New Hair

Every five weeks is cut and color day for me. An unusually high number of gray hairs at an early age means I go that often or the whole front half of my head starts to go haywire-literally. Those gray hairs just won't stay flat. I really like my stylist here, and after years of overseas haircuts that ranged from really really bad to just mediocre, I trust my new pal Mark to do pretty much whatever he wants with my hair. And today, he cut it off. And I totally adore it.

Return from Brisbane

It's always fun to catch up with old friends. Even more fun when they're spread all over the globe. Last week FFM and I took off for Brisbane to visit some great pals from out time there. They've had a new arrival since we moved away, and we were excited to meet her.

The weekend before we left Travis snapped a few photos around the house, and I included those in the slide show.

Cooper and FFM are 12 days apart in age and have been buddies since before they could crawl. FFM fell head over heels for new baby Scarlet and still is saying her name even though we've been home for a couple of days.
As always Sara and her family were wonderful hosts and we felt right at home and were relaxed and comfortable all week. We're really hoping they can make the trip west to come see us before we leave Australia.

Going back to Brisbane

FFM and I are leaving Travis in the lurch and going off on a vacation of our own tomorrow. We'll spend a week with friends in Brisbane, catching up and letting the kids run wild. I'll finally get to meet the newest addition to the family, Scarlet, who arrived early January. I can't wait! I bet she looks a lot different now...

Kisses

We get a lot of lovin' around here. Hugs, cuddles, and plenty of kisses. The kisses crack me up, they're what I call 'fish lips' kisses because FFM sucks in his cheeks and purses his lips and makes a great big smacking sound. I love every single slobbery one of them.

It's just not a party until you get really filthy

Recently spotted at a friend D's birthday party this weekend, one super-grimy-nearly-two-year-old. You can't see his black feet. Or the line of red crud under his chin.It's also not a party until you are wearing THREE hats. And my favorite shot from the party, friends Kelly and Gareth putting up the really fabulous balloon 'chandeliers' (OK, they were just groups of balloons we let hang down from the trees).

A little chuckle

I stumbled upon this blog waaaaaay back some time ago when I was hunting up some recipe or some crafty thing or some random thing. It's a mom in Anchorage who's got an award winning blog and since I'm a mom and I love Anchorage I pop in very sporadically and check to see what she's written.

This. Made. Me. Laugh.

Things I Will Never Wear, from Scribbit:Motherhood in Alaska

Have a read when you've got a moment, I love the bubble shorts the best, but the harem pant/dress is pretty good, too.

Just one of those days

Every once in a while I have one of those days where everything just seems harder than it really should. Now that I live overseas I like to call them my 'expat days' and I blame them on the fact that I'm probably having typical American-style expectations in a foreign country. Even if that foreign country isn't really that 'foreign' after all. And today I probably really can't blame it on the expat factor because, seriously, life in Oz just isn't that hard, but I'm gonna, just 'cause I can ;p

Silly things like every jug of milk at the store today had an expiration date that was no more than 3 days out. See, I do my shopping once a week, with 1 auxiliary trip for milk since I don't have enough room in my fridge for an entire weeks worth of milk. OK, so to be fair I didn't check the whole milk, and skim is only available in jugs too small for me to consider, but in the Hi-Lo category (Hi-Lo being the reduced fat milk) there are three brands available, all with short term expiration dates. Grrr, say I, as I dig all the way to the very very back still with no luck. This, faithful readers, is how my whole day went.

Thus the blank post earlier today. I started what was supposed to be a nice, chipper post and was interrupted by a phone call from the daycare. Apparently I posted instead of just saved, and my blank post inspired a COMMENT which is more than my long winded, long thought out, toiled and slaved over regular posts merit so I thought I better leave it there instead of simply deleting the entire thing! ;p

I'll spare you the gory details, but my day culminated with yet another call from daycare with the news that FFM had been bit AGAIN. Poor guy. He goes to full day 'school' one day a week. He's really gotten into the social aspect of it, but he's been bitten 4 out of the last 6 times he's gone.

In more pleasant news, our friend D turned 4 yesterday and invited us to join her to play at a fun indoor play area. Guess who made a bee-line for the cars... That's the birthday girl with the striped skirt on the scooter and our friend Jacob on the blue car. F's on the yellow one in the back.

There were also several large play structures complete with ball pits. I think this is the first time FFM's been in a ball pit. He was having a better time than it looks in the photo. It's surprisingly hard to capture a shot of three wiggly boys diving around a ball pit. Ollie in red and Mac in blue.

Disco! Almost every other picture I took in the disco FFM was staring up at the disco ball. It was fun to watch the kids dance, they liked to watch their shadows on the back wall so mostly they danced facing away from us.
All in all today wasn't really that bad, especially since when Travis finally arrived home he did all the dishes :)

Spoon 1

I started a silversmith class today and our project is to make a spoon. 5 minutes into class and we were already flaming things and dropping them into acid baths! I started with a couple small flat sheets of silver and this is where I ended class today:This is the result of a lot of pounding, sawing, filing, more sawing, and even more sawing. The bowl of the spoon is smooth, but the handle is hammered. Neither is polished yet, so it's a little hard to tell the difference in texture. Not sure it'll be a family heirloom, and I'm positive I'm not up for making 5 more like some in the class are talking about...but it's fun to think that I might actually have a real spoon by the end of the class!

ssshhhhh

It's been fairly routine around here lately. The new term of swimming lessons started up again, and we've got a great instructor who will hopefully get FFM ready for the next level. We're still moving and grooving at the gym several days a week, I will have to always find a gym with a good creche/daycare as it's the best best incentive to go work out I've ever had. I simply sign up F for his time slots the week before and I have to take him or the creche ladies (and he) will be terribly sad! The fact that I get in a workout and peaceful shower is just an added bonus.

I've also gotten brave enough to tow the bike trailer on my own. It's a tiny bit hilly here in Perth and F's no lightweight, but it's really not bad at all. I do shift gears a lot and F grunts and groans along with me when I huff and puff up the hills! He also says "wheeeeeee!" as we coast FAST downhill.

Speaking of whee...the words are finally bubbling out faster than I can keep up. They're not all crystal clear, but we definitely can communicate. FFM's favorite words this week seem to be 'dark' (which is clear as a bell), 'belbow' = elbow, 'eps' = steps, and 'wo' = two. And, of course, ' no no no no no no'. He tells us which bib he'd like to wear, the striped one, dot one, or choo choo one, and whether he'd like milk or water to drink. This week he started putting his animals to bed under blankets and telling them 'sssshhhhhh' and at a toy store yesterday moved a whole pile of bears into a cradle and told them all 'sssshhhh', too. He was very careful to tuck them all in, first.

I have no idea how many words and animal sounds he's making, but it's these important ones like getting the right bib on at the right meal that are making headway into less toddler frustration. Who knew that putting on the train bib when he really wanted the dot bib was the end of the world!?!?

Last weekend we went to the circus with some friends. It was a small family circus, just our speed. We got to sit just a few rows back from the ring so the action was close enough that it easily kept the interest of all the kiddos. I will admit I've never before seen a circus with trained goats, but can now say I have. The youngest member of the circus was probably not too much older than FFM.