end of the school holidays

School holidays this time coincided with the recordbreaking longest stretch of rainy days for 77 years. But we did have a few hours respite on most days where we could enjoy a break in the rain. Back in The Old Country the saying goes "there is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing", weather is no hindrance to getting out to play. But we've gone soft since moving here.... I haven't bought wellies/gumboots for the kids for years because in times of drought and occasional downpours, there just hasn't been a need for them. I wish we had them these past couple of weeks, though!



But, enough about the weather..... here's a photo from the park. It was one of those precious times when all 3 children played together (usually there's one that wants to do his/her own thing so the other two pair off).

happiness is......

a Nutella sandwich......... at least in the eyes of Turtle who happens to believe firmly that chocolate is one of the major food groups the only food group that matters..... (ok, so he is obviously my son). He went through so much Nutella at one stage that we set down a new rule - only one Nutella sandwich per day. So, the Turtle Special "TripleDecker Sandwich with Triple Lot Nutella" was born. (He's too smart.....) .

The angle on the photo is wrong so you can't see the size of this thing, nor the thick layers of Nutella oozing out from between the slices. I believe there may have been more Nutella than bread, and the bread was serving as a sort of napkin to hold on to the Nutella.........

So how do we persuade a child who would happily live off chocolate and who considers fruits/vegetables to be evil, that he needs to eat a balanced diet in order to grow big and strong and healthy? Ironically he is bigger, stronger and every bit as healthy as his older brother who could be a poster boy for the fruit/vegetable growing industry........

While I ponder that, I think I'll just ask Turtle to make me a sandwich, because looking at the photo is making me hungry....................... :)

ANZAC day - Lest we forget

A sprig of rosemary in remembrance of Anzac Cove, where the rosemary bushes grew in abundance

Every year, LP goes to Grandma Marnie's house to make Anzac biscuits. These biscuits were called Soldier's biscuits until after Gallipoli and their origins are fascinating: During WWI mothers and wives were worried about their men receiving adequate nutrition. The problem with sending care packages to them was the length of transport from Australia to Europe and the lack of refrigeration. So these Soldier's biscuits came about. Biscuits with as much nutrition as possible packed into them - oats, coconut, sugar, bicarb soda, water and golden syrup or treacle to bind everything together in lieu of eggs.

This is the "Hobart", a navy light cruiser that Peter's granddad served on. We honour his contribution to WWII on Anzac Day.

And every Anzac Day Pop (Peter's Dad) marches in the big parade in Sydney. We watched the parade on TV and waited eagerly until we could see him wave. Next year I would like to take the kids to the dawn service, and go into town to watch the parade. I'd really like for the children to learn to appreciate the significance of this day, to learn to truly honour the memory of all who have fought and to learn true gratitude for the blessing of living in a country that is free and prosperous.

deepish random ponderings

Part of my morning routine is to have a little roam around the Blogworld. These blogposts do many things - some posts amuse and entertain as I read of the events small and large that form part of the daily lives of my blog friends. Other posts inspire creativity, and then there are the posts that inspire me to think and ponder.

This particular morning there are 2 posts that sent me down a particular path of thought. First I read the latest update from our friends Mark and Tash over in London. Tash is battling secondary breast cancer. In Doodlebug vernacular what is happening to her stinks, but she remains such a positive and vibrant person.

While I was digesting the latest news which isn't good, I visited Jordan over at the Wonderwheel and her beautiful piece on faith and its place in parenting. One particular point Jordan brought up was the belief in "everything happens for a reason" and how she prefers to turn that around to believe we can find reason in everything that happens. Jordan wrote her piece so beautifully that I won't butcher it by trying to paraphrase what she said, but I wanted to think out loud for a while over here instead.

I believe in an omnipotent, omniscient Heavenly Father and that He has a plan for us. This means that I believe things happen for a reason or purpose even when I don't see clearly what that reason or purpose is in the short term. Usually the reason can only be seen by hindsight.

Life on earth may appear random in the way good and bad things happen to people. A bit like a boardgame e.g. Monopoly where landing on the "chance" box means drawing a card that might earn us a blessing or a tribulation in a completely random fashion. But, according to scientific theory, nothing is truly random. What might appear random to one person might have a pattern to another. All the bad things that happen such as war, natural disasters and disease are part of our earthly existence. So are the personal disasters or trials we face in our life. Are these things random? Are our reactions to them random? Some people find faith despite disaster or even because of it while others use these things as a reason not to believe in God.

I believe that everything happens for a reason and that the reason is for us to find reason or purpose in everything, to find faith, to find good in ourselves and others and to use this for good.

love in my mailbox

That one thing I miss the most with the arrival of email are good old-fashioned letters. These days I go to the mailbox only to collect a wide selection of envelopes that usually never contain anything warm and fuzzy. Then every once in a while there is something special.... like today!

Tusen takk Joanna for my beautiful "Pobody's Nerfect" journal! I love it!!! LP was most envious of my special book and most put out that I wouldn't give it to her. So, now I'm in trouble because I promised I would make her a journal of her very own. Tutorial please, Joanna?

school holidays!

On this first day of the school holidays, it's a wettish, grey day outside. So we made a cubby in the playroom instead of our planned outdoor one. The finished result is not just your everyday ordinary sort of cubby, but a mansion with 4 little rooms and a waterfall outside (the blue sheet).

so much fun!

"on my night table..."

my little item in the sidebar makes it look as if there are only one or two books on my night-table.... this might be true, but lately my collection of "to read" books has grown to the extent of no longer fitting on the nighttable, and I had to move them to the top of the dresser. This picture does not include the ones waiting for me in the bookshop that I have ordered in......

My name is Mari and I am a book-a-holic.........

boomerang

Doodlebug has studied the colonial era in school this term. As part of these studies the class visited Cockatoo Island and the whole school had its Colonial Day. For their end of term project, the children have to make and present either: 1. A ship like one from the First Fleet, 2. A model of Uluru, 3. a model of a settler's cottage or 4. a boomerang. They also have to write a report about their chosen model. Doodlebug wanted to make the boomerang but needed some assistance from MOTH. The opportunity arose on Friday when Doodlebug was off from school with a high temperature and MOTH was working from home. They went down to The Shed and got to work.

This photo was taken around the time Doodlebug's temp spiked again, hitting a toasty 40.8/105.5, and judging by this photo he was feeling the chills despite the outside temperature still being pleasantly warm.

MOTH gave a hand with the curved bits, but Doodlebug did the cutting on the straight lines, thanks to the guidance of a laser line. Very cool apparently..... :) The finished product was then sanded. That was enough for an exertion for one day, and Doodlebug had a long sleep after this.

We continued yesterday with the finishing touches - the painting. We had researched traditional Aboriginal designs and Doodlebug decided he wanted to do the dot painting rather than painting a kangaroo on it. MOTH had cut out some extra boomerangs for the others so they could have some fun too, and yesterday afternoon we set ourselves up on the deck with paints and cotton buds to make dots.

And here are the finished products, didn't they do well?

Traditionally the owner/maker of a boomerang would decorate it with a design that had some significance to him. In that spirit all the children chose their own patterns rather than copying the designs we had found on the Net. We have possibly the very first boomerang with a Pokeball on it........

Last, but not least, we had to check if it flies.

the game of two halves

and so soccer season starts again. Doodlebug was struck down with a virus, and to his great distress was not able to play his first game. But Turtle was excited to play his first game. He was trying his very best. Every once in a while as he stole the ball off someone I would hear a "sorry" and I was about to be really impressed at the manners and sensitivity of my boy...... then I heard what he said after... the full sentence was "sorry..... but you don't get to score a goal this time". He played very well and was awarded the "player of the game" trophy at the end. To top that off, I bought him a sausage sandwich from the BBQ and his bliss was complete :)

my little angels

their wings are slightly tattered around the edges, but still...... when I see them asleep I suddenly can't remember the frustrations of "Witching Hour". The boys decided this week that they would like to sleep in the same bed. Fine by me. Their sleeping arrangements have always been changeable - from separate rooms to sharing rooms and back to separate rooms again. Our bed is also a favoured stopover in the night. They are so adept at sneaking into our bed that most of the time I don't wake up - they just slide in under the doona and snuggle up - They are thankfully not restless sleepers!