Hello? Anyone awake?

I woke Easter Sunday, it was quiet... too too quiet. There was just one boy awake.  It wasn't ridiculously early, it was 7am.  The boy that was awake was the one 'in the know' about Easter Bunny, so everything was untouched as I had left it the night before.  He was quietly playing his iPad Mini in the minimal morning light.

No 6am start? No excited children tugging me awake?  Did they not get the memo?  It was Easter!

Not quite sure of the etiquette in such a situation, I assumed that they would probably appreciate a lovely sleep in and would hate for Mummy to wake them up to show them their treats.   

Right?   Of course!  

So Legoman and I carried on as we would on any other morning, bar school days, or soccer mornings, when Mummy runs around like a chook with her head cut off, usually looking for lost socks or library books.  I had a coffee while I browsed around the interwebs, he had breakfast and watched a movie.

It was all very respectable (for once), each boy waking up, one at a time, at regular intervals, giving obsessive Mummy the opportunity to take photo's more leisurely then she normally would on such an occasion, Christmas for example.  By 8am they were all awake.

Legoman, the ever helpful (when it suits him) 9 year old, was on hand to undo packaging and set up toys.  Can I just say, that I am love seeing this side of him, and it really helps!  The boys each get a toy, an item of clothing and a few eggs.  Legoman does not like Chocolate, so I usually throw in a few lemons and an extra item for him.

How was your Easter Sunday, did you have an early start to the day?


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I am linking up with Essentially Jess for IBOT (I blog on Tuesdays), and linking again on Friday for FYBF with Grace, With Some Grace.

 



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The -best- day ever!

"This is the BEST day ever!"  We overheard Voltorb exclaim from the bedroom on Christmas morning.   To which Legoman responded: "That's because it only happens once a year".  Always the realist.  Also, I guess we aren't doing a good job of being Easter Bunny.

We were trying to ignore the fact that they were busily and nosily going through their stockings, hoping to get another 10 minutes sleep.  We had agreed the night before that they were allowed to do that, but must wait for the rest of the family before starting on the rest.  I wanted to close the door and go back to sleep, but figured that would be a bit rude, especially seeing it was "the BEST day ever!".

So we got up, made coffee and began the process of opening packets, untwisting ties, installing batteries, fastening costumes and loading Nerf darts.

After all the chaos had subsided, I found a solitary 8 year old in his room, setting up a Lego game.  "Is Santa real?" he asked me.  I wasn't shocked, I knew it was coming.  Ever since the tooth fairy trap, he has been suspicious, even to the point of instructing me to set up his iPod to record the lounge room as I went to bed on Christmas Eve.  I played along, always intending to 'have the talk' after Christmas. 

He was fascinated in the schematics.

"So YOU put the lemons and the lime in my stocking?"

Yep

"And the jar of Olives!?"

Yep

"So YOU bought me the Mario hat?"

Yep

"So YOU ate the biscuits?"

Well, technically that was Daddy.  But yep!

"And the carrot mess outside?"

My teeth.

"Can I help you next time!?"


This has gone on for a few nights as he has processed all of the events.  He knows what an important secret it is, he understands why we want to keep the magic alive for his younger brothers.  He is reveling in joining the secret club.

Preparations are very important on Chrismtas Eve, especially if you are in charge of taste testing the Santa Gingerbread.  Reindeer food was sprinkled, times 4 packets.. just to be sure.  And carrots were placed as offerings for any reindeer's with oat allergies. 

The boy who held up the proceedings, sleeping in, blissfully unaware that his 3 brothers were literally bouncing off the walls waiting for him to wake.  When he did get up, he made a bee-line to his new Fire and Police station house and wouldn't budge for half an hour.  Refusing food, refusing other presents and generally just grunting people away if they approached.  When he finally did come up for air, he quickly decided that the singing and dancing Alien with the green glowing bloodshot eye was seriously too freaky for him and quickly found the off switch before throwing it away as far as he could manage. 

The new plush toys were a big hit.

As were some of the other gifts.

Gearing up for school with backpacks purposefully chosen to suit.

And just a random selection of photos from our day.  The quality of the photo's is considerably low to be able to fit so many on.

I have some blogging news!   Today, I am joining the IBOT (I Blog on Tuesdays) Team over at Essentially Jess.  I am -very- excited to be on board and can't wait to get started!   Which coincidentally happens today!


If you have enjoyed reading this and/or my photos, please subscribe via email at the top of the page.  Then head over and like my Facebook page.  And then... follow along at Twitter too!

The year was 2012

 

January

After spending Christmas in Coolum, we spent all of January in Broken Hill, we stayed in our house that we own there, basically like squatters, with minimal furniture.  The boys had a great time playing with their cousins everyday, swimming and seeing Grandparents and Great Grandma often.  I loved being back there with family in the heat, now that we are in Tassie I really miss a long hot summer.

And Legoman learned to ride a bike (without training wheels)! And then couldn't get enough of it.  We ended up in a storm on this day.

February

We had a Birthday in February, Legoman turned 8 on Valentines day.  We had his party at local park/beach and it was 38 degrees!  The cake I made was a bit of a flop, not only because of the heat, but basically I just butchered that one.  Sorry son!

                                                It was meant to be a Minecraft cake.

School started, Legoman in Grade 2, and Voltorb started full time school (Prep).  Voltorb's teacher was new to the school, so we were unsure at first.  But she has been so lovely, a breath of fresh air.  She had him pegged in those early weeks, and catered to his sensitive ways.  She also taught the Magic Words (which the school in general doesn't do, weird, I know), and introduced the Home Reading books to keep track of your reading days.  Undoubtedly this helped him get a solid foundation to reading and he has improved in leaps and bounds.   Unfortunately she is moving on (really long story, but so not fair), so the school has lost a brilliant teacher.

First day of School 2012.

March

March saw our annual visit from Coder's parents.  They live in Florida and come to visit every year for 3 weeks.  This year we had just his Dad come, and he was able to squeeze in downstairs, sharing a bunk with one of the boys.   During his time here we took a trip up to Binalong Bay, which is on the NE coast of Tassie.  It was a beautiful spot (right on the beach) and a very memorable trip.  It gave me a great opportunity to get to know my camera a bit more.

This looks familiar yes?  It was taken at Binalong Bay in March.

Coming Grandpa!

April

On the second day of April I started to blog.   You can't get rid of me now.   I feel like it's something I should have been doing long before, it seems to suit me well.  Or so the little voice in my head tells me, and it is always right you know.

Easter was thrown in there somewhere too.  

May

Another birthday, Voltorb turned 6!  We had a big joint pirate party for him and his best buddy who also turned 6 in May.  I wrote a blog post about it, and it was the first post that I got alot of feedback from family about.  My sister told me it was 'hilarious', yay!  At that stage, it was only family and a few friends that were reading it.

 Mummy and Daddy playing pirates.

The hidden treasure that they had to find using a map and clues.

 Yes, he insisted on wearing his glow in the dark skeleton PJs to his party. 

We also began the long drawn out process of the house extension.

June

We visited Broken Hill again in the June school holidays.   Actually, it was a surprise visit too.  No one knew we were coming, but everyone loved that we did!  Or so they made us believe!  The trip over was fairly incident free.  The trip home? Well not so much, and please, read about it here before you decide to fly alone with 4 young children.
"Not sure what happened, but somehow the good children from Flight May31 had been replaced by the hyper, hearing impaired children from June14."

Cousins.

July

We had visitors from Broken Hill, and even though we waited for more snow, it didn't make an appearance.  But nevermind, we made do with some patchy week old snow!

 My youngest niece, this was her first experience with snow.  She's a fast learner as you can see.

August

August was a pretty rough month for us.  Oshawott ended up in hospital for 7 days with Scarlet Fever, and then Pneumonia.  It took weeks to completely get over it, and get back to his normal eating habits and not scratching himself to shreds.  He was incredibly brave, even when very miserable.   A week after coming home from hospital we celebrated his 4th Birthday, and made sure it was a doozy!   

September

Pichu turned 2 in September.  

 I made him two different cakes as we ended up having two celebrations.  Lucky boy! 

Father's Day was earlier in the month and after getting his present a few days early, (well it is almost impossible to keep a piano hidden you know!), we spent Father's Day at Mt Field National Park.  And even got to have a snowball fight.

During the September School holidays I took the boys up to Launceston.

And in September I flew to Melbourne for a one day Intermediate Photography class with the Nikon School.

 

October

Nothing special really, just my Birthday, plus a warm day saw us head to the beach where I used my new tripod to get some family photos.

November

Gearing up for Christmas, I took the boys to the Hobart Christmas Pagaent.  Plus, Legoman helped out at McHappy Day with his Scouts Troop.

December

December see's me making masses of Gingerbread.  Other then that, School has just finished for the year, so that is a big relief as the boys are just exhausted.

And then there is that small matter of Christmas Day that is fast approaching!  I think I am 95% organised, and I'm pretty happy with that at the moment.


If you have enjoyed reading this and/or my photos, please subscribe via email at the top of the page, and one day when I work out how to actually use Feedburner you will get updates in your inbox (I think it may be working!).  Then head over and like my Facebook page.  And then... follow along at Twitter too!

The persistant Mummy.

Persistence paid off, it was painful, laughable at times, but we got there in the end.

Last week I shared with you the out-takes from our Christmas photo session.  This week, now that most of the cards should have arrived at their destinations, I will reveal the better ones. 
 

So I managed to get some ok individual ones that I then used for our Christmas card collage.

If you have enjoyed reading this and/or my photos, please subscribe via email at the top of the page, and one day when I work out how to actually use Feedburner you will get updates in your inbox.  Then head over and like my Facebook page.  And then... follow along at Twitter too!  If you do all of this you will get a puppy*.

*no actual puppies will be distributed.


 I'm linking up with Grace today, at With Some Grace, for FYBF (Flog your Blog Friday)

The face of Christmas at our house.

The face of Christmas at our house is sometimes happy, sometimes not.  Perfect example was on the weekend when I attempted to get that perfect Christmas card photo.

Basically that didn't happen.  

But I did manage to get enough pics here and there to do a collage Christmas card instead.

It was probably not a good idea to start this project an hour before bedtime to begin with.  But I was running out of time, everyone was home, everyone was awake, and no one had skipped a nap that day.  So I had to take what I could get.   As it turned out, there -should- have been two boys napping that day, because Voltorb was point blank refusing to participate from the get go.  

That's the spirit!

Not.

I should have guessed this would be a problem for him, as a few days earlier, he had refused to even talk to Santa, let alone sit on him!  His 4 and 2 year old brothers waltzed right up the big man in red, Voltorb ran back to pram bay.   We weren't even attempting the Santa photo that day, as we were still missing one brother, but I was testing the waters (thinking I may have trouble with Pichu).  

I know I have buckleys of getting a descent Santa photo this year (again).

Intermission saw a bit of mischief with an accidental set breakdown, an intervention (Legoman had a 'talk' with Voltrob to figure out why he was crying), a photo bomber (bottom left), and a hat thief.

Pichu then had to have a turn, but this is nothing compared to some of the Tantrums he throws. You can check out The Tanty Files here.

If you have enjoyed reading this and/or my photos, please subscribe via email at the top right of the page.  Then head over and like my Facebook page.  And then... follow along at Twitter too!  If you do all of this you will get a lollipop*.

*no actual lollipops will be distributed.


 I'm linking up with Grace today, at With Some Grace, for FYBF (Flog your Blog Friday)