Running away from home, pre-schooler style

Thumper, unhappy that we have restricted her access to jelly, stormed off down the hallway, announcing: “I’m going to live at a different house! I'm not going to live with you ever again because you're not going to let me have my jelly now” 

Me: Do you want me to help you pack a bag of clothes to take?

Thumper: Yes. 

Me: And where are you going to live? 

Thumper: I’m going to live at Cuz1’s house forever! 

Me: Are you going to take some clothes with you?

Thumper: Yes! 

She goes back to her bedroom then returns with a small backpack containing one pair of pants, one pair of socks, sandals and bunny pyjamas. 

Me: what about some undies? 

Thumper: Oh yes! 

Back to her bedroom again, returning with two pairs of undies for her bag. 

Thumper: Now I'm ready to go! ...Mum can you please drive me? 

--

Wee Wee

An email from CutLuce today:

Forgot to tell you... Cuz1 said BallFiend & Thumper today... Sort of. We were talking about her cousins and she said BallFiend, but for Thumper - she said "wee wee". X

To which I responded:

Wee Wee! That's sooooo cute!
And so appropriate, seeing as Thumper has a bit of a tendency to do wee-wee all over the place at the moment, while she is toilet training. 

--

Blue book

Yesterday, BallFiend and Thumper were very excited to receive a letter in the mail, addressed to them.  BallFiend immediately opened it and found inside a gorgeous invitation to Cuz1’s first birthday party.

Today, I asked Thumper for ideas about what birthday present we could give Cuz1.
Thumper replied, “A book.” So I asked her what kind of book.
Thumper stated in no uncertain terms, “A blue book”.
Intrigued, I then asked, “What sort of blue book?”
Thumper said “One about lions... ummm no, I mean elephants".

So now I have the rather tall order of trying to find a blue book about elephants for Cuz1.
--

BallFiend's Birthday Week Bake-a-thon

Last week was spent celebrating BallFiend's 5th birthday...

• On Friday, I sent BallFiend off to creche with a green-and-chocolate swirl cake to share.
• On Saturday, we held a party with his friends.
• On Sunday, we hosted an afternoon tea with the extended family.
• On Monday (his actual birthday), we chilled out at home.
• On Tuesday, I made gluten-free, egg-free, nut-free (flavour-free!) cup-cakes for him to take to Kinder to share.

Saturday's party was held at the local scout hall with 10 of BallFiend's kinder, creche and other friends, including MasterF, MasterW, LittleMissIz, Thing1 and Thing2 (daughters of FunkyOrganMan and ThingMaker). The party had a green-theme (a really simple theme to do - I can highly recommend it!). We had green balloons, a green table-cover, green napkins, plates, cutlery and of course all the food was green:

• pea and ham soup served in green cups;
• avocado dip with celery sticks for dipping (also some corn chips in green tubs);
• green jelly; 
• green-and-white coconut ice (which DeepSpice and I between us took four attempts to get right and then the kids didn't eat it anyway, but that was OK because all the groan-ups loved it!);
• a fruit platter of green(ish) fruits - Granny Smith apples, green pears and green grapes;
• the birthday cake was a butter cake with a green swirl through it and iced in green icing.

I also got 3 metres of neon-lime green tulle from Spotlight (on the discount table... I wonder why!) and made the kids green headbands to wear. We played a few games involving green straws but mostly the kids just played around in the hall. It was the easiest kids birthday party I've ever organised. Although I have to give fair credit to all the parents who hung around and helped out. I was assuming that being a five-year-old party, at least some of the parents would drop their children off for the 2 hours. But none did, and all were roped in to help with blowing up balloons, party games, food preparation and sorting out disputes! I was really glad that they did all end up staying.

Sunday's afternoon tea was attended by Gran, GrandPaul, StompyDad, CutLuce, DesignerMonkey, Cuz1, DesignerSis, Wigward and Great-Aunt-F (GrandPaul's sister) and her husband Great-Uncle-M. BallFiend and I made yet another birthday cake (banana with chocolate chips at BallFiend's request), and we ate party left-overs as well as Gran's chicken sandwiches and Great-Aunt-F's scones. Yummo!

By Monday (BallFiend's actual birthday), we were all too exhausted to do anything much at all. So after going to his usual swimming lesson, we came straight home so BallFiend could get down to the serious business of playing with all the toys he received as gifts. Highlights were:

• the mega-mega-soccerball (about 60cm diametre) from his aunt CutLuce and uncle DesignerMonkey.
• the gi-normous Earth beach ball (68cm diametre) from his aunt DesignerSis and uncle Wigward. (I'm sure DeepSpice would beg to differ with the promotional description that "It only takes a few huffs and puffs to fill this globe full of air" - he spent the first half hour of Sunday's afternoon tea blowing it up!)
• the foil "Happy Birthday balloon" on a stick from Cuz1.
• the green helium-filled balloons from Gran and GrandPaul.
• all the green balloons left over from the birthday party.

He also received several Lego kits and has been enjoying them a lot (as has Thumper), books, games, a marble run, construction toys, outdoor adventuring tools, dinosaur kits, a watering can and more. Some of the toys have been packed away so I can bring them out in instalments. There's easily enough to last him until Xmas time!

Overall he was totally indulged and doesn't really (know how to) appreciate it, but it doesn't matter... I loved seeing him so excited as he ripped open presents and how he got even more excited if they turned out to contain anything vaguely spherical. 
--

Pasta, Plonk and Puzzles

Took the family on a one-day road trip today to visit Great Gran Billy in Ballarat. Due to the section of obligatory roadworks on the Western Ring Road and the usual stops along the way to respond to the various demands of our back-seat complainants, the journey took us around two hours instead of the 1 hour 20 minutes that it should have taken. 

So we arrived in Ballarat right on midday and decided to stop for lunch first. As always, BallFiend insisted on having pasta and therefore Thumper got the same (we have learned to always get her the same, otherwise she won't eat what she has and demands to eat BallFiend's food). 

As can clearly be seen, all was going quite well, until Thumper finished her meal. I carefully shifted my half-finished glass of wine out of her reach and then proceeded to wipe her hands and face before she left the table, only to catch my glass with my elbow and turn just in time to see it crash to the floor. It was just like in the movies... I watched as the glass seemed fall in slow motion, tumbling end over end, then the slow motion stopped as it hit floor and shattered into about one billion pieces. 

We made a hasty exit, stopped at a bakery for some afternoon tea supplies, then continued on to visit GGB.

Poor GGB had been ill last week - taken to hospital with vomiting - and being 95 years old, it really knocked her around a bit. CutLuce and DesignerMonkey took Cuz1 up last weekend to meet her great-grandmother for the first time and on their return, CutLuce told me how frail GGB had looked. So I felt quite relieved when I arrived to see her looking better than I was expecting... though she is definitely not the lively woman she was a few years, and even a few months, ago. 

GGB enjoyed watching Thumper and BallFiend play and even helped out with a puzzle that I had brought to keep Thumper entertained. 

We consumed our bakery treats. BallFiend and Thumper shared a croissant and GGB particularly enjoyed the lamingtons, so I got the snot-block all to myself and DeepSpice got the jam tart that had been intended for BallFiend. 

At 3.00 pm, we left GGB and gave the kids a quick run about in the playground across the road. It all ended in tears when Thumper decided to live up to her name by running into a pole and thumping her head, causing a good-sized egg to swell-up. So we loaded everyone into the car and went on our way home. 

Much like the journey to Ballarat, the journey home was plagued with slow patches due to roadworks. The recently-built Bacchus Marsh by-pass is now in operation, but obviously 'they' don't want the new road to get worn out, so one lane was blocked off, causing the traffic to dawdle along at 10kph for a couple of kilometres. Most of the rest of the journey was uneventful, apart from BallFiend kicking my seat, and Thumper repeatedly dropping her blankie and waterbottle, making me reach around awkwardly to pick them up for her. BallFiend did a reasonable job of keeping Thumper entertained by tickling her foot with his foot - bringing about endless rounds of giggling. And the colourful music of Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass kept BallFiend in good spirits.

Eventually we reached the dreaded Western Ring Road, and of course, the traffic slowed to a crawl. It took about 25 minutes to travel around 2 kilometers! Finally we reached our turn-off and stopped by Gran and GrandPaul's house where a nice glass of red bubbles awaited us. The kids were offered dinner, and refused on the grounds of cake already consumed. Then once again, we packed everyone back into the car and finally got home at about 6.00 pm.


Though it was lovely to see Great Gran Billy, overall, it was a rather exhausting day - especially for DeepSpice who did all the driving. ...if only we could teleport to Ballarat.
--

As promised...

Here is the more news I referred to earlier...

This story starts ten years ago, when DesignerSis was just sweet-sixteen and she met a young lad whom we now know as Wigward. Now, most normal teens enjoy a romance for a few months, then break-up in order to be able to write better teenage-angst poetry and have an excuse to go through an obligatory goth phase. But not DesignerSis and Wigward. They set out to prove that your first love can be your true love.

Fast forward ten years and announce they're off to Noosa for a holiday. Nothing really unusual about this, they've done so a few times before. They usually disappear for a week or so and reappear back home with little fanfare (other than the occasional gripe about the crappy service that they got from a cut-price airline).

But not this time.

It was Saturday afternoon, and DeepSpice and I were out gallivanting around the inner-suburbs, pretending to be child-less yuppies, whilst Gran and GrandPaul babysat BallFiend and Thumper. Yep that's right - we were on a date! It was quite a novelty for us to be able to wander into shops and cafes at our leisure. We ended up passing a furniture shop that I have heard about but had never actually been to, so I dragged DeepSpice in for a look.

Then my phone rang. It was DesignerSis calling whilst still away on holiday. She had news: that Wigward had just proposed to her and they are now engaged! (She had to tell me quickly as they were about to tell Wigward's mother and once she got the news, it would be instantly broadcast far and wide.) I was too stunned to say much (or perhaps it was just that I was too focused on imagining how nice it would be to get a new sofa)... I managed to stammer out a "congratulations", before collapsing in shock on my dream sofa. (Just kiddin' - I am genuinely happy for them!)

Later when chatting to CutLuce about the news, I found out that she had had a much better come-back than my corny old 'congratulations'. She immediately asked: "So, when are you having babies?" I can just picture DesignerSis squirming a little on the other end of the phone.

Anyway, I am very happy for DesignerSis and Wigward and I hope they do get on with making some more cousins for BallFiend and Thumper (and Cuz1) soon... though perhaps not too soon, as I'm still on my 'auntie' L-plates.
--

Auntie Stompy

It's been a mad couple of weeks... a lot has going on in my life and as a result, I've had little time to post on The Swamp. And as a result, I have some long overdue news to brag...

On 9th June 2011, I became an auntie for the first time after CutLuce and DesignerMonkey's first progeny finally made her appearance, about a week overdue) at 4.39 am.

This of course means that DeepSpice is now an uncle for the first time and BallFiend and Thumper have their very first First Cousin (they already have a few cousins of the third or fourth or once-or-twice-removed variety, or something like that anyway).

It's all very exciting and I am very much enjoying getting to experience a newborn without all the horrible sleep-deprivation. No such luck for the long-suffering CutLuce and DesignerMonkey.

Now this little bubba just needs a Swamp-handle... I will be naming her soon, once her personality shines through, but for now, she can be Cuz1, in the hope that Cuz2, and even Cuz3 and Cuz4 will be along in the next few years... because, oh yes! there's more news...
--