A new toy

Today Hannah and I bought a new Kenwood bench top mixer - model KM002 on this link. I think Hannah was more excited than me! We got a great deal at Harvey Norman. The RRP is $799, and they had a bonus offer of a food processor attachment. Then it turned out the display model was the last one they had in stock so she knocked it down to $700. This is the model that scored highest in the Choice test. It's fabulous. And huge. Mum will have to design her kitchen to fit around it! (It's not really that big, don't worry!). We haven't used it yet, but Hannah is looking forward to licking the beater, which is really big and in the shape of a K. There are some really cool attachments available, including a potato peeler (basically I think an abrasive type bowl that spins the potatoes around and scrapes the skins off). There is of course the food processer that we got (with thick and thin slicing and grating blades as well as a chipping blade), a mincer, pasta maker, juicer, blender, spice mill, and a grater attachment (where the grated things come out a chute so you're not restricted by the size of the food processor bowl). It also came with a lovely glossy cookbook (because we don't have enough of them already) and a little video. The video was real food p@rn at its best. Non-lingual, and six minutes long, it had one of those non-descript music soundtracks, lots of shots of well-manicured hands switching knobs and feeding food into apertures, close-up before and after shots of processed food, and laughing people eating the prepared meals.

The machine is stainless steel (matt, so no fingerprints) with a stainless steel bowl with handle. Just way cool (as Hannah kept saying 'How cool is this!').

Hola!

How exciting, we had an early morning call from Mexico! Kids were very happy to hear from Nana and Papa, except Bethany, who wanted them to be Adam and Eva instead. The kids wanted them to 'talk in Mexico' which I think means 'say something in Spanish'. Nana and papa were happy to oblige. After the phone call finished, I explained that it was nearly bed time for nana and papa. Hannah was surprised and enlightened: Oh, they have beds there!?

Photo: Look what was on sale at Coles!

Broken record

That was me today praising Hannah. Is it possible to compliment a child too much? I know I'm a mum and not allowed to have favourites, and of course all my children are special and precious and have their own (big) place in my heart, but, gee, that Hannah...

Today we made little spinach and ricotta triangles. A fiddly, time-consuming job. Hannah was helpful and interested the whole time (Sophie was kind enough to sleep for most of it). She brushed the filo with oil each time, brushed each triangle as it was finished and placed them into the container, chatting happily away the whole time. Towards the end she wanted to have a try at folding her own triangles - we had those ones for lunch. :) She made 10, 4 for me, 4 for her and 2 for Sophie (she decided herself how many we needed). Sophie's she made a special shape (squished roundish, as opposed to ours which were squished longish). When she counted them and there were seven, she knew straight away she had to make three more. So helpful, happy and a genius. :)
Later, we hung clothes and nappies out on the line. Hannah hangs things on a metal clothes horse that she can reach. Later, without prompting, she went out and checked the nappies she'd hung. They were dry, so she brought them inside and folded them and left them on the table. What a child!

Picture: Hannah with her triangles.

So I don't know how many times today I told her how wonderful and fantastic she is, what a great helper, how much I enjoyed my day with her, all those lovely positive messages.

Then tonight as I write this, she keeps waking up and crying in her sleep for no known reason. Bad child!



Picture: Sophie has discovered
the cereal shelf in the pantry.

Another one bites the dust

Not quite in Irwin's league, but the Bunyip reports that Gordon Andrews died this week.

Here is Sophie in triumphant boxing mode.

Crikey

Of course, it had to be said. Our Steve is gone. Everyone here is taking it stoically, brave on the outside while shattered on the inside. In all seriousness, it's terribly sad to see the death of a man full of such vitality and enthusiasm for life and living things. And of course leaving behind some young children.

Yesterday at school was 'wear-what-you-want day', oops, I mean 'casual day', they renamed it because you can't really wear what you want; amongst other things, it has to be sun-safe (read: collared shirt) and apparently according to Ryan, not scary (so just about every single one of his t-shirts was out, due to skulls and scorpions galore).
Bethany chose a tribute shirt, here is a lovely pic of her in her Steve Irwin t-shirt.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hannah's moment (there's always one). Today we headed to mum's to do some catering for the first time since they left. As we approached, Hannah asked if nana would be there for a while before going to work. Before I could remind her, we came around the corner and she saw the station wagon in the driveway. 'Nana is home!' she cried. 'Ah, no...' I started. 'Papa, then!', even more excited. When I reminded her they were actually on the other side of the world, she took it well. 'Silly me, I forgot. But I get to teach Jarra how to feed the chooks!'.

What she said...

Photo: Kids and grandparents at the airport
Yes mum and dad left today. Check out Nicole's blog for the story. My kids were not too sad, Bethany didn't even cry 'because she knew it was not for a very long time'. We of course will all miss them, at times it will seem to be forever until we see them again, other times we will look in amazement at how fast the time has gone. At all times we will be envious of the experiences they are having! Love you guys.

Photo: Sophie at Ikea all tuckered out from saying goodbye

Techno-child moment: Later at home Ryan looked like he was up to some mischief, I asked what was happening. 'Nothing' was the answer, then, 'on second thoughts, check out look@me-now.com.au to see what I'm doing'. Ha ha.

Show weekend

I had my first A&E lapse over the weekend when we were planning going to the Gawler Show - in my mental planning I thought mum needed to invite them to join us. Only a little glitch, but still one of those 'oh' moments. But even without them we still managed to have fun. All the usual show things, rides, clowns (and those disappointing prizes), dodgems (Ryan: That was so worth the $4!), donuts and a few new things - a big pile of foambubbles pumped out onto the ground for the kids to play in, and the Gawler Gymnastics tent set up for trampolining and balancing.

Hannah remembers too

Driving with Hannah the other day past Parafield Airport, we spotted a light plane. 'I think that's the plane Adam and Eva are on!' Hannah exclaimed. I reminded her they had got off the plane and were in a different country. 'Oh yeah, how could I forget that they are in Ukraine now? Yeah, Ukraine...' and she descended into Hannah-revery. A little later in our drive we passed a construction site. She pointed at the crane on the site and asked 'Is that a Ukraine?'

Turtle showcase

As I type, Huck is cowering shivering in the corner of his tank, muttering over and over to himself 'the children! so many children!'. Yes, today was show-and-tell day at school (or 'hotel day' in Hannah-speak). First the turtle was trapped in a circle of 26 squealing five year olds, then transported in a box only to be trapped in a circle of squawking eight year olds. He did perform well, and was rewarded with some extra food afterwards.

Added picture: Bethany's interpretation of Huck at school. Note the circle of children, some with blue and some with yellow tops. The two arrows point to me in the middle of the circle, and Bethany as part of the circle. I don't doubt that each person in the drawing relates to a particular child in her class as well. The text on the other side of the picture reads "Hava a grat time at your holadae OOOOOOOOOOO Love love love love love I hop you hava a grat holadae I LOVE YOU!"


Photo: Unrelated to turtles and school, this is a photo of 'Winterlicious' at Port Adelaide. 'Crap' as declared by Ryan. 'Crap' as confirmed by mum. A little mound of snow that we queued 50 minutes for to play on for five. Woo-hoo. At least it was sunny and there was a guy selling rainbow sno-cones. And donuts. Don't forget the donuts.

Made redundant

Today is Sophie's second day at childcare. I didn't post about her first day as I didn't take photos, but after forgetting to take photos today as well, I faced up to the fact that she will probably be at school before I remember to bring the camera, so a thousand words will have to do instead.
I'd hoped (kind of) that today she would be a bit sad that I was leaving her again, after the uneventful first day she had, but in true Feuerherdt child style, because the children were sitting down eating fruit, she practically jumped out of my arms, pulled out a chair and started commanding and gesturing to the staff that she wanted a bowl too. My departure was a mere annoyance, interfering with the consumption of food (including oh so precious bananas - so that's where my fees go!).
She really has settled in very well, probably because Charlotte is also there Mondays, and Hannah stays in the baby room for a while too, so she is surrounded with familiar people, as well as being so familiar with the centre anyway.
So I'm enjoying today child-free. Of course, I'm used to it to a degree, as mum and dad have the kids on Fridays, but I work then! Today, I'm just working at home, cleaning up the debris from the weekend. Oh, and writing interminable blog entries.

Turtle fishing

When we inherited the turtle it came along with a big green net that my brother bought to catch little fish in the river to feed to the turtle. Notice I said he bought it for that purpose, not that he actually ever used it for that.
Ryan found a good use for it, as 7 year old boys do, namely catching bees. As we have a big row of lavender bushes along the front of the house, there are always plenty of bees to feed this hobby. Once he's caught them, he puts them in a bottle and leaves them lying around the house like everything else. He believes he is immune to bee stings as he 'got stung once and it didn't hurt'. Knowing my son's pain threshold, I beg to differ. I think a bee might have accidentally lost its stinger somewhere near the vicinity of his finger. When he gets stung for the first time, I'm sure we will hear about it loud and clear.
The time came, as was inevitable, that merely catching bees wasn't enough. He wanted to catch fish to feed the turtle, because that's what the net is actually for. Finally he wore me down and we went down to Clonlea Park yesterday to see what we could get. Fortunately Sophie (and Bethany) stayed home with Paul as that reduced the number of children in close proximity to water and therefore reduced my stress levels. After much fruitless swishing of nets in water (we knew there were things in there to be caught, after Ryan's class excursion to the very same spot this week, where the yabby nets captured yabbies (of course) and some sludge-suckers or other such fish), I finally emerged triumphant! A tiny, almost transparent, shrimp-type thing. Success. I managed in the end to catch two of these minute creatures. Standard response from Ryan was of course disappointment that he wasn't the one catching them. Following on the heels of the unsuccessful day fishing with Papa the day before, he was concerned he was losing his fishing prowess.
But, of course, we took them home, tipped them in with Huck, and he ate them. A bit of excitement because one lasted almost 10 minutes before he saw it (yes, they were that small) but nature ran its course in the end.

Midnight snacks

Recently we adopted a turtle, well, I guess more accurately we have fostered a turtle. My brother and sister in law have headed overseas for a couple of years and we are looking after not-so-little Huck for them. He's pretty easy to take care of, feed him when you think of it, clean the tank if it gets really dirty, drop the odd snail or slater in for a bit of entertainment. Ryan loves having a turtle, particularly since the fish tank got retired (after the seventh fish died I thought it was time for a break).
Adam said we need to feed the turtle four squares of turtle food once a week or so. To increase the excitement factor, we thought we would feed him one square every other day. Ryan has taken this seriously. The other morning he came into the bedroom at 2am, whispering some long story that my weary brain couldn't compute. I asked him to state in three words what he wanted. 'I need to feed the turtle' he said. Well, at 2am that is not my priority so we told him to get back to bed.
Apparently he didn't, he went out to the kitchen, got the turtle food, cut it into pieces and fed the turtle. The next day he said he had been very worried because we had missed a day feeding it and he was worried it would die of starvation before he woke up in the morning. Given that my brother had fed Huck when he remembered, even forgetting for as long as a month, I suspect that wasn't an imminent danger. However, Ryan is a very caring child (at least when it comes to turtles).

A tale of two Hannahs

Actually, that would be Hannah on the right and my cousin (so Hannah's second cousin I guess) on the left. Bella is about a year younger than Hannah I think, but it's kind of spooky how alike they are. They have the same wispy white-blonde hair, the same eyes and cheeky smile. Same body shape (scrawny). This photo was taken on Easter Sunday - we all kept mistaking them for each other. Something to be said for genetics I guess.

Not to offend anyone...

For those finicky parents who hate the whole Barbie thing, here is a refreshing alternative.

Spotted in a shop in Hahndorf, on a fun day with mum and the kids in the school holidays.

Bethany's first day at school

The title says it all really. How can she be possibly this old? And she has a wobbly tooth too! Where oh where have the last five years gone? Somehow it seems more unbelievable that B is at school than it did when Ryan started. Perhaps that's because with him being the first, I tended to focus more on every little thing and so was acutely aware of each stage as it approached and passed. With Bethany, I guess I've been a little distracted (to say the least!). Older and younger siblings help diffuse the attention so it seems to have just sneaked up on us. But she seems to be loving it, despite the tiredness that comes from suddenly attending five full days a week.

A night away from home

Only not in a good way. Yesterday afternoon Sophie started with a runny nose. By bedtime she was a bit noisy in breathing, and I reflected on how with her last three colds (yes so many colds are unusual in a breastfed baby, but she does have three siblings and spends a lot of time visiting childcares, schools and preschools) she has gotten wheezy and noisy, but not bad enough for me to even get to the steamy bathroom stage. This time, she woke up about 8pm, in ‘acute respiratory distress’. And oh boy, it was. She was crying, I guess because her throat was painful, and exhaling huge amounts of air as she wailed, only not able to get in the same amount of air on the inhalation as her airway was so restricted. Her lips were turning blue, she couldn’t calm down and wouldn’t nurse at all. Finally got her a little calmer, but the tell-tale pull in the throat and under the ribs as she tried to take each breath sent me scurrying to the hospital. Good call, as it turns out. Straight away they put oxygen on her (well, I had to hold the tube near her nose as they had no paediatric masks in Emergency) and then some prednisolone. Her O2 stats went as low as 79, not really what you want to see in a baby. Fortunately the pred worked its magic nice and quickly, but not quite quick enough for the doctor, who began talking about having to intubate her and mentioning that they don’t have the facilities for doing that to an 8 month old at our lovely little country hospital so it would mean a trip down to the big city an hour away. That’s really what you want to hear, with three other kids sleeping peacefully at home and a husband who has to leave for work at 5.30am.

As it was, she settled quickly enough (with a slight setback as she vomited the Panadol/Tylenol along with her dinner and possibly some of the pred, leading to that fun experience of a painkiller suppository). However, as you may have guessed by the doctor’s threats of sending her to Women’s and Children’s, he was a bit nervous about her. He admitted her and ordered her to be on oxygen all night, with obs done every hour and O2 sats three times overnight for 30 minutes a time. That lead to a nice peaceful night, with her hyped up from the steroid, bugged by the nasal tube taped to her face (I took a photo with my phone but the darn thing won’t download to the computer) and annoyed by the nurse all the time. Not to mention sleeping in a hospital cot, not snuggled next to mum like she is used to. All things considered, she slept okay, and only succeeded in finally ripping off the nasal tube at about 730am. I sneaked a bit of sleep too, and managed to end up feeling only very exhausted, not quite totally wiped.

Since Paul was unable to find someone else to cover for him in the morning, my mum as usual saved the day. She came around at 530 so he could go to work, got the kids dressed and ready, took them back to her house for breakfast, prepared and delivered the breakfast catering job we had, popped in with the kids to the hospital for a quick visit, and then dropped Ryan at school. She is truly an amazing person. Did all that with a smile, too.

While she was at the hospital with the kids, the doctor called in to see what was happening. Only, as luck would have it, it wasn’t the same doctor from the night before, but our regular doctor, the wonderful Dr Anthony. He was, as always, a pleasure. He sent us home with a two day course of prednisolone and a few jokes.

My wonderful mother took the older girls to her house so I could take Sophie home for a sleep and a long hot shower (shower for me, sleep for her). As of now, she is doing fine, a runny nose still and occasionally coughing, but otherwise quite happy.

Here's to a better night's sleep tonight!

To knee or not to knee?

Well the dust has finally settled somewhat on the whole knee thing so it's time to report (okay, you saw through me, I've just been slack about writing about it). Paul had his surgery last Tuesday night (despite being scheduled for 4pm, he finally made it into surgery around 7pm). All went as well as these things do, I gather. That is to say, his anterior cruciate ligament was completely torn apart, but it's a fairly routine (if painful) procedure to replace that. For the queasy among us, I won't mention it involves taking a third of the patella tendon complete with bone plugs, drilling holes through femur and tibia, threading the donor tendon through the holes and securing it with screws. That part was simple. The complicating factor is the stress fracture of the femur... This is not common (one in 25o, the surgeon said) and there is not a whole lot that can be done about it at this stage. Paul has to stay on crutches for four weeks (in a standard ACL op, often they don't get any crutches at all) and avoid any weight-bearing or pivoting. After that, he will have an MRI to check on the healing of the stress fracture (which is not technically on the bone, but in the hardened cartilage right on the end of the bone - think the shiny white end of a chicken leg). If it doesn't heal properly by itself, he will probably have to have a bone graft. I'm guessing that's not a fun operation.
By all accounts, Sportsmed and Dr Keene were great (as you would expect with an url like www.kneesurgery.com.au) as were the nurses. I don't think he was so fond of the passive movement machine which continually forced his knee up to 90 degrees almost immediately after the operation, for three hours. Ouch. One cool thing is that the doctor took photos as he did the operation and Paul got a neat little write-up of what happened. That's this pretty photo right here.


Recovery has been slow and arduous. He has a bunch of exercises to do several times every day. He is just now able to get the leg to 90 degrees himself, but still can't straighten it fully. The pain was and is constant and strong, helped now somewhat by the illegal possession of very strong painkillers courtesy of Stan 'in the hospital they call these morphine' F. The leg swelled up big time, and along both sides of the foot it looks like a giant bruise where I assume the blood has pooled. Swelling has gone down now, and there is more movement with a little less pain, so things are slowly improving. Next week is the physio appointment, where they will be expecting him to be able to do the straighten and 90 degrees thing, then the week after is the follow-up with the surgeon. From there, they will book the MRI to see how the stress fracture is doing.
So no prospect of returning to work any time soon, although he did drive today for the first time.

Growing up, throwing up and sewing up

Tonight Sophie, at six months and three days, had her first solid food. That, combined with her improved crawling and just a hint of tooth under the gum, means she is well and truly growing up. A baby's first solid food is always a big thing for me, partly I suppose because it signals they are already halfway through their first year, but mostly because, up til now, other than that one little sperm contribution way back when, every cell that has grown and developed in that little body has been nourished from my body. That's fifteen months or so of total dependence, and the formation and growth of a beautiful human being solely from me, without even trying! And now, with that spoonful or four of pumpkin tonight, everything changes. Okay, so technically she was probably also nourished from the pieces of paper she ate last night, and the little bits of green fluff she pulled off the carpet the other day, and whatever she sucked out from under Ryan's fingernails, but you get the point. Not only does she now get nourishment from other sources, but oh, the mess! I just know with my crowd, the novelty of feeding the baby will not wear off for a long time. Feeding a baby is messy enough when it's me feeding her, but when it's the two year old...! Tonight's pumpkin was well recieved, two spoonfuls given by each sibling and all caught on videotape (plus the Mars Bar that Paul decreed should be her second solid food). Now just to wait for that first solid-food pooey nappy tomorrow.

And onto the throwing up - Bethany's turn tonight. She started feeling sick in the early evening, which is definitely better than 11pm. Lots of stoic sitting around with a bowl held up to her mouth. The actual vomit came after sitting at the toilet bowl for a while. She decided she really had to wee, so she stood up and turned around to sit on the toilet, just in time to spew all over her dedicated mother, sitting next to her keeping her company. Oh yay. But, like the others, once the vomiting was out of the way, she felt better and is now sleeping soundly. Some weird bug this one - a couple of days incubation period, seemingly very weak transmission (otherwise you'd think everyone would get it at once) and actually a very mild illness. At least it's not Listeria.

And the sewing up? Well, technically that happens tomorrow when Paul gets his knee done, almost two weeks to the hour from when he injured it. But I liked the title. :)

Picture: A few of Hannah's favourite things (Picasa is my new toy)

Here are a few of Bethany's favourite things

 

Ick ick sick

A couple of nights ago, Hannah woke up crying, which quickly turned into that chesty cough thing that made me run and grab a towel. She spewed up all in the towel and on her quilt. Yay. She was quite happy though once she'd got it out of her (must have been my spaghetti bolognaise). I brought her into my bed (first judiciously covering every available surface with beach towels) and gave her a little drink of water. Ten minutes later, vomit everywhere again. Hooray for beach towels! I wised up after that and got her a bowl. She slept fine all night long, then had another drink of water at about 5am. More vomitting. This time I got the bowl under her, so there was very little mess. I think, though, that she thought having the bowl there was what was making her vomit. She kept trying to push it away so she could heave in peace all over my bed. At about 8am I gave her some toast and water and she kept that down no problems, which was good because I sent her to childcare anyway. Knowing the rules about vomitting, I kind of stretched the truth and said she only vomitted once at 11pm. I know it's a bad thing, but she really was just fine, and had held her breakfast down. Besides, I had to take Paul to Sportsmed to get his knee looked at. That was challenging enough with Bethany and Sophie, never mind adding Hannah to the mix!
And just when you thought too much vomitting was never enough... Two nights later, Ryan came in to my bedroom saying he felt sick. I was just about to dismiss him politely (Bethany had already snuck into my bed at some stage of the night, otherwise I would have invited him in to sleep) when he did that lovely gutteral cough/belch thing. I told him to run to the bathroom while I extricated myself from between Bethany and Sophie. When I made it to the bathroom, he was vomitting all over the floor. I told him to move across to the toilet, but he only made it a bit further along the floor before vomitting again. By the time he actually made it to the toilet, there was no vomit left. What a waste of great veal schnitzel (his favourite food too!). Now, I will note, that when vomit hits a hard tiled floor from a small height, it splatters. Everywhere. I should also add that, on account of being part of my house and subject to my own peculiar housekeeping, there is all sorts of stuff on the floor of my bathroom. On this occasion, for example, there were: Ryan's sneakers, Bethany's slippers, a bath mat, some toys, my pyjama bottoms. All of these were undeniably enhanced by the colours and aromas of regurgitated schnitzel. As were his feet, my feet, and the pyjamas we were wearing.
At least it motivated me to give my bathroom a very thorough clean the next day.