This Blog is Moving

to Wordpress

I'm too lazy to try to figure out how Blogger works and Cyp said Wordpress is easier.

so here goes.....New Address

Talking to Uncle Max

On Saturday morning I was in Gmail when I noticed that Max was too - I don't think I've ever seen him logged in before. I decided to send him a chat message - he responded.

"hey - your brother is online and he says hi."

"Really?" said Cyp - "he never chats with me."

We ended up calling Max and put him on speakerphone - I think Ellis was ecstatic to hear Uncle Max's voice - he even had a sensible conversation with him - amazing really. Rowan wanted to be part of the action too - even if he couldn't see anything.

I've posted a few pictures so Max can see what it would be like if he hooked up his webcam so we could do videochat....or skype.

Don't Tell Ellis

But on Friday I took Rowan to Funkee Monkeys without Ellis. At first I wasn't going to go, but then thought about Mr. Clingy Rowan and decided I needed to socialize him. Plus - I get to sit there and drink coffee - If I stayed home, all I would do is obsess about the mess (hey that rhymes). Rowan did surprisingly well at Funkee Monkeys - near the end he actually ventured away from me.

I met one woman there who had a little boy the same age as Rowan who was due in November with twins. Her baby was way more active than Rowan too - he was already a climber.

Rowan fell asleep on the drive home and then of course woke up the instant we got home. Darn 10 minute nap - it seems to revive him for the rest of the day. Cyp got our new cordless phone set up so I could talk to Elizabeth while Rowan played in the playroom - worked great.

Perhaps I Spoke to Soon

Did I say Ellis might have turned the corner on 3? Yah - not quite yet. I realized that I hadn't made us any plans for Thursday so I thought we'd go to our neighbourhood park - the boys seem to be enjoying the parks these days. They chase eash other around and tire one another out - and I just have to slightly monitor so they don't kill each other.

If I happen to say "go out" in any part of my conversation, Rowan immediately runs for the front door and Ellis usually says "I don't wanna goooooo."

Ellis was in a stay at home mood on Thursday but I decided he would start enjoying the park once he got there. Now - to just get sunscreen on him and him into the stroller. I remind him how much fun the flying fox (zip line) is and that kinda gets him going.

Unfortunately, the park doesn't seem to work it's magic - Ellis goes on the zip line once and then is done - he then torments Rowan who only wants to play with Ba and then he starts hitting a little girl that he has taken a dislike to for some reason. Then he hits me so into the stroller he goes. There is another mummy group there - most of them have what appear to be two year olds and new babies - their kids have not hit three yet. They don't seem perturbed though by the shrieking Ellis: "I WANT OUT" I ignore him and continue to follow Rowan who is doing laps around the playground. Ellis starts his spitting - he leans all the way over and spits out huge goobers that dribble down down down... do your worst I am ignoring you. Unfortunately, this seems to be a genetic tactic as whenever Rowan is unhappy he starts spitting. I try not to react to this, but I must subconsciously be giving off signals that I find this behaviour disturbing cause they both continue to do it.

On the way home I note some orchids that have planted themselves in our neighbour's tree - see the yellow flowers?

Speaking of neighbours - we had a play date to go over to the neighbours across the back - kids are a year older than Ellis and Rowan respectively.

Of course Rowan chooses this day to have a record nap - he goes down at noon as is still sleeping at 3. How do the little rotters know?

I finally wake him up at 3:20 - I need this playdate!

The kids got along okay - Ellis only made Emma cry twice - Meg the mom takes this in stride. Apparently Emma has been calling to Ellis through the fence so when we got home we had to check this out - It would be good if they could be friends.

I mentioned the noises that wake me up some nights - Possums dancing on the metal roof.

"yup - I sleep through these noises when Paul is home, but the minute I'm on my own it's some crazy psychopath trying to get into our house." I know exactly what she means.

I Just Remembered Something Funny

As we were walking along last week - I was pushing Ellis and Rowan in Shiskabob - Ellis said:

"so - we have a green stroller."

"yes." I said

"and a red one."

"yes." I said again

"and this one.....so mum..... we could have two more kids."

Cyp's Home

So last Friday I started counting down the days until Cyp got back. I would say to Ellis - "only 3 more days until daddy gets home. " To which Ellis would reply - "I don't like daddy anymore.... I don't want him to come home."

I would be lying if I said that I secretly didn't snicker inside - ha - serves you right buddy - your kid doesn't like you anymore - heh heh. These thoughts usually coincided with thoughts of Cyp getting to sleep uninterrupted in his own bed all night long.... and getting to talk to other adults.

I was always a good mom though and said "oh -you're just mad because daddy is away, but you really love him and he loves you and misses you, but he had to go to work."

I had told Cyp that there was no way he was going to work on Tuesday afternoon (he got home at noon). "Oh." he said.

"Cyp's here." says Ellis when Cyp got home. Rowas was sleeping. I suddenly had a brainwave and phoned the school where I had left my jacket. They had it. Yay. I told Cyp I was leaving him with the boys to go get it. "Both of them?" said Cyp?

I decided to take mercy on him.

"Ellis - do you want to come for a drive with me?"

"where?"

"to go get my jacket at a school."

"that's not very good for me.....no." (those were his exact words)

ok - daddy - you're on your own (or not actually).

When I got back we went to the park to encourage Ellis to ride his bike - I've been seeing a lot of two year olds biking these days and started to feel like neglectful mom. Ellis really isn't interested though. He did two laps at the park and then had had enough.

Picked up our veggie box on the way home - hey - no more gold kiwis! We did have a huge bunch of kale though. Sigh - I will be needing to figure out what to do with that. I still had a huge bunch of greens from last week - I think they call it silverbeet here, but I know it as swiss chard. I ended up cooking that for dinner - now that Cyp is home I can cook more veg. At lunch I had whipped up an enormous amount of guacamole using up three avocados that were ripe - good thing they had also included cilantro in our box last week. It was delish with the quesadillas I made. I got three more huge avocados this week and more cilantro. May need to pick up some chips.....

At dinner Ellis said:

"I changed my mind.... I still like you daddy, but why did you have to leave? Don't leave again."

Ellis has really changed recently - not sure if it is the structure of his sentences, but he no longer seems like such a little kid. He keeps reminding me that he will be four soon and he seems it. Plus - he seems much more reasonable these days - logic almost works on him.

After dinner I said: "right, I'm going out."

"WHAT?" said Cyp. He looked extremely put out - "fine...what time will you be back?"

I was kidding - I have no where to go... but I wanted him to imagine what my life had been like making dinner, doing dishes, running bath, getting kids ready for bed and then not managing to get Rowan to bed (as he won't sleep without me) and finally giving in and passing out at 8 only to wake up the next day to do it all again without having another adult to talk to. Really - I shouldn't complain - it's not that it's hard - it's just kinda mind numbing - and then trying to figure out to do with ourselves every day was the real chore.

Last Day of Long Weekend - Made It!

I quite like my new morning routine - put on the dance music, haul out the marble works and ignore the children. I've almost got it down to a science. Of course - the novelty will likely wear off for the boys in a couple of days and I'll have to figure something else out.

the other good thing is that the boys are actually playing more these days. Could also be that Rowan doesn't really let Ellis play on the computer anymore - if Ellis is sitting at the table, Rowan comes along and tries to pull him off his chair. Heh. Rowan also goes and wakes Ellis up in the morning - not so good. This morning he went into Ellis's room and Ellis threw things off the bed at him. Of course Rowan got hit in the head and started wailing. When I went in to investigate Ellis said "I didn't do it" The peg fell off the bed and hit him on the head." Then he started giggling - "hey, that rhymes." all this while Rowan was screaming his head off.

Anyway - yesterday I turned on the TV - I needed some mummy time. There was a good lineup yesterday including the Gruffalo. Rowan watched for a bit and then went off and played somewhere. I got ready to go out - our other new routine is to head out after Rowan's nap.

We ended up taking the bus down to the Roma Street Parklands - they are super nice actually. I had been skeptical. This city is a different place in the winter - the parks have people in them during the middle of the day and the kids can play without melting. Could be that it is warmer outside than inside....

The boys raced around for a while and then we met up with Portland friends. The daughters are the same age as Esme and Ava. Ellis really likes them - I got him out of the house today by telling him we were going to meet them.

They were there to see a play in the park - we ended up tagging along and Ellis loved it. The setting was magical -it was late afternoon and the sun was slowly going down - the park is really lovely. Too bad mom and dad didn't check it out while they were here - it has a nice garden. Next time. I had bad preconceptions about it as the only time I'd been by the garden it had been blazing hot and it didn't seem to have many shade trees. It does actually....

It also has mom and bub walks. I may check one out next Friday.

After the play we ran to the train station - pretty much walked onto the train. Yay! Got to Toowong Village - food fair was closed so I quickly picked up some snags at Coles (sausages). Got out to the street, thought about getting home at 6 and trying to cook said sausages and decided we better eat at Jackpot Noodles. Boys had a barbecue pork bun for dinner.

Pushed them up the hill, put them in the bath and then it was bedtime. Nothing good on TV so watched back episodes of Grey's Anatomy on the net.

Day 2 is Done - Phew - Dicey for a Bit

Ever since I blogged about how Rowan always wakes up happy, he has stopped. Ellis on the other hand seems to be happy when he wakes up. They like to keep me on my toes by mixing things up I guess. Or - maybe Ellis has finally turned the corner on 3 - oh please oh please oh please oh please. I can only hope.

Our new morning routine is to go sit in the sunroom (only semi warm spot in the house) and dance to music while mummy blogs. Someone told me once that the room that is unbearable in the summer would become our winter sanctuary - she was right!

Yesterday we had to drag out the marble works to give me a bit more time. Does it ever get boring? All goes well until Ellis decides he's hoarding all the marbles. Some friends of ours have new school marble works - but I say old school is better - easier to put the big chunky plastic tubes together - the new ones are smaller and trickier for small hands.

I managed to get Rowan down for a nap and then Ellis and I started to get on each other's nerves - he had found a pad of onion paper and was busy making pirate maps and depositing them all around the house. I looked at the state of our house and went "ARGH!" No more onion paper (as if that was the only problem). I went on a mad frantic trying to tidy spree but was soon thwarted.

Thankfully, Tanya and her family were going to the Planetarium and I invited myself and the boys along. I strapped the boys into Shiskabob and we headed off to the Bot Gardens (also home of the Planetarium). Of course we got there early - but that was ok - I found out that the 2:00 show was Cosmic Collisions and was for adults - hmmm. Would Ellis and Rowan last 40 minutes? I decided not - I went outside to wait for Tanya et al. I had brought ball and Ellis tackled Rowan for a while until Rowan got fed up. One particularly rough tackle got a look from some other parents so I decided we had to put ball away. This meant Rowan decided it was time to just run so I chased around for a bit. Tiring.

Tanya arrived and decided her kids would be fine for the show and I hummed and hawed and then thought - what the heck - I didn't want to give up on the idea of being with adults even if it was in a theatre where we couldn't talk.

So - sprang for the tickets ($21) and went in. Ellis seemed impressed by the dark sky and tilty seats. Rowan too. The theatre went black - oh - I hope this wasn't a bad idea. It is a good thing I am still nursing Rowan (I do get looks here in Oz - I have not encountered anyone else who nurses their kid past 6 months). I think Ellis loved the show - he was silent except for one part where I heard a quiet little "wow" from next to me. I liked it too - would it be pushing our luck to try going again? Probably. Oh - Rowan fell asleep - that helped too. Maybe I should try making our room pitch black at nap time - worked like a charm.

Afterwards we did a tour of the number garden and then I walked us home. Of course - we had to stop for fish and chips at our local fish and chip shop - it was dinner time - oh and Happy Hour - that means day 2 is almost over. I just have to survive bathtime (helps to take a glass of wine in there and a book).

It was Border Security night - 7:3o showing - good thing - 8 pm seems to be my bedtime these days.

At 2 am, there was a great commotion outside on our bedroom patio - sounded like a bookshelf falling over. What was it? I don't know! Of course I couldn't sleep after that. It was probably a couple of possums fighting or something, but I don't know. Rest of the night wasn't so restful....

One more day to go......

First Day of Very Long Weekend

So - 3 days without any other adult interaction - it's going to be an extra long weekend. It also appears to be sunny in Vancouver too as no one is on Facebook. Hmm. I decided we needed to go on an adventure so we set out to go to New Farm Market. We took the city cat down, which killed one hour and then wandering around the market took a while too - Ellis is fairly cooperative at the market as he likes the free samples - so he sits in the back of shiskabob and reaches his hand up as I pass down strawberries, yoghurt etc. I decided we needed treats so bought a bacon and cheese pasty and then I found these super delicious Thai coconut pudding things - kinda like pancakes, but pudding like. I should have got more - the kids loved them and so did I - hmm, Ellis is right - sharing is not always all it is cracked up to be.

After our treats we had an impromptu game of Footy - we don't have the proper ball for this though - Rowan tried to remedy this situation by surreptitiously sidling up to a group of picnickers, putting down our soccer ball and picking up their ball. He was caught though much to the delight of the men in the group who heckled us and told me to get a proper ball for the boy. They even told me the name for it, but I didn't catch it. I will have to pick one up though as the boys do l0ve to tackle each other. No tackling in soccer.

Hey - did you note that Rowan is wearing his hat? Hooray! Getting him his own hat seemed to work.

Using the ball we walked to Methyr Park - along the river between the New Farm and Sydney Street City cat stops. There was a little playground there that was the perfect size for Rowan and Ellis - they set up a cooperative game of playground dirt. Rowan put it on the platform and Ellis shoved it through the holes using a stick. This lasted so long, I even got out my book. This came to an abrupt halt when Ellis decided he had to poo (darn market strawberries). I strapped both boys into shiskabob and sprinted for the citycat which I could see rounding the bend. As soon as we got on Ellis said - I don't have to poo anymore. Sigh. We got off at South bank as Ellis wanted to go to the library. We got there just in time for closing, but he managed to dash off a quick art project that was very lovely (his new word - everything is lovely these days).

Fortunately we found another part of the library - the Parlour - that was still open- it had games that entertained the boys for a while - really, who needs to know how to spell with scrabble - not necessary.

I tried to interest Ellis in a game of draughts - a.k.a checkers. I always thought draughts was darts - as they always seem to be playing it in the pubs of the detective novels I read. So - I learned something new. I also have forgotten how to play checkers so I had to do a quick search on wikipedia (yay iphone).

After watching the boys sort scrabble tiles for what seemed like forever I decided I was done for the day. We caught the city cat home where Rowan modeled his new behaviour of spitting when he doesn't get his way (i.e. out of the stroller). Next the shoes went flying and then the socks. We managed to make it home where thankfully it was happy hour!

Ellis was glad to see the potty and had the biggest poo I have ever seen (I probably shouldn't blog about this - but I just cannot believe how much poo can come out of such a little person).

Mac and cheese for dinner, bath and bedtime where I passed out not long after the boys. Good thing Doc Martin was on at 7:30.

Friday - Let's Try That Playgroup Again

Ellis has an uncanny ability to sleep in on school days. I got some blogging done and a shower before he finally woke up. As we got in the car I noted it was 9:30 - darn! I had planned to meet some moms at a playgroup in Southbank today. I was planning on the park and ride City Cat but the lot would be full. I was trying to figure out how else I could get there..... It was 10 (playgroup start time) when I finally got Rowan and myself back into the car after dropping off Ellis.

I guess I'll drive.... I zipped along Coronation Drive - I guess it was good I was late - rush hour was over. I drove along trying to remember where the Southbank Institute of Technology when I spied it - actually I spied the visitor parking. Great - I drove in - hmm -no tickets - call security button. I called security.

"Hi - umm, not sure where I can park - I'm here for playgroup."

The guard paused - "hmm - the parking lot for that is actually (and then he paused as if to say to himself - what the heck) - can you just park on the left."

Hooray! Classes are over for Uni and Tech students so I guess he thought it couldn't hurt to let me park for an hour. Plus people are just more considerate of parents with kids here - really - there was tons of parking and I would only be an hour. I'm pretty sure in Vancouver he would have sent me away. Free parking in Southbank!

Rowan clung to me the entire time - after the hour, he finally started to explore a bit, but it was time to go. I was just glad he stayed awake. I figured he would fall asleep on the way home and then wake up and that would be it for the day.

He actually stayed awake! He finally feel asleep at 1 and then slept the rest of the day. What an excellent day this is turning out to be.

When he woke up we went to get Ellis (with the requisite stop for rum first - this time I'll only drag one child into the liquor store with me).

Ellis was sitting outside reading books with Sam his teacher - the rest of his class was running around. I shall not start to obsess about this.

On the way home Ellis was talking about some new kid that comes just before him and mummy can you please figure out his name and he goes everyday and I want to go at the same time he does and be picked up at the same time.... Ellis gets a case of verbal diarrhea sometimes in the car on the way home. Finally at dinner he managed to string a coherent sentence together. There is a new kid named Islam and he and Ellis kicked a ball back and forth today. Ellis was pretty ecstatic.

After dinner we watched the video of Em doing ballet - both kids were transfixed. I had to play it over and over again. Ellis wants to do ballet.

Bath time gets more and more rambunctious and then it was finally bedtime. I managed to stay up till 9 before giving up trying to get Rowan to sleep without me. When Cyp gets home I'm sleeping downstairs.

At midnight Ellis came to our room - "mummy - is it morning time?"

"NO!"

He came into our bed - I left - I was hoping both kids would just sleep - who was I kidding. As I sat in the lounge (Oz for living room) trying to read my book to try to get sleepy again, I could hear giggling from our room. I went in and there was another wrestling match taking place. I ended up sending Ellis back to his room as he sobbed and cried and then I had to put Rowan in the crib for a while to prove that I meant business about this sleeping thing. It works - but takes some time. He plays with the fishy aquarium - somehow he got it into permanent play mode and it played the rest of the night - that plus my possessed electric toothbrush that goes on all by itself made for not a very good night sleep. Ugh. It's a long weekend.

Mr. Science

On Monday, Sam - Ellis's teacher - had mentioned that there was going to be a special science show at Ellis's daycare on Thursday.
She had noted that Ellis seems very interested in that sort of thing so she invited us to come along. I thought that was pretty good of her to notice that -or maybe she just feels bad as yet another Monday holiday is upon us. Anyway - I was glad that we had something to do as Thursday is sometimes hard to fill.

The show was at 10 - good time for us. We drove to the Uni and parked for the day. They have stupid signs up now that say parking is for staff and students. I decided that they have no way of knowing yet and really - why else would someone park there?

We got to Ellis's school at bit early (how surprising) and the kids were still running around outside in the playground. I tried to encourage Ellis to play, but he didn't - he eventually went off on his own corner and played by himself. I think he is a bit of a loner.

It could be that all the other kids go everyday so they know each other well and Ellis is treated differently as he only goes two days a week. He didn't seem to know the protocol like the other kids - or maybe he was just thrown off as it wasn't his usual day.

The science guy was great - he used different things to show how air worked - air propelled rocket, balloons, dry ice - it was pretty good. Ellis seemed to like it. He was sad though that he didn't get to be a volunteer in the show. Maybe if I hadn't have been there, Sam may have called on him, but she probably didn't want to get accused of favourtism. I tried to explain that there were about 40 kids watching and only 5 to to be helpers so the majority did not get to be volunteers.

Afterwards the kids got to play with the science toys that Mr. Science had brought. Both Ellis and Rowan enjoyed that. He had an especially fancy marble works that Rowan was very adept at using. He no longer shoves marbles in his mouth except to make sure that his mummy is paying attention to him. He takes great glee in looking at me with a challenge in his eyes and then slowly inserting the marble into his mouth. He thinks it is hilarious when I shake my head and say "no!"

Afterward I decided we should hang out a bit and get lunch at the Uni. I had to take money out - I stopped at a bank machine and surprise surprise, Rowan took off when I was in mid transaction (I was letting him be free for a bit - how could I forget that 15 month olds do not listen?). Leave the money, card in the machine and chase child?

No...... hurry up machine!!!! I was saying to myself as I was yelling "STOP" to Rowan as he careened around the corner and out of sight. I watched some Uni kids look at him with interest, but no one stopped him for me. I managed to get my money and catch Rowan just before he got to the road. Ellis was watching all with interest from the stroller.

I decided I couldn't cope with lunch but Ellis really wanted to stay and have lunch like he did one day with Grandpa so I decided we could get takeout and go to the great court.

I strapped Rowan in while we figured out what to eat.

We ended up a place not unlike the Sub Cafeteria at UBC. Ellis got a hotdog (quite a big one) and I got chicken curry. Then we headed to the Great Court. I figured I could see for miles if Rowan took off again.

That worked fine in theory, but soon Ellis got bored with the wide open spaces. He started running around the perimeter of the great Court under the covered walkway. Soon he was out of sight - I threw Rowan into the stroller and then sprinted what felt like a km trying to catch Ellis. I finally caught him.

"you got way to far away - why didn't you stop?"

"I thought you were right behind me - you were - see - when I turned around there you were."

"Right - I said as I puffed and huffed." don't do it again. He knew...

He then took me on the Ellis tour of the Uni - we found some ways we'd never been before and then we walked by the Lakes again to look at the birds. Rowan loves the birds - brrr? he says

We found some new ones - not sure what they were, Ellis said they were hens. They had polka dots. You can't really tell from my picture.

I made chicken for dinner - Ellis watched as I coated them in corn flakes just before shoving them in the over.

"Do the chickens mind?" Ellis said at dinnertime.

"what? oh, you mean having no more leg? - uh, no they don't mind as they are dead."

"how do you get the chicken legs?" asked Ellis.

"From the store - see a farmer raises them for us to eat."

"how do you just get a leg?"

"well - the butcher cuts up the chicken, but we eat other bits on other days."

"oh." said a slightly perturbed looking Ellis. I was starting to feel a little blech myself. Imagine - 10 chicken legs for $4.33. There seems to be something wrong with that when you think about it.

"Eat your chicken." I said (with the underlying threat of no cookie if you don't).

"ok." said Ellis and slowly ate it up. Rowan meanwhile was having none it. He stuck to corn.