was a formal occasion. The boys had to wear a jacket and tie (although Boy Child said he was told to wear a suit) so we had to get him some clothes. It was surprisingly easy to get him a suit. The shirt and tie were slightly more difficult but compared to what the girls would have gone through getting formal dresses I had it easy.

Because I'm sentimental (but not mean) I took photos of him all dressed up. I did that mostly at home so as not to embarrass him in front of the other Cadets. Of course I couldn't just leave it at so that I took some photos while walking to the Dining In Night venue.

My gorgeous children

The Cadets spent the night on base before preparing for their parade. They apparently polished the brass parts of their belts on and off for part of the night. The was some shenanigans (what else would you expect with 30 plus teenaged boys in a barracks) but Boy Child apparently managed to get enough sleep.

For Boy Child morning consisted of breakfast, parade practice and the the real parade.

Here's Boy Child and 2 other cadets on parade.

So my Boy is no longer a Cadet Recruit he is a fully fledged Cadet. He scrubs up pretty well too.

How was your weekend? Any milestone events?

 

Uh oh, it's Nits!

Yes, me doing NoBloPoMo does mean that you get to read about the boring minutiae of my life. Today is another one of those posts.

Girl Child had an end of year concert this week. Each year group performed as did the school band, the choir and there was also an item performed by the teachers. The finale was a whole school performance of a dong in Japanese (the language thy learn). As Girl is in the choir, she performed in 5 items including the finale.

After it was all over, she came up to us. All in all it was a pretty good concert. We asked her what she liked the most. Apparently she liked nothing because she was bored. And then I saw it. Right at the front of her hair. A lovely full grown louse.

Excellent! Just what you need after a school function with a tired (and hungry) 9 year old. We went home, had dinner and then it began. The great lice hunt.

It seems that the one I exterminated at school was probably the only one. I only found one egg as well. While normally I'd just condition and comb I pulled out the natural chemicals just to blast any I may have missed. Last time she had nits was December last year. Somehow I missed at least one of the little buggers and I had to do her hair forever (probably was only 3 or 4 times). This time I was taking no chances of a repeat perfomance.

On the plus side her hair looks great and is soft ans shiny. Now I just need to ensure that I have added tea tree oil to her new shampoo, conditioner and detangler so we may miss any other infestations for the rest of the year.

I hate nits and the time consuming delousing process. I'm sure I'm not alone in this.

I'm feeling a bit fragile

It's funny the things that will set you off or send your brain down a weird train of thought. Recently, Girl Child sang Christmas Carols a a nursing home with her school choir. I drove some children to the nursing home and I was surprised when it seemed that most of the choir had never been to a nursing home before. Girl Child had been to some back when we were looking for somewhere for Mum before she died. Then I realised that Girl Child was only 3 when we were doing that. She doesn't remember.

The whole nursing home thing coupled mixing powder with with water to syringe feed A (rather reminiscent of feeding Mum through her PEG) has unsettled me a little. I'm okay, though I do feel like I'm dwelling on stuff more than usual. Maybe it's the time of year. Maybe it's the possibility of A not being around for much longer. Or it could be just be because Christmas is a family time. I'm spending a lot of time thinking about family members who have died. Parents who have lost children, children who have lost parents, people who have lost their husband, wife or life partner. I think of the children who have lost their siblings. I think that a big part of Christmas is tradition and those traditions are tied together with memories of our loved ones.

I'm thinking I need to stop dwelling on stuff. I hope that A starts to recover soon. I hope that those who are missing family members can wrap themselves in the happy memories. I hope that your Christmas and/or New Year celebrations aren't too bittersweet.

For me, tomorrow is another day.

Day 6 of NaBloPoMo December 2012

Well so far I have managed to post every day. Of course Mr E.'s prediction that I would be up posting at 1130 pm seems to be coming true today.

I didn't manage to celebrate completing my course with a Strongbow (or any type of alcohol for that matter). But that's okay. I rarely drink anyway. In fact I'm going out with some friends next week and I'm likely to be the designated driver.

So far I have minimal Christmas spirit. It seems that our neighbours are really into Christmas and have lights all over their houses. Girl Child wants us to put up lights but as our house is set back from the road nobody would see them even if we did. Of course the next priority for her is to get the tree up. Pity that I established the trading of having shortbread and / or fruit mince pies while that is going on. It really means I need to do some cooking unless I am lucky enough to find some Gluten Free Christmas food around. I know I can often get GF shortbread in the supermarket so I may just take the easy way out and going looking tomorrow. In previous years, I've found mince pies in health food shops but they are generally around $12 for 4. Since I've found GF pastry (also $12 for 4 sheets - there seems to be a theme here) I may cheat and use that this year.

If anyone as some spare Christmas spirit, can you send some my way? Thanks.

I got an email today

Giving me the results of my last piece of assessment for my Cert IV in Education Support. After submitting it at the end of last week I have been wondering how I went. I hadn't expected any feedback for another few days and really wouldn't have been surprised if hadn't heard by mid December.

I was happy to find out that I have PASSED! No resubmits for me. How cool is that? I'm very happy. Party, anyone? Pity it's too late for me to have a celebratory drink tonight.



This may be mine tomorrow. Cheers!

This is a sick bunny

This was A at 1:08 this afternoon. This was the pic I sent to Mr E. with the tag He looks so sad. I cried and I made an appointment at the vet for him.

 

I'm not one of those ladylike criers. When I cry its messy and my face goes all red and blotchy. Unfortunately it's now more than 90 minutes later and my face is still all blotchy. In fact I'm pretty sure when I go to get Girl Child from school there may be comments about my blotchy mess.

 

On the up side, A did start to show signs of life on the way to the vets. We (well really, just me) will be syringe feeding him for a while. He has barely had anything to eat or drink since yesterday. And for a just 1.2kg animal he really doesn't have much stored to fall back on.

 

I do however suspect him to be like my children. Sick enough to debate taking them to hospital then arriving there only to have them run around in the waiting room, while other people are staring daggers at you wondering why you brought the child in.

 

But faced with the above version of A, I felt I had no choice. Wish me luck with the syringe feeding. If he isn't eating and drinking on his own in a week then we have run out of options.

What is it about December?

This is the second year in a row that Mr E's vehicle has decided to give up the ghost (where on earth did that saying come from?) in December. Thankfully Mr E. noticed the issue and took it in to checked out before it died in the middle of an intersection in Sydney which is what happened last year. This time around it is costing over $4,000 to fix. Last years effort was around $3,000 and then the hot water tank died as well. Thankfully, it is highly unlikely that the hot water tank will need replacing again but we do have another issue, a sick bunny.

Our bunnies A and B.

A is the albino and 6 years old. He is currently suffering from Head Tilt. Which basically means that heis having issues standing up and keeping his head straight. So far A is okay but has an injection of anti- inflammatories and is on 2 different antibiotics twice daily. Of course so far A's vet stuff has been cheaper than Smiley Dog's surgery in 2009. But as he needs to go back every few days that I'm sure his costs will mount up quite quickly. We are not sure of his long term prognosis but he is still happy but missing his sister. They have to be separated for the moment until he more stable on his feet.

I think December really just means haemorrhaging money for us. I'm glad we have what i always used to refer to as running away money. How is your December shaping up?

You were very productive in my absence

I knew that I hadn't read any blogs for a while and thought I would have to mark things as read but I wasn't really prepared that there would be 778 unread items in my blog reader. Unless I sat down to read for a entire day I probably wouldn't get them all read. So I'm reading some but deleting more. I hope I don't miss the major going ons in your lives.

If someone wants to let me know the major things that have happened in the blogging world I will be very grateful. I almost missed the fact that Eden went to India for / with Worldvision. Yes, it would have bad to miss that but I haven't really been on Twitter either. If it hadn't been for writing assignments and submitting some of them on line I would have thought I'd been on a digital detox. Yes, there is such a thing but I can't see it in my foreseeable future.

Day 2 of NaNoBloPo and I'm still posting. Take that, Mr E. he suggested tha I would be up and posting after 11:30 pm for all of December. I've beaten that by almost 30 minutes. Go, me!

NaBloPoMo December 2012

Hi everyone. I hope you are all well. I've been missing in the blogging world for a little while - yet again. I'm sorry about that. I'm a bit scared to go into my blog reader to see what I have missed out on. Last time I checked I had more than 100 blog posts to read and I'm pretty sure that was at least 3 weeks ago. I'm thinking I'll be marking everything as read. Sad but perhaps necessary.

But as I'm back once again I thought I'd participate in the Blog Her NaBloPoMo. Yes, I'm am planning to blog everyday for December. It's been ages since I have done NaBloPoMo and i think I may need a little butt kicking to get back into the swing of things. If you want to sign up here are the details.

While I've been absent from blogging, I completed my 9 days of prac as a Learning Support Assistant (LSA) at a school. Once the days were complete, I had eight pieces of assessment to do in two and a half weeks. They have all been submitted now and unless I get asked to resubmit anything I am finished.

Dance has finished for the year. Girl Child did well in the concerts. She seemed to enjoy herself and loves her ballet costume. Every year its great to see how much she has improved. While she is not a natural dancer it is really good for her core strength and coordination.

Anyone planning to do NaBloPoMo?

 

Grateful: 3 November 2012

It feels as though it's been a long time since I have done a grateful post. So I thought I would do participate this weekend.

This week I'm grateful that my meds have kicked in. While I was whining in my last post, it had actually been written a couple of weeks earlier. Now, my new preventer and the increased dose of my older preventer have kicked in. I did end with a bad day one day last week. On the plus side I managed to function, finish my prac day, and take Girl Child to an after school activity.

My prac for my Education Support Course is half over. I have been mixing it up and working with children aged from Preschool to Year 8. I'm not sure I'm cut out for preschoolers (but that was the day my head really hurt) but it has definitely been a learning experience. I must be doing well because I have been asked to put my name down on that school's relief Learning Support Assistant (LSA) list, even if it's just for one day a week. Got to be happy with that.

With my Prac half over my course heading towards being over as well. As long as I don't have to do any resubmits on my assignments I will be a fully qualified LSA by the beginning of December. Then I will have to decide what schools I would like to work at and put my name down at them.

As we are heading toward the end of the year it's nearing time for the Dance Concert. We have both of Girl Child's costumes and one has been sequined by a family we know. A huge thanks to them for spending all their holidays sequinning our classes costumes. That leaves only a bit of sewing for me to do on the other costume before the dress rehearsal.

Things are going pretty well here at the moment. That's always something to be grateful for.

Drop by Village Voices to see what other people are grateful for, this week.

 

Stop your whining

I've turned into one of those people. Recently, I've been complaining - a lot. It's annoying to me and those around me. I say "Not now, I'm tired." and "Maybe later, when my head hurts less." Or the one I think I should use more frequently "After I have a nap." Whine, whine, whine.

If we have learnt anything over the last 19 months it is that my head hurts less when I get enough sleep and when I take my migraine med. We also know that stress and lack of sleep can make me a banshee difficult to live with. Thankfully apart from the Easter Weekend I have been feeling quite a bit better than last year.

Dr Jesse was away recently so I saw another doctor at the same practice. He is also good looking but more in a baby faced way. For anonymity we shall refer to him as Dr Chase. Check out the representation below:

Image from: http://www.fox.com/_photos/shows/house/extras/season_7/

Yes, he does look like Dr Jesse. There may be a bit of a family resemblance there. Dr Chase is nice but he delivered some unwelcome news. The migraine med which I have used since mid last year is less available than it has been. Apparently it is highly addictive and the government doesn't want it to be so easy to get anymore. So, despite the Neurologist saying I have to take it and my preventative every day until I have had no pain for 4 to 5 weeks, I have gone from having enough for one a day to only having 8 tablets over 8 weeks.

Because of this, Dr Chase started me on another preventative medication to add to the one I've been on since mid last year. It can take up to 6 weeks to work and I get to take it morning and night. I've also seen Dr Jesse on the meantime and my other preventer medication dose was put up as well.

My night time meds last week (plus some pain relief)

Some days I feel like I rattle. I take 4 tablets to 'prevent' my headache (or in reality just make it less annoying). On good days, the pain is only mild so I only take them and maybe a couple of paracetamol. On other days, if a drink or a shower is too hot or cold then the pain escalates and doesn't subside for long time. I guess that's why I have 4 different pain relievers.

But hey, I'm grateful that there is nothing really wrong with me. I read blogs where other people (or their family and friends) are facing or have faced life threatening illnesses and really, I have nothing to complain about.

I read about Megan (who got sick from the meds helping her fight leukemia and ended up with a liver transplant due to liver failure), Ashlea and her family (her dad donated a kidney to her and ended up in ICU) and Nicola (who is 4 and in pain from cancer). These blogs are mostly happy and upbeat.

I need to take a leaf from their books and stop my whining.

Edited to add:

Nicola got her angel wings on Saturday 27 October 2012. My thoughts go out to her family, friends and everyone touched by her life. R.I.P. Nicola.

 

Thankful Thursday: Friends!

In 2009, when we were looking at high schools for Boy Child, there were a few we considered including the local one where probably 75 per cent of his peer group would end up at. But the school that we felt met his academic needs was one out of our local area. He was very angry with us for not letting him attend the local high school where all his 'friends' were going.

Now, given he was rarely invited anywhere and only really talked about doing things with 4 kids (he has read this post and said he had lots of friends) I was a little curious about who these friends actually were. It turned out that by 'friends' he meant kids who knew him. So not really friends in the sense that I would use the term but probably quite normal use for an Aspie.

He got over his anger about being sent to an out of area high school and we are now nearing the end of the second year there. Academically, he is flourishing. While he often talks about his friends but we haven't met many of them. I had wondered if perhaps his friends were of a similar nature to his friends in primary school.

It turns out they aren't! The day school holidays started a few kids got together straight after school and went for pizza. Over the holidays he has had a few things on as well. He has been to a sleep over at one house, been to someone else's birthday and went to the movies with a couple of girls as well.

I am very thankful that he has friends, real friends who want to spent time with him. I'm linking up with Kate for Thankful Thursday. Why not drop by and join in?

What are you thankful for this week?

Reinventing myself

As part of my Cert IV in Education Support, I have to do 60 hours of practical work experience in a school. Which is fine except that the school where i will be doing my work experience has a no denim rule.  Oh, and shirts have to be slogan free and meet the Sun Protection Policy.  The Policy recommendeds Loose fitting, closely woven cotton fabrics and shirts with a collar and longer sleeves and longer skirts and shorts.

I have been working from home from most of the last 8 years.  My standard mode of dress is jeans with T-shirts (mostly with IT company logos or slogans on them) and runners. There are people I have known for years who have never seen me in anything other than jeans. I’ve been in a bit of a panic so I have been shopping (something that I really don’t enjoy) on quite a few occasions.

This is what I have some up with:

   

3 pairs of 3/4 cuffed pants

An ocean coloured top with gathers on the neck and a cream collared shirt with roll up sleeves

I bought the black shoes. The denim ballet flats I’ve had for a few years but not often worn. 

What do you think?  I have also bought a pair of full length black boot leg pants so I think pants wise I am covered.  In fact, the grey and olive look so similar I was thinking about returning a pair.  I do have some more shirts but I need to have enough decent clothes to wear 2 days a week without looking like I’m wearing the same thing every week. I’m even considering wearing makeup to hopefully make a good impression.

I had thought that I will probably revert back to my normal standard of dress for the 3 days I’m at Tafe but maybe not.  I would actually like to have some decent stylish clothes so I don’t have to panic when I’ve got a work meeting. 

I’ve put on about 5 kilos in the last year so it’s highly probably that some of my shirts don’t fit anymore, plus my previous new clothes are basically T-shirts with long sleeves, so not that great for the warmer weather.  Unfortunately, most of the tops / shirts available in the shops at the moment don’t meet the Sun Protection guidelines.  I’m not too worried about not having a collar but the sheer, lacy and singlet styles are definitely out.

It would be really good if I could get hold of some more tops and even better if I could upgrade from very casual to smart casual at least.  Will two pairs of shoes be enough? Has anyone got any ideas to help expand my wardrobe?  I’m really only looking at pants and tops because I figure I may need to get down on the play a lot and skirts and dresses aren’t really my style suitable. 

I think the just starting the course was a huge step in the reinvention of me.  This next step could just be seen window dressing.  That can be pretty important, too.

A mini break

I may have mentioned that in the space of 33 days during August and September we celebrate all our birthdays and a wedding anniversary. This year things were a bit more exciting as we had a mini break to the Gold Coast in the middle. This was partly because we haven't had a family holiday this year and the dates tied in with a conference Mr E. was attending which started on me turning a  significant age.

After last year when I didn't get cake until a few days after my birthday, this year we had a plan. My sister lives near the Gold Coast and she discovered a place that made a gluten free brownie cake so ordered one for us. With that  important thing sorted, we then had to decide what else to do.

While we were in New Zealand last year Girl, Boy and I went Zorbing. Given rolling down a hill in an inflatable ball was much less scary than I had thought, what adventure could we dream up to celebrate a milestone birthday?

Hot air ballooning seemed like a good thing to do. Unfortunately, at almost $300 per person and a 5 am start, it was just going to be Mr E and I. Mr E organised the balloon ride and more importantly my sister to have our kids overnight. That is how Mr E. and I managed have our first night alone in 6 years.

 

Mr E's photo of the balloon while it was inflating.

The balloon ride was nice, although every time the gas burners were turned on I jumped out of my skin. But when we were just floating along it was very peaceful. The scenery was lovely, too.

Mr E., me and 19 other people floating over the Gold Coast

 

After the balloon ride, Mr E and I had a champagne breakfast before we met up with the family at Movieworld.  That's where we spent the day. I started the day with the Scooby-Doo Spooky Coaster and that did it for me. I was suitably nauseated for the next few hours. Mr E spent lots of time getting photos while my nieces, our kids and my sister and her husband  went on ride after ride. Just before Movieworld closed, I summoned up the courage to go on the Looney Tunes roller coaster (yes, the kiddie coaster) with Girl Child. Go, me!

Photographic Proof - (we are in the 3rd car) and I didn't throw up!

When we celebrated my birthday the following evening having dinner with my sister and nieces while my poor brother in law had to work. Wethen had brownie cake with vanilla gelato. We sent some cake and gelato home so my Brother in Law wouldn't miss out.  It was delicious! 

 

 

So that was our mini break. We celebrated with Family, food and fun.  Yummy cake, too.

An award...I’m honoured!

A while back (over four weeks ago!), Kylez aka Mrs P distributed the Liebster award around the Blogosphere. I was very impressed to be on the list.

What does this mean? Well, here's the drill:

• Each person must post 11 facts about themselves
• Answer 11 questions the tagger has given you
• Choose 11 people and link them to your post (they must have 200 followers or less)
• Provide 11 questions for the people you tag
• Tell the people you have nominated

Here are 11 Facts about me.

1. I’m a big wuss. I can’t watch scary or violent movies. I can read scary stuff but prefer to read stuff with a happily ever after.  Or at least where the good guys win and the bad guys get caught or wiped off the face of the earth.
2. I get sick just looking at a roller coaster. Sometimes just looking at a Merry go round can make me feel nauseated. This happened after I had Glandular Fever in Year 11.  Before that I was fine and I can remember going on a roller coaster 8 times in a row a few years before that.
3. My favourite colour is blue. And I don't like pink at all. This can be an issue as pink is one of Girl Child’s favourite (if not the favourite) colour.  I do however, like P!nk.
4. I am now the mother of a 9 year old and a 14 year old.  Add to that Mr E and I have been married for 17 years and time just seems to be flying. I also had one of those significant birthdays recently. I’m not sure which of those make me feel the oldest. Probably having a 14 year old. I found my first grey hairs when he was 6 months old.
5. I still own the teddy bear I was given for my first Christmas.  I even sleep with him, occasionally. Generally that only happens when Mr E is away or when I’m upset but my bear is always then if I need him.
6. The guy I went to my Year 12 formal with (we were probably together for 5 months) decided / announced he was gay not long after we broke up. As it turned out I was not very surprised by this.
7. For me, the most important thing about birthdays is cake.  I don't care if I don't get a present but cake is vitally important. I think it stems from my Dad and I having birthdays a day apart and I remember birthdays when I did not get a cake. 
8. Mr E and I recently had an entire night without the children. It’s the first time that this has happened in about 6 years.  We have had times without one child or one of us has been away from the rest of the family but this was just the two of us overnight. While it felt bizarre only being the two of us, I enjoyed it. I think I would have enjoyed it more if we hadn't had to get up before 4 am.
9. Sometimes I wonder if I should have named my blog something else.  Does having a blog called Whining at the World mean I actually whine more than I would if it was called something else?  I wonder if just having a blog called Whining attracts less than desirable vibes or whatever to me. Would changing the blog name would affect the vibes I’m putting out into the universe? 
10. I’m often told that I over think things.  The previous fact is a good example of this.
11. I have spent over a week writing this blog post. I keep changing my mind about which facts may actually be interesting to you.  I’m still not sure the are but I think these are okay.

The questions Kylez gave me to answer are:

Q1. What is the stupidest thing you've ever done?
Probably backing into a tree in my then new car while the reserving sensors were frantically beeping at me.

Q2. Do you scrunch or fold. I'm talking about toilet paper here. Kylez is a scruncher.
I’m a folder.  I also prefer the paper to go out from the wall…just in case you were interested.

Q3. Think about your best-friend in the world. Now think about them getting stung by a jellyfish. Now think about whether you like them enough to pee on their sting for them. Would you do it?
Yes.  I’d prefer to pee into a container and pour it on the sting though. I like my privacy.

Q4. When the zombie apocalypse happens do you want to be a survivor or are you too lazy to be bothered living that kind of existence and would you rather just be a zombie? I figure it can't be that bad, you're a zombie, you wouldn't really know would you? You'd just be interested in eating brains. How bad is that, I'm too lazy to want to survive a zombie apocalypse. Yep, I take laziness to a whole new level right there!
I’m not sure.  If I could be a zombie quickly then a zombie is fine but if I have to get eaten alive then I’d want to be a survivor.

Q5. Do you pee in the shower? Yes or No? Why or Why Not. I'll just put it out there, I don't think there is anything wrong with that! Unless it's someone else's shower. Or there's someone in the shower with you!
No. I pee before I shower. I think the episode of Seinfeld where George pees in the locker room shower because it’s just a drain scarred me.

Q6. What do you want to be when you grow up? Totally stole that one.
In no particular order I wanted to be a vet, a librarian and a journalist. I became none of those.

Q7. If you won 50 million bucks in lotto, would you give me some? At least pay off my mortgage?
I have no idea what I’d do with that amount of money. I might give you some.  but then I might just blow the lot on myself.

Q8. What's your fave colour?
I answered that up there.  For the record it’s blue.

Q9. What's the best book you've ever read? Yep, stole that one too!
Best? Probably the Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

Q10. Have you ever farted loud enough in public that people have looked at you?
Unfortunately, yes! Very embarrassing!

Q11. At what point in this post did I prove fact number 2  to you? (Fact 2 was that Kylez talks a lot)
Kylez – Very early on.  But I hang around to look at your photos and stalk you.

I’m supposed to only be passing this award on to bloggers with 200 or less followers. However, some of the bloggers I want to pass the award on to don’t have their followers displayed so I’m going to just take a punt that they may make it in.  So here we go.  I’m passing this award on to:

Megan at Silver Threads of Happiness

Sarah from People Don't Eat Enough Fudge

Renee who blogs at  About a Bugg

Lisa from Simple Loving Thoughts

J. from JAAK’s Place

Jen from Now Let It Go

Emma who blogs her Desert Ramblings

Kakka from Menopausal Mumma

Lisa who is a Mum of Adult Kids

Kate who blogs at To My Dear Angel

Suzi from Under the Windmills

I’d like these lovely ladies to answer the following questions about themselves.

1. Why did you start blogging and why do you keep doing it??

2. What do you think is best thing about blogging?

3. If you were going to be abducted by aliens in the morning, what would you want to have for your last meal on earth?

4. If you could be any fictional character, who would you choose to be and why?

5. You are a world famous and respected blogger.  Someone is going to name a cocktail (or mocktail) after you.  What’s it called and what’s in it?

6. What’s your favourite comfort food?

7. When was the moment when you suddenly realised that you were considered a responsible adult?

8. You go to a blogger event…do you think of other bloggers by their names, blog names or twitter names?

9. If you could meet anyone in the world (currently alive) and have a deep and meaningful conversation with them about anything – who you would you want to meet and what would you discuss?

10. If you could travel back in time would you try to change significant historical events or change minor things or just observe the way things were?

11. Aren’t you glad I tagged you in this award?

There you go!  Sorry, Kylez that it has taken me so long to do this.