Vacation is over

We had a great holiday traveling and now I'm getting back into reality again. We've been back now for a week and a half and the time has flown by. There was so much that happened and we saw so much while we were gone. We took our car, equipped with dvd players, gameboys and notebooks, crayons and pens (and heaps of luggage and supplies of course) and off we went for a month. We left alcie Springs and drove for 2 1/2 days to arrive in Brisbane and Gold Coast where we spent 5 fun days. From there we drove to Sydney, another long days drive, and spent a week doing everything you can imagine. After Sydney we drove a long day to Melbourne and spent another 5 days playing tourist. And from there we took a 2 day drive to Adelaide, stopping to see the 12 apostles along the way and many other scenic views along the great ocean road. We spent a week in Adelaide with friends and tried to find many indoor activities since it rained all but one day while we were there. We saw beaches, collected shells, and were really good at being tourists I think. There is so much more to tell but i'm going to break it down into a post for each stop along the way so that I don't overwhelm and I can include pictures to go with it all. We got to stay in some great hotels that cost us nothing, thanks to our time shares, and Josh's employer paid for the gas so we pretty much just paid for our food, trinkets and fun stuff along the way-what better way to travel! You can look forward to pictures and details in the very near future.

We're off to see the wizard

I actually feel like I've accomplished a lot the last couple days. My house is mostly clean. All the kids bedrooms are clean and vacuumed, my room is clean, my bathroom is immaculate (which almost nver happens), laundry is almost finished, my dishes are all but done, just one load to put in and start and then it'll all be done and nothing dirty left in the house. Pretty much the only thing I have left to do is to straighten the living room and dining room, clean the kids bathroom, which isn't too bad, and then pack the boys and myself and then pack it all in the car. We leave in the morning shortly after Josh gets home from work and I'm exhausted. I think I'll just get it all ready and stick it by the door so he can help me load it up in the morning. Anyway, I'm off to finish up and I'll try and update along the way.

Busy

This week has been so busy and a little bit stressful. It turns out that everybody got this flu bug, except for me. I don't know how I managed to avoid it because I'm usually the first person to catch whatever it is because I have this low immune system or something. I have had a cold though, but I can handle that much better than I can the flu. I think the weirdest thing is that all the kids got this flu bug but it only lasted for about 8 hours and then they were fine and going crazy and driving me nuts again. They had the diarrhea for a couple of days but seemed to be able to get by alright with it. Then, a couple days later, they all got lethargic again and started vomiting for another 8 hours or so. What kind of flu acts like that? It was so weird. Anyway, it's done and gone now and everybody seems to be feeling much better. It's a good thing because the only thing I accomplished last week was cleaning up after their vomit and changing sheets, etc. My poor house suffered more than I wanted it to but we've fixed that this weekend for the most part.

This week is going to be a bit more stressful. We leave for vacation next weekend and we'll be gone for a month. I have most everything for the actual trip done but now we have to clean and pack. That means making the house clean enough that when we come home we won't be disgusted to be here, making lists of things to do and things to pack and all that fun stuff. I'm anxious to go and we'll be able to say that we've been to all the Australian temples but 1 when we get back. We have a bunch of activities planned that we've looked up online and made lists of possible things to do in each place. It'll be a fun trip and memorable for all of us, it's just all the stuff you have to do to get ready that can be bothersome. That's alright, it's all worth it in the end. So, I'm off to make some lists and then pack lunches so the kids can eat at school tomorrow.

Good Days

There are days when I end the day thinking "gosh, my kids must think I'm a big, mean ogre" or that I really had a bad day. Most days have the sort of an ending where I lost my temper or did or said something that I'm sure my kids or husband weren't happy about. Then there is the occasional day where I put the kids in bed and sit down to think"gosh, that was a good day".

Today was one of the latter. Even though I was awakened last night to give cold medicine to a sick kid (that Josh had just bitten his head off for waking HIM up), the kids woke me up earlier than I would normally like to have woken up, there was no school today for an Australian public holiday but Josh still had to work, we started having a flu bug through the house about lunch time and, even though I got to lay down for a nap with kids today, I got awakened 4 times to deal with vomitting kids or cleaning up the vomit that was spilled from the "throw up bucket" and onto a bed. Somehow I was able to deal through it all and was even patient and didn't yell at anybody for anything too miniscule today. Somehow I didn't mind having to get up to deal with kids while I was sleeping (I am normally very grouchy when they wake me up from a deep sleep). And, even when Josh came home in a bad mood, it still didn't phase me the way it normally would. I got some cleaning done today, did some dishes and even had plenty of computer time and got to talk on the phone to family for a couple of hours to boot.

I wonder sometimes what it is that makes the difference, why it is that I can sometimes deal through all of the chaos and not have it phase me, when most of the time I get really frustrated or lose it. I don't pretend to understand it all but am really thankful when a day ends the way it has today and hope and pray that tomorrow can be just as nice.

Happy Birthday to Rebekah!

From then.....

to now.....

Rebekah is 4 today. I can't believe it most days. Sometimes it's the wonder that she's 4 already and other days it's that she's only 4. She acts so much older and is so smart. She can be such a little spark of sunshine one minute and then a little terror the next. She is definitely a girl-and isn't that what I asked for? I went into labor with her while we were going to a session at the temple and all of the temple workers were freaking out and wondering what they could do to help. Little did they know that being where I was was an answer to prayers because it meant a 5 minute drive to the hospital instead of an hour to 2 hour drive. I remember having her and the wonder of holding her little tiny and new body in my arms. She was a good little nurser and was definitely Mamma's girl (and still is most days). I'm so glad that the Lord sent her to me and, even when she's throwing her tantrums and fits (which is most of the time lately) she knows that I still love her and wouldn't give her up for anything. Happy Birthday Rebekah!

Crazy drivers

I was driving last week and thinking to myself how lucky we had been since we got here not to have had any accidents or anything. There are so many traffic circles here and, surprisingly, things run pretty smoothly through them and there are very few accidents. Now, you still here from all sorts of people about the accidents they got into in traffic circles but it's not usually anything serious. In fact, most of the people that I know of with good dents and dings in their cars got them while they were parked someplace and they came out to find that somebody had hit them and taken off. It's apparently pretty common here.
So, I guess that when I was driving and thinking those thoughts last week, I forgot to knock on wood or something. I went to the school today to pick up the kids and parked my car in the line along the road with all the other parents in front of the school. I went into the office and talked with them and then grabbed my kids and we headed out to the car. As we walk past the line of buses and the car comes into my line of vision I noticed a good dent in the door. I was thinking to myself "wow, that's a big dent. I wonder how long it's been there. I don't remember seeing it before. I wonder how it got there." Then my thoughts turned to "Oh no, I wonder if somebody hit me while I was parked here".
So we get even to the car and get ready to cross the street to it and this girl with a YMCA shirt on turns to me and says "Is that your car there?" I said yes and she proceeds to tell me that the bus driver just backed into my car. She was indicating toward where the school's bus usually parks but the shed it parks in was closed and it didn't look like it had been opened in awhile. And she kept saying "She" and I know that the school's bus in driven by a man. Then, around the corner comes an unmarked bus. It's not a huge bus or anything but still a good sized bus. The girl tells me that it's the YMCA's bus and she doesn't know why they let this lady drive it and tells me all about her backing into a tree last week while she (this girl) was yelling at her and another lady was honking at her.
So the bus driver pulls into the bus lane to park and has most of the bus sticking out into the middle of the road. Don't they check these people out before they let them drive buses? And then they're picking up a load of kids for after school care-makes you feel for those children's safety doesn't it? I'm trying to figure out what I'm supposed to do now, we haven't been in an accident since we got here 2 1/2 years ago and things aren't done the same here as in the states. The bus driver gets out, with most of the bus still sticking out into the road mind you, and proceeds to apologise saying "I know it's not any consolation, but this is the first time that I've ever hit anything and I thought I had plenty of room for a 3 point turn there." Wait a minute! Didn't the other girl just finish telling me she hit a tree last week? Besides, buses are supposed to drive around the loop and aren't supposed to be making 3 point turns on this road. Then Noah turns to her and says "but look at all the dents in your bus. You have to be more careful how you drive." Go Noah! You should have seen the other girl's face and the old lady trying to worm her way out of that one.
Anyway, they take down my name a number and tell me that somebody from the Y will be calling me in about half an hour or so and we can get it worked out. They also offered to call the police to file a report but I still needed to get Rebekah and they needed to pick up other kids (poor kids). Long story short, they are going to call me back tomorrow with all the insurance info and get it taken care of. It's not too bad, the door still opens and I'm pretty sure it'll just pop back out without any further damage (I hope), At least we weren't in the car when she did it. I think I'll talk to them tomorrow about maybe getting her to take another driving course or maybe some more practice hours or something cause, goodness knows, she sure needs it and those kids riding the bus deserve more competency.
Here are a couple of pictures of the dent. Like I said, it isn't so bad, it's just that she probably shouldn't be driving around a bus full of kids without more training to be doing so.

How did he get so smart?

Caleb is 19 months old now (or he will be in a few days anyhow) and he amazes me every day at just how smart he is. Tonight he was down by my desk and playing with the main part of my computer. He likes to play with this and has, on numerous occasions, pushed the power button and shut everything off while I'm in the middle of things. We've fixed most of the stuff he could mess with down there by covering it up with index cards and tape. So now about the only thing he can play with is the disc drive, which he proceeded to play with. He found the little button that opens and closes it and pushed it to find that it came open. I was in the middle of a game that would have been lost if there was a disc in there that popped anything up on my screen and had to be closed, so I checked to make sure there was no disc inside-nothing so I was safe and he could play. I commented this to Josh and we went on letting him play. after a couple of minutes he left, I thought he was done already-short attention span and all. Nope. He came back a minute later with the DVD that had been in the player in our bedroom, popped open the disc drive and proceeded to put the DVD in. Little smarty pants! How did he know that would work? He does play with the DVD player in our room and thinks it's so much fun (that's what we get for placing it down where he can reach it) and the two pop out just the same way, so I can see how he associated the two. He was quite upset when I grabbed the disc just before he could push it in but man, how did he get so smart?