You wont believe it

After having kids for 11 years now and no broken bones. We had two in one night. Both kids have casts on. What's the chances of that happening?

As I was preparing dinner last night Dessy came home screaming, she had fallen from a swing at the park (2 doors down the road). Her wrist didn't look broken or even swollen but after half an hour of screaming we took her to the after hours doctor and sure enough it has two breaks in it.

They put a cast on her (a purple one) which they are going to redo on Monday morning in case her wrist continues to swell over the weekend.

Anyway, while we were there we got the doctor to check Jo. Two weeks previously he was playing tag at school and a wee boy climbed up a wall and as Jo was tagging him he fell on Jo's arm. He had complained quite a few times about it but there was no bruising or swelling so I just kind of thought he was using it as an excuse. However yesterday we had noticed he couldn't straighten his arm so we ran it by the doctor - who xrayed it. Next thing he tells us we have to go to the hospital as it looks like Jo's elbow has been damaged and may need surgery. (makes you feel great as a parent when he's had this for two weeks and he's been playing T-Ball and doing everything normally - he must have a huge pain thresh-hold).

Anyway, the doctor at the hospital couldn't really tell from the xrays - so he put Jo in a huge cast and they're going to re-x-ray next Friday and reassess the situation.

2 children in casts on the same day - when it rains it pours.

What's Up Doc?

We got rabbits!

The kids saved up their pocket money and bought a rabbit each. Dessy's one is called 'Bugs Bunny' and Jo's one is called 'Toby' - although he keeps forgetting the name. They both took their pets to school to show their classes - the rabbits are only six weeks old so just sat their shaking in fear. Poor things. Was good for the kids though as the rabbits let all the children pat them. In the photo Dessy's one looks like a guinea pig, but it is a rabbit, she was just patting down the ears.

We've had rabbits before and Shane and I decided we wouldn't have them again, however next thing I know he's encouraging the kids to get them. I think it's cause he's sick of moving the rabbit hutch around the lawn so he can mow underneath it. lol

Anyway, my class went well. It was a very simple layout aimed at beginners but I was happy with what everyone created. I've seen other first layouts people have done at various classes and they've been dreadful... so a reasonable layout that looks good is a great start. My next 'page' class is on beading and is more complicated. It's not til the end of March and appears to be almost full already, so that's a good sign.

I also taught a class this morning teaching a hinged canvas - again it was quite simple but each of the ladies created a lovely piece of art that they seemed happy with. I thought they looked lovely and we had lots of laughs.

I had a bit of a bad start when I sliced through my thumb with a blade (never a good thing), but a particularly bad thing for me as I'm a fainter. Donna, who manages the shop, rescued me with a sticking plaster before I got a chance to look at my thumb. Otherwise I would have been down on the ground in an instant. In all the years I've scrapbooked I've never done that before... and wont be doing it again.

Oh, by the way, Happy Valentines Day

Teaching

A lady I used to scrapbook with a few years back has bought a wee stationery shop in Mosgiel and is introducing scrapbooking stuff into the shop. She approached me last year to see whether I could help out by teaching some scrapbooking classes for her and so my first class is tonight.

At the time when I said yes, I thought it would be fun and that I would quite enjoy it (and I'm sure it will be like that) but everytime I found myself thinking about it over the weekend I felt quite queasy. The owner of the shop tells me they are a great bunch of ladies who love to have a laugh and I shouldn't feel nervous. But I think my problem is more that it's a very SIMPLE layout and I'm a little worried it's going to be too easy and that people might think "is that it?"

The picture above is a version of the class I'm taking. I'm doing it in blues and greens but I thought I should have another example in a different colour so that the ladies see that you can use the same layout of papers and yet make things look completely different. Fingers crossed the class goes okay and that they like it. Fingers crossed I don't make a dork of myself by getting all tongue-tied. Times like this I wonder why I don't think more before saying yes. :-)

Have a great day

School Days Again

Well this week it was back to school for the kids after a long summer break. Dessy looked so grown up and smart in her new intermediate uniform - don't their bags always look huge! I was outside trying to get a good photo of her all dressed up when Jo marched out and demanded I take his photo too. He wanted a photo from the front, from both sides and of his butt - strange child!

Dessy went off to school quite happily. She had visited briefly on Tuesday for an hour and had met her teacher already. She also knew 7 of the children in her class so she was happy. At the end of the day she came out beaming from ear to ear and announced that she loved her new school, it was the bestest school ever. So that was an easy transition from primary to intermediate.

Jo on the other hand was not so keen to start back at school. He has always had Dessy with him at school and although they don't hang out too much, it was reassuring for him to have her there if anything did go wrong. He wasn't at all keen on no longer having her there. There were a few tears first thing in the morning which is hard to deal with but by the time I picked him up from school he was a box of fluffies. He adores his teacher and was pleased to see his friends again.



While I was ready for them to go back to school, it seemed really strange to have the day to myself once they had gone back. They are such easy-going kids and quite fun to have around. Also I know once the school year starts, the year speeds up and all of a sudden another year will be gone. Here's hoping it will be a great one!

The 'RED DRESS'

Dessy 'loves' her red dress so I decided to create some pages about how much she loves her outfit. First I required some nice photos so we went down to the beach for a fun photo shoot. She is such a natural 'poser'. I asked her to casually run through the water - slowly of course as I don't have a fantastic camera. Next thing I know she gets caught up in the waves and she is a dripping mess from her hair to her toes... so much for a perfect plan huh? I did get some great shots though, and she had a blast runnng through the waves in her clothes (something she always asks to do - and being the sensible mum I am - I normally say 'no'). We had lots of strange looks from people walking their dogs wondering what on earth we were doing. These are some of the scrapbooking layouts I completed to tell the story - they use lots of tiny beads that are hard to see from the photos.

A boat trip

While Shane was off work we took the kids out on the Monarch Cruise Ship. We had a wonderful afternoon out on the boat spotting the huge albatross's with 2metre wing spans that flew by the boat. There were also lots of penguins, seals, sea lions and birds galore. Once we arrived back on shore we drove down to Pilots Beach where we spotted some penguins inside their nests and heaps of seals up close on the rocks including this gorgeous guy who rolled around and around in the water for ages then came up onto the rocks to dry off.

January 28th 2008

I can't believe the first month of the year is nearly over. I had to laugh at Jo's question on boxing day - "how many days til next Christmas" - (groan) - just when I thought the counting had finished.

We had a lovely holiday time with Shane having a month of work, although time goes all too quickly and he is now back into the grind of things.

Our holiday away turned into a bit of a disaster holiday. We arrived in Christchurch and put the tent up in the camping ground. This small task took us three hours as Shane had purchased a hammer from the $2 shop which had a faulty head that kept spinning around (most frustrating if you're hammering - but hilarious to watch). After a few hundred hits the hammer head fell off completely and it was even funnier to watch Shane hammering in the pegs with just the head of the hammer. After a couple of hours and no more pegs (as they kept bending) Shane went off to buy a new hammer and some more tent pegs.

The tent was finally up and so we hopped into bed while Shane watched Coronation Street on his little black and white TV (powered by the cigarette lighter in our car). Jo, being ever helpful, noticed the car was unlocked and decided to lock it for us on his way to bed. Unfortunately the keys were in the ignition powering Shane's TV. So the next disaster was a callout to a lock smith to get our keys out of the car.

We only had one full day in Christchurch (two nights) so we went to Orana Park where we had a wonderful day.

After a couple of nights in ChCh we went to stay with our fantastic friends Clive and Dawn in Timaru where we planned on staying a further two nights. Unfortunately Dessy overdid some of the rides at Caroline Bay and she became quite sick and so we ended up driving home at 1am on the second morning - getting into Dunedin at 4am... amazing how the kids were so wide awake four hours after we arrived home.

Nevermind, am sure we will do it all again next year.... maybe with a different tent though.