Update Update....

I know I'm still slack. Its just been so busy around here.

School Update: Its going well. We are still part of this social programme group. The kids part is great but the parents part is not. I spoke up last week about how I don't think it really applies to us and she agreed but as the hour went on one of the mums admitted she has no control over her kids and she just gives in to keep the peace so maybe the programme will help her. One of the other mums decided to remove her child. Her child was included cause she was initially very withdrawn and quiet but her parents are going thru some major issues with the courts involved, and strict visiting schedule/DOCS etc so I think she was just more scared than anything else. Her mum is finding the parenting programme offensive so...

Anyway other than that school is great. I've put my name down to be a regular reading helper and I'm also in the canteen every few weeks. I'm loving my time in the classroom, its great to see DD interact with her class mates and also to get to know them myself.

No shampoo: So tomorrow it will be 8 wks and frankly I'm disappointed. My hair does not feel any nicer than normally. The yukky oily stage is gone but my hair still feels rather dry but now its also super curly and I mean super curly. My future SIL is a hair dresser and she said obviously this is my natural hair - and I don't like it. I'm not sure where to go from here. Maybe I should try the bicarb wash and apple cider rinse. I'm truly tempted to go back to the chemical filled products I was using before. I miss my No Frizz Serum. If anyone has any ideas..

House Update: Wooden floor was laid this week. The laundry was installed (which will be the temporary kitchen while we building the rest of the house). The plasterboard is just waiting for the final sand down. The tiler just laid the flooring in the bathroom and will be back next week to do the walls. Only thing that can slow us down is our painter lives in a area that is currently cut off due to flood and he has a few jobs to do before ours so we are left waiting on mother nature. ((On a side note, how bizarre with a huge part of VIC burning and only a few hours away parts of NSW flooding and then again more flooding in QLD, Australia is a very weather diverse place at times)). Anyway we are on track for a late March move in.

Financial stuff: Is going terrible. I'm even more behind. I have bills overdue to be paid, money spread over various bank accounts at both banks. I need to find time to sit down and transfer money, close the accounts from the old bank and pay bills. Then once again get stuck into MYOB so I can finish our budget.

Coming Week: Once again a busy school week, Monday is my only free day. Tues is the social programme at the school, Wed DD#2 has her sports class, Thurs is reading in the class and canteen, Friday is DD#2 swimming and speech therapy. Saturday I'm meeting some old school friends for lunch, I haven't seen them for ages. And finally on Sunday we head off for a 4 day break, my parents bought a package for us at a lovely resort, so as long as the weather is nice we are going to swim and dolphin watch and generally relax. The accommodation we booked has a full kitchen so we can keep the cost down by taking our own food. We think we will have breakfast and dinner at the accommodation and eat out for lunch while doing our sight seeing etc.

Family: We are all a bit sick. Just coughs, sore throats, runny noses etc. So hubby is pottering around at the house today doing little things which won't tire him out too much and the girls and I will sloth on the lounge I think. I'm re-reading the Twilight series again (for the third time) I'm about a quarter of the way thru book 3 so that's my plan for the day.

As for my weight loss/get healthy plan well.... nothing. I've really fallen off the wagon with a lot of things... eating healthy... exercising... meal planning... saving money... living simply...

Its been so long

12 Days since I last posted. How slack.

Being a school mum is hard work and tiring, I find. Of course Kinder kids are still being picked up a bit earlier so its a very short day. Its been going very well on a whole. She had 2 bad morning this week and I spent one day with a cramped stomach worrying about her. She has been selected for this social programme with 3 other kids from Kindergarten, which is perfect for her but while they run the kids programme they run one for the mums. Which isn't so good. Its ultimately aimed at parents who struggle to control, discipline and deal with their kids. Which isn't me. DD#1 has had regular therapy for her autism for 2 years now. Any problems or ways of dealing with her has been worked thru long before now. And I don't think I'm the only mum struggling with the parents programme - 2 of the others mums are. But I'm sure we will keep doing it cause it only last for an hour and then the last hour is spent with the kids. And the parents bit is only 6 weeks.

Anyway I have alot to do today the last 2 days have been spent in a foggy mess. My brain is tired and run down. I've barely moved after getting home each day so the house is a mess. The laundry is overflowing and I have a huge folding pile and iron pile of clothes. So thats my saturday.

Like most Australians I've been glued to the TV. The Vic fires have been very sad and devastating. I know alot of people who live around the areas where the fires were, they are all safe. But there are many people who aren't. Schools, whole communities, lives and families have been lost.

Scary Saturday

I know its Monday but I wanted to tell you what happened to me on Saturday. I've mentioned before I'm terrified of spiders. Well....

Friday night we went out for dinner to celebrate a wonderful first day at school and seeing it was so hot I took them down to the waterfront for a quick swim first, so I totally forgot to get my last load of washing off the line. Saturday morning I headed out and two of my tea towels were twisted up together so I casually lent over and pulled them straight and then hung a wet towel on the line next to them, and thats when I saw it. The biggest huntsman I've ever seen - on the tea towel I just touched . Now I know all the Aussies out there are going to all go, 'just a huntsman, suck it up princess' but they terrify me. Of course it was sitting right next to the peg so I couldn't even just remove it from the line and I couldn't just walk away, what if it moved onto another item and I couldn't find it.

I had this perfect plan to use a broom to brush it off and remove it else where but I honestly couldn't even get close enough for the broom to reach. I felt like vomiting everything I saw it. Then the wind blew and it moved and spread it legs to stablise itself, oh my... it was even bigger than I thought. Argh.. In the end, knowing my husband was not going to be home for hours I ended up calling the guy across the road to remove it while I hid on the verandah.

Week In Review 26/1 - 1/2

This past week has been a real mixed bag. The funeral was on Wednesday and it was horrible to see my grandmother so upset and frail. I really fear she will be next and so does she, she mentioned its her turn next a few times. She is 77, she sister was 81 and their brother is 75.

Before going to the funeral we went to visit my cousin in hospital, that was a horrible experience as well, he looked terrible, his body was a shaking mess which he had little control over. We only got to see him for 10 minutes cause they decided to rush him in to get a series of test cause breathing is becoming more and more of an issue. The results weren't positive, he is looking at a minimum of 6 wks in hospital. He is only about 33. Because of the problems with his heart and the blood clots there is a real risk of death or serious complications. We are still keeping his problems a secret from my grandmother because we truly don't think she will cope at the moment and have no real answer or hope to give her at the moment anyway.

On the positives it was a great first day at school for #1 and also two great days for #2 in the 'big' room at preschool.

The real estate contacted us and although we know them very well they have to do a rental inspection, we've been lucky and had 14 months without one but the timing couldn't be worse. The office is a total mess, I mean a total mess, a cleared space for a walk way thru it and a small cleared space at the desk for hubby to sit. We have been using it for not only office stuff but for mine and his clothes, the kids misc. bits and pieces they don't use all the time and all my avon selling stuff. Overall the house needs a total clean and yard needs a huge clean up. I really didn't want to put too much time into it cause I'll be packing up stuff in a month or two in preparation for our move but now I'll have to tidy, clean and declutter this week.

No Shampoo: Is going ok. Actually the day of the funeral my hair was great, mum commented on how soft it was but as the day went on it got a lot worse and Thurs/Fri it was a matted mess of knotts again. Today it is oily but manageable and with my dry frizzy curls it doesn't look oily, I could easily wear it out if I want to, but I can feel the oily when I touch it. Its now been 5 whole weeks since I washed it. I'm hoping for umm... something in the next week or two. So far my hair has been no better than its been in the past. Obviously I've been avoiding those few days of frizzy breazy mess I get for the first 3-5 days after washing but I've not gotten a lot of great hair days. I do wonder what I'll do in the future about colouring over grey, I do colour it every6-12 months, I don't get a lot of grey but at 31 I'm sure that will increase.

Meter Reading: I didn't end up taking reading last week so this will be a fortnightly update
Meter #1 29183
Meter #2 31935
A total usage of 430 and a daily usage of 30.7. I really need to do some research to find out what I should be aiming for. I'm sure this daily usage is bad, we've been running the airconditioning alot over the last fortnight, like most people who live in NSW, I'm sure.

Water 59609, which worked out to be a daily usage of 117 per person.

Garden: Here are some photos, I have strawberries coming on which is really exciting. And the lemons are not getting bigger but are starting to turn yellow a bit. I ended up pruning the lemon tree a bit and trying it to a stake cause it was heavy on one side and leaning well over. I also cut off two of the smaller lemons. It just seems to be really struggling to support itself and 10 lemons in this heat so I cut some branches and the 2 lemons off, I'm not sure if its the right thing to do but the tree is still young, only a bit over a year old and the first time its produced fruit. I just wanted to lighten its load a bit.


Coming Week: Busy week for us. The first full week of full time school. #2 starts a sports programme tomorrow, I have a heap of avon deliveries to drop off and I also have my first day of volunteering in the school canteen on Thursday.

I'm hoping to get some baking done this afternoon for lunches and morning teas. I'm going to look for stuff I can bake and freeze and just take out as I need it.

Finally: I want to thank everyone who has been visiting my blog, I love seeing how many drop by and where they are all coming from, its exciting to see all the international visitors as well. Please leave a comment to say hello next time you drop by.

Smiley Saturday, now I have one too.

I regularly read the Smiley Saturday post links on Lightenings blog, today I have one of my own.

Yesterday was DD#1 first day at a main stream school, she started Kindergarten which in NSW is the first compulsory full time year of school. Why this is smile worthy - 18 months ago we got the paper work for a special autistic school that is near us cause no one who saw her thought she would be able to go to a mainstream school, we were told over and over again to hurry with the forms cause of waiting list etc. Something held me back and I devoted my time to finding therapys we could do now to improve her ability to cope within a society that is not set up for a child like mine.

Yesterday she went off to school with all the other little kids who live in our suburbs and not only did she cope but she loved it. She made a new little friend, she doesn't know his name so is calling him 'the boy' but this is huge for us cause she knows two little girls in her class, the school put her with those two girls so she would have some familar faces and feel more at ease. I asked her if she played with either of the girls and she said no, which both amazed and excited me - she made a friend, I want to do a happy dance.

Once in the car instead of the meltdown screaming match I both expected and prepared for I got a detailed description of her day and how great it was. I honestly want to cry, I can't believe how wonderfully great this is. I know its only one day and it could all change on Monday but one day of calm happiness is... enough to give me chills. Her teacher was gushing when I picked her up, she was so excited and happy at how great the day was and how much she interacted with both her and the other kids. We had done as much as we could to set her up for success, I had started having meeting with the principal and her current teacher in April last year and its truly proved to be benefitial.

So thats my Smiley Saturday. I have not stopped smiling since I picked her up yesterday afternoon.

Week In Review and Me update all in one

This week I didn't lose any weight but I'm not overly complaining, I did get a bit of exercise in and my muscles have that slightly sore feeling so thats OK.

Its been a hard week. The kids have been real out of sorts, my youngest who is naturally a sooky crying child has been in tears at the drop of a hat every single day. The three boys in her swimming class made her cry 4 times in a half hour lesson. I ended up changing her lesson to a later time so she can be in a class with more girls. Why they thought one girl would be good with three boys is beyond me. My eldest has been relentless in annoying, hurting and generally being mean to her so tears are happening all day at home too. Speaking of my eldest, argh... I'm actually glad school is starting on Friday, I never thought I would say that cause I love having kids and being at home with them but she is going crazy. Unfortunately she is a overpowering mix of being extremely intelligent who is moderate but high functioning autistic and suffers from severe anxiety. Yesterday she spent a hour screaming at me through a closed door that she wanted to go home to her real mum!!! I would love to explain to her that I still have intense memories to giving birth to her 37cm head. (Only slightly replaced by giving birth to her sisters 38 cm head).

Deep down I think she is really worried about starting school, she is really excited and desperate to learn (though she is doing 2nd grade maths so she is going to be a bit bored I think for the first 2 yrs) but she is anxious and worried, yesterday she ended up breaking down at the end of the day and saying she didn't want a new teacher when she moves up a class. Poor little thing, worrying about something that won't be happening for a year. I told her if she ended up being really unhappy then I would do something about it for her, I promise. I have pretty much gotten to the point of accepting one day I'll have to homeschool her.

Anyway all in all its made for a pretty full on noisy week and I'm so tired. Last night I went to bed and my head was running and when hubby started to snore I ended up moving to the lounge to watch a movie - I woke at 6.30 this morning with the TV still on.

Today is a public holiday in Australia, Australia Day in fact. There is a movement going to change the day cause the aborigines feel that its not a day to celebrate seeing its the day the white man came to this country. I'm not sure where I sit on it all really I am considered white in this country but have alot of aborigines in my family tree, my mums grandfather was a aborigine.

Most of my family still work on public holidays, my mum is a nurse and she is working this afternoon, my father works in a RSL Club as a supervisor so that is open today as well, hubby is self employed so if he doesnt work he does get paid, and my future sister in law is currently working in a cafe until Uni starts so she works too. But we are all going to be available for brunch today so we are grabbing the opportunity to eat together, we are about to leave for mums shortly.

This coming week is a huge one for us. #2 child starts her extra day at preschool as well as move up into the next class, she goes off to school next year so is in the 'big' class at preschool, so she is there 2 days a week from this week on. And my eldest starts school on Friday. Also mum and I are going to not only go to the funeral on Wednesday but while down in Sydney we are going to take the opportunity to visit my cousin in hospital. Its been a marathon to get the girls minded for the day. I'm dropping them off at mums so my future SIL can mind them until my MIL arrives to have them for the day then she is dropping them off to my dad who will then take them to hubby when he finishes work. What a mess but the drive is going to be too long for them to do and come back in one day and also my eldest is already obsessed with death as it is, a funeral would be... awkward.

On the organising front and budget mess. I've gotten no further. With the kids being they way they have been I've been far to crazy to think straight. Hubby did move some stuff from the garage this week so I have a bit more room in there to do some sorting. But really our accounts and budget must come first.... and I'll keep working on it.

Bit of a winge, more sad news and a no shampoo update

My cousin is getting married soon. Weddings, how lovely. I loved my wedding and enjoy weddings as much as most romantic souls but... the couple have decided they want a big fancy wedding, good on them, whatever. But they can't afford it, so they have asked all the guest to pay for their own meals - at $45 per person. I'm not going, neither are most of the cousins but my parents are. Mum's put away the $90 for the meal plus she needs to pay for accommodations cause they live so far away and although my cousin has told people a gift is unnecessary it was said in a way they would still appreciate them, so she is buying a gift too, I told her not too but she feels like she will be the only one who doesn't so she is.

My winge is, if you want a big fancy wedding then great but damn well pay for it yourself. Our weekly food budget is between $200-250 per week so that works out to be between $7-9 per person PER DAY. $45 is expensive I think, I know that for weddings this is average or even cheap. My best friend paid $65 per head for her wedding. But really... Also they have listed the dress code as strictly formal. I laughed and laughed when I read that cause at my own wedding the three most worst dressed was my aunt and uncle (parents of the groom) and my other uncle, which I expected cause what do you expect when you invite a fully tattoo'd biker who spent many years in jail ;-)

Fine they want the dress to be formal but... my grandmother, a women who is well into her 70's and living completely on an australian pension, which we all know is terrible, was told her best outfit, a blue pant suit was not good enough. Hello, she is paying $45 for her own dinner at your wedding, she can wear her pj's if she wants... is what I think.

Look weddings are lovely and we all want ours to be special but it doesn't have to be expensive to be nice. My wedding was so lovely, we were 22 & 21 so had next to no money, my husband had just finished his apprenticeship and my receptionist wage was higher then his wage so we were broke. We were also madly saving for a deposit on a house. So we found a beautfiul old fashion 'bed and breakfast' that had lovely manicured gardens with big fig trees shading everything and we had a garden wedding complete with afternoon tea. My mum booked the rooms at the bed and breakfast for older relatives and out of towners like my grandmother so they could stay there for the night and the owners daugher was getting into the catering business so she made a huge spread of hot and cold foods. There were chairs and lovesets put all through out the garden for guest to relax. I think the whole cost of the wedding ended up working out to be somethink like $15 per head, and with keeping the guest list down it was affordable.

OK, I'll get off my soap box now but I'm so annoyed at my cousins, having been married for 10 yrs now I'm not up with wedding do's and don'ts but I think expecting people to pay $45 plus saying they need to dress to the nines, as well as hoping for a gift is a bit rude. ((although not a surprise from this family))

Well my sad news, as mentioned my great aunt died the other day, the funeral is on wednesday but on the same day one of my cousins who I'm very close to was rushed to hospital with breathing problems, and once there it was deteremined he also had a staff infection in his shoulder and a blood clot near his heart. He has been very ill for a long time, many years ago he was in a serious accident while working on a road crew for a council. His back was almost broken and walking and moving has been an issue ever since. There is nothing more doctors can do, his spine has been fused and thats it really. He will be in pain for the rest of his like. He may of picked up the staff infection during one of his back operations, hospitals are a common place to get it. But I have no idea what will happen with the blood clot, its a waiting game now.

Now for my hair..... I've finally figured out what it feels like. You know when you use heaps of hair spray and the next day you wake up and your hair is sticky and really knotty, thats what it feels like. Every time i brush my hair it clumps together again and gets knotty. Is this oily??? I don't know, having dry frizzy hair I've never had oily hair before, I expected oily to be shiny and slippery. I think I'm up to 4 wks today so hopefully something better will happen soon cause really right now no matter how many times I brush my hair it gets knotty as soon as my hair moves again. Last night I brushed for an hour and it was still getting knotty, I ended up braiding it which I'll redo today.

I'll update later today with my meter readings, I'm dreading the electricity reading though, yesterday was 41 degrees here, and the whole week has been so so hot. The air con has got a big workout.

No Shampoo & Sad News

It was 3 weeks and 4 days ago that I last washed my hair with shampoo... I have very dry curly frizzy hair and shampoo has always been pretty mean to it, the last few months I've been buying very expensive creamy shampoo & conditioner which was slightly better but still not great. Usually I'd wash my hair and tie it back with lots of products in it for 4 days maybe even 7. Once was hair was a bit 'dirty' it was manageable, but then I'd wash it again after a week (so only ever went 2 wks without washing my hair). Last month I got really sick of it and decided to give No Shampoo a go. I've heard about it from a lot of people, heard about how the hair naturally sorts it self out after about 6 wks or so. I wonder if mine will do so around 6 wks as well or not. Right now it feels OK, not dry like it usually is but definitely not oily like others would be at this stage, I think being so dry it will take longer for the oily look to happen. The only problem is its hard to brush, its just doesn't feel right...

Now the sad news, my grandmothers sister, so my mums aunt died today. She was in a nursing home but not overly sick or old, but she just decided that she didn't want to live anymore so she stopped eating. She lasted about 3 weeks, in the end catching colds and having breathing problems. She lives a far distance from us but I'm sure we will go to the funeral. To support nan. They were very close, she used her sisters name as my mums middle name and how appropriate it was cause my mum is alot like her aunt.

Me - 21/1/09

I'm a bit late in the update on me this week. I had a pretty bad week, I only lost 0.1kg. About mid week I ended up getting the worst migraine, which made me feel really sick. Hubby ordered in some thai for dinner and I consumed a huge portion of coconut rice, the more I ate the less i felt like being sick. Not happy. Anyway then the week just went downhill from there.

I'm not in a great head space, things are a bit busy. Hubby's not been around much cause the plasterer starts at the house today, so when he is here we need to touch base and make decisions etc and we aren't agreeing, we are both so tired and run down and its just so damn hot, I don't think I spoke to him at all last night, cause of a disagreement we had earlier in the afternoon. The kids have been at each others throat as well, its hot and almost too hot for outside so they are a bit over it. DD #2 is at preschool tomorrow so hopefully it means they can catch their breath and start again. DD#1 has had a few meltdowns - its hard cause with all thats going on we aren't as routined as we usually are and she doesn't like that at all.

So basically I feel I need to start again. We have nothing planned today and I'm hoping we can just plod along and have a nice day, the house is tidy and all I really have to do is make the beds so it might be a good day to read books, rest, recharge.

My plans for this coming week is to try to stick to my weight watchers eating plan, drink more water cause I've slipped with this again and also to try to go for a walk if the temperature ever drops.

Week in Review 12/1 - 18/1

I am always amazed at how different my girls are when it comes to waking up. My youngest is smiling before she even opens her eyes, she wakes up instantly and is chirpy, asking 'mum lets get up, can I have milo and milk, what are we doing today', she skips to the lounge room with her curls bouncing. My eldest however wakes slowly, with groans and grunts, her long thick hair so matted around her face you can't see her eyes. Even when awake she likes to lay there for a while, preferring to be cuddled awake by me. She then prefers to be not spoken to for 1/2hr - and don't ask her if she wants breakfast too early or woe be to you.

I understand my eldest, that is the way I greeted each day for a good 25 yrs of my life, until I had babies. I do wish however I could wake like my youngest. Today I am half way in between, I hate waking and wish I could stay in bed and some days I curse #2 chirpy voice and smiling face. But I wake quickly from necessity.

This week: I really wanted to get the bookwork close to completed, but that didn't happen. Basically I was planning on 4-5hrs on Wednesday when MIL had the girls, well MIL ended up picking them up a good 1.5hrs after I thought she would, then wanted me to go and get them a bit earlier than I thought, so after doing a quick tidy, hanging a few loads of washing on the line and cleaning out the guinea pigs I only had 2 hrs to work. Oh well, I did get a lot done in that 2 hrs so I'll just keep going. I got a letter this week from ATO asking why I haven't done the Jul-Sept BAS yet... uh oh.

Our house, the solar hot water system was mostly installed yesterday and its being finished off today, hubby is also cleaning the whole place out in preparation for plasterboard which will start this week, we will probably go over this afternoon and help clean after the plumber leaves.

Yesterday I did something I somewhat regret now. I suggested to the girls we make a paper mache pig. Of course I suggested this before reading the instructions, only to find out you need to do 4 layers, with it drying in between, then leaving it over night before painting. The paste is annoying to make and you need to make it each time you put a layer on. This was a bad idea with a 4 and 5 yrs old, on a rainy coldish day, so it ended up being an inside project. I now have paste all over my floor. The girls soaked their paper and balloon in paste which did not dry even though we went to mums for lunch and stayed there for 3 hrs... the second layer went on and even though its now been left for 16 or so hrs its still not dry. Both girls continually coated their arms in paste cause it felt nice. And I still have 3 pigs needing another 2 layers plus paint. Argh..

Coming week: We have speech therapy for #2, therapy for #1 on Monday, a little playdate on Tuesday followed by swimming lessons for #1. Yay Wednesday is completely empty so far and I'm hoping to keep it that way. Thursday is a full day with just #1 and I while #2 is at preschool, I think we will head into the shop to buy food for Friday night and claim a few medicare and NIB bills. On Friday after #2's swimming the girls are going to MIL's again. When she brings them home she is going to stay for dinner. MIL and I don't click much, we are very different, so aren't overly close, we really don't see her much, though the last few school holidays she has taken the kids for a few hrs each week. (I think she figures that most of #1 therapy stops during school holidays so they will have more time and she can then take them to her house and see them away from hubby and I).

Meter Reading:
I made a huge mistake last week with my water meter reading, I was out by 1000, no wonder it was so high...
Meter 1 - 28857 (usage of 133)
Meter 2 - 31831 (usage of 58)

Total usage of 191 over 7 days. Or 27 per day. Still not sure what the average is or what I should be aiming for. This week hasn't been so bad though, I've hardly used the a/c.

Water was 53049. Which makes the usage 125 per day per person. More than last week but still well under our allowed usage per councils restrictions.