Becca's Musings

The Lead-Up to the Birth of Grace

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 00:07:00 +0000

First I'll give you some of the background story.

When I fell pregnant with Grace I didn't immediately rush to the doctors to have it confirmed as I'd already been there, done that and had my own idea of dates. I did eventually go though, and then got told that I should have gone in sooner as the hospitals liked people to book in earlier than they used to and I needed to go for an ultrasound to confirm my dates. I was happy with mid to late November as a date, the doctor estimated the 18th of November, a little more exact but still pretty much the same as my dates. The ultrasound place was horrible. They weren't rude exactly but they weren't friendly, I was in and out with barely a handful of words spoken to me. They said my due date was the 23rd November and gave me a disk to give to my doctor upon leaving. When I went back to my doctor and went to give him the disk he said that I was to keep it as they would send him a report.

After a couple of months I noticed that the doctor was still going on the date of the 18th and asked him about it as I was going on a later date. He said no that this was the date we had always been going by. I didn't question this and also thought that it was great that the baby would come earlier that I was expecting. I love my babies but hate being pregnant because I am always so sick and this time seemed even worse.

So my due date was coming up and I had been having lots of Braxton Hicks contractions, once I even thought it was the real thing. Every day I would wake up wondering if this would be the day our baby girl would make her appearance. And then I had a tooth-ache and during the night one of my glands started swelling and by the morning was the size of a small ball. I was in agony and immediately went to the dentist. The dentist took out the offending tooth after an x-ray showed that she could do so safely and sent me on to the hospital to get IV antibiotics for the abscess. When I first got to the hospital at 12pm the anesthetic was still working, by the time I got in to be seen (after 4pm) I was in agony. I hadn't eaten or drank anything since breakfast as the signs in the hospital say not to.

So 39 1/2 weeks pregnant with a tooth removed, huge abscess, starving and dehydrated and waiting on horribly uncomfortable chairs for over 4 hours and I finally get to go behind the mystery doors.....only to have to wait again. At least it was only for 1/2 an hour this time. The doctor took one look at me and immediately handed me off to the first doctor who walked past us. The second doctor took a brief history and said that because I was so pregnant that I really should go to Dandenong hospital, where I was booked in to have the baby, to be admitted and have the antibiotics overnight. He then promptly disappeared to find a bed for me. After what seemed like an eternity, but was probably closer to 1/2 an hour or so, I was in so much pain tears were pouring down my face and I begged Tim to get a nurse as it appeared that the doctor wasn't coming back. He managed to get a nurse's attention and she quickly moved me to a bed (no more uncomfortable chair!) and asked me how much pain was I in. I said that on a scale of 1-10 it was a 14, according to Tim the look on her face was that she didn't believe me, she asked some more questions and about my previous births. I guess she was assuming I was a bit of a cry-baby and asked about pain-killers I'd had during my births and when Tim told her that I don't have pain-killers and that I'd rather be giving birth now she straight-away went and sorted out some pain relief for me. Finally I was in less pain and someone gave me some kind of electrolyte icy pole and IV fluids. What surprised me about all this was that a)I didn't go into labour and b)my blood pressure barely changed. While in hospital they did an ultrasound to make sure the baby was okay and she was and the internal ultrasound showed that my body was not ready to give birth.

Fast forward a week and it's past my due date. I went to the doctors for my regular weekly checkup. I did not expect him to ring the hospital and book me in for an induction. With other babies we had talked about it but I'd never made it far enough past my date for it to actually happen. He did some kind of check and gave me a 'Bishop Score' of 3. I had to google that when I got home, but basically it meant that my chances of the induction working would be low. I walked out of there in shock. I knew that I didn't want or need an induction but could not say why. After the shock wore off I researched induction to find out the pro's and con's and quickly came to the conclusion that the con's outweighed the pro's, especially considering that both the baby and I were in good health, I mean I'd been through a tooth removal and an abscess and my blood pressure had barely changed. Because of my age and how many baby's I've already had every body is so quick to assume the worst is going to happen and think they need to intervene. I went and had another ultrasound and the baby was still healthy with plenty of fluid around her but I also remembered that first ultrasound and the different due date. What if the baby wasn't coming because we hadn't even reached the time for her to be born? I know that the medical profession say that a baby is 'term' when we reach 37 weeks but if we force her out when she's not ready what long term effects would that have? So while in the hospital having the ultrasound I asked the nurse if she could get the ultrasound place to fax them a couple of the original report. Sure enough I was only a day or two over not nearly 2 weeks. I went back to the doctor with this report and asked him to ring the hospital to cancel the induction, instead he only postponed it. I didn't make a fuss as I knew I wouldn't make it to that date anyway but I also figured if I did make the date I would find a way not to be induced.

As it was I didn't make it to the second date.

These articles and websites helped me with my decision not to be induced. I hope they might be helpful to others.

http://www.ivillage.com/when-baby-due/6-a-129259

http://www.joyousbirth.info/articles/drcommentsonpostmaturity.html

http://www.theunnecesarean.com/blog/2009/10/3/postdates-separating-fact-from-fiction.html

http://mumatopia.com/2010/04/22/in-their-own-sweet-time-a-journey-into-post-date-pregnancy/

http://www.whale.to/a/labour.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fPauJEy7

http://www.bellybelly.com.au/birth/induction-of-labour-to-induce-or-not-induce

I think the last one is my favourite. Next time I'll be going for that early ultrasound to confirm dates as I don't want the stress of the confusion or the pressure to be induced again if I can help it. I am so grateful for Tim who stands by me even if I get a little crazy and insist on not being conventional. I'm also grateful for my friend Clare for all the information she shared with me and who is such an inspiration. And I'm also grateful for all the prayers during my pregnancy and labour.

Announcing Our New Baby Girl

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 12:29:00 +0000

Grace Ellen Lillian was born at 8:32pm on the 30th November. She came naturally, narrowly avoiding an induction and is such a peaceful little girl. She weighed 3870g and was 51cm long.

Breastfeeding: The Nitty Gritty (or: why I think I have never had mastitis)

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 00:57:00 +0000

I've decided to keep the breastfeeding theme going. If you're a guy reading this I'll probably get a little personal so you might want to stop reading this post now.

Either I've got really good genes or was given some great advice when I was new to breastfeeding. I think it was more the advice so I thought I'd share that advice here.

Firstly I'd like to say that I am NOT a lactation consultant and if you really need advice and are having problems you NEED to talk to one. In Australia we have the Australian Breastfeeding Association that you can ring. I'm only passing on the information that I've learned on my breastfeeding journey.

Of course it hasn't always been a smooth road but really the only times I've had trouble while breastfeeding is when I've been too tired to pay too much attention to how well the baby has latched on. The first thing that you need to learn is how to latch the baby on to your breast properly. Don't be afraid to ask the nurses in hospital to help you until you feel you've got it down to a fine art. You're only in there with their experience for a short amount of time. With my second child I would call someone in every time I felt he needed a feed and get the nurse to help me get him to latch on. With my newborn I make sure I'm sitting up nice and straight and comfortable, the baby is normally resting on a pillow on my lap. This allows me to use both my hands to position the baby's head and my breast. I'll normally hold the baby's head in one hand and my breast in the other, then I tickle their mouth with the nipple and when their mouth is wide open pretty much shove them on (very descriptive, I know). Make sure their bottom lip is near the edge of your areola, this should mean that your nipple is in far enough.

More often than not even if you don't get cracked nipples, or mastitis, you may still get grazes or just be sore. I don't really recommend using anything except breast milk on your nipples as the idea is to keep them as dry as possible in between feeds and most products out there have harmful ingredients in them. When I first started having children the big thing was putting lanolin on your nipples to moisturise them and yes it might have been 'natural' but the sheep the lanolin came from were dipped in chemicals so there was every chance that these chemicals were in the lanolin. Anyway I think if you keep them dry enough in between feeds, changing your nursing pads when they get wet from leakage, you can do without these moisturisers. Plus do you really want your baby swallowing these with their feed? There's even no need to wash your nipples with anything special, just water will do. This will keep them as natural as possible for your baby.

So you think you've gotten the whole breastfeeding thing down pat and then your milk 'comes in'. What joy! (only kidding). It can be quite a shock when you're new to this, and these days they send you home from hospital before your milk comes in and if you do not have a good support system with good advice in place you may be at a loss. This is where most new mums get into trouble, they're milk supply is in excess of their baby's needs and the breasts aren't getting drained enough. There are a few things that you can do to help with this until things settle down, that won't affect your milk supply.

I've mentioned in a previous post that I have never used a breast pump. I'm not against them, I just never needed to, but I have hand expressed. When you're full to bursting and you're baby is already satisfied and it's no good trying to make them drink more hand expressing will give you some relief. Position your thumb above your nipple, on you areola and two fingers under and gently press. You won't get anything squeezing your nipple, it needs to be the areola. You can express into a sterilized container and keep it for baby or into a cloth nappy or rag, I've even heard of someone expressing straight into the bath to be washed away.

Change baby's position when you feed him or her. Where the baby's chin is is where your breast gets drained the most so it's useful getting comfortable with other feeding positions such as the football hold and laying down. Just make sure that the baby's chin is towards the sore part of your breast. Also as you feed gently rub your breast towards the nipple. This will help dislodge any blockages that might be building up and help with the release of milk from that part of your breast.

I don't hear this technique very often and it can be misused and start to dry up your milk but it can be useful for really engorged breasts if you use it the right way. That is cabbage leaves. You only need to use a part of a clean leaf tucked into your bra against the sore part of your breast. Don't leave it there for long and don't use this too often as you don't want it to affect your milk supply. This is more for if the other techniques just aren't doing their job and I would suggest that you get more professional advice than mine before trying this technique. I don't know the science behind this, though I am sure that you could find out if you googled it, but it does work.

When your milk first comes in it may feel like it will stay that way forever but it will soon sort itself out as your body comes to learn how much milk your baby needs.

Make sure that each breast is drained before moving onto the next one. I remember being told to feed 10 mins on one side and then 10 mins on the other. This is BAD advice! I only feed on one side per feed and if the baby falls asleep before I think he or she has finished and wants more a 1/2 hour later I'll offer the same breast back. This will make sure that the baby has had the more filling hind milk and not just the fore milk and will make sure that your breast is drained, leaving less of an opportunity for blocked ducts. If you have a problem remembering which breast you fed the baby on last, which is a reality for a sleep deprived new mum, I keep a clean tissue in the bra cup that I did not feed the baby on. This tissue is not replacing the nursing pad but just tucked in as a reminder that I did not feed the baby on that side. On the other hand if you think that baby has drained that particular breast but is still looking for more then do change sides (this especially happens when baby is having a growth spurt or you haven't rested enough or drunk enough water), don't forget to offer the second breast first for the next feed.

I've probably left a lot of other information out but the Australian Breastfeeding Association has a great informative website and if that doesn't have the information you're after I highly recommend that you ring one of their Lactation Consultants.

Tips for Successful Breastfeeding

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 00:36:00 +0000

My last post ended up being so long that I decided to split it in two.

My tips on successfully breastfeeding:

don't worry about doing everything. You need to rest to build up a healthy milk supply and the housework will always be there but time with your newborn or young baby slips away so fast and before you know it they're a toddler and don't have as much time for you.
drink plenty of water. Lay off the tea and coffee for a while, or at least cut it down. Water is the best thing for a breastfeeding mum and baby.
listen to your baby. I know this can sound a bit trite but you and your baby need to get to know each other and your baby will let you know how they're going. Whether it's throwing up from too much feeding or needing extra feeds because they're going through a growth spurt there'll be some indication of what needs to be done.
don't be afraid to ask for help. Once more I'll post the link to the Australian BreastfeedingAssociation for those who live in Australia. Christian was my 5th child and I still needed their experience to help me through a rough patch.
Find positive, supportive people who will encourage you to continue when you're feeling like giving up. This doesn't mean people who'll just tell you to 'suck it up, Princess' but people with helpful advice.
This may fly in the face of some public opinion but I don't recommend supplementary feeding. Your body is able to cope with your baby's demands. If you think they are extra hungry feed them more and soon enough you'll be supplying more milk. I personally think that supplementary feeding interferes with a mum's milk supply too much but also feeds the doubts that are there in the back of your mind. That's not to say that the occasional bottle doesn't come in handy. I have to confess that even after having seven cherubs I've never expressed milk using a machine, only hand expressed for some relief, and so when I've had to leave my baby with someone I've left a bottle, but I prefer to leave them only between feeds anyway so the bottle is just a back up.
get a sling or a wrap to wear your baby at times when they're needing comfort, not a feed. I can't believe that I waited until my 6th child to get a sling but it is the best investment ever! I don't mean the usual clip on pouches that are found in most baby shops, that hurt your back, neck and shoulders, but something like a ring sling or a Moby Wrap. I bought my ring sling off Ebay, you can just search 'ring sling' and I made my own wrap, it's so simple and no sewing. There are plenty of instructions on baby wearing on the internet to find out how to use the sling and wrap. I was able to go to the beach with 4 children on my own. I had the baby in the sling and was holding the toddlers hand at the edge of the water while the other two paddled in front of me. It was so liberating. I've also been able to feed while walking around the shops, with no-one the wiser, something I never thought I would do.
Research, research, research! If you want to be successful at something put the effort into the research. You won't regret it.

I'm sure there are plenty more tips I can tell you but I believe these are the best ones.

Don't Give Up On Breastfeeding

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 22:37:00 +0000

It's less than two weeks now until bub is due and I've been doing a little extra reading just to get my head in the right place. A great blog I've found is The Mule. She has some great informative and inspirational blogs about birth and breastfeeding which has inspired me to blog about my breastfeeding experiences. I say experiences because every child is different and your body is also different after every baby so just because you think you failed the first time doesn't mean it'll happen again, but also just because you've succeeded before doesn't mean that for a subsequent child you won't be incredibly challenged and feel like giving up.

When I was younger I worked in Child Care. I had an Associate Diploma in Child Services and thought I knew everything. I'd also grown up with two younger sisters, I was 13 and 15 when they were born and loved looking after them. Then I go and have my own baby and everything that I knew went out the window. My little sisters were bottle-fed so breastfeeding was new ground for me, I was also the first of my friends to have a baby so I didn't have their experiences to go on. I started off feeding well. Josiah latched on well, the nurses in the hospital were very helpful so I didn't end up with mastitis or cracked nipples, it was a great start to breastfeeding. But around the 6 week mark Josiah started crying all the time and wanting to suck. He had a dummy but as an inexperienced parent I thought he was hungry so I kept feeding him and he kept throwing it up. I didn't understand what was going on. How could we have it all sorted out so easily and then this? It wasn't until it was too late that I realised that he had severe reflux and that was his problem, I thought it was me and my milk. I was feeding him every hour and he was throwing most of the feed up and still crying and still wanting to nurse. I don't remember anyone encouraging me to continue breastfeeding but that doesn't mean it never happened, I never have a good memory after a baby is born (or before). I went to a Maternal Health Drop In Centre but still felt discouraged and incompetent and decided that the best thing for both of us was to put him on the bottle. Because I had grown up with bottle-fed babies it was very easy for me to listen to my inner doubts and wean him onto the bottle, I thought that at least that way I knew how much he was getting and in that respect I was right. He still threw up a lot, though. We nick-named him Cyclone Chuck because he'd get into a room and destroy it whilst throwing up everywhere.

After realising that it was reflux and not me that was the problem I regretted putting him on the bottle so hastily and was determined with child number 2 that I would breastfeed as long as possible. So Elijah came along and while I was in hospital I would call the nurse in every time I needed to feed him so that he latched on properly. I think they got sick of me needing so much attention but I figured that's what they were there for. Once more at around the 6-7 week mark I had a crying baby who couldn't seem to get enough from me. Only this one didn't throw up as much. Just in case I decided to space his feeds a little further apart than I thought he wanted. He was a big boy, 9lb7oz when born, so wasn't about to waste away. This worked for me and within a week or two we were back to a normal routine. I put his fussiness down to a growth spurt and all my children have gone through this period of fussiness between 6 and 8 weeks of age.

Kahlia was very different. We didn't have any latching problems but she cried and cried and wouldn't be put down. She needed more feeding than the boys, it could be because I had 3 little ones so was a lot busier and not resting enough or drinking enough water for good healthy milk production, but making her wait for too long between feeds was not the way to go with her. I fed her more often and when this was still going on at 3 months started feeding her solids early. This helped settle her greatly and didn't interfere with my breastfeeding her. I managed to feed her until she was 13 months old.

I fed Daniel until he was 7 months old and regretted putting him on the bottle, even though I was classed as successfully breastfeeding him we had so many problems once he started being bottle-fed. Once he was on the bottle we noticed he had an allergy to lactose and to gluten, we hadn't noticed it before then. So we had to find formula's without either, which in 2000 and 2001 was very hard, they'd just started bringing in food that was without one or the other but not both. Thankfully he grew out of it between 2 and 3 years of age and he probably would've had these problems eventually if I had fed him for longer but I think that breastfeeding negated the effects of his allergies and we wouldn't have had to face them so early. If you're wondering why I stopped breastfeeding him so early it was because I had 4 little ones with only 18 mths between Elijah and Kahlia and 22 mths between Kahlia and Daniel. I was overwhelmed with life and didn't think I could cope with anymore children and was so stressed with the thought of getting pregnant again I just wanted to go on the pill. Look at me now, having baby no. 8.

So far I'd been very blessed and hadn't had to experienced cracked nipples or mastitis, but with Christian I made the mistake of buying cheap nursing pads with plastic on them and accidentally put one in my bra with the plastic side on my skin. This kept my nipple from drying out between feeds and sure enough next feed cracked nipple. It was extremely painful and after a couple of days I noticed puss coming out, ewwww! I hadn't experienced that before and wasn't sure if I should still be feeding on that side so I rang the Australian Breastfeeding Association for some information and was told that it was still fine to feed him on that side especially as I didn't want my milk supply to slow down. I decided though that that side needed a bit of a rest so I'd feed twice on the good side and once on the sore side and then when it was healed went back to feeding normally. I fed Christian until he was 14 months old.

With Rose I had a completely different experience. I didn't feel my milk come in like usual and I rarely felt the 'let down' that I usually felt when I fed my babies, yet we had no feeding issues with her and I fed her until she was 18 months old. I loved the experience of feeding her at that age but once again I was pregnant and she weaned herself off me.

And Emily, child no.7, she was even worse than Kahlia. Because I had issues with her quick birth and it took the nurses so long to figure out that I was in a lot of pain and I had a separation of the stomach muscles I was put on strong painkillers. That was okay while I was on them, Emily slept a lot and seemed like the perfect baby. But once I came off them, which I did as soon as possible, she was another child altogether. It seemed like she was always attached to me, and when she wasn't she was crying and crying. She wasn't too chucky so I think it was coming off the painkillers that affected her so badly and thankfully I had a sling and a wrap so I could carry her with me and also older children who could hold my fussy little girl.

So seven children and 7 completely different experiences. I've been so blessed to not have had any attachment issues, or mastitis. My advice is to read as much possible on the positive experiences of breastfeeding and get good counselling from people who are going to encourage you. It is easy, when you're new at this, to just go and get some formula but I know that if you get the right advice and persevere you can get past that stage.

I guess people might be wondering why I stopped feeding my children when I did and the most common reason was that I was pregnant again. I know about tandem feeding but I get so sick and tired and my body doesn't do well being pregnant and breastfeeding at the same time so for the sake of the new little one I normally stop when I'm a couple of months pregnant.

Update on Yoghurt

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 20:29:00 +0000

It's been a couple of days now and I've been making yoghurt day and night. The kids LOVE it! Since the first batch I've been taking out 3 tablespoons of the new yoghurt to make the next batch before I put it in the fridge, and adding different flavours to it. I've used honey in one and, because Tim is diabetic I used vanilla and stevia powder in another and they've set fine. So once you've got your first batch of yoghurt made here's what you do:

Take 3 tablespoons of yoghurt and put into the yoghurt maker container, plus 1 and 1/3 cups powdered milk. Add sweetener or other (the one I have setting at the moment is cinnamon and honey) and fill 1/2 way with cold water (I just use water from the tap). Shake well and then fill all the way up and shake again. Fill the yoghurt maker up to the baffle with boiling water and sit the yoghurt container in there. Leave it as long as you would normally, when making yoghurt from the packet.

Enjoy!

Making Yoghurt With Powdered Milk

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 22:36:00 +0000

I just wanted to let you know about a new recipe I recently found out about. We love yoghurt in this house but with so many kids it goes so quickly and even making it yourself with an Easiyo Yoghurt Maker it is still expensive. I was googling yoghurt making and found a blog that was really interesting so I tried it out. Here's the recipe:

3 Tablespoons yoghurt maker culture

1 1/3 cups powdered milk

Make like you would in the yoghurt maker (fill 1/2 way with water, put the lid on and shake, then fill all the way with water and shake again then fill the yoghurt maker with boiling water to the baffle)

We've always got powdered milk in the cupboard for emergencies and a bag of powdered milk from Aldi is so much cheaper than several sachets of yoghurt culture.

I made it this way for the first time last night and it set even better than usual. I like the fact that it is less sweetened than other yoghurts and you can add your own fruit to it.

Here's the link to the actual blog: http://sustainablesuburbia.net/how-to-make-yoghurt-from-scratch-in-an-easiyo-yogurt-maker/

Homeschooling While Pregnant

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 08:47:00 +0000

I don't often blog about our homeschooling life, let me correct that, lately I haven't been blogging much at all! I often wonder how other families do it. Sometimes it's so hard to fit schooling in with just life in general, especially a large family. The logistics of running a household sometimes leave little time for anything else except taking a well earned break. Since starting our homeschooling journey I've had 2 babies and am about to have another, which will mean eight children in our family, and one thing I've learned is that there is no correct way to go about it, it's what works for you and your family.

So what do we do when I'm pregnant? We relax. I don't know that I actually plan the 12 months out (9mths of being pregnant and the first few months with a new bub) but at the very beginning, when I'm really sick, I only really insist on the basics: maths and reading. Of course they're learning all the time and there are a lot of home duties in the older kid's day so it's not like they're playing games, computer or watching TV all day. Then when I'm feeling a bit better and have more energy we add more subjects to their week. Towards the end of the pregnancy we tend to get even more involved in book work, knowing that once the baby is here we'll probably relax our homeschooling routine again for a few months.

What are we doing right now? I'm about 36 weeks pregnant now and have been in this house for a month and a half. We've also just started a new school term at the beginning of last week. It's the perfect time to re-evaluate what we're doing in our homeschooling. Earlier on in the year I made a Routine Chart for the family which included time allotted for school work, chores and breaks. I've made a few adjustments over the course of time but it is still working for us.

8:30am Have breakfast, showers, dressed, washing on

9:00am Morning Jobs

9:30am 1st Subject

10:30am Clean loungeroom

10:45am Have morning tea

11:00am 2nd Subject

12:00pm LUNCH

1:00pm Clean family room

Second load of washing

1:30pm Lunch jobs

1:45pm 3rd Subject

2:45pm 4th Subject

3:30pm Clean room for 5 mins

This is by no means a strict routine. I would probably have a breakdown if I felt I had to stick to it like glue. But it's a great guide and I find that having this poster up on the wall for the kids to see, rather than a laminated piece of paper that I used to have, gets them more involved.

On the chart it says 4 subjects during the course of the day but in reality they only do 3 as each of the 3 older children take a turn at occupying the little children to allow the older children to study in relative peace. They have large blocks of subjects as this chart is for the older children who are aged 11, 13 and 14 years. I would not expect the younger ones to sit still at a subject for this length of time when they start their formal learning. I also didn't mention that we only do school work 4 days a week. Our eldest son is studying at TAFE and has been having one day a week off so we make that our day off too. It gives us time to just chill but also to get things like folding up and intense cleaning of rooms done.

For their jobs I used to have a roster system but found that it wasn't really working for us so now they have their set chores that they do day in and day out. That doesn't mean they do them without me telling them,though (I wish).

Well that's how we homeschool while I'm pregnant and maybe by the next post we'll have our new precious little one.

So Many Things Happening

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 00:50:00 +0000

I can't believe it's halfway through September already. It's been so mad here in this household. I'm finally over the morning sickness, but still have bouts of it occasionally. We had to be out of our house by the 8th of October so once our tax return came back I pretty much had a full time job looking for a new house. It took 3 months to get accepted for a house 3 years ago with I don't know how many applications I put in. This time I was only looking for a week and a half. I put in a dozen applications on the Monday and before lunch time on Tuesday we had been accepted for one of our favourite houses. We picked up the keys for the new house on the 2nd of September and handed in the keys for our old house on the 12th.

Being nearly 30 weeks pregnant we decided that it would be best to hire cleaners for the old house, thinking they would be able to do a much better job than I or the kids could do, plus they did the yard and the steam cleaning, but we've had nothing but dramas with them. The real estate agent recommended them but also suggested that they needed 2 days to do the cleaning. We think that because they had the 2 days they may have backed off in the urgency and therefore not done a thorough job. On Saturday morning I called the boss and said that it wasn't good enough, which is so unlike me, but we were paying an exorbitant amount of money and I felt in my condition I shouldn't have to go and clean after they'd been there (I did however go and buy 2 bottles of spot cleaner and spot clean the carpets after the steam clean, the carpets looked 100% better). She was very apologetic and sent someone out on Monday morning but he still didn't do a good enough job in the 3 hours he was there so I met the real estate agent at the house on Tuesday morning to explain that I still wasn't happy with the job. She hadn't even walked into the house and was pointing out everything they had missed and once she went through the house rang the boss of the cleaning company who promptly apologised again and said she would personally come out and get the house up to scratch the next day.

So it's the 16th of September now and I've barely started unpacking in the new house. The kids are so whingy because their mum hasn't been around and their toys are still packed. I've been falling asleep right after I get the kids into bed and sleeping right through until they wake up (which beats last week where every day we were up before 6 to get to the old house as soon as possible.).

I've also found out that I'm severely lacking in several important vitamins and minerals. I'm lacking in iron, vitamin D and protein, and I'm also borderline gestational diabetic. So I'm really watching what I eat at the moment, taking extra iron and vitamin D tablets, drinking a protein drink that doesn't have too much sugar and is suitable for pregnant women and not eating sugary things. It's a good thing we don't have many birthdays at the moment, so I'm not making birthday cakes.

My plans at the moment are to get the house in order so that in 3 weeks, when school holidays end, the kids are ready to get going with school work, to get my body up to scratch to deliver a healthy baby and to finally prepare for the baby, which is no easy thing when I have to tackle Mt. Washmore and Mt. Foldmore. I've also been inspired lately to practice decorating cupcakes and to come up with my own cupcake designs, but I won't be eating them :)

Mushroom Risotto

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 07:39:00 +0000

This is one our staples at the moment. I used to hate mushrooms but when I was pregnant with Rose (no.6) I had a craving for them cooked in cream. Now I don't mind them, preferably not raw though.

As I make this off the top of my head some of the measurements may be a little off.

As a general rule I use 1 litre of stock per cup of rice.

For a while I was too scared to make risotto as all the recipes had Arborio rice but once I started making it I realised you can use any rice. We make it fairly often with Basmati Rice.

To give you an idea of how much to make for my large family I use 3-3 1/2 cups of rice, I actually add 1 cup of cheese as well.

Ingredients:

Butter
Rice
Chicken or Vegetable stock (I use stock powder mixed with boiling water)
Sliced Mushrooms
Grana Padano Cheese (you can use parmesan but I like grana padano better)
Cream
Salt and Pepper.

Method:

Melt a few tablespoons of butter in a large non-stick frying pan.
Add rice to frying pan and cook for a couple of mins until grains start to look opaque.
Add boiling chicken or vegetable stock to the rice and stir. Cook for 10-15 mins on medium high stirring occasionally so the rice doesn't stick. If you find that the rice is getting too dry add some more boiling stock.
While the rice is cooking saute some sliced mushrooms in a few tablespoons of butter until soft.
When the rice is ready turn off the heat and stir through mushrooms.
Add around 1/2 cup of grated grana padano cheese and 1/2 cup of cream.
Season with salt and pepper.

My Little Girls Birthday Cakes

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 10:32:00 +0000

My youngest girls turned 3 and 1 earlier this year. I had so much fun making their cakes.

On life and stuff

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 22:48:00 +0000

I haven't blogged much over the last couple of years, I know, but life just gets in the way sometimes. Almost from conception Emily was a handful, with the worst morning sickness for a while and then being so tired and breathless from lack of iron. Normally it's a relief when a baby is finally born but not in Emily's case. I had a separation of the stomach muscles and a herniated belly button and was in agony only a few hours after her birth. Nobody picked up on it until I figured out what the problem was. I was in more pain that child birth and in the middle of her first night she was crying and I was in so much pain I got stuck halfway between sitting up and laying down. I couldn't even reach the buzzer to get a nurse, not that they came when I buzzed them anyway. I finally figured out that if I pushed my belly button in and held it I was in a lot less pain. After I finally got the attention of a nurse we figured out what the problem might be and in the morning I had a visit from the hospital physiotherapist and given a band to wear around my waist. I had to go home that morning, they wouldn't keep me in any longer, it's not their policy to keep women in longer than 2 nights and because she was born a few minutes before midnight that counted as the first night for them. They drugged me up with panadeine forte and Tramadol and made an appointment for me to see the hospital physiotherapist in 6 weeks.

I was not supposed to do any heavy lifting for those 6 weeks but you know what it's like being a mum and 2 days later I was in extreme agony again, feeling like I was going to die. My bowel had gotten caught in the muscles. I took some Tramadol and my husband called the ambulance. They were all busy and were going to take half an hour to get there so Tim drove me to the hospital. By that time the Tramadol was working and I wasn't in as much pain. So the doctor gave me endone, a morphine drug, knowing that I was breastfeeding, I decided to go to my own doctor before I got the script filled and he agreed that if I didn't need it not to get it filled I still had some Tramadol, which was bad enough.

We also had a house inspection coming up when Emily was only 2 weeks old. I knew I didn't want to be in that much pain again so I got the kids working to get the place ready. The owner of the house was also coming to take a look with the agent. We'd already put the inspection off once and couldn't do it again. I thought the place looked great, especially considering that the kids did most of the work, but the owner of the house was not happy, noticing some little rings of dirt around the jets of the spa bath. I'm glad we're moving out of here in October, though I'm worried he's going to try and get some of our bond money.

So on top of all that Emily had reflux and didn't sleep well. She would wake up within 5 minutes of being put down, so we had to hold her most of the time and while that wasn't so bad when she was really little nothing changed as she grew older. She wasn't settling until nearly midnight and even then she was really restless. She needed to be rocked and sung to and the only ones who could settle her were myself and Elijah (13) for the most part. This dragged on and on for months with her starting to pinch me and drawing blood as she was being cuddled, she was also starting to play with a mole I have on my neck, which I couldn't allow her to do. I was hating holding her and giving her a cuddle. I didn't want to get close to my little girl as she just hurt me.

I knew I was in a bad place when she was about 10 months old, when I was getting so frustrated and tired that as I was cuddling her I would squeeze her and yell at her to go to sleep. Don't get me wrong I never hurt her and when I say yell....well....that is comparatively as no-one else in the house heard me. It wasn't just me it was affecting. The other little one's weren't going to bed at a decent time as there was no point, Emily would wake them up with her crying and I was too tired to fight with them to get them to stay in bed. So they were falling asleep in front of the TV at who knows what time. The big kids weren't going to bed at a decent time either because Christian and Rose would wake them up with their noise. I had to do something drastic. I was going to just have to let her cry herself to sleep before something bad did happen.

So I googled 'control crying techniques' and read as much as I could to back myself up. I found out that it would only take about 3 days for things to get better and if after a week there was no change to go and seek medical advice. It was much easier to contemplate doing this knowing that there was a time limit. Her cot was already set up in the girls room, it just hadn't been used as she slept in bed with me. For the first day she cried for 2 hours before she fell asleep. I only went in a couple of times as I felt that I made things worse going in and trying to settle her. The second day she cried for 20 mins before falling asleep and the third day she only cried for 5 mins.

She's now 14 months old and things are a lot better. We still have issues with her sleep. We're slowly getting her to go to bed earlier but she still isn't settling until 9:30pm if I'm lucky. We're putting our foot down with the other littlies and working on getting their bedtime to the same as Emily's although they're so used to sleeping in front of the TV that we're having tantrums, especially our strong-willed Rose. The bigger kids have always been good with going to bed when they're told and so it's just a matter of Tim and I sending them to bed at a decent time, at the moment that time is 9:30, the same as the others, for Kahlia and Daniel, 10:30 for Elijah and well Josiah's nearly 18 so he stays up a little later.

Some of you might be asking where Tim was during all this but if you know me at all you know that don't like to delegate what I feel I should be able to do. Tim would try and take Emily for me but the way she cried just broke my heart and I couldn't bear it (although I look back now and think I should have let him have his way). He really did try to help but I wouldn't let him in, yes I am a little bit of a control freak. Emily was baby no. 7 and this was the first time I had had this issue. It shows that no matter how many children you have each one is different and you handle each one differently. I thank God that we made it through those 12 months with our family intact and our faith intact.

Emily is a gorgeous, intelligent little girl who started walking at 10 months. She loves running up to me and giving me cuddles and I love giving her cuddles. She gives the cutest sloppy open mouthed kisses and dances to any music that comes on. She loves her big brothers and sisters and follows Rose around like her shadow.

Homeschool and the Matrix

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sun, 20 Feb 2011 22:21:00 +0000

I've been thinking about this analogy a lot lately and thought I'd share it.

School is like the matrix. It's not a real world, it's a world made up by adults to keep children conformed, to make them good little robots that follow the system, oh and to get an education. Most kids will survive in the system but a percentage don't. Most parents have been in the system too and can't see anything else but the system, even to the point where their children are killing themselves. Few aren't entrenched in it and are able to take the red pill, to walk a different path, to 'follow the rabbit hole'.

I'm so glad I was one of the few, that my son did not become one of the ones who felt there was no way out except to take his own life, and that I'm teaching my children a different way of looking at the world.

Over the last 6 or seven years I've been on a journey into the rabbit hole (or maybe it's been my whole life as I've never really conformed and still believed in God the Creator and his Son Jesus who died on the cross for my sins) and I've found out so many untruths that this world has told us, not just about education but our health as well as many other things.

So what are you going to do? Take the blue pill and continue to let society dictate what you should believe and how you should live your life? Or take the red pill and step out of the box and, here's another cliche, take of the rose coloured glasses that were put on your eyes when you were a child.

Some great websites that have helped me over the years are:

Home Education Association

Homeschool Australia

Homeschool Australia FAQ

Always Learning Books

Rainbow Divas

Doctor Mercola

Natural News

If you're in Australia and want some more info on homeschooling Rainbow Divas has a secure online chat room with guest speaker Beverley Paine, who has been homeschooling for 20 years, this afternoon and next Monday afternoon.

Some changes coming up

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 06:55:00 +0000

One thing I hate about the New Year is that our rent inspection is usually in the second week. In 2010 I was very pregnant and managed to put it off for a few weeks but this year I didn't have that excuse and it was yesterday. We were only offered a 6 month renewal of our lease last year and since then I've feared that the owner was going to turf us out and I was right. We've been given our 90 day notice to vacate the premises. I'm taking it better than I expected but I suspected this was coming. The real estate agent is very happy with us as tenants and is quite happy to have us rent through them again, except that they don't have any properties out this way so she will give us a glowing reference.

So over the next 3 months I'm going to be a bit distracted with looking for a place to live, packing and moving. Hopefully with our glowing reference it won't be as hard to find a place to live as it was before, even though we have another child. To get the house we're in now we offered extra bond but that hasn't turned out so well and we won't be doing it again.

I have 2 little girls birthdays coming up in the next couple of weeks and I can't wait to make their birthday cakes and post some pics.

9/4/2011: I just realised that I haven't updated on the fact that the owners of our house offered us one more six month lease so we're here until the beginning of October now. This will be our last lease and even if the owners decided that they wanted us to stay we would not.

Christmas Baking 3

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sun, 02 Jan 2011 00:22:00 +0000

Cheeky Little Boy

Christmas Baking 2

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 23:53:00 +0000

I also made Caramel Fudge this Christmas. I use the ingredients list from one recipe but the method from another but I'll put them together in this blog.

Ingredients:

2 x 395g cans sweetened condensed milk

2 cups firmly packed brown sugar

250g butter, chopped

1/3 cup liquid glucose

1/4 cup golden syrup

400g good-quality white cooking chocolate, chopped.

Method:

Line a 28cm x 18cm x 3cm pan with foil or baking paper. Melt butter in a large saucepan. Add brown sugar, golden syrup and condensed milk; stir over a medium heat until boiling. Lower heat and cook, stirring for 10 minutes. Remove from heat and add chocolate; stir until smooth. The fudge will start to set quite quickly, so immediately pour into prepared pan, then spread evenly with the back of a spoon. Allow to cool at room temperature for 30 minutes, then refrigerate until firm. Cut into small pieces.

Christmas Baking

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 23:05:00 +0000

I know these posts are a bit late but I was madly baking for Christmas. I had a very good year baking and everything turned out perfect. The first thing I made was marshmallows. The recipe I use is from my very favourite cookbook The Commonsense Cookery Book.

Ingredients:

3 tablespoons gelatine Vanilla or lemon essence to taste

1 cup cold water Icing sugar

4 cups sugar Cornflour

1 1/2 cups hot water

Method:

Soak gelatine in cold water.
Bring sugar and hot water to boiling point.
Add soaked gelatine.
Boil gently 20 minutes.
Pour into a large mixing bowl. Cool and add essence.
Beat until thick.
Pour into a swiss roll tin lined with baking paper.
When cold, cut into squares and toss in a mixture of icing sugar and cornflour (I have used only cornflour when I've run out of icing sugar and it was still fantastic).

This time I coloured half the mixture pink and I wrapped them up in cellophane.

I Love Sunday

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 23:01:00 +0000

I love my baths and I usually take a cup of tea, a glass of water, something to eat and a book and stay in there for hours. Unfortunately I've only had 2 since Emily was born but I plan to rectify that situation.

I Love Sunday

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sun, 19 Dec 2010 03:55:00 +0000

I love looking at little packages of matching quilting fabrics but I've never actually quilted more than a cushion.

Blog Plug

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sun, 19 Dec 2010 02:01:00 +0000

I found this great blog for crafty people. I love her style and her family values.

My Life...A Happy Circus

Self settling

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Sun, 19 Dec 2010 01:17:00 +0000

It's been a couple of weeks now since I started getting Em to try and settle herself in her cot. I don't know if my last couple of blogs made much sense as I was severely sleep deprived and depressed but the self settling techniques I have been using seem to be working.

When Emily was a little baby I was planning on blogging about how I get my babies to settle themselves without much fuss, I was just going to wait until I actually had her settling to write the blog. Well that didn't happen. She had reflux and cried so much. I gave her a dummy and she still cried. We walked around the room singing 'Jesus Loves Me' to her and she still cried. That was what she got used to so even thought her reflux may not be so bad anymore she still wanted to be cuddled off to sleep and sung to, even when she woke up in the middle of the night. Luckily for me I had so many helping hands to hold her when she needed or to do jobs for me if I was holding Em. And then the pinching started, and boy did it hurt. I had bruises all over my neck and my underarms and as the weeks went past the pinching was hurting more. That child has strong little fingers.

At a home school mums get-together I was talking with another lady about how difficult it was to get Emily off to sleep and that she only slept in her cot for about 5 min's and at the most 20 and that she still needed to rocked and sung to in the middle of the night. This lady had a similar issue with her daughter, who is a couple of months younger that Emily. The lady had been at breaking point and ended up taking her daughter to 'Sleep School'. She told me a little bit about sleep school and what they did. It sounded very much like 'Controlled Crying' which is kind of what I used with my four older cherubs (I'm just such a softy now). I thought to myself I've done this before I can do it again, but I was going to wait until after Christmas.

My sanity had other ideas about the timing, though, and I reached my breaking point 2 weeks ago. I googled controlled crying because I just wanted to have some back-up, I could tell myself that these people did it and it worked for them. Also the info I googled let me know that it would take about 3 days and if it took longer then there was something else that was the problem and to see a doctor. The first day Emily took over 2 hours to settle every time I put her to bed. I only went in a couple of times to check on her, I also had the baby monitor on. The second day it took under an hour each time and the third day we were down to 5 min's for the most part. It was hard, very hard and I hated doing it but I had reached that point.

2 weeks later and she is settling after only a couple of cries most of the time and she has even slept through the night twice. I'm able to get stuff done because I'm not as tired from holding her so much, although she is still going to sleep for the night a little bit too late for my liking (11:30 pm) but we'll get through this too.

Pre-Christmas Post

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 06:35:00 +0000

I'm so frustrated. Last night I was almost finished writing a post but then got sidetracked by visitors and forgot all about it. It was only auto-saved so I don't think I can get it back. Damn!

Anyway lots of things are going on here, I'll share some of them in point form:

Emily has her first tooth.
She is also walking around the furniture and has taken 4 steps.
She loves standing up at the furniture and then letting go to clap.
She gets cuddled to sleep and has been pinching my neck and arms as she goes off to sleep.
She also is really hard to settle so we pace the floor and sing Jesus Loves Me to her even at midnight.
This has drained me so much and is starting to affect my relationship with her so I've put my foot down and we are now in our second day of getting her to go to sleep in her cot.
We've finished up our schoolwork for the year.
I'm looking forward to getting together with family for Christmas. I don't go so much for the commercialism and we don't have santa or a christmas tree but we do have some presents and a kris kringle for our family get together.
Rose is being toilet trained. The weather here has warmed up really quickly so I've been letting Rose and Christian run around in their undies. Rose doesn't have many accidents but she still has to master doing poos in the potty.
Josiah got mostly A's with a couple of B's at TAFE. He'll be doing year 12 next year and has decided her wants to be a helicopter pilot.
The main reason that I haven't posted much this year is that every time I try and post something I have a sooky child wanting my attention and now is included. Rose is sitting on the floor at my feet throwing a temper tantrum and Emily has been crying because I walked away from her....Rose has finally gotten the hint and walked off but she'll probably get into mischief.

Hopefully my next post will have a bit more meat in it. I have all these ideas floating around in my head but I never end up posting them.

What a Wonderful Life

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 10:12:00 +0000

This is my post that I thought I had lost:

Emily is now 10 months old and has gotten her first tooth this week. Today she even took 4 steps. I'm hoping that she might be walking by Christmas so I can brag about it but she won't even be 11 mths old yet so I'm not holding my breath. Last night I cracked it with her and put her into the cot to sleep. I've tried this several times but each time her heart breaking cries made me cave in and I got her up. Lately she's taken to pinching and scratching my neck and arms as she goes to sleep and she REALLY hurts but my neck can take NO MORE and she will now have to go off to sleep on her own. She has been the most fussy of the lot of our children when it comes to sleep. Our usual thing is to cuddle her to sleep singing 'Jesus Loves Me' and pacing the floor, when she was younger this was the only thing that would settle her and she's grown used to it.Of an evening she'll fall asleep while I feed her, I would then take her to bed with me. Not long after that she would start to squirm and groan in her sleep. If left there she would eventually wake up and not go back to sleep until after midnight but I would get up and pace the floor with her. So now we're doing the controlled crying thing. I'll let you know how it goes.

Nearly School Holidays

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 23:52:00 +0000

It's amazing how you feel after a few nights of decent sleep. I've actually been in the frame of mind to sort out the kids homeschooling curriculum for next term and even next year. I've been going through all of the workbooks we already have and seeing if they're suitable for passing down. The kids have been flying through some Spelling and Vocab workbooks that I was hoping would last until the end of the year so I've found some Spelling and Punctuation ones that were barely touched when we first started out and the kids can finish them next term. Kahlia can start on Writing Strands next year. It should be good for her as she loves writing. It wasn't good for Elijah, though, he's a reluctant writer and isn't very good at spelling. I've just found out about a Young Writers Program called NaNoWriMo, it's about writing a novel in a month and I'm signing the kids up to do that. They have a workbook that you can print up to go with it so we'll be doing that next term. They have an adult section so I'll sign up and do it with them.

I want to take on more of a mentoring role so I'm thinking of organising a playgroup out this way for mums who have decided to homeschool their preschoolers. This also gives my preschoolers the opportunity to play with other little kids. They're really bored at the moment and Rose is getting into so much mischief lately.

Elijah wants to be a chef and because he's a reluctant writer I'm getting him a special folder for him to write his recipes in. He'll be able to write his favourite recipes and also the one's he's made up. I'll also put in something that'll let him write how well they turn out.

Daniel is obsessed with xbox games and wants to be a game writer so I'll be focusing on what he needs to do that as well as giving everything a gaming spin. For example his writing activities will be ideas for games, his art and craft can be graphics for his games.

Kahlia does all the work I set for her and more but she's very creative. She'll love the curriculum I write up for teaching Christian his colours and will probably help me implement it. I have a classical art curriculum in the draw that I haven't had time for. Hopefully we'll be able to get into it soon, if we can't get into it as a family I'll get Kahlia to study it on her own.

I haven't really got anything planned to do over the holidays. We might go into Melbourne a few times, maybe to the museum and the aquarium. The kids have been going a little stir crazy because of the illness that's been going around our family. I haven't wanted to go out and pass it on. But we seem to have gotten rid of it at last so I think we might try to get a bit more.

Homeschooling Update

noreply@blogger.com (Becca) — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 22:17:00 +0000

I realise that I haven't written anything about our schooling for a while. I must admit I've been remiss in almost every area since before Emily was born, I'm only now feeling like I'm getting my life back together after her birth and she's 7 months old. I think I'm just getting used to the lack of sleep.

Over the last 12 months or so I've really struggled to get the kids to do any of their school work without me on their backs but with our tax return we bought a new printer so I was able to print up planner pages. My favourite planner pages are from the Joyful Steward Combo from Notebooking Nook, you can get these from Currclick. This time I made books out of them, one for each school kid, as before I would just blutak the pages to the wall and then I'd have them just hanging around after I took them down, they would never make it into my folder. This seems to be working as the kids know exactly what they need to do for the day and can get on with it on their own, they just ask for help when they need it. I've also implemented a new rule. As they aren't allowed on the xbox until after 1:30pm the first one finished their school work is the first one to have a turn on the xbox. After implementing this rule Daniel, my most reluctant student, started getting up in the morning, before me, and getting his work done before breakfast.

Christian is going to turn 5 this Christmas and he still doesn't know his number, letters or colours. I'm not too worried as he's not getting any further behind and doesn't seem to be showing most of those Aspergers type signs that we worried about when he was a lot younger. I think he may just stay about 18 months behind. Tim and I were talking about that and we wondered what the difference would be. When Josiah was 15 he acted like a 13 year old and we never worried about that. But we do need to focus on some things so I've signed up for an online reading program called Reading Eggs. He loves it and asks to do it every day and now he's starting to point out the familiar letters in everything. I've bought some 'educational' placemats from Aldi to help reinforce what he's learning. I'm also putting together an intense, hands on, program for teaching him his colours, which I'll post when I get it finished. Most children pick these things up through the course of their everyday lives but with Christian we really need to spend time helping him to 'get' it.

I've also made new job charts for floors and the kitchen. Josiah has changed some of his classes at TAFE and so some of our previous jobs weren't applicable to him. I've changed the charts to accommodate his days home and to make it fair on all of the children, I like them to have roughly the same amount of jobs each, but try to make the jobs suited to their ability. They can't have morning tea or lunch until their morning jobs are done and can't play the xbox until their floor jobs and lunch jobs are done. Elijah gets a special reward for vacuuming the tiles after dinner without us reminding him but I've had to tell him that it needs to be started within 1/2 an hour after dinner or I will remind him because he was leaving it until almost bed time. Emily is already crawling so we need to stay on top of the floors.

We were having a 'student of the week' award but that wasn't really working. Daniel never deserved it and I felt sorry for him and he felt like it wasn't an achievable goal. Other times it was too hard to pick between Kahlia and Elijah. They also didn't really take it seriously and still cruised along so quite often we couldn't honestly give it to anyone. So I've change that to the 'over and above' award. Whoever does over and above the set work I've given them for the week gets a special reward, normally a chocolate bar, if they just do the set work they get a smaller reward but they all get rewarded. This seems to be working well. They are all motivated and feel that it's achievable. As I said earlier Daniel has been getting up before me to get his work done, he's also been doing more of the work than I've been setting for him.

Daniel has still been talking about going to school. I really don't think it'll be good for him. He has a coloured view of school because the only year he went was Prep and they don't do much except play and learn the basics. He mainly wants to go because he wants friends, while there's nothing wrong with the homeschoolers we meet up with we haven't met any boys his age, or that he can relate to. We've signed up for an XBox Live gold membership and he's having a lot of fun talking to the kids he's playing with online so I'm hoping that that fills his need for friends for the time being. We're also starting to get a bit more involved in the local homeschooling community. I'll be setting up a get together at a local play place in the next week, if we're all well that is.