Happy Mother's Day!

Sitting on the couch this evening, I said to Brad "Can you believe this is my 5th Mothers' Day?"  I still can't believe it myself. 

Five years ago I was 29 with a 3 month old baby, and living in a permanent state of exhaustion thanks to Naomi's total inability to sleep for more than 39 minutes at a time, day or night.

Now I am approaching 34, with Miss 4 and Mr 2 making life interesting at every moment.

I have so many memories of my own mother.  She was (and still is) such a strong person, who quietly supported my Dad in his ministry, and his full time work as a teacher.  Despite often having little in the way of worldly things, we children were never aware of our family lacking anything - we had all the love and support we could ever need.  She went back to work full time to pay for our University educations, and subsequently nursed my Dad with courage and love, until he joined our Lord.

I honestly hope that I can be half as good a role-model as I had.  So for Mothers' Day, I say these would be lovely....

But the smiles on these little faces are even better.

I love you Mum xx

Holding it all together ...

I am holding it all together, just.  With a lot of help from my all-time favourite Cadbury's peppermint chocolate.  In the family block size.  One good thing about being married to a diabetic is that my chocolate is totally safe....

You want to know my favourite sound these days?  The soft, gentle, even sound of our boy breathing easily, in his sleep.  I still love the sound of the 2 kids running around and playing, but that reassuring sleepy breathing is music to my ears.

The rest of my family is in bed.  Ryan sleeping peacefully, Daddy and Naomi snuggled up together in her bed - they both fell asleep during bedtime story.  I have a few minutes to reflect, sip a cup of tea, and gather my crazy thoughts.

I am so grateful to customers of Tags and Labels, who have been so understanding about the crazy long delays in my label-making process, over the past 2 weeks.  It shouldn't surprise me - mothers across the world all feel the same, when our little ones are sick.

I have been flicking through a crochet pattern book that has been on my craft shelf for about 6 months now - Cool Crochet by Melissa Leapman. 

I am planning a crocheted jumper for myself, for winter, but am having a bit of deciding on a suitable replacement yarn, because the weights and brands listed are all American.  Can anyone recommend a chunky, soft 'bulky weight' yarn?  The pattern is in a nylon yarn, but I would prefer something natural...  Ironically, I own a shop that sells yarn. 

But I think I need something in about a 10-ply?

I have recently joined Ravelry, but am yet to come to grips with the amazing store of information and inspiration there.

In and out... of hospital

Well, this classifies as just about the worst couple of weeks we have had for a long time. 

Ryan has been in and out of hospital with chesty wheezing, suspected asthma, finally diagnosed with bronchitis.  We have been told to expect a 12 week recovery period, and he has been on steroids for a week now, and several days to go.  We are learning to cope with giving him ventolin through a mask and spacer, every 3 hours, which is traumatic for all of us.  But watching him struggle for breath is far worse...

We all had a night's sleep at home last night, but I think it will be a long time before I let Ryan sleep in his own room by himself again.  The thought of missing the signs of an impending bout of wheezing scares me.

On top of this, Brad had day surgery under general anaesthetic to have some teeth surgically removed, and Naomi had a nasty gastric bug last weekend.  Suffice to say I am buying us a new feathr duvet, because the old one took quite a beating one night.

Anyway, on happier news, I have been able to do a bit of crochet while sitting in the hospital rooms :-)

I hope your families are all healthier than ours has been!

Easy like a Sunday... afternoon

What is your favourite time of the week?  Without doubt, mine is Sunday afternoon.

The serenity ....

The domestic satisfaction of being caught up with the laundry ....

Finding what must surely be the best ever use for spare coffee mugs.... chocolate pudding!  (recipe to come)

And being so un-stressed that I can calmly deal with Naomi accidentally dumping an entire packet of flour on the kitchen floor, while helping with the cooking.

Moving house...

Well, the last few weeks have been crazy.  Much more family, than crafting...

We finally decided that we are paying far too much rent for the house that we were in, looked around and realised that the market has changed an awful lot since we moved 18 months ago.  We are now happily renting a different house in our town, and saving $150 per week!  The compromise is that it is smaller, and a bit more basic, but still has a great yard that the kids are going to love.

Which all means that this weekend is going to be spent moving boxes of 'stuff' from old house to new house.  How is it that we acquire so much stuff??  I thought I was ruthless last time we moved - I sent loads to the tip, to the charity bins and to friends. 

But somehow, in 18 months it has all crept back in - I again have 8 large garbage bags full of kids' clothes to give to charity, not to mention toys toys toys toys toys...... heavens above, I think the stuffed toys have been multiplying in the toy box!

We made the emotional decision to sell the cot, high chair and baby rockers.  Our little family feels complete... and if by chance a Number 3 comes along, we will just have to sort out what we need then.

AND the reason there are no pictures of the First Steps baby quilt that is now finished, and beautifully quilted by the very clever Tonia at Malanda Quilting is that the batteries in my camera are flat ... what craziness made me buy a camera that needs constant replacing of 4 AA batteries?!?!  But I promise there will be photos very soon - I am so happy with the first quilt I have pieced in absolutely ages....