Everything breaks

It seems sometimes like every single thing we buy breaks...and fast. And not only that, but something else almost always goes wrong.

Now the breaking thing I can just blame on the fact that we are cheap...we buy almost the cheapest option of whatever we need pretty much 95% of the time.

Remember this coffee machine I bought for Conor's birthday? Only 2 months ago?

Well the steam wand broke.  Sometimes I could get it to work, but then for over a week I tried several times every day to no avail. So yah, I'll blame that one it being a cheap machine that cost less than $100.

But the rest of this story...has nothing to do with how much we spent. Nothing is ever made simple for us.

So we bring the machine (Sunbeam Crema) back to the store we bought it at, not worth fixing so we get a new machine...except they don't have any more of that one in stock.  I had looked online before going in though, and saw that I could order one from them online...so surely they could just order it in for me.

Guy puts in the order and says he'll call when it comes in. Meanwhile we're back to stove top espressos and heating our milk up in the microwave.

Get a call that the machine we had is completely discontinued, blah.  We all go in Thursday evening and decide to upgrade to the now-cheapest machine they stock - a Breville.  Yay, we've made a decision, but uh oh, they only have the display model left.  They sell it to us at a discount and off we go.  Yay - we got it on sale!

Except when we take it out if the box we realize it's missing the handle...which means it's worthless and we have to go in AGAIN!

Seriously - nothing is ever simple for us.

Anyways, hopefully this us the end of the story. We knew if we went back to that location our only option is the next machine which is the new Sunbeam Crema for $200. I looked online and we could either get the Breville again at another location of the store we went to, but then I found the Sunbeam one forsake at Myers, making it just a bit more expensive than that Breville so that's what we did.

Coffee Machine #3 - hopefully the last one for awhile!

Yesterday we went to the mall, and after getting Conor an iPhone (FINALLY upgrading his very old Nokia - and having a surprisingly smooth transaction given our history), we went to Myer and got the Sunbeam.

So now we'll see how long it lasts for us...and I still have to return that Breville one.

Elle singing

Elle is so cute when she sings.  She also gets very... um... passionate, as you can see in the video below.

I had got a better video of her earlier in the week though.

Driving home from Easter Sunday lunch, Elle was singing "I'm a little teapot" on repeat for about 20 minutes!  The funny part was though, that she was just singing one part over and over again. "I'm a little teapot short and wide, here is my handle here is my pout, when I get all teamed up hear my shout, tip me over and pour me out, when I get all teamed up hear my shout, tip me over and pour me out, when I get all teamed up hear my shout, tip me over and pour me out..."  It was hilarious.

Yesterday I got her to sing it and Finn did the actions :)

Easter Weekend

We had a nice Easter weekend - although the holidays are always bittersweet when you're away from all of your family.

On Friday we went to the 3pm service.  For it being almost twice as long as a regular Sunday Mass, the kids did surprisingly well.  When we got home, we had our regular Good Friday hot crossed buns.  Saturday wasn't too exciting... Thea and I headed to the shops to get a few Easter things (I needed to buy some crayons so the kids could color their eggs before they dyed them) and then otherwise it was just a boring day spent at home!

On Sunday I put Thea down for her regular 9am nap, and got us all ready to head off to Easter Sunday mass and some salad stuff ready for a late lunch with friends afterwards (hosted by Thea's Godparents).  When I went to bring the stuff out to the car at 9:45 I heard Thea, she was still awake!  She never did fall asleep, so I was pretty worried about how mass would go, but she did alright.  On the drive to our friends place she fell asleep JUST as we got there, and then woke up, so no sleep.

We had a yummy BBQ at their place and the kids played in the backyard.  It was nice and relaxed.  I was there with the kids a couple weeks ago and Thea was trying to walk with this little dolly stroller, but only took a step or two before falling to her knees and giving up.

Well watch the video and see what she did yesterday...

She was quite proud of herself.  Then she saw a big window in the front of the house and went to look out that and I went to the back door to chat with people.  I turned around to see her take 4 steps from the window into the living room, without the walking toy!!

I was the only one to see her, and she wouldn't do it again.  I think we left their place around 5ish.  I was surprised Elle didn't fall asleep on the way home, as she missed her nap as well, but Thea fell asleep when we were nearing the house.  I carried her in the house and she was still sleeping on my shoulder but I woke her up because I wanted her to go to sleep at her regular bedtime.

Formula 1 was on, so Conor had the TV on and the kids were watching, and then the big kids went out to the trampoline and Thea was playing around inside... and then this happened...

Conor was happy to finally see it, and she's done it a few more times!  She gets too excited though and tries to go faster than she's able to.  We're so excited that she took her first steps before her birthday, and we'll never forget what day it was!

Today (Easter Monday) Conor let me go out for a bit in the morning for some mommy time.  The coffee machine I got him for his birthday wasn't working properly so I had to return it and we'll have to figure out what we want to do as the one we had has been discontinued and the next one is almost $100 more expensive!  Conor took the kids to the park and then after lunch he and Finn went off to the driving range for some boy time :)

Hope you all had a Happy Easter!

Goodbye to my first wrap

In the world of woven wraps, there are people who just "buy.all.the.wraps"!!  And then there are the people who can't afford that, so they either get new ones as gifts for birthdays, etc... or else they sell one to buy another.

Right now I'm in the "one in, one out" camp.  Another local babywearer had a wrap that was really stiff and she wanted to pass it around to different people to use it for a couple weeks at a time to help "break it in".  After using that one a bit I started wanting something different than mine.

My first woven wrap - and the first time wrapping Thea in it.

I finally decided that I would sell my first wrap (it's a size 6 and it's actually too long for me, so it was either cut that one down to a size 5, or buy a new size 5) and buy a rainbow wrap and in the same brand as my other two because those are the cheapest ones, so then I wouldn't lose any money in selling mine to buy another one.

As it turned out though, the rainbow one would have cost about $20 more than what I thought I could sell mine at, but just as I had decided which wrap I wanted to buy, the company that sells them were celebrating their 2nd birthday and would be having giveaways and sales for a week. My plan was to list my wrap and once it sold I would buy the wrap I wanted from a local vendor and tell Conor that the $20 difference could be my mothers day gift! haha.  BUT if it went on sale from the original company that makes them then I would just buy the wrap and cross my fingers that mine would sell quickly.

The bottom wrap, Sandy Agat, is the one I wanted.

So I washed my wrap and put the listing up on the babywearing swap group on facebook, and just hoped that it would sell, and that they would put the rainbow wrap I wanted on sale- and two days later it did go on sale!

 So I bought it right away, and an hour later someone asked to buy my wrap.  It was pretty much perfect timing, and a few hours later when I went back to the website they had completely sold out of the rainbow wraps in every size.  In the end I had to pay $1 something more, but this wrap is a little more expensive than mine was to start off with because it's a bit thicker.

Once I saw the money for my wrap go into my account, I went and brought it to the post office.  I'm a little bit sad that my first wrap is now gone, but I'm excited about the rainbow one coming!

Clever girlie

The other morning, Elle as usual didn't finish her mush (porridge) and I was feeling lazy and hadn't gotten around to clearing the table or doing dishes yet.  I was sitting at the desk and usually Thea pre-occupies herself with pulling ALL of the cloth diapers out of the change table.

The big kids were off playing together and then I heard Thea munching away, I turned to see this...

Thea had stood up to the table, and gotten Elle's bowl off the table

I should have grabbed the bowl from her right then, but she was so happy and just chowing down

Seriously, she was so proud of herself.

I had to get a video, because it was just so darn cute!

I let her pretty much just finish it off... I was happy as long as she didn't crawl around and smear it all over the living room.  

I called the big kids over to see and Finn thought it was hilarious... Elle on the other hand was pretty upset "my mushy!  I want eat my mushy!" (even though this was a good half hour after we had left the breakfast table when she was adamant she was all done!)

Bedtime crafts

Awhile ago Finn had seen some kids tracing their body and painting it on butcher paper and has repeatedly asked me to buy "long paper to paint myself" on since.

Well I bought some awhile ago but it's not a very good craft to do withThea crawling around!

Last night he asked again and the girls were going into the bath after dinner so I got the paper out, traced his body, and then let him color away (although he was excited about new felts so I dodged the paint bullet! *I hate paint*).

He got SO giggly when I was tracing him! ha

Ignore the weird lump in the side of his face... like I said, he was really giggly and kept moving!

He did NOT want me putting the picture up on the wall, but I tried to tell him I just wanted ONE picture with him beside it and I would take it down.  Meanwhile Elle came out of the bath and was happy to pose! haha

He finally agreed to stand beside it for a second.

Afterwards he rolled it up into a tube and brought it to bed with him.  This morning he let me hang it on his bedroom wall - and now he's excited to trace Elle later so that she can color he body :)

Ups and Downs

Last week there were a few days which were absolutely AWFUL!  Kids fighting endlessly, Thea teething and not wanting to be put down for even half a second... I think it was Wednesday which was the absolute worst for me on my own.  So much so Conor bought me flowers!  I think the next couple days were a bit more bareable, but then the weekend as a whole was once again just awful, ugh!


I hate those days.  Each kid wanted my complete and undivided attention which means that 1. the house was a complete mess (obviously not the end of the world, but a tidy house makes me instantly a bit happier) and 2. Not a single child was happy, because it's impossible to give them that attention.  And then we were all just in a funk so even when I could give Finn a bit of attention when the girls went down for her nap, he was just grumpy and wanted to have his quiet time.  You can't win some days.

Poor Thea was teething and did NOT wake up happy from her nap

But then guess what?  After and awful weekend I was terrified of Monday coming and having to deal with it on my own, but Monday was good.  Monday was really good!  Then Tuesday was good.  Other than going in the backyard a bit we didn't even do anything special, but it was really good!  Wednesday as also pretty good, but for some reason around 11am I just became exhausted and getting through grocery shopping, lunch making, unloading groceries, get the kids down for naps was near impossible.  And then you think I would just conk out and have a good nap, but I couldn't fall asleep.

Read the caption under the photo, I posted that on my facebook and thankfully some one pointed out that it was a Doris Day song that Conor later confirmed was playing on the radio in the car on Saturday when he went to the garden center with the kids.  So no, he doesn't want to put me in a box and throw me in the sea!

Some funny moments
One day Finn asked me what a bow was. I told him it's what you do when you tie your shoes, or wrap a present, or when I tie Elle's dresses. Then he asked me if I wanted to hear a song he learned from the radio. This is how it went:

I'll put you in a box, a tie you in a bow, and throw you in the deep blue sea.

Got up from naps and in a haze get the kids some snacks and stuff and told Conor I didn't know if I would get the lasagna in the oven before he got home.  Seriously, the one night in a LONG time that I was going to do dinner and I didn't think I was even going to get the beef cooked! haha

A better day, where the two big kids played with these toys together for a record breaking amount of time with no fighting!

But somehow the kids were good eating snacks and playing and I managed to get all the dishes done, house tidy, AND get the lasagna in the oven (and that was WITH the kids "helping" me by eating all the cheese as I sprinkled it in! haha).

My pretty baby playing at the playplace in Target - love the little pony tail!!

So things went back up again, just in the knick of time!  It's Thursday morning now and I've already got the breakfast dishes done before Thea's having her nap, so it's already a good day haha!

Trying to sit on her car

This little goober let me put her hair in pig tails!  So we did a photoshoot :)

Thea - 11 Months Old

*Tears* My little baby is so close to being 1 - I can hardly believe it.

Like past month, there hasn't been a whole lot of big new developments.  She's cruising around furniture a lot better, and getting into things like crazy!

She still just has the same bottom two little teeth (at least as on her actual 11 month birthday she did!).

Feeding: still eating food like a champ.  She's started getting demanding if she's waiting for you to give her more food and will scream quite loudly!  She also loves just chucking her food on the floor if she doesn't want it...but like a good little doggy, if you leave it on the floor she might come back later for seconds! Haha. Breastfeeding is still going well. She had a bit of a tummy bug this month and then for a few days afterwards wasn't quite feeding the same (not feeding as often, and only from one side at a time), but she's back to normal now.

Sleep: she wakes up earlier than I'd like, but I can't really complain as she naps pretty consistently and goes to bed between 7-7:30.  We had the time change last weekend which threw things off a bit, but she's basically back to normal now (unlike Elle who feels the need to wake up at 5:40am).

The kids love and hate her sometimes!  Every morning Elle runs into the room to see Thea, and in a squeaky voice "hi thea boo boo, you such a big girl thea boo boo!"  They both like to point out when she does big girl things, like standing on her own, driving a little toy car around, etc.  BUT she likes to get right in with them when they play, which sometimes ruins the fun.  I used to be able to send them to the craft table to play up there, but now she can stand up to the table and grab at their things!  So now if they really really want to play something and I can't get her away they have to go to their rooms and close the doors, which Thea does NOT like.

She's starting to throw little tantrums over things now too.  Like if you take one of the kids water bottles away from her (which she can now drink out of on her own as well as sippy cups!), or if she's following the kids to their room and they slam the door in her face (she either screams out in anger, or bursts out crying!)

She still doesn't want to do much walking with the walker or holding onto our hands, but I'm okay with that...although I think Conor wants her to walk before her 1st birthday.  We shall see!

Now to decide if we'll have a big birthday party for her or not...

Playground: Wombat Bend

The couple of weeks ago it was nice out and we didn't have anything we needed to do, so we hit up another local playground "Wombat Bend".

It was a nice park, but a little bit more awkward than the last one because it was a lot bigger, either the kids had to be in the exact same area or I just couldn't see them both at the same time.  And I couldn't really put Thea down because I had to keep going to check on the other kid, where ever they were!

Just before we left I let the kids run around in this spot, that way I could put Thea down as well.

The other thing was that it was really dewy still on the ground, which is annoying with a crawling baby!  Another reason I ended up wearing her most of the time.

Elle loved these swings!  And it actually worked out well because twice there were other kids on it and the other parents were pushing it, so I knew Elle was in a safe place and I could go keep an eye on Finn as well.

Here's Elle on the swing

Finn got up the courage to go on the flying fox and he had so much fun.  Love hearing his squeals of delight!

Looking forward to checking out some more parks on the list!

Updated picture albums!

Alright I've just uploaded a BOATLOAD of pictures onto facebook, so here are the links to the individual albums:

December 2013
January 2014
February 2014
March 2014

Enjoy!

Gotta get blogging!

I've really fallen behind with updating the blog, and my picture albums.  I LOVE having this blog to look back on, and I know there are people who read this as a main way of keeping up to date, since not EVERYONE in the world is on facebook! haha.

I'm working on it this week.  I changed up the look of the blog again, and I really like it!  I didn't like the other one and didn't want to do much until I had one I liked better.

Now to get some more content, and to upload some pictures and videos which I am really behind on!