33 Weeks and Counting...

Ever showing off her baby bump!!

An Acquired Taste...

Tonight Ever picked her nose and ate it for the first time...then came over to Mummy and said, 'yummy!!' with a very proud look on her face like she'd just discovered her own food source.  Just thought I'd keep the family up to date with the important things! :)

Spending time with Aunty Chels before she heads for Sydney.

WWJD?

No no...not 'what would Jesus do' but 'what would Janelle do??!!'  This is a question I've been asking myself at lot over the last week...actually, it's been more like 'what DID Janelle do??  I'm talking about matchbox car playmats!!  Inspired by Aunty Janelle's creation that entertained us for hours as kids, I decided last year that I would make some for my niece and nephews who are just about to hit three years old...so I bought the material and then didn't touch it for 9 months!  But this week, I've started and nearly finished one mat.  Aunty Nelly - why didn't you tell me how much work was in one of these things!?!  Yikes!  But I've been enjoying myself anyway.

Here's the Aunty Nelly original given to Dean in 1985....

And here is the half-finished Anna version, slightly girlied up for my niece in 2010...

                                         

We've got Ava's house, a hospital, school, daycare centre, police station, zoo, Kmart, church and a florist! Fun! Just got to finish putting the rick-rack on and then add all the little button embelliishments.  Now how did Aunty Janelle makes those flowers again?....

Hi Everyone!

Hi everyone! Kimberley here!

I Hope you are all doing well and I can't wait to see you all again!

I especially want to see Ever!

Anna, what could be another title for me to Ever (not 1st cousin once removed!) That is to long to say as I always talk about her to my friends and how cute she is!

I hope that Chelsea and Steven are going to have a good time in Sydney!

TC I hope that you are also going well and Janine and Lauren and Kent and Anna!

Of course I can't forget Chloe!

Anyway, Got to go and do some homework/assignments!

Love you all!

Love, Kimberley

Wanted

Dear Cousins,
Has anyone got a photo of the mystery man in Laurens Life. Aunty Merryl is desperate!

Ode to Uncle Ssssss...

We all knew it was coming...the allure of Australia's very own hollywood would eventually call to our beloved Steve.  But we thought maybe it would be at a time when we were ready to say goodbye! I don't really know when we thought that time would be!?! 

Ever in particular is quite devastated at Uncle Steve's departure....ok, ok...she really doesn't have much of an idea that he's gone but I know if she understood the concept of people going away she totally would be!  You see, Uncle Steve or Uncle SSSsssss as Ever calls him, has continually conquered the 'favourite' relatives list since Ever was born, much to the continued dismay of Aunty Chels and Grandma.  They can spend days with her, giving her baths, changing her nappies, playing with blocks and reading her stories but when Uncle S walks into the room after two months away they are dropped like a hot potato! 

Whenever Aunty Chelsea appears at the door, Ever eagerly looks past her saying 'Sssss?'  When she sees a pair of men's shoes at the front door she says 'Sssss???'  When she came to the dinner table last night after having her bath she looked over the guests slowly...grandma, granddad, aunty chelsea, uncle dean...and then said 'Sssss????'  So maybe she does understand a little bit that he's not around.  

We had the official goodbyes on Sunday and it was very sad.  BUT we will see him again soon whenever Ever's sibling decides to arrive...woohoo!  We will miss you a lot Steve and wish you all the best pursuing your dreams....

Last hugs...

Hippie Cousins

Thought you may like to know we have all become hippies

A Day In The Life of An 18 Month Old

On a lovely rainy day Ever woke up to her one and a half year old birthday...

...had a big girl drink out of a cup,..

...and then decided which candle she would like on her 'cake'.

Time to help Mummy cook!

Just when she thought she was going to have to wait for the cakes to cook, Nanna & Poppa showed up with some specially made biscuits just for Ever! ('Face' biscuits especially made by POPPA that is!)

A little quiet time with Poppa...

...and a book with Nanna...

...before realising the cakes still had to be iced before we could eat it!!

Yay! They're ready!

Happy 1/2 Birthday to Ever!

If the big story is the big one and a half year old then the little story is the little bub who's getting bigger everyday...

26 weeks...

A Trip to the Park

That White Bird Again!

Our airstrip was cleared and graded with another 'drag over' this morning. The plane arrived and after a couple of 'fly bys' checking out the strip they landed in a cloud of dust, safely. We all breathed a sigh of relief! After a bite to eat up at the house, Lauren braved the cockpit with Uncle Geoffrey and flew up to see our green property from the air.

Always a bridesmaid...

Hello family! It has been a long time since I wrote a post, mainly because nothing was/is happening in my life. But I was recently a bridesmaid for my friend Kym who I met in and lived with in Gladstone. She had her bridezilla moments like most brides I'm sure, but I survived with a saw bank account and a nice black dress!
We all got ready at the Stamford hotel (along with the West Coast Eagles). The ceremony and reception were at Sirromet Winery down at Mt Cotton. Which was gorgeous! I didn't get too many photos but here are a few for those that are interested.

try again to get photos uploaded

Rugby

Aunty Janelle,
This is the moment you have been waiting for. He got tackled and he ttackled and he survived. What a man!
Posted a photo of the 50th anniversary for you also
Merryl

Wet, wet and wet again!

I know everywhere in Qld is getting rain, but thought I'd share what we've been experiencing out here. We got 6 inches in 24 hours, an event Graham has seen only once before out here. We got out of the house yesterday and walked to the creek through the mud, water and long wet grass. It was a site to see. Merryl, the gully behind the house came up again looking more like a lake across the paddock. We've had our yearly rainfall in the last 2 and a bit months which makes getting around the place nearly impossible.

There was a fence (floodgate) across this creek,

but that will be a job for a fine day

This was taken before this last lot of rain.

I'm sure Nanna has caught you all up on my 'situation' of the last couple of months but here's an exert from another blog I write that will fill in the details.....

Ouch! 3 months! I'd like to say that 'I can't believe it' but it's been a very real and a very long 3 months. My last post was written the day before I discovered I was pregnant with our second bub and it wasn't long after that that I became too sick to haul myself from the couch to the computer. Well, from the couch to anywhere really.

I decided though that I wasn't going to revel in the sickness...no, I would soldier on. I recalled the times when we were deep in the infertility journey when trying to get pregnant with Ever, and what it would do to my heart to hear the multitudes of pregnant women around me complain about their ailments...jealousy, devastation, resignation. And so knowing there were some around me going through that journey themselves, and not knowing if there were others privately carrying that burden, I decided I would be resilient and at least publically carry on as per usual. Also, there is nothing that irritates me more than 'attention seeking' which I think is a too common 'side effect' of pregnancy!

For a while this worked pretty well and then the clock struck 2010....uh ohhh....NOW I was feeling it. I was pretty prepared for the 'morning' sickness since I'd experienced it pretty badly with Ever until 32 weeks...when I say prepared I mean expecting it....hoping against hope and praying fervently that this time would be different but in my heart of hearts expecting it.

While still trying to maintain my 'I'm good, nothing to complain about...see look at my smile' public face, I was having my dear Mum look after Ever a couple of days a week and Pete taking semi-regular sick days to help out. As if the actual physical effects of the morning sickness aren't enough I was soon feeling terribly guilty about not being able to care for Ever. At the start she would cry every time I vomited...these days she hands me a tissue to wipe my mouth! Who's the mummy again?

January saw me gradually getting worse, with a bout of gastro topping it off....oh, that was a week I'll never forget! And then there were the two wedding photography jobs that had been long ago booked...shudder. Vomiting at a wedding just ain't right.

Then February....oh february. Suddenly it hit...oh no, another bout of gastro! But this time it was continuous vomiting all day long. Mum was practically living at our house, not only looking after Ever but playing nursemaid to me. At this stage I literally could not change positions on the couch without the threat of throwing up and was seriously considering attaching a ribbon to my friend the bucket turning it into something like an animal feed bucket...partly for convenience, partly because I no longer had the energy to carry it when I needed to relocate. After a few days of this, I started to think it might not be gastro and after a week my desperate Mum and husband convinced me to go to my doctor. I hadn't wanted to go because I just felt too sick!!

After being at the doctor for all of 30 seconds and telling the tales of the last week, she was on the phone booking me in to hospital with hyperemesis gravidarum...which is basically excessive vomiting during pregnancy which occurs in about .05% of pregnancies. I almost cried with relief when she suggested I go straight away! And then came the best 24 hours of the last few months!! A drip to rehydrate me, anti-nausea meds so i could eat something, a room to myself to rest and a good dose of tlc....heaven must feel like this!

After coming home Mum looked after me for another week while I got my strength back AND we managed to organise the house. Ok, she organised the house while I sat pathetically in the corner telling her where things were supposed to be. This might sound like a little task but think about what would happen to your house if you were basically confined to the couch for three months...yeah, disaster! Don't get me wrong, Pete has been so good...doing all the cooking, shopping, washing and parenting while also 'bringing home the bacon' to put it plainly. However, all non-essential cleaning and tidying had fallen by the wayside....thank you, thank you, thank you to my supermum for overhauling Cunningham headquarters!

That brings us to last week where we had cleverly booked a holiday up the coast outside of crazy kid time...I mean school holidays. We were a little bit hesitant to go, fearing it would just be the same thing, different couch, but decided that even if it was only a change of scenery it was worth it. Turns out, with the help of my industrial strength anti-nausea magic pills and a beautiful view, we had a most enjoyable week! More on the holiday later. But to top it all off we arrived home to not only an organised house but a beautifully clean house thanks to the cleaning fairies Mum had put to action! Ahhhhh........

more photos please

Aunty Merryl wants more photos of family activities

first day of high school

well here is the photo some of you have asked for. Kimberley has had a little bit of a shock at high school. Most nights she has between 1.5 - 2 hours homework each night...a bit of an overkill for her mother who has to encourage her the whole way. She is enjoying her new apple computer. She has met a couple of girls she hangs out with. Tomorrow night they have a social for year 8. The big news for Mitchell is that we have given in and he is going to play Rugby for school. I don't want to be around when he gets squashed! Kimberley is going to play Netball with school. Hope you like the picture

My trip to Vanuatu

A big hello to all my family,
I just thought that I would put some pictures up of my recent trip to Vanuatu. My good friend from Emerald decided to get married over there, and I thought that was a pretty good excuse to go overseas, and sounded like a good place to go for my first time overseas. We headed over there on the 3rd of January, and stayed for 6 nights. I traveled with 2 other girls and had a great time, the country is beautiful and the people are lovely.

Happy new year to all our dear family and best wishes for 2010. Love Poppa and Nana